Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 3/31/26: Trump Floats Iran Surrender, Trump Rock Bottom Polls, Gas Prices Spike

Episode Date: March 31, 2026

Krystal and Saagar discuss Trump floats total Iran surrender, Trump hits rock bottom polling, gas prices spike.    Rory Johnston: https://www.commoditycontext.com/about      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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Good morning, everybody. Happy Tuesday. We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do we have, Crystal? Another wild morning. We've got a Trump truth to reckon with. He says he's very much indicating he'll just walk away from Iran, leaving the Strait of Hormuz closed. He tells the world to go get their own oil that he's done with it.

So I don't even know where to begin with this. with this. So we'll get into that. Also, that's maybe quite related. He's seeing some of the worst poll numbers, if not the worst poll numbers of either terms of his presidency. So there's a lot going on there. Some new analysis, too, of just how dire things may be for him and where we are heading. National average for gas is officially over $4 a gallon. Our oil analyst is going to join us to talk about the level of disruption and what would happen, even if Trump, does unilaterally taco now what that will mean for the future. Meanwhile, global ramifications of that, you know, oil blockade are spreading rapidly. So we'll take a look at that. Israel yesterday passed a death penalty bill that is only for Palestinians in another new disgusting low. We also are going to pick up the story we tried to do yesterday. We just couldn't put it in the show about the IDF assaulting a CNN photojournalist and the fallout from that. And then I had to take a look at Trump's ballroom.

Apparently, it's coming with a new nuclear bunker. Yeah, wow. Great timing. Really. Is it time to put the tinfoil back on? Oh, it was on yesterday. A little unsettling there. But like, maybe we put it back.

Maybe all those people have come up to me in the last several months to tell me that there's a data center under the ballroom. Maybe they were on to something. Maybe they were right. They were on to something for sure. Trump just says the stuff out loud. All right. Before we get to that, thank you to everybody who's been supporting the show, breaking points.com. We did our AMA yesterday, which was very enjoy.

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Let's go ahead and start then with the unilateral potential Trump Taco. And let's put this up here on the screen, literally breaking as of this morning. Let me go ahead and read it. All of those countries that can't get jet fuel because of the straits of Hormuz, like the United Kingdom, which refused to get involved in the decapitation of Iran. I have a suggestion for you. Number one, buy from the U.S. We have plenty.

Number two, build up some delayed courage. Go to the straight and just take it. You'll have to start learning how to fight for yourself. The USA won't be there to help you anymore, just like you weren't there for us. Iran has been essentially decimated. The hard part is gone. Go get your own oil. This fits very much with a late breaking story last night. Let's go and put the Wall Street Journal up there on the screen. Alex Ward over at the journal. I highly recommend the follow, by the way. Excellent reporter. He was also the person who broke the Roe versus Wade story back in the day. So highly recommend. I've been known him for a long time. He says Trump tells AIDS he's willing to end the war without reopening Hormuz. So if you put these two things together, it does indicate that at the current moment. That is what Trump wants us to think or is potentially doing. So this is at least what Donald Trump is telegraphing now publicly and or privately behind the scenes. Everybody do keep in mind that all of this could be an elaborate sciop, as we have seen now multiple times from the

Trump administration, potentially trying to signal that the war is over while if we continue to follow all of the ground troops in the region. So I no way want to say that this is the end. But let's pretend that it is. Let's pretend that it's Taco Tuesday. And of course, stock futures are surging right now as you and I speak over this. Should they really be surging? I mean, this is a genuine Suez moment for the United States. Let's think about this. The U.S. military went into this campaign unilaterally with Israel with a singular objective, unconditional surrender, the decapitation of the Iranian regime, a replacement of that regime, a reopening, re-control of the Straits of Hormuz. At one point, we floated a reinsurance scheme backed by the United States and the United States

Navy sailing freely through the strait. Now, after, after, over a month, there is now an effective declaration. Trump says, well, we have actually changed the regime because we killed the original Ayatollah. Now, we have a new Ayatollah whose father was murdered and his brother and his wife. I mean, can't even go through the list of family members. The guy who had the fatwa against nuclear weapons, he's gone. The hardline IRGC is all in control. The Straits of Hormuz is under Iranian control, who is allowing selectively certain ships that were either Pakistani or Chinese or any country which is willing to make a deal with them. They a piece of legislation yesterday in their parliament, saying that they have officially approved a toll program,

almost like the Egyptians, in the control of the Suez crisis. And then Trump comes in and he says that we are basically will be done because you didn't join us. So first of all, it was a war of choice. It's not like we needed anybody. Allegedly, we were told we could do this all by ourselves. We didn't necessarily need anyone to come in. We blew up the global economy quite literally. We're going to tell everybody just in the one month of what it looks like. Asia, 80% of oil from through the Straits of Hormuz goes to Asia. Only 50% goes to China. The rest of them are extremely critical U.S. allies. LNG, which is heavily reliant. Europe is after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Oh, well, sorry, 70% of Qatar's Rasalafon gas. That's gone. It just evaporated

for the next four to five years. Good luck paying for it, though, by the way. So what this means is that the U.S. came in here, who didn't even military accomplish its objectives, basically got all of our bases like destroyed and or hit. We lost all these strategic aircraft. We humiliated ourselves, really, in terms of what people expected the United States to be able to do. Now, we could finish the job with ground troops. We decided we don't want to do that. And we tell the Europeans and the Asians, go get your own oil. So what's more likely, Crystal, that the UK and the EU and Japan and South Korea are going to form a coalition of the unwilling and go and militarily take the Straits of Hormuz, or Tehran is going to be like,

pay up. Let's go. And by the way, no more dollars, you're going to denominate it in won. Any U.S. flagship, you're never coming through here. If you're sailing to Israel, you're not going, you're not coming through here either. And this is the new new sheriff in town in the Straits of Hormuz. What's that sound like to you? That sounds like a strategic victory right now. So far for the Iranian Empire.

They get two, or the Iranian regime, potentially, an empire. Used to be an empire. So we've got the Iranian regime, which is now reempowered, massively rich already as a result of the war and spiking oil prices, control over the Straits of Hormuz. They stood up and survived over the big bad American military and Israel. I mean, this is a strategic nightmare. And yet somehow it is still the preferable outcome. Yes.

And that's what's so insane about it. Is we were really screwed either way, which is why we never should have been in this war. I'm just like thinking through all of the global ramifications. And I'm like, I cannot believe that we just blew up the global empire and the global economy and told all of these countries, I mean, if you're the Gulf, I was telling you the What do you do now? Iran has been firing on ship. Now you got to pay the piper. Yeah, Dubai was getting messed up just yesterday. Dubai was, they got more missiles yesterday in the first week of the war. Do you just pay it?

I guess. I mean, and you bought all these billions of dollars and all these troops are here. And everybody's backstopping your economy. If you're Dubai, your Abu Dhabi, like your whole brand is screwed. It's over. I mean, it's, okay, so again, very possible that this is just a sci-op and some other thing is in the works, we'll put that. But I do actually, I actually do believe that Trump would really like to Taco, that he, all the reporting about he's trying to find an off ramp, blah, blah, but that he's bored. I mean, I think that is all true. And you see the bond markets are problem for him, the oil markets are problem, the stock markets problem for him. His poll numbers are

tanking. He's looking at this and going like, all right, we need to wrap this up. So I do give it some credence that this is possible that he's like, all right, we're just going to walk away. So let's be really totally clear. If he walks away and leaves the Strait of Hormuz in Iranian hands for them to do with as they wish, it's a surrender. I mean, it is a surrender. The ultimate surrender. Yeah, because... The role of the U.S. Navy, why do you and I pay the taxes we pay is to guarantee commerce on the high seas?

That is literally the point of the empire. That's why Japan and South Korea and all these other countries are like, okay, let's do all this right. exchange, you guarantee our security and our ability not to be Chinese vassals. I mean, what are we doing here now? So we came in, okay, let's just remember, let's rewind, back when, you know, Trump announces in his baseball cap without a tie on before we're going to a party of Mar-a-Lago announces that he started this war. Okay. He's calling the Iranian people to rise up, right? So regime changed, like, not the fake kind that he's claiming, but the real, like, oh, we're going to have somebody who's a puppet and amenable to our interest, blah, blah, blah, blah.

That's what the original goal was. That and to destroy or make render impossible or do some deal with them to make sure that they're never going to pursue a nuclear weapon. Okay, those things are off the table. Then the war became about reopening the thing that the war closed, the Strait of Hormuz. Now they're saying that is also off the table.

And this is why you could never get a straight answer out of them after the initial days of the war of what the objectives actually are. So now what are we going to, I mean, Trump will claim mission a combo. We decimated them and we set them back. No, what you did is you strengthen them. There's zero doubt about it. Yes, they're, you know, this and that got hit and there were, you know, tons of civilian

it was horrible, right? There's no doubt that there were losses on the Iranian side. But if they come out of this with control over the Strait of Hormuz, this is like an ability for them to play in the world. and have the sort of sanction power that we do, right? If some other country is messing with them, if some countries, you know, supporting a genocide in Gaza or whatever, they can wield this now as a weapon. They can throw their weight around.

Not to mention, okay, they still, by all accounts, still have all of the, you know, highly enriched uranium and nuclear material and know-how. Do you think that they may pursue a nuclear weapon now to make sure they don't get messed with again? I certainly would if I was them. So, I mean, what are we like, so, okay, so let's play the sound. I'm just trying to think of, like, what all the implications are. So you're right, the Arab, like Gulf Arab states, totally fucked.

Totally screwed. Like, what are they going to do? They have all these bases, the Iranians, listen, I'm Iran. I've got you by the balls. And you're Saudi Arabia and your UAE. Every U.S. troop on the ground, got to go. Yeah. Now what?

I mean, Trump says he doesn't want to pay. And this is what they said. Right. And this is what they said their original goal was we went all U.S. troops out of the region, we want these bases closed. And we all look at that and we're like, that's insane. Now it's like, is it? Is it insane? Israel's on here floating, hey, we want the U.S. bases on our soil, which would be a major, I mean, that's a major change in terms of their orientation or our orientation. It basically means like the merging of our states completely. That's a whole other

can of worms, but that could be where we're heading if these Gulf Arab states are like, you know what, this is not going to work for us. Like, you made us a target and then you you screwed everything up for us and then you cut and run. Okay, so that's the Gulf Arab states. For the Israelis, Iran is not in chaos. They did not collapse the state. They strengthened the logic of pursuing, you know, longer range ballistic missiles and a nuclear weapon. Do you think the Israelis are just going to sit back and say, that's cool, we're going to let that happen? No, they're not. You're still going to have the same logic on the Israeli side from Netanyahu and his whole crew, and they're going to continue to be trying to, you know,

drag us back in the same sort of thing that played out here where reportedly Israel is going to strike Iran anyway. And so our leaders were like, well, I guess we're going to do it too. Are we just going to let them get hit by Iranian missiles? Like that, so that's, you know, a whole situation. I mean, the whole thing is, and then of course, in terms of the rest of the world, they look at us, this global superpower, allegedly, nuclear-armed global superpower. And we were like opening the Strait of Hormuz is going to be too militarily difficult for A. You think that's, you think They're going to go out. No, of course not. Of course not. They're going to look at this and go, okay, China, okay Iran, like trying to make some deals. This is a new world order. I mean,

that truly is what we're looking at here. And I know that may sound really grandiose, but this level of humiliating defeat at the hands of, you know, I mean, Iran is a large country. It's sort of like a middle income country. They have clearly military power. But really, they just outthought us. They outplanned us. They outtaught us. They were much smarter, much more strategic and Trump came barreling in thinking that he could do a few day excursion and get some you know, dubia before his meeting with China and then it'd be all good and he's an idiot and he's a fool and they revealed it. This is why part of me is like why is that we shouldn't be too declarative is because all of this is about to become real obvious to NATO to Japan to South

Korea to the Gulf. Saudi. I mean, yeah, MBS and MbZ are going to be on the phone today. day, right? Being like, listen, man, this is a, this is, you can't, you can't let, leave us hanging like this. And that's why every single report out of the Gulf is they're like, finish the job, finish the job, we can't live this way. So now what, so when Trump tells the UK and Japan and South Korea to go get your own oil, they're like, oh, we'll get it all right, but we're going to pay the Iranian hostage toll. Whatever they want, we'll pay. And denominated in Chinese Yuan. And then what are they going to say? I mean, what's America going to say? They're going to be like, oh, well, you can't do that because X, Y and Z. And now you, this is why this is like empire ending,

in a way is the Japanese are going to be like, okay, our security guarantor or 90% of our oil, what do we do? What choice would you make? I mean, this is when your actual back is up against the wall. I mean, Pakistan is already making deals with them because they are so screwed. 100% of Pakistani LNG comes from Qatar. They don't have a choice, right? It's literally existential. Bangladesh, all of it, India. I mean, already you've watched what happens with Russia. I mean, Yeah, by the way, even Russia, in terms of their strength that's come out of this war. I don't accept that Russia is an enemy of the United States. You could say adversary largely as a result of our own creation, but whatever, it has now proven its ability.

And this is part of why- We're strengthening this Iran-China-Russia alliance. Yes. And that's very powerful. So, right, then let's think about China. So China's going to come in and say, we have to denominate all of the exchanges have to be denominated in one. 50% of our oil comes through the straight, so they will make a deal where they massively enriched Tehran. They've already created the parallel banking system to get around U.S. sanctions.

They could create an entire exchange. I mean, this is the backbone of America, of what we really are, is not just the strength of the dollar, but all of the power of the swift sanctions and our ability to compel commerce across the globe because of the strength of our consumer economy. And that's part of why I go, he may want this today, but soon the phone is going to ring. And that's part of the reason with those troops in the region, he might just have to use them. He might say, you know what? What we're all talking about here is so unacceptable that we actually do have to do some sort.

Not we don't have to, but they will want to do some ground invasion because you just can't, you cannot have this. If you are all of these critical U.S. allies. And you could end up with a scenario where we, you know, effectively surrender. and then Israel and Iran are still warring and we're right back in. I mean, that's another possibility here is, you know, after the 12-day war, something we warned about and many others who were opposed to going to war with Iran to begin with, that this is not over. Like, yes, Trump is declaring mission accomplished and it was much, you know, cleaner way to wrap it in a bow than anything that he thought of for this new phase of the Iran war. But what we said is you have not fundamentally changed the logic coming from the Israelis and

the way that Trump is, you know, very susceptible to being lured into, and again, I hate using this language because obviously it's on him. But clearly the Israelis were pushing for this, right? And we knew that after the 12-day war, the fundamental logic was not going to change, which is why I don't think any of us were surprised when we ended up back in horrified, yes, surprised, No. And so if he does walk away now, you still have a situation. Not only has the logic not changed, the logic has gotten worse for the Israelis or stronger for the Israelis in terms of continuing to pursue this war because you've got, you know, more of an impetus to actually pursue a nuclear weapon. You've got a harder-line regime. And now you've handed them this extraordinary power.

Now, I will say the Israelis are talking about, oh, well, we'll create a pipeline, you know, that bypasses that. That takes a lot of fucking time. It takes a decade and we wiped out with a drone. Exactly. Yeah, such a great point. But even if you give that credence, I mean, the time alone. And so in the next decade, we're just going to deal with it.

I mean, you'd be better off just going whole hog on like nuclear and renewable energy versus thinking that some pipeline is going to save you at this point. Not to mention, I mean, Israeli society has its own problems. And I don't know. I agree with you that I do believe. if I had to say, I think Trump does, he wants to be done with this. He's trying to find an off-ramp. There's a lot of reporting in that regard.

He's been floating various things, trying to, you know, trying to basically like will a deal into being, project some sort of strength, pretend like these ships that are passing through the Strait of Hormuz because other countries are making deals with Iran. Like, this is some gift to him. He's trying to figure something out. But he has really, this is Robert Pate, he is in an escalation. trap. It is a trap. And if he walks away now, the repercussions may be such that he just can't stomach it. And the, you know, the countries surrounding us that our allies also can't

stomach it. And so there's going to be tremendous pressure on him to continue this thing and try to, I don't know. I mean, and that's the other thing is let's say he could he, okay, you know, he hears from everybody. He's like, all right, I guess I got to keep going with that thing, with this thing. What does that mean? Because the seizing of the nuclear material is a fool's errand and insane. The seizing of the islands just enmeshes you further, whether it's Cargoy Island or these UAE aisle, whatever, like that just emmeshes you further. That's no solution. The only solution is like a full-scale ground invasion. Even then, it's not really a solution. But this is the corner that he's backed himself into, and it is a disaster. It's a disaster for the world. I mean,

We're going to suffer here in the U.S., but people around the world, we're going to talk about this later. Like, you know, developing countries around the world, people are going to starve to death. Like, there's going to be places where you just can't buy fuel. The level of demand destruction

that would be required is just, you know, shocking. Well, they may not starve now because of the taco, but it's one of those where, look, we may have an end to the actual crisis, but this is a full-blown, like, this is the Pandora's Box. I mean, this is why you shouldn't get into any of this in the first place.

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do for your mental health. Listen to mostly human on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. We have a lot of elements here. I'll skip most of them, but let's just make sure, again, that we set the table, that there's still a war going on with Iran. Let's put A2 up here on the screen just to show all of you. This is video that came out just yesterday.

This is, by the way, what makes me very skeptical that this unilateral taco might happen. So this was a massive airstrike, bunker-busting bombs dropped by the United States. States just yesterday on an Iranian ammo depot, which was in Isfahan, which is near, of course, all of those nuclear facilities in Iran. Now, here's the thing. Originally there was some cope and hope, honestly, that there would, they were like, oh, we finally hit the Missile City, the Pentagon even confirmed this is an ammunition dump with artillery and other things. And that is what made me think, look, you can strike an ammo dump with bunker buster bombs, not the Missile City. Now, you probably would if you could, but why would you do that? Especially,

in the area where you have these nuclear facilities and some sort of potential nuclear operation was going to happen. So keep your eyes open. You know, the unilateral taco could also still happen, even after some sort of potential nuclear operation that's happening there. The other... The other reading of this, so one reading of it is that, yeah,

this is, you know, Isfahan is where they think a lot of the nuclear material is at this point. And so you could be trying to, you know, degrade their capabilities there for some eventual, you know, know, commandos coming in and trying to seize the nuclear material, all that stuff, okay? That's one possibility. The other possibility is Trump shared this on true social, which makes it more noteworthy,

because clearly wanted to highlight, like, oh, look at this big explosion, you know. The other possibility is this is just him trying to show, like, you know, oh, look at this grand display of how much we've decimated them, et cetera, because it was a large explosion. So I don't know, but I think either of those interpretations are possible. Take it for what you will. Also, look, now that we have this truth, the taco stuff, it's everywhere. Let's put A3. Let's go ahead and play it. This was Caroline Levitt telling everyone just yesterday.

Well, the president said four to six weeks. We're on day 30, so we're on track. Let's take a listen. President Trump initially said about four weeks. Secretary of State Rubio on Friday reportedly said it might be another two to four. It's two to four the current ballpark that the administration is thinking. With respect to the timeline, again, the president, commander in chief, the Pentagon has always stated four to six weeks, estimated timeline for Operation Epic Fury. We're on day 30 today. So again, you do the math on how much

longer we, the Pentagon needs to fully achieve the objectives of Operation Epic Fury, which I will reiterate. So there she says laying out the timeline. Secretary Hegset is briefing literally right as we're all talking here. I haven't seen anything exactly noteworthy, but he has continued to say Iran should try to make a deal because we're decimating. We are the people that are making sure he said we are like, you know, bringing them to the table, negotiating them with bombs. So you could see that the messaging has shifted dramatically. We also should go to A7. Now, this, again, was a little bit of a preview of the current truth social this morning. Here is Secretary of State Marco Rubio, an interview with Al Jazeera, where he again opens the

door to, well, maybe we don't have to control the Straits overmoos. Other countries can do it. Let's take a listen. The Straits of our moves will be open. When this operation is over, it will be open, and it'll be open one way or another. It will be open because Iran agrees to abide by international law and not block the commercial waterway or a coalition of nations from around the world and the region with the participation of the United States will make sure that it's open.

So the Straits of Hormuz will be open. Iran either agrees to abide by international law and not by the international law from this administration. Come on. I know. This is fake as hell. I know. You open the war by murdering a bunch of schoolgirls.

and assassinating their head of state. And threatening to bomb nuclear, or sorry, to bomb like power plants. Yeah, Trump literally yesterday was like a blow up your water plants. I mean, this is like textbook. War crimes, but whatever. As I said, international law is fake. And that's fine. International law has always been fake.

It's really all been in terms of the norms and the enforced ability of being able to do so. We have decided to get in bed with Israel, this rogue state, and conduct ourselves the way that we have. It always kind of has been an illusion. We just decided to put the blinders on. And it's like, all right, well, if we're going to go about the world and we're going to kidnap Maduro and we're going to just, you know, come in, create a gigantic mess, withdraw, tell everybody else to do so. Who are we to tell the Iranians exactly? How are they going to govern the Straits of Hormuz?

They will govern by force. As we could do it too, you can invade and take it if you want to. It'd be a nightmare and a disaster. Part of the reason maybe you shouldn't have gone into this mess in the first place. Well, and just really quick, Hegsath is doing a press briefing right now. And just a couple things that were noteworthy here. I see this one clip of him. He says, President Trump will make a deal.

He is willing, and the terms of the deal are known to them. If Iran is not willing, then the U.S. War Department will continue with even more intensity. So that's the messaging they're putting out is continuing like this. Oh, we'll deal with them, but we're going to come in with even more, you know, fire and fury or whatever is where there's what he's still messaging this morning from the podium. Yeah. So look, very important just to put, I just, I really am all over the place this morning just because I have to deal with the ramifications of what this would mean. Also, to make sure our audience understands the war's still happening. The bombs are still dropping.

Yeah. It's not like the Israelis, oh, they're doing just great. They just basically annexed half of Lebanon in case anybody's wondering. The Israeli empire, it's expanded. The regional super. Think about this nation since October 7. They've expanded their border into Syria. I mean, remove the leader there.

They're basically taking half of Lebanon. They're basically taking the, I mean, they had the West Bank. Now they're solidifying control over at Gaza. Wow. You have to marvel at it. Yeah. This country, which I don't want to say hijacked. It was willingly given, I guess.

Think about it. We will end our own empire and create a new Israeli one. That's effectively been the net policy, if the current status quo remains as it is. Although the Israelis have their own vulnerability because they can only, act the way that they act because they have our full and complete backing at all turns. And the moment that that has taken away, then they are extremely vulnerable. So they have their own, you know, their own vulnerabilities here. My heart breaks for them. Actually, I saw Ryan was sharing this, this threat on Twitter about, you know, this whole like, do they have a right to exist?

The state of Israel have a right to exist discourse. And someone was pointing out, like, in what way are they even a state? Because a state would indicate that there are borders and laws that are applied consistently to the citizens of that state. So by the conventional definition, Israel isn't even a state because of the way that they operate. But that's another discussion for another day. I mean, another thing I wanted to point out, because I think it's relevant, you've now got two European allies, Italy and Spain, who have both said, we are not allowing U.S. military planes to land at our bases and enjoy flyover rights. So, I mean, that's really significant. So it also tells you... Italy is way bigger than Spain.

Yeah, Spain from the beginning has been like, you know, it's a left-wing government, their adversary, like they've been opposed from the beginning. Italy coming out and joining them and being like, yeah, we're done here too, that is highly significant. And also shows you, you know, shows you the way that our allies are feeling about this and that they are also coming to a point where they're like, okay, whatever we're getting from the U.S., it is not worth it because the costs that are being imposed, I mean, the energy prices in Europe already were high.

Now they're going even higher. So they're in quite a bind tier as well. And yeah, I don't think to your point about like, let's say we do walk away and just tell them go get your own oil and good luck with the straight of four moves, they're going to be, you know, quite willing, I think, to go and make a deal with Iran at whatever terms are necessary. People know. No big fan of Europe, you know, I would decouple on my own terms. These aren't the terms that I would do it on.

And let's think about Italy. All right. So Italy, NATO country. It is, I think, four U.S. base. I want to say four major U.S. bases, probably 15,000 or so troops, a major hub for Afri-com operate. Remember Benghazi and Libya and all that? They were scrambling the jets out of Italy. It's kind of a critical U.S. note last time I checked. Their own prime, we'll get to this later on the show. Their defense ministers saying, like, he's like vague posting being like, I can't sleep

at night because of the things that I know that are coming. So obviously then, they're facing a crisis. And it's not like their economy was doing all that well, even within the EU context. So for them, high energy prices, it's a nightmare. It's a total disaster, especially on top of what just happened with Russia and with Ukraine. I guess continuing on down this line, let's just make sure that we get a couple more things that are in here. Oh, right, A11 or sorry, A12, please. This also happened yesterday. This was the Kuwaiti crude carrier, the al-Salmi, was directly attacked by Iranians,

docked at the anchorage area of the Dubai port in UAE. So yesterday, the UAE took more missiles and incoming drones than at any time since the first week of war, showing, again, Iran's projected ability, or Iran's ability to continue to project some force in the region and also to be able to hit whatever, you know, tanker that they want to. There is some confusing stuff around this tanker. Apparently it was bound for China.

So there's a lot of reasons as for why Iran hit it. They may have actually mistakenly targeted, this carrier. There was another one that was heading to Israel. I've also seen it could have been, you know, a shrapnel from a missile intercept or something like that, too. I've got another clip here from Hegset that is noteworthy on the Strait of Hormuz significantly, specifically, he says, on the Strait of Hormuz, there are many more vessels flowing through today than there were, as the president has arranged. Oh my God, the Cope. No, he's not. The Cope. The Cope. The Cope's arranged that. That's not even true. The president's been clear to Iran. Open it for business,

or we have options, and we certainly do. There are countries around the world who ought to be prepared to step up on this critical waterway as well. It's not just the United States Navy. Last time I checked, there was supposed to be a big, bad Royal Navy that could be prepared to do things like that as well. So he's pointing out this is an international waterway that we use less than most, in fact, dramatically less than most. So the world ought to pay attention and be prepared to stand up. President Trump's been willing to do the heavy lifting on behalf of the free world. Oh, thank you so much, President Trump, to address this threat of Iran. It's not just our problem.

problem set going forward, even though we have done the lion's share preparation to ensure that that straight will be open. So, you know, sort of consistent with what the reporting about Trump saying basically and his true social being like, hey, you guys use this more than us, go and get the oil, you know. But in other comments, Heggseth also said. What year do they think we're living in 1898? I know. Where the sun never sets on the British Empire?

Right. People look at the UK and their society. I know. The idea. And they want to go and... We can't do it, but we're going to... Oh, they're going to... Okay, right.

Yeah. And then he also says, we'll negotiate with bombs. He loves this line. Our job is to ensure we compel Iran to realize that this new regime, this regime in charge, is in a better place if they make that deal. And so we'll continue. We're working hand in hand, but the primary effort is a deal.

We want the deal to be accomplished, if at all possible. If not, then we're prepared to continue. So take from that what you will. I mean, we can't trust Trump's right. We can't trust any of this. This guy's just idiots do. So I can't take any of his words seriously either. I think this is what he wants to do.

I just don't think that it can be done. I mean, well, it can. It can. And then all the consequences that we've laid out just are. And it's probably, and those consequences are probably best case scenario at this point. It probably is. If you continue, it only gets worse. But let's then talk about the economic ramifications.

We talked about the empire ramifications. You've got the UAE and Saudi Arabia. They're effectively being held hostage here now by Iran. They've proven their capability to hit you. They have, I was listening to an episode this morning. about the amount from Adlaught, shout out to them, about Dubai and specifically the real estate market. But they touched on the amount of 40% of global sovereign wealth is just the Gulf. The big four countries out of the globe.

Golf. Almost all that wealth is invested in U.S. companies, from venture capital to commercial real estate, to private credit markets, which are having their own problems right now. Now, let's take Qatar, the Qatar Sovereign Wealth Fund, right? QIA, Qatar Investment Authority. Well, they just took a 17% haircut on their natural gas. stands to reason they're going to take some haircut on their flow of cash, which maybe means they can't fulfill future like deals or other things. So let's call it 10%. Well, if 10% of that money just

dries up, that's a lot of money. I mean, that's billions of dollars. So what's that mean? And then you've got high oil prices as a result of this shock, potentially for years if Iran is messing with the oil market. So these Gulf economies will either be held hostage or they'll have to pull back their investments here in the United States, Japan, South Korea, all these Asian countries, we're supposed to invest all this money here, they are getting destroyed right now in their stock markets and their economy. So just think about the ramifications for all of us. I mean, again, look. And our economy is a house of cards. Like, it's basically AI speculation. It's like the whole economy and like gambling. And for everybody saying, well, I don't care about that. I'm like,

well, listen, you know, oh, actually it'd be a good thing. Yeah, I mean, theoretically, you know what it also means? It means you're going to lose your job. It means you're going to pay high interest rates. It means that you're going to pay high gas prices. Like, remember, they'll be, you know, find taking a 10% haircut. Can you realistically afford to take that? The answer is always no, is that the people at the top will be okay. They're largely insulated from these decisions. But, you know, when the bottom falls out, then people get laid off. They lose their jobs. You can't buy a home. You can't buy a car. It's a genuine nightmare. So look, that's what things stand. Obviously, this is breaking situation. So, you know, hopefully it's still as up to date whenever

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Why don't we turn to polling? Just why did Trump decide to do this? Yeah, I mean, this is one piece of that puzzle. I think probably the markets are even more important piece. But let's go ahead and put this up on the screen. This UGov poll came out yesterday, and it was a real eye-opener. Proval rating of 33%. That is about as low as I have ever, ever seen it.

Disapproval at 62. Now, this is a little bit of an out. It's not that much of an outlier. It's a little bit of an outlier. But we've been seeing a lot of polling coming in for him that has the approval rating under 40%. And in fact, if we put B3 up on the screen, this Nate Silver's analysis of his poll numbers, according to his average, and keep this up on the screen for a second, because this chart is actually really useful. According to his average, he now has Trump dipping under 40% approval rating. So 39.0.3.8.000. 7%, I think, for an average of all the polls, the ones that are more favorable to him and the ones that are less favorable to them. And you can see quite clearly, first of all, the trajectory has just been consistently downward. So, of course, there have been, you know, little peaks and valleys in between. But overall, the story of his second term in office is just down, down, down. Now, the place where he actually saw the steepest decline was after Liberation Day, and the terrorists were just, like, wildly, wildly unpopular.

And then you can see, though, since the Iran war began, you know, he was actually at a little sort of localized peak there, and it's just been downward ever since the Iran war started. Nate Silver also tracking, you know, the popularity of the Iran war and finding that it is very unpopular. And usually Americans have a good war. So it's kind of historically unusual for this country to have, be negative on a war really from day one. The other thing here, Sager, is put B2 up on the screen.

So we called this because it was obviously predictable when Trump and Hexat said, oh, we're going to need $200 billion to pay for this war. And we're going to achieve it through reconciliation. Well, that means you have to balance it with cuts elsewhere. Where are you going to get that money? Healthcare. Because that's basically like the big, if you're not going to cut defense spending, the other, and you can't cut interest spending. In fact, that piece is going up, interest on the debt because of the high. yield surging. The only other place where you have a significant amount of funds is health care.

So they already cut health care significantly back in the one big beautiful bill, and they are looking at taking another hatchet to health care, Americans' health care, in order to pay for the bombs to, you know, to hit around and continue this war. I don't, I'm like, where would you even cut it from? They said made deep cuts to federal, I'm looking just at even what would even potentially be. I mean, then you're really, I mean, they're already cut into the bone, but you're really cutting into the bone with that one. Oh, I see.

It would be Medicare Advantage. Okay. This is, yeah, I mean, look, you're paying the fire. Yeah, you're cutting Medicare. That's the bottom line. You know, pro-Medicare also, you know, boomers taking a little haircut right now. Like, oh, what a tragedy. No, I was much rather boomers have their health care than,

not to mention, sorry, you know, you know, you know. It's penny wise and pound foolish because then you end up with people at the emergency You're getting the most expensive again and not getting preventive. I know you understand these things. But in any case, let's talk about how this is going to play for a midterm election. We're cutting your health care so we can bomb girls' schools in Iran and, you know, wage Israel's war. Oh, and gas is more expensive. Yeah.

Any potential housing that you want to buy. I'm sure people are going to love that. I'm sure people are going to be flocking to the polls to, you know, do their patriotic duty of paying more gas at the pump and giving up their health care so that more bombs can be dropped on I was thinking about it too. At this point, I actually do, I don't say I support more defense spending, because that would be the incorrect way of putting it. I do not support an increase in the dollar amount. I do genuinely think at this point we need like a Manhattan level project to reform the entire defunds industrial base. Of course, under this administration now, it's pretty clear that's just not going to happen, largely because of people who are in charge, but also because of

not just corruption, the creative thinking and like ability to take on permanent Washington to basically we need to make sure that we're safe in a future conflict. Because what has Iran really showed us is the asymmetry problem that we face from drones, aircraft carriers with laundry fires, massively expensive. Interceptors is like, this problem needs to be solved yesterday. It's literally an urgent and a critical situation. And let's say if we ever got into a conflict over something that really matters. You know, one of the reasons why I think this is so bad, too, is now this poisons the well, people are going to be like, well, hold on a sec. I'm not going to give you more stuff so you can go do more stupid shit like this.

Totally. I mean, rational, right? They're not going to sit there and give the same soft case that I'm taking. To your point, they already get a trillion dollars. Do you know what Iran's annual military budget is? It's $10 billion. We're asking for $200 billion just for this one excursion, right? They spent roughly $10 billion a year on them.

I do think they upped it a little bit since the 12-day war or whatever. But yeah, whoever it was that was on the show that was like, we built our military to fight the Cold War. And it was more about like some big presentation of power than it is the reality of modern warfare. And we've seen the reality of modern warfare up close in the Ukraine-Russia fight. I mean, even with Hamas and what they were able to do, we've seen the reality of modern warfare. And the more that we obliterated international law, frankly, the more it benefits a country like Iran. Because in an asymmetric fight, yeah, if you have the ability to pick off civilian targets and, you know, screw up an oil tanker, bomb a refinery,

bomb a water desalination plant, and no one can say shit to you because they murdered your head of state and bomb little girls schools, that is not actually to our benefit. That is to the benefit of smaller players who, you know, can use these low-cost drones. And of course, the number one drone producer in the world by far is China. Yes, of course. See, that's what I'm most worried about. I don't think we need an increase in the defense budget. We need to literally, we could probably spend less if we just took on the actual industrial base, reformed our companies, you know, had an intelligent like DARPA, Manhattan-level Manhattan Project style like investment and just be like, okay, this is a crisis. And by the way, everyone was saying this is agitating for war with China.

Listen, even at this point, like with the whole Taiwan situation, I mean, come on. I don't know how you can look at this and say there's any chance of the U.S. having the ability right now. I'm not worried about that. You know what? I'm worried about Japan. I'm worried about South Korea. I'm worried about, I mean, these are real allies. These are people, number three, number seven, whatever, economy in the world, top 10 trading partners. We're talking about Singapore, Vietnam, the Philippines. I mean, these people who have been there with us, this is the backbone of the U.S. consumer market, 50% of global GDP. That's the stuff that I actually worry about right now.

And I look at this and I go, oh, it's not going to happen. I mean, and you could call it Dumer or any of that, but I genuinely believe that if we could have done more in the Iran, where we would have. It exposed all of these so predictable problems. And it's like I said, for years we heard people make fun of the Russians. It's like, what if we're more like the Russians than we wanted to think? Turns out we are. That's just the truth. And I mean, yeah, the level of changes will take

from our government. And the thing is, we're a democracy. We have to convince people why this is necessary. And this has actually poisoned the well for any future defense industrial project. Because people are going to say, I'm not going to give you more weapons to go out and fight stupid wars. We should only, you know, if you had a doctrine of like rearmament or reform in the system without all of this insane adventurism, people would say, okay, that makes sense, you know, all of this.

And of course, by the way, $200 billion of the $1 trillion is on TRICARE last time I checked, like the health care system. It's a disaster from everybody I've spoken to. So, yeah, the level of reform and all that we would need would be Titanic. And also this is where Doge comes into play. They poison the well on this. You know, they never even looked over at the Pentagon. Yeah.

So I look at this president, I look at this like polling now, and I just think about the overall, like, sweeping democratic effect that this is going to have. People will very rationally not want to give a dollar more to defense under this administration because they don't want to see more things like this. And then in the interim, we still got what, three more years to go. Let's put B3 up there on the screen from N. he makes a point. Trump's approval hits the 30s. Can't his numbers get any lower? It's a, it's a genuine question. It's one of those where what else could you, what could you do to lift yourself out of this? I don't think in modern history we've ever had a president who has been at this low at this time and had any meaningful recovery. Look, he's going to think about legacy,

but let's think also generally about the GOP and about the ramifications. So if you see this type of situation take place. I mean, this is where the Senate starts to come into play, right? When's the last time we lived with something like this? 08, I want to say. 08 with the financial crisis and Iraq. I mean, that's when crazy shit happens. Like, that's when what were Democrats were getting elected in like North Dakota, right?

Obama won North Dakota. Didn't Arkansas have a Democratic senator? But he won, he won Indiana. North Carolina. He won North Carolina. He won North Carolina. Didn't like Arkansas have a Democratic senator? Democratic Senator? Yeah, I mean, part of that...

You know, I was like, it was just sad. Yeah, I mean, part of that is because it was pre, like, full partisan realignment, so things like winning in Arkansas and South Dakota were more possible. But, yeah, I mean, in the 2008, like, there were people who won elections that...

I always think about that. That no one thought was going to be on the table. And, you know, the other thing Nate Silver points out, because this question of, like, can he go even lower than the 30s? Because his base famously, very strong, very cold-like, etc. That is definitely the case. But he does point out, that the level of strong approval for Trump has really fallen off.

So if you ask people, you know, you can give people these options, not just approve, disapprove, but strong disapprove or strong approve, weak approve, weak disapprove. And the strong approve has fallen from, you know, at the beginning of the term, it was at 36%. Now it's only 22%. And that's all his base going from like, yes, make America great again, to being like, I think he's better than Kamala. You know, I mean, that's, and that's significant.

Yeah, that's the only coke that you have left, right? And in a midterm election, that's really significant. Because, look, these are all people, anybody who approves the Trump is going to vote Republican if they come out and vote. But if you're feeling like, eh, this is not that great, are you going to take the time to come out and vote? I mean, it looks, and that's why also we... 2010 is the same scenario. Yes. Is you have all these disappointed Democrats, and they're like, hey, you said you would get us out of Iraq.

That didn't happen. You said you would end the war in Afghanistan. We're sending more troops staff Afghanistan. You just fucked up my health care. Yeah. I mean, I'm not happy about this. Yeah. And so, I mean, it's, look, the midterms, Democrats just won yet another seat in Florida.

It was like really close. It was in a Trump plus 11 district. This is different than the one that represents Mar-a-Lago. This is another Florida special election seat. The Democrats just won. I think that means that they've flipped 31 seats since Trump's election and Republicans have flipped zero. I mean, it's very clear where things are trending.

The only question is what sort of things Trump's going to do to try to mess with the elections. But I have to say at this point, I'm less worried about that because it's one thing when things are marginal. You can screw with things enough that it makes a difference. It's looking increasingly like things are not going to be marginal. Well, also, too big to rig. Too big. From 2024, 2020 and 26 will be the two big to rig elections, which is really funny. But then let's think about, you know, generally what that even means politically.

This would be 2008 level sea change, except within the Democratic Party, there's been all kinds of learning within the Republican Party. I have no idea. I mean, I don't see a scenario where there are more Tom Tillis types who are willing to buck Trump. But if anything, it'll probably narrow the faithful down to like an extremely small group. But it could be years then in the wilderness. Like those are wilderness years where six years, eight years out of power. I mean, who knows, right? And all kinds of crazy stuff. stuff happens. Saga, what do you make of, sorry, what do you make of all these reports about like, oh, J.D. Vance is trying to bring the order of clothes, and he's not happy, and he said Netanyahu, you better cut it down or whatever. Is that coming from his team trying to separate?

Or what's coming? No, I don't think so. I think I have no inside knowledge. As you might suspect, many people are very upset with me right now. But my theory, and this is based on a little bit of, of like, observation and knowledge of the dynamic, a lot of people who were his boosters are very worried about his potential candidacy. And so that is a very convenient.

Now, here's the problem, though. Those leaks, while could be important for him in the future, are actually extremely detrimental to him in the interim. Right. Because any report that the vice president's, you know, straying away from the president is very bad for him in the immediate term. At the end of the day, the calculus is empirically correct politically. He has to chain himself at the hip with Trump.

That's why whatever Trump does, he has to defend him. Did you see him, given the Iraq comment in the situation room about a suicide bomber? Oh, God, yeah. I was like, oh, I mean, okay. So we're doing this now? Yeah, when it was like, just imagine if they've got suicide vests that are nuclear bombs. And it's like, oh, my God. I mean, that's one of those where I'll tell you, look, I've been shocked by a lot.

I see that. And I'm like, wow. Yeah. Like, that's what we're doing now. But that's evidence of the point of this dramatically difficult dynamic, which is, You have to chain yourself. If he loses his access to Trump, he lose everything. The vice president sees an irrelevant job.

Ask Kamala Harris, John Nance Garner, FDR's vice president. It's not worth a warm bucket of piss, I believe, is what he said. He hated it. Absolutely hated it. And so it's really only what the president decides to give you. Now, look, there's various different schools of thought because clearly the president doesn't really give a shit what he thinks very much. Whenever it comes to foreign policy, he's just going to make you go out and humiliate himself.

But I do think a lot of the people who are around him, let's say, consultants and others, are either leaking it or they're trying to like prop up this type of messaging to preserve that optionality in the future. But honestly, the smart play at this, I mean, we're talking now. Who knows what things will look like in three years. I've seen Saurab Amari with a guest we've had on. He's very close with JD. He wrote a piece and he's like, maybe you won't run in 2028. Maybe you would run in 2032, like some sort of Nixon style comeback, you know, spend a couple of years in the wilderness. Let Margo Rubio be the heir to Trump. Enjoy.

Yeah, enjoy, right? You know, all I want to spend, he's having a baby this year. He's going to have four kids. Easy excuse. I want to spend more time with my family, my young family. I could see that as well. So I really have no idea. I mean, if you were asking me today, that would be a smart play.

At the same time in politics, it's all about timing. Like, you're only going to be vice president once. People may not care who you are five years from me. I think the thing I'll say is that for Trump, it is not a good sign that the error parent, which is obviously your vice president, either him or his staff think that it may be politically advantageous for them to try to create some distance

from the man who has been the, you know, the kingmaker in the Republican Party. I thought about this. This is why vice presidents are terrible candidates. They just shouldn't run. Like, they really, if you look in history, who are all the vice presidents who really got screwed?

Gore, Harris, I mean, potentially, J.D., there's, I mean, there's a few successful campaigns. H.W. Bush. Right. But even then, you know, he's, you know, he's, riding off the coattails of Reagan, and when he has to stand on his own two feet, he gets a bitch slapped by Bill Clinton, right?

And Ross Perra's help, yeah. You really can see in, like, vice presidents empirically then, are kind of bad candidates because they're so chained to the status quo. Sometimes you get lucky, like with Reagan, but a lot of the time it doesn't work out for you. Especially in the modern era where people are just disgusted with the stuff. Right. And we have change election after change election.

But, I mean, all of the little leaks that they're putting out or whatever they're doing, I mean, at the end of the day, when you decided to cozy up to Trump and, his guy and defend, like, you placed your bet. Well, there's a second angle. That would be the, you know, that would be the lane. And it wasn't a bad bed politically because he has been so dominant in terms of the Republican party.

But I just think, I mean, it's very possible a Republican project is just destroyed for quite a while, for anyone, whether it's him or Rubio or even Tucker Carlson or whoever. Just remember, things change rapidly in American politics. A decade from now, I mean, a decade ago, you're really going to say Trump is going to stick around still be the president of the United States? No, nobody would say that, right? Remember, 40 more years. So never make grand pronouncements about it's over forever.

It could be over in the interim, six to eight years, something like that. And I think American history, modern American history shows us genuine dominance would be the FDR to Truman pipeline of about, what was that, 20 something years, 24 years, right, of democratic rule. That's about as good as you can get, I think, in America. Yeah. And so, yeah. Large majority. Things change very rapidly. But for Vance, I mean, I actually was thinking about this earlier, not to,

started going on a bit of a tangent, but he was at a donor retreat yesterday with a lot of tech people, and a lot of them are very pro-AI. And I was like, you know, that's like the wrong side of that issue, right? So you've got, I mean, it's not me saying this, Republican voters are like, hey,

I don't want these data centers here, right? Voters, period. But I'm saying even Republican voters, they are not on board with a lot of the AI policy out of this current White House. They're not paying attention, per se, but the data center is going to be a critical issue, I think. Especially in the energy crunch after this nonsense.

Oh, yeah. We're going to pay higher bills to make sure that Google's AI can, you know, create black Nazis in the Gen Gemini. Like, no, we're not doing that. Yeah. So I was thinking about that, too, about I actually think the insurgent lane in the Republican Party is probably more open than ever before. Like somebody could do to the Republican Party today what Trump did. Somebody has to be so disconnected from the system to be able to stand on the stage and be able to be like, Donald, no one's ever told you this, Mr. Vice President, Iran was a disaster, you know?

Maybe. You need somebody to be able to say that. I mean, maybe. But at this point, we're still at a place where the Republican base. Right. They may not be in love. You're talking about today. I'm saying, let's say years from now.

Possible. That's what... It probably couldn't happen in 2028. And maybe it can't really happen while Trump is still alive. But look, look, he's 80. You know, who knows 10 years from now, what that would look like. So yeah, same thing like Iraq. 10 years later, somebody can come along.

Let's say any Trump-aligned official is running. And tell the truth. And just say the truth about what happened with Iran. Ron, I may be wish casting. I don't know how things will work out, obviously. Last point I'll make, sorry, B3, Nate Silver's thing back up on the screen for the third time here, but I want to make a point about look at each of these moments that, you know, where he really suffers a significant decline. So first you have the Liberation Day announcement. So none of these are external crises. These are all things that Trump himself did, right?

So the Liberation Day tariffs, dreadfully unpopular and a chaotic mess. even were people who are sympathetic to targeted tariffs. This was idiotic, okay? Justice Department declares Epstein investigation over. Again, the whole Epstein thing, total own goal, mess, disaster, really damaging to his brand. Government shutdown begins. Again, these are, you know, political problems that he could have handled differently. Then you have Renee Good killed and, of course, Alex Pretty a week or so after. This was, again, all because of his choice to occupy the city of Minneapolis after Nick Shirley does his like Somali fraud thing. And then the Iran war starts. I mean, in a sense, he's been so fortunate. There haven't been a lot of really any major external crises

in this administration. This is all of his own making. Every one of these decisions. And Doge was not even on there was also ended up being, you know, a total cluster and profoundly unpopular, etc. Even though it started off with people sort of open and receptive to it. So, I mean, that's why I do think that the damage to the Republican Party could be relatively severe because, you know, it's one thing like you're dealing with coronavirus. It's not your fault.

And it's everybody's struggling to deal with it. You know, I mean, obviously there were moves that were made by the United States of America that helped to spark the Ukraine-Russia war, but that ultimately is also like an external event, at least is perceived that way by the general public. These are all choices that he made

that every single one of these freaking people were out there defending. So, I mean, And that's part of why. It's very Iraq level. Yeah. Very similar. That's right. That's why Iraq just nuked them.

That's right. And Iraq started so much more popular. And honestly, had less of a direct impact on our lives than this is already having outside. Obviously, you know, there were, you know, severe casualties and American service members who were killed. But unfortunately, the reality of service in this country at this point is that it's confined to, it's sort of like segregated off from a lot of the population. So in any case, you know, certainly he's looking at these polls and feeling like things

are not going too great, which part of what played into potentially the attempted taco. That's right. All right. We've got to our friend Rory standing by. Let's get to it. Canadian women are looking for more. More out of themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world are out of them. And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast. I'm Jennifer Stewart. And I'm Catherine Clark. And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women. Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey. So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us. Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on Iheart Radio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

You know Roll Doll, the writer who thought up Willie Wonka, Matilda, and the BFG. But did you know he was also a spy? Was this before he wrote his stories? It must have been. Our new podcast series, The Secret World of Roll Doll, is a wild journey through the hidden chapters of his extraordinary, controversial life. His job was literally to seduce the wise. of powerful Americans.

What? And he was really good at it. You probably won't believe it either. Okay, I don't think that's true. I'm telling you. I was a spy. Did you know Dahl got cozy with the Roosevelt's? Played poker with Harry Truman and had a long affair with a congresswoman.

And then he took his talents to Hollywood, where he worked alongside Walt Disney and Alfred Hitchcock before writing a hit James Bond film. How did this secret agent wind up as the most successful children's author ever? And what darkness from his covert past seeped into the stories. we read as kids. The true story is stranger than anything he ever wrote. Listen to the secret world

of Roll Dahl on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Lori Siegel, a longtime tech journalist. And consider my new podcast mostly human,

your bridge to the future. Anyone can now be an entrepreneur, anyone can build an app, and it's very empowering. Each week, I'll speak to the people building that future, and we're going to break down

what all of this innovation actually means for you. What I come to realize is that when people think that they're dating these AI companion, they're actually dating the companies that create this. We're experiencing one of the greatest tech accelerations in human history. And let's be honest, that can be messy. There's no playbook for what to do when an AI model hallucinates a story about you. But it's my belief that we should all benefit from this moment.

Mostly human will show you how. My goal is to give you the playbook. so you can benefit. The reason I say agency is because, like, if we can give power back to people, then I think that's probably the best thing we can do for your mental health. Listen to mostly human on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Joining us now is our great friend Rory Johnston. He is the founder of Commodity Context on Subsect, which we highly recommend everybody go and subscribe to.

There will be a link down in the description. Thanks for joining us, man. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me back. All right, so, Rory, let's start with your reaction to the Trump Taco. It's Taco Tuesday. Let's put this up here on the screen. All of those countries that can't get jet fuel because of the Straits of Hormuz, like the United Kingdom, which refused to involve the capitation of Iran. I have a suggestion from you. Number one, buy from the U.S. We have plenty. Number two, build up some delayed courage. Go to the strait. Just take it. You'll have to start learning how to fight for yourself. The USA won't be there to help you anymore, just like you weren't there for us.

Iran has been essentially decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil. The premier oil analyst, how's that going to work? I mean, it's just a wild statement from a U.S. president. I think just on two points here. Actually, let's go a third point as well. So hard part's done, you know, you do the rest. Obviously, the rest is the part that's too hard for Trump to do himself. So I would say at this stage, it's not entirely sincere,

although that's not shocking in this environment. I think the part that really hits like a hammer, though, is the go get your own oil exclamation mark, which is essentially like the epigraph on a book about the end of the Carter Doctrine that the United States has been the policeman in this region of the world for decades. It has been the guarantor of these oil supplies

and for the regional security of the Gulf kingdoms and Gulf states and Gulf, you know, oil exporters. It's a complete rewriting of how this situation in the Middle East works. And I, you know, when we're talking about the unilateral taco, I think I kind of see the two most likely scenarios here as kind of the really, really bad scenario where the global economy goes into like a deep recession. We get $200 plus oil. That is the scenario, I think, that we've been grinding towards steadily and disconcertingly of boots on the ground, trying to take Carg Island, et cetera, et cetera. That's where you get prolonged closure of the strait. You get risk of further attacks on regional oil infrastructure. things that can't just be undone, things that are permanent or at least years-long durable. I think that's a scenario, but I see that is so dire that I see it as very difficult to hold as my base case, because I just don't think that any politician, at least alone, Donald Trump,

has the way or a lot to go through with kind of something so long and arduous like that. I think more likely here is the other scenario, which is my base case from the very beginning, which has been what I call the unilateral taco, which is people are like, well, Trump can't just taco. This is not tariffs. This is not trade policy. you know, there are multiple participants of this war. He can't just decide by himself. I humbly disagree, and I think that Trump would likely disagree with that as well. I think if we've seen anything about Trump, he's not bound by precedent, he's not bound by

allies, he's not bound by anything. And I think he's very clearly already bored of this war. I think by this stage he planned to basically be rolling over onto Cuba. I think, you know, I never thought that Trump planned to get this deep, and he never had a plan for once he was this deep. So I think if the consequences keep ramping, and I don't think this is over yet, I think that we still need higher oil prices

and lower equity prices and more economic pain to force that unilateral taco. But that's how I see this eventually going. It's the one day we're just going to get a post. It's like, it's done. You know, U.S. Navy's sailing home. That's how I picture this ending. Let's put C-Zero up on the screen.

We're now officially at national average over $4 a gallon for gas, so a significant and not great milestone. being reached here. Let's say that he does the full taco. Go get your own gas. We're out. Straight of Hormuz. There's new reality. There's a new sheriff in town. We're going to let Iran charge their toll. And you can do deals with them and shiny as you want. We're out of here. Okay. Let's say that that is what happens. What is the damage that's already been done? And how will that trickle throughout the global economy?

Yeah. So the one thing I want to kind of stress here is that in no reasonable scenario coming out, of the Iran war. Do I see the oil market being in a healthier or more secure position than which it entered the war in? Yeah. So I think, you know, any scenario is going to have structurally higher prices. I think in this scenario where you have, you know, a boots on the ground drag out, $200 plus. I think in this scenario of a unilateral taco, Iran having some kind of sovereign control over the straight, which again is just an unthinkable thing to kind of consider long term, but that's what we're looking like we're at least trending towards possibly. In that scenario, I still think that oil prices, currently I'm looking at my screen, Brent's

just about 117. I think that's still too low. I think that, you know, even though this unilateral taco is bearish or a lower price environment than the boots on the ground scenario, I think both of them are still dire and like a deeply untenable supply situation. I think in this scenario where Iran does continue to control the straight, then we're just going to, like, it's just setting us up very predictably for the next crisis. I think this is like, this is a situation that can't last. It is inherently politically untenable and unstable. And we're going to get the next flare-up.

So we go from a long, drawn-out, awful Hormuz closure to maybe like a perennial two-week closure in Hormuz, which seems like an insane thing to bake into the system. And but that's kind of, again, what it's looking like we might be arriving at. Yeah, it really does. Let's go and put A-9 guys up on there on the screen. That's the bill in, that has been passed through Iran. they say that they would impose a toll system in Riyals,

that they would ban passage of U.S. and Israeli vessels through the strait, assert Iranian sovereignty over the airway, strategic waterway, ban any country that imposes unilateral sanctions against Iran. Oman slated to help shape the legal framework. Which, by the way, that Omanian piece is actually pretty significant. Yeah, so, Rory, I mean, let's game this out. I was thinking earlier, I go, how could you be the Gulf countries where you have to get all,

you just got bombed by these people? And now you have to pay them some sort of toll. And maybe they won't even want money and they're like, bombs keep coming unless the bases go. But like, that seems to be the reality. I mean, the UK, Japan, South Korea, all of these Asian countries, they would have to pay. I mean, I don't even know how they could get reales, by the way.

I mean, is there a market to exchange? Like, talk us through what that would look like. Yeah. So just let's talk through the size of the toll first. So I think, you know, what we've seen discussed so far is a $2 million dollar power. passage, which sounds very expensive, but relative to like a VLCC or a very large crude carrier tanker, the largest ones that are typically used, they carry about two million barrels of crude.

So that's only about a dollar or a barrel on toll. That is expensive, but relative to the current deeply, deeply problematic status quo, it is a clear kind of beneficial change to the global supply situation. But to your point, the politics of this are deeply untenable, and it seems unlikely that Iran would allow a complete reopening of the strait. Again, prior to the war, we were having about 100 plus 100 to 120 vessels crossing the street every day. You know, maybe we get back up to 50% of that. Then with some of the offsets that we have in the system, like the Saudi East-West pipeline

and other sources, maybe we get back to something that's, you know, just a deep deficit rather than a catastrophic supply deficit. But I think that's a scenario is that we just have some kind of durable control for Iran in this region, and the Gulf countries kind of having just need to, you know, swallow the bitter pill, because the alternative is existential for them. This, I think, is existential for them as well, but at least it is a scenario where they continue exporting their oil and restarting their economies relative to right now where virtually, I mean, by far their large economic sector is completely sidelined. The other thing Trump says offers as a solution other than go get your

own oil and good luck militarily in the street of Hormuz is, hey, come by from us. We've got plenty of oil. Can you talk about, you know, how our supply fits into the global oil markets and the reality of what that looks like as well? Yeah. So, yeah, definitely. So let's say Europe is the young, because I think that's kind of who he's aiming this tweet at in terms of like the UK reference. The UK and Europe more broadly is a net importer of what we call middle distillates, so diesel, jet fuel, et cetera. Historically, Europe got that from Russia. Following 2022 in the invasion of Ukraine,

they banned the import of Russian oil and gas. And increasingly, they turn, European importers turn to the Middle East and the Gulf for those supplies. So this is obviously particularly acute for them. You can actually, you know, the United States is a net exporter of diesel and middle distillates.

Largely those current cargoes go to Latin America. Mexico is the largest single recipient. So if Europe started to overbid those, one, they'd be paying a very pretty penny for them, and you'd essentially be taking those flows away from Latin American importers, which are going to be in a different entire world of hurt. But I think also what's further going to complicate this is if this crisis continues, if prices get higher and more volatile, I think the one thing that a lot of people, a lot of analysts have been watching for is any signs that the Trump administration is going to pull the trigger

on some kind of trade restrictions, which obviously I think, I mean, the ultimate rugpole here would basically be that Trump starts the Iran war, destabilizes the straight, leaves and says, oh, by the way, your problem, go get your own oil or buy it from us. They're like, okay, we'll buy it from you. And they're like, actually, we're going to ban the export of diesel in the first place. So go find it somewhere else. Like, this is, it's a recurring cycle of kind of bad faith negotiations and diplomacy leading to just a situation that is, you know, sure, the United States, relative to a lot of the rest of the world, is going to be in a relatively better spot because a lot of domestic production, I'm up in Toronto, you know, you have

secure supplies of Canadian crude into the U.S., Midwest, in particular, that can't get enticed away to other regions. So the United States is in a good spot, but the United States exists in a global economy, and the U.S. can, you know, just no matter how strong the U.S. economy is, it's going to feel those buffet, that buffeting from a global economy if it's under that retrenchment of this recessionary pressure. Something I've really learned from you, Rory, is about why an export ban would be a bad idea. You've talked actually about refinery capacity, about the various different types of refineries and what they're built for. Some of it's for foreign oil, some other foreign

refineries built for U.S. oil, about how much that would distort the global market. So when people say, when Trump says you can come by from us, I think, you know, what you're trying to hammer home is, yeah, they'll come by from us, but we have to buy ours, too. And that's really going to be expensive. So it could still be a $6 a gallon type scenario, depending. on where the crude oil market and all of that goes. Not to mention, I mean, I know you're not an LNG expert either, but like that is also kind of critical. Last time I checked for Europe, could you just talk through that about why you're kind of screwed out of way? If you do an export ban, you really would hurt the U.S. market, you know, kind of forever. And if you don't, we're also

still going to have to pay sky high prices. Yeah, just to your point, even aside from the crude quality and the kind of, you know, refinery slate stuff, even just on the product side, if, you know, the U.S. Gulf Coast is the net exporter of diesel and jet fuel and other products like that, whereas the East and West Coast are net importers of gasoline. The relaxation and kind of suspension or waving of the Jones Act could allow some more of those Gulf Coast barrels to the coasts in a way that could help an autarkic kind of U.S. petroleum trade work without completely breaking. But fundamentally, you need these export markets in order to clear additional, like,

let's say, excess diesel from the U.S. Gulf Coast. If you banned the export of that, it would initially manifest as what the white hazard would see is a great thing, which is you'd have excess supplies, you'd have inventories that built up, you'd have depressed diesel prices domestically, briefly, which is going to sound like a great thing for a couple of weeks until that surplus of diesel ends up forcing those Gulf Coast refineries to reduce their run rates because they can't put their diesel anywhere. And that means that you'd end up in a situation where you could actually end up running out

or having a scarcity of gasoline in the U.S. Gulf Coast, which would be. an insane thing. One thing I keep saying is that for advanced economies, this will largely manifest as a debilitating price shock, because we'll be able to, we have very low price sensitivity of these fuels. I like to say, like I'm driving my kids to school regardless of how

high the pump prices, but much of the world does not have that scenario, and they're going to feel the weight of this through supply losses, but as soon, sorry, actual scarcity and the lack of supply, but the way you can short circuit that ability for us to pay for these fuels,

is by beginning to muck with trade. And I think that is the temptation here. And again, that's my worry of if this keeps going, where we could be headed. Let's put C-5 up on the screen. There was an announcement from Russia. They're planning to ban gasoline exports starting on April 1st.

You know, Russia, obviously, major oil producer, a significant global supplier. What is the significance of this? Yeah, so I think you're seeing a lot of countries around the world. Russia is one example. is another example, I think even more critically, that has banned the export of refined fuels. In 2022, they were a very important swing producer into that diesel-starved market. With Russia specifically, Russia isn't often typically, it's a very, very minor net export of gasoline.

And ever since Ukraine's attacks on domestic refining infrastructure, it's increasingly have actually been pushed into a scenario of net imports. So the reason that they're banning exports is to kind of try and hold back as much of that gasoline is possible. The bigger concern would be if you started seeing Russia banning the export of diesel, unlike gasoline where they're a minor export player, diesel, they're a major export player, more like a million barrels a day versus, let's say, gasoline had 100,000 barrels a day. And in that scenario, again, diesel in middle distillates, the tightest area of the market, that would, you know, really, really hurt in terms of those refining margins of cracks,

and the prices you and I see at the pump. But one thing on Moscow, I just, I keep repeating this, that Moscow is the single largest beneficiary of the Iran War, both in terms of an overall higher price environment, explicit removal of sanctions by the U.S. Treasury against Russian, and, shockingly, in this context, even Iranian crude. And I think all of the pressure that the White House had very successfully imposed on the Russian oil industry, you know, over the past, you know, eight, nine months, that was undone in a month. And I think we're back to square one. And I think the one rubbed to this is that the one person who knows, this has been a boon and likely a windfall for Putin is Zelensky.

And what we've seen over the past couple weeks is Ukrainian forces dramatically ramping up attacks against Russian export infrastructure. Last week, Reuters had it at 40% of Russian oil export infrastructure was offline, was the largest disruption to Russian supply in modern history, on top of the largest supply shock in the oil market's entire history happening in the Gulf, just entirely separately. So there's this pro-sicist. element now that the higher oil prices go, the more pressure Ukraine is going to put on Russian

exports, and that's going to put prices higher, and again, ramp pressure further. So even more geopolitical spiral. My last question before you, man, is let's put C3. I love this map that you put out there. I believe it was made by J.P. Morgan, which shows the actual, like, you said where the air pocket, which is kind of a way that you could think about the supply loss, is moving through the world. So East Africa was already hit.

East Asia this week. We're literally about to do an entire block about. all of the global chaos and South Korean president being like, I can't sleep at night, Europe next week. And you say North America two more weeks. Now the Secretary Hegseth took the podium this morning, basically refused to give some sort of a timeline. The war is not going to end today. That's for sure. It's going to end sometime in the future. But you're saying two weeks coming up on that. What does that look like? We're already at $4 a gallon here in the U.S. nationally. Let's say two more weeks when that pocket hits us. How does that manifest? Are we

going to have supply shortages? Are we going to be Australia with, you know, petrol, stations that are closed? What's that look like for us? So I think the United States, like I was saying earlier, is in a beneficial and kind of privileged position that it likely won't immediately run into any major physical shortages. But to your point of like US average gas prices already back over four bucks a gallon, the price pressure is going to keep coming. So like that chart shows that that air pocket, and just to give the logic of this, you know, before the war, you had tankers leaving the Gulf fully laden with crude. They take upwards of a month or a month and a half. And so, you know, to get where they're going.

You're not going to feel the loss of those supplies and the closure of the strait until that final tanker reaches your shores, behind which there's nothing but air. That's the air pocket. That air pocket is landing in Asia likely this week, Europe next week and North America two weeks after. But if you look at that chart,

North America also doesn't get that much oil from the Gulf anymore. It used to get a lot more. Shell Revolution and growth in Canadian production has largely displaced those barrels, but we got big, we end up back in the situation. the United States is still an importer of, or is still an importer of various fuels

on the coasts and of crude oil in the Gulf because of quality issues, those barrels that are imported are going to have furious demand and competition for them already. And as Asia starts drawing down stocks because that air pocket has arrived and then Europe next week, that's when you're going to see mounting

and ever more pressure. And one thing we keep talking about is this disconnect between paper or financial futures and crude and the physical market underlying these industries, that has remained fairly wide. When that air pocket lands, it's going to wedge those things together. We're going to see way more of that physical pressure manifests in the prices that we see on our screen. And, Roy, if you could, best you can, sort of bottom line it for consumers who are listening,

like what should their expectations be over the coming weeks at what they're going to pay at the pump? It's going to be a very, very expensive driving season, like, you know, easily the most expensive driving season since 2022. and if this continues through April and further, we will very, very likely see all-time high pump prices and surely all-time high diesel prices in the United States. Great. All right. Well, you know, heading into good weather, but...

We got a note of the plan. We trust you, and you are not a sensational person. That's one of the reason I really enjoy speaking with you. Well, he is a sensational person, but not a... Yeah, sorry. Not a sensational list. Thank you, person. He's not...

What's the term permable? You're not a permable in the oil space. Everybody go follow Rory and subscribe to your substack. Thanks, man. Thank you for joining us. Thanks for having me. You know Roldahl. He thought up Willie Wonka and the BFG.

But did you know he was a spy? In the new podcast, The Secret World of Rold Dahl, I'll tell you that story, and much, much more. What? You probably won't believe it either. Was this before he wrote his stories? It must have been. Okay, I don't think that's true.

I'm telling you. I was a spy. Listen to the secret world of Roll Doll on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Lori Siegel, and on my new podcast, Mostly Human, I'll take you to some wild corners of the tech world. I'm about to go on a date with an AI companion at a real world cafe right here in New York City. There's no playbook for what to do when an AI model hallucinates a story about you. Mostly Human is your playbook for how tech can work for you. Anyone can now be an entrepreneur.

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