DeProgram with John Kiriakou and Ted Rall - Big Border Patrol is Watching You | DeProgram with Ted Rall and John Kiriakou

Episode Date: December 18, 2025

Political cartoonist Ted Rall and CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou deprogram you from mainstream media every weekday at 9 AM EST. Today we discuss: • Orwellian, much? The U.S. Border Patrol is monitoring millions of American citizen drivers nationwide in a secretive program to identify and detain people whose travel patterns it deems “suspicious.” A secret network of cameras scans and records your vehicle license plate information, and an algorithm flags cars based on their route. Federal agents then flag local police. Cops cite speeding, failure to signal, the wrong window tint or even a dangling air freshener blocking the view. • Trump delivered a prime-time address to the nation and promised $1,776 checks to troops. The same day, the White House attached a predecessor-trolling Walk of Fame to the outside of the building. • Centrist Republicans revolt, join Democratic discharge petition on ACA subsidies. • Farmers block roads in Brussels to protest EU-Mercosur free-trade deal. The accord, which would eliminate tariffs on nearly all goods traded between the EU and five Mercosur nations — Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia — over 15 years, faces mounting resistance.

Hey there, happy Thursday. You are watching D-Program with Ted Raul and John Curiakou. It is Thursday, December 18th, 2025. Thanks for joining us, John. Thanks for joining us, too. We have a little bit of trouble. 30 minutes. 30 minutes to get my computer up.

30 minutes. So annoying. So if you're a Mac wizard, you might want to chime in on the chat. Yeah, appreciate it. John has a somewhat aging computer. Not so old that it shouldn't work, but, you know, old enough that it might stop working due to planned obsolescence. Is it a laptop or is that a desktop? It's a great big desktop.

So it's not the kind that you've been banging around, you know, South Asia or whatever. No, not at all. Yeah, I lost, Afghanistan claimed every laptop that I took there because there, the dust, the glacial flower, crazy, gets into everything. All right, so we got a lot to talk about. I know I always say that, but it's always true. I can't wait to talk to you about this story from the Associated Press about the Border Patrol, which is using these license plate scanners on the nation's highways. They're tracking all of us. They're tracking all of us wherever we go, and then they're pulling American citizens over, as well as other people, just basically just because, and they're using pretextual stops.

So this is no longer about illegal immigrants or scumbags or people who are doing anything wrong. This is now about, you know, it's George Orwell. It's classic. Last night, the president delivered an 18-minute prime time address to the nation. We'll talk about that. Centrist Republicans joined Democrats a little belatedly, but they're going to force a discharge petition vote about the Affordable Care Act subsidies. That vote comes up in the new year because Congress is out of session. But nevertheless, we'll talk about whether that has any import and whether it might save those of us like John and I were about to get slammed by giant increases in our health care costs. And finally, there's trouble in Europe.

We've seen this sort of thing before, but there's a new free trade deal. This one between five countries in Latin America and Europe. This is the Mercosur EU free trade deal. And farmers are really pissed, and they took to Brussels. They're burning things, blocking roads. You could almost call them riots. Here it would be called a riot. In Greece, they're so upset about it that farmers have taken over the airport in.

in Eraclion, Crete, and the airport's closed. No inbound or outbound flights. Well, I'm on team farmer here for sure. But all right, so, and then of course, as always, please like, follow and share the show. Before we get started here, I want to bring in Robbie, just for our periodic reminder about the need and the desire to, if you'd like to see the show continue to grow, and John and I'd be able to continue to do it, how this works. I mean, you guys have been very supportive, and we appreciate you.

But your money goes further when you're on Rumble than when you're on YouTube. And so I want to just bring Robbie on to explain that again, and then we'll get to it. Howdy, y'all. So, yeah, I mean, Ted said it pretty sweet. The way that, really, the monetary model between YouTube and Rumble could not be any more different. Literally for every dime that YouTube pays them, Rumble pays them 98 cents. for you doing the exact same thing, which is watching the show. It is crazy, but that's how it works.

YouTube treats the creator as a commodity that then is used to feed its advertisers. That's how YouTube makes this money, whereas Rumble is more creator-centric because they're trying to compete with YouTube. That means they need to capture that share. The way to capture the share is by having creators that you aren't listened to, and then they actually pay the creators. to make content on rumble so if you do the exact same thing that you're doing right now which is watch us on rumble and a lot of people watch us on rumble and youtube at the same time you can actually help john and ted make more money without having to contribute a single dime of your own money just literally by watching the content also i just dropped a link to the discord server big shout out to king kong over there he redid it

we will be doing another call-in show i'll have to cord it with john and ted about when that's going to happen. And if y'all want to be able to chime in and talk to one of these two stellar people who I'm this privileged to be able to call my friends, you've got to be able to Discord server because that's how I get your phone calls. So come over to Rumble.

The weather's fine. You'll like it. It's not scary. I promise. You'll enjoy it. Thank you, Robbie. Okay. And if you have an ad for us,

you can put that up in a minute or two. All right. So thanks for the donation over on YouTube from Umar Sheikh, Umar Sheik, um, 25. I believe those are UAE Durhams. Um, much of you. Uh, so, uh, let's get to it. John, what do you want to talk about first? I think we should probably start with, uh, Donald Trump's address to the nation last night. Sounds good. Um, it's not what I expected. I, well, you know what? That's not true. In a way, it's what I expected. In a way, it's not what I expected.

I thought that he would address Venezuela at least a little bit. Having said a day earlier that we're going to initiate a complete naval blockade, he called it the greatest armada ever in the history of South America. He never mentioned Venezuela. No. It was all about, well, it was apparently the purpose was to shore up the base and to talk about the economy, economy strong. He made a couple of soaps. For example, checks for $1,776 to our warriors. Warrior checks. I mean, God, that's so cheesy. And I thought it was cheesy when they wanted to make the

New World Trade Center at 1,776 feet high. I hated the idea and I still hate the idea. Yeah. But what we got last night was an angry Donald Trump, a Donald Trump who didn't appear to have any answers to some of these questions that the base, that the mega base has. And I really don't think he accomplished much last night. Do you? No. I mean, look, full disclosure, I've gotten so used to being disappointed by hyped White House speeches that I didn't watch until this morning. I was like, there's, I don't, you know, I know this is going to be another, like, wash. And it's not specific to Trump. All of these speeches are like that. But I was shocked that he didn't try to say anything about Venezuela. I mean, look, we very well may get pulled into a major conflict there. And there's no attempt to build up political will.

We've talked about it here a bunch of times. We'll keep talking about it. It's bizarre. It's almost like he knows it won't be popular, so there's no point doing it. Yeah. Just before we went on the air, John, the new inflation figures came out. Inflation is actually down a little more than people thought.

That's really unfortunate timing for the president. I'm sure he's like, God damn it, why didn't I get that like, you know, a day earlier. A day earlier would have really been helpful for my speech. You know, he does, one of the things that I've always given the president credit for is really having a thumb on the pulse of the mood of the people. And that just doesn't seem to be true anymore. He's like now completely in some sort of bubble.

and he's, you know, not able to, he's not going to be able to talk his way out of the American people feeling broke. Well, Ted, they do. Let me ask you, why, listen, Donald Trump has made a career of being underestimated. Yes. I think he's far, far brighter

than people give him credit for being. And I think also that his political acumen. His instincts. are incredible, terrific, terrific instincts. So why does he appear to not get that the base is upset? I don't know if he's just getting old. I mean, there's been some kind of, some speculation that maybe, you know, he's pre-Bidening out. You know, maybe he's just surrounded by too many yes men.

That wasn't true in the first administration. He had people at the table who didn't agree with everything that he had to say, you know, I mean, or he just thinks that he can, I mean, it must be the first instinct of every president to think, I can talk my way out of this. And, you know, he's a good talker, but you can't, you can't talk to, you cannot convince people who feel that they're having, that they're struggling financially, that they're not. And, you know, even like, even if objectively they're wrong. I mean, I've always thought the American people were wrong about the Carter economy. you know basically yes inflation was high but wages were going up faster than inflation

therefore they shouldn't have been complaining but jimmy carter you know basically couldn't assuage that feeling that feeling is there now in this particular case that feeling is real because it's been it's the culmination of you know 70 years of increasing income inequality and so it's true and i mean there's it's funny to me that there's no answer i mean and and also It's funny to me that Republicans can always come up with these sort of really symbolic, like, band-aid on a bullet wound kind of solutions. I mean, like the $2,000 subsidy for, you know, medical health care accounts that would help you pay your insurance. I mean, John, many, many people are paying $2,000 a month in health care premiums. Yes. One month. One month.

Right. And that's not going to- In addition to all their co-pays. Right. And they're, yeah, they're going to, and most of the time they have to get to $10,000 before their insurance company pays a dime because of the deductibles, right? Or more. So $2,000 is a pissant joke. Ted, $20,000 would be a pissant joke. Ted, I left yesterday when we finished this show and I went and I had dental surgery for the third time in the last four weeks. Fun times. It's awful. pay 932 a month for my basic Obamacare, and I mean it's basic, and I pay another 32 a month for dental. So before I went in for the first time, I said, I called Humana. I said, what is my dental cover? They said, up to $2,000. I was like, okay, well, that's not much, but okay. I figured I

have one tooth fixed and that's it. Well, it turned out I had an infection in my sinus. They had to drill through my jawbone. They pulled five teeth out altogether, five teeth. And I keep saying, listen, I can't afford this. I'm telling the dentist. I can't afford this. They're giving me discount, discount, discount. It still cost me $10,000 out of pocket. And yesterday when you're insured. And I'm insured. And yesterday, the insurance dropped me. Oh, my God. Did they say why? Yeah, because I used the benefits too quickly. They don't like me. They like people who buy dental insurance but who don't need dental insurance.

Well, that is, I mean, that's funny that you should say that because back when I worked at the Japanese bank, I remember just going through all the bank accounts of all the, and we had these accounts that were non-interest bearing that had hundreds of millions of dollars. Oh, my God. And I remember, and they all belonged to insurance companies. And I talked to my boss. I said, oh, should we contact these clients and, you know, get them into some interest-bearing accounts? He said, ah, fuck them. He goes, they don't care. They, they, he said, that's the insurance company model.

Bear in mind, this is in the 80s. And it's a Japanese company. He said, they collect premiums. They don't pay out. They have more money than they know what to do with. They literally are just shoveling it into a corner. They don't care or need interest. Unbelievable.

Yeah. Nothing's changed. Well, it's actually worse now. Let's go ahead and read this, get through this ad. Get Ready Fight fans on December 20 at the biggest crossover boxing event of the year drops live from Dubai only on Rumble Premium. It's Misfits Mania, the fight before Christmas, headlines by Andrew Tate stepping into the ring against heavyweight champion Chase Dumor for Misfit Boxing's heavyweight title. This isn't just another bout. It's a global event with a stacked undercard and all-out action. You can't miss. I'll be in there next year. tune in exclusively on Rumble Premium and witness drama, power, and one of the most talked about clashes of the year.

Mark your calendar is December 20th because Miss Fitzmania is about to deliver fireworks, sign up today. May I add something? Please, anytime. I was asked to be on the undercard a week ago. No, stop! And I said, you have got to be kidding me.

And the guy who approached me is a guy that I like and respect. He's involved in the planning. He said, tates at the top everybody's going to make a shill load of money you got to be in and said are you kidding me i'm 61 years old i'm going to humiliate myself that's going to help your dental surgery seriously getting punched in the face by some blogger yeah no i'm not doing that i was joking hard when i said i was going to be on oh my god you know he's explaining it to me he's like no no hear me

out. It's a really good idea. Every good is going to make a ton of money. It's going to be an Atlantic City. I was like, yeah, no, I'm not. I don't know how much money I would need for that, but it would be a lot. It would have to cover all my new dental surgeries once I get my teeth It would be hard for me to think about that for under, under six figures, really. I mean, and I'm broke as shit, but like, wow, that's incredible. It's funny as hell, though. I'm literally crying. I'm laughing so hard. um jester one thanks for the five bucks uh did you see there was another spoiled terror attack in sydney a few hours ago oh no i did not no maybe okay check that out thanks ben for

switching over to rumble much appreciated uh lmn first day at rumble today better video and sound here feel uh feel free to sign up good i'm a tammy i'm a very proud first amendment a supporter i beg people to get comfortable with diverse opinions indeed me too um gabriel Can you speculate on a situation where a faction of the U.S. military would stage a coup? Yeah, I can. Go ahead, John. Yeah, I can. I think it would be, sorry, go ahead, go ahead. I, you know, we talked about this a couple of weeks ago, Ted.

Well, we touched on it a couple of weeks ago, where there was an attempt in 1933, 1934, by a group of a half a dozen or so generals to overthrow Franklin Roosevelt because the generals believed Roosevelt was a socialist. And Smedley Butler reported it to Roosevelt. He's the war as a racket guy. Yes, exactly. A great hero, an unsung hero in American history, I think. True.

So, yeah, I could see a situation where the... John, you're... Suddenly you're... You muted yourself. you are muted if you can demute maybe can i demute you let me see okay you're demuted now i think i don't know what happened can you hear me ted you're good now yeah you're good i hear you i can't hear anything oh i hear you try and figure this out oh that's so strange um huh uh hmm i'm gonna type to john dad i'm gonna i'm gonna get out and come back in because

everything looks like it's up and running fine that sounds good okay so all right so i will go ahead and answer that question well uh john reboots so my take on this is uh i could really i'm not sure there's many situations in which a coup would start cold but i could definitely see as we've seen in other revolutionary situations where if there were a popular uprising that the military or parts of the military might decide to chime in and basically bring the revolution over the finish line. Robbie, I'll just bring you in to talk about that. I mean, I could see, you know, we've seen this in the Russian Revolution, the French Revolution.

John, where are you at two stage? He's not connected, though. All right. Oh, there he is. I'm having these crazy computer problems. I think it's time for a new computer. Say it, but I think you're right. That sucks. But anyway, I was just saying that I think that like we've seen revolutionary situations

where the military finishes the revolution, basically when, let's say, they're ordered to shoot at their fellow citizens and they hate their own government and they decide, you know, I'm not going to kill, you know, other people. Patriots, I'm going to join them, or I just refuse. That's a kind of coup. That I can definitely see happening. I don't know, starting cold like now, I think it's extremely unlikely. I don't think so.

I think what's going to happen is if ever got to the point, then states really start looking hard and heavy at secession again and that the country would just fragment. It would go like the way of Yugoslavia. Octavia Butler, Parable of the Sower, kind of. yeah i mean i mean people want a national divorce i mean serious a serious question you're honest to god what exactly does montana have have in common with massachusetts the answers both start with m there's alliteration i mean but culturally politically demographically there's nothing there's nothing there's no glue to hold it together you can say the same thing about any country that's not a

micro-state like Liechtenstein, right? I mean, it's like, what do the Urals have to do with St. Petersburg? You know, and what do they have in common? What does La France profound, like deep France, have to do with Paris or Nice? Nothing. Well, you saw your history. And I also know you have a population, but at least a shared history and a shared culture. I mean, Montana, I mean, Montana and Massachusetts both speak English. They're both predominantly white. You know, I mean, there's definitely European, you know, Western European ancestry. I mean, there's definitely cultural studstones. Yeah. But I mean, well, let's just take a step further because of the secession. I mean, if it happens, and again, for the record, I hope that I'm wrong. I'd rather things not fall apart. But if it does, it would be, it would be regional. I think it's all

that happened is, no, I could see New England going its own way. What does New England have in common with the Bible Belt? The sci-fi writer Octavia Butler wrote a trilogy which is the first one I think it's called the Parable of the Sewer. And basically that's her scenario. She basically says she sees the states, you know, collapsing economically and then breaking into regional nations, sort of like the USSR in 1991. Yeah. Well, it's like no human productions says he's more than happy to divorce from Robbie's Montana.

I'm sure the feeling is mutual. I don't know who you are, but I have no interest in being in the union. Don't knock Montana until you've tried it. It's a beautiful state. I wouldn't want to lose it. Yeah. But I mean, it's cultural, though, right? Because if you have a group of people that are culturally conservative, that are still religious, that cling to those old, the California Obama said that the bigger, the bigger clingers.

And then you have, then you have another section of the country. America's huge. It's a, it's a continental nation. And I can just 100% just see. it falling apart. Sure. Eventually. I disagree, though. I can't see it falling apart. First of all, one of the reasons why there

will never be secession besides the fact that it's unconstitutional. It's constitutional. It's not constitutional. This will be a fun conversation to have one day on a premium episode. But haven't right now, if you want. But besides that, the states that would secede are the shithole states

for the most part. I mean, there are states that can't, they're They rank last in economic growth. They rank last in education. They rank last in medical care. They're broke. They're broke. I mean,

Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana. Look at Kentucky. I just read the other day that for every dollar that Kentucky sends to Washington in federal taxes, it gets $1.24 back in what amounts to federal welfare. You know, listen, I'm from Virginia, the sophisticated part of Virginia. am very happy not to not to subsidize these these idiots in mississippi and alabama and kentucky and places like that if they want us to cede you know they'll never make it yep well listen as far as that goes i'm about there with you i mean there should not be any federal funding

going to the states at all none secret swim figure it out no clamp your own house is listen well that's not what's the point of having a country then right yeah we don't have a viable country then well that's a whole well we're supposed to be a federal republic right there's supposed to be a union of sovereign states united united in a federal union the entire point of the federal government originally was for the common defense and regulating the cost of currency yes i mean that's what it was all about yes as far as the session this is just going to have this now the ninth and 10th amendments both specifically say that whatever power is not really is not given to the federal government is reserved to the people and the states and the federal and the founders

thought it was so important that they mentioned it twice. Nowhere in the Constitution doesn't say secession is illegal. Also for historical record, the founding fathers were secessionists. They seceded from the British Empire. So to say that secession is illegal, you have to show me in the Constitution where it says a state can't go, where you can't leave. It's not a Roche Motel.

I still remember that logo in Spanish. Las Cucaracha San Fran, but no put in salier. I lived in New York in the 80s. All right, Robbie, I'm taking you out here. Okay. By the way, there has been a terrorist plot foiled in Australia recently. So, you know, we probably should touch upon this.

I mean, ISIS, you know, never really went away. And there's something, I mean, obviously the self-radicalization model, it has a strength and a weakness, right? The strength is that your former colleagues at agencies like the CIA can't track you, right? Like if you join, you know, you join ISIS, it's kind of like you download the zip file with your own ISIS flag that you print out and you duct tape up to the wall of your shitty apartment. You read a stupid statement pledging fealty to the Islamic State. You go out and kill a bunch of innocent people and then, you know, the cops shoot you and, you know, rinse, lather, repeat. But it's really hard to stop people who want to do that. because, you know, the only place that the only people who know have that information is the people

themselves. It's in their brain. And then, but on the other hand, they can't really do anything in a coordinated, organized way like a group like Hezbollah or Hamas or anything like that. They can't do big things all at once. They can just do, it's all individual. It's kind of like why Occupy Wall Street was worthless. You know, it's leaderless. Yeah. What do you think is the future, if you're not? any of ISIS. I mean, they once controlled what was effectively half of Syria, half of Iraq. That's a big country effectively. But, you know, they're not, now they're back to being a regular terrorist group, although they still control, it seems like they still control areas, right? Wouldn't that

be fair to say? They do. I think that the future of ISIS is the same as the future of al-Qaeda. We're not at the end of al-Qaeda right now. We're in a lull. But what's going to end up, having to happen is individual countries are going to have to declare war again on ISIS like many countries did in Iraq and Syria. And they're going to have to just smother it. I mean, that's the only way to do it. And the part of the problem is ISIS, like al-Qaeda, like so many of these other groups, are ideas rather than they are standing armies. And so how do you kill an idea? I think in the end, Ted, I think that. that they'll self-destruct because invariably, they'll undergo leadership challenges.

And, you know, two people or three people at the same time are going to want to lead the group and then they're going to end up going to war with each other. But one of the things that I think we should be worried about over the long term is individual ISIS affiliated or ISIS-related cells in places like, well, we're already seeing Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, the first. Philippines, Indonesia, Australia now. It's more like a, it's more like a traditional group in Central Asia. Yeah, it's more like a traditional group.

That's right. ISIS Khorasan. So this is going to be a long-term thing. It's not going to be easy. No, no. As long as there's a sense of grievance on the part of Muslims. And the West isn't very good at alleviating that sense. Yes.

Let's talk a little bit more about Trump. Um, so he moved his, uh, presidential hall of fame plaques outside to the outside of the building. Did you see, oh, sorry, ten or us, go ahead. You know, go ahead. And basically, go ahead, go ahead, please. Actually, I'm going to, you go ahead and explain it. I'm going to pull it up because I want to read some of it. Okay, great. So basically, um, you know, this thing was inside there has traditionally been a hallway in the White House where, or the former, there's portraits of the former presidents. Trump, as anybody who's watching this show is, is aware,

had, had, like, basically had, like, this trolling photo of, like, the, you know, auto pen for Biden and stuff like that. But he up the ante by putting these plaques, moving these plaques to the outside of the building, affixing them to the wall outside where the Rose Garden used to be. And these are very expensive, like, bronze plaques. historical markers. May I interrupt you and read you, Joe Biden? Please. And I assume we're paying for them. Oh, of course. Here's Joe Biden's presidential plaque in the White House. Nicknamed both Sleepy Joe and Crooked Joe, Joe Biden was dominated by

his radical left handlers. They and their allies in the fake news media attempted to cover up his severe mental decline and his unprecedented use of the auto pen. And words are just randomly capitalized. Following his humiliating debate with President Trump, in the big June 2024 debate, he was forced to withdraw from his campaign for re-election in utter disgrace. Biden weaponized law enforcement against his political opponent, singular, while also persecuting many other innocent people. He left office issuing blanket pardons to radical Democrat criminals and thugs, as well

as members of the Biden crime family. But despite it all, President Donald J. Trump would get reelected in a landslide and would save America. What do you say? I mean, what can you even say to something like that? I know, and it's a plaque. I mean, so, you know, okay, I mean, obviously,

that's hilarious on a number of levels. I don't need to explain them. question this is a president who's almost 80 years old he is very interested in his um in his legacy and that's why he wants to have like he wants to be on coinage he wants to have an you know his own after triumph uh you know he's he's he's really i mean you know everybody everybody who's president's interested in their legacy but he's really interested he's got to know that those plaques are coming down the second he's gone yeah i mean even A president, Vance, has to take him down.

Absolutely. It's like, why bother? What's the point here? Is he losing it? I don't know. And I'll add another thing. This is not an original thought. This was raised by the New York Times last night, and I happen to agree.

But the way these are written with randomly capitalized words, lots of exclamation points, it convinces me that he wrote them oh a hundred percent the president of the united states has the time right to write these himself executive time i i don't even have words i don't even know what to say you know i mean look i'm glad you brought that up because it always pisses me off when um you know presidents like don't work hard um in fact we've made fun of regan remember i remember time magazine having a cover story called the 9 to 5 presidency and people are like what do you mean he's only going to work from nine to five he's got a whole country to run right well now yeah my my father told me that uh when he had to write memos for reagan that there was a rule that the memos couldn't be uh more than a page

long or regan would refuse to read them um and that and that's how was the judge w bush they would try to cheat and make a bigger margin and reagan would be like uh-uh like now i remember when Bill Clinton was elected, they told us that we could make things longer, but that the president's preferred font was Calibri 14. 14. 14. That's big. Yeah. 12 is normal. 11's normal. Wow. So, I mean, yeah, I mean, I don't like, honestly, I don't think my feeling is if I were president of the United States, you'd be getting peak Ted Rawl morning, noon, and night. I'd be up at five in the morning, working like a bastard for the American people until two in the morning every fucking night. And that's how George H.W. Bush was. My ex-wife once was called

to Brief Bush, and she just assumed that she would go over to the White House with the PDB briefer for the 7 o'clock briefing. He wanted her at 6 a.m. She went up into the residence. She was escorted up into the residence, and President Bush and Barbara Bush, in their bathrobes and slippers, at the table, they served breakfast to my ex-wife, and she briefed them over scrambled eggs and bacon. I like it. Yeah. I had a lot of respect for that. That's the right work ethic. You know, I mean, I don't want them to golf.

I don't want them to watch sporting events. I don't want them to be like, you know, I mean, yeah, you need some downtime. But bare minimum, like seriously, there's too much to do. Once you have the unemployment rate down to zero percent, once the, you know, once, you know, there's no housing shortage, not there's not a single homeless person. Okay, maybe you can chill a little more. But, you know, this isn't Switzerland. We've got major problems here. All right.

So while we're on the subject of domestic politics, so a handful of centrist Republicans have crossed over. in the House of Representatives, joined the Democrats. They, 219, they got their discharged position, petition through. So when the new session of Congress opens up in January, there's going to be a vote on these Affordable Care Act subsidies that expired and jacked up the Obamacare, you know, premium rates for millions of Americans. Is that going to pass?

Yeah, it'll pass. Trump is going to veto it. And will there be political consequences for that in the midterms? Yes. Think of it this way, too. This is very clearly divided issue, right? Every Democrat supports it. Four Republicans support it.

That's enough to discharge it from committee. It'll pass by a vote or two, right? It'll probably pass the Senate because it's an election year. And most of the people running for re-election in 2026 are Republicans, right? The Republicans have a lot of seats that a year ago looked safe that this year, you know, may not look as safe. But then Trump will veto it. It just seems like, it just seems like political suicide. I mean, I totally agree.

I don't understand. I totally agree. Save health care. You can. Yeah, you can. You can. Or throw us this lifeline of an extension and subsidies until you can repeal and replace, as they have been saying for the last, what, six, longer than that, nine years. Longer than that, yeah.

Nine years? Since Trump, since Trump came in the first time talking about repealing. Yeah, in 2016. Yeah, nine years. Madison Durex, thanks for the money. It just learned that I grew up near your hometown, John, which made me wonder if you've ever been to a tiny town named East Liverpool, Ohio. And I just, I just wrote a little note back. I love East Liverpool. My mom and I used to drive to East Liverpool because they have an amazing antique mall there.

Oh, no, really? Yeah, it's amazing. You're talking, you're speaking my language. Terrific. And there's a lot of, if you like, if you like North. East Ohio pottery, especially from the 30s, 40s, 40s, and 50s. It's all over the place. Like that Zanesville stuff.

Like Zanesville, exactly. The last time I passed through Zanesville, it was about a year ago. And there was a pottery outlet on the left of Interstate 76. So I got off. And it's all new crap that's not made in Zanesville. No. That blows. Yeah.

I hate fake shit like that. I do too. Bait and switch. Okay. So we, and by the. way, we're letting John go five minutes early because you've got to go run off and do something. Yeah. Thanks for that.

Thanks for the five bucks. Imagine turning on the fight Saturday night and seeing John Kariaki fighting on Island Boy. You guys are awesome. Oh, my God, I would love to fight an Island boy. That I would actually do. That I would do. I would fight Austin Butner. Because the Island Boys, what do they weigh, like 90 pounds?

And their faces just look like they're begging for a beating. But they might be quick. Yeah, but they're a little. twinks. Although I have to say, I mean, when I was young, I remember a couple of times I ended up in fist fights with like, I was like in my 20s and I got ended up with like a fight in the guy in the Times Square subway station. It was like 45. And I was like amazed at how fucking hard it was because it's like older guys, you know, they're economical and they're fighting. They don't flail. They just make, they just, and they're strong and they make things count and

they can take pain. So, you know, I wrote that in. my second book, as one of my 20 CIA rules to live by, is your body can take a lot more pain than your brain thinks it can. Yeah. And you learn that as you get older. I mean, just think about how intense pain is when you're a kid. You know, like if you have a sore throat or something, you think you're going to die. And, you know, you said the same exact thing when you're 60. You're like, it sucks, but you know you're going to get over it. Yeah, that's right. I've only been in one fight in my life really and i'm a little bit ashamed to say that i i put the guy in a coma and the only reason i got i don't know why are you ashamed of that yeah the only reason i

wrote about it in my first book the only reason i got away with it was because i had diplomatic immunity oh god well it was bad yeah well i put a guy in a coma i'm i'm not i'm not ashamed he broke trying to break into my apartment oh that's different i didn't give a shit about him this guy called my first wife a whore and he did it on the day i found out she was cheating on me and i just lost it i lost it like a crazy oh did you because he don't even say it okay it says it speaks for itself oh my god um okay uh thanks justin for the compliment uh paris tennessee indeed uh will the will the upscene files be released great gregg badis um i'd say some what do you think? Wow. My heart says, oh, of course they will be. You know, it's all about the children.

My head says, absolutely not. Not when both parties are implicated. A senior, senior members of both parties are implicated. You'd have to have like a complete political outsider when the presidency to finally come in and say, come on, let's, let's be honest about this and just release it. I feel like the only solution in American history for that, what you need is a theater a Roosevelt situation where someone gets to be vice president because they're trying to sideline him because he's out of control and then the president something happens to the president and he ascends that's the only way you get like really cool presidents that's it you know what a system is it rational ted you would need to rest the body physically needs to rest the mind needs to

clear out the gunk otherwise it will be burnout the west wing said staff are in a sprint West Wing's head said staff are in sprint, president runs a marathon, fair. And I think, for example, you know, presidents like George W. Bush, you had a rigid exercise regimen. That's the way to handle that, right? Like sound mind, sound body, you know, you definitely want to be in good shape. But rest is, see, sleep is important. Fucking around is not important. Yeah, that's right.

Watching sports, like you can do that. Angela, Falala, maybe someday we get a Ted and John Antichie. show we can do that that would be fun you know people keep telling me i should do short videos uh where i just walk through some of the cemeteries that i cover in my books oh i like that and and do you know video tours but you and i could do something like that at an antique ball yeah yeah we could totally do that i'll meet you at an antique mall uh we could also show off some of our uh some of our things because we both have some interesting items i'll tell you something i bought the other day that i'm absolutely thrilled with it's upstairs um so i can't

just turn around and grab it but i i scan all my receipts on my phone um with this thing called fetch and it gives me points and so i saved up enough points for four one hundred and fifty dollar ebay gift cards it took me two years but i saved it up and i bought a copy of the new york herald newspaper um uh from april 15th 18th And it says, President shot at the top. Yeah, and it has a picture of Lincoln. And then each column is an update. Seward stabbed repeatedly, expected to live.

And it's like 14 columns across, right? Like super thin. Oh, really, really, really narrow columns. No pictures. No pictures. Yeah, but it's all about. And then there's an update at the bottom saying, President pronounced dead at 6.15 a.m.

Wow. That's chilling. Did you have, does that paper have, is it like on that, Is it still white because it's that old rag? You know how there's like older, like 19th century newspapers. Oh, yeah. Beautiful because they're white. They also sent me an unframed one.

Hold on. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah, because one of the things about what I was really surprised, you, I mean, if you're old enough to have read a paper and print newspaper in this country, you know, you're thinking of high acid, yellowed paper that yellows quickly. But these old, I have old New York Times is from the 1870s. This is the Baltimore.

son. Wow. Saturday, April 15th, 1865. Look how beautiful it is. It's like it came out a day or two ago. See, right here, it says, post script, death of President Lincoln, War Department, Washington, D.C., April 15th, Major General Dix of New York, quote, President Lincoln died this morning at 32 minutes after 7 o'clock, signed E.M. Stanton Secretary of War. And look how small it is. yeah well that's how it was that's that's how that was that was the style yeah look at the columns this this is this is the front page that's crazy yeah yeah I love the way that looks though so cool huh by the way we are currently number eight on rumble hey so thank you for supporting us there um let's see Robin Riley you get a pass for that fight he definitely opened his mouth on the wrong

day that's true yeah that it and I've said that in the book any other day, I would have just said, get out of here. It's a matter with you, idiot. But, um, yeah, Robbie said he has his great-grandfather's Confederate saber. It's true. Wow. I was there. And it's cool.

It's very, very awesome. That is cool. That's very cool. Yeah, we could definitely do antique, like show and tell, for sure. Um, okay. So, uh, but, but, but, but, but, but, I do not want to let you go without us talking about the border patrol situation. Yeah, this is.

So the AP, good for them. They did some investigative journalism. They're monitoring millions of Americans nationwide in this secret program. So basically, I wrote about this, and others have written about it. I put it in my Snowden book. But there's a system of license,

basically local police departments for years have had these local, these license plate scanners that you don't see. But they set them up on the side of the road. Sometimes they are disguised as those like you've been driving, you know, shows you how fast you've been driving machines. But supplementing those are now a system of border patrol units that are set up on highways and state routes and all over the country that basically scan your plate as you go by. All this data, it scoops up everything,

all goes up into central computers, and AI basically algorithms calculate. patterns and then spits out stuff that they deem suspicious for whatever reason maybe this person's involved in drug trafficking human trafficking um who knows what they're up to and so what they do and this is all like verified is they call local the border patrol will say how kiriaku we want kiriaku pulled over yep um you know do a pretextual stop so they wait for john to drive down the road, and then local PD comes up with something. There's literally, for example, the state of Texas, thousands of possible pretextual reasons to stop his car. It could be like the little Christmas tree deodorizer is blocking his view. That's been used repeatedly. Oh, yeah.

Speeding, two miles an hour over the speed limit, it's still speeding. You know, stuff like that. You know, we're checking your, and then the person gets question at link. There's video. of these things happening over and over. And most people, and I know, John, you'll have stuff to say about this, most people answer all these questions. Where are you going? Where are you coming from? None of your doggone business?

What do you do for a living? What are you up to? Do you know why I stopped you? All those things, right? And basically people have been detained. They've been arrested. And here's the thing. Most Americans don't know that, first of all,

the U.S. Border Patrol works within legally, anywhere within a 100-mile border, distance from the United States border, that's 90% of the American population lives within 100 miles of a U.S. international border with Canada, Mexico, the Atlantic, or the Pacific Oceans, right? Yep, that's right. And that's like, for example, everyone on Long Island, New York, right? Like everyone in like the Boston metro area, the New York metro area, everyone in South Florida, everyone.

And so it's 100 miles is big. This goes even further. The AP found Border Patrol operating two, three hundred miles away from U.S. borders, and they're scooping up everyone. It's really Orwellian. And anyway, I have a possible solution to this, but John, what do you think? Thoughts? I think that so long as whoever happens to occupy the White House

doesn't crack down on this from a policy standpoint, they're going to do exactly what federal agencies and departments do. Just keep pushing the legal envelope, pushing, pushing, until something bad happens and the Supreme Court or the Congress pushes back. They're out of control and they're going to remain out of control. Well, what you said is 100% correct. In the meantime, these cameras are hidden in barrels. Those orange and white striped barrels on the side of the road.

So that's why God invented sledgehammer. which are one of my favorite toys and everyone should own one. And then there was a guy in L.A. who used to have a mask and he would like pull up to with a pickup truck with a ladder where there's traffic cameras and go up to the camera and smash it

with a ball peen hammer. And everyone, they could, it drove the LAPD crazy because no one would report him or say anything about him. He was like, you know, we all love you. You're God. And anyway, but the other thing is, we need to follow the Kiryaku rule.

If no one talked, they would have to stop doing this because it would be a waste of money. You know, if everybody was just like, I respectfully declined to answer your questions. That's it. That's it right there. Yeah. Over and over and over. I'm represented by counsel and I don't speak with law enforcement. The end.

I mean, and so that's the thing. It's really especially tempting people, especially people. people who are up to nothing bad are the people who need to do this. They're the most protected. Yeah, they are. And so, you know, so if you're, if you get pulled over and this happens to you, it probably will happen to someone who hears us today, you know, don't cooperate. Yeah. Don't fight. Don't put up resistance. Don't be respectful. But you don't have to answer their questions. That's right. That's right. Let's see. Question for you. John? What martial art did they? Oh, I like this from Umer Sheik. What martial art did they train you at the agency? Also, what's your favorite pistol?

The only martial arts training I got at the agency was Jiu-Jitsu, and it was like introductory jiu-jitsu. It was every day, every day for two hours for six weeks. So it was good. The pistol, that they originally, pistols that they originally trained us on were the browning 9mm which we switched out to the Glock and the, and the Smith and Wesson 38 snub nose. And then we also got certified in the Remington Pump Action 12 gauge. But the question was, which one is your favorite? Oh, the Glock is just cuts like butter. Oh my God, there's no kick. It's, it's the browning the hammer would would would snap back and hit me right here in the webbing between my thumb and my forefinger and cause it to bleed oh god yeah and i i remember telling the guys in

training like this is going to be a problem for me we're shooting 1,500 2,000 rounds a day it's it's it's tore up my hand and then we switched that specific to you to the to something about your It's like 10% of people, they told me, have a problem like that. And so as an agency, we switched it to the Glock. And then that's what I ended up buying myself, was a Glock. It was fantastic. And I think that's the service sidearm of the NYPD, if I'm not mistaken. That was very controversial.

You have to forgive me, but I must run to Union Station. You must. And I will see everybody tomorrow. All right. Thank you very much, John. Have a good train trip. I always love the train. Okay.

Anyway, all right. So we're sitting in in the John chair. Robbie, do we have any ads I need to read before we continue? Let me check and see if they gave us a new one. Yes, indeed. Just one second. I'll pop it up for you. Do you want me to read it or do you want to read it?

Go ahead. You can read it. Okay. Looking for a comfortable but unique option for your gaming setup, check out TechnisportUSA.com with a wide range of ergonomic chairs and an array of colors you'll definitely bring to your next set up to the next level always comfy never boring technist board use code rumble for 10% off your entire order short sweet and to the point for a guy with the southern draw i like that's yeah that's not bad at all so um so we saved a topic that john i didn't get to but i had a feeling you'd have opinions about this too um so there's protests right now in brussels um over this free trade deal um as you know Robbie, free trade deals make my blood boil. NAFTA was the last nail in the coffin of the industrialized Midwest where John and I grew up.

And anyway, so this is a deal that would eliminate tariffs on all goods traded between the EU and Mercosur nations, which include Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Bolivia over the course of 15 years. Now, the EU has always been very protectionist for its farmers, and it shows. I mean, the food is expensive, but it's great. You know, I mean, you go to any European country, spend a month, eat normally, eat as much and drink as much as you'd feel like. Don't go on a diet, quote, unquote, just eat and be yourself. You will come back looking better. Your pallor will be better.

you're going to lose a little bit of weight, you're going to have less inflammation, you'll probably be less sick, you're just going to feel good because the food is better. Now, I have no comment about South American food since I've never been there, so I can't say anything about that. But clearly, incomes are lower there. So even with the cost of transporting fruits and vegetables and other food stuff from Latin America to Europe, it's going to be cheaper. it's going to undermine the pricing of European farmers. So they're pissed off. They're burning shit in the streets.

They're blocking roads in Brussels. And as John said, there's unrest in Greece. I know there's been unrest in France about this. So, you know, it just seems like the EU is just trying to continue the same failed trade policies that fucked over workers over the course of years. and, you know, they haven't learned their lesson. Internationalism is a poison. I mean, seriously, how do you say that you hate your people without saying that you hate your people?

By putting them out of work, by driving down their wages, by subsidizing people, not even in another country, but on another continent at your people's expense. Now, I'm 100% European farmer go out there and paint those buildings brown, block everything. then do what you got to do, raise Hill, and the cat is here to photo bottle. So here's, here's Bernie, the better half. People have been asking about Clovis, my better half, but, you know, he's cold these days. So he's been spending, you know, the better part of his days like an American president, sleeping. And under the covers of the bed, he like, he like, he like, clambers underneath and goes, lives flat and it's dangerous because there's like a cat lump and if you don't plop on the bed

you might kill your cat i mean but i mean as far as the whole european thing goes honest to god trump when he ran in 2016 back when i supported him he ran on the pledge of putting the american people first the european people they need to they need to realize that the european union that that that that body that you are seating your authority to your autonomy to, your sovereignty to, does not care about you. I think that, if I had it my way, the European Union would end tomorrow. And the European nations have become sovereign. They become independent.

They would actually start sending up for their own interests. And they would just put this global experiment in the trash can where it belongs and never look back. I would have no problem with that at all. Just, I mean, I do like to pat myself on the back for being right earlier than others. And, you know, I'm a French citizen. And when the EU is formed, it was the, it was a joint venture between France and Germany, first and foremost, right? It was that they were the two principal members. And when France voted on this, it was a plebiscite.

I voted no. I was like, this is a, you know, and back then voting in the French election was kind of hard. Now you can do it online. But I was like, I was so pissed about it. It's like, wait, you're getting rid of the Frank? Like, why would you do that, you know? I have no idea. I don't understand. And why would you get rid of your sovereignty? Why would you agree to rules that you didn't have vote upon like some weird Brussels conference? I don't

know. So, you know, I have to think that at a certain point, the political downside of these deals will exceed whatever financial corruption benefit the elites receive from it. But we're not there yet, are we? No, we're not there. And the thing is, I honestly don't think that the, that the leaders in Brussels or in Paris or in Berlin, I don't think that they, honestly don't think that they care. I think that's the same, that's the same mentality of our leadership here in the United States has. We're getting funded, we're being donors, we're going to these fancy parties, or going to the fancy dinners, we're rubbing elbows with the fancy people. I don't give a crap about what, about what some guy outside on the

street thinks until of a sudden that guy on the streets had enough and they start telling your country off yeah yeah yeah i mean the thing is that the you know when the when when when but the thing is europe has a tradition of revolution you know the elites have to know that they read their history books it's not like it it's that old i mean you know france almost burned to the ground in 1968 yeah but i mean here's the thing though is no the generation that we have now it's it's all it's all post world war two you know, the exception of some of the boomers are hanging out. You're taught that nationalism is a bad thing.

Nationalism is racist. If you want to be French or English or Welsh or Scottish or German, then you are a xenophobic bigot. Then you just sit down, shut up, take your lumps, except multiculturalism, and you get better food to kind of make up for the rape gangs. I reject that. And I have a question that I want to answer tomorrow. about like training to travel overseas.

How do I prepare for it? I'll try to get to that tomorrow if I remember. If not, feel free to post it again. Everyone, we will be back tomorrow with John and I Friday at 9 a.m. Eastern time. We're here Monday through Friday at 9 a.m. Eastern every week, every day. Thanks for joining, liking, following, sharing the show. Please stay tuned to the TMI show with Ted Rall and Manila Chan. Yeah, that's me, the same Ted Rall.

Robbie will be in the wings there as well. Thanks for, as usual. See you soon.