Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 12/11/25: Trump Seizes Venezuela Tanker, Trump Voter Rebellion Over Failures

Episode Date: December 11, 2025

Krystal and Saagar discuss Trump seizes Venezuela oil tanker, Trump voter says he failed her. Juan David Rojas: https://www.compactmag.com/article/how-the-gop-lost-miami/   To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show AD FREE, uncut and 1 hour early visit: www.breakingpoints.comMerch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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from the Stuff You Should Know podcast and it's that time of year again when we knuckle down to do our annual holiday episodes. We collected our best past classic holiday episodes and compiled them into a 12 Days of Christmas toys playlist that the whole family can enjoy. That's right, maybe you missed it the first time we detailed the history of Beanie Babies, Monopoly,

or Yo-Yo's, and a whole lot more. So listen to the 12 Days of Christmas Toys playlist, list on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, guys, Saga and Crystal here. Independent Media just played a truly massive role in this election, and we are so excited about what that means for the future of this show. This is the only place where you can find honest perspectives from the left and the right that simply does not exist anywhere else.

So if that is something that's important to you, please go to breakingpoints.com, become a member today, and you'll get access to our full shows, unedited, ad-free, and all put together for you every morning in your inbox. We need your help to build the future of independent news media, and we hope to see you at breakingpoints.com. Good morning, everybody. Happy Thursday, right, Thursday. Yeah. We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do we have, Crystal? Indeed, we do. That's how that goes. We seized a Venezuelan oil tanker, and Trump is promising more to come. So, a lot to dig into there. Also, we got the announcement from the Fed. they are cutting rates a quarter of a point amidst other economic fallout.

We also have Republicans in complete disarray on health care, a very messy situation and some interesting bullet points that they released about some of the various ideas that they are considering amidst a bit of a like, I guess, moderate or centrist Republican revolt over a desire to extend those ACA subsidies. Sam Altman is apparently using chat GPT to raise his baby. That doesn't seem like a great idea to me. That's some other AI news as well. The Washington Post is launching a new AI podcast feature. So the future is here, guys, whether we like it or not.

New details have emerged about Jeffrey Epstein's relationship with Les Wexner and with Israel as well. This is more great reporting from DropSite from Ryan and Maas over there. And we've got a political sea change in Miami. Juan David Rojas is going to join us to talk about that. That one is really interesting to me. I'm talking about the Miami mayor's race because Miami has become such a sort of like epicenter of right-wing tech and even the podcast world. It was really emblematic of this right-wing shift, especially among Latinos. And so you now have a Democratic flip by quite a considerable

margin. So I'm really interested to hear from Juan about what this all means. Yeah, me, especially in the context of Venezuela and everything else that's going on. Yeah, I mean, he's very insightful. First Miami, a Democratic governor, or governor, mayor of Miami in 30 years. It's pretty astounding, really. And he lives there, so he'll break all up that down for us. Thank you to everybody who has been subscribing, breaking points.com for our premium members. We have some exciting holiday content that all of us are filming right now. I believe I have previewed this, but this week officially will be filming and it will be released over the holidays. First for our premium subscribers, I will be doing with Griffin a review, a full review, professional review of Reefer Madness,

how it holds up nearly 100 years later, perhaps one of the most influential films of the 20th century. So excited to do that. Crystal, you've got an interview line there. Yeah, we also have some non-weed content. Yeah, it's not just... We've got that. That'll be... I'm looking forward to that.

I actually recorded an interview yesterday with the author of a book called Gilded Rage. Elon Musk and the Radicalization of Silicon Valley. I think that's the full title. And obviously, what could be more pertinent to the moment that we're living through right now, both in terms of how we got here and where we may be going. So that was really good.

Emily and Ryan interviewed each other. This is my personal favorite. Yeah, which I'm definitely excited, like digging into their backgrounds. I don't know. I haven't watched them yet, but I think pushing them on different issues and really trying to get to the core of their political ideology. They did. That should be really fun to it. Confrontational interviews of each other. Yeah. Separately. It's exciting. It's exciting. Definitely. And they also, a little update, dominated the big tech debate. Oh, yes. Their debate. The reason big tech debate. Overwhelming victory, even on the libertarians home turf. Right. For the side, that big tech is, in fact, net bad. I don't know.

I have the vote on the other side at this point. The vote margin was 51.3% does more harm, 38% does more good, and undecided, undecided, 10.7%. That's so weird. Sorry. How you go to debate like that and not pick a side? You're a loser, all right, I'll say it. We're just going to put those in Emily and Ryan's. Yeah, exactly, 100%.

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This message is intended for audiences 21 and older. Gentleman's Cut Bourbon, Boone County, Kentucky. For more on Gentleman's Cut Bourbon, please visit gentleman's cut bourbon.com. Please enjoy responsibly. What up, y'all? It's your boy, Kevin on stage. I want to tell you about my new podcast called Not My Best Moment,

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Check out Not My Best Moment with me, Kevin on stage, on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcast, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcast. All right, let's go ahead and start with Venezuela, as Crystal said, huge, huge ramping up of action from the Trump administration. all of this in context, because when I lay it out in context, you're going to see this not as a single one-off, but as Trump said, one of many things in a regime change operation that could potentially be very, very soon to come. So first, let's go ahead and start with this. This is video released by the United States Attorney General Pam Bondi. What you guys are all seeing in front

of you is a sanctioned oil tanker, which was bound for Cuba from Venezuela. This is an unflagged, uninsured tanker. It has kind of operated in the midst of Russian oil sanctions and others been previously sanctioned by the United States of America regarding the IRGC and Hezbollah. But to be very, very clear, this has no connection whatsoever to those regimes. This is a oil tanker bound from Venezuela to Cuba operating under the so-called U.S. sanctions regime. You're all watching their armed United States Marines and U.S. Coast Guard board this oil tanker and seize it. It remains unclear actually today what will happen to, said oil tanker. President Trump saying that we will potentially actually keep the oil. All of this is part of a concerted

effort to cut the Maduro regime off from any of its oil revenues and to continue the sanctions pressure. It is the first oil tanker seized by the United States in 11 years since 2014, just to show you how extraordinary that is. And that was in the Middle East. I had no connection whatsoever to Venezuela, just to contextualize again how crazy it is to actually do something like this. And this was supported these operations by United States aircraft carrier. So even though they're framing this as a Coast Guard mission, this is the United States military, United States Marines were on board and were part of the boarding party. And all of this is being supported, supplanted there as part of regime change. Here was President Trump's immediate comments about the

news. Let's take a listen. Well, thank you very much. It's been an interesting day from the standpoint of news. As you probably know, we've just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela, a large tanker, very large. Largest one ever seized, actually. And other things are happening. Have you considered talking to the president of Colombia that you called Adropir? No, I haven't already thought too much about him. He's been fairly hostile to the United States and I haven't given him a lot of thought he's he's going to have himself some big problems if he doesn't wise up Colombia is producing a lot of drugs they have cocaine factories that they make cocaine as you know and they sell it right into

the United States so he better wise up or he'll be next he'll be next too and I hope he's listening he's going to be next yes mr president because we don't like people when they kill people. They sell drugs. They kill them in the United States. And Colombia is a major manufacturer of drugs, meaning cocaine in particular. So that was also a threat to President Petro over at Columbia. Now, again, I just want to contextualize much of this in what's happening. Let's put A6, please, up on the screen of the Wall Street Journal, Rupert Murdoch, Wall Street Journal with a harrowing account here of Maria Machado, the Nobel laureate recipient. Yeah. opposition leader of Venezuela who traveled covertly to Oslo.

Now, let me tell you all about her harrowing escape there from Venezuela where she wore a wig, went through 10 police checkpoints, boarded a boat, here's where it gets interesting, called the United States of America to inform them that she would be on said little boat headed to Curacao. Why did she do that? Number one, she was provided U.S. military escort. Two fighter jets actually came closer to Venezuelan airspace than ever before to make sure that the Venezuelans didn't do anything. Two, they wanted to make sure her boat was not blown out of the water and mistaken for a drug trafficker, just so we're all very clear. And three, I don't think the timing is an accident of her leaving the country being escorted out of the country and then this incredibly dramatic escalation. And I know we're all used to the U.S. doing whatever the hell we want, to whoever the hell we want, to whoever the hell we want.

around the world. But I do want you to imagine that someone did this to us, seized one of our tankers, one of our flag ships, and, you know, in this brazen act, we would consider that an act of war. And certainly the Venezuelans also will consider this an act of war. In fact, the president Maduro, of course, came out and called this barefaced robbery in an act of international piracy. And of course, we can all recall that we launch an entire like multi-state war against the Houthis because of their actions in support of Palestinians and trying to, you know, trying to end the genocide in Gaza where they were blocking certain ships in waterways. So I think it's important to keep in mind what a truly extraordinary action this is. And also, as Saga was

saying, this is not a one-off. We know there is a huge push within the Trump regime for this regime change operation. We know that plans have been greenlit for regime change operations, whether it's direct invasion, whether it's regime destabilization through deep state actors. We know that is all going on. And so when Trump comes out and says, hey, this is the first thing that you're finding out, but there are more things that are happening that you're going to learn about. We all have to take that incredibly seriously. Right. So the Maria Machado thing is important for a couple of reasons. Number one is that they didn't want retaliation on Maria Machado, the opposition leaders, truly the anointed one from the United States. I mean, don't forget,

Ryan and I reported I had those, my exclusive documents. This was a, oh, what was it, a month or so ago, I'll just read from the report I did for Dropside, quote, mountains of money sent to Venezuela in opposition groups, 213 million in the last five years. The documents note that the U.S. spent 18 million alone in 2024, just on Maria Machado's recent global travel, who, of course, this is the thing about Maria Machado. And look, I'm not going to just say she's only a puppet of the United States. She is certainly one, but that's not her only thing. Like, what the Venezuelans have told me is it would be ridiculous to deny that she doesn't have some domestic, you know, actual support in the country. I'm not even going to sit here and say, Nicholas Maduro is wildly

popular or stolen election or whatever. I'm, like, she clearly has a constituency. But what has happened is that prior to Donald Trump's election and since she has worked hand in glove with Donald Trump and with Marco Rubio to orchestrate this entire thing. So, for example, what she has done is she is actually the one who put it in the heads of the Trump administration, Rubio, that this whole drug trafficking thing was real. She actually bolstered those claims and has since, it's actually facing a lot of pushback inside of Venezuela because they're like, hey, you are supporting this Maduro narco trafficking thing, which is leading to the murder of many of our country.

So it's actually diminished some of her support. The reason she left the country to Curacao and is now in Oslo, she claims she's going to come back. Now, here's the thing is, does it not seem like the perfect set of circumstances? Seizing an oil tanker. We've got these B-52s on the coast. You've got the aircraft carrier. You've got the whole U.S. military thing. And then you happen to have the chosen recipient of hundreds of millions of dollars from the United States over the last five or so years, who is now finally out of the country.

Can you not think? I mean, look, it doesn't take a genius to put the pieces together here. Part of this is also we're finally abandoning the pretense of drug trafficking. Like now at least we don't have to debate fentanyl. Although I'm sure they'll come up with some, you know, BS justifiable. Like actually, there was fentanyl in the fuel or something like that. This is 100% ideological. This was a Venezuelan oil tanker bound for Cuba. It's like a Miami neocon wet dream, depriving the Cubans, depriving the Venezuelans.

Now, you could say, well, they're under sanction. Yeah, there's a lot of countries under sanction. Russia's under sanction. You see us going around with United States Marines boarding Russian oil tankers, although I'm sure Lindsey Graham wants us to, which he tweeted this morning. He said, I applaud President Trump's boarding. Now we should do it to Russia, right? This is the logical.

And that shows you, it shows you. Like the level of insanity of what this looks like. And that's what I want to hammer home for everyone is they're trying to claim as this is some routine. It is not routine. Again, the last time the United States boarded an oil tanker was 2014. It was about some Libyan rebels and was involved the United States Navy SEALs. That's the last time. I also want to say that when, you know, the Houthis or others board a other.

Then they're like, this is a flagrant act of war. that violates international law. The law, by the way, oil futures went up, so if you're a surprise about that. And I also just want to sit with the sheer stupidity and ridiculousness of all of this. Because at this very moment,

the United States is buying oil from Nicholas Maduro via Chevron. In fact, oil analysts were like, yeah, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to board a Venezuelan Cuban oil tanker when Chevron has a special license from the Trump administration to continue to buy.

oil. And there's all this talk right now about the Monroe Doctrine. Now, again, this is infuriating because I tweeted this morning, the vast majority of these Trump people who are like the Monroe doctrine, you learned about it in AP US history at age 16. You don't know anything about the Monroe Doctrine. What does a Monroe Doctrine actually say? It says the United States should be the sole and or guarantor of the region of the Western Hemisphere. What it was designed to say is to keep the European great powers out of the Western Hemisphere. Now, what is consistent actually with the Monroe Doctrine, overthrowing a regime purely for ideological reasons or ensuring the, quote, security of your region in the Western Hemisphere, so-called

U.S. neighbors, not just through tranquility, peace or whatever, but through making sure that things are beneficial, let's say, to the United States. Nicholas Maduro, and let's say we're talking about oil and gold and minerals. Nicholas Maduro has offered the United States gold, minerals, and access to his country. He is happy to do business as long as he gets to remain the figurehead. Why not take him up on it? Yeah. What's such a big deal about that? Right. And, you know, I mean, same thing here with Cuba. What, I as an American, can't sleep until casinos are back in Cuba. I mean, I'm sorry, I don't care who rules Cuba. It's been 60 years. Not my problem. Maybe it is, you know, the grandfathers or whatever, down in Miami-Dade.

Not mine, and definitely not the rest of the people left in the U.S. If you look also at the reasoning, because everything is about resources, he is offering the resources. Like, what are the things through a Trump-America first lens that we would want from Maduro? We don't want you to do as much business with Russia and China. Maduro goes, I don't care about Russia and China, man. This is out of convenience. They're willing to buy my oil. If you buy it, I'll sell it to you.

No problem, I won't sell it to them anymore. He said that. Trump himself said, quote, he offered everything. And then migrants. Okay, Maduro today, today is still accepting United States migrant deportation flights. He is open to accepting said deportation flights. People blame him for the migrant crisis. To be honest, and I am not one of those people who blames problems on America,

the Biden administration and the Trump administration kept extraordinary sanctions. And as I reported with Ryan, we spent a hell of a shitload of money encouraging a lot of these Venezuelan migrants to come to Colombia and to come here. We wanted them to leave because we wanted to destroy the country and point it or paint it as some destroyed political project. We can't just say in a vacuum. Now, look, many of those people did leave because, you know, they were fleeing, whatever. And I'm not going to say that that is a hundred, like all, that Maduro bears no responsibility. But it's complicated. We want a stable Venezuela. Who governs it? I don't care. Especially if we get oil, gold, and it'll take his migrants. I mean, come on. What are we doing here? Well, our actions dramatically undermine regional stability, dramatically undermine regional security. And if you want to know why Venezuela or any other nation would, you know, turn and be interested in relationships with China and Russia, I mean, our actions are aggressively pushing them into the arms of the people that, you know, people here in D.C. see as our adversaries.

So it's counterproductive all the way around. I mean, the Cuba, like, the Cuba is the perfect example of this. How many years have we had sanctions there? It hasn't worked. It's emiserated the people. It has pushed people out of Cuba and created refugee crises there. It is that, I mean, Cuba's in a horrible condition right now, may actually be on the verge of for real collapse. But that's what we're talking about here.

I mean, they're so delusional. It's a we literally never learn. People in this, in D.C. just never learn from the mistakes of the past. They still have in their head, like, oh, we've got a 50-day plan. and we know what to do, and it's going to go so easily, and it's going to be mission accomplished, and then we'll be able to just take whatever oil and whatever resources we want.

Completely egotistical, narcissistic, and utterly delusional and devoid of learning any of the lessons of the past. You know, it's funny because you were saying that all these people want to portray the seizing of the oil tankers, oh, this is just like some normal shit, no big deal, whatever. The person who actually didn't frame it that way was Trump. He was like, this is the biggest we've ever done.

I mean, he wanted to brag about it, be like, this is an extraordinary action that we're taking. And you know what? He's right. He's right. And so you've got, let's go ahead and play CNN. This is A4, talking about how how absolutely normal this action is and nothing to see here. And this is what is so, where we truly have a democracy problem in this country is when it comes to foreign policy. Because the American people do not want this. Do not see it as normal. Do not see it as a priority. Want this administration and other politician to be focused on, you know, how they can afford health care, how they can afford groceries, how they can afford housing. And instead, here we are bombing random people in the

Caribbean, seizing a drug boat and preparing for yet another regime change war. This is a four. Let's play it. I'm seizing a tanker. How could this escalate the conflict with Venezuela? Well, you know, we've had sanctions on Venezuelan oil for since the first Trump administration. And Biden kept them. Kept them. Yeah. So to me, this is absolutely normal. I mean, seizing an oil tanker? Yeah, yeah. We've been seizing Iranian oil tankers in the past. We also, according to the law that I've read, we can, that oil is up for forfeiture. So we could keep that. We've kept Iranian oil in the past. So I actually think that this is less controversial in terms of law and sanctions and what has been, you know, disputed or not disputed. Like, I think this is actually

a pretty, you know, check-the-box case. Now, you know, what will this mean in terms of escalation? You know, what is he going to do? What is Maduro going to do? Is he going to step aside because we're sanctioning this oil? I mean, you know, we pick up this oil tanker. It's one oil tanker. Probably not. And this is the thinking in D.C. I mean, in a way, it's a very useful segment. because this is actually the bipartisan thinking in D.C. Don't take it from me. Take a listen to Chuck Schumer talking about, you know, he's being asked about Venezuela and regime change,

and he refuses to object straightforwardly. He's got, oh, Trump doesn't have a plan and it's going to be incompetent the regime change operation. That's his beef with it. Let's take a listen to A3. Do you disagree with President Trump's ultimate goal of regime change in Venezuela? Look, the bottom line is,

President Trump throws out so many different things in so many different ways. You don't even know what the heck he's talking about. You know, obviously, if Maduro would just flee on his own, everyone would like that. But we don't know what the heck he's up to when he talks about that. So it's very, very, you cannot say, I endorse this, I endorse that, when Trump is all over the lot, not very specific and very worrisome at how far he might escalate. Yes, actually, you can say, I endorse this or I endorse that. it is not hard to say, I do not support a regime change war in Venezuela, but the truth is Schumer

and other Democratic leaders as well. They are on board with this. I mean, they were all behind the whole Juan Guaido attempted coup scheme as well. And Biden, this is why I can't, we can't, this is a bipartisan story. And any honest telling of it ignores that, right? Is that Donald Trump, yes, the Juan Guido situation supported by Marco Rubio, but also by the Democrats. Don't forget, he was at the State of the Union. They all stood up for him. Nancy Pelosi, I covered that with you. And I remember saying, I go, man, anytime you see two people standing up at the state of the union, if it has nothing to do with like a veteran or a gold star widow, it's like, we're in trouble. Like, we're in trouble. Anytime people on both sides of the aisle are all standing up to

cheer something. That's what happened. Chuck Schumer, all these people, they buy the fundamental premise of regime change in Venezuela. And just to again sit with this, this is an action, genuinely extraordinary. She talked about Iran. She's totally wrong. What I have, you know, I did my research in terms of the oil tankers. Here's how it usually goes. We issue a threat. We say you need to transfer the cargo. The United States Justice Department

is going to seize this based on XYZ sanctioned endorsed by the United States Congress. We do not, like as I said, 2014, last time we've physically boarded a vessel. She said we do this to Iranian oil tankers all the time. Completely false. Now, do we run up on them and say, hey, you need to surrender and all that?

Yes, but by force like this, no, no, no. Like this is seriously. We're pulling down from a helicopter. I mean, this is serious. shit. And beyond that, the United States Congress has never once declared, never once war on Venezuela, has not endorsed regime change on Venezuela. And, you know, at this point, I would say, you know, I'd be like, okay, now I think it's a horrible idea. But if you're going to do this, you need to go to Congress. And they all, I want their asses on the line. I want everybody to

vote for it. So if this shit ever backfires, I want to hold you accountable. But they don't want to do that. They want to hold, you know, behind the cameras in D.C. and Chuck Schumer can sit there and say Donald Trump doesn't know what he's doing, but, you know, at the end of the day, he's doing it incompetently, but I still kind of support it. Yeah, well, I can't really endorse or un-induced. Yes, actually, you can. You can. Like, it's not all dependent on Donald Trump. You could have your own view of things. But the truth is he does, and he, like, low-key or high-key, supports it. I want to give a shout-out to Roe gave excellent comments on the floor yesterday. Chris Van Hollen gave excellent comments on the floor yesterday. So there have been

some really powerful but potentially minority voices from the Democrats on this. But in terms of the leadership, you know, they are very reluctant. And it's, it's, I don't even understand it because it's not like Democrats win in Florida anymore. You know what I mean? Like Florida's not a swing state anymore. You don't have to do this shit anymore. Like, you could just oppose this and join with the, where the American people are and say, no, we don't want a war for oil. We don't want a war for these South Florida neocons. We are not. not on board with this whatsoever. You could just do that, even if you're just reading the cynical political calculus, but even that is beyond them because they are so ideologically committed to

these global regime change operations. Yeah, and considering, you know, what else is going on, I do at least want to highlight there are rumblings in Congress. And some of this was sent to me by Eric Spurling. He's over at Just Foreign Policy. This is pointing out that even a guy like Ryan Zinke, he was a Trump cabinet official. He's one of the most hawkish members of Congress. Even he is going on CNN, and he's like, look, we may need to pump the brakes here. They don't have unlimited powers to launch war in Venezuela. A8, please. Let's put it up on the screen. The president has powers, has powers, but he doesn't have unlimited powers. When it comes to using force against him, the country of action is that this is why we have

Article 1 and Article 2. He has to present a case to the Congress. Congress is the only body that it can clear war. Should the U.S. go to a land war in Venezuela for this? Venezuela. I'm an advocate of the Monroe Doctrine. You can't have a drug-dealing country like Venezuela in the soft underbelly of the United States, which is the Caribbean. You can't have a country that's running narco-terrorists and drug boats by air, sea, and land, constantly running against U.S. policy and the policy of being a safe, secure Caribbean. Is that a yes? I would say I would leave that up to Congress. See, I would leave it up to Congress.

Also, yeah, again, Monroe. Oh, Monroe Doctrine. It's like Munich, you know, whenever we have to talk about it. You don't know anything about the Monroe Doctrine. You literally don't know. And it was designed, as I said, in the 1800s to keep the European powers out of Latin America and the Western Hemisphere. Then, and probably you don't even fucking know this, there's something called the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, which says the United States has a right to intervene in Latin America,

also designed at the time of European monarchies to say that if Germany, for example, was going to intervene or invade Brazil, I think it was Argentino, it was one of those countries at the time, that no, the United States instead has a right to do so. None of this has to do with an ideological war, again, inspired by emigres, mostly rich emigres, let's be honest, of the Venezuelan and Cuban emigre population

to Florida, who now literally are occupying, our government. Who will never let the Cold War die? It's not just Cold War. It's like they're, again, like, who rules Venezuela is not our problem, period, especially if they're going to give us oil and they'll accept them. I mean, what else could you want? Why do I care? Oh, we stole an election. You know how many people still in elections around the world? How many dictators? We just received the Saudi monarchy, right? Literally. A literal al-Qaeda terrorist.

The president of Syria and where, oh, we're dropping the sanctions on them. And, Crystal, he sees his country by military force, right? Oh, those spooky and bad, right, though. I mean, this is what I'm saying. It's preposterous. We deal with bad people all over the world. Not to mention that our sanctions and our program against Maduro and also against the Cubans, like, it's part of what helps prop up these regimes.

Because Maduro can blame all of the problems of that. Venezuela on us, even when some of them are his doing. I mean, I think it also contributes to the authoritarian bent because you're under so much pressure and have so much pressure coming externally. It makes you, you know, terror, it makes you want to and need to rule with an iron fist. This is not an excuse or anything like that. But it's just to explain how incredibly stupid, counterproductive, damaging our foreign policy has been and our sanction policy has been, especially with regard to these countries. So, yeah, so, I mean, here we are.

Saga, what's your estimation of, like, are we, is this, this is just happening? Is that where we are? The decision has been made because it seems like there's been waffling in the past number of weeks. They continue to believe that Maduro will just step down. Like, that's really what this is about, is this is about a military pressure campaign. There is one saving grace to this, which is that they are still terrified of the U.S. boots on the ground. Now, I'm not saying that can't happen. because here's, I mean, look, if the United States oil tanker, I mean,

freaking Captain Phillips, who was like a merchant marine captain, who was seized by Somali pirates, we sent three U.S. warships, dropped 100 Navy seals, and sniped three of them in the head in the little of moving waters just to protect the primacy of the American flag on the high seas. It's an act of war, right? I mean, that's why we treat it the way that it is. This is one of the, I mean, literally the point of the United States Navy is to guarantee the seas, you know, for commerce, for the United States. This is something we would never tolerate. We would absolutely go to war over something like,

and frankly, we should. We should, okay? And so my point is, but yeah, but even the Houthis never fired on a U.S. ship. That's right. That was all on behalf of Israel. That's what I'm trying to say. It's like if this was actually a United States oil tanker

and another country, oh my God. Even I would tell you, I'd be like blow their asses out of them. We said they were terrorists for what they were doing. And it wasn't even to us. It was to Israel, right? Or to a British ship or, you know, whatever, like some other U.S. ally ship, which, again, I don't know why that's my problem. Last time I checked the British Navy's, their pride and joy, let them deal with it. But, you know, we could step back.

The point remains solely that they are still afraid of actually putting troops on the ground. But how quickly could all this all spiral out of control? What if one of those guys fired at a U.S. what if a U.S. Marine, God forbid, was killed in this action? Can you imagine that? And then the bloodlust here in this country? And this is why, this is just like Iraq. It was an ideological project from the beginning. WMD was a pretext.

That's why I've been screaming so much about fentanyl. It's bullshit. It's completely bullshit. It's literally fake, fake. And faker than WMD, to be honest. You know, they had much more of a case that time around. John Stewart did a good job of breaking all that down. But it's like the fentanyl thing, you know, created this thing where the narco-terrorist is now in the lexicon.

And now that's all over Fox News. and the brain-dead maga people, they believe it. And now the oil, they're like, well, just like overthrowing Saddam, it's like, well, it was about WMD, but that's why we need to replace him and debath... Like, it's all part of the next logical conclusion. This has all been part of regime change from the beginning. Now, the final thing is we should be at least assured

they are still afraid of a Libya-style situation. They want Maduro to just hand power over. But let me just even say that. Is even, you know, look at Libya. let's say even militarily, we don't strike Venezuelan land, and Maduro just goes. You think, like, he's, the Chavez people have been in power now for like 20-some years. Just because he goes, what, you think that the people of a monopoly on the use of force are just going to be like, here, Maria Machado, here's my rifle. Right?

No, that's not how it works. Or that the people of Venezuela are just going to accept, like, oh, yes, thank you for our U.S. puppet regime. We accept this and are happy about it. Yeah, I mean, probably not. Okay, maybe some, but maybe not other. Like, what is the history of that tell? What Iraq, Saddam was a bad guy, okay? He killed hundreds of thousands of his own people,

literally gassed women and children. Well, guess what? After he left, it was way worse. And you have to just be honest about that. Yeah. That's maybe what happens in Venezuela. And created new terrorist and new hatred and security threats to the U.S. I mean, look, you got Venezuela, which they claim is a drug capital.

And it's like, oh, let's just plunge the country into civil war. I'm sure that won't be to the benefit of the gorillas, right? Oh, civil war in Latin America's never been exploited by drug traffickers. Oh, Colombia. Oh, right. You know, read a fucking book. I mean, this is where, you don't even have to read. You could watch clear in present danger, like, you know, some movie from 1990. This is, this was long held as some sort of wisdom, wisdom post-1980s, 1960s to 1980s, like direct meddling in Latin America, which did not work out to the benefit of U.S. interests. Almost everyone in hindsight is like, yeah, man, that was crazy. Right, the Sandinistas. I mean, even going back to the whole

Banana Republic stuff. Like, most people look at that as a pretty shameful part of U.S. history, which, again, beyond that, like, did it work out to U.S. like, no, it certainly didn't. And that's why putting this all full circle, the press, I mean, that absolutely normal clip, that should live in infamy for real. It really should. You can't say that. Like, it's not true. And people just don't have the requisite knowledge base or they don't either read or they're not skeptical of the government's claims.

And we have a bipartisan wish for expelling Madur. Again, why? Because he's stolen election. Maybe. I mean, can anybody even prove? Maybe he did. Maybe. And by the way, even if he did, who cares?

He's very same people. He's willing to leave, too, by the way. Yeah. Just not on the same timeline. Yes, he wants to do it on his term. I mean, to your point about, like, you don't even have to have read a book, you just have to have, like, existed in the United States for the past number of decades. This reminds me of why I am fundamentally a populace, because look at where the elites are and the insane shit they talk themselves into and think they're so much smarter than the population. And then look at the polls.

And in spite of all the, like, frankly, half-assed propaganda efforts, you have a majority of Americans who are like, no, not on board with this random, like, alleged drug boat, murder. not on board with Venezuela regime change. We don't want any of this. What are you doing? So it only takes some sort of like lived experience, frankly, and basic common sense to understand what a terrible direction this is. And yet you have so much bipartisan elite support, including on networks like CNN, including from Chuck Schumer and, of course, from the Trump regime and the, you know,

the Miami occupied government, as you put it, that, you know, we're in spite of the public being adamantly opposed to this and wanting their politicians to refocus on domestic issues and actually deliver and make their lives better. Instead, we're doing this bullshit. Yes. And again, unfortunately, it's not receiving nearly the amount of attention it deserves. They are counting on everyone to just look the other way. Oh, it's just another Trump thing and then it'll explode out on this. I mean, you know, if we think back to Libya, you were, were you on MSNBC at the time? What was it like? Like, was it really the headline every day? Because from what I remember, Gaddafi was gone.

And then after that, when did people start to pay attention? Chris Stevens, you know, after Benghazi. But there was a nine-month period where shit was going bad. And that was more, I mean, certainly MSNBC was covering that. But that was more a partisan, like, on Fox News they were on it all, you know, every day. But my point is just like most, we don't remember. Like, even in the midst of a lot of, even Iraq, I lived through Iraq. That's when I really became cognizant of the news.

You know, for a while there, after 03, you didn't pay. much attention. There were years that went by where there was very little news covered. Yeah, there was nothing. I mean, I remember ISIS, for example, right? The Caesar of Mosul. Nobody in America had thought about Iraq for three years. We left in 2011 and then we just woke up three years later and they took over the city. If you were paying attention, you know, maybe you would have learned. But like, that's my biggest fear with Venezuela is we'll just do something. They'll declare victory and then nine to ten months. That's how this stuff, you know, nothing happens like this. right? Like it's a slow burn, but the results are very predictable. So I don't know. I wish I could say

call your congressman. But you know, the truth is, they probably support it. Well, I will say, I will say that remember there was, they were pretty close to some sort of a resolution. And then the White House basically lied to them and were like, oh, we're not going to do anything. This isn't necessary. You don't have to pass this. And then they backed away from it. So there is at least some support for, you know, war powers resolution, some sort of a check on this administration. But, you know, I would bet on the side of cowardice, they don't want to be on the record. No. Especially the Republicans. Even the ones, even the ones, exactly, even the ones who are leery of the action, they would rather just be able to, like, blame Trump if it goes

wrong and not have their name on a yes or a no vote, up or down vote. So, you know, I think, look, I, I am really, really pessimistic because the other piece is by painting this like, oh, Monroe Doctrine and narco-terrorist, and as Jesse Waters said, you know, America is literally in the name of South and Central America. Wait, what? Did he say that? Yes. So, of course, it's America first.

He literally said that. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I mean, you don't have the same level of dissident voices on the right that you had in the buildup to the Iran strikes, for example, or people with access and power and influence and sway who are in the White House trying to make an opposite case or on the airwaves trying to make an opposite case. And, you know, I mean, the Trump administration doesn't give a shit of what lefties like me

have to say or any other Democrat for that matter. And so the fact that you don't have really any competing pressure saying, no, we shouldn't do this to me is why we're in a very- Yeah, they don't care about me either. The only person who maybe, I wouldn't say he could have stopped it, but he would have been influential on this is Charlie Kirk, but, you know. But I mean, you know, I mean, I don't know if he would have opposed it because so many Mag voices are on board with it, you know? I mean, who can speak for the day?

Is he? Yes, he is. On Venezuela? Yes. Wow. Okay. Yeah. No, it's bad. Okay. Wow. Just wow. Being a parent is basically a juggling act. Dinner, hockey practice, homework, a last minute science project, and someone's always, always shouting for you from another room.

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It's your boy, Kevin on stage. I want to tell you about my new podcast called Not My Best Moment, where I talk to artists, athletes, entertainers, creators, friends, people I admire who had massive success about, their massive failures. What did they mess up on? What is their heartbreak? And what did they learn from it? I got judged horribly. The judges were like, you're trash. I don't know how you got on the show. Boo. Somebody had tomatoes. I'm kidding. But if they had tomatoes, they would have thrown the tomatoes. Let's be honest. We've all had those moments we'd rather forget. We bumped our head. We

made a mistake. The deal fell through. We're embarrassed. We failed. But this podcast is about that and how we made it through. So when they sat me down, they were kind of like, we got into the small talk, and they were just like, so what do you got? What? What? What ideas? And I was like, oh, no. What? Check out Not My Best Moment with me, Kevin on stage on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcast, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcast. All right, let's get the Econ.

So speaking of those things that Americans would actually like us to be doing rather than a new regime change wars, Trump was, gave a big speech this week. trying to tout his economic results and also giving us some advice about how to navigate the current economic waters. Let's take a listen. Our economy is unbelievable. There's never been anything.

But the Democrats go out. Prices are too high. Yeah, they're too high. Because they cause them to be too high. But now they're coming down. One of the most important ways we're defeating inflation is by unleashing American energy,

including oil, gas, and clean, beautiful, call right here in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. They gave you the highest inflation in history, and we're giving you, we're bringing those prices down rapidly, lower prices, bigger paychecks. You're getting lower prices, bigger paychecks. We're getting inflation. We're crushing it.

And you're getting much higher wages. I mean, the only thing that it's really going up big, it's called the stock market and your 401Ks. You can give up certain products. You can give up pencils. Because under the China policy, you know, every child can get 37 pencils. They only need one or two, you know. They don't need that many.

But you always need, you always need steel. You don't need 37 dolls for your daughter. Two or three is nice, but you don't need 37 dolls. Throw back to some of the Liberation Day rhetoric about like, ah, your kids don't need that many dolls. You don't need that many pencils. I think he's used both of those examples before. I also love that, of course, the prices are high, he says.

But then in that previous interview with Dasha Burns, he was saying, oh, the economy's A-plus, plus, plus, plus. Also, as a father of just not even one-year-old girl, they do need a lot of dolls. Each doll is a very specific purpose, okay? In terms of when specifically, and what mouth feel the infant is looking for. So sorry, President Trump, we do, in fact, need lots and lots of dolls. He's the expert on parenting, I'm sure. Yeah, that's true. He has a lot of kids.

involved in raising all of those children. Other big economic news yesterday, everybody was watching this closely. The Fed announcing that they are moving forward with a quarter point rate cut. Let's take a listen to a little of that. Total PCE prices rose 2.8% over the 12 months ending in September. And excluding the volatile food and energy categories, core PCE prices also rose 2.8%. These readings are higher than earlier in the year as inflation for goods has picked. up, reflecting the effects of tariffs.

In the near term, risks to inflation are tilted to the upside, and risks to employment to the downside, a challenging situation. There is no risk-free path for policy as we navigate this tension between our employment and inflation goals. A reasonable base case is that the effects of tariffs on inflation will be relatively short-lived, a one-time shift in the price level. Our obligation is to make sure that a one-time increase in the price level does not become an ongoing inflation problem.

Accordingly, we judged it appropriate at this meeting to lower our policy rate by a quarter percentage point. So a quarter rate point cut is a very modest, you know, modest cut, less than what certainly President Trump is looking for. All expectations are Jay Powell's term expires in May. Either then or even before then, Trump will be putting in his own person. he has said explicitly that what he wants from that person is for them to cut rates aggressively. Powell seemed to be indicating hesitation and nervousness.

And I think the Fed was divided in terms of even this quarter rate cut because you've got those competing pressures he's talking about. On the one hand, you have inflation concerns continuing. That would argue against a rate cut. On the other hand, you have unemployment concerns increasing. So that would argue for a rate cut. So that's why they took this sort of middle ground, but signaling that future rate cut, are not a guarantee whatsoever. So, you know, what do you make of this move and how Trump will feel

about it? What I'll do with the economy? Well, he's already gone after the Fed chairman, but I mean, I think what it definitely shows you, first of all, for the Fed, this is part of the danger, is because they have more unreliable data that they have because of the Bureau of Labor statistics and because of the government shutdown that previously happened. But beyond that, what Trump and them are doing right now is just so Biden-esque to me. Because very recently on their affordability tour. So he went to Pennsylvania. I believe the vice president will go to Allentown, Pennsylvania very soon, is all built, from what I remember, the first Trump administration doing on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, is they would be like, well, remember I told you

that story about Paul Ryan was like, well, over a year, it should save you enough to buy a new sink from IKEA or so. I'm like, that's basically what they're doing. They're like a Costco membership. Yeah, Costco membership. Yeah, Costco membership. I love Costco. I don't want to But the point is just that they're trying to find these like little things and statistics, which even if they may be true, don't really fit with inflation and are very much Biden-esque in terms of, well, we saved this amount of jobs. People do not need to hear about whether they're doing well or not. They just don't. You can never convince somebody who is financially struggling that they're actually doing better than they are. They have to feel it. And that comes from

a vibe. It also just comes from basic like facts. And if you look at the balance sheet of the everyday American, it does not comport with what Trump is saying. Yeah. That's why I think it's such a failed strategy. I mean, beyond the, look, maybe the MAGA folks will buy it. You know, there's a lot of evidence around economic sentiment that people feel better who are Republican voters about the economy when a Republican is president and vice versa with Democrats. But I still think that much of that is beginning to erode because the economic picture of fundamentals is getting so bad. And we're about to talk about health care. I mean, it's, look, ACA premiums and all of that aside, even employer-sponsored health care, which the vast majority of Americans

have, is way too expensive. And it's bad. And most people know that. And it goes way up. Health care, education. You know, I was doing the 529 math recently for my daughter. And I was looking and using chat TPT to track education inflation. And it was, it's like, you know, I mean, I'm pretty wedded to in-state tuition because I just don't think. there's that much of a difference. But even that, when you look at it, you're like, uh, like when you're looking at 17, 20%, you're like, so I'm going to need 200 grand. This is going to outpace the S&P 500 just to send your child to a state school, like, and just track if things don't change. And I mean, would anybody take the bet that things are going to

change in higher education? No, it's the most corrupt industry in the world. So everybody can feel that. Everyone. And groceries. I mean, don't we have have some of the polling about how people are feeling? I mean, that flight vacation one really stuck out. Yeah, let's put, we can go through that. Let's put B7 up on the screen. And by the way, I don't think we pulled this, but in this affordability polling that Politico did, they found that a majority of Americans say the cost of college is not worth it. Now, if you still look at the wage premium that you achieve with a college degree, it is quite significant. It's actually growing. But that is the sentiment among the American people increasingly is like this level of debt that I have to take

on, it's not worth it for college anymore. And listen, I have a daughter who's going to college next year. So I'm looking very closely at all of these things. I said the same thing to her. I'm like, we have good in-state colleges here in Virginia. Why would we even look anywhere else when the tuition is so incredibly. This is insane for an in-state school, but it's utterly insane to go out of state. In any case, okay, here are some of the findings here.

They say that nearly half of Americans said they find groceries, utility bills, health care, transportation difficult to afford. The number one issue that people had affordability-wise was actually groceries. And I think that's because, you know, that pain point is there every single week when you're going to the grocery store and trying to figure out how you're going to feed your family. That is with you every single week. And it is so in your face and, you know, it's so in recent memory you can, you are connected to how much cheaper groceries used to be. Let's put B8 up on the screen as well. 27% say that they have skipped a medical checkup because of costs within the last two years.

So a court of American saying, you know what, I just can't go in and get a checkup. We all know what that leads to. When you delay care, then you end up in the emergency room getting the most expensive care. And it's obviously much worse for your health. So this is a little window into why we spend the most on health care and get the worst results. Let's put the next piece up on the screen. This is the one you were referring to, Saugger, 46%. So almost half of Americans in what is supposed to be, you know, this wealthy, glorious country,

say they can't pay for a vacation that involves air travel. And I couldn't help but think about Sean Duffy telling us all, we got a dress up, and the improving the flight experience starts with you. Like, just imagine how galling that is for 50% of Americans who were like, fuck you, I can't even afford. Like, I can't even conceive of going on a vacation that involves air travel. and you want me to, like, show up at the airport, you know, and you're lecturing me about how I should be dressed in this theoretical air travel that I can't even afford to partake in.

And then the last one we have here is food. Half of those surveyed said they find it difficult to pay for food. Majority 55 percent blame the Trump administration for the high price. So half of Americans saying they find it difficult just to pay for food. And people, of course, are not buying anymore that it's, you know, it's all Biden's fault, which is, you know, the two lines that Trump has are basically like, the economy's amazing. A plus, plus, plus, plus. I think he actually believes that. He does. I think he believes that because all he really looks at is a stock market. And he's like, what?

The stock market is up. And, you know, I'm doing all these deals. And all these CEOs are coming and kissing my ass and telling me how great everything is. I don't know what's wrong with you people. I think that's what he actually believes. And then when he's sort of cajoled by his aides into talking about affordability, he calls it a con job. Or if he's going to acknowledge anything like he did in that clip we showed, he'll say, well, any problems are Biden's fault, right?

People just aren't buying that anymore. And it's two things. Number one, look, you're the president, you with him the president for a year now. We're on your watch now at this point. But number two, he has been so extraordinarily active himself directly over and beyond, you know, going over the heads of Congress with his tariff policy. He has been so actively messing with the economy that, of course, that's going to land in your bucket, not to mention all of the, you know, destruction of the federal government, all of those layoffs,

which do have a significant impact on the economy. economy as well. I think, you know, the air travel, yeah, first of all, as I said, I do agree with the secretary, but have you seen his most recent gambit where he wants to put pull-up bars in airports? So you're going to be in your suit doing pull-ups? The last thing on earth you want when you're at an airport is more performative antisocial behavior. Anybody who wants to do a pull-up in an airport, you are a fucking loser, okay? 100%. Now, can I be honest with you? Oh, go ahead. I actually wished at times when I have like a long layer. There is a gym at that. No, no, that's not the same thing.

Okay, a random pull-up bar that you're doing, yeah, but like to have a gym at the airport where you can actually work out and take a shower, like, yes, I actually like that. How many people have that more along the layover? I mean, who's laying over for multiple? Unless you're flying internationally, you have never more than a two or three-hour layover. I mean, sometimes you fly international. Right, but then you're going to be international.

You're not going to be in America, so it doesn't even apply to us. You're probably going to be in Europe, on your weight somewhere else. Okay, whatever. I'm just saying there have been times where I've thought, like, I wish there was a gym here because then I could, you just feel better. after you work out and get a shower. Yes, as long as the shower is involved. But I'm not trying to, like, dress up and do some pull-up.

Who else is, that's right? But I'm saying, who's going to do that? I mean, who's actually going to shower? Have you been on an airplane? You ever been on a flight to Florida? People don't even wear deodorant. Okay, they wear those cut shirts down here with fucking flip-flops and your disgusting, smelly toes.

All right? So, yes, he's correct about the people. Did you watch the Tim Dillon bit about. No, what did he say? Oh, was hilarious. Yeah, I'll definitely check it out. Yeah. Let's bring it back.

I have very strong feelings on air travel. All of that said, you are correct, in that when you can't, look, vacation and air travel. Air travel actually is a current proxy for the current U.S. economy, because if you saw this, you would think that air travel is very cheap right now. It's actually not. It's very expensive. Part of the reason it's very expensive is because the top 10% of Americans are actually flying and vacationing more than ever.

The luxury resorts and all that are booming internationally. off of the backs of rich Americans. But the poorer America, and this is the thing about democratized air travel itself, it's supposed to exist for everyone. That's actually one of the coolest parts of the United States is almost a third of people

go on an airplane every year. And it's because of vacation to visit family. I mean, that's the purest form of democratized travel. And to the extent that we defend budget travel, that's why people are always like, oh, Spirit Airlines. And listen, I mean, I don't want to fly it

or any of that. I hate Southwest, you know, if I'm ever forced to fly it. But it's good that it exists because it exists so that someone can go visit their sister on the other side of the country. Right? And if you can't do that, you're really robbing people of a lot of experience. So 2000, Thanksgiving, the Thanksgiving was the most amount of people this year on the road since like the year 2000, right? Yeah. And 20 years or something like that. And mostly people can't afford to fly and people will afford, are afraid also of the whole government shutdown, TSA situation, I just think when you put that all together, when you have to make trade-off

choices about things that you, which, look, you know, nobody deserves to be able to go on a European vacation, for example, but somebody deserves to be able to fly to the funeral of a family relative or to visit their, at least in my opinion, in my opinion, I think that that's part of the foundation of being able to live in this great big country of ours. I also just like, I mean, I feel like there used to be a real sort of aspirational celebration of like, you know, the ability for families to take the vacation and that was understood as part of just living, you know, that you're not just surviving, you're able to live this like fulfilling life. 100% and complete life. And so, yeah, now people are just increasingly priced out of the possibility of that. Not to mention if you're actually, I mean, God forbid, you want to go to Disney World, forget about it.

You better be like, have saved for years, you know. I've done the math. It is cheaper. to go to Japan and to go to Tokyo Disney than it is. Well, the high price, like, if you want the full-fledged experience, you are, it is orders of magnitude cheaper

to go to Tokyo Disney, to fly to Tokyo and to go to Tokyo Disney than it is to go to Florida and to some grand Florida. And there's no little undiscovered cheap beach towns that everything is multimillion. Anyway, we're getting a sidetracked here. But in any case, let's go ahead and take a listen

to Kevin Hassan. who was asked by actually, interestingly, a number of hosts, but Laura Ingram was kind of pushing him in particular. And remember, she did that interview with Trump that was kind of tough as well, where she was like not really impressed with what he was selling her. And he says, well, you know, these bad numbers that are coming out, maybe the reports are wrong. Maybe the reports are off. Maybe that's the real problem here. This is B3. Take a listen. Layoffs reach 1.9 million. That's the highest since 2023. So what is that? Is that a, Is that migrants leaving the country?

Is that, you know, automation? We still have to get, like, the government data that we lost because of the shutdown. And one of the things we're seeing is that payroll surveys, where they call up firms and say, hey, do you have how many people do you have working with you, that they're showing much lower growth than household surveys where we ask people, do you have a job? And so it could be that what's going on right now is that there's a problem with the way the surveys work. And I'll be able to talk to you in a week or so when we finally get the data we need to assess that. Incredible. So blaming, oh, maybe the surveys are wrong. Maybe that's the real problem here.

She also asked him about the president's comments that the economy is a plus, plus, plus, plus, which I really think that comment, Saga is going to live in infamy because talk about being out of touch. I mean, as much as the Biden administration tried to sell the economies being better than ordinary people are feeling, no one there ever said, oh, we give ourselves a beyond perfect, a beyond perfect, gore. It's amazing. It's spectacular. And yet, that's exactly what Trump is trying to sell the American people when their experience of it is wildly, dramatically divergent from that sentiment. So let's take a listen to how Hassett handles that question. The president gave the economy an a plus, plus, plus, plus, plus, plus. But you know this, I know this. The November Fox News National Survey found that 76% of voters still view the economy negatively, and that's up from 67% who said the same thing in July. So you've

watched these trends over the years. You've seen the ups and downs. What explains that in particular? Well, first of all, don't forget that because of Joe Biden, then a typical family buying a typical home would have to spend $1,200 a month more on their mortgage. Because of Joe Biden, you know, groceries went from $400 for the typical family for a month to $525. and we're making an enormous amount of progress. People's purchasing power has gone up by $1,200 already this year, but there's still room to go. And the fact is that Joe Biden dug a big hole and we're filling the hole really fast. Biden, Biden, Biden, Biden, Biden. I mean, good luck with that. That might sell in Fox News, but not many other places.

Biden tried it too. Biden tried it a year in. We covered it right here. He was like, oh, Donald Trump, Donald Trump's economy. We inherited a mess. It's December 11th, bro. People don't want to hear it. This is exactly when it is amazing how quickly stuff everything just repeats. Like that Mark Twain quote about history rhyming, like almost exactly four years to the day. The Biden administration was doing the exact same thing. This is when Bidenomics and all of that was born. Right now when their approval was in the shitter after Afghanistan, post-October, that's when things flipped. The vibe was totally nuked.

Okay, it's like all the ingredients are all right there. Well, and let's think, too, about like what was the central promise of the, tariff policy, right? I mean, a big part of that was, yeah, was manufacturing jobs. There's going to be, you know, companies are going to be bringing back jobs. There's going to be this incredible manufacturing surge. Instead, we are seeing a dramatic, we've now had nine straight months of manufacturing decline. It's been, you know, a complete reversal of any of the gains that were made during the Biden administration in terms of manufacturing. It's just been completely destructive in that regard. So whatever the promise was of the tariffs, you know, you could say,

okay, well, we didn't completely nuke the entire economy, but it certainly hasn't delivered on any of the promises that were made as part of that policy. And to the point about, you know, whether this is even selling on Fox News at this point, I have seen polling that, you know, of course, a majority of Republicans still support the president, still support his economic approach as well. But there is starting to be some significant slippage on some of these issues, on health care in particular, on inflation, on just the sort of focus where he's placed his time and his attention. Let me play for you an interview with actually a Trump voter talking about the struggles that she is having in this economy. This is B5. My kid's daycare went up, can't afford

the cost of food, using credit cards for everyday expenses, no money left after their bills were paid, pretty much just a whole bunch of financial mess. We changed presidents at the beginning of the year. I did. And the guy who moved into the White House said that he was going to fix it. Several times he said it would be easy. Absolutely. Has he fixed it? Absolutely not. I'm definitely waiting for him to fix it.

Jones is a three-time Trump voter, but she says he has simply failed to keep his promise to lower the cost of living. I'm very let down by that. Very, very let down because I feel like it's only gotten worse. And like this lady, I don't know, you know, if she's going to vote for a Democrat, but is she going to like enthusiastically show up to vote for a Republican again in the midterms? And maybe she is going to vote for her. I don't know, but, you know, it doesn't take a lot of slippage with your own base to have a real political problem. And also to have a real problem with apathy where people are like, yeah, you're telling me to go vote for these people. Like, my life hasn't gotten better.

I'm busy that day. Sorry. I'm not going to be bothered with it. And that's a lot of what they're facing politically is there is increasingly a reckoning that is happening, certainly among independence and among Democrats. In fact, the people whose sentiment has shifted the hardest against Trump are Latinos, who we have found, you know, know, are a key swing block and are very economy sensitive, tend to be, you know, strong economy voters. And also young people who are, you know, trying to, trying to get their foothold in the world, trying to establish themselves, trying to imagine a future for themselves, potentially,

you know, get married, have kids, like imagine that life of themselves. And they're just getting hammered and hammered and hammered. And their whole future is being sold out to these tech oligarchs, too, by the way. Yeah. It's not good. It is certainly not. And look, voters, they're paying attention, convincing them otherwise. It never, ever works. I know he has a reputation, but it's going to catch up to him. Gabe Ortiz is a cop. His brother Larry, a mystery Gabe didn't want to solve until it was too late. He was the head of this gang. You're going to push that line for the cause. Took us under his wing and showed us the game, as they call it. When Larry's killed, Gabe must untangle the dangerous past, one that could destroy everything he thought he knew.

Listen to the Brothers Ortiz on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Stefan Curry, and this is Gentleman's Cut. I think what makes Gentleman's Cut different is me being a part of developing the profile of this beautiful finished product. With every sip, you get a little something different. Visit Gentleman's Cut Bourbon.com or your nearest Total Wines or Bevmo. This message is intended for audiences 21 and older. Gentleman's Cut Bourbon, Boone County, Kentucky. For more on Gentleman's Cut Bourbon, please visit

Gentleman'scuturban.com. Please enjoy responsibly. Hey, everybody. It's Chuck and Josh from the Stuff You Should Know podcast, and it's that time of year again when we knuckle down to do our annual holiday episodes. We collected our best past classic holiday episodes and compiled them into a 12 days of Christmas toys playlist

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