Shaun Newman Podcast - #1033 - Martin Armstrong

Episode Date: April 14, 2026

Martin Armstrong is the CEO of Armstrong Economics and is renowned for his economic forecasting model, the Economic Confidence Model, which has notably predicted major market events. He has advised governments and financial institutions worldwide, offering insights into market trends, currency movements, and geopolitical impacts on the economy. Watch the Cornerstone Forum 26’https://shaunnewmanpodcast.substack.com/Silver Gold Bull Links:Website: https://silvergoldbull.ca/Email: [e-mail] Grahame: [phone]Bow Valley Credit UnionBitcoin: www.bowvalleycu.com/en/personal/investing-wealth/bitcoin-gatewayEmail: [e-mail] Get your voice heard: Text Shaun 587-217-8500

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So buckle up, here we go. Well, welcome to the Sean Newman podcast today. I'm joined by Martin Armstrong. Martin, great to have you back. Nice to see you. I, for people who attended the Cornerstone Forum, they got to see Martin again in Calgary. Appreciate you making your way. I know I was looking at the results of the survey I sent Martin of people they wanted to have back.

You're number one. So obviously people thought what you had to say at the forum and you being in person again was beneficial. So thanks again for making your way to Calgary. And I feel like now when you go around, telling people that you went to Canada and it was snowing and everything else, that story can be updated because once upon a time you told it from the 90s, now in 2026, you can say you were in Calgary when it was, I don't know, not miserable, but it wasn't exactly balmy, was it? Well, it wasn't the minus 40 below as I experienced in Edmonton, but that's when you just kept your mouth shut. you didn't you went um-huh because you open your mouth and your teeth are well let's fast forward to today like i was just saying you before we started i'm like there's never a dull moment

and uh as you're probably going to talk about it isn't going to slow down anytime soon but how about we start here uh hungry the election that just happened uh there orban is is gone uh is it peter megiar i don't know how to say it you know this is where martin can come and you could do the pronounce better than I ever can. What are you, what are your thoughts on Hungary? Well, the election was, most likely rigged.

I mean, pretty much the same as Romania. There was no way they could allow Victor to remain. He's actually the only sound voice that was left in the EU. You had Brussels against them, Germany against them.

Zelensky was sending in people to pretend to be protesters paying them. He tried to sabotage the pipeline several times to, you know. Victor was the bulwark against them. war with Russia. With him now removed, you will see the EU is an absolute desperate shape. And to give you a statistic that you, I think, need to know there in Canada, given Carnage love for the EU. The total amount of GDP that goes to fund the government, just to keep the bureaucrats, you know, fat and happy in the EU is the highest in the world. It's nearly 50% of the entire economy goes to the bureaucrats. In the United States, it's about 35.

Canada is about 44. So to give you an idea, this is why the EU needs war. They have the lowest economic growth period. A debt crisis, which you take the problem we have with energy. from, you know, the Straits of Hormuz. I mean, there's a crisis that is just unbelievable in the stupidity of bringing it about. You know, as I've said up there in the conferences in Canada,

I mean, I didn't go to West Point, but if you're going to start a war with Iran, I think you should have secured the Straits of Hermoos first. I mean, you know, this is always the same neocon nonsense. And Netanyahu, oh, we go in, we kill the Ayatollah, you know, we basically bomb them so they can't use nukes. and we win everything in an hour. There's never a consideration,

what if that doesn't work? All right? They did the same thing with Iran. I mean, with Iraq. You had Dick Cheney out there, oh, this will be just weeks. It was eight years. They never consider what happens if they're wrong.

Iran has strategically won. No matter what anybody wants to say, okay? They have control of the Straits of Harmoos. Netanyahu is, in my opinion, him and Zelensky's, the two of them should be locked up for life and put in a padded cell. So they don't hurt themselves so that they basically can enjoy tax-free living for life, you know? but, you know, both of them only look at their own self-interest. Here you had Trump remove some of the sanctions on Russian oil.

So what did Zelensky do? Oh, he didn't want Russia to benefit. So we attacked their oil to reduce it down the 40%. The hell was the world. It's what he wants. Netanyahu. was there in a situation room selling this to Trump. My question is, Trump aside,

there was nobody else in the room that even brought up the possibility that Iran would use the straits as a Trump card. I just find it sadly disappointing that there's nobody there with any real intelligence at this point in the game. Europe is going to now with Hungary in their pocket, they're going to start war with Russia. This is what Zelensky wants. He wants to kill Russia just as Netanyahu wants to kill Iran. They do not care about the world.

This is a personal vendetta on both sides. So Iran, you know, with the idiots don't know. And if they just opened up a history book, they think, oh, we have the biggest military in the world, and everybody else will just fall. If they picked up a history book, they would see the biggest always false. Persia fell to the Greeks. The Greeks fell to the Romans. Even Carthage fell to the Romans, you know, when they were fledgians.

This is the way it goes. All right. And sometimes a big fighter in a ring is so big and fat, he can't move quick enough with the young, you know, spry guy that takes him down. And Iran has won strategically. And I don't care what anybody else says. All right. George Washington, it's the same thing.

He knew he could not go toe to toe with Britain. So what did he do? He adopted guerrilla warfare. And won. This is what Iran is doing. and they are very, very well, I would say, from an intelligence standpoint, they're better than the Israelis. And what people do not realize is,

we saw them, you take out a tanker, fine, that's three million barrels, whatever. They started attacking the refineries of the other. Gulf states. You do that. You brought down Asia. We have offices in Thailand. Not only there's no gasoline, okay, there's no diesel. With no diesel, you can't send out the shipping fleets for food. You know, I mean, the lack of intelligence here is just, It's mind blowing, really. Then there's the real Trump card, which nobody even talks about. All right.

Netanyahu is refusing any kind of a ceasefire because he is focused on the destruction of Iran. All right. If I'm Iran and let's say you're bringing it to the point, my last dying breath. What am I doing? I am going to blow up all the cables that connect the entire world financial system, all the banks, etc. runs right through the straits of Hormuz. Nobody's looked at this. All right. I ran, I mean, we had offices in UAE. There is a $30 billion our project there, everybody's there. Open AI, Amazon, etc. All right. They sent some drones

into attack it. They took it down briefly. I can tell you, because our staff, the banks were down for seven days. That was just in the UAE. And that was just attacking that facility. All right. You take out those cables, guess what? This is going to be like the truckers. You can't even use the bank accounts. I mean, I don't know. I mean, it's, and you've got a sovereign debt crisis that, again, I'm doing an institutional report on it. It's off the radar of everybody.

I mean, people think that the Middle East is just rolling in money. They, when oil went down, and it went down to $6.50 during COVID, all right, what did they do? They borrowed extensively. And then, a lot of them, even stupidly, signed contracts for 10 years of oil at $30-some a barrel. to China. So oil goes up to 100. It doesn't matter. You still got to sell it a 30 bucks. All right. And then on top of that, if they cannot, Iran knows what it's doing. It's more than just an energy crisis. You shut that down. Okay. They can't sell oil at any price. Guess what you get?

a sovereign debt crisis. And then that ripples through the banking system. I mean, this is the worst possible war that anybody could have possibly even contemplated. This is why Netanyahu, in all honesty, has been trying to sell this war with Iran to every president for the last 47 years. all right and there was nobody in that situation room that even raised these issues and trump goes oh that sounds good to me i mean this is a mess it's a complete mess and people have no concept of what can really happen here um it's just crazy if i go back to all the cables in the strata hormones

walk me through that look you have all the cables that connect east to west run through the Strait of Hormuz. All the internet, et cetera, everything's there. Just as they took out the communication cables with Norway, et cetera, you could easily do that in the Straits of Hormuz. I would have sent down, you know, divers at that point, which would have planted plenty of, you know, explosives, and I would just wait to push the button.

You know, Iran cannot defeat the United States toe to toe, any more than George Washington could, you know, defeat the British toe to toe. So you adopt guerrilla warfare. That's what they're doing. I mean, I just, I am stunned that don't they teach strategy at West Point? more. I mean, you know, I don't know. I mean, that's what I would do. If they took away the cables, what would be the ripple effect of that? You're looking at a major communications decline, but a banking system, people can't access

their accounts. I mean, it's just, it gets to be nuts. even the sovereign default that if I'm Iran and people say, oh, well, yeah, it's attacking the Gulf states. No, if they force them into default, you've got a sovereign default crisis going on. That starts taking down some banks. And that ripples through the entire financial system. I mean, it's more than just the price of oil. When you, okay, so if you take down the communication, communication not is a bad thing, right? But when you go to the everyday average person not being able to access their accounts and taking down banks and sovereign debt cases and all those things,

basically the confidence of human beings of the general public would be a mass rush to the banks to pull out what they have. Is that fair? Yeah, they wouldn't be able to. Which would then cause protests. And, you know, when you talk Martin about, you know, specifically Alberta, you're like, you think it's just Alberta. But, you know, as we're seeing in Ireland now, and I hear the UK's about to have their own protests. You know, what you're pointing out once all again is that you told me on stage, you think it's Alberta, but it's everywhere in the world. If something like that were to happen, communication falls, now you can't access your money, etc., just take that out a few steps.

the uncertainty and the crisis it would cause in the world population would be immense. Yeah. Look, this is why this is what our computer's been forecasting about 2032. All right. It's people are going to realize that our forms of government don't work. They're incompetent. All right. We have no right to vote on any of this stuff.

I mean, did anybody ask us, shall we go to war with Iran? No. You know, Trump goes, oh, that's a good idea. It's even questionable when you have a foreign government in the situation room usurping U.S. foreign policy. I mean, it's never been done before. Well, if I bring it back to Canada, Carney signaling a tighter relationship with the, I don't know, you know, who got asked about that. Exactly.

I mean, and he's just a globalist idiot. He really does not understand economics. Just because he's the head of a central bank means nothing. All right. You know, you can look up its own or site. Maybe you can find a copy of the book. It's kind of rare. It's called Rediscovery of the Business Cycle by Paul Volker.

1979. They go for a few hundred bucks if you can find them. All right. In there, in 1979, he said, Keynes in economics, the new economics failed. Yet these, you know, heads of central banks continue to use it, and they know it doesn't work. It's just absurd. You know, And then you have people that don't understand what the hell they're forecasting. All the stock market's going to fall 80%. Why? Because they look at a chart from 1929. What they don't know is the U.S. had a balanced budget at that time. All of Europe defaulted.

South America defaulted. Asia was defaulting on their debts. So that all the capital was coming to the dollar. So it was massive deflation. But the U.S. didn't default. And okay, so fine, you say, oh, the stock market's going to fall 80%. So that means you buy government bonds? I mean, they don't even connect the dots.

They don't understand the world economy then or now. And, you know, stocks end up being a private asset. And that's the only thing that's going to survive when governments default on their debts. Because when a government defaults, you get nothing. If General Motors defaulted, they go into bankruptcy, they sell off the assets, you get something back. That doesn't happen with governments. You can't go down to the next. National Art Museum and start lifting Picasso's.

It's, I mean, this is a conundrum that, I mean, honestly, it's like what they say, Murphy's Law, whatever they can screw up, they have screwed up, because it's not just one thing. I mean, it's every which way from Sunday. And the idiots that we have there don't know anything. And Hungary, that's it. That's the last straw. There's nothing now to stop the EU from going to war with Russia. And it wouldn't surprise me if they didn't do it already by June.

I mean, it's just a mess, a complete mess. With Hungary being the one stopping them, what were they doing in order to hold the EU back from going to full out war with Russia? From where I sit, Martin, I feel like they've been at full out war with Russia for a long time. But obviously not if you point to Hungary being that backstop or the one holding them back. Supposedly, when they formed the EU, they guarantee. it wouldn't be a tyrannical. They said it would require a unanimous vote. Unanimous, not majority.

So that one vote that was stopping everything was Hungary. You know, it was Hungary objecting to Ukraine joining NATO. It was Hungary objecting to money, billions being poured into Ukraine, to Ukraine from, you know, illegally seized Russian assets, which were private assets, not even the government, and people don't even understand that. If you, they were, Switzerland has lost any kind of credibility. So is Sweden. They were confiscating assets of Russian individuals, not government, saying, oh, you knew Putin, you were one of his friends, were taking your money to. This is what Europe has done.

They stole private assets, just as Canada was doing to people that just donated to truckers. You know, they go, oh, Russian assets. They make it sound like it's the Russian government. No, this is Russian individuals. And the bulk of a lot of the stuff that they have, yachts, properties, things like this,

that were private individuals. Chuck Zavak even had the audacity to say anybody that's Russian, we're going to confiscate all their real estate. Period. This is Europe. And like I said, just look at the total cost of government in the EU as a percentage of GDP and it's virtually 50%. the highest in the world. If I go back to Hungary, you're saying at this, you know, when they need unanimous consent, every other country is for it, but Hungary was the one saying no.

And with the new Peter Magyar, we're assuming this is all going ahead then. Oh, yeah, he's very pro-EU. So if you play that out into, I don't know, the near future, you mentioned, in June, you're going to see Europe send more money, more troops, more tech, more everything to the Ukraine front. Oh, yeah. I mean, Macron has been arguing to send, you know, boots on the ground and so does UK. So with us here in Canada, now I'm going to pull it all the way to Canada for a second,

Martin. We've been hearing rumblings of the 300,000 public servants, right, that they're going to be, basically a reserve army, a reserve group of people that get trained. When we hear more and more rumblings and more and more things coming out about our military and how we have to grow it with siding with the EU, that would be why, is we're planning on sending things there as well. Oh, absolutely. I mean, Carney just topped, you know, topped up what Canada pays to NATO.

Hill. He's fully on. You're going to have, you know, drafts just like everybody else. I don't know if you've seen the latest thing from Germany that if you're of draft age, you're not allowed to leave the country for more than three months. Yes. I mean, this is, you know, France, they're all basically doing the same thing. Why? Because they, the economic model. is a disaster. All right. Once you go down this pebbled road of socialism, and, you know, oh, the government cares about me, they don't give two shits about you. You know, by selling socialism, vote for me,

and I'll give you this. It's bribing the people all the time. And once you get in that, It does nothing but gross. Okay. And it's unstoppable because eventually you have to default. There has to be a revolution. And the government falls.

History says this all the time. I mean, you know, it's amazing, but they always think this time is different somehow. But, you know, if what I'm saying, wasn't true. As I said before, we would still be speaking Babylonian. All right. The biggest always fall. It's hubris, it's mismanagement. I mean, they fight like hell to retain power. There's absolutely no purpose whatsoever to NATO. NATO was there as the check against the Warsaw Pact. When communism fell, why do we need NATO? NATO and all their pensions and salaries, they're only good, all right, if Russia wants to invade Europe, as if it's

Khrushchev still. You know, so they have to say, oh, Putin wants to invade Europe. Give us money and we'll protect you. I mean, it's like a mafia protection game, you know? They go down to the stores and say, pay me and nobody's going to bother you. And this is what NATO has become. It's just a protection racket. You know, if I go back to one, I don't know how many conversations this was ago with you, Martin. But I was talking about Alberta independence.

And if you got Alberta independence were to pass, one of the most beneficial things that might come out of it was not having to go to war. And when you're talking about Hungary and now that they've fallen and are going to go along with the EU and pushing for all out war against Russia and the fact that the federal government of Canada

is signaling we want to be a part of the EU instead of the United States, right? Like we don't want to have relations with the orange man. We're going to team up closer to the EU which means if they go to go, to war, we go to war. One of the things that might be a, not a nail in the coffin, that's the opposite, I guess, but one of the final things to drop for me on why Alberta independence would be

the right move is you wouldn't have to send all your sons off to war, or at least you'd have the choice on it. Yeah, I mean, this is, this is what, you know, that's going to probably be the final issue that pushes it. But, as I said, the computer projects Canada will split. The same as, you know, you're going to eventually see Europe split, but it's going to take war to do this. It's going to take war for it to split. Yeah.

When you bring up the computer saying Canada will split, I feel like I've asked this again multiple times, but I'll ask it anyways. It's not like it gives you February, 2027 Canada, split. No, I mean, it basically was starting that 2026 was the beginning of all of this. This is why we said it was a, we have a panic cycle in our war models for 26. And it did pick February and everything started right then and there. But on top of that, I've written for years that we have two models.

One is civil unrest, and the other one is international war. You can see with the energy crisis that's taking place because of the international war in the Middle East. All right. You're getting civil unrest in UK, Ireland, everywhere. people have to understand that, you know, North America, and I would say the western part of Canada, we're not going to see the shortages. U.S. only gets maybe 3% of its energy from the Middle East. We've got offices in Thailand. There's no gas, no diesel. You're seeing this over in Europe, et cetera. in Canada because of this whole net zero nonsense, you don't have pipelines to the East.

The East has to import oil. They don't even get it from Alberta. I mean, how ridiculous is that? All right. So you're going to see the East is going to need more and more money. They're going to say, give it to us, Alberta. You're rich. Okay. This is, you know, look, that's what broke up Yugoslavia. Serbia was the one that was producing

everything and it was the positive and the money was going to all the other, you know, regions like Croatia, etc. That they can get off their ask and was always, you know, living off the, you know, the excess money from Serbia. That's what you're doing. Eastern Canada is broke. All they want is more free time, you know, more social benefits and grab the money from Alberta to pay it. That's going to stick in your throat eventually and you're going to wake up and say, this is not a fair deal. There's been a lot of interpretations of the U.S. attacking Iran, one of which is that they don't get a ton of oil from the Middle East and that by shutting down the strait of Hormuz,

they're putting way more pressure on the rest of the world and that that can have net benefit, essentially, bankrupt Europe, for one, and force all these different players to have to readjust. You take anything of that? No, I mean, it's giving again, far too much credit to these people. I mean, trust me, I've dealt with, they're not that smart.

If they were, they wouldn't be calling me. I mean, you know, I said the craziest thing was to get called in to write, as to write the peace plan for Putin. I said, excuse me? I'm not part of your administration. They're coming to me to write a peace plan to circumvent the State Department. What does that say?

Either they didn't want to do it or they couldn't do it. I don't know. Then I get a letter from Trump thanking me. Okay. You know, you're not, you're giving these people way too much credit. They're not that smart. And second of all, You know, forcing Europe to default is not to the benefit of the United States.

All right. Trump wants to sell widgets to everybody. They're not going to be able to buy them. All right. So that theory, oh, you know, it doesn't hold water at all. And if anything, you know, I think I was asked, to write the peace plan because I knew the real facts behind Ukraine to begin with. All right. And I laid it out. I was, I've been surprised, but everything I put in that

proposal, Trump has followed. I mean, I said, you know, I even said, you know, we should exit NATO for the first time we're starting to hear U.S. may exit NATO. I said, the EU is going to to stab you in the back they need this war your your enemy is not russia it's the e u he has followed everything that i put in there quite amazing in my opinion is it possible then that trump is you know you you talk about they're not that smart is it possible trump is that smart but he's surrounded by everything you talk about trump is is definitely a very intelligent guy. Okay.

That does not necessarily mean that he is familiar with the international global perspective that I am. I have had, not theory, not from books. I got clients everywhere, all right? So I've had to deal with it. I've seen it firsthand. They have taught me things that you'll never get in school. All right.

So I don't think that there's anybody in Washington that quite understands the global economy because they don't teach this in school. I mean, I won't say which university of one of the top five asked me if I would come there and teach. And I said, no, I'm sorry. I'm not interested in teaching a class there. But I asked them, why are you asking me?

They actually said, we know what we teach doesn't work. I said, well, that's great. That's the first step. But they also said, I don't think I was the first one asked. They also said nobody wants to come back. There aren't that many of us that were really at the high level of international hedge funds, etc. All right. I don't know anybody that wants to go back and teach a classroom with 30 kids.

You mentioned they're not that smart. One of the things I was curious about, you know, I assume you saw the Christy Noam news that her husband is a, I don't know, cross treasher. Is that the easiest way to put it? I've been wondering, you know, like, Christy Nome was sold as one of the best, one of the good, one of the good guys. Then it comes out that her husband and you're like, like, is it possible she didn't know?

Yeah, sure, it's possible. Is it possible the inner workings of bureaucracy didn't know? Yeah, sure, it's possible. But I'm like, at this point, Martin, if they're not that smart, are any of them that good? I think you have to, look, I used to be part of the vetting process. They would send me out to go meet with somebody who wanted to run for president.

And I was there to explain the world economy and how it function, really. But I would get back. And then it was really a vetting process. And they said, what do you think? Is he smart enough to hand them? it, et cetera. This was up to 1999. And then Bush Jr. came into play. And I was asked to go down to meet with him. And they said, oh, but this one's different. I said, what's different? And I swear to God, they said to me, he's stupid. I said, what? I said, why would we make somebody stupid president?

And they said to me, he's got the name so we can win. They then picked the cabinet, not Bush Jr. They picked Dick Cheney. And I was asked to be chief economic advisor. I declined. I said, you know, the reason is I can't have a conflict of interest to take that position. Now, if I work for Goldman Sachs, fine. I get to sell all my stock tax-free to take that position.

People don't know that. I have my own company. I said, I'm not going to give up my company for this. Forget it. All right. So, look, I knew somebody that Trump in this first term had nominated for the Federal Reserve, Stephen Moore. It was head of Cato. I knew Steve. I thought he was actually very qualified. Immediately they started attacking him, his family, his wife, what she does, this, he withdraws his name.

You know, you can't have anything to take such a position. I mean, you're going to be an orphan and, you know, not married and not have any kids, everybody they're going to attack and drag through the mud. I mean, when you do this to people, I mean, they did that to one of the Supreme Court justices. This woman, oh, well, he tried to rape me, wanted to, we wanted to. Furn out she wasn't even, didn't even go to the same school. I mean, it, who to hell wants these kind of jobs? You've chased away anybody that I know that would be actually good and qualified, you know, it's like you hold up the cross and say, please go, you know, the silver cross go away. You know, I'm not interested. It's, I don't know, you know, I think that's part of this 2032 process. It's become so polarized that nobody who

is actually qualified in their right mind would even touch something. like this. I don't know what else to say. I certainly wouldn't. If you go back to Bush Jr. and them being stupid, Canadians know all about that. We had a guy named Trudeau come in.

He had fancy socks, Martin, but that was about it. So we know a little bit about having people that are unqualified be elected to lead a country. Look, I could run for president, you know,

Congress, all right? I'll say anything you want me to say. I'll save the whales. I'll clear the atmosphere, whatever, you know. I get there and then what happens? There's a meeting on day one. Everybody comes in. Glad you made it. Now, this is how it works. All the decisions are made in the back office by unelected people. and just look at the votes. They're down party line. All right, so I could say anything you want me to say to get there. And then when I get there, I got a vote according to what they say. This is not democracy. And people have no clue, all right? It's people that, it's like these neocons.

You know, they got it down pretty pat. If you look at every administration, Obama, they tried to invade Syria, it doesn't matter if the Republican or Democrat. They move from one administration to the next. Trump thought, okay, he's not going to deal with the neocons. Well, Netanyahu grew up in Philadelphia. He hung out with the crystals. Irving Crystal is the one that started the whole Neocons.

I don't know he was just the show on the you know to get in and Trump goes oh okay fine he's ahead of a state no he's the same damn deal con you know crew and they don't think of anything besides their objective and they cannot see beyond the end of their nose um and you you you said you know like nobody worth their salt would get into politics In the same breath, you talk about 2032, you know, over the course of our conversations, that humanity, different countries, are going to have a choice in how they want, you know, the future of their civilizations or their countries or their communities to go. Would you foresee a time where people that have credibility that have something to offer government,

there will be an opportunity here very shortly for them to get involved and actually do some good. Yes, but the system has to collapse. It can't be that you... So there's going to be good, but in between there, there's going to be a lot of bad. Well, I mean, collapse in the sense that we all know what we're talking about here with the politicians. All right. They no longer have any credibility. So that system of collapses.

It doesn't mean there's people starving on the streets or something. But the political system collapses. It happens many, many times throughout history. All right. U.S. was a revolution per se. Okay. Even Canada. had an independent movement.

Okay. It technically broke away from Britain. All right. So it's not, you know, look at Russia. Communism collapsed. All right. It split up. But it wasn't like, you know, people dying in the streets of starvation sort of thing.

The governments collapse all the time. And I mean, yes, sometimes there are bloody wars. and other times they're not. I mean, Russia revolution to collapse in 91 was bloodless. You know, that was, you know, Gorbachev. And I can say this, that, you know, I did some advising with Gorbachev,

and I was impressed that he understood cycles. Like Margaret That, I think instinctively. And he happened to have been in China during Tenement Square. That's why I got so big because they wanted to capture the cameras, et cetera, because he was there. All right. So he saw how China responded. When he went back to Britain, I mean, to Russia, Brolam Wall's fault, he didn't send in troops.

He understood and he believed that, you know, I had written a report that Margaret Thatcher had said, you know, more than a year before Tony Blair was ever elected. We never heard the name Tony Blair at the time. And she said, the conservatives are going to lose the next election. And I asked her why. and she instinctively understood cycles. And she said, it's just time. I wrote a report, and I named it after what she had said. And Gorbachev was the same thing.

It's just time. He knew we had a revolutionary cycle on Russia, and everything was lined up, that Russia would collapse. He allowed it to happen. They didn't send the troops out like China did. So, and that's why they tried staging a coup against them, the old hardliners, because they wanted to restore the communist world. So, I mean, that, you know, ends up being with Epstein and Maxwell funding the coup.

I mean, it was just like, I mean, it just goes on and on and on and on. know. So do you think Ireland's sending the troops in, you know, if you shift to Ireland and what's happening there right now with the fuel or port blockades, the fuel protest, Ireland's sending in the troops, sending in, you know, trying to resolve it, in your mind is that, is that going to end poorly for them? Yeah. Look. a government falls when the troops no longer are willing to fight to save the government. That's what happened in Ukraine. All right, Yanukovych brought in Russians.

And the local police, when they realized they were foreign people coming in to support him, they've refused to support the government. All right. So it's when you lose that power of the police and the military, the government fails. You know, the coup in Russia, the 91, all right. Yeltsin stood on the tank. Do not fire on your own people. When the military didn't, the coup failed. So it's very critical. And this is how tyranny survives. They use the military as they did in Venezuela to suppress the people to keep the government in power. It's, you know, government ends up being your enemy, not your savior. What did you think of, um, Trump calling out Tucker, Candace, Megan, and Alex? I thought it was absolutely absurd. Um, he's fighting, uh, against criticism.

instead of owning it, in my opinion. And he made a mistake of listening to Netanyahu, and he should just simply say, I screwed up instead of, you know, doing exactly what he swore he wouldn't do. Yeah, and I always, as soon as I hear, you should admit a mistake. The next question I assume, I feel like I always ask, is what politician in modern times has owned a mistake? Rarely. There are a couple, but not many. Like, I can't think of a president that that is, that is owned a mistake. No, even Abraham Lincoln.

It had nothing to do with slavery. It was all about. retaining the union. You're going to look at all his speeches at first. It was, you're you can't separate. We're going to, you know, had nothing to do with slavery. He never, you know, advocated freeing the slaves. That's all to cover up afterwards. So when you look at the next couple months, you know, as you walk through 2026, 2026 has been the year of, uh, it all kicking off, as you pointed out, in February. When you look at the next couple months, what does the computer see?

Or what are you interpreting from the computer that is coming here, you know, for the rest of 2026? This is going to get a lot worse from June all the way into September, October. And we'll probably continue off into the first quarter of 27. I don't see a peak in this geopolitical craziness until probably at that point in time. My concern with Trump not owning this issue is that he is hostage to Netanyahu. He's not in control of this war. He tries to do a ceasefire.

from Iran's perspective, they wanted, from what I understand, I don't know what's in the press, but they wanted U.S. guarantees that the war ended and they would not be attacked again. Trump could not deliver that because of Netanyahu says, Screw you are my own country. We're not in charge. any more than Europe is really in charge of Ukraine. Zulinski will not, I mean, his latest attacks on Russian energy after Trump lifts sanctions shows. He doesn't give his shit about the world.

This is what I want. Netanyahu's the same. They're two psychopaths. You know, after the Cornerstone Forum, I was having conversation with a few different people and they were wondering, you know, what to do. And, um, normally, you know, earlier iterations of the cornerstone form, I used to ask that a lot. But I found with talking to people such as yourself or others, they broke it down almost the same, albeit this is in my words, that when the giants are fighting, don't get stepped on. And then I'd ask, well, what does that mean? It goes, well, take care of

your family in your house, talk to your neighbors, build a community, and then identify your pinch points, your spots that you're exposed. And for every family, for wherever you live, are very different. If you're in a city versus, you know, you're on a farm, if you're in Canada versus you're sitting in Ireland or New Zealand, etc. Would you agree with that overall synopsis or summary of what what you would tell people as it continues to get worse? Yeah. I mean, realize the government's not there for. you. Okay.

They are always going to act in their own self-interest. So I really think you should have a couple years worth of food. I don't see this geopolitical stuff peaking until at least 27. And it can extend even into 2028. There are usually shortages in any war when it comes to food. They had World War II. you had, you know, victory gardens. This one gets a bit worse because 30% of the fertilizer goes through the Straits of Hormuz.

Without diesel, you can't, you shut down the shipping fleets, you shut down the farmers and their tractors. So it ripples through a lot of things. And Netanyahu, honestly, I've just done a report. And I've gone through all the biblical prophecies that he seems to be actually following. And one of them, you know, Bays, Zachariah even says that the entire world will be against Israel. Everybody.

You know, and I can at least see that, that support for Israel in the United States has declined dramatically. And maybe he's trying to fulfill that prophecy, and that's why he doesn't give a shit. I don't know. You know, as I said at your conference, if we assume these prophecies are correct, can they be fulfilled if you deliberately try to make them happen? Or are they just supposed to happen? Who knows? You know, it's, I don't really know the answer to that.

But it's a question that people do ask. You know, can you actually deliberately do this? Go in and blow up the dome of the rock, you know, to make the third temple. I mean, who knows? I don't know. Well, I was just reading Matthew, I believe, if memory serves me, correct. And forgive me, I'm going to have somebody text me the actual scripture, and that's cool, fire her away.

It was talking about Judas, and he sold, you know, he betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. And then he felt guilt over it, and he gave it back. And then the Sadducees or one of the groups went and bought a field, and that was to fulfill prophecy. I read that now standing here, Martin, and I go, so they buy the field because they knew it would fulfill prophecy, or was that something else, right? It's weird to read it thousands of years later and go, did they actually do that fulfilled prophecy or in the sense that you're talking about it? Because I've wondered the same thing. I don't fully know, obviously living it here and now if you can artificially invoke prophecy. I have zero clue. I have, I, I don't fully know, obviously living it here and now if you can artificially invoke prophecy. I have zero clue. I, I, I, I, I, I, I don't fully know. I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I I have zero clue, Martin. I don't think anybody has the answer to that. I did hear that before the 1700s, they believed you could not deliberately.

And then others were saying, well, maybe we can. I mean, you know, post-17. I don't really know. I'm not a biblical scholar, so I'm not really sure what. Well, if somebody knows a biblical scholar, now's your chance to fire me off a text. One more question before I let you out of here. I'd read a post.

Oh, I can't remember if it was, well, I was in the last couple days. Not that that matters, the time frame. But, you know, you mentioned 30% of fertilizer comes through the straight. And there's a whole bunch of other things that come through the straight, you know, and they're large percentages of the world's resources, essentially. And the post had said, or positioned it, that it was like getting it from a grocery store or a dealer that when one cannot deliver, you just switch your order to somebody else. And they were pointing to the United States having a lot of these different resources.

Do you give that any credit, that thought process, that if you're running out of oil and gas, well, you just switch over to the United States and it can fulfill deliveries of what you need? I don't think it was intentional. I know that geopolitical, some guys will basically say, okay, fine, we'll give you some oil in return for. But the U.S. still has to import 3%. So it's not that we have, you know, 25% excess. So, I mean, a lot of these, you know, people try to connect for conspiracy theories, et cetera, you know, it's, you know, I don't, being behind the curtain all these years, I just don't see them as figuring that out. If they really were that smart, they would never have called me in, you know, day one. So it's not as simple as just switching over to the United States.

And oh, wait, we got 50% we can just give you because that takes away from what the United States needs. Exactly. But what that will, you know, look, doing what they've done in the Strait of Harmoos, sending oil prices up, hurts Trump. It hurts the Republicans for the elections. So this is not something that. was for a benefit. They didn't even understand that, I mean, I am shocked that in that meeting, nobody even came up and said, Iran's going to use this trait. I mean, I would, I'm dumbfounded that nobody even brought that up. It's just, if I'm there in Iran and you're, you know,

you're the giant coming to step on me. I'm going to do every damn thing I can. Martin, we always appreciate you having on the show and giving us some of your insight. Well, I look forward to the next time. I'll say this is in the next time, I'm sure there won't be anything not to talk about. I feel like every day that goes by, something new happens. I was jotting it out this morning. I'm like, you know, I told Martin before we started, folks, where do you want to start, right? Like, I mean, you're watching all these things go on in all parts of the world. And if one thing is for certain, the next time me and Martin talk, I'm sure I'm going to

have a similar list. And Les Martin goes, oh, by the way, it's going to calm down. Everything looks like it's going rosy. But that's not what I hear coming out of Martin's mouth. No, it's, look, the computer in forecasting that war would take place. It said we're in heading into World War III. but it also said this is not going to be like World War one or two. It's not us against a single adversary.

This is wars all over the planet. So you're seeing Thailand versus Cambodia, Israel, you know, Iraq, I mean, Iran, you got China going Taiwan, you know, it's North Korea versus this. It's everywhere. it's not a single entity like Germany coming after this. It'd be nice if it was that simple, but it's not. It's just not. So you're saying buckle up.

Yeah. It's coming from every which angle. I remember in COVID, I tried to get a new refrigerator. I couldn't get it. They said because the chips come from Thailand. So, I mean, it took months to even get one because they got to wait for the chips and chips to be able to move. You're talking about impacts on things far beyond what is just in the headlines. And that's why I said with the cables and the food.

It's just a mess, a complete mess. And, I mean, it's just a long list of. things that you're going to go, oh shit, that too? So if you go back to my earlier statement when the Giants are fighting, take care of your family, talk to your neighbors, build your community, and really identify if you got any points where you're like, well, I can, you know, you mentioned two years of food. You know, for some, maybe that's a concern. Maybe they have that covered.

Maybe there's other things in your life. You should be identifying sooner than later so that it doesn't become a problem for you while this goes on. Right. I think it's actually, I think the lesson of Joseph advising the pharaoh is a cyclical forecast. There'll be seven years of drought and seven years of plenty. Okay.

Prepare during the plenty for the drought. It's always a cycle. All right. And that's basically the advice. I had a, this was early on in my podcast and career. I was doing legacy interviews. I was doing interviews of people, my elders, I guess. And I had a farmer tell me in the good times you prepare for the bad.

And that's the cycle. Farmers have always known that there are cycles. It's the academics to think that they can. smooth everything out and eliminate them. And that's more... It doesn't work that way. It doesn't work. It's far more complicated.

Thanks for hopping on and doing this. Well, thank you for inviting me. Take care of up there. We will try, Martin. We will try. You stay safe down south. I will. I'm in Florida.

I'm ready to build a wall to stop the rest of the country from coming here. We're getting overcrowded.