DeProgram with John Kiriakou and Ted Rall - Epstein’s Swan Song | DeProgram with Ted Rall and Jamarl Thomas

Episode Date: May 1, 2026

Editorial cartoonist Ted Rall and political analyst Jamarl Thomas deprogram you from mainstream media every weekday at 9 AM Eastern time.Today we discuss:• A suicide note purportedly written by Jeffrey Epstein in a Manhattan jail has been kept secret for nearly seven years, locked up in a New York courthouse. A cellmate said he discovered the note in July 2019, after Epstein was found unresponsive with a strip of cloth around his neck. Epstein survived but weeks later was found dead.• Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth tells Congress that Trump does not have to comply with the War Powers Act requiring presidents to seek congressional authorization to continue a war beyond 60 days because the cease-fire agreement reached with Iran has paused the clock.• Trump issued an executive order that expands access to retirement accounts for workers who don’t get 401(k)s. 54 million Americans lack access to an employer-based retirement plan.• Labor unions, Democratic organizations and community groups march to commemorate May Day, International Workers Day. May Day Strong organizers are calling for “no school, no work, no shopping”, in protest of government policies that put billionaires’ needs above those of workers.JOIN US LIVE ON RUMBLEhttps://rumble.com/c/DeProgramShowFOLLOW TED:https://rall.com/https://x.com/tedrallLISTEN ON SPOTIFY:LISTEN ON APPLE MUSIC:https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deprogram-with-john-kiriakou-and-ted-rall

Hey, hey, don't know what's going on with my signal here in my hotel. That's how it is. Anyway, hey. Hey there, you're watching Deep Program with Ted Raul and Jamarlem. Thomas, happy May Day International Workers Day. It is Friday, May 1st, 2026. Please like, follow, and share the show. We're here Monday through Friday at 9 a.m. Eastern Time coming up at 10 a.m. Eastern Time.

will be TMI show with myself and Manila Chan, except it'll be Robbie West filling in for Manila Chan. Manal Chan's recovering nicely from her surgery and giving birth, although, of course, newborn babies. You know, there are a lot of work. Anyway, good morning, J.T. How are you doing? I'm doing okay, man. How is it going? Pretty good. How did it go without me yesterday?

It went fine. Robbie was a great. stand in, as always. We ended up in a conversation on abortion, which kind of took the show. I heard about that. Yeah. Now, it went fine. No issues.

Excellent. All right. So, all right. So I don't know how abortion wasn't even in the in the in the in the in the rundown, but I'm not going to ask. All right. It's evolved. Or devolved.

Anyway, I'm not watching it. You know, it's so funny. people are always like, oh, like, do you watch the show if you're not on it? I'm like, no, it's a vacay. I just don't. I've never read one of my old books ever. I've never look at my old, the only time I ever look at my old cartoons, if I'm going through them to pick them for a book or to, I don't want to reread my own shit.

I just don't want to do it. Anyway, so, all right, let's get into what we got going on today. Jeffrey Epstein's purported suicide note has surfaced, you would think that, you know, something like of that import with that much discussion would not be left sitting around for seven years and have the authority say, oh, by the way, we have Jeffrey Epstein's suicide note, we'll talk about that. Pete Hankseth testified before Congress that Donald Trump doesn't have to actually comply with the War Powers Act, which requires presidents to go to Congress to get authorization to use military force within 60 days of the

beginning of hostilities because, you know, there's a ceasefire. And, you know, although that's in not, that's not in the, you know, War Powers Act. But then there's, Trump has issued an executive order that expands access to people who don't have 401Ks or to find benefit retirement plans. So we can talk about like the retirement crisis of the United States as a 62 year old. I'm interested in the subject a lot. And today is May Day. So there's kind of there's a sort of there's going to be protests across the country calling for people to boycott work, school, and shopping. This is International Workers Day.

And some people, it's mostly being organized by Democratic Party affiliates because we don't really have left wing parties or organizations in the United States. So anyway, where do you want to start? Let's start with the war powers. I find that to be interesting. And the argument that Pete Hetzif is effectively making on this is nonsense. You started a war regression. Okay, fair enough. The president gets wet, 60 days to go and kill people. That's 60 days that's supposed to have ended today, meaning the murder of people supposed to stop today without congressional approval. HEC-Seth, because all laws and problem with laws, is that they're made in language, and language is a fudgy thing at best.

It's like, well, we're not actually murdering people currently. We pause. And so it changes the timeline on the amount of time that we get the murder. So if we reopen and start it, and the problem with that is right, they could say, well, you get a new timeline when you resume. So if you resume military operations, well, the timeline changes now. Now we've re-up. Wait, you get a reset every time?

Is there an argument? That's my point, right? Like, meaning the language is so fudgy that you could say, well, the time that we stop killing people should not be included in 60 days. Or you can say, we get a reset. It doesn't matter what you say, because at that point, you're just inventing, you know, you're manipulating language in order to get to the designated end that you're effectively looking for. That's outrageous. I mean, and then, you know, the wild part about this is even if this went up for a vote,

they may actually get the votes to keep the war going. I mean, I guess that's the other question. Even if they followed the law, do you think that they would get the votes from Congress to allow Trump to continue the war? I do think they would get the votes. think, and I think what's interesting is this argument, which is really novel, like, from obviously the U.S. Department of Bullshit subdivision of lame excuses, right? Is like, oh, we're, you know, we need to come up with some, you know, why is Pete Hague Seth making this argument, right?

Why not just simply say, we have control of the House and the Senate? We can just tell our Republican allies in Congress and, like, you know, de facto, like Dino's, like, like John Federman, to just do what we want. And we won't have to worry about the War Powers Act. And the reason is because this war is so unpopular and this president is so unpopular. And we have a midterm election coming. And a lot of these Republicans in Congress are running scared. So they don't want to vote.

What they're afraid of is something that looks like, kind of like this. Like around September or October, attack ads start running by Democratic opponents to incumbent Republicans saying, like nuclear confrontation with Iran, the American economy in the toilet. This is Donald Trump's war. Congressman Joe Smith voted for Donald Trump's war, vote against John, you know, that's what they're trying to avoid.

And the thing is they think, oh, well, maybe we'll just do a workaround and claim that the War Powers Act doesn't apply. But obviously, there's nothing that prevents the Democrats from just filing, an emergency injunction in federal court and saying like, look, we need the Supreme Court to weigh in here, which I think they would. And I think the Supreme Court would rule unanimously against the administration because the plain language of the War Powers Act is so it's been adjudicated

previously and it's very clear. And what Pete Hagsath said is plainly nonsense. So that's what they're scared about. They don't want to just put it up for a vote because yes, they can get the votes that they want, you know, but the problem is it's going to come at a cost. That would be amazing if the Supreme Court came back and said the president needs to stop waging war on Iran. Well, he doesn't have to stop. He just he just has to go to Congress and get approval. True.

But if you're right. And Democrats are like, hey, I'm not of mind that the Democrats are against the war. I think they just don't like Trump. There's that. Two, it is a constitutional crisis. If the president makes the argument, hey, we can continue this war because of hashtag reasons, whatever those reasons are. Democrats, take them to the Supreme Court and Supreme Court without a military, comes back and says, hey, the president needs to stop the war or go to Congress to get approval. And what happens if this president says, yeah, we disagree with the Supreme Court? I mean, that's a whole other issue, right?

Like, will Trump acknowledge and say what the Supreme Court is right? Or does the president say, well, look, we disagree with what the Supreme Court is. We're going to take this back to the Supreme Court and we're going to entertain the war while we relitigate this in the Supreme Court. Like, that's a mess. That just gets very messy. Do you think it's the other question? Oh, well, that is a good question, right? I mean, look, the thing is, what's really dangerous is when you have a president who is determined on a course of action that runs in opposition to the clear language of the law and or the Constitution and or the interpretation by the courts.

And, you know, who's going to back down in this game of chicken? And there's that old question, you know, what army or police force does the Supreme Court have? And we know the answer. So the, you know, I mean, I'm terrified that Donald Trump, will be backed into a corner in any number of ways. And this could be one of them where he says, like, basically it's like he can't just walk away. On the other hand, it just crossed my mind. This might be the best out for Donald Trump.

Donald Trump wants an out. He doesn't want to fight this war anymore, right? So he could go to the American people and say, you know, back in the 70s, Democratic Congress passed this terrible law. nothing I can do. I had my 60 days. And because I'm such a strong believer in the law and the American system and the separation of powers. And I love democracy. I'm going to, I have to stop the war.

What can I do? I mean, this is a way. It is a way out. I don't know if Democrats would do that, though. That's the rug. That's the rub. Yeah. Because what, because what, pursuant to what you're pointing out,

there's a second part to that that Trump is going to say. I had Iran beat to death. Their Navy was in the bottom of the Persian Gulf. The airfare, you know, there was no air. We had air superiority. We can do whatever we wanted. And Democrats lost the war. If it wasn't for them taking me to court and helping Iran get a nuclear weapon,

I would have lost the war. We would have finished the mission. We would have finished them. Jack. Yeah, it's the, 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, they, we, we wanted to fight. They wouldn't let us win. I mean, people believe, there are a lot of people who actually believe that, and in a certain sense, it's kind of true in that, like, look, we weren't going to fight this war for another 30 years. No, we were not going to, we were not going to nuke, so you could say, like, okay, there were limitations. Same thing here. We can nuke Tehran if we want. We're not going to, I hope.

So, yeah, but that would be the narrative. I mean, and look, I think that the secret part that, you know, you're saying out loud is so important. A lot of Democrats like this war. A lot of Democrats have had a hard on for Iran for a long time. And a lot of Democrats will do whatever the fuck Israel wants. And so all of those things mean that, that if this came up, look, even if you had a 60% Democratic House, I'm not sure that the, that Congress would deny Donald Trump the right to continue his war against Iran. Same. I'm just skeptical of it. I mean, granted, they hate him. Fair enough. They do. But if, let's be very honest, if this was Joe Biden, would they be against it? No.

Fuck no. Or Hillary Clinton. Yeah, or Hillary Clinton. I don't think... No, they'd be all about it, or Barack Obama. And so, and I think a lot of them are even under the current circumstances under this administration with a 33% approval rating. They're still saying, like, well, actually, you know, we don't like Trump, but we hate Iran, so, you know... Let it right.

And I get the sense. Let's be very... It's sort of like when I was negotiating divorce with my ex-wife and we were trying to figure out our finances regarding the LA Times, and my wife said, I hate you, but I hate the LA Times more. You know, it's like, it's like that. And clearly, you know, the Democratic, the Democrats in Congress, you know, they hate, they like war more than they hate Donald Trump. Yes. And I suspect it's a bit of double dealing.

I mean, like, if your opponent is dying, let him die, meaning Trump is drowning in this war. And so it's like, do you really take them to the Supreme Court that may actually do something about it? I think they probably would. Don't you think they probably would? I mean, it's just too clear a separation of powers. True, but it's, it feels weird to me that the Supreme Court makes a determination on war. I mean, maybe it's just me. It just seems to it's an interpretation of the War Powers Act.

Like, can the president credibly say, you know, use either this pretext of like, well, there's a ceasefire, so therefore the clock starts ticking again? Or, I mean, look, honestly, that is not, I think it's a stupid argument. I think it goes counter to the intent of Congress at the time. But, you know, I mean, it's not a zero argument. It's worthy of interpretation by a court. That's what we do in this country. like when we have a when we have a different differing opinions of what a law means and I always thought the I don't know about you I when I first learned about the war powers act I always thought it was a

strange like solution to the Vietnam War it's like it's like um it's like um like okay so you're basically it's 1973 right the Vietnam War has is about has basically ended the draft is is no more the Paris peace conferences have happened. Watergate scandal has begun and the beginning of the end for Richard Nixon is, is underway. And this democratic, very empowered Democratic Congress at a time when the Vietnam War is massively unpopular and has been lost, says, okay, so our solution to this is not to just say the right to declare war and wage war resides with Congress as the founders intended. no our solutions to say have had it for two months and then but after two months you got to come and talk to us

it's weird as shit i mean it's and it's like and it's not written with with total clarity too right i mean it's it's true what heggs set this saying in a way right like wars sometimes happen in fits and starts like sometimes you know things aren't linear um you know i mean when did world war two begin right Well, we say September 1st, 1939, with the Nazi invasion of Poland, right? But credibly, you might say maybe the Anschluss of in Czechoslovakia, I mean of Austria in 1938. You could credibly say the remilitarization of the Saar Valley in 1936. You could credibly say the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1934. I mean, so there's a lot of places like where does it really start, right?

So, you know, a court needs to weigh in. Yeah, I think people, well, two things. One, I think people need to be aware of the history that you pointed out that we were careening off the edge long before 1939. Like, meaning, if you were paying attention, you'd be like, that looks bad. And you may not look at any individual act as, oh, my God, this is world ending or world shaking. but it was in the context of where it was leading to and the things that people were doing and what people got comfortable with at the time frame. There was no such thing as international law. And I keep saying the same thing is here. So there's that. Two, true. I don't take issue

to be any litigated in court. The 60 days, I kind of get, kind of, I mean, like, I think the purpose of the 60 days to me is like to respond to, a presidential to an emergency. Let's say, for example, like, it's Saturday night. Congress isn't in session. The Canadians finally have had enough of our shit, and they invade, right? Well, I mean, obviously, the president has to be able, or someone, right? Has to be able to call up, call up the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and say,

go to the border and kick out the Canucks, right? Someone's got to be able to do that. And, like, they can't be dicking around and waiting for a debate in Congress. Okay, so fair. You know, and this could happen Christmas week, right, when no one's around. So, like, but, like, 60 days, what takes 60 days? Like, nothing. I mean, it's over by then.

I guess the problem with laws is that they require good faith, right? Like, the laws don't assume bad faith, which they should. Exactly. Exactly. We were taught that the American Constitution was written with bad faith in mind. But I don't think it was, really. I don't think it was. And saying, yeah, we can trust the president. Give them 60 days. Why? Why? Why? Why? It's a long fucking time.

It's giving you the impression, especially after Richard Nixon, that presidents are trustworthy entities. They're not. I mean, think of, yeah, 60 days, right? I mean, the Nazis' crossed the Maginot line and, you know, and in May of 1940, six weeks later, they were in Paris, right? It's like the, it's like, and the country had collapsed, right? Two months is a long time. It is a long time. It is a long time. Especially for the person to be dicking around with some foreign country. And that mentioned, the amount of hardware. Taliban were defeated in about that amount, that amount of time. Yeah. I mean, does that 60 days include the president moving hardware and armament's still location?

I don't think so. I don't think it does. The president can deploy forces wherever they want. And by the way, just for the sake, another thing that we never talk about in this country is we keep hearing, the media CNN will always say, like, and the president is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. True.

But that was a ceremonial title when the Constitution was written. It came out of British and French understandings of what the commander of the armed forces was. And it was just kind of like a, you know, it's like it's sort of like how the, like the king of England has like this long list of titles and, you know, he and like, or like being the Prince of Wales, right? It's like, you're not really the Prince of Wales, right? It's like, it's just, it's, it's, it's honor. It's an honorific. It didn't really mean that the person who commanded the army was the president of the United States. That was really expected to be like top generals when they wrote the Constitution. And somehow that power ended up sort of devolving to the

presidency, but it's sort of not really totally constitutional. But it should be the presidents. We have the civilian military. I mean, unless you're with the military. Well, I think that's what happened is. Yeah, I think people ended up, I think, I think it stuck because American and it kind of made sense. Yeah. Okay, so we have an ad that I should read. So here we go. And it's not a coffee ad, I think.

So let me see if I can get this thing that can come up on my crappy. Oh, here it is. Here we go. Okay. Hey, everybody, quick word about one of the most important documentaries you'll watch this year. It's called The Fall of Minneapolis, produced by Alpha Dews and award-winning journalist Liz Collin. This film blows the list. off what really happened with George Floyd, the trial, the media lies, the police body

camp footage they never showed you, and how an innocent city was burned while good cops were thrown under the bus. It's already been watched over 10 million times and praised by Charlie Kirk, Megan Kelly, Jack Pasobeyek, Dinesh D'Souza, Tim Poole, and many others who care about truth and justice. Best part, it's 100% free right now. Oh my God, I don't know if I can read this one. This is so crazy. That is hard, man. You know what? I'm canceling this one. Sorry. I can't do it. I've never done that before. I can't do it. I can't do it. I'm sorry. I really I can't do it. Robbie, I apologize. I can't do it. I can't talk about anything. The good cops who got thrown under the bus. What fucking good cops? There are no good cops

thrown under any bus. They drive the bus. I would not have read that ad as the right winger on the show. And you as the communist, on May Day, you pick the most screwed up jacked up ad. Oh, that's hilarious. Oh, my God, I could like just read Jeffrey Epstein's suicide note right now. Yeah, no, you're banned from ever selecting ads again. Oh, my God. No, you're just, thank you. You are banned.

Yeah, yeah. Thank you, Robbie. I appreciate you. Thank you. It's right. People rather, the people rather, people have to Susan. Capitalism. Capitalism.

Dinesh to Susan. That's going to read the ad about Lloyd for, oh, Lord. I mean, seriously, I don't know. Yeah, George Floyd, he really, yeah, he's, he's, he's really the, he's really the, he's really, he's really, yeah. The poor cops. In fairness, no, no, he did pass a, he did pass a fake 20. Never mind that 5% of the 20s in circulation are fake, but okay. I mean, I mean, did, no, did he deserve to get whacked the way that he did?

No, I think a better question would be to ask, why. did the IDF, what does IDF train our policemen to be soldiers? Soldiers do not make good cops. And that's a question needs to be asked. And either people on the left or the right are going to ask that question. And that's a question needs to be fundamental. I mean, but no, I mean, we'll have to have a blame the IDF for a cop that's a lunatic. I understand your point. Soldiers are not cops. Those are very different things. Agreed. They have a very different But in Israel, though, they're one in the same. Here, they're not. They're supposed to be officers of the peace. I mean, that's the title. And so in Israel, they have regular, they have regular police officers who are not IDF soldiers. Yeah. Conscription is mandatory. It is a military system. I mean, sure, you can, no, you can say the exact same here. No, ICE agents are law enforcement officers. Okay, but they have tactical here. Here in Calisville, we have a SWAT team. Okay, well, they're cops. They explain to him why they have a tank.

It's because they're not cops. They're soldiers. There's a difference. Right. That's fair. That's true. Even a job is different. Yeah, 100%.

Theoretically, it's supposed to be Andy Griffith. It's supposed to be officer friendly, right? 100%. And that's a conversation, seriously, that we need to have in this country, that we're not. And how you pick that ad on Mayday being a communist? I didn't even know what it was. I just saw the line like film documentary. I'm like, film documentary.

How bad it would be? Ted, oh my God. You can review them before you click to go live button and kick me in the balls to the people at Rumble. I appreciate you, Ted, so much. Because it's funny, they're going to be like, Robbys chose the ad. You picked the ad.

Robbie did not choose the ad. But, all right. Well, anyway, that was, okay, that was funny. All right, well, whatever. Okay, so. That's hilarious. Robbie, you can pick, if you find another ad for us, you can just tell me.

Okay. You have blown up our ads for the show, Ted. So congratulations. Oh, if you cancel an ad, that's it? Well, potentially. I will keep an eye out, but you probably just kicked us right straight into slong COVID for today's show. Oh, for today's show. Yeah, well, you know.

Not forever. Whatever. I see an ad right now. I can read it. Coffee or Rumble premium. What's your poison? Well, it's not a timer in it. No, I haven't hit except yet. I'm going to hit it right now. Here we go. Well, they do coffee.

All right, yeah, we know that coffee ad. Jesus Christ, Tinesh, Susa. Still haven't tried 1775 coffee. Now is your shot. The 1775 starter kit just dropped only 1,000 units. You're getting the bold, dark roast that hits hard. The smooth medium roast and the vitality mushroom coffee for clean energy and laser focus, no crash, all single origin, small batch, toxin free and mold free. plus you're also getting a gold spoon clip because freedom is not scooped with plastic. A frother strong enough to stir up your coffee and your mother-in-law's opinions and a black 1775 tumbler,

$170 worth of coffee and gear. Years for $99. It's for the ones who've been watching 1775 blow up on Rumble, wondering if it's actually worth it. Spoiler, it is. Go to 1775 coffee.com slash studio and grab your starter kit before they're gone, bold beans, clean fuel,

and a morning routine that stands for something just like Rumble does. and there's no Dinesh D'Souza involved. In full disclosure, I had to cancel my 1775 description. Why? The shipping costs are getting so much. Really? Oh, really?

Yeah. It costs almost as much now to ship it as the coffee costs. Thanks, Trump. Oh, because of the oil, all the fuel. Just to wait. So the average price of fuel in the United States is now, as of this morning, $4.39. It was $2.79 seven weeks ago. I mean, that's what's double 279, like 540 or something?

So 548? Yeah. So, I mean, we're closing in on a 100% increase here. That is crazy. Gas prices here in Calisville are now $4.14 a gallon. The median annual income here in the valley is $30,000 a year. I'm in Ohio. I just bought gas for $5.19.

And I got to tell you, it's like Ohio has very, has very, people always on the right say, well, and they're right. They say that California gas prices are high because of the state taxes, and that's true. Ohio always famously had low, has always had low gas prices. And whenever I came out here, I'd always wait to fill up because, and not so much now. So, yeah, there's no getting away from it. Guys, I think we should talk about May Day since May Day came up. So, so, Today, there's going to be protests all over the country, kind of like the same people who brought you No Kings, and they're calling for like no school, no work, no shopping. Well, okay, so I have thoughts.

Okay, I'm going to rant. Okay, so first of all, okay, so here's the thing. You can't, what you're talking about here is a national boycott, right? You're talking about a national strike. We heard talk about this during previous No King. rallies. We heard about it during Occupy Wall Street. We need a national strike. You know, fuck the capitalists, make them hurt in the wallet. Look, agreed. But historically, a national strike is one of the very last things that happens in the cycle that builds up towards a

revolution. It's not one of the very first things. And it's certainly not, and right now, here in the United States, we still have to do the most basic thing, which is to build a revolutionary organization. We don't have a left-wing political party. We don't have a grassroots. Do not talk to me about the Green Party. The Green Party is not a national party. They don't run candidates all over the country for school boards and for, you know, for Sheriff and all that stuff. The Green Party is not, I mean, God bless them, but they're a tiny little every four-year party. And they're not a hard left party. But okay, but the point is, I'm not sure they're a revolutionary party, I think they're a reformist party, but that's neither here nor there. The point is,

we need a broad-based grassroots national organization, ideally from my point of view from the left, but it has to be populist anyway. And it has to be completely opposed to the Democratic and Republican parties and the system that feeds them and the media infrastructure that feeds them and operates completely outside of them. And then you can slowly start to, you can slowly start to think about like, you know, agitation and breaking the system and then trying to build for the seizure of power. That's years away, if we're lucky. If we get started right now, it's 20 years away if we're lucky. I mean, what is it about Americans that we want the dehydrated revolution just add water? I mean, it's just, it's not going to work. Well, two points. Agreed. The fact that it's

being run by liberals, definitely not going to work because they don't believe in it. They believe in it purely as a typical sphere to go against Trump, not as a means of changing the political system. Those are very different things. Meaning, it's kind of like the no kings rallies. It's like, hey, everybody should come out and we're going to have dancing frogs and dancing penguins, and we're going to take the system. It's like, yeah, but do, but you're really only doing this for Trump. If you had a Democrat in office, there would be no king's rallies. You know, and the same issues would be present and available even under a Democratic administration. We should be very clear on the options and what they're trying to go at.

We want to make a big stink about Trump. So we are going to call and bring up all of these old revolutionary ideas to go against Trump, not the system broadly, which you should be going against. And honestly, no BS. Part of the reason that I want a strategic defeat is because I want a credibility law of the entire system, not any one individual political party. If it's a situation where the people immediately go to Democrats because they're pissed at Trump, that doesn't further my objectives, nor that the furthers, I would argue, the objectives

of an America public that wants America full America. I hope that makes sense. I agree with you. With one thing I may disagree is that if things crash or go bad, you may get a situation where people turn on the system broadly, in which case you can get that broad base because people are so angry. Kind of like, what is it, Black Friday, for example.

Like when you get a situation like the, that created the New Deal, many things are so bad that you can get a president that makes the argument of basically, you know, he's, FDR moved in those hundred days as if the country was attacked by alien force, like meaning by like space aliens like everything is on the table and they were taking them the court

to the point where he was like yeah maybe we need to pack the court people like oh my God pack the court but again that's it was such an emergency the Great Depression that all bets were off if you get something like that

especially with the current age of like the technological communications that we have today do you think that the timeline is better, meaning do you think that the future is moving faster than history move? I hope that makes sense and hope it's clear. Yeah, it does. Well, I mean, I think, look, I think one thing that is true

is that the ability to organize at the grassroots level has been radically accelerated by the Internet and other technology, right? So, you know, now if you, you know, you can reach people in remote areas via, you know, via the Facebook or a Facebook page or whatever, and to say, hey, be at this place, you know, two o'clock today, and people can be. You know, the days of having to, you know, of labor organizers having to go to a bar at a factory after work and chatting people up and arguing with them and explaining things and passing out flyers, those are over. So I think it is possible to mobilize a lot faster.

What I worry about is that American liberal politics and left-wing politics outside of the Democratic Party has become like a series of flash mobs. I mean, every three or four months, you know, on a family-friendly Saturday, weather-allowing, millions of people gather and march through the streets in their silly animal outfits. And then they all go home. And gee, I wonder why Donald Trump isn't trembling. in his shoes. You know, it's, that's, and so I think the problem is you can organize quickly, but you can deorganize just as quickly. And this comment that just got posted by a Manchild, I think, is extremely pertinent to

the conversation. So I'm going to put that in there. And thanks for the $2, Manchild. If May Day hits the 12 million person, 3.5% tipping point of the population, it continues on to May 2nd and then beyond, like May 3rd, May 3rd. May 4th, May 5th, there's a chance of revolution. If not, it's just a no-kings rally with a union card. Yeah.

Yeah, pretty much. I mean, look, I agree with you. The flashing a pan thing is not the way it works. It's a sustain. And that's the problem with democracy. And I know it sounds strange, or that sounds coming out this country. But, and it's democracy is not even right, representative of government. Because the reality of it is, it.

we have a system that does allow change and does allow the potential for the society to, let's say, be more aggressive in going after what he wants politically. It takes so much work. Like they have money and they are like 0.5% of the country or whatever. But in the same token, in order to get anything accomplished where you have this kind of sustained effort where power is under threat. and it knows it's under threat and it acts accordingly by the fact it's under threat. And this is kind of like a Nixonian era where Nixon

is like, Henry, they're coming to get me. And you're like bringing buses around the White House because they're concerned about the population. Okay, that's not where we are today. And I don't even know what that looks like in today's terms. Maybe January 6th with actual real convictions, as opposed to the nonsense, and they would know it.

It has to be sustained. It has to be like the yellow vass in French. in France. Yeah, where it just goes on. Get what they want it. I mean, even though they still can get... It basically becomes a full-time job. It does.

Or Tereere Square. Yeah. It does. And I don't know how we do that in this country. I don't think, yeah. I mean, it's not that we can't practically do it. I mean, of course, people personally sacrificed financially and otherwise. But like the, but temperamentally and culturally, you know, we won't have the revolutionary spirit.

We're not a revolutionary country. Our revolution isn't a real revolution. The American Revolution was not, from a Marxist point of view, a true revolution. It's an independent struggle, right? You know, a revolution is the replacement of one class by another. That didn't happen in this. Rich people stayed rich, poor people stayed poor. The middle class stayed middle class.

We didn't have a revolution. The elites remained the same. So, yeah, we don't have that tradition. We have rebellions, for sure, a lot of them. January 6th was a rebellion. The real lumped proletariat says, thanks for the $5. The birthday of one of the greatest radicals, John Brown of Harper's Ferry Fame, is coming up on May 9th.

I'd like to sponsor a small segment on John Brown. John Brown, how do I contact you? I love John Brown. John Brown is a fucking fascinating, awesome, misunderstood figure. Let's totally do John Brown. So if you want to reach me, you can reach me through my website that you can email me directly through there. Just go to rawl.com and then either click contact or just go to roll.com slash contact. And I promise you I will read to get back to you.

I mentioned Republicans win, thanks for the dollar. Republicans win John a lot about a $40 trillion debt, yet they encourage a $1 billion a day war. Actually, it's closer to $2.5. but okay and a $1.5 trillion defense hike how is it fiscally responsible to bankroll a forever war on little more than hopes and prayers what the fuck deficits don't matter dick chaining deficits don't matter that's what dick chan that's what dick chan is said deficits don't matter i remember because remember this was coming up in the context of the iraq war i mean for god's it spent 10 trillion dollars on it war well so the fiscal yeah i mean the thing about republican fiscal hawks right is basically it's not like like i could respect them if they were like look you know we we we want to live within our means

we want to have a small limited budget across the board do as little as everything as possible i wouldn't agree with that but i respect it um but what they really want to do is just like spend like drunken sailors on whatever the fuck they feel like, which basically is tax cuts for the wealthy and killing brown people, and then, you know, and fuck over everything else. If they were consistent, you know, first of all, they'd have to start with defense because that's where the money is. And so, yeah, like, how can anyone take their idea that the idea that they're like fiscally conservative? Seriously, I don't even understand it. They just keep saying it, and I guess people believe it. Yeah, it's nonsense. And people believe it. They do. I mean, they were like, yeah,

we need to do something about the budget with $40 trillion in debt. And it's like, dude, Bush, Republican spent $10 trillion on the wars in Afghanistan and RF. How are you talking to me about being physically conservative? Like, don't give me this nonsense, right? You spend money on what you want to spend money on. You just don't like the priorities of Democrats. And let's be very honest, the entire point of them is preservation of the rich. We are going to be the body man, but the rich against the interests of the American public. So yes, we don't want to spend money on Medicare. We don't want to spend money on Social Security. We don't want to spend money on schools. We don't want to spend money on any of these things that are required for society to actually exist and function. We are in

fantasy land. And so that's what we want to do. And that's what they do. They get a lot of money from the rich to defend and protect the rich. And so do the Democrats. Totally. Primal Barbarian, thanks for the dollar. Do you guys think that there would have been a revolution during the Vietnam War if there was no draft? Well, there wasn't a revolution. What would a working revolution look like today when independent voters grow every year? Well, I mean, a revolution is the violent overthrow of one class by another. That's what a revolution is, partly can be nonviolent, but violence will be part of the picture. What would it look like today?

I mean, you know, I don't think we're going to have that here. I think what we're going to have is collapse. It's going to look more like the Soviet Union in Christmas Day, 1991. I don't think it's going to be revolution because you can't have a revolution without some sort of left-wing, organized outside of electoral politics, force and we don't have that. And there's no class consciousness in this country. So I don't think we can have one. What do you think? I agree with you. As I keep saying, I think it collapsed. I think it has to. I think the productive energies are, I think this goes as far as productive

energies allow it to go. And to me, that is a mechanical process. And like any machine that operates, it eventually collapses. And governments do all the time. I mean, every empire has collapsed. I mean, it's not like, oh, we have this example in history of this empire that lasted for 20,000 years. No, that's not the case. Every example we have is of the U.S. doing what every other empire has done. Over expands. It grows. It overreaches. It dies. Yeah. That's what True. And it's challenged by external forces. Yeah. It's like, right. It's not the external stuff. It's what it does that causes it. Many, it's creating, it's like the moment you use the dollar as a weapon, people are not going to want to use the dollar and they're going to find ways to get around the fact that you use it as a weapon.

The moment that you find yourself... And you're going to use it as a weapon because it becomes too tempting not to. Exactly. Exactly. The moment you just are looking at other countries thinking, in this kind of Hitlerian way, hey, I'll just take the country. What are you using to justify it, that we are a superpower? I just want it.

Yeah. I mean, after a while, your priorities become too great. The Roman Empire, same thing, right? Your priorities become too great, the British Empire. What happens? It gets into war after war after war, where it becomes this kind of brittle empire

that owns 51% of the globe. It will collapse. At least that's, I thought I could be wrong. But I don't think revolution is possible? No, I think we are all three going to agree on this. I think we're just going to implode. And the country's going to balkanize and God help us what happens

because it's going to be along racial, ethic, or religious lines. And that's the worst possible scenario. I think the Octavia Butler scenario is so far, among fictional scenarios, is pretty as close to realistic as possible. Yeah. And that's my dread because if France imploded, you can make a case except for maybe Paris that most French people are going to regard themselves as being French and want to just kind of try to put the country back together.

When you have a large influx of people who have a different language, different culture, different religion, they're not necessarily as vested in restoring what used to be as the native population is. And so when you have a big continental nation like the United States is, where we're we have a majority of nothing. We came in a degree on an American is. Hell, we don't know what a woman is anymore. When that collapse happens, it becomes fundamental and it's going to be bad.

It's going to be very bad. You'd be surprised how many people don't. I think that men can get pregnant and lactate. Yeah, no, we don't agree. Look, I'm glad you brought that up. By the way, I wanted to, as the resident former MAGA person here, Robbie, I got to ask you. So what's with, so there's this radically. heterosexual vibe that Maga tries to get off, give off, right? But what's with the fact that, like,

the figureheads of Maga don't represent anything like that? So it's like Hitler. You know, he's like a mousy brunette, but he's like, you know, he's extolling the virtues of the Aryan, blonde, blue-eyed, perfect, you know, Nordic man, right? Similarly, we have doy, fat Donald Trump, not exactly a pinnacle of masculinity. He's like a softie. And then we've got like Pete Hagseth who would not really be out of place in a gay bar in the West Village.

Marco Rubio also would not be out of place at a gay bar in like in Miami Beach. And then you have Melania who is being touted as the prettiest first lady ever. I'm like, well, you've obviously never seen a picture of Jackie Kennedy. So like, but Melania, is not fuddly that would be ridiculous to say but she's she's ugly as hell what are you talking about

she's masculine she's got a lantern in a dark room she has a better she has a more mannish chin than i do you know and so yeah you know what i mean in the dark yeah in the dark room which is the only place you never meet Donald Trump i guess i mean listen no so maga is not what it was in 2016 Lindsey Graham, who's like the most masculine dude you're ever going to meet. Definitely not, definitely not a queer. Like 100%. He is the picture of masculinity. He falls deep in girls all the time.

All the time. All the time. And not little girls like on Epstein's Island, but like real grown women. All over 18 of legally grown women. And then you've got, and then you've got Pette Seth, who's just a strapping man, who's concerned about the dropping sperm and testosterone count in Western men. I mean, that's the guy who I 100% want to invite to my house because I'm going to look up to him as a pillar of masculinity. Definitely got to lock up the liquor cabinet whenever he's around.

Right, right. No, the MAGA is, the MAGA of today is not what I saw that for in 2016. The America only faction of the right. But what about, okay, but that's still not answering my question. Like, what is, like, nobody ever explained to my satisfaction how it was that Adolf Hitler, who was so brunette that there were rumors that he was part Jewish, probably not true. But, like, you know, like, he was into blondes. What is it with people being into shit that they so clearly are not themselves?

Like, Mark, you know, like, like, beexcepts not really butch. You know what I mean? Like, it's like that. Well, it's because they're trying to paint a Hollywood picture. of what they want reality to be. So what they want, traditionally, the American military is made up of white heterosexual men,

predominantly from the South, from rural backgrounds who are butch, manly, like to go drink beer, and think that they are fighting for something greater than themselves, i.e. the country. The problem is that now we have gone so far, where those butch country boys eat grits, no, three days of,

three meals a day, seven days a week, on the farm in Alabama aren't signing up for the military as they used to. Oh, I do too. Grits are awesome. And so that's what they're trying to do. They're trying to make it seem like joining the military is masculine. It's manly.

It's the thing that you want to do when nothing is further from the truth. Whereas what my faction of the right teaches is if you want to be a man, get married and have a bunch of kids and then you take care of them. You go home, you go to the same woman every day. You're kissing them and say, I love you. Let's go make another baby tonight. I mean, that is, that's masculinity in a traditional sense. What Trump is trying to do, he's trying to weaponize it with this Rambo-style cuckery that he's got.

And he can't pull it off because everyone in his administration is functionally retarded. All right. I'm going to leave. I think that's a good place to leave that. Thank you, Robbie. I did really, I was seriously curious about it. Okay, we have more questions to get to you and then we need to move on to our last topic. B.W. Walker, Republicans and Democrats are waiting and hoping Iran restarts the war so they can pretend the U.S. was attacked. Well, they won't do that.

Exile the Knights of Malta now. Robbie take the glowing like a peach filter off of Ted's. That's for the White House's spokes lady. That's my fault. I've got this lamp and I can turn that off and then I'm like all washed out. I don't know which is worse. What do you think? I feel like the other one's worse. Yeah, I think there's nowhere around that box. Yeah, there's no way. Can't help it. Unless you open the window behind you, the sunlight may help. Yeah, maybe. Yeah, well, maybe I'll do that.

Leave a Bernie. Thanks for the $10. Thanks for the laugh guys from before. And let's see. And Ray C. In balls deep in Lindsey Graham or Lindsey Graham, or Lindsey Graham, deep in a man.

That is the funniest shit ever. And as you were saying, I could think to myself, yeah, but what is a man? Yeah, what is a man? It's like, is this the 300-pound guy with a beard that calls him some woman and Lindsay Graham's balls? It could be a weird. It's like, oh, you're such a sexy woman.

Right. Yeah. Let's not be so chromosomal about this whole thing. All right. So let's talk about retirement stuff. And then we'll talk about Epstein. So I don't have a lot to say about this, but I want to say Trump signed this executive order. 54 million Americans, I'm one of them, don't have access to traditional 401Ks.

I assume you're one of them too. You can do, if you're a self-employed person, you can do a CEP. But for foreigners who are watching us, the United States has a supposedly developed country, has basically destroyed its retirement system. In the post-war era after 1945, many Americans went to work for a single company, worked there their entire lives, and had what they called a defined benefit pension plan,

which basically meant that they'd work there, say, 40 years, and then when they retired, they would get a set check every month until they died. Then there were defined contribution plan, where the plans was invested and then you got money. And then there's 401Ks, which basically is like you, it's a savings account, basically. The employee donates money out of their paycheck, into this plan. And then it goes into investments.

And if the stock market goes up, they increase in value. And if not, they drop in value. And there's some tax benefits. but that's about it. In the early days of 401K, some employers match to them. But the bottom line is most Americans are really not prepared for retirement. As Gen X heads into retirement, these are the first generation where basically most people don't have adequate or even any retirement savings whatsoever.

And it's a discussion we haven't had. So I want to praise President Trump for doing something. that doesn't really solve the problem, but at least brings it up as an issue and acknowledges it as something that we ought to be talking about. And he's throwing a little bit of money. It's like basically there will be modest contributions like one or $2,000 a year by the federal government for people who qualify for these plans. But it's not going to allow you to retire. I guess, I don't know, do you have anything to add to that? I don't want to suggest be a topic of discussion.

I'm sick of things just being a topic of discussion as a talk show. These pennies that are being thrown to people to almost make them forget about the fact that the government is spending $1.5 trillion on the military. It's the way that bugs me. And, you know, it's one thing if we were $40 trillion in debt, spending $2 trillion. a year. We had health care, education, roads were being built, high speed rent, meaning if we were living in a Jetson's or if we were a real shining city on a hill,

I can accept us spending, the budget being that high or the debt being that high. That's not what we are. And it's like we are not, like most people are ill-prepared for retirement. Most people are going to live off Social Security. And Social Security, it's not enough to live on, just to be very clear, right? I don't know if this is.

It helps. I mean, okay, it helps, but it helps in a Democrat way, if that makes sense. Like, where Democrats will say, okay, we are going to give you, we're going to throw change at you. And you should be happy for it because Republicans are going to do anything. And as you get further in time, that five cent becomes three cent and two cent. And then it's one cent. And it'd be like, hey, at least it's one cent. Are you really going to argue with the one cent that we're giving you when those guys aren't giving you anything? Well, yeah, I'm going to take issue with it. I mean, at a certain point, it becomes so ineffectual. It becomes so negligible. It's a fucking joke. It's a joke. Yeah. So I feel like it is a joke.

You are given billions to your rich cronies. You are maximizing your profit. Or foreign countries. Like the UAE is going to get half a trillion dollars? What? Yeah. That's my point. Like, meaning, this is an insult.

That's what I feel about. Yeah. No, it's an insult. I'm just kind of, the only thing I like about it is that it's like dragging it from the bottom of the topic pile. So, I mean, if we have a chance of anything happening, it starts with like a discussion. I don't think we're going to have that discussion, but I just thought it was worth noting. We should probably delve into this in more detail. You know, we should get Larea.

Yeah. that's what we got to do. We get, um, Rodi. Keyless Lerea. Let's, let's get him in to talk about it.

Yeah. Let's have him come in and do, and have him do retirement. Yeah, no, cool thing about, about Achilles, full disclosure.

After I got docs and lost the job at the hospital, now, we had a 401K. And he, and, uh, he knew what was going on. I do some work for him.

And he was like, uh, Robbie, I'll take over your retirement account for you. And I'm a little guy. Like, I'm a little fish. I mean, Achilles swims with the whales. Yeah, he's a wealth manager. And he was talking about the taking over your account.

That's very cool. He took it over for me. And he's like, he's like, Robbie, I will treat you the same way I do my other clients. He said, I love you. And I get how he comes across being abrasive to some people who are, you know, we're in the audience. I don't think he's abrasive at all. I mean, but, but, but I got to remember, though, I mean, he, he deals with the upper crust people. That's his life.

And so I can understand why sometimes you can come off like, you know, save your money. I mean, he's right. Everyone spends money on things they don't need like a $5 coffee. And so there's choices that we all make is, but saving is hard. And hell, you've seen me get into it before. If you're just trying to figure out how they hell to survive, you don't have the mental bandwidth to plan for anything bigger than you. And that's by design. That's a function of the system.

That's not a bug. Guys, let's talk about, so all right, let's get Achilles on to talk about the 401Ks and, you know, what America should do about retirement. Because look, you know, you're going to have millions of people sleeping outside soon unless this country gets serious about this issue. I don't care, Ted. No one. Well, they're going to care when, because Jen Xers, when we get old, well, I'm good. we're going to still be spicy we'll we'll lead the fucking revolution um all right so but do you

think that a serious question though do you think that any of the leadership and either political party gives a single solitary flying fuck in a way shape or form about people going hungry in this tree the answer is no no fuck no uh epstein suicide note um so basically that the allegation here is we've got two minutes to deal with this, that it's been sitting around and literally in another inmate's book reading material for seven years, sitting in a file, but it was Epstein's suicide attempt note, right? So he attempted suicide allegedly shortly before he was found dead, right? And so basically, and it says, I guess it's time to say goodbye. Do we believe this? And then like, even if we do believe it, I mean,

What does it say that the government sits on this shit for seven years when everyone's going crazy about Epstein and they're still, and they're like, they don't think they should come clean and tell us everything they fucking know? I mean, how stupid do they think we are? I don't believe this was a suicide. I'm a firm believer that he didn't kill himself. Oh, I don't think he killed himself either. Yeah, I don't believe it. Do you think there was an initial attempt that failed? or not?

I think they tried to off him in the cell with, what's his name, that policeman that was in a cell effectively that he was with, who tried to claim that he didn't hear Epstein trying to hang himself. Okay, fair enough. And then you get him in the suicide thing, and all of a sudden, cameras are down, guards are narcoleptic, the thing lies about the video, because there's a section of the video that you can clearly see that there's somebody in the background. Like all of this stuff is very strange.

I don't I don't buy the government's story on this. And I damn sure I don't buy a seven year old suicide. No. I mean, listen, I am probably the most jaded rat winger y'all are ever going to meet. And that the government says, even if you show me proof otherwise, I'm just going to assume that they're lying because they lie about everything. And they're sure as hell lying about this. I mean, Trump's, listen, Donald Trump started a war, an unconstitutional. Constitutional War of Aggression at the behalf of the Israel Lobby, you got to ask yourself why.

I'm going to use a word that starts with an H and has a P in there. It's called Honeypot. They own you. They blackmail you. You do what you're going to say or all your little petro friends, they're going to get exposed. That's 100% what I believe. Can I prove it? No.

Do I have proof of it? No. But is that what I believe 100%. Yeah. Okay, guys, believe it or not, I was able to actually start the stream on TMI without like screwing up here. Look at me. I'm learning things. All right. So with that, I'm going to bring us out. Thanks everyone for tuning in. We'll see you next week, Monday at 9 a.m. Eastern Time. Stay tuned for TMI show with Minnila Chan and Robbie West, because really it's going to be Robbie West, no Manila Chan. You know, if you're listening, we love you, and all our love to you and your daughter. Anyway, take care, and we'll see you later.

Bye, JT. Have a good one, guys. Be safe.