DeProgram with John Kiriakou and Ted Rall - Pirates of Petulance | DeProgram with Ted Rall and Jamarl Thomas

Episode Date: April 20, 2026

Editorial cartoonist Ted Rall and political analyst Jamarl Thomas deprogram you from mainstream media every weekday at 9 AM EST. Today we discuss:• Hours after the US and Iran announced a ceasefire deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, Trump took to social media with insulting, triumphantalist messaging that reneged on America’s promise to suspend its own blockade of Iranian ships. The Strait closed again, Iran attacked two ships and the U.S. attacked and took over an Iranian cargo vessel. Peace talks are supposed to start Wednesday—but will US envoys be talking to themselves?• Republicans have few days left to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). But Trump, GOP leaders and White House officials have failed to come up with a workable framework for months—and there is no agreement.• Progressive Bulgaria, the party led by former President Rumen Radev, wins general elections in Bulgaria with 44.7%, a better-than-expected performance and one of the largest parliamentary mandates by any party in recent years. Warmer relations with Russia are likely.• Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney says that Canada's strong economic ties to the US were once a strength but are now a weakness that must be corrected.MERCH STORE: https://www.deprogram.livehttps://x.com/tedrallhttps://x.com/JamarlThomasLIVE ON RUMBLE: https://rumble.com/c/DeProgramShowSPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/2kdFlw2w8sSPhKI8NRx8ZuAPPLE MUSIC: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/deprogram-with-ted-rall-and-jamarl-thomas/id1825379504

Good morning. It is Monday, April 20th, 2020, 26, and you're watching Deep Program with Ted Raul and Jamaral Thomas. Good morning, J.T. What's happening, man? Doing okay this morning? I am. I'm not sure how well the global economy is going to be doing going forward, and I'm very curious to see what the stock market does in 30 minutes, but yeah, I personally am okay. We will be talking about Iran today, obviously. A lot going on there. FISA, the Bulgarian elections, and Canada is kind of like kicking us to the curb, not that we don't have it coming. So please like, follow and share the show. If you're watching in the 9 o'clock a.m. Eastern hour live on Rumble or YouTube, which is when we are live Monday through Friday,

please put your questions in the live chat. And producer Robbie West, we'll feed them up to Jamar and I, and we will answer them. top priority always goes to the super chats but we will try to do the other ones as well and I'm trying to think if there's anything else we need to know any housekeeping we have a guest coming in tomorrow we'll talk about Robbie can tell us a little more about that later at 930 tomorrow an expert on the ground perspective from Lebanon which is of course getting gazaified these days so we just get to it I mean basically over the weekend We went into the weekend.

We ended the show last week with Donald Trump kind of triumphantly saying, like, look, we have a ceasefire deal for two weeks. We're going to have more talks probably in Islamabad. J.D. Vance is going to go back out. We're going to wrap this whole thing up, and it's going to be all over. Well, oh, and the straight was reopened for a little bit, a little while. So then Donald made a mistake that maybe you've made, but I know I've made, which is to say, dumb things on social media. He went on social media and basically bragged and crowed that, you know, that the Iranians

had bent the knee and said, oh, you know, I forced them to reopen the straight. And, you know, anyway, I win again, basically, I'm paraphrasing. And then he said, oh, and by the way, I'm keeping my blockade on. Right. Not only, now the Iranians are saying they never agreed to that. I am sure the Iranians never would have agreed to a ceasefire deal that included the U.S. blockades staying on. So anyway, so the Iranians got pissed.

And over the weekend, we now have three ships attacked. The Iranians have attacked two ships, Indian ships, that tried to run the straight before it got closed again. But those were just very minor attacks. And then the U.S. went in and blew out the engine room with a rocket of a 900-foot-long cargo, Iranian-flagged cargo ship and took it over and basically seized it. 900 feet's big. You know, a mile is 5,280 feet. So this is like, you know, basically a sixth or fifth of a mile long.

I mean, this is a big vessel. And so now we have this very peculiar situation where, Iranian emissary, sorry, Iranian envoys have said they're not going to Islamabad. The talks are supposed to begin Wednesday. The American advance team is already there preparing things. Islamabad is already being shut down. The Serena hotel has all been blocked off and the guests have all been kicked out. So basically the Pakistanis and the Americans are operating under the assumption that these talks are going to proceed. The Iranians are kind of like letting everyone wait and say like, maybe we'll show up, but probably not.

But they kind of did this last time, so they might still show up. It's a lot. I guess the first thing is, do you think the Iranians are going to show? Not under this model, no. How could they? Again, everything that Iran does,

Iran is in a game of empire and dealing with an empire. And that empire is not going to, I keep using the term, go quietly into the good night. meaning from the U.S. point of view, we're American. And Trump is going to do everything in his power to push, push all the way through this. And so if Israel can get ceasefire violations without it being responding to, the U.S. will. And if they can do it, it gives some kind of credence or let's say point of view in regards to Iran's capability and what Iran thinks about their own capabilities. If the U.S. can say, hey, we're going to maintain our while you get rid of your blockade, the U.S. would do that. And it would inform our point of view in regards to what is going on internally in regards to what Iran thinks about itself and their capabilities.

Meaning, of course we're going to push. There was never a situation where the U.S. was going to honor any of these agreements in Ernst. It was always going to be this kind of pressure against Iran to, hey, are you willing to give up Lebanon? Hey, are you willing to let us keep our blockade? Hey, how strong do you think you actually are in these terms? So if Iran is willing to negotiate under this model of this nonsense that Trump is coming out with saying, they're agreeing to give up their uranium dust or nuclear dust, whatever the hell he's called. Nuclear dust, yeah.

Yeah, they've agreed to all of these red lines. Basically, they've agreed to break all of their red lines because they need to talk to the U.S. because of our blockade. How could they negotiate under those terms? Iran has been very clear. They said, if you want to show up in Islamabad, that is for you. that it's not for us. And they've also pointed out, we don't negotiate on social media.

So you behaving in this way is off the table. They even wrapped Arigachi, the foreign minister, on the knuckles, but coming out saying the street was open, saying, look, you've given this comment out and you weren't necessarily clear that this stuff was, in paraphrasing, connected to other things.

It's not unilateral. It's not Israel and Lebanon ceasefire. Straits open. The world is great. That's not it. So will they show up? I would be shocked if they show up under the model of the blockades, they'll be in place.

But I don't know. Again, this kind of goes into how Iran views their own capabilities in the face of this kind of aggression and what they think is in their best interest. But I don't think it's in the best interest to go. No, I don't think they should show up. It would be a stronger position not to show. But I think there's a possibility that they'll

go in order to try to come off as a reasonable party and not be framed as like, well, the Americans, we showed up, but where were they? You know, we, you know, meet me at the bike racks after school, dude. And like, you know, it's like if you don't show up, you look bad. I have a kind of a different read, though, about the pressure tactics. I mean, my read here is that Trump actually is more or less serious about making a deal because he really wants to get out of this. He knows it was a mistake. I suspect that he has a little friend in Tel Aviv, who he reports back to, and then that little friend tells him, dude, you can't do that. You can't agree to that. Like, you've got to push hard. And that he's getting that basically he agrees to things and then reneges because Netanyahu,

who is obviously also the head of a government that routinely reneges on deals like this, is he's, and he's pressuring Trump to do that. I really, Because the reason I think that is just because of the timing of it. It's always like Trump seems kind of serious. And then, I mean, it was serious to send J.D. Vance. It was, you know, especially not only to see the number two, but also it was known by the Iranians that he was against the war. That's a strong signal. It's like, you know, I'm, I have goodwill here.

And then, you know, so then to re to reverse that, I mean, I really think this is the Israeli. really influence. I don't think, you know, this is kind of like, you've had these, you know, I had a, I once wanted to buy a photo from a guy who took a photo on the internet, and I wanted to buy that photo, the use of that photo for a cover of one of my books. I, I reach out to the guy, negotiate a price. Then he gets back to me, and he's like, my friends say that this could become a bestselling book and that I should charge you like $100,000. And it's like, your friends are high, okay? Like, I'm not going to make $10,000. from the entire book and I fucking wrote it.

Okay, so, but basically, you know how there's like the friends who are like, you know, pushing you harder than, you know, like they're trying to be supportive, but they push you to go too far. I can really think that's what's happening here. So, okay, so there's been reporting coming out the Wall Street Journal. Jerusalem Post also was reporting from the Wall Street Journal that Trump is belligerent. He's raging to the people that are around, basically raging in the empty White House that the Pentagon saw him as being so untethered but unhinged that they basically only clued him in a momentous moments and basically left him out of it.

Look, I think it boils down to kind of like the Ukraine thing. If you ask me, would the U.S. want to make a deal? Yes. Can they make a deal on terms that the U.S. will accept? No. Meaning losers don't get to dictate terms. And if you have a president that is effectively losing or lost a war, how does that president come to the American public in a way? that gets across, we lost, which means that even if he's open for a deal, there is no deal that can be made because he's effectively can't accomplish his military objectives. So how do you make a deal where you come away as a losing party in that deal as a U.S. president? That's hard to do.

I agree with you. He probably is in communication with Netanyahu. But if you notice, when it came down to it and the U.S. says make a deal because we need to make a deal with Iran, they push Israel to come to terms. Is Israel going to keep their terms? No. Did he push them to do it? Yes. So I guess both of us are saying very similar things in this. It's not that I don't agree that he's trying to get a deal. I think he does just because I think he wants to get out of this morass. That's even in the reporting in the Jerusalem Post, Trump is trapped. Well, he, but the thing is, you know, look, I don't know if he watches the show. He should. He should. He really should. But if people close to him watch the show, show. What I would advise him in all seriousness is, listen, you have an opportunity here to

transform this tactical defeat into a strategic victory. And what you do is go with me here. You open full normalized relations with Iran. Effective next week. We're opening embassies, we're exchanging ambassadors. We're becoming friends. And you can characterize this as you can frame this on the Venezuelan model. We left the regime in power, but now we got rid of the evil Ayatollah. Now there's more reasonable people in charge in Tehran. We're going to be buds. We're going to do business together. The strait's going to be reopened. I always said, I, Trump, because he did always say he wanted normalized relations with Iran. So we're going to, so we're going to trick. And if you do that, you get rid of the, the strait.

closure, you get rid of the economic pressure that we need to talk about that too. I mean, it's very, it's very weird how insusient the futures, oil futures traders and the stock traders have been so far. I mean, the truth is this is rippling already through the global economy to an extent that even if the crisis were resolved in the next five minutes, there would be grave implications. There's a small Emirati airline has already canceled. all of their flights for the summer. Europe is projected to run out of jet fuel within just a month or two. There's not going to be, so you can fly to Europe, but you're going to need to take a boat back.

There's not, assuming that you can get boat fuel. I don't know if they can do that. You know, like, it's a one-way trip. There's going to be already the Asian economies are in deep shit in the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia. there's already widespread fuel shortages. Factories are closing down. Already major airline carriers are canceling a lot of their flights.

Like big American carriers like Delta are now focusing on canceling flights that are on less profitable routes entirely. Entire cities in America will not be served until this is resolved. And even after the supply chain has to, you remember after COVID how the supply chain had to catch up again. And you can shut down the global economy in a minute, but starting it up again is like, you know, getting the warp core up and running again. Yeah. It takes a while, right? So it's like, this is, that's a, I mean, you can get rid of those problems, like immediately, by,

with my solution. He should give the Iranians what they want. Like, welcome back to the, to the international community. it also solves the inspection issue, right? Like if you're now fully integrated, you'll have no problems with IAEA inspectors coming to look at your nuclear stuff, et cetera. But you're talking about a U.S. President.

That's a capitulation. He can't accept it. But it's like he wants that Nobel Peace Prize. He could get it. It's a competition. It's not good. I mean, it's capitulation in that. Come on.

How does the U.S. president go to the Republic? after everything that he said, right? I would say, Mr. President, you already agreed to that you did this with Afghanistan. And I would say, God bless you for that. You wisely put an end to America's longest war. You negotiated the end of the Afghanistan occupations. God bless you for that, right? Afghanistan is at peace now.

No American bodies are coming home from Afghanistan anymore. Nobody said, oh, you know, Donald Trump was a puss for negotiating that agreement. They did. Some people did. And Trump could say that's Joe Biden's war. I'm putting it into Joe Biden's war. Like, meaning he could say that, I'm sorry, Obama's war or whatever, basically. Meaning he could come out of this effectively blaming somebody else for it. Whereas for this, Trump initiated this war. But mind you, he wouldn't even do that for Ukraine, right?

Trump could have stepped out on day one. That's Joe Biden's war. Nothing to do with me. I'm ending the war. But as the reporting pointed out, he did want to. He wanted to, but he thought it would be humiliating for him to do it and all of the blowback that he would get. Well, the Europeans were in the office. I'm saying in this case, this was a war. He started where he set the objectives that he wanted to accomplish in the war that he started. He failed on all those objectives.

And so to be able to come out and say, all right, we're going to end this. We're going to normalize relations. A, the people who are in an office are now the hardliners because you've murdered the moderates. Right. You've created a. situation where you've pulled a community and a country together rallying behind its government. And even worse, that even if Trump did that, Iranians still controlled the straighter for moose. They're not giving that up. They're putting in a regulatory thing that allows them to effectively get a total vote's going through. Meaning, this is far worse. Like, I don't know how

he could do that, right? He is going to, I don't know if a U.S. president. Yes, he could do it. I don't think he's like to do. Well, Okay, well, all right. Well, let's, but let's game that out. Let's just say he, I mean, I know he doesn't think two steps ahead much, us one. Let's say he comes out and does that.

Yeah, what's going to happen? Like, I mean, look, he's going to lose the house? He's going to lose the house anyway. Yes. You know, is he, is he going to not be reelected? He's supposedly not allowed to run for reelection. I mean, what's he worried about? I'm not saying he can't do it.

I mean, Trump could end the Ukraine war tomorrow, right? Was it not given weapons? Stop giving, et cetera. No one cares about Ukraine anymore. I mean, all the flags, all the liberals have taken the flags down from their, from their houses. You know, Ukraine's done. Well, okay. That war may be done, but that war still rolls on.

And the war's still going to roll off another year or so. But as an issue in the United States, no one cares. Nobody cares in the U.S. agreed. I'm pointing out that Trump could do it. I'm saying he won't do it. because he doesn't necessarily want to take the humiliation of starting a war failing. And U.S. presidents, as you know, don't like to lose wars, especially humiliatingly. But they do all the time, right?

All the time. But they don't like to, right? Like, Nixon got Vietnam going for months or for years, knowing forward that war was lost because he didn't necessarily want to own the loss. That's like the same thing is true for Trump and doubly is over Trump. It's just, I don't see. It's not that he can't do it. He could do it. But I'm just saying this was a, this is a.

was a game changer president, right? First guy, you know, to be elected president of the United States without any political experience or having served in the military, ever. You know, beat a $7 billion opponent Hillary Clinton with a $2 million campaign budget. You know, basically went to some like remote elementary schools in eastern Pennsylvania to do campaign appearances. And it worked because there were TV cameras there. I mean, the point is, He eliminated the stump speech. The stump speech is dead. It's free form jazz.

He just shows up and blabs. And it's more interesting because you never know what's going to happen. Donald Trump really, I mean, he reinvented, you know, American politics. He revived the Republican Party. My point is, this guy used to think outside the box. He's in the box right now. He needs to get out of the box. I don't know how he gets out that box.

I mean, because look, Radaless of him doing free form jazz, as you put it, it's still a U.S. president. And if you think about it, it's not like Trump is doing anything uniquely, radically different in the office, even though his style is different. I mean, if you think about it,

Iran was always going to get attacked. And the direction of U.S. policy was always going in the direction of attack. Yeah, it's actually kind of amazing that it didn't happen sooner, right? when you just consider all the heated rhetoric for 47 years. Agreed, but I think it took Syria to go down. I mean, it's like the monster was rummaging through the village. Like you can see it, right?

You can see Sarmon and the eye. Like just waiting. You can see trees fall. It's like, all right, that monster is coming. It just took a while to get around with a thing. John, you know John have told the story about how when they went to attack Iran, I mean, to attack Iraq, how Dick Cheney comes in and it's like, and we're going to be in Iran in a couple of weeks.

X number 30 years. They're always thinking about the future, right? I mean, I took when I was in Afghanistan in late 2001, I saw U.S. Tenko by it on the back and said, next stop Baghdad. Exactly. They're always thinking about the next thing.

It's like regardless of who the president was, Democratic or Republican, and externally, they were going towards Iran. So, yeah, Trump is free-formed jazz in the way he comes across from Staliener, standpoint, but from the standpoint of policy, this is firmly in line with U.S. policy. Maybe he's not. But maybe he's also losing his touch. Maybe he's, he's gotten Beltway bubbled. Maybe he's old. Maybe all of the above. Maybe something else I'm not thinking of.

I mean, I just feel like Donald Trump 2018 would not make this mistake. I don't know. I mean, 2018 was different. Like, a lot of people make this point about Trump and the Russians and everything else. A lot of what Trump was doing was pushing back on this idea that he was working with the Russians. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, it was it all drove him crazy. Yeah. Yeah. The Democrats gaslit him.

Yeah. I mean, it's just, it, for whatever we want to think about the whole Russia gate stuff, it constrained his administration in a way that that constrain is off. True. I think this is probably been to ignore it and just move and do your thing. but yeah. So I guess now, I mean, look, regardless of whether there are talks in Islamabad or not, look, I think the odds are against it. I don't think there's zero, but I think it's not likely to happen. All right. So, you know, as the Rolling Stone said, time is on Iran side, right? So it's a waiting game. And now the Iranians, and so Donald Trump has threatened for the second time in two weeks that

tomorrow is going to be Iranian infrastructure death day, right? Like the ceasefire expires tomorrow. He's going after all the power plants and the bridges. Now, here's the thing, right? Like, he was bluffing last time. Yes. Is he bluffing this time? See, that's always the rub with Trump.

You never know. Yeah, you never know. It could go either way. And if you're Iran, you kind of have to accept the pressure strategy. Meaning, because a lot of the stuff is just pressure, right? Like what will the U.S. do? What can the U.S. do? Will they do X, Y, Z? And last time, I'm going to destroy Iranian civilization. That was this point, right? I'm going to destroy Iranian civilization. And again, what was he doing? Pressure in order to try to get something out of it. The problem that I think it has is, is they don't trust you, dude. Yeah, they don't believe a word that's coming out of your mouth, right? Like, if Donald Trump's lips are moving, he's like he's, he's like. lying, right, as far as they're concerned.

And there has to be their point of view. It has to be. It has to be. There's no other way around it. I mean, they have to be complete idiots to look out any different way, any different way. Yeah, they have to prepare for the next stage of the struggle, which I suspect they're doing. Yeah, I'm sure of it. Let's take a few questions. Manchild, thanks for the dollar. Morning, if Israel's 2026 strategy relies on a coalition of Christian nations. How does it reconcile that with soldiers desecrating Christian statues and communities in Lebanon and Gaza? I'm glad you brought up Gaza, Benchrist. Because it has certainly happened before.

Yeah, and Syria. I mean, they have no issue doing it. I mean, I don't know how people reconcile this idea of a genocide in Christ. I just don't get it. It's like these guys out there murdering babies and blowing up Christians. Christian babies and blowing up. Christian babies and blowing up and blowing up Christian churches. And, you know, and I mean, like the last Pope, Pope Francis, was just devastated by what was going on to the, how the Palestinian Christian community was being targeted in Gaza. It would be wrong not to put Robbie up while we're talking about this.

And Robbie, I also wanted, I do, can you, do want to repeat what you said in the chat about the donors? Because I thought that was super interesting. Yeah, well, I think the reason why Trump's in a box, I don't think it's so much ideology. I think that this is people just, Trump is repaying the people who funded his defense teams when he was the victim of lawfare.

He is trapped. Listen, if someone owns you economically because the Democrats, if they would have had their way, Trump would have been bankrupted. He'd be in prison right now. The only reason why he's not is because he had a very well-financed legal team that was able to protect him. Now he's president again.

That bill has come due. And that bill is not due in the form of money. it is due in the form of foreign policy and influence and providing cover for the people who paid for his defense. Can I prove that? No. But, I mean, if there's smoke, there's fire. And that's just my take on it. I think he just toned. As far as what Hegg Seth is doing, what Israel does, I don't really know how you reconcile that.

I mean, you have Israel bombing Christian churches. They use tanks and attack the oldest operating church in the entire Near East. And there's not a peep, not a word. Yeah, well, it's team politics, right? I mean, it's like, I mean, isn't it sort of like the equivalent of we're going to defend Joe Biden, even though he's drooling, we're going to defend, you know, we're going to defend Donald Trump. We're going to say he's like doing God's work even while he's balls deep in Stormy Daniels. I mean, you know. I really think, Ted, honestly, what it is, is how when we were talking last week off camera

and we were talking, it's like, it's like, Rob, you're kind of a rarity because you actually believe this stuff. And it's true. I really do believe this stuff. Yeah. I'm not a cultural Christian. Like, I am a Christian. And I think what is it? So many people in this country or in the West either have completely rejected religion.

I've just gone atheist or agnostic. Well, not most. And the polls consistently, even though the numbers have dropped, America still, most overwhelming majority of Americans still identify as Christian. Well, identifying as a Christian being one or two very different things. I can identify as a Muslim, but not actually believe the tenets of the faith, right? So, I mean, I think that's really different. Well, we live in a world where anybody can be anything, right?

Like, I literally can transition to be a girl. I don't have to grow boobs. I don't have to take estrogen. I don't have to put on a dress. I don't have to wear lipstick. I just say it. I'm just like, now I'm a girl. And you're supposed to say, okay, yeah, Ted, you're a girl and you have to call me she, her. That's the world we live in now. But that's where you lose me because one of the Ten Commandments is, thou shalt not lie. I would be lying to you and lying to myself and everyone else around me if I went along with that delusion. That's the, it's the same thing.

I had the same conversation yesterday at church. We just kicked off missions month. We support a lot of missionaries, trying to do a lot of work. That's fine. That's great. But you can't on one hand reach out and try to win people to Christ using the gospel. Well, at the same time, supporting a government that wages war on behalf of a president who mocks your God.

And yet we all do. I mean, we don't all, but many of us too. I mean, basically, I just feel like we live. It's upside down world. Slajav Zizek, the philosopher, he's a Lacanian, and he's obsessed with, and I'm interested in this. He's not my favorite, but he's worth reading. Yeah, like.

And he basically said, Sartre's my favorite, but he basically says, you know, that man is on a quest for the real in the postmodern era, and that what's real is like really elusive. And that when you, and that when people. find something they think is authentic and real. They latch on to it because it's so precious in this time of fakery. And I mean, everything is fake, right? I mean, like we live in the land of the free and the brave. Like, not really. I mean, you know, the NSA is up our ass and we don't really care and the cops are fucking with us and we're not brave enough to protest in the streets or to tell the cops to fuck off. We live in a democracy. Two parties for 330 million people. That's not

a democracy. So everything is fucking fake. And so this is just now religion, which a lot of people, atheists would certainly argue is fake. But the point is that it's being, even within its own construct, people who claim to be religious often aren't, you know, they're faking it. It's changed. That was always true, right?

Yeah. It just seems like it's more acceptable now and that you're supposed to. just think it's okay. But I think they thought it was more acceptable back then, too. I mean, it's almost like it's an imitation of an imitation of an imitation, right? Like whatever was real at some point becomes imitated and that type of stuff. Now, I understand this point. It's just, but I get the sense it was always that way.

Like, my mom used to view religion as a, you know, as a Chinese menu, you know, one from column A and one from column B. And, you know, and I would be like, but, mom it's a religion like if you either believe all of it or you don't believe any of it that's how religion works and exactly is it i mean is it really all-en-nothing prospect well for sure like for example for example j t i've literally believed with every fiber of my being in the virgin birth that christ he came to this world he never sinned he was god and flesh because he's The entire point is that God came down to us to meet us because we are incapable of reaching him. That's the whole point.

He then went to the cross, died, and resurrected on the third day. If I reject any of that stuff, I cannot be a Christian. Now, I can say I'm a follower of Christ's teachings. I believe in what he taught. I'm all about the sermon of the Mount. Okay, that's fine. That's great. I'll still split hell wide open whenever I die because I'm rejecting him as God.

That's the point. It's either a yes or no. It is a binary choice. So you can't, so you have to accept everything that's in the Bible or you accept nothing in the Bible. Is that what you're right? Yeah. Oh, I wouldn't say that. That's a point of view.

That's a fundamentalist. You can accept 62% of what's in the Bible, but it doesn't make Christians. I would say it doesn't really make you Christian. You know, it's sort of like, it's sort of like, if you're a communist, you can't really believe in. There's some things that are not, you really can't believe in and be a communist, you know. Well, I mean, but you even believe the contradictory things. Like, what I'm getting at is this idea that you have to believe everything or nothing seems to be alleged to me. So a person who, let's say, political philosophy, for example.

Sure. So if the person disagrees with one tenet of communists, they're no longer a communist? Or if they disagree with it is, I think. Well, no, I mean, you got, for example, there's different interpretations and stuff, absolutely. Like, no, when it comes to violence or warfare. Right. That's what I'm getting. Interpretation.

Well, interpretations, no, interpretations of different doctrines are, that's one thing, right? I'm talking about the key tenets of the faith. Like, do you believe that Jesus is born of a virgin? Yes or no? You cannot be a Christian and reject that because at that point you're calling God a liar. Now, on the flip side, though, you can talk about, for example, in the Old Testament, the Bible famously says an eye for a tooth. Jesus then says, I give you another commandment, love your enemies, as you love yourself.

If a man takes your cloak, give him your shoes also. Jesus also says, if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and go buy one. That's not a contradiction. That's him explaining that the times are changing because he's leaving and that he's not going to be there to protect his apostles. The Bible also says that there's nothing worse than a man not to provide for his family. if you do your person infidel. I happen to believe that part of that provide your family is not only financially,

but it's also physically protecting them if they are in danger. Because that's part of it. Yeah, that's not how I read that. But I mean, obviously that is, you know, but it's not perfect. I think when they say providing, that's not what they meant. But I mean,

but these are the kinds of conversations and disagreements that people have had for 2,000 years, and that's making you less of a Christian. But you cannot deny that Jesus is God become in flesh and be a Christian. You can call yourself one and all you want, but you're not a Christian. It's just like you can't be a Muslim

and deny that Muhammad was the messenger from God. Right. It just simply doesn't work. There are some things that you're able to argue about about doctrines, but that core tenant, that core tenant you've got to agree on. You've got to accept that. And here's the worst part for rationalist side of the two of you.

It's 100% unapprovable. It's all based on faith. Right. Right. Yeah. I mean, it's just, belief, right? I mean, the person has accepted. So look, I, and Americans have a hard time with my point of view because so many Americans, they call themselves something, but they don't actually

believe it. See, I don't have an issue with your point of view, because it's, it's, whether I believe it or not, it's at the release earnest and consistent. I think it's like it will like people do. Yeah, like where, as long as it doesn't lead you to evil, like, you know, look, I just heard over the weekend, I forget the guy's name, but it's, it's, it's, it, former Israeli, well, he's an Israeli guy who's now a professor of Brown who wrote a book called Israel What Went Wrong? And basically he went from being a Zionist to an anti-Zionist. And, you know, he basically has concluded, like I concluded actually years earlier, I could have just told him, I mean, that Zionism was inherently like an ethno-nationalist, colonialist

project, right, inherently. And that therefore, the logic of Zionism naturally led to the genocide in Gaza and now in Lebanon in the West Bay. And I think logically, so if you have a, but, you know, I don't think Christianity logic, I mean, I have friends who would disagree with this. I don't think Christianity logically leads anyone to evil. Therefore, I have no problem with anyone being, you know, Christian, I mean, hell, I have no problem with people being Zionists. I just think they're wrong. But, and I think it is a dangerous ideology, but it doesn't make them dangerous people necessarily, but they're, really? Maybe it does, I don't know, as a part of a group it does. I mean, it's like saying is a Nazi dangerous. Well, it's not as an individual. An individual

Nazi is not dangerous. Was John Rape dangerous? I agree. I agree to disagree. Because I think it powers their point of view. Like meaning what a person thinks informs what a person does. No, but if they're the only person who believes it and they don't have any any allies who can help them, it doesn't make any difference what they think. Well, also I'm going to push back to because the individual sales agency, right? John Rae single-handly saved hundreds of thousands of Chinese from being massacred by the Japanese during the rape of Nanking. The man was a Nazi.

He wrote letters to the Fuhrer begging Hitler to intervene to stop what Japan was doing because Japan was Germany's ally. And he went to prison for his efforts. That's why he was called the good Nazi. If y'all never studied the man, seriously, read. Paul, Stolfenberg was a good, was a Nazi? It was a political party. Although not originally, he wasn't.

He just sort of, he has served in the, in the Baramacht. I mean, what choice did you have? I mean, honestly. Well, you could quit. And then do what? And they commit economic suicide because you can't, you lose your post and everything else? No, I mean, that was the rough choice at the time. Yeah.

Some people did. Some people. My grandfather used to say when he, you know, he hated when people called him as a hero for surviving Buchenwald because he said the heroes died. The heroes gave away their their rations. The heroes fought the Nazis. Like we surviving in heroism are not the same. Do you all want me to go ahead and let people know about the guests coming on tomorrow? Yes, please. Yeah. So tomorrow is really excited about this. We have Demetri Laskaris who's going to be coming on. He is a Canadian journalist. And he was in Iran and Lebanon last month during the peak of the fighting. We try to get him on

no live while he was there but I mean he was just always having to move around because well he was in a war zone so he was a truck yeah me just yeah for sure just never could happen but he is he'll be coming on to the show tomorrow highly highly highly recommend y'all share that link when we post it it's going to be awesome

because we'll be getting a bird's eye view from the man who is actually there and who's freaking fearless Dimitri is awesome yeah he's awesome he really is Yeah, he was in both Lebanon and Iran. Iran. Yeah. He was in both. Okay.

But Zionism is ultimately, it is an anti-Christ philosophy and the Christian church, Jesus walk away from it. Oh, Robbie, before I let you go very quickly, what do you think about the thought that's going around social media these days that right-wingers now are increasingly concluding that Donald Trump is the antichrist? My reading of the Antichrist was that he was going to be a lot cleverer and smarter. I feel like it's a little insulting to the Antichrist.

But you've got to think. So there's Antichrist and then the Antichrist, who's the son of perdition. Christ is, the Donald Trump is definitely a version of the Antichrist. He is a Antichrist. Is he the man, the abomination that the book had Daniel Revelation talks about no, but he is 100% a Antichrist. He's the enemy of Christ.

He's an enemy of the church. He is a scumbag of the highest order, and I regret ever having supported the man back to 2016. If I had known the kind of complete coward and cuck that he would have been, I would have just voted for my dog or something back in 2016. All right. And with that, thank you. Please put up the ad.

Okay. So let's do some more questions. there we're getting a little behind here um Arab Muslim the American Western Empire is collapsing this century agreed do you expect it to be will be a peaceful demise of the American regime and perhaps more importantly do you see that it may be fast two interesting questions I mean other words a piece a relatively I don't know if I would characterize the collapse of the Soviet Union as peaceful I mean there were all sorts of regional conflicts that resulted millions of Russian

starve to death. So I don't know if I would call that piece, but I mean, it didn't lead to a large, significant war. So I don't know. I don't think so. I don't think this country goes. I think the culture of this country is to go out, you know, I had a, I had a friend who she worked in transplant, so she saw a lot of people die at the hospital. She said people tend to die the way that they lived. Like if they were kind of happy, calm, cool people, they kind of went out peacefully. People who were unpleasant and difficult

went out kicking and screaming. I think we know what kind of country in the United States is. Unpleasant, difficult, aggressive. I don't know. What do you think? I don't think we go silently into that good night. In fact, I think what we're seeing now is climax on this kind of thematic,

thematic climax of an empire that is to use the euphemism, or not the euphemism, but to use the example that you gave, kicking, screaming, clawing, biting in order to avoid going into the good night. I think it's that. I think if you look at the wars, for example, the Ukraine-Russia war, if you look at what we were trying to do in the sense of China, with the economic sense, if you look at what they're doing now militarily in regards to global energy markets, where the U.S. effectively is asserting control over global energy through a blockade that it's enacting on energy. I mean, because it would be like, hey, we're going to turn on the Russian tap. Who the hell are you? We're stopping Iranian oil from going to China. We don't want China to take

Iranian oil. Meaning all of these things is the U.S. trying to interdict this idea of a multiple world coming into fruition, coming into focus. And this seems to be this kind of last gasp of empire in the way that they're trying to stop it. And the catch is putting on a sort of precipice of a larger war. I mean, we're bumping heads with China as we speak. Talking about raiding Chinese ships, for God's saying. Oh, it's crazy. We're talking. We're doing it. Let's do the out here. I mean, I don't see, this doesn't. And you get Russian and China lever off talking to Wang Yi saying, we need to stop the U.S. The U.S. meets the fail in its efforts to maintain unipolarity. Agreed. So this is a systematic struggle that we're saying.

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Just go to Rumble.com slash premium and use the promo code studio at checkout. That's rumble.com slash premium promo code studio. No ads, more freedom, and content you actually care about. That is the deal. And before I forget, I knew I was forgetting something. We have our Q&A show today. Monday at 12 noon, Eastern Time. We'll be taking questions.

And unless something major breaks, that will just be a question and answer show. So please do tune in in two hours and 17 minutes from now. We should talk about Bulgaria. Yeah, the elections. Yeah. So basically. I was supposed to be born to Bucking. Yeah.

Bulgaria was going to be on my list of places because you could stay there for like three months. I found a place on the coast. And that mentioned, they were belligerent. They weren't insane. But I'm sorry. This story. Well, so anyway, so it turns out that former president Rumen Radev leads a party called Progressive Bulgaria. And he seems to have settled sort of an unsettled Bulgarian election landscape for the

first time in years by having one of the largest parliamentary mandates by any party in recent years, winning nearly 45% of the vote. That's a lot better than expected. It's widely anticipated that he will warm up relations with Russia that had cooled off significantly under the previous regime. So, I mean, the Ukraine-Russia conflict, even though it's not really at the top of anybody's thoughts here in the United States, still looms large over European politics. And I guess it's understandable, especially in central and eastern Europe. Bulgaria was in the Warsaw Pact. It was an eastern block country. I mean, it would be a little insane for Bulgaria not to have good relations with Russia.

So, I mean, what are we to make of this? I mean, just a return to sanity or what? I think people are sick of the war. I mean, the war's been going on for five years, nearing five years. Europe has taken an economic hit for it, like meaning all of us, oh, we're not going to use Russian energy

and all the Putin is this and Putin is that. All of this, you know, propaganda that went along with maintained and sustaining the war effort. I think in the same way that you pointed out in the United States, the war is over. We don't really care. I don't know if we ever really care. if I'm being plainly honest with you, considering the number of, meaning if we care for Ukraine,

we would have wanted war to stop. Not all of these Ukrainians be dying. And I suspect when you get into states like Bulgaria, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, etc., they're sick of it. I mean, as you pointed out, they're right beside their neighbors. I mean, it makes all the sense in the world to have decent relations with your big brother, Russia, former member of the Soviet or South Africa. I think the nations and the populations are sick of the war that allows, of the stuff had to do with the people at the top, let's say the elites of Europe and the European leaders. I think it was their war, not the population's war. And I think that's what we're. I could be wrong. I could be wrong, but I don't think I am. I think they're sick of it.

Agreed. Manchild, thanks for the donation. If Israel's, let's see, we, oh, let's see, I think we already did that one. I think this is another one from the same person. As Spain and Ireland, pushed to end the EU-Israel Association Agreement, does this signal a permanent rift in Western support or just a temporary diplomatic rebuke? So it depends on who you're referring to. If you're referring to leadership, I don't, I mean, leadership hasn't necessarily separated themselves from Israel in real sense. I mean, they would make noise because the population felt some kind of way about Israel committing a genocide. But the leadership, no, I don't think there's, I mean, Spain, you're going to get pockets like Spain and Ireland.

But if you look at the West as a whole in regards to the leadership of those countries, they're firmly behind Israel. I mean, correctly for wrong. Do you disagree with me on this? No, yeah, I agree with that completely. Yeah. Let's see, there was something else here. It's in their interest to be. From their point of view, it's in their interest. I mean, they're looking at Israel as their little project. in the Middle East. And so do they want their little geopolitical project to be curtailed? No. Are they embarrassed by the genocide? Maybe. Does that affect? Their project is fucked. Yeah. They should just cut bait. Loon Léger. I like the Deep Space Nine stuff in the background,

tomorrow. Oh, thank you. Thank you. I need to switch out Dax. I actually have a picture of Q. I like Q better and have a picture of Dave. Dax is taking a prime real estate. She needs to move. But thank you. Philip Blair, what do we know about psychedelic-assisted therapy to treat PTSD, which is in the news right now, right? Because the president just signed an executive order saying that people can take magic shrooms or at least urging the federal government to move towards the legalization for medical purposes, especially for veterans suffering from PTSD, but anyone suffering from PTSD. And obviously this has been in the news.

People, it's been very hip to do microdose. with, you know, the, what is it, the thing that's empty. Yeah, that's the active ingredient in magic mushrooms and other psychedelics. I've never used these things, so I can't speak to them personally. But, like, yeah, and I, you know. Who thought you would have been hit, Ted? Well, yeah, one day I'll talk about my, by, I had one, like, early experience with just with pot brownies and it was a fucking catastrophe.

And afterwards, my roommate said, you know, who did every drug. He did all the drugs. And he was like, he was like, you know, Ted, as you know, I always urge everybody to do as many drugs as possible. But he was like, in your case, I make an exception. I'll tell the story. I'll tell the story. If someone wants to bring it up in the Q&A, I'll tell the story then. So, you know, in D.C. is legal for secondary.

And so you can get pretty much whatever psychedelic you want. You can get it delivered to your house. DMT, Sincela, what is it? Sincirilla. It's a setteva divadorium. That's the name of it. That's another one. Shrooms, all those things are legal. I've had shrooms delivered to the house. I can tell about that experience. I've tried sativa dividorium. I can tell of that experience. It's, I mean, the effect of it, supposed to be to reorganize the way the brain works. And they shown success by using things like ayahuasca to treat PTSD. Now, how it works, who knows, you need to adopt or to explain it. But, you know, if you're talking about stuff like mescal independent upon the culture you're talking about, some of this stuff is not really seen as a drug. It's seen as like a being or gateway to different worlds. Like when you're using

DMT, there's a book called DMT Spirit Molecue, where they were doing medical research into what people were experiencing, why they were on DMT. And they were doing different doses. Some just below a threshold, others beyond a threshold, where the person felt like they were talking to other beings, like machine elves. It's very wild. Even Carlos Castanada in those series books, where Carlos Casanada is in like Peru,

and he's dealing with, like, witch doctors and stuff like that, dealing with mescalent as a gateway to talking and dealing with other beings. That's what it's fascinating. Oh, that stuff is fascinating. No, it is, it is super fascinating. And, you know, I know people who swear by this stuff. You know, I mean, I certainly, it's obviously very promising. There's that book that came out recently, how to change your mind, right?

Which is all about this subject, which I read. And, you know, hey, whatever works. Look, let me, I'm so critical. Let me applaud the president for this. You know, I think it's people should have access to stuff. that can help them. And, you know, I guess I get a little worried if they get behind the wheel of a car. But there are laws to deal with that.

There's no test, this is the problem. But, you know, I would hope that people would just be responsible enough not to do that. But, you know. I would hope. I mean, I thought that would have alcohol. And yet alcohol is legal. I feel the way about pot. Pott has become legal.

Yeah. I mean, people are going to do it. Driving while stoned is rampant. Everybody's doing it. Yeah. And they should. And they should. Let's talk about Mark Carney.

I just thought this was the classic JT question. So, I mean, Canada's always been like our vassal state. I mean, their coins even copy the shape of ours so that the vending machines, the same vending machines would work, right? They're literally like our little brothers up north. And we've always taken them for granted. They've been at our side fighting in all of our stupid wars. they've, you know, they've, when you're in Canada, you know that they're like feeling

totally overshadowed like the little brother to the big brother. Yes. And Donald Trump went really out of his way to insult the shit out of them, calling them the 51st state, saying he wants to annex them, imposing tariffs against them. He basically went to war unilaterally against them. And not surprisingly, they're really pissed. Now, the Prime Minister, Mark Carney, says, that gave a speech yesterday saying that it used to be a strength to have strong economic ties with the U.S. And now it's a weakness and Canada has to spin off.

This isn't really new. This is something that the Canadians have been talking about for months. But it's, you know, it's striking that this is now mainstream Canadian. This was the most unforced error. And I got to tell you, I don't blame. Donald Trump, I blame the American people for not pushing back against Donald Trump on this

as for so many other things they failed to push back. Someone should have just been like, at long last sir, have you no decency? These are the fucking Canadians. They are best friends. And like we should be like it's just, it's unconscionable to pick a fight with your best friend

for no reason. I agree with you. I agree with you. It's Trump we talked about. I always get this impression that Donald Trump is just the honest face of America. Right? Yeah. If you think about it, you're right.

Most Americans were not spent, before 2021 or 2025, no American was thinking, fuck those Canadians. In fact, it was a joke, the idea of like Canada threatening to invade us or something. That was come up in like comedies, SNL skits. You know, it was that outlandish, the idea that we would be anything other than, like, like close friends. But I think the way Trump looks at it is America is the end. You know what? If you spend decades calling yourself the indispensable nation and then the president

comes in and fully believes it, whose fault is it? I mean, no, you can say it's the U.S. because we tell ourselves these things. True. You can say that American public should reign in their president. True. But when have we ever done that short of like the Vietnam War or short of something where we take economic damage as a result of something that the president of the government is doing. Usually it's just, we disagree.

And let me go have sex with my wife or my mistress or play my Xbox or do whatever. Right. Like, I don't know how we don't get engaged until it hurts us. That seems to be the rule. Yeah. Yeah. And the only reason that we got engaged during the Vietnam War is because our brothers and our sons and we're getting fucking killed in a stupid fucking war. I mean, I don't know another way around it.

In fact, that's, I don't know if you've seen the polling recently. What time is it? Do we have time? Yeah. I don't know if you've seen the polling recently talking out about Trump and how low, I think he's at like 30% approval. That's correct. That's correct.

The failing and the war and the inflation, meaning the pain that is being imparted or that will come to the U.S. may change that, meaning that reckoning may take place. Yeah. No, agreed. and we, but not FISA. So civil war in the GOP, right? So because they're effectively, Democratic Party is useless,

you know, all the conflict in American electoral politics takes place between the, the two halves of the corporatist wing and the populist wing of the GOP. So the conservative populists are skeptical of big government. They don't, they'd want at least to see some reforms

to Section 702 of FISA, which allows, basically has been allowing the NSA to spy on everybody. But now it just seems like they're not going to be able to get there on time. And a lot of people are blaming Speaker Mike Johnson. I would love to see this expire never to be seen again. Same. I mean, we have laws.

Why do we need warrantless wiretaps? Right? I mean, that's the Stasi and stuff like that from those other type. I don't understand these fake warrants, right? So it's like administrative warrants, they call them. So like, for example, ICE, they're like, oh, we went to, you know, arrest Ted's cat because, you know, we usually get administrative warrant. And all, that's not a real, that's not a real word. I mean, it's not a, it doesn't mean anything.

Administrative warrant is just a internal memo written by ICE that says, hey, dear ICE, go arrest, go arrest this guy, signed loving ice. it's like a judge issues a warrant and that's how it should be with FISA. Like you should get, I mean, I know it's a judge but it's not a judge that's operating within the context of a normal adversarial legal framework where there's, you know, both sides are represented.

I mean, the idea that it's like, they're acting like this is a court. Even the language is off. It's not a court. Yeah, I mean, the way it works, right? So I don't know if people know this, right? So I'll explain it. So the foreign intelligence surveillance

Surveillance Act courts are basically like sort of a side project of the federal court system. So a federal judge basically meets in chambers on his or her personal time. And then a government lawyer comes in and says, I'd like to spy on, we'd like to spy on Jamarle Thomas. The judge says, okay, what basis do you have? And they say, oh, well, we know, we think he's a bad guy. And here's why we think that. Then the thing is, there's no one in the room who argues.

against it. There's no Jamarle Thomas lawyer. There's not even a generic defense anti-surveillance guy who says, you don't have enough. You don't have, you have, you have, you have no evidence that Thomas has done anything wrong. And so because there's only one side of the argument being granted, and because it's also a little extra scratch for the federal judge, the federal judge always rubber stamps it. It's like 99% literally 99% of the time, they get the, they get the warrants that they want. If there's a mistake, the judge will say, you know what? Oh, actually, I'll sign this, but you have to fix line six. And then they come back and then they sign it every single time. To make a slight correction, I think it's 99.7% of the time that it's approved. Right.

If I remember correctly. It's like something. It's basically, it's all of them, basically. Yeah. It's a rubber stamp. Yeah, it's a rubber stand. Like, it's outrageous. How are we saying freedom democracy, we believe in our court systems and all of the stuff. And then you have this thing working in the background. And by the way, they have construction too. Like meaning if they can pass that information off to, let's say, a cop or police organization and they can basically go back in order to reconstruct a case based off of something. Like, it's a lot of stuff that's going on behind the scenes on this that is very dodgy. And yeah, it should die. Yeah, totally. Well, that is totally it.

for today, but not really because we have Q&A show coming up at 12 noon. Please tune in there, 12 noon Eastern time for a Q&A with myself and tomorrow. Thanks, everyone, for tuning in. Please stay tuned for TMI with me and Manila Chan coming up right now. Bye, everyone. Bye, JT. Have it, see you later. In a couple hours.