DeProgram with John Kiriakou and Ted Rall - DeProgram: “Why Jeffrey Epstein Refuses to Die”

Episode Date: July 18, 2025

It’s time for “DeProgram,” where political cartoonist Ted Rall and CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou tackle today’s most urgent stories. Ted and John bring you up-to-date on the Jeffrey Epstein case Trump wishes would just go away, where the WSJ reveals a bromance between the president and the disgraced financier in a bound birthday book, and the White House orders the release of some court documents but not all. Next, we dissect the Senate’s vote to cut $9 billion from NPR and PBS, threatening public media and perhaps even the lives in media deserts in places like Alaska and the Great Plains. The focus then shifts to Iran’s nuclear program, bombed by U.S. and Israeli strikes on Fordo, Natanz, and Isfahan, with conflicting reports on damage—Trump claims “obliteration,” while intelligence suggests a mere months-long setback, raising the stakes for diplomacy, European sanctions or renewed war with Israel. Finally, they address the NYPD’s use of FDNY’s Clearview AI access to bypass a facial recognition ban to illegally identify a pro-Palestinian Columbia protester, Zuhdi Ahmed, in a case dismissed due to this privacy violation, sparking outrage over free speech.

Thank you. Hi, thanks for joining us. I'm Ted Raul. John Kiriaku is on the other side of the screen. You're watching the program show on Rumble and YouTube. It's Wednesday, July 18th, 1 p.m. Eastern Time. We are trying to get our act together here. We've been terrible this week. We really screwed up Wednesday. Sorry. We do the whole thing off. Today we're rescheduling. But we promise, really promise, Monday, Wednesday, Friday next week, 5 p.m. will be on the three day a week. schedule. Thanks everyone for bearing with us. We're just very busy guys. But legitimately, we're winding down the other busyness. Oh, John, you broke up a little bit there, but

let me just check your audio maybe. What I was saying was we really are trying to wind down this other busyness so we can focus on this. Totally true. Totally true. All right, so today we're going to be talking about Jeffrey Epstein, the case that just won't go away. We're also going to be talking about the budget cuts at NPR and PBS. How serious are they? What will the effects be politically and practically? What's up with Iran? Are they going to go back to war with Israel?

And there's a bunch of other questions there. And there's an interesting story regarding facial recognition software here in New York City, the cops and the fire department. Oh, my God. Went after a Palestine protester at Columbia University. They took him to court. They indeed him through his prom photos from high school. Oh, my God.

And then basically the judge said, no, no, no, that's against the law. You promised you would never do that. You keep doing it. So I'm going to send you a message. So Jeffrey Epstein, the case that just won't die. The latest is that the Pambani, the Attorney General, now says that in fact there will be some documents that will be released from the case files specifically the grand jury indictment files that that is not her call actually she did say that

she did say what you say she said yeah but it's not her call they have to motion for a judge a federal judge to release the grand jury uh transcripts and the judge can just as easily say no want to add, though, Ted, Donald Trump's reaction to this whole thing has been inexplicable because he ran on a position of releasing all documents. And now he's the one who's standing in the way of releasing whatever documents they happen to have. Now he's talking about suing Rupert Murdoch and he's going to sue the Wall Street Journal and he's going to sue the reporter who wrote the article, and then at the White House, Kaylee, Kylie, whatever her name is, one of those 90s names, is saying that they had no right to release this 50th birthday letter

that Trump allegedly wrote to Jeffrey Epstein in which he sketched a naked, the president sketched a naked woman and said, you know, may all of your future, see, secret wishes come true or some stupid silly thing like that with innuendo um the question though is why the why the 180 why the flip-flop unless he is somehow implicated in this i i just don't understand me or someone he cares about or someone he cares about he cares about a lot yeah yeah right so those things could be donald himself someone a close ally or um and or or, I should say, Israel, and or, who knows, right? I mean, it's, those are, but that's it.

Basically, he didn't know what was in the files. He and his team got into the files, took a look, and decided. He said, forget it. You can't be released. Not releasing them. Yes. But they could have been, you mean, so, what about the judge in this situation? Could a judge have put the kibosh on releasing that stuff anyway?

Absolutely, yes. It's the judge's decision. Soul discretion of the judge. But they could have requested it. Yes, they can request it. In my own case, we asked to see the grand jury transcripts and the judge approved it. And that's how I know who ratted me out in the grand jury. Hmm.

Yeah. So it could be yes. It could be a no in the interest of transparency. I didn't realize. I didn't realize those were sealed. Yeah. They are. They're sealed.

And so, you know, if the judge says yes. then the question is then does the administration actually release it or is it going to be redacted and if it is who in the world are they trying to protect well so crisis management 101 as you know john this is not something you do you either i mean let's put it this way right there's really only two choices if you're in this kind of squeeze either you come clean and you release everything or i mean And maybe you hope that it doesn't get released because a judge says, no, but you okay. You're like, I'm as transparent as I can possibly be. Or you recognize that you really can't handle the truth coming out and you resign and you go

and you believe you go to Mar-a-Lago, you've got to exile in Saudi Arabia. That's right. That's what the King of Spain did when he got caught embezzling money and screwing women. He abdicated and he moved to Dubai. It's, I mean, those are the choices here, right? And I think that's what, it's also, the politics of it are super interesting. I mean, like a lot of left-leaning people, I didn't really care about the Epstein case at all and barely followed it until fairly recently. You know, I felt like I had my moral obligation as a reporter to keep on top, to keep on, to keep tabs on it. But it wasn't like something I personally really cared about. But like, like normal Democratic voters, everybody cares about it now. And it's not just because they want Donald Trump to go down, some of them, for sure, but a lot of them are just like, no, no, now that clearly something's up.

And that's something is that there's some really rich and powerful men who are getting away probably with pedophilia. That's right. Those people should be caught. That's something that, you know, we're not that politically polarized in this country. That's absolutely right. And, you know, one thing that the MAGA Republicans are saying, and they're repeating it over and over, is this is about crimes against children, right? This is everything that the MAGA Republicans have been yelling about the last 12 years, crimes against children, that there's this, there's this governmental elite that is trafficking in children.

I always poo-pooed the idea that, like, no, they're not trafficking. Well, you know what? Maybe they were. maybe they were trafficking in children and we're just now hearing about it and of all people Donald Trump is the one covering it up who knows because that's what it seems like right now obviously the pizza I mean hell we live in a world where the pizza thing turned out to be true where's where's the entrance to the basement that's where the children are being held there is no basement there are no children here yeah right right but but something yeah something

smells to high heaven yeah yeah this is just isn't right getting worse that's it that's it it's this is not right and and these maga people smell a rat they want to know why in the world trump is covering richard nixon stalled on releasing the white house tapes but ultimately had to although relented yes he he redacted a lot of stuff he did but you know what it comes back to that old adage it's not the crime that brings them down it's the cover up of the crime that brings them down. Like, do these guys learn nothing from history? They don't. Nothing. And they also think they're smarter than everybody else. And, you know, they think they can just, they, oh, well, if we just tell them, just shut up, focus on the economy, nothing to see here, just move along.

Nobody, that doesn't work. It never has work. No, it doesn't work. That's right. It does not work. So they should move on. There was a good question here. And I kind of like it. From Schmatt, why won't mainstream news talk about the Mossad angle? Yeah, good question. I think I know the answer. I mean, I guess they're probably going to say it's speculation, but you can report on speculation because when people are speculating in public and they are, then, you know, it becomes news. Yeah.

A lot of people are, do think that they're, you know, I mean, the honey trap, the Mossad or other Honey Trap operation is a scenario that kind of works. Yes. I view it as a test model. It may be wrong, but right now it's like, you know, when you stress test it, you look at it from all angles, it does seem to work. Yeah, I think that's right. Yeah.

You know, I'm looking at the, I'm looking at the chat. And so many of our viewers are correct. this has intelligence written all over it within that my guess is it has Mossad written all over it USC thank you for the for the five dollars is it possible this is being covered up because it is a dark CIA or join up with Mossad or likely cover it because it is close to this administration yes yes and yes and I'm going to also add it probably is solely Mossad but the Israelis have been yelling on every network that they don't spy on the United States, which we all know is just a crock.

Right. We know that's not true. We know that's not true. Yeah. So a question is that did anything connected? I don't think so, right? From Eric Hussaud. What do you think?

I don't see a connection beyond the fact that Comey's daughter was a prosecutor in both cases. But I don't know. The Barr family connection, I mean, that's, that's kind of messed up. And the same thing with the Maxwell family connection. It's very interesting to me, though, that we have not heard from Galane Maxwell's attorney saying, hey, you want her to talk? You're going to renegotiate her sentence. And then she'll talk until you're happy with it. Well, she might be worried that she might suddenly have become overwhelmed with a sudden urge to kill herself.

And may I answer red axes? Here's another good question. Can Mossad operate so blatantly in the USA without CIA knowledge and then have Epstein avoid consequences the first time? It's not that they operate without CIA knowledge. The CIA is fully cognizant of the level of Israeli intelligence operations in the United States. It's the FBI that is on the Israelis all the time. The problem is that many years ago, like going back to the Nixon administration, the White House made a decision. that they're not going to crack down on a on israeli espionage they're just not going to because in the greater scheme of things when considering the full uh relationship it's better easier whatever to just let them go so michael gardner saying that actually uh maxwell's lawyer is talking and suggesting oh good that um no it's um you know yeah she's in a definitely she's a definitely she's Look, she's in a delicate dance, right? Because she has something to offer, but she's in, as you know well, that feeling. She's in the jaws of the state.

And until she's actually out walking free, at least on bail or something, she's in danger. Well, you know, there's another little thing. This is probably neither here nor there, but it's something that occurred to me yesterday. As a matter of policy in the Federal Bureau of Prisons, pedophiles are not permitted to be in a minimum security work. camp okay you don't put pedophiles in the maximum because they'll get killed you don't put them in the medium because they'll probably get killed you don't put them in the the minimum because then they can run away and and molest more children so as policy they have to be in the low security prison galane is in a minimum security work camp and she has 20 years for pedophilia how'd that work out

how that happened how come how come she gets to have And we know this for a fact. She gets to have her job as cleaning up the beach every morning in Florida. They put them all in a van, drive them over the beach, and they clean up litter on the beach. That's her job in the prison. Why? Why does she get a sweetheart position like that? Yeah, that's right.

Rich people always get their own rules. And you could say that again. I saw it. I was asking, do we think Washington would be united enough to have carried out a sigh up on this? I don't think so. I don't think that's sophisticated. And Red Access is asking if that's what she was actually convicted of. I'm going to, I'm going to look it up.

I'm going to look it up just to be on the safe side because I don't want to be a fool. And if I'm right, I'm going to, I'm going to repeat this. I think it's trafficking. Was her conviction? I think you are right. it's a long time it is it is let's see it's trafficking six counts of enticement of minors sex trafficking of children and perjury so yeah she's a chomo yeah done and done so how does she get this sweetheart position i mean it is also i mean there is the there is the question of why is she in prison

all by her lonesome. Yeah, right. I mean, the assumption here is that only Jeffrey, with his, you know, incredible voracious sexual appetite, is the only victimizer here. That's the implication. I mean, we're not even hearing from the feds, hey, we looked into all sorts of other people,

but we, you know, with this one, we couldn't build enough of a case. So, you know, the person ABC, this other one, we didn't have enough witnesses. this other one, you know, whatever. They're not say, or, you know, or we found this person was innocent. They're not saying anything, right? It's the deafening silence that speaks volumes here.

And how hypocritical is it of both the Democrats and the Republicans to be pointing the finger at each other when the Democrats did nothing to release any of these documents during the four years of Joe Biden's administration? That's true. And now the Democrats are. are pushing legislation in the House of Representatives to demand release of the documents. They put the Republicans in a tough position, but why don't the Republicans just vote yes? Because either you're for transparency or you're not for transparency.

Because it's all, you know, it's all a ruse. I mean, the Democrats, you know, the Democrats only fight when they know they're going to lose. Republicans are, you know, this is kind of like, oh, I'm really trying. to start to release this uh we want to release i mean yeah yeah it's it's it's just not it's it ain't gonna happen um so oh my gosh thank you thank you jordan biffle that was nice i missed that that that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's nice they stole they stole my image for for the late show the other day and dog on it i put myself in for an i mdb credit for it really they stole your image what do you mean

They had a picture of me from Fox News that they posted while John, what's his name, the Daily Show, John Stewart. Stuart, thank you, was yelling about Epstein. Wow. Yeah, nobody asked me. One comment. I think that there is a moral standard for CIA operations, but no, and that's actually part of my standard speech at university. universities is there is no moral guideline, none, zero. And so I tell young students, if they're considering going into the CIA, you have to go in

with your own set of moral values because there will never be somebody to tell you, no, you can't do that. That's unethical. That's immoral. That's whatever. They just tell you, go, you know, collect the information or make the recruitment or whatever it is. So you really have to be clear in your heart.

so there's nothing is there no equivalent in the agency for like the uniform code of military conduct where there's a lot of rules do this you can do this you can't do that zero zero rules the only thing they ever told me and they told everybody is never fuck with medical security or finance because they're the three that can land you in prison that was it well that's amazing well so i mean John, this is a tough question, and you can just say, I'm not going to answer it. What's going to happen? Yeah, man, that is a tough question. I think that as tough as Donald Trump likes to be, he's going to have to relent here because his base is breaking apart as we watch. And so he's going to have to relent. Now, whether that means that there are documents that have to. been destroyed or there are hard drives or there are DVDs that's a different issue but i think he's

going to have to relent and honestly everything or can he get away with a partial release i think he's going to try to get away with a partial release he'll try to get away but but the pressure's not coming from democrats they can just stiff arm the democrats the pressure is coming from the mega base they want this done and they want it out there and i think he's going to have to do it i mean it's really fascinating, right? I mean, here you have a president who, you know, is viewed with some justification as a threat to democracy itself, who, you know, basically started a riot inside the capital who provoked a riot, right? Let's just say that. You know, a guy who did all sorts of terrible violations of the emoluments clause of the Constitution, like crazy over the top.

Yes. Yeah, I mean, totally, like, destroying all sorts of norms that really, have made official Washington work well for years. And then, but this is what he's going to go down for? Of all things. It's like getting Al Capone on taxes. It's exactly what it is. Yeah. I mean, the Democrats, it's just, it's like they could never have made this up.

It's not based on the issues. You know, it is kind of amazing. Yeah, so I did want to address this. So Houdini says Trump already said he doesn't care if some of his base walks away. you did say that he says that yeah and some is one thing but yeah but if he but if he if this if this disinterest in the base then leads to a 50 seat turnover in the house of representatives and maybe even loss of of the senate which paralyzes his final two years as president that he's screwed and remember every single president in his second term becomes obsessed with his own legacy

And every single president in his second term ends up wallowing in scandal, right? I mean, Obama was the exception. But, yeah, second terms are bad. That's when Iran-Contra broke out for Reagan. Monica Lewinsky, for Clinton, Watergate for Nixon. Absolutely right. I mean, although this is a little bit of a different second term because there's an interruption, right? There's an interregnum, the Biden interregnum.

That's right. over Cleveland having to deal with Benjamin Harrison in between. Yeah, that's right. But yeah, that's amazing. All right, well, we'll continue to follow this. Is there anything we need to deprogram further on this point? Or should we keep it moving? No, I think we've said we've given all the updates.

But again, I don't think we're underestimating the import of this thing. This is a bona fide scandal. And it may not be a big deal for the Democrats, but this is just tearing the Republicans apart. Well, I mean, the thing is, it's like, I mean, obviously if it's a big deal for the Republicans, it has to be a big deal for the Democrats. I think what's really interesting is, you know, as a side note, how much this kind of highlights the cluelessness of the Democrats. I mean, the Democrats recognized the scandal that was Watergate. They understood it. The Republicans, you know, understood that the import of, you know, all the Clinton scandals like Traveling, Travelgate, Whitewater, and of course, Monica Lewinsky, instantaneously. The Democrats still kind of don't, you know, you don't see the feeding frenzy that you would kind of expect to see from the opposition party in relishing their mortal enemy really in trouble. Yeah. I think the Democrats really are that clueless. Yeah.

I really do. Yeah. It's very strange. Yeah. All right. Well, let's move over to NPR and PBS. So basically the Senate has voted to cut $9 billion in funding from NPR and PBS. Most of this is PBS.

And the main effect is going to. So for people who don't really understand how this works, right, all the stations are privately owned. So you and I can buy an NPR station. Well, you know, W. Sean Intent, JNT, and then, which would be fun. Yeah, it would be. And then. That's how Lady Bird Johnson made millions and millions of dollars.

It was by buying radio stations. Really? Mm-hmm. I didn't know that. So anyway, so the state, then you, but if you want to become a public radio station or TV, you buy programming from the national, like, groups like PRI that you hear. This show is sponsored by PRI. They sell that to the local station.

And then you might hire some local town. You know, like, hey, let's bring in some people from New York or Washington to do local New York and Washington stuff, you know, whatever you want. And then you put together a programming schedule and you either make money or you don't make money and you beg for donations from every so often. And that's basically the model. The big stations like over where you are, W.A.M.U. in D.C. here in New York, never have any problem raking in the big bucks. no so like for and and they make crazy amounts of money there like like Brian Lerer who's the local guy here in WNIC very talented uh host really good and good guy um but he the money he makes more money than the presidents of the united states oh my god

thousand dollars a year what and i'm like thinking they could probably get someone to do as good a job for less hi i'm here um you know it's it's like it's really crazy but then the real But then there's the little stations out in flyover country in like northern Montana by the Canadian border and places like that where they're filling the gap in what's already become a private radio desert. And so we already have serious problems like flash flood warnings, tornado warnings that go out over the radio. And these stations are private and public alike are getting national programming piped in and they're not able to be. part to provide emergency alerts in places like rural Alaska, like Senator Murkowski, expressed concern about these cuts. So, you know, people are going to die in red states, mostly. Because of this, I don't know if, I mean, I do know the answer. Democrats will never

be smart enough to run the ad to say, like, you know, my beautiful little daughter was swept away by a flood, and it's all Donald Trump's fault. Like, you know, that would be great, but they're not going to do that. But the, you know, but, but anyway, this is, it's, on the other hand, I'm really torn, right, about this. I'm kind of like, I kind of see the Republicans beefing about, like, why should conservatives pay for liberal programming? On the other hand, every big country has state media. Everyone. This is kind of state media. You know, and we're getting rid of Voice of America, our other sort of outward-facing state media propaganda arms, it's a little weird that, I mean, it reminds me of like getting rid of the Department of Education. It may be

without import, but the message that it's going to send to the world is, we're voting to be stupid. This is idiocracy. We're getting rid of, we're getting rid of educational programming or getting rid of costume dramas. We're getting rid of, you know, history and documentaries. And we're getting rid of the Department of Education. What does that say about us? You know what? I don't even have anything to say about that. I agree with every word you just said.

Every major country in the world, probably every country in the world has a state radio station. The one in Greece is called ERT, Elenikira, the Hellenic radio and television. And most of the day, they've got classical music. They do the news at the top and bottom of the hour. They have weather reports or watch out for this forest fires that's encroached, forest fire that's encroaching on whatever city.

It's important. And it's really not political. They don't even have this debate in Greece because everybody just accepts that that state radio is a public service. Yeah. The part that annoys me about this discussion is that Republicans characterize NPR and PBS as far left. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, I'm far left. Right. Right. Like, it's like we don't exist. Those are just, you know, that's just liberals. Dilan is asking something that's not related. So just pipe into it, though. So are we to talk about Syria? We should talk about Syria. We absolutely should.

So there's, during Hurricane Katrina, the Onion had a headline about the National Guard and said, National Guardsmen cannot decide whether to help or shoot people in New Orleans. Israel seems to not, they can't decide whether they want to be allied with the new government of Syria or to bomb them. Which, you know, those two things seem a little inconsistent. I have been watching the Middle East. or working on the Middle East or living in the Middle East since I was 16 years old. And I genuinely don't understand what the Israeli policy is here. First of all, they overthrow Assad along with the Turks and probably the Americans.

And then they install al-Qaeda as the leader of the country. And then they bomb the place like three times. and in the meantime not the first time we ever got rid of a socialist secular dictator and replaced him with al-Qaeda and in the meantime

oh yeah that's right and then in the meantime people like you and I were saying whether you like Bashar al-Assad or not he's the only thing protecting the Christian community the new guy comes in

and says love and milk and honey for everybody and between 2,000 and 3,000 Christians have been killed since Assad left, including an attack on Assyrian Orthodox Church a week and a half ago that resulted in the deaths of 87 worshippers. It was a massacre. Thank you, Rafi. So the Israeli government is, I mean, obviously a classic definition

of what Marxists call a division in the ruling classes, right? they are, you know, the, the Netanyahu government is divided between the people who wanted to bomb to support the Druze, right? Yeah, yep, yep. In Syria and those who want to have relatively friendly relations with the new regime. And, you know, it's, I don't know, do you think that the fault line there is between the way we sort of generally understand it between Netanyahu, within this constant? even though he's far right is not, he's the most liberal member of his cabinet. Crazy, right? Right, right.

And then I can't figure out where the Israeli people fit into all this, because as long as I've been alive, the government's always been to the right of the Israeli 50-yard line of politics, right? I guess I should say 50 meters for the metric system. But now it's like, I don't know where the Israeli people are in all this, but there's no coherent policy in Gaza at all. I mean, it's kind of like, at this point, you guys are just bombing for the sake of bombing. Yeah, they are. You're out of targets. You have nothing to bomb. That's absolutely right. There was a poll that was released, I don't know, less than a week ago saying that October 7th galvanized the Israeli population and that support for destroying Gaza

has remained consistent, which was very, very disappointing to me. I was, you know, Ted, you remember two months before October 7th on your show at Sputnik, on my show at Sputnik, we were talking about these major demonstrations, thank you, GigiK, major demonstrations against Netanyahu, against his plans to reorganize the Israeli court system, against his attacks on the Supreme Court of Israel, against Netanyahu personally because he had been indicted on seven felony counts of corruption. And all of that has just gone away because everybody's focused on Gaza. Now, with that said, where are those voices from the Israeli left that we read in Haredes

and the Jerusalem Post, but that don't seem to be out there in public saying, wait a minute, we can't just murder hundreds of thousands of people. Right? Isn't that what happened to them? And it's happening now to the Palestinians and nobody seems to care? I just don't understand it. There definitely are tons and tons of Jewish people and including and Israelis who care. Yes. Yes. I don't like it. And then some, there's the people probably who, you know, may not personally care,

but also might see how this is going to hurt Israel's position in the world. That's a way of caring also. I mean, it's complicated, right? there's so many different responses to it. You know, I think this is going to be one of those things like after the Israeli government falls or is replaced in some way, they're going to be writing books for years. Yeah, analyzing this. After Nazi Germany, it was like, what was public opinion?

Like, what did people really think, like that really famous book, they thought they were free, where basically they interviewed ordinary Germans about what it was like because they, you know, they couldn't express themselves in public. I think we can't know Israel's become that closed of a society. That's comparable to the Nazi experience as well. You're absolutely right. And it was just a few days ago, Ted, that two former Israeli prime ministers came out and called this camp that has been set up on the, right on the border of Gaza, called it a concentration camp, saying if it's a camp that you are forcibly taken to and you are not permitted to leave. That is a concentration camp.

By definition. By definition. Yeah, concentration means concentration of people, right? That's what it is. It's, now we should, I actually do think this is worth talking about, because it is confusing about the Drews. So it's a little misspelled here. It's D-R-U-S-E, right?

But not that it really doesn't. Yeah. But, you know, they're not Israelis at all. I mean, well, there are Israelis, there are Israeli droos. They're a fascinating, a fascinating group. There's no such. thing is an ethnic Israeli. So it's like there's no ethnic American. It's really just someone who lives in Israel and is a citizen of the state of Israel. They're not Arabs, right?

They're, they're, you want to explain it? Well, they're monotheists, but they're not really Arabs. They're not Jews. And they inhabit this border area of Israel, Lebanon, Syria. they stretch up even up toward the Turkish border and they're fiercely independent. They've, for the most part. The Kurds are a good analogy, I think. Yeah. Yeah, because the Kurds aren't eras. They're their own thing.

That's it. That's right. They're their own thing. Yes. What do I don't even know the answer to this. What language do they speak? Do they have their own language? It's my understanding they speak Arabic.

Okay. I knew a Drew's. actually he was my chiropractor and he said it's so hard to be a droos because even in america his parents will only allow him to marry another droos and you know how many droos there are there aren't any there only 50 000 in america or 20 000 whatever it is i think it was 50 um so it's hard because they're not israelis they're not arabs they're not muslims they're not christians they are monotheists like unitarians they have their own temple like a big temple inside Israel. And they try to get along with everybody. They try not to be involved in these

wars and border skirmishes. They just want to be left alone. That's kind of like the Zoroastrians. Very much. Very much so. Yes. Non-atheistic. Old religion. They have their own thing. They want to be left alone. They want to get they want good relations with everyone. Or the Yazidis in Iraq who are always called devil worshipers and they are not devil worshipers. They pray to Satan to appease him, but not to worship him. Yeah. Rid just sort of confirmed what I said. Yeah. So yeah. Well, okay, so before we move on here, anything else do we want to say about the PBS thing? I mean, you know, look, I have a love-hate relationship with PBS at NPR the way I do with like the New York Times. Yeah. I'm mostly

hate with NPR. I don't like politics. Yeah. The politics are stupid. They don't really, I mean, there's a lot of dumb things about that network, not the least of which is they lard up the weekend with a bunch of stupid quiz shows when it's a news network and news happens on weekends too. But also, the take is painfully woke and mainstream. Yes. Yes. It's so, God, the cultural coverage makes me want to die sometimes. I mean, it's like, you know, it's always like, So there's a new novel by a trans, you know, handicapped, half-dead, quadriplegic. And it's like, okay, okay.

I mean, actually, from time to time, it would really be great to hear stuff like that. But it's not from time to time. It's all the time. And it's just like after a while, it's like, really? Again? I mean, just for old time's sake, it could be great to be like, so there's this straight dude. He wrote a book. Let's talk about it.

Yeah. Never hear that. No. Straight white guy has an interesting book. It's so cheesy. Oh, I couldn't agree more. I was, I was asked. Steve Inskey from NPR asked me to go in one weekend and do a do an interview. And it was live, which they didn't tell me. It's fine. I do a lot of live interviews. But it was a gotcha interview. We're live right now. Yeah, we're live right now. It was a gotcha interview. And I didn't budge one inch. He was giving it to. to me and I was giving it to him right back. And then at the end of it, we went to, you know, whatever they call their commercial breaks. He said, well, I didn't expect that kind of, that kind of response. And I said, don't ever call me again. Don't ever call me again. And as I walked out, I turned my phone back on and it blew up. People from all over the country that friends of mine saying, oh, man, you gave it to him so good. I was like, I just walked out on NPR and I will

never, ever listen to them or speak to them ever again. And I haven't. Yeah, I know you told me the details of that story. We don't have to get into it here, but it must want, but it was like, it's disgusting. I mean, look, I've been ambushed at Fox News and I was pissed off there because, you know, you're told a specific thing. You know, you're basically told what this is going to be about, what you're going to be talking about. And, you know, they don't give you the questions, because after all, we're not Joe, we're not, we're not Hillary Clinton. going into a presidential debate, but you are, but you're still given the topics, right? And so you generally know, like, what is it about?

Then suddenly it switches and it's not about that at all. That's an ambush. And it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, we're, you know, we didn't, you know, we didn't, you know, we didn't switch on him and, and, and, you know, CNN or, you know, CNN's coverage writ large, we probably, we probably, he probably would have been fine answering, but the point is that's not. It's not cool. We would have mentioned it. Yeah, that's right. That's right. It's, it's not polite, right? It's rude. Be polite. It's wrong. Yeah. No, it's true. And NPR comes off as very polite, but maybe they're not

polite. They're just calm. Sort of like the line from double indemnity where Edward G. Robinson tells Frederick Murray, I used to think you were really smart, but you're just tall. Chris Cross So great That's a fantastic movie By the way, if you're watching, you've never seen Double Indemnity Watch it today. It's like you will thank me.

It's a great movie, classic. Yeah, totally classic. All right, so let's go to the situation in Iran, which you're probably more up on than I am. But basically, obviously, we're still trying to figure out what was the extent of the bombing to how much damage was done to Iran, how much enriched uranium did they get out and all that? It doesn't look like there was that much damage. No, an Iranian intelligence assessment is that we really didn't do

much damage, and they had already gotten all the enriched uranium out in the weeks before the bombing, anticipating that the bombing was going to come. Well, we all knew it was going to come, right? Or that it might come. Yeah, we all did. Do you think that that was intentional? Like, you know, it's... I do.

You know, so like, I scuba dive, right? And one of the things they... People who worry about scuba dive and worry about sharks. And they always say, like, you know, look out for sharks. I'm like, no, you shouldn't worry about sharks because if you see the shark, he's not going to attack you. And if he does attack you, you'll never see it coming. It's like that. If we were really going to bomb Iran.

and catch them with their pants down, who just would have done it out of a clear blue sky, right? That's right. When it's not all this, like, working up the tension and, you know, analysts on all the networks talking about it. So obviously the Iranians, they're not idiots. They know what's coming. So obviously they're going to move their stuff.

I think this was a very elaborate effort for everybody to save face. I really think that's what it's been about. Yeah. The Israelis killed a lot of people, which makes the Iranians very, very angry. You know, we talked about this on the show where the Israeli strategy...

Well, that's their deal. They always do that. Yeah. The Israeli strategy is if there's a target in an apartment building, they'll blow up the entire city block to get that guy. And they're going to kill 300 other people, but their target is that guy. The Iranians didn't do that. Their targeting was far more specific. And that's why the Israeli casualty numbers were so much lower. But now we're learning that we really didn't put the Iranians out of business. the U.S. attacks were not crippling. They had already gotten the enriched uranium out.

And in the event that they want to reconstitute what they had, it would be relatively easy. Another thing, too, the Iranians said yesterday that they are ready and willing to go back to the negotiating table. Why, I have no idea. But they're ready to continue talking. And this tells me that the Iranians are false. more reasonable than the Israelis have been and will be on this issue. The Israelis just want everything destroyed. Yeah.

Well, that's their thing, right? They've convinced themselves, or at least they've convinced the world that they are convinced that the biggest existential threat to Israel is Iran. Yeah. I have become convinced that the biggest existential threat to Israel is the Israeli government. Totally agree. It applies completely on international support and everybody liking them, right? At the UN, at the ICJ, at the ICC, and that's not true anymore.

I mean, they're underwater in the polls. The United States is their number one benefactor. And so if the people, if the citizens of the country who supply you with the most foreign aid and run interference for you in international organizations like the UN Security Council, don't like you, you're going to pay for that. I mean, you know, the Israelis know that, they've got to know that. We should add to, Rita asks a question. We've addressed it a couple times, but we can give a little bit more detail here. What would the Saudi reaction be? Well, the Saudis have been pretty public with their policy that they want to begin enriching their

own uranium. So the original deal in the two weeks before the October 7th attacks was that the Saudis would sign the Abraham Accords. They would open an embassy in Tel Aviv, not in Jerusalem, and the Israelis would open an embassy in Riyadh. And in exchange, the United States would guarantee Saudi Arabia's security and provide Saudi Arabia. with its first nuclear reactor where they could begin enriching uranium and using the nuclear reactor to generate electricity. That all fell by the wayside, of course, but it looks like that's the deal that's on the table. Well, so we'll see what happens. I mean, it feels like we just go round and round and round and round, right? I mean, and I know that it's hard to know how to negotiate

with the Iranians because no one person can really sign off on anything. Right. It's a, you know, it's much more of like you need a collective group, right? Like Iran has like overlapping, very Byzantine kind of governing style. But still, this, I mean, nope, the Trump administration has had a lot of trouble with diplomacy. I mean, they just, you know, look, look the thing. They dropped the ball with Russia and Ukraine, although, what do you, by the way, do you make of this 50-day delay? The Ukrainians are complaining that this is just giving

during the peak of fighting season, it's giving the Russians more chance to beat them up and soften them up in preparation for the ultimate peace talks. Or maybe it's just Trump, as usual, like with the tariffs, kicking the can down the road over and over and over again, like a college student who keeps asking for extensions on his paper. Yeah, I think that's it. Trump is personally offended that Putin hasn't agreed to engage in peace talks. And so now he's going to start taking it out on the Russians by providing arms to the Ukrainians that he had previously said he would cut off. Hegset actually did cut off aid to the Ukrainians only to be overturned by Trump a day or two days later. I don't see any end in sight to this Russia-Ukraine thing, Ted.

And in fact, if anything, the Treasury Department right now is coming up with new sanctions to impose on the Russians. I don't know. What new sanctions are there? Or could there be? Only meaningless ones. You and I have talked about this before. A sanction can be, well, there's this guy, Ted Rawl, and he is not going to be allowed to open a checking account in any of our banks. That's a sanction.

Right. I don't want to. No. You never would. You never would open a checking account in one of their banks. But that's a sanction. And they can say, well, we toughen sanctions. So, you know, we're going to see this thing through.

I don't know. I think it's all silliness. Well, so I guess. So there's also been talk that maybe the hot war between Iran and Israel isn't over. Yeah. You know, on the Iran. Iranian side, at least if Iranian YouTube channels are to be believed, they fully expect another hit from the Israelis. They don't know when it's going to come, of course, and they

don't know whether the United States is going to be involved, but they believe the Israelis are going to hit them again. What do you think? I don't think they will. The Iranians have done everything right, willing to go back to the negotiating team. table, not really retaliating against the United States. They fired a missile at Al-Udei Air Base. They hit a U.S. After providing warning. After providing warning, the geodesic dome with the communications equipment in it.

But if they were to attack the Iranians again, they're going to have to do it without American assistance. And obviously the Iranians have to be racing to get that. nuclear weapon online, but it's going to take a while. Oh, yeah. Even though Netanyahu's been saying since 1992 that the Iranians are six months away from a nuclear weapon. Yeah, it doesn't work that way, right? I mean, so, yeah. I mean, it's funny because it's not like a big secret, right? The Progressive Magazine, remember when they published the H-bomb information, how to make one back in the 70s? And the FBI raided their rated their offices. Right. Yep. I was, you know, so I was a nuclear engineering major at Columbia,

applied physics and nuclear engineering. And, you know, one of the first things you learn is, it's not really that hard. It's like, I mean, but it's time consuming. Yeah. It's, it's like making a, it's like making a turkey. Anyone can, anyone can cook it, but it takes all day. Yeah, exactly. So, exactly. So, yeah, so let's talk about, facial recognition software. So I was really fascinated by this. There's this company called Clearview AI that has kind of like this very strange

kind of advisory board, Richard Clark, Floyd Abrams. Richard Clark. Of all people, right? Shame on him. And basically, as of 2020, and I'm sure they're a lot bigger now, they had 2,200 contracts with police departments and intelligence agencies and government agencies

in 27 countries. Now, that was five years ago, right? And two of those organizations are the New York Police Department and the Fire Department of the city of New York. And I was kind of like trying to figure out, like, why would the Fire Department need facial recognition software? Well, anyway, I also should point out that in New York State, there is a lot of law that says that because when this first was introduced and the NYPD said, hey, we can use this to catch criminals. The concern was that Clearview would scrape, and they did this. They scraped everything off of Twitter, every photo ever loaded off of Twitter. Twitter sued them to try to get them to stop, and that case is still pending in the courts. But anyway, in the response to that, New York said,

okay you can only look you can compare photos of say your suspect that you're trying to find but only to arrest photos and parole photos that so we already know the person's kind of like in the system and you know never mind the whole innocent until proven guilty you know and if you've committed a crime before you're not doesn't mean that you're guilty of another crime throw that out but anyway that's what the state that's what the state legislature did here um anyway Apparently, the NYPD and the FDNY can't seem to even follow that rule, even though that gives them a lot of access. And this is a really, really crazy story. So a city fire marshal, by the way, I should point out that there's been all sorts of violations of this kind of rule.

For example, we've mentioned John Katsimatis. Yeah, John Katsimatidis. That's the resident Greek here. You have to do this. he's the Gristides grocery market billionaire. Anyway, he subscribed to Clearview AI to identify someone that his daughter was dating. What? Yeah, yeah.

And he also used it at Gristides to identify shoplifters and go after them, right? So this is a really over-the-top firm. They've been using it illegally over and over and over again. And so anyway, this latest example, this latest example, This latest case involves a dude named Zudy Akhmet. And Zudy, I'm wondering, by the way, if they mispronounced his, if it's Ahmed Zudhudy, I don't know. Yeah, right.

But this is how they're reporting it in a thing called the city. Anyway, the city fire to Marshall went into the FDNY to access this facial recognition software to help out the NYPD who they're trying to identify appropriate. Palestinian protester at one of the encampments at Columbia University. Now, he's 21 years old. He's pre-med at City College. So he was at Columbia. He's accused of throwing a rock at a pro-Israel Zionist protester back a year ago during the April 2024 protests at Columbia. Anyway, the cops identified him using his old prom photos from high school that they found social media, which is illegal.

He was charged with felony assault, third-degree assault as a hate crime, which was then reduced to misdemeanor second-degree aggravated harassment. A criminal court judge dismissed the case and now was very angry about it. And she said, where the state routinely gathers, searches, seizes, and preserves colossal amounts of information, transparency must remain a touchstone. blessed fairness be lost. Judge Valentina Morales wrote. So anyway, the point is that they keep doing this over and over again. Is it time to ban the use entirely of this technology? Which, by the way, NYPD officers have repeatedly downloaded it to their own private phones, tapped into the base,

and used it to investigate, for example, people that they said, perspective, their wives cheating with or whatever. They just can't help themselves. It's been abused so much. I mean, should we just ban the cops from using it? I would. I know I'm biased, but I would because I don't trust the cops. I don't trust the firemen even.

You know as well as I do. A lot of these cops are going to, you know, see a beautiful woman in the next car and they're going to take a picture and put it through facial recognition software, it's they can get her phone number, get her address, her home address, see if she's married or whatever. First of all, there's no probable cause, you know, so they shouldn't even have the right to do something like this. There are only 17 states in America that are ID on demand states.

Okay. So in 33 states, the cops cannot come up to you and say, hey, you have an ID, let me see your ID. It's like you can only see my ID if you have, if you have articulable suspicion that I have committed a crime, am committing a crime, or am going to commit a crime. You can't just walk up to me and ask to see my ID. Obviously, if you're driving a vehicle, that's a different. If you're driving a vehicle, it's different. Yeah. But if you're just, you're protesting or you're standing on the street corner, whatever, the cops cannot just walk up to you and demand that you identify yourself. Well, this is circumventing that. And so I think it should be, it should be

illegal. I really do. I mean, yeah, I think you have a reasonable, I mean, so you don't really, it's interesting. You don't have an expectation of privacy legally if you walk in public, right? Like, for example, I can take your picture on the street as part of a crowd scene or whatever if I'm just taking a picture on the street. But at the same time, I do think you should be free from thinking that your photo is going to end up in a database that could then, and this is not outlandish, could then be fed into a drone, an assassination drone that can track you down based on your face, identify you and shoot you remotely, even without a human operator controlling it. That technology is now it exists. It's been deployed. And also, you know, Clearview AI doesn't

seem to be very discriminant about who they lease this to. The Ukrainian minister, of defense, for example, is one of their customers. And they claim that the Ukrainians now have access to two billion images from Russian social media at their disposal. So there's just, you know, they're like, you know, Twitter sent a cease and desist. I mentioned that to Clearview. And I'll love this. The CEO of Clearview replied to the lawsuit that they have a First Amendment right to access public data. I don't think that's quite true, is it? No.

No. No. I don't think it is true. But basically, it's the Wild West. And it's just, you know, and it's also like, I don't know, it's like they had no, if they can't identify this guy some other way, I'm sorry. I guess, you know, the, I mean, and of course the counter argument is, well, this could be used to catch bad people.

and that's true great we have yeah we have a legal ammo that the cops need to use to go catch that bad person yeah I would rather see guilty people get away than see innocent people oh my God I agree completely completely so yeah well I mean so yeah this but here we go and it's not it's not I wanted to talk about it because it's really just like not an issue that even the left seems particularly concerned about, although traditionally it's always the left that's targeted. Although this, by the way, this technology was used to ID a lot of January Sixers, too. I believe that. So, um, I believe that. Hey, I know we're short on time, but I want to

say, remember a couple of weeks ago we talked about Rahm Emanuel running for president? Yes, yes, I remember that. Well, Governor Glenn Yonkin, of Virginia is currently on a campaign trip in Iowa. So he must have spoken to his mom and she said, you know what, Glenn, honey, you should be president. And so he's off to Iowa to campaign. And he said, he's not campaigning. He just wanted to give a quick talk at a dinner.

He's really only concerned about serving the people of Virginia. yeah. Remember when Yonkin was the the great Republican hope? I sure do. I sure do. I mean, is he still? I mean, is he? No. What happened? He ended up being Governor Vito. After a year as governor, the Democrats won both the House and the Senate in the state legislature. And so they did everything they could to protect education and abortion. And he just, you know, vetoed, vetoed, he just vetoed everything. And then even stuff that the Democrats and Republicans agreed on, like budget numbers, he vetoed that too just to throw a wrench into everything. So he ended up not accomplishing anything. The economy in Virginia is good just because it's always good

until very recently. And it's because there have been federal layoffs for the first time since 177. So, I mean, the buck has to stop somewhere. He took credit for the good economy. He's going to have to take credit for the bad economy as well. Inaologically, where does he fit it in terms of the whole country club Republican versus mega populace? Yeah, very, very much the country club Republican, very much so.

The guy's a multi, multi-millionaire. He's a businessman. He was one of the founding partners of BlackRock. finance, plenty, plenty of money. He liked to call himself almost four years ago, as Donald Trump without the negatives, he's not Donald Trump without the negatives. He is a down the line, run-of-the-mill country club Republican. Yeah, I don't see that coming back soon.

It could come back at some point, but not, yeah, maybe after I'm dead. USC has a question here what do you think about what do we think about Newsom trying to expand his likeability by going on shows like Sean Ryan I mean I think it's smart Yeah but you know what though

Newsom first of all I'm biased I don't like Gavin Newsom for personal reasons I just think what's your personal reason I can tell you my personal reason When he was running for Lieutenant Governor he would specifically task his campaign manager with, you know, doing these long days and go represent me here and go represent me there.

And here he's screwing the guy's wife the whole time. And then they got caught and he had to apologize, oh, my best friend, I betrayed my best friend, I screwed his wife. Shame on him. Unforgivable. Not worthy of California's votes in my view. But with that said, Newsome. is going to have to answer for the gigantic homeless population that we've come to see under

his tenure. He's going to have to answer for $6.5 a gallon gasoline. He's going to have to answer for these ridiculous wildfires where the state government has done nothing to upgrade the electrical lines or to do anything to stop these fires. California has so many problems right now. highest taxes in America. And then his response is, oh, but I'm liberal and I'm good looking. So vote for me. Uh-uh. Well, perception is reality, right?

And I mean, the perception is that California is a disaster. I happen to think it's true. Yeah, I lived there for years. And but I think, and also, you know, it's not like when Clinton, former governor of Arkansas ran in 92, the national. press didn't go to Little Rock to look around. If they had, they might have been like the guy who gave us this

shithole shouldn't be presidents of the United States. But California is not secret. It's not in hiding. It's like everyone can see it all the time. And, you know, I think that's his problem, right? When you're a governor, you are judged on your state. You're the

executive. Yeah. Like I said, the buck has to stop somewhere. I mean, like if Andy Bashir runs, everyone's going to look at Kentucky. You know, Josh Shapiro, everyone's going to look at Pennsylvania. It's not like that for John Federman, even though he's from Pennsylvania. He's a senator. That's right.

It's different, inexplicably. Yeah, that's exactly right. I still don't understand why he's still there. No, I don't either. Let's talk, very quickly, I wanted to touch base with you about Trump's illness. Yeah, how do you like that? He has circulatory issues. Not uncommon for older people.

But, you know, it was pointed out. It looks like he's probably had him for a while, and it's only when it was his legs are photographed. Using makeup on his hands. Yeah. See the pictures? Yeah, so he must have those black marks. Yes. So he's not obviously, I don't think it's huge.

We're breaking any news by saying that he's not the most physically fit dude, whoever was president of the United States. You know, he's overweight, doesn't eat well, doesn't exercise. So, you know, clean living is not his thing. I guess Democrats are in no position to talk about this after, you know, we just talked to Jake about. They've, they've undergone a cover-up for four years. They can't credibly say, hey, can we, can we know more about Trump's, you know, physical health?

Not a chance. Not a chance. Nope. Nope. And in fact, this week in congressional hearings about the Biden, auto pen and Biden's health, everybody took the fifth. Yeah, what do you make of that, right? Because I was kind of like thinking, so here's my question, John. I know you're not a lawyer and neither am I, but I was, I'm sure you've thought about this. We both have lots of friends who are lawyers.

Okay, so I understood that the doctor pleading, doctor patient confidentiality, okay, but he also pled the fifth. Okay, but there's no law against covering up the failing mental acuity of the president of the United States. It's not against the law. No. So what's so, but the only reason to plead the fifth is to avoid self-incrimination. So what's going on? Was this a just to show contempt for the process?

I think it was. I think that's exactly what it was that the, the Democrats, see, this is one of the reasons why I hate the Democrats. The Democrats just don't want to play this game. They're willing to use it against the Republicans. But they don't want the Republicans to, you know, Houdini? I said exactly the same thing. When I saw the picture of his ankles, the first thing that I thought of was this is a renal problem.

Yeah. Yes, I thought the same thing. I mean, it probably can be, it can probably be, you know, managed for a while. Oh, yeah. Yeah, without a doubt. But, you know, I have to be full cards on the table, John. I've never thought that Trump was going to finish his term. I remember you saying that a long time ago.

I mean, who knows? And who knows that may be the plan? Who knows? Yeah. I mean, like, we're in a state now where most of my liberal democratic friends are literally saying, you know, Vance wouldn't be so bad. No. I've said from the beginning, I'm more impressed with Vance's wife than I am with Vance,

even. Well, but you know, when someone has an impressive wife, you always think, like, there must be more to that guy. She married him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Vince wouldn't be terrible, I think. I don't know. I mean, I do think he's a smart man. And of course, I'm highly biased being from a fellow creature from Southwestern Ohio from the Rust Belt, even though his story in mine are very similar, except I don't lie about claiming to be a hillbilly. I mean, it's like, sorry, you know, that was your, that was your grandma. And by that stand. I'm from Brittany, okay?

So, like, be serious. Like, oh, but you went to visit, so did I. He went home in the summer. I mean, not home. He went to Kentucky in the summer. Sorry, fraud. Anyway, whatever. Okay, so, okay, I'll put this up.

Yeah, no, Ted. Some people aren't with the right one. Fair. Tell me about it. I'm divorced twice. This is more about, like, If I have to choose between one of the two, I personally don't like any of them, and that includes the Democrats, they're right-wing as far as I'm concerned.

But, okay, so are we sufficiently deprogrammed? Anything we need to deep-program further? I think so, Ted. All right, then. It went well. Thanks, everybody for joining us. Thanks, everybody. It's much appreciated.

And we will see you next Monday, Wednesday, Friday, 5 p.m. Eastern Time. we really, really, really mean it this time. Have a great weekend. Take care.