Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 6/20/25: Ro Khanna Flames Schumer On Iran, WH May Use 'TACTICAL NUKES & MORE!

Episode Date: June 20, 2025

Krystal, Saagar, Emily and Ryan discuss Ro Khanna flames Chuck Schumer, US floats tactical nuke in Iran, MAGA civil war over Iran, media warmongering & MORE! 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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But enough with that, let's get to the show. Good morning, everybody. Happy Friday. We've got the whole team here, plus special guest, Congressman Ro Khanna, fresh off a Theo Vonn appearance. Great to see you, sir. Great to see you.

Not quite a breaking point appearance, but you know, it was a good one. This is, are you, Yeah, what are you talking about? You get the full team. Very rarely does a full full team. I'm talking about Theo von doesn't quite as big as the breaking points That's very kind, you know So we're gonna talk to the congressman here for a little while then he's gonna run and catch a flight There's a bunch of updates with regard to Iran and Israel. We want to get to you

We'll see how far we are able to get with that. We've also got some Zoran news we might jump on. We've got some Obama comments we might get to. We should ask the congressman about the Obama comments. And then Ryan is Turtle Boy joining. Is that a thing that's happening? Oh, you're muted, Ryan. Yes. Producer Griffin says that Turtle Boy will be in the back end of the show.

So if there's ever been a reason to become a paying subscriber, that's says that turtle boy will be in the back end of the show. So if there's ever been a reason to become a paying subscriber, that's that's the guy who broke it. I was thinking when I get off, I'm going to Google that. I have heard I just have never heard I don't know what it means. Make sure it's doctor you Google doctor turtle boy not just to avoid. He is the local Massachusetts reporter who kind of broke the Karen Reed story out into that in a national view.

And he's so he's now on taking his victory laps after her acquittal. Gotcha. Okay, so lots to get to in the show. So first, Congress and I wanted to start off by getting you to react to a little bit of you just play a little piece of this at the Yvonne appearance. You can tell us what your, you know, what your experience was and what he sort of wanted to focus on here. I thought, I thought this part was interesting.

He started off the podcast world. Now you like react to yourself on podcast. Exactly. Yeah. Well, and this is, you know, exclusive, your first reaction to you being on. So in any case, he wanted to start off talking about Iran, talking about Gaza. I'm about like 30 minutes into the podcast thus far, but let's go ahead and

pick up with this part and then we'll get your reaction. It is Trump. Is Donald Trump afraid of Netanyahu? I don't understand that, you know, cause Trump certainly feels like he's seen, he is a guy who does not seem afraid to say what he wants to say. I don't think he, I don't know what it is, because I want Trump to do the right thing. Like I want him to start to end the war in Gaza

to actually figure out how we get peace there. And I think he could, he could, if he picks up the phone and he says, Netanyahu, you're done, Netanyahu is gonna stop the bombing. And then Netanyahu is gonna say, OK, but we got Hamas. I can't stay here with Hamas. And Trump can say, OK, I'm going to help you get rid of Hamas.

But you can't keep bombing and killing women and children. That's not getting rid of Hamas. Yeah, it's freaking crazy, dude. I mean, it's just like. And so you get Egypt, you get Jordan, you get Saudi Arabia. I call it the 23-state solution. You get all of those Arab states. Put Mississippi.

Dude, I'll tell you this, we can give Mississippi to Palestine. I've been saying that for. Give Mississippi to Palestine. Classic Theobon solves. Finds Middle East peace. But Congressman, what was, what was your experience in? Were there any particular moments that we should really like pay attention to, or that you found particularly noteworthy?

really like pay attention to or that you found particularly noteworthy? I was amazed by his passion, his empathy, his outrage with what's going on in Gaza. I mean, you could just see it in his voice. It was just this utter frustration that the United States was complicit in the killing of women and children. And Theo Vonn is always someone who takes the side of the underdog and also kind of

just reflects American values of someone who hasn't thought and read every Brookings paper. He's just like, look, this is wrong. And I was also struck by how concerned, scared, outraged it was that we were thinking of getting into another war in Iran. That's a very important. So, Congressman, that's actually one of the main things we wanted to focus on with you is the role here of the Democratic Party and of the opposition. One of the things that's really rhyming for me, going back and really thinking about what happened in Iraq is I don't see a mobilization of the Democratic establishment on the Iran question.

You know, we've had Thomas Massey and leaders like you who have introduced, you know, the need for a declaration or an approval by Congress. I guess we can give it to the Bush administration. At least they went to the lengths with that. But here the Trump administration is taking a completely unilateral approach. And we have not yet seen calls from major Democratic leaders for this, yeah, exactly like as you say here, what does this mean from Senator Schumer?

I'm just wondering if you can expound on that and the lack of leadership right now from the Democratic Party on the Iran war question. It's deeply disappointing. This is like the Iraq war moment. The Democratic Party should be in unison, screaming from the rooftop, we don't want another war in the Middle East.

Donald Trump won the presidency because he said that the Iraq war was a disaster, and Jeb Bush wasn't willing to say that. He won over a lot of people who previously supported Democrats because he committed that we weren't gonna get into another war in the Middle East. We've had Iraq war cheerleaders in our party who ran for president. John Kerry, Hillary Clinton,

John Edwards. It didn't work out so well for them. And then we had people who stood opposed to the war like Barack Obama, who did very very well, and Bernie Sanders. My view is that this is the moment the Democratic Party can reclaim the anti-war mantle. Obviously, we should have unison of Democrats on my War Powers resolution in the House. This isn't even a close call. And we should have Senator Schumer,

instead of saying, oh, I don't know, maybe they should strike him, maybe Trump isn't tough enough, he should be behind Tim Kaine and saying every Democrat needs to oppose this war. Yeah. Just from a cynical perspective, it seems like if you're a politician looking for future advantage, the play here would be, even if you're not against war, would be to speak out against war and reap those benefits going forward. At the same time,

the no kings protests had, you know, hundreds of thousands of people around the country. You have Democrats saying that he's an authoritarian, that he's a threat to democracy. They've been saying that for a very long time. It's how do they blend this idea that, okay, yes, he's a threat to democracy, he's authoritarian, he's a tyrant, but maybe, but I'm okay with this war that this tyrant is going to operate. When you talk to people privately, what is holding them back from just coming out with a full-throated opposition to Donald Trump just launching a war against Iran? Well, your first point there, Ryan, was K, that it's not just that we should be opposed to this war, but we should be opposed to Donald Trump waking up

and deciding whether to commit us to a war based on the last conversation he had. I mean, everyone should be for this coming to Congress, especially if you think that Trump has overreached his constitutional authority and consolidated power. A number of people, they have been itching, some of them candidly in the Congress, to take out Iran's nuclear facilities. And this is something that there are a number of Democrats

and Republicans that they want to do this. And they think magically, okay, we're gonna have a military strike against Bordeaux and Iran will not have a nuclear bomb and then everything will be peaceful in the Middle East. Well, first of all, we know that this story has been told before.

We're gonna have a successful military operation. Everything will work out. We took out Saddam Hussein. Then what happened? We got stuck for almost a decade in Iraq. We're going to get rid of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, everything will be fine. We got stuck for nearly 20 years in Afghanistan.

The idea that we can strike for dough and that Iran isn't gonna retaliate against American troops in Iraq, that they aren't gonna retaliate with counterterrorism against Americans is utter naive thinking. It's gonna draw us into a conflict. And for what?

We don't even know if the bunker bombs can destroy the entire Fordow site. At best, it's going to push Iran back two to three years in developing nuclear weapons, and they're going to rip up the NPT, their involvement in the NPT. They're gonna push out all inspectors. And we know in the past, the Obama deal

had it so that Iran couldn't enrich beyond 5% at any place other than Netan. Now they're enriching at 60% at Fordow. We know we've had a deal before. Even if you think the deal wasn't perfect, it was much, much, much better than the situation we have now or the situation we will have if Iran gets out of the NPT and kicks out all the inspectors. So those are just the facts. I don't know why the Democratic Party isn't bolder. It's a symptom not just of being acquiescent to

another war. It's a symptom of a lack of leadership. You know, I almost have to see more conviction on Lindsey Graham being like, let's go bomb him. I mean, that's the worst of all world. Well, and Congressman, can I ask to what extent you assess? I mean, we are all looking around and thinking why Democrats, even from the cynical perspective that Ryan raised, are you not, you know, mustering the same level of opposition that Sager pointed out you used to see during the Iraq war? Why is that not happening? And to what extent would you attribute

that to the donor class of the Democratic Party? Do you think that's who's in the ear of Chuck Schumer stopping him and other high profile Democrats from going all in with a sense of conviction? First of all, on the war powers question, and then on the question of the war itself. I think it's the foreign policy hawks and the beltway that people listen to. I'm sure there's- I mean, Schumer wasn't for the Obama nuclear deal. So-

The Obama nuclear deal, he was one of the cheerleaders for the war in Iraq. Like, how are these people still around with credibility and foreign policy? Why should we care at all- I mean, should he resign? Do you think he should resign? What about another war in Iraq. How are these people still around with credibility and foreign policy? Why should we care at all? I mean, should he resign? Do you think he should resign? Or another war in the Middle East?

Like, why should he even matter? Yeah, do you think he should resign, Congressman, at this point? It almost doesn't matter. He should be seen as totally irrelevant. Like, the average person on the street has more common sense about the Middle East than Chuck Schumer. Chuck Schumer's record on the Middle East

is opposing Obama's Iran deal, is cheerleading George W. Bush to get into a war in Iraq, is now having nonsensical statements about Tim Kaine's war power resolution. Why does he matter on this debate? People say, oh, go on podcasts, go on Theovon, and they're usually thinking about it from an electoral perspective. And of course, they're're usually thinking about it from an electoral perspective. And of course, they're right that we should be going on these podcasts, but you know why they should go on TheoVon? Because TheoVon talks to truck drivers and talks to folks

who are working in construction and industry and young kids or recent college graduates, and he's reflecting what most Americans are thinking about issues, agree with him or not. And he is saying overwhelmingly people don't want another war. They're afraid that they may get called up and have to serve in Iran. They're concerned about the cost. They're wondering why we're not spending that money and time in the United States. And I feel like instead of listening to the people advising Chuck Schumer, maybe this party should be listening to people who are talking to Theo Bon and we do much better in terms of building the coalition and we wouldn't need these ridiculous 20 million consultant studies that are going

to go to the same people that are advising Chuck Schumer. Unbelievable. I wanted to ask you about this though. We've got Thomas Massey sponsored the War Power Resolution. You're one of the lead co-sponsors here. There's no other Republicans on it, though. So for all the talk of America first, the split in MAGA, et cetera, and there's zero Republicans on the Senate version of it.

So what is the reluctance here? What's going on? You're right. I mean, at the base of MAGA, I would say at least a third of them don't want this war. And you have very outspoken people like Tucker Carlson, like Steve Bannon, like Marjoleke Taylor-Dream. What they're saying, the reason they're giving for us, for not getting on this war power resolution as well, there's not a war.

Well, don't you think Congress should weigh in before there's a war? I mean, if- Also, there is a war. I mean, that's just a nonsense way of thinking about it, but go ahead. Yeah, I mean, they're saying, well, we haven't struck Iran yet.

That the United States hasn't struck. Now, Ted Cruz admitted on that Pepper Carlson clip that we are helping Israel in the bombing of Iran. But the point is that they're trying to avoid the issue because they don't want to get in the crosshairs of Donald Trump. I believe that the pressure is going to build on the MAGA base for some of these Republicans

to break. And look, people say it doesn't matter. I do think the fact that Trump is saying, now I'm gonna wait two weeks, is partly a recognition that the bunker bombs may not even achieve the objective. But it's also partly a recognition that a lot of the MAGA base is upset and he's hearing the anti-war sentiment. And if the Democratic Party was unified in our opposition, maybe we could actually prevent this war. I mean, it would influence Donald Trump, who is so susceptible to where public opinion is.

It's not just a lack of leadership for how do we win. It's an actual moral moment, like you're in Congress for these big decisions and the vast majority of members of Congress have just been solid. Yeah, go ahead, Ryan. Joe, just speaking of going on Theo Vaughan, have you reached out at all to Bannon or Tucker Carlson to appear on their program?

Cause that seems like the kind of seal that hasn't been broken yet. But if you listen to, as you have been lately, a lot of Tucker Carlson, like 80% of the time he's making a lot of sense. Then he goes around. Yeah. I'll get in touch with Tucker on some of the clips.

I'm just concerned if I go on, he's gonna start asking me the population of every country. That better be nice. I am. Do your job and study. I have no sympathy. I'm confident you can handle that a little better, Gauz. But I also think if you say, look, I don't want to invade that country, therefore I don't need to know their population.

There you go. Fair. It's a fair question. But you know, I do think we need to, I mean, I'd be open to going on, but more importantly, I think we need to be sharing their clips, sharing what they're saying. I was on CNN and they thought they had a gotcha question saying, oh, that means you agree with Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson. And I said, yes, it does.

On this issue, I agree with them. I'm hoping that they actually can convince some of the Republicans to get on. One of the things, Congressman, I know you're on the Senate Armed Services Committee, so maybe you can speak a little bit to this. There has been now open questioning by Donald Trump and actually a lot in the open source environment as to whether these massive ordinance penetrators could even accomplish the goal of taking out the Fordo nuclear facility. So I'm wondering, you know, based on your own knowledge, I'm sure you've sat in briefings and others, what your assessment of this easy strike, which is being pushed by the CENTCOM commander, Carilla, and what the reality of something

like that could look like. Well, based on public information, I don't know. And I don't think most people know. And that's the real issue. I mean, first of all, maybe it's 50-50 it'll work, but it could be too deep. Maybe we hit some of it but don't get all of it. And the reality is the best case scenario, that we hit all of it. We don't know how widespread Iran's nuclear capability is.

We know that they have scientists who can rebuild it. We know they have spare centrifuges. You're not going to destroy all of it. And we know that within a year to three years, they can start to rebuild their nuclear sites. Then what? Because they're going to then kick out the inspectors. We won't even know where they're building it.

And the lesson they'll draw is the lesson that Pakistan and North Korea drew, that if you have a nuclear bomb, you're safe from American invasion. If you don't, you could be Libya, Iraq, or Afghanistan, or Iran. The logic on this makes no sense for us to get in, especially when we had a deal

where Iran was committed to less than 5% enrichment, even if they were cheating. Let's say they were at 10%, 15%, they weren't at 60%. And so the effort needs to be to get a deal. I was one of the Democrats, so I got criticized for this too. I don't make every call right. I was cheering Donald Trump when he said, let's get a deal. Chuck Schumer was saying, oh, you're making side deals with Iran. I was like, great. Let him make a deal with Iran. Taco Trump, no, no, no, no. Let him, let him do his thing.

Taco might be one of the most destructive things that's ever happened. Thanks, Wall Street. Yeah. Horrible. Horrible. All right. Congresswoman, I know we got to let you go. Thank you so much for jumping on this morning.

It's always great to talk to you and get your insights. Thank you. We appreciate it. Take care Just like great shoes great books take you places through unforgettable love stories and into conversations with characters You'll never forget. I think any good romance it gives me this feeling of like butterflies I'm Danielle Robay and this is bookmarked by Reese's Book Club, the new podcast from Hello Sunshine and iHeart Podcasts. Every week I sit down with your favorite book lovers, authors, celebrities, book talkers, and more to explore the stories that shape us, on the page and off.

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or wherever you get your podcasts. So he brought up the two weeks thing, the white house is floating. Uh, Caroline Levitt said like, Oh, Trump's going to decide in the next two weeks. I mean, I just like, I don't know, what do you guys make of it? Because I just, you can't trust anything. These people say it could be another faint to just, you know, let the Iranians sort of relax again before they bomb them in five minutes. I don't know what are what's your guys?

What I think and this is based on a little bit of some people I've added to is and at first let me set the stage. What we're dealing with. This is not a normal White House. We are basically in the court of Versailles. All right. No one can criticize the legitimacy of the monarch. So that's why you why Steve Bannon and Tucker have to target the neocons who are talking with him. Everything is about gaining the audience of the king, end of the year of the king, and the king can vacillate from time to time.

But his own legitimacy of the throne cannot be called into question. He's all powerful and he's all knowing. So what's really happened, I think, over the last couple of days is, I can say equivocally, the Bannon lunch was a pivotal moment. So Steve Bannon was yesterday at the White House had lunch with Donald Trump, I don't think he

said anything different in his private comments than he did publicly. So that's very encouraging. And that did lead to the so called two week deadline. Now, if it were up to Donald Trump, I'm actually relatively confident that we would be heading towards some sort of diplomatic solution. The problem is, of course, the Israeli question on the side, because what Israel now has is two weeks to mount the pressure campaign of the century. First and foremost, there's a credible report out today from the Iranian foreign minister

who's in Geneva to speak with the European foreign ministers that somebody tried to kill him possibly even the Israelis and or advisors around them. Remember they already took out one of the negotiators who spoke with Steve Wichoff There's also crystal. Maybe you can pull this up. I tweeted it out from the Times of Israel The Israeli foreign minister The Israeli defense minister today said he has officially greenlit strikes on the regime. We're not even talking specifically about nuclear facilities. They are, in the next two weeks,

basically have a free military hand to ramp up military strikes on the Iranian regime and specifically to try to kill all of the people around the Ayatollah. So like I said, if it were just up to Donald Trump, I genuinely do believe we would be heading to this. It does seem that he's been spooked a bit by some of these reports and questioning the CENTCOM intelligence as to whether the Fordo facility really could be taken out by the US military. But Israel really could, you know, really could force our hand. Yeah, you could see it right there. Katz

instructs the IDF to quote destabilize the Iranian regime with intensified airstrikes and Israel. They're not doing well right now. I mean, I know that sounds crazy to say because of all their propaganda. They're running out of interceptors. The war is costing Israel hundreds of millions of dollars per day per The Wall Street Journal. Commercial air shutdown is devastating the economy. Nobody's going to work.

How can you work when every single night you're spending in a bomb shelter looking at your phone? So their society is in chaos. Every single time one of those interceptor gets fired, it's $700,000 to $2 million. The flight cost of an F-35 is like, I don't even know, $35,000 per hour. They're going bankrupt. And will, according to their own former bank official, I was reading this morning, we're looking at a bill well over 12 billion a single month of the war in Iran, which not a lot for us, but that's a lot over for them. So I would say like we have had a

factional victory in getting to the two two week period. But obviously, I really don't think Trump is the principal actor here, especially because the Iranians won't meet with us. They're meeting right now with the Europeans. It's the Israelis who are going to try to destabilize. And then it's really Trump and what to the extent that he wants to insert himself as the primary policymaker in this process Yeah, and I think it's our curious and you guys to take on this but like if 50 years from now when they look back at Kind of how the conflict overall between the United States and the up-and-coming powers played out the US Decision based on pressure from the military industrial complex to go into this

like Rolls Royce style approach to and literally Rolls Royce is one of the main contractors for US weapons. To make it so that you have these this massively high margin industry that is making lots of people very rich. Despite the fact that strategically, the numbers are just idiotic. In other words, if you're spending seven hundred thousand to two million dollars on an interceptor against a missile that costs your adversary 10,000 or 50,000 dollars to put together in the case of Yemen, the orders of magnitude were even further apart. Yes.

We're a couple, we're like a week plus into this. Yes. Imagine a year out. Like it's as if nobody did the math on this, but the Israelis, they did do the math. And the math for them is we cannot afford this. We also cannot do it ourselves militarily, but the United States can afford it, at least in the medium term. is we cannot afford this. We also cannot do it ourselves militarily,

but the United States can afford it, at least in the medium term, and the United States can do it militarily. So they did the math and they didn't conclude, well, I guess we shouldn't do this. They concluded, let's do this and just bank on the fact that the United States is gonna come in behind us. That's a small conflict between these two countries,

Israel and Iran. If there is ever a bigger conflict, you could just see how long the United States would be able to carry on before it's it is itself. Bankrupt isn't the right word, but just out of ammunition. We can ammunition costs. Yeah, I can pull that up. Actually, let me find that. Yeah, I mean, this is a this is a tried and true thing about countries that always, you know, one of the, for example, if you, that's one, there's a great book behind me, which is about the ammunition shortage during World War I. And the

amount of ammunition they used in the first month of the war is what they projected they were going to have to use for the entire war. And so after like three weeks, they're like, oh shit, they're like, now what? And they're like, you know what you do? You have to go into total war. And so after like three weeks, they're like, Oh, shit, they're like, now what? And they're like, you know what you do, you have to go into total war, you have to lock down your economy, you have to seize control of all of the industry, and basically, Marshall and mobilize to produce as much as humanly possible, and you will literally go bankrupt as all of the European great powers did basically became

subservient, you know, bank, bank loaners to the United States of America. That's the entire story behind the fall of the British Empire. So that is a very, very good lesson. Now, I'm not saying it can't be done, but the point is, is that you have to marshal your entire society towards it. But you're exactly right, Ryan, from what I have read. The Israelis are like, yeah, we knew we couldn't afford it. We're just going to get America to pay for it.

And that's the problem. Usually a pretty safe bet. Put it on the visa. Yeah, they're right, though. See, that's the thing. At the end of the day, they are right. And this is why I'm still pessimist, even though I do think we have won a victory. People who want to, you know, to avoid this going all out yet. I do think we have won some of a victory and we may still have a chance, right? The Europeans are meeting with all of them, but I would still put it around 2530% simply because of unrestrained Israeli military action. There's a story out this morning from

the New York Times, the US intelligence assesses that there's two scenarios right now where Iran goes for a nuclear bomb. One is kill the Ayatollah two is the US military strikes for dough. Well, you know, what what is the Israeli option there for they're going to try and kill the Ayatollah just yesterday, they hit a bunker in which the Ayatollah was thought to be in. Now the ostensible target was one of the Ayatollah's quote advisors he's survived by the way, at least according to the Iranians. But that's where

things are like you see the IDF action and also they can do math to Ryan, they can't afford this shit for too much longer you know already there are you know prioritizing their interceptors remember the censorship blackout in Israel is real we have no idea what is being hit or not and there's a reason for that and it's because these they are now having to prioritize maybe military interceptors but they have to let civilians get hit right so you're gonna start to see the death toll rack up. They've got problems. Sorry.

I would dare you. I forgot that I'm talking about the most moral army in the world. The most moral army in the world would never make that decision. But that's my point is these Israelis are the the Israelis are the most aggressive, you know, actor in this and they just have such an incredible ability to shape events without being restrained by US policy. Shape events. That's very okay. I mean, okay. I know what I'm saying. They can just they can just do whatever they want to do.

And America, Trump does not pick up the phone. I don't know what you're saying. But I'm saying they can just do whatever they want to do. No, it's true. Trump does not pick up the phone. I mean, it's like the one, there's this whole thing about the Ayatollah, but. This is Bibi's claim to fame is that he knows how to work us over. And it's freaking true. I mean, he is one of us. He is an American. I mean, he's born in Philadelphia.

Okay, so if you really want to get into it. Emily, Emily, what are your thoughts? Like, what are you hearing and what are your thoughts on where we stand right now? Well, I think actually Sager just did a little, like, very helpful reporting by saying, having talked to folks, he thinks that Bannon lunch was significant because there's a real question as to whether the two weeks is cold water, whether it is, you know, sort of the lust for another interventionist conflict, or is it a negotiating tactic where Trump is, as you said at the start of the show, crystal giving the two-week window and then immediately gonna move the next day or the day after something like that, but everything that we've just laid out about the costs

and about the sort of timeline tells me two weeks is most likely going to be two days in some respect or another. I mean, I just I think the cold weeks feels like I think it feels like a sort of last ditch helpful dose of cold water, but the machine has been turned on and it's lurching towards the conflict. I mean, at this point, it feels like turning the Titanic around. So the two weeks, I agree with Sagar is obviously better than, you know, not having us being at war, you know, directly right now. But yeah, right. I mean, I'm for all those reasons. It's like, I'm very cognizant of the fact that first of all, at least according to the Trump administration, you know, the last movements towards diplomatic negotiations were just a ruse. So there's that. There also

previously were these reports out that effectively the plan was to give Iran one final deal ultimatum that contains in it the sort of poison pills that we know will make it, you know, guaranteed that the Iranians won't take it. Not to mention, if you're the Iranians at this point, how can you negotiate with these people? Like, on every level, not only did you already negotiate a deal with them that they just were like, yeah, we're not going to do that anymore, but then they're broadcasting to the world that, like, yeah, we pretended we were going to go forward with these negotiations,

we were just tricking you so that you could be attacked and destroyed. So Iranian nationalism is mounting because of all of that. Oh, yeah, definitely. Oh, yeah. By the way, they took to the streets on Friday and actually across the Muslim world. Friday prayers have reportedly been like overwhelming in their support for the Iranians, even amongst the Sunni populations, which that's hard to do. Yeah. For everybody out there. I mean, that's what, you know, Saurabh and Trisha have been telling us. They've you know, they're seeing unfold this rally around.

I mean, it's entirely predictable. It's entirely predictable. Think about us after 9-11, right? George W. Bush had like a 90 percent approval rating. I was like, yes, let's go. So, of course, that's going to happen. And I just, you know, obviously the space for negotiating a deal has dramatically,

dramatically closed. And then to your point, Sagar, like you have this incredibly nefarious actor in Netanyahu who you can't put anything past this guy in terms of what he's willing to do to make sure that we're gonna be there to help him effectuate the plans that he has had for decades at this point. So it's, you know, precarious is like the,

the probably like lowest nicest thing I could say about where we sit right now. It's really quite dire. Yeah, it's not good. Go ahead, Ryan. Just real quickly to respond to what Crystal said, I actually put that, I put that question that you asked about. How can they trust us to get back into negotiations directly to a couple of Iranian sources?

And they said, well, look, the thing you have to understand is. Like, maybe you had a better perception of the United States 10 years ago. We never did. Like, we have never trusted the United States, no matter who the president was. They were right. And so we were not shocked that they pulled out of the JCPOA. And we were not shocked that they attacked us. They and Israel attacked us. They expected it.

They saw it coming. So their answer was, you make deals not based on trust, but expediency and necessity. And then you put everything into the deal that you possibly can to make it enforceable. And that's why, you know, the Russians and the Europeans were part of the JCPOA, some hope that like, you know, global involvement, you know, would pressure the United States to stick in it. Obviously didn't, but go ahead. Yeah, let me pick up on that because this is actually

one thing that gives me a little bit of hope is that the main parties meeting with the Iranians today are the European powers. And Macron actually has a quote comprehensive offer to Tehran. I can read a little bit from this and I'm reading from the Financial Times Crystal. It says, Macron said negotiations must move towards zero in uranium enrichment as foreign ministers will meet with them and they will present to them this, quote, comprehensive negotiation offer, which would put an end to the hostilities,

namely it would cause a ceasefire, as well as lead to zero enrichment from the Iranians. Again, I don't know if that's what the Iranians would agree to, but really, the real problem here is that the so-called comprehensive offer, even according to the French and the Europeans, is that the so-called comprehensive offer, even according to the French and the Europeans, is that it also has to be acceptable to Israel. I just don't think that there is any deal at this point which is acceptable to Israel,

which again is one of those things where it's the United States of America who would probably take that deal. But the Israelis would be like, oh, how can we trust it? Zero enrichment, yeah. Right. But even with zero enrichment, they would say, how can we trust you that you're not going to they'd be like, you need to basically let me occupy your nuclear facility, right? They're gonna know this not

gonna happen. Another really nightmare. If it's mutual. Yeah, right. But one like, nightmarish scenario I see right now is that Israelis are now talking about some sort of Grand Commando raid on the Fordo facility like occupying the way that they did in Syria. But I mean, look, the risk there is just so insanely fraught and especially if it were to become a disaster. And then you could easily see how things snowball from there. A failed Israeli commando slash strike raid that fails to take out power, doesn't finish the job. And then

the Iranians are like, screw it, let's go sprint to the bomb. Right. I mean, there's so much here, which would obviously just almost immediately draw America in. So I'm like cautiously, like 25% optimistic about this, but I just, I don't see how we can surmount, you know, the Israeli, I don't see how we can surmount like you know, the Israeli, I don't see how we can surmount like all of their clear strategic objectives at this point, unless a different Donald Trump emerges, who is like, no, we're done, this is what we're doing. But I mean, he couldn't even stop Israel

from striking Iran, if that's even to be believed. You know, and that's part of the problem. Right, we don't even know that he wanted to. He didn't want to. I mean, let's not be foolish here, right? And I think Ken Klippenstein, and now his reporting was confirmed by Reuters, I think that, you know, Trump for a while,

and Biden too, by the way, was like, no, you're not doing that, you're not doing that, you're not doing that. And then Trump was doing the same for a while, and then he stopped saying no, and that is the equivalent of a green light Now maybe you know that way you have plausible deniability that you didn't affirmatively say yes go ahead But of course the Israelis are gonna know as soon as you are like, oh well do what you want to do

They know exactly what that means. And so, you know Trump knew exactly was unfolding here. He he greenlit this I mean we saw the buildup We all were watching closely as to what was ultimately going to unfold. So he wanted this to happen. He greenlit it. We shipped hundreds of Hellfire missiles to Israel in advance of these strikes. So it's like, I don't want to, yes, Netanyahu

is doing everything he can to create that outcome. But ultimately, it's Donald Trump who decided, yes, this is the direction that we're ultimately going to go in. We're going to let Israel attack Iran days before we're supposed to have the next round of negotiations. Even though, I mean, from all indications, there was a plausible chance of actually

being able to seal some sort of a deal and achieve a diplomatic solution, which is much more unlikely at this point after we blew up our own deal-making ability. and achieve a diplomatic solution, which is much more unlikely at this point after, you know, after we blew up our own our own deal making ability. And we have some relevant comments I can put up from a senior Iranian advisor that goes exactly to this point. Let me put this up where basically he's saying do this.

And this is a close advisor to the Ayatollah saying that it is it would be a mistake to do to reach a ceasefire at this point because israel is going to break the ceasefire in two months and they will use the two months or whatever the period is to restock their supplies particularly of of interceptor missiles so any ceasefire that is implemented now will lead to renewed war. We should not allow the enemy, which is currently in a weak position to revive itself with a ceasefire. And he goes on through, you know, with that analysis. But I think this is a consequence of, you know, the US and Israel not abiding by any of its agreements, whether it's the January ceasefire that they reached with Hamas and then said they were going to break and then broke, broke, whether it was the deal over Edon Alexander,

where they said, if you release Edon Alexander, we'll let in aid and we'll push for a ceasefire. And they, and they did none of that, whether it's, you know, assassinating Hanee in Tehran, as they're getting very close to a deal and on and on. If you believe that a ceasefire can't be trusted, then why reach a ceasefire unless you are on the brink of like regimen elimination? Just like great shoes, great books take you places. Through unforgettable love stories and into conversations with characters you'll never

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or wherever you get your podcasts. Let me put this up on the screen and get your reaction to it. This was the, just to put it out there, this is the reporting from Cy Hirsch of what his sources are telling him it's gonna happen. Say mixed bag in terms of his reporting accuracy. But I think it's good to put it all on the table.

Michael Tracy tweeted these portions. So he according to his reporting, this report on what is most likely to happen in Iran is early this weekend, according to Israeli insiders and American officials I've relied upon for decades will entail heavy American bombing. I have vetted this report with a longtime US official in Washington official in Washington who told me that it will all be under control if Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei departs. Just how that might happen, short of his assassination is not known.

There's been a great deal of talk about American firepower targets inside Iran, but little practical thinking as far as I can tell about how to remove a revered religious leader with an enormous following. Next piece here, he says, I've been told the White House has signed off on an all-out bombing campaign in Iran, but the ultimate targets, the centrifuges,

buried at least 80 meters below the surface at Fort Doe, will as of this writing not be struck until the weekend. Delay has come at Trump's insistence because, now this does kind of ring true, the president wants the shock of the bombing to be diminished before the opening of Wall Street trading on Monday. Trump took issue on social media this morning with the Wall Street Journal report that said he had decided on the attack on Iran, writing he had yet to decide on a path forward. So what are your thoughts on that? And Krista, could you? Okay. So I was going to say keep that up. Yeah. There was a- Oh, sorry. I'll re-share it. No, no, no. Because I just wanted to zoom in on the Hananiya post about the sort of disputed accuracy of Sy Hersh's record because Hananiah sort of has this like snarky reply.

I remember Seymour Hersh reporting that we were soon to bomb Iran during the Bush administration. And I know what he's saying, but I actually think that's an interesting point because it tells you who has been leaking over the course of decades to try to force a bombing of Iran. And I think that's like whether or not this report specifically is an accurate assessment of Trump's thinking. What it is, is Seymour Hersh having a source who he is describing accurately as a senior US official. I'm sure that part is true, talking to him and saying that this is what's being discussed in a serious way. So I actually, I mean, yes, take it with a grain of salt, but I think it's actually not insane that this is likely a serious high-level conversation that's

happening. I don't know how this is going to be affected by Trump's ban on lunch yesterday and the the two-week, I don't know what we call it, like deadline extension. But it did feel like we were in a 48 hour window. And I don't know that we actually are out of the 48 hour window at all, because it's hard to know when Trump says two weeks, what he's trying to telegraph to Iran. It's hard to know what Israel then does. There's no way that Netanyahu is happy with Trump's two week announcement yesterday. And so do they escalate in a way that forces the hand?

I don't know. But that reporting to me doesn't seem insane. Sagar, what do you make of these this tactical nukes talk? Oh my God, don't even get me started. It's some of the most insane. I'm getting you started buddy. Put it on there. Let's play it.

All right, let me pull it up. I got it here. Let's go ahead the most insane. Put it on there. It's the point of the show, man. Let's play an actual movie. All right, all right. Let me pull it up. I got it here. Let's go ahead and play it. To senior White House correspondent, Jackie Heinrich, from... The cutaway from the Shaw son. ...headlines this afternoon, including one from The Guardian that claims that US military

has doubts about whether the Bunker Buster bombs could get the job done and further claiming that only a tactical nuke may be finish it and it further stated that the president is not considering a tactical nuke that it was not one of the options that was presented to him I was just told by a top official here that none of that report is true that none of the options are off the table and the US military is very confident that Bunkerbusters could get the job done at Porto The president is giving so she says there It's not the tactical none of it's true. The tactical nukes are actually not on the tactical nukes are on the table

She kind of buries the lead there. You kind of have to like really listen in which seems kind of significant. It's You kind of have to like really listen in which seems kind of significant. It's insane Preposterous it also though. I really want people to see here how the slippery slope happens. Yeah first It's just we just one bomb. That's all it is then as I would actually it's a couple of bombs And that's why you leak this stuff, right? Maybe the bombs though can't actually do the job So then it was only a tactical nuke Oh see drop a tactical nuke on here now We're in a whole different other world and you know this just demonstrate look these generals

They make all kinds of promises from what I hear general. Karilla has been you know in all these like meetings with the president Be like mr. President we can do this He wants to cement his legacy as the guy who took out the Iranian nuclear program. His term is up in only two weeks, and he's given all these pie in the sky bullshit military assessments to Donald Trump. Of course, Donald Trump is loving it, right? Corrilla is like jacked. He looks good. He's got a nice figure on camera straight out of central casting.

Oh, God, calm down. No, this is the listen. It's got a name, the gorilla, the gorilla, the the gorilla's like we can all see how the wheels are turning. It's obviously it would be devastating. I think one of the main reasons they're keeping it open is just basically to scare the shit out of the Iranians. But really what it's about is they are being so reckless in their rhetoric that they're actually again just increasing the odds of the Iranians being like you people are crazy we are just going to sprint to

the bomb and the only reason why this really is all happening is again because of Israel's actions just basically ratcheting up where the US has to go from the escalation ladder also can we all keep in mind that when Russia was even openly talking about a tactical nuclear weapon in Ukraine that everyone was like that would be a red line and that we should basically go to war with Russia. So should Russia go to war with us, you know, that Iran is technically their client state in a similar manner. Yeah, maybe not exactly the same, but everyone just see how crazy this all is. And this is again, you know, where I've been going back and I've been reading even more about all these these military guys are the kings of over promising and under delivering. So we can all talk about Libya. We actually delivered in Libya. We took out their air defense. It was just a strategic problem of the fact that the country

collapsed into civil war. But what about Serbia? Serbia is actually a very apt example. So in 1999, NATO in the United States wanted to take out Milosevic and basically get to stop the civil war and all of his actions, right? Well, the US military predicted, and NATO said it will just take three days of bombing to get Milosevic to back down.

It took 11 weeks. And at the end of those 11 weeks, the US military was presenting options to President Clinton to fully invade and to take over Serbia because air power could not get the job done. We have to just keep learning these lessons over and over and over and over again. These guys don't actually know what they're talking about. They said Iraq was going to be a cakewalk. One hundred and fifty thousand troops, Mr. President.

No question, no problem. Afghanistan. Don't worry about it. We should get a couple of special forces, overthrow the government. We could take out the Taliban with limited airstrikes. It never works. It's always gonna lead to the ground troop and or way more than we ever thought

from the very beginning. Go ahead. The incredible irony of all of this is that Iran itself should have been the first lesson of this decades ago. This is the textbook example playing out in front of us. So it's a tragic irony that, you know, again, they thought they had that completely under control.

No unintended consequences that have happened down the line from meddling. And here we are in 2025 still groping to figure out what happens talking about bringing back the Shah's son to learning any lessons. Can I talk about that too? Fox News is referring to this guy is his Royal Highness. Oh my god. No, they aren't. No, no, they are. I don't even tweeted Even tweeted out they go his royal highness the shot I go where am I on bizarro planet? What's happening? You know we all are the son of a deposed king does not make you HRH is a title it has meaning

Okay, I mean Not to be a royal expert But like, you know, not to be a Royal's expert or whatever, but you know, it's like if we had on Edward Habsburg and we're like his Royal Highness of Austria-Hungary, I'd be like, what? But I think he's like a banker in Switzerland. I've had him on other podcasts. Did you call him a race car driver? He'd be like, I'm Edward.

You don't have to call me that. He's like, the dynasty is gone. You know, when you when you get thrown out, you don't get the title anymore. I thought we all acknowledge that. But they're seriously having this guy on. And he's like, oh, Iranians cry out for a monarchy and it's insanity. The me. Sanity. We I have the media clips on here.

The coverage, the level of on horrible. I I don't even know what to say. I mean, we truly do. Like cable news really does never learn anything ever. It's so wild to see the propaganda march and it matters. I mean, Sagar, we are covering that polling where it really depends. People feel about this all kinds of ways, depending on how it's framed. So I guarantee if you ask people, do you want to get America entrenched in some potentially

catastrophic regime change or regime collapse war, they'd be like, are you hot? Like what? Why would we do that? Why? I think it would be 90-10. But if you ask, oh, well, should Iran have a nuke? Well, should we let Israel strike Iran to get rid of their nuclear program? Who could object to that? Well, should we supply a nuke? Well, should we let Israel strike Iran to get rid of their nuclear program? Who could object to that?

Well, should we supply the weapons that Israel uses? Well, you know, should we maybe be the ones just to go ahead and take out these nuclear weapons because you've already said Iran can't have a nuke? When it's framed in that way, suddenly you get a disturbing amount of public consensus. And we also have to be real about the quote unquote anti-war MAGA base. The Republican base is vastly more pro war than the Democratic base. They will go and support whatever Donald Trump wants to do, including Steve Bannon, who already has told the Financial Times, at the end of the day, me,

Tucker, Marjorie Taylor green, all these people will support the president's decision and just assume he has more intelligence and more wisdom and more understanding that we do at the end of the day, they will all bend the knee to whatever it is that Trump decides most of them will and most of the base will but you know You made an important point yesterday crystal on our show independence won't and that And that's why that's your matter and you know, I I want to get this guy on the show this guy rich Barris He's like a MAGA like a line poster Yeah, and he's been making some great points where he's like, Hey, guys, Trump's entire margin of victory in Michigan is the anti

war independent base. He's like the Dearborn people who voted for Trump and or people who were union and anti Iraq war. That is the margin of victory. So Donald Trump, it's striking the parallels with George W. Bush. Like if you look at the 96 electoral map and the 2000 electoral map, it's actually insane how much things can change in just four years. George W. Bush, everybody forgets this. He ran as a restraintist.

He thought that the US campaign in Serbia was a disaster. He was like, that's not something that I'm interested in doing. He ran on reducing America's footprint abroad. And then of course we got, you know, Mr. Neocon himself. Things changed a lot after 9 11 because he literally had a messianic complex where he believed he was put on earth by God to be there at 9 11 and to destroy the axis of evil.

Oh, which is telling Trump right now. Look, I'm trying to draw parallels here. Yeah. I believe here. Yeah. Trump believes it. I mean, it's not just Mike Huckabee. There's a reason why he shared that text and he talks about himself this way. I mean, in his inaugural speech,

he talked about how, you know, he's basically put there by God for this great moment. And so, I mean, Emily, you're gonna have to, you're gonna have to be my decoder in some of this stuff. But the religious fervor of the Israeli fanatics, and then you've got the Huckabee End Times people and Ted Cruz, and then you've got Trump believing he's the second coming of Jesus Christ, to me this is a terrifying mix, a totally terrifying mix because then you're like, you can't presume anyone's even acting rationally when you have this divine justification behind you, when you believe that it's your mission

from God, as Ted Cruz explained, to always serve the government of Netanyahu. Yeah, so I do have good news on that front, which is that's so boomer brain, even in evangelical circles. It's people like there was this time before Y2K where the Left Behind series and this millenarian Christianity pointed straight towards Israel and created this real, very like very, very serious political support for Israel that we all kind of think of when we think of American evangelicals. That has not really trickled down. And in fact, what I saw over the last 48 hours after the Huckabee thing, and after the Cruz thing

in particular, was a ton of pushback. For example, the Federalists published a long pushback to what Ted Cruz was saying. And I don't think that would have happened 15 years ago. It doesn't make it any less frightening that Mike Huckabee, who has played very fast and loose with whether he's a dispensationalist or not, is there. I mean, I think in all likelihood, yes, Mike Huckabee believes that political Israel is, you can sort of swap that in and out with when the Bible refers to the nation of Israel that today, 2025, political nation state Israel is, you can read that into scripture, you can read that it's a revelation,

it's completely ridiculous, but it is popular with evangelical boomers like Mike Huckabee. So to the extent that Huckabee is the ambassador to Israel, that matters, but I don't think that's, it's certainly not how like a Catholic like JD Vance or Marco Rubio is seeing this. I know that's cold comfort to everyone. But the good news is the boomer brain dispensationalism hasn't trickled down to millennials right now, I guess.

I wanted to get your. OK, good to know. Hopefully we all survive until those millennials have a little more power. You'll know when we're not raptured. Okay. All right. Good to know. I wanted to get you to explain, Ryan, this report from DropSight about how the Israelis are reposting some of the same strike footage from Moz, obviously, you know, has been tracking

this and broke down this reporting. So what should people like, what's the significance here? What is he finding? Yeah, I mean, so this is allegedly two different strikes on two different days posted by the Israeli military. And as as Maz points out, like, if you look closely, there's just a little bit of tweaking done to the color and to the angle. Yeah, like, let's blur it a little bit.

Yeah. But if you look at if you look at that, kind of the markings around the rest of the image, you're like, oh, you know, it doesn't take, you know, a PhD in OSINT to be like, this is actually the same picture. And so it raises the question of, you know, have they exhausted kind of a target bank in the sense that they're not, you know, they're not able to produce new pictures, which is strange because they have, you know, free reign over the Iranian sky. And all this is not exclusive to Israel. All of these illiterate powers are capable of bombing even something that has nothing, no military value whatsoever.

And putting a clip out and saying that it's a command and control center. So it's not like they have a shortage of videos. It's just, it shows, I think it shows a sloppiness and potentially shows, you know, that they potentially shows that they're really scraping the bottom of the barrel at this point. Well, and this was also significant in that vein. NBC News is reporting that according to a senior Israeli intelligence official, only

65% of Iranian missiles were intercepted in the past 24 hours. That's down from nearly 90% the day before. And we have other reports as well that they're having to ration interceptors. I mean, this is something that Sagar was talking about before. It's just part of why, you know, they're obviously we have to be involved. We've been in, not have to be, but we choose to be involved and have been from the beginning. And I think this is one of the hopes of the Iranians probably,

is that they can learn more about the missile defense systems and that as time goes on, they will have to further ration interceptors and also that they will have more understanding of how to evade those interceptors and those missile defense systems. And on top of that, they use their older and crappier missiles, as you would expect logically. The first ones out of the gate were the cheap old guys

that aren't as good. So do we know that for a fact? Because I saw that speculation too, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because you know that when your first volley comes in, they have their entire bank of interceptors ready to go. So you throw the cheapest stuff that's the worst. And so the interceptors then take all of that out.

And then gradually you start using that and hypersonic missiles. And yesterday they fired one sounds like one missile at Beersheba and it got through but it seems to maybe have missed his target. It landed right near the Microsoft building there. And then the IRGC said they were actually aiming for the Microsoft building, which may have been because, you know, citing Microsoft's role and the Israeli industrial complex, which may have been kind of reverse engineered cope like that.

They're probably aiming for Elbit systems, which is nearby there, but hit closer to Microsoft. So they're like, you know, there's a lot of reverse engineering, we're like, Oh, yeah, that's definitely what we were aiming for. After you try to figure out where it landed. And then we're getting reports right now that there was another missile landed right around Beersheba. So, you know, if they're two for two in Beersheba getting through, you know, if they're two for two in Beersheba getting through, you know, missile defenses that allows them to shoot many fewer missiles and still have the same amount of impact.

You know, if they were firing off, you know, 300 in the beginning, just to land 10 or 20, that's not a sustainable pace. If you have, you know, a missiles, missile stockpile and low thousands. But if you're hitting at a 50 to 100% clip, that causes a lot more damage and helps you win in a war of attrition. I think Sagar, do you have to jump now? Yes, I do, unfortunately.

But yeah, just last thoughts is, I think we have a 25% chance of avoiding this, probably a 75% chance. By the way, literally as we're talking, Israel is getting rocked by ballistic missiles in terms of at least some of the images that have made it out. They are going to come under intense pressure in the government. They are going to ramp up regime change and destabilization efforts to the best of their possible ability.

And yeah, I think it's going to be a very, very dangerous two weeks. But you know, I'm hope I'm hoping for some success coming out of Europe and at least see what what they're able to get out of the Iranians and publicly as well. You know, some of the statements to get them on the record and presumably a press conference or some statements from the Iranian foreign minister that could at least keep us out of the woods. But I also want to echo Emily's warning. We could be in a 48 hour time window. This could all be fake and this could by Monday on our show, we can be covering a four dose strike. Yeah. All right. Well, as we let Sager go, I think we're also going to conclude the free

portion premiums. We're going to cover a bunch more stuff. I've got a bunch of clips. I got Dave Smith on Piers Morgan. You guys know you don't want to miss out on that. I've had it, Lady. Even Emily has to admit she was kind of cooking on CNN. She's like more based than we expected her to be. So that's kind of cool. We've got more coming out of Israel in particular. Bibi Netanyahu is paying a personal price guys and I want to share with you what that personal price is and we all should thoughts and prayers with Bibi and his family during this very difficult time. And so in any case, bunch of stuff to get to.

We'll try to get to Zoran, maybe talk about Obama, see how much we get to. But for those of you who want to join us for the full show, breakingpoints.com, that monthly subscription is back. So you know, partake in that to your full delight, see how you like it. And for premiums, we'll see in just a moment. All right, guys, thank you so much for watching the free portion of the Friday show. We're going to move into some premium bonus content. So if you want to watch that as well, make sure to go and subscribe at breakingpoints.com

and for all of you guys who are already premium subscribers, that portion is going to start right now. Just like great shoes, great books take you places through unforgettable love stories and into conversations with characters you'll never forget. I think any good romance, it gives me this feeling of like butterflies. I'm Danielle Robay and this is Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club, the new podcast from Hello Sunshine and iHeart Podcasts where we dive into the stories that shape us on the page and off.

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