The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - So Much For A Quick Win Against Iran

Episode Date: March 16, 2026

Donald Trump keeps saying the US and Israel are ahead of schedule in their war against Iran. Do they have the strategy? So far that seems in doubt. Dr. Janice Stein from the Munk School at U of T has her take on where things stand during her regular Monday segment on The Bridge. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. You're just moments away from the latest episode of The Bridge. We're into the third week of the Iran War. Lots of questions. And we'll put most of them to Janice Stein coming right up. And hello there. Welcome to another week. Welcome to Monday.

Peter Mansprich here with the Bridge. And as always on Mondays, Dr. Janice Stein from the Munk School, the University of Toronto. We'll be joining us as we enter week three. of the war in Iraq. And lots of questions, lots of contradictions. So we'll get to that in a couple of moments. But a few things first.

Do you watch the Oscars last night? I don't know. You know, I've been watching the Oscars since I was a kid. Since Bob Hope was hosting. So I've seen a lot of Oscars over the years. And I'm not sure. I've got to tell you, I'm not sure why I keep watching. You know, surely I've got better things to do with three hours of my time.

But, you know, there were a few lines that were kind of funny. There were lots of shots at Donald Trump, and you know he must have been sitting there watching, because that's the kind of guy he is. And taking notes. Taking notes on people. And screaming and yelling at his office and throwing things at the wall. But hey, that's Donald Trump. There were, I'm not sure, I don't think there were any real surprises in the way the awards were handed out.

There were some great outfits. Well, it was the Oscars. They took a big hit last year in terms of audience. Not sure what will happen, have happened this year. We'll find out probably later today or tomorrow. Anyway, another year, another Oscars, and we move on. we move on with the real news which continues to be two things

affordability and a war so we'll ask questions of Janice Stein in a moment the other thing to remind you of is this is Monday that means Thursday is your turn and the question of the week we're going to return

to what we passed over last week to get to war talk from you but two weeks ago we did our show on how you felt about the relationship between Canada and the U.S. Would it ever return to the way it used to be? And you had a lot of answers and we only got to a little more than half of the ones you'd sent in. So I do want to honor those who also sent in responses to that question. And after going through the editing process,

we determine that which ones end up on air. And there's room for a few more. So I say that to encourage you, if you have a strong feeling, and if you didn't write last time, then please send along your feelings to that question. Can the Canada-U.S. relationship ever returned to the way it used to be? Your thoughts on that?

You send them to the Mansbridge podcast at gmail.com. You keep it under 75 words. Right? You include your name and the location you're writing from. And you have your answers in before 6 p.m. Eastern time on Wednesday. All right? So if you didn't send in an answer last time, please go ahead and send one in now.

because there's room for some more. So we'll look forward to receiving those. Okay, let's get to the reason we do the bridge on Mondays. We do it because we are lucky enough to have Dr. Janice Stein with us on Mondays. And right now is a critical time to hear her thoughts, her analysis, of what she sees going on in this war between the U.S. and Israel against Iran. So here's Dr. Stein's comments for this week. So Janice, whenever Donald Trump says anything about this war, he says,

we're ahead of schedule. Should we buy that? No, we shouldn't. you know, the military, I'm sure, Dan Kane is a really professional general, and I'm sure there was an operational schedule for taking out missile launchers, for taking out missiles. And the third big element here, the factories that make the missiles, missile production, which is what they've been concentrated.

So you put notional deadlines around that, Peter. But, you know, the famous race, no war survives. The plan never survives beyond the first day or two of the war. I don't think people had a really accurate idea of the number of missiles. So far from what a missile launcher, so far from what's been released, over 400 have been destroyed. That was not a number. That was available before the war. much lower. Now, maybe the military

had much better information wasn't releasing. So I think it's much more consistent with Donald Trump. He wants a positive message out there, how well this is going. I don't think it's equivalent

to hearing chain himself. So even this is going according to schedule, which he really hasn't said. I'd discount Pete Higgs to something right too here. These are not the most professional reapers we've ever had. Well, I mean, listen, there's no doubt they have the most muscle. They have muscle well beyond what Iran has.

But you wonder if they have the right strategy for that. Yeah, and she, that's an entirely different question. You know, if I look at this, what am I watching just on the tactical level? how many missile launches Iran is able to launch and do see a significant reduction in the number of missiles, not only from the first day or two of this war, but if you compare it to June of last year, when the last round of the war, the so-called 12-day war, which was in October, there were been three rounds, much less. So, you know, clearly they could be conserving, but if they're this conservative, it means that their infrastructure is really being hit.

The bigger question is, okay, when that infrastructure is diminished, does Ron still have a capacity really to do two things? Because the goal is to end the war on your terms. right, that's what strategy is. So if Iran can disrupt shipping, Google, well,

that's non-satisfactory end to the war from the perspective of the U.S. administration. And secondly, if Iran can fire drones and groans with considerable capacity to disrupt,

that could prolong the war, and it has thousands of these drones, Shahed drones. It, you know, we're on pioneer these drones and supplied Russia for a long time. So when you take all that apart, I think saying we have a strategy, not clear to me what it is and not clear to many others and focusing only on ballistic missiles and ballistic missile launchers and ballistic missile production, that's part of the story and it's important, but it's not the whole story here. You know, on the first weekend of this war within, you know, hours, you brought up the interceptor question. Yeah.

The issue being that there's only so many interceptors that the Israelis and the Americans have, and they're incredibly expensive, and you can't mass produce them. They've used a lot of interceptors so far. Now, both Israel and the United States say they're not worried about interceptors. they've got lots of them. But when you look at the way this war is being reported, not just from the Iranian side, but from the other side as well,

the issue of interceptors does come up and that they're running out of interceptors. Yes. So let's divide the interceptors, okay? There are two that the United States makes, and it makes very small numbers of these, Peter, with Patriot and so. And, you know, Zelensky is the one who has talked most openly in the last four years of hours.

So, but how he would give eyes, eyes teeth to get hold of the Patriot missiles that were fired by Israel and the Gulf states to intercept Iranian missiles. He's been asking for a year, and the answer to this come back is we don't have enough. Now, they fired a lot. even more important for the ballistic missiles that travel longer range at a higher altitude are what is called the FAD missiles, higher altitude missiles. That's where the HAA comes from, theater higher altitude missiles. They're very expensive to produce 30 million. The numbers vary 30 to $40 million sometimes for one missile.

you know, interceptor against the missile that may cost a million or two for Iran to manufacture. So that's asymmetry. But if there's some truth to the fact that the missile launchers have been destroyed or most, that the missile production capacity inside Iran has been destroyed, the factories making these missiles, And by the way, China supplied some of the fuel that is necessary to make those missiles. If that's truthful, you don't need those very expensive, sophisticated ones. Or at least Israel doesn't.

The Gulf states do, but Israel doesn't. Israel makes its own interceptors at lower range that, you know, David Sling, the arrow missile. Those are manufactured inside Israel. and those factories are working around the clock. So think about this is a hierarchy. The most sophisticated missile launchers and missiles against the most expensive interceptors than only the U.S. can provide

as you go down to the drones, Israel has capacity to manufacture. How do you determine what and who to believe these days? Now, whether it's about interceptors or missiles or drones or the Strait of Hormuz, which we'll get to in a moment, how do you decide who to believe? Or do you believe anyone at this point when you're in the middle of a war? So I don't believe what I read from or hear from any official spokesperson, right? So then you have to go.

First of all, it has to make some intuitive sense, if this is possible. when you see this precipitous decline, Peter, in the number of missiles that Iran is firing, we're now at the beginning of the third weekend, it's 10% of what they fired before. Okay, that tells me something is happening here, right? So I look for the evidence that is independent of what, you know, states are saying, what Israel is saying, but what Iran is saying. You just can't believe it. And you can't believe some of the social media that you read

because there are defaic videos all over the place on this one. You know, they're so pervasive that they show you buildings being blown up after a missile strike. They're fakes. So they are. So you go to some of the best news sources that, you know, that you're going to find. I actually believe that the deeper we go into artificial intelligence and social media,

the more important journalism is that it's fact-check. Because where are you going to go? You know that a decent newspaper is going to check. He's going to go to three or four sources. You do it all the time, which is if you don't do that, you're going to be wrong. And it's getting harder and harder.

Yes. You know, I mean, the technology is so advanced. Yeah. And the deep fake stuff, in some cases, is so good. Yeah. The journalistic organizations, whether it's the BBC or the New York Times or the CBC, whomever it may be, it's harder and harder to determine this stuff. And they each have their own segments of their newsrooms that are just, just doing that.

That's right. You know, this proposals, you know, all this stuff. proposals for watermarks. I mean, but we're going to be driven to some form of authentication. We really are. Because otherwise,

nobody will have any grounds for believing anything. You know, in the last two days, I've heard, most of us, Khomeini is dead. How do they know that? Because there's been

no audio recording release by Iran. And a video recording, of course, not because you might be able to see where he is by the background. Well, even that's a stretch for me, frankly, or some of him, you know, issue. Yeah, and that didn't enable anybody to geolocate him. But why no audio recording?

Well, he must have been mortally wounded. And so the channels get flooded with he's dead. Well, there's no evidence. There's absolutely no evidence, right, as to whether he's alive or dead. No one knows except the people who are surrounding him and know, frankly, and they're not saying it if they said we wouldn't believe. You know, it seems to me a time, I mean, listen, you can understand why there's an argument

that he's dead because they totally destroyed this place with, you know, upwards of 40 leaders of the Ayatollah's inner circle. But then again, if he's a little, live. Why would you stand up and say anything that could in any way indicate where you are? Yeah, but you know how you do this. There's an audio recording, right? Now, would that persuade you? No, because you could say that's a deep fake of his voice. But more mysterious is why there is no audio recording. Well, you know, the CIA and, you know, all the people who study these things and MI6 and all that would take that audio recording and break it down, you know, a millionth of a second at a time and listen to what was in the background and trying to determine where it was and all this. I mean, you know, I can see the argument, just as I can see the argument that he's dead, I can see the argument that if he's, if he's,

alive. Don't say anything. Don't secure head up. Don't do a thing. Because the next thing, there'll be a missile coming down your chimney. Yeah. You know, on the audio recording, I think it's harder. Oh, yeah.

It's definitely harder. Yeah. Given the flood of disinformation, misinformation around this issue that's out there on social media, taking calculated risk, you know, his statement was read. by a spokesperson, that's all. So that's what fueled all this, right?

The fact that there was no audio recording. Frankly, I have no idea whether he's alive or not. And more to the point, I'm not sure it matters, all that much because I think, in a sense, you know, we had regime change already, but people don't want to acknowledge it. It's a Republican, it's a revolutionary guards who now control the regime. He's much less influential than his father.

He's not going to stand up to them. So what we probably have now is exactly what the United States and Israel did not want when they started this. Because the senior guy, Ali Kham, he was a break on the revolutionary guards. He's probably not even if he has a lot. You know, there's nobody, Peter, in the kind of expert community on Iran, who thinks that even if he is alive, he's more than a transitional figure. So if he's dead, who's running the place? Is it these fellows we see occasionally in military uniforms standing up there

looking like pretty mean-looking dudes? Yes. Is that who'd be running the place? Well, I mean, I think we said when we talked last week that I said to that I was really struck by whom they did not attack, right? Which is so that's again, you'll look at the names of the institutions. So they attacked the Revolution Guard headquarters. They attacked the beseech, which are, you know, spread out now all across the island. and they're the ones who are proud enforcers.

They're the ones who shoot at civilians who find their industry. Kevin taught much of the Iranian military, which is the regular army. And the other group, they attacked the minister of defense. They killed them in that initial strides. But they haven't attacked the Ministry of Partner Affairs. And that's where we're getting most of the statements from the region. from. So that's, you know, if you're, if you're reading the tea leaves, you're saying, okay, it looks like they're leading those two alone, relatively speaking, so that there's a transitional

regime that, first of all, can make decisions because the worst is that the regime employs, and there's no capacity to make decisions, and there's a decentralized capacity to fire across you know, 20 plus provinces, then you're really in deep trouble. And some people to talk to. And I expect it's around the foreign ministry. Let's flip the script. Who's really running things in Washington? Who's got the year of this president?

Who's the last person to talk to him as he goes out in front of the microphone or as he sits at his, you know, iPhone? or whatever he does his social media posts on. Who's that? What do we know? What do we know, right? There's five or six. There's Susie Wiles.

You can't underestimate Susie Wiles. She's the chief of staff. He's chief of staff who brought some order to his life for that campaign, presidential campaign. It was probably instrumental in getting elected. She's lost it longer. than any chief of staff he's ever had in his life.

She's got a good personal relationship with him. She's orderly. She tries to put some order in the briefings. She's probably likely to be the last person before he walks out to talk to me.

But that's the organized media briefing. Have you ever seen a president? Do a press conference every single day, Peter? and talked to reporters every single day. And phoning Sunday morning hosts, talking to them. Yeah, and reporters have a cell phone number and they call and he answers his cell phone. So at 2 in the morning.

And he gets the spin he wants out of that. You know, I mean, NBC all week I was talking about the fact that he said to Kirsten, Welker, the meet the press host. said, you know, they want a ceasefire. Yeah. Which they, of course, said, that's crazy. They do not. They don't.

No. But again, so, you know, who does he talk to? Well, Lindsay Graham was outside of Pete Higgs and Marco Rubio. And he clearly talks to him. And he talks to his press spokesperson because she's also lasted, Carolyn Levin. She's also lasted a very, very, very long time. because she did anything more aggressive than he is, right,

and pushing back against reporters. So you have to talk to those. But that doesn't include all those calls he's making late at night and early in the morning. So who talks one? Lindsay Graham, for sure. Senator Graham, who really wanted this war. There's no question about the house. Some of the Tech Brothers, they talk to him.

Now, what they know about this is an open question, but they talk to him. His son-in-law, his son-in-law, for sure, Jared Kushner, for sure, Steve Wyckloff, for sure. I think he talks as well to the president of Egypt because there was a flurry of activity over the last 48 hours where Turkey, Oman, and Egypt put a, tried to, get some momentum behind the ceasefire and they approached him and they approached Iran and that's where you got the story that Iran wants the ceasefire he said no no I don't want it I'm not ready

to work but they want it and the Iranian he said no no we don't want it we're not to talk to them unless they pay us reparations for all the damage that's been done so he's clearly talking to the Almanis and the Egyptians I'd be stunned that he's not talking to Nathaniel and we know he talked to Nathaniel because he hated that strike on the oil refineries,

which also tells you a lot here. It tells you, it tells me, that he has plants for Iran's oil in the same way as he has plants for Venezuela's oil and does not want to see it destroy. He has to be talking to General Kane because they launched.

And here you might argue that was the closest thing to a strategic strike, was the strike they launched against Carver Island in the Straits of Hormuz. And why was that? Because they destroyed every bit of military infrastructure on that island. But it is the biggest shipping zone to Iranians for their own oil. They left that alone. Yeah, tell me about, you know, there's been so much over the last couple of days about the Straits of Wormuz.

tell me i mean this has got to be the least surprising thing to be happening in this war like anybody who'd followed anything in that area would say oh well that's going to come down the straight or more moves um what do you make of where we are on that and what do you make of his trump's attempt to say we need a coalition of countries i you know i want everybody to join me in this and you know when he's saying that he's talking i i assume other than you know, obviously some of the Gulf states, but Britain, France, Germany, Canada. Yes. It's not like we haven't been there before.

We've been there a lot. Yes. And there's a lot of experience, frankly. Sure. You know, that was, again, one of these late-night two social posts, which probably astounded everybody out. You know, I was saying the most mature person of this whole group, and it's not a high bar is my worldview.

And I would imagine you're quite absolutely flat-footed when you read that because there are no volunteers to do this, and why not? Again, to look at the tactics. Then here's Dan Cain again, right? Gone in early enough to take out most of the capacity of a wrong, on to mine the straits, which is a considerable achievement. Given, frankly, I haven't seen any evidence that they really prepared for it. Because if they really had prepared for it,

they would have gone after that mining capacity in the first couple of days. They didn't do that, which again tells me they were not thinking they would face an initial of the magnitude. This is the biggest energy shock ever. That would be like to the globally coin. Biggest ever says the eye. And here's a neutral spokesperson, the International Energy Association says back.

They could have preempted that, frankly. But they didn't. So they didn't really take it seriously. Why is it still a big issue? Because it's a narrow streak. You know, you have Iran on one. side and the Gulf states in Iraq at the top and the Gulf states on the other side. Iran has missile batteries in the banks, buried in the banks of the Strait of Pormuz.

So when a tanker comes through, it can fire on those. I would expect probably the next thing that's going to happen here because this is now, it's a game of chicken. who believes first on this? It's a really dangerous one. But the next thing I expect is that there will be attacks against the Iranian missile placements to the extent they're fixed. I'm of them are mobile.

So a tanker starts down. Yeah, pull out a mobile missile launcher. You have fire the missile or fire drones. And that's the end of the tanker. That's not a good story for what? In London, it sure isn't. You know, when you look at a map, when you look at a map of the Persian Gulf

and the Arabian Sea and how the Strait of Ormuzus joins the two of them, you look at that map and you go, it's been, whatever, it's been 50 years that we've been concerned about how oil is going to move through that passage, that they never built a canal, you know, closer to the, you know, to the Arab States.

on the other side. Right, right. That's what you needed to do, frankly. And, you know, the Egyptians would have been very happy to participate in that. But they didn't. They really did. Because the last time, you know what? So, again, a little bit of history here.

Peter, the last real oil shock of this kind was during the 1973 war between Israel and Egypt. The Arab countries, OPEC launched a blockade. What's really important here is it took till 1985, well, years for oil prices to come down. Yeah. And when the Trump people keep talking about how this is all, you know, this is going to be over in another week or two, and then it'll take a week or two after that for the prices to come down.

That's not the way the system works. That's not the way this is. You know, it's interesting because just before this started, I happen to be speaking to a group of energy economists who work for big private sector institutions. And I asked what I thought. I said there's going to be war. Oh, well, it'll be 10 days. The market's price.

I said, no, I don't think so. I think when you're in this part of the world and 20% of the oil still goes through very narrow straits. Oh, no, no, no, no, that's not going to happen. And, you know, some said afterwards, none of those big financial institutions, Peter, have traced in a war that would go on for three weeks, four weeks, five weeks, and would disrupt international energies. They just thought that was behind them.

Well, that's what they got now. Yeah, for sure. Now, here's the other good story. don't forget because there's a good story. What happened after 1973? That's what gave us the first real push for renewables. That's where it all started. That's what drove that sector for 20, 30 years.

And I think, not to be cynical, but I think that energy security is a much more powerful driver. of renewables, of solar, of wind, of EVs, and then climate, sadly. And energy security is right back now front and center on the international agenda. It's the biggest impact of this war, for sure. Well, we know how Trump feels about renewables.

Yeah, but, you know, Canada. Yeah. Canada is blessed with an incredible energy sector and the capacity to really fill a gap on LNG exports. So, you know, advantage is not distributed evenly, and this happens to be for Canada, an area of real strength. Okay. We're going to take our break, and we'll be right back after this.

And welcome back. You're listening to The Bridge for this Monday. That means Dr. Janice Stein from the Monk School, the University of Toronto. You're listening on Series X-M. Channel 167, Canada Talks are on your favorite podcast platform. I'm glad to have you with us wherever you are joining us from. Okay, here's the next topic. And, you know, I should have realized this beforehand

that this could be a really, really big issue, but I didn't. And I've been reading as much as I can on the weekend, but I know you're going to help me and help our audience with this. The issue is desalination. Getting the, basically getting the salt out of the water. The salt. Yeah. Getting the salt out of sea water.

These are all countries that are on the ocean, around seas everywhere. Yeah. Right? All the countries that surround the Gulf. Yeah. Some not even directly on it. Like Jordan, I think like 95% of the water in Jordan has to be disseminated for drinking water. Yeah.

And, you know, without those. plants, Jordan would be out of water in three days. Yeah. Now they're not alone. Kuwait is like that. There's a number of countries. Kuwait is the most dependent. It's 90 to 100% of its drinking water comes from desalconization.

I mean, it's so acute dependence. And, you know, Peter, this has been water. In some ways, actually water is the more strategic resource in this part of the world. Yeah. Their oil is important to the rest of the world, but for them, water is the most strategic resource. Iran itself has been experiencing the last 18 months a growing water crisis. There was water, there was water rationing in Tehran because they've not invested in their water infrastructure. And so even before this war started, there were achake shortages of water.

in the city of Tehran. That's an incredible vulnerability. All in Iran for every Gulf state or Israel or Jordan, literally every country in the world is vulnerable here. Well, the reason that plays into this story is, I appreciate what you're saying about Iran and its water shortages, but Iran's in a lot better shape than the other countries we just mentioned. And the fear here is that Iran,

Iran, if it gets more and more desperate for targeting, is going to target desalination plants. I think they already targeted one. Yeah. Damage was minor. But nevertheless, these things are relatively easy targets. They're all right on the shoreline. They're all within range. So all the Gulf states, not Israel and Jordan, but all the Gulf states are within range of Iranian Shiharan.

had drones. You don't need very sophisticated policy. Now, what have they done, Peter? Many of these plants, you know, Saudi Arabia has the largest in the world, by the way. And he has four because, you know, without water, there is no Saudi Arabia, frankly. There really isn't. You think about data centers, well. We're worried about water in Canada to full of.

state or senators. Just imagine how important this is to the Saudi economy. They have surrounded their big plants with anti-missile defenses. That's why the damage was not that bad in the first strike that around

launched. It was in the Emirates. They're defended. Now, anything can get through, as we know, these defenses are permeable. But the Gulf states, did anticipate that and they have put

anti-aircraft missiles all around and the other thing they're doing and that was a big story this weekend is partly because of these desalurization plans who shows up what a mere Zelansky I mean after

you know what Trump did tell him I just can't help myself, but stop for a second over that. The Ukrainian technology is the best in the world at dealing with Shahed drones. Well, because Iran supplied Russia. You know, Ukraine has had 18 months to improve its technology to knock Shahed drones out as they come in. And we have a minute just for digression. Sure.

Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, who then became very interested in intelligence. I can do an intelligence and autonomous weapons. Went to Ukraine 18 months ago, to the front lines. And spent time with the units in the Ukrainian army. that had to deal with these shahed drones and what they were innovating in the field cannot start a yet another company that makes drones

that intercept shahed drones. Those he began to export them before the sports. Here we are again with the former CEO of Google making the most valuable, inexpensive drones that cannot shahed drones. out, they're going to the Gulf and the Ukrainians are sending technical advisors.

Isn't that amazing? Yeah. It is amazing. Some guy says Wayne Gretzky once said one of the greatest comments I've ever heard by any military strategist that's right up there with

closet is Wayne Gretzky who says you don't skate to where the puck is. You skate to where the puck is going. Right. It was actually Walter Gretzky who said that to his...

I think it was Walter who said that to his son. Oh, David had better story. Yeah. You know, Walter was the... Walter was a pretty smart guy and noted about that. Okay, well, so that's where we are at.

It's not necessarily a war on oil. It's a war on water. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, water is not just... You don't just need to... to stay alive yourself. You needed to grow food. Everything.

Everything. And, you know, one of the things that we didn't talk about with these plants, which is a real vulnerability, they run on electricity. They went on electricity. Right. Okay. If you don't have access to a secure supply of electricity, these plants are dead. and can really, it can be weeks and weeks and weeks to restart them.

So that's another area of vulnerability, which is the electricity grits. So where are we? We are, I don't think, or near the end, whatever that means yet. I think for the Gulf states, they want to stop yesterday. and would do anything. I think for the Iranians from the response I gave to the Omani's and the Egyptians,

they know this is about survival to them. Their goal is just to survive to outlast the United States. If the United States asks for a ceasefire before they do, they think they won. And I think they will be very reluctant to go to the table

unless, and this is the big unknown here, unless their capacity to export oil, their capacity to export oil, is jeopardized? Because if it is, it could be months and months until it's repaired. Now, yes, it would be terribly destabilizing to the oil market. But you think about Iran the day after the war stops.

Think about the infrastructure and terror. And if there's no sanctions relief, which is conceivable, depending on the way this ends, where will the capital come from? To rebuild, there was already,

the reason those people went into the streets in January was because of inflation, their inability to buy groceries. You think about the damage, the infrastructure, 6,000 bombing rates. We're not seeing any picture. of what's happening in that city.

But their only lifeline to the global market is a capacity to export oil. If that's Shepard O'Hs, that's probably a game shopper for them. Yeah. So it's the highest, you could say this is the highest, high risk, dangerous contest of whales now between the United States

and run in Israel, which, you know, has impact on everybody in the global economy, without exception. Does you have an energy shock of this order? The plush. Okay. We're going to leave it on that note, which is certainly one. They will sit with us for some time.

Okay. We'll talk again in seven days. Thanks, Janice. We will. another amazing conversation with Janice. I was trying to find the right word. You know, fact-filled? Well, it's not really fact-filled

because in so many cases we don't know the facts. But we go to somebody like Janice, and in particular Janice, because she gives us a sense of knowledge about the situation that can draw us to where we think the facts are. So I know some of you don't agree with some of the things you hear on Mondays and you write to me and you challenge us and that's good. You know, I'd like to hear that.

But when we're in a situation like we're in right now, there's so much of it that is unclear that we rely on people like Dr. Stein to help guide us through a difficult situation. Um, okay, that's going to do it, uh, for that part. I do want to let you know that tomorrow, tomorrow is, um, tomorrow's going to be a really interesting show. It's a more butts conversation. You know, we alternate Tuesdays, Moore Butts and Raj Russo. Tomorrow's more butts.

Um, I, you know, we recorded it over the weekend. I think it may well be the best one we've done in a couple of years. It's really good. it's really good. We talk about, we talk about two things. We talk about floor crossings. And we talk about the impact of formers.

In other words, people who used to be in politics and who are trying to affect the way politics is done now. So, you know, the three of us are former, in a sense. I'm a former journalist, anchor, et cetera, et cetera. I'm now a podcaster. and there's a big difference, as I try to explain to everybody. Jerry Butts is a former senior advisor to a prime minister,

and James Moore is a former cabinet minister. So we give you the former's perspective on stuff. And tomorrow we have an interesting discussion about that, whether that helps or hurts the process. Anyway, I think it's a really good discussion. So I encourage you to listen to it or to watch it because it's also on our YouTube channel. Tuesdays and Fridays are on our YouTube channel. So whether it's Raj Russo or Moore Butts or Good Talk with Chantelle and Bruce on Friday,

those are always on YouTube now. With a significant audience, we got about 100,000 views on the Good Talk from just last week. It's, you know, very popular. Anyway, that'll do it for today. Hope you enjoyed it. And hope you're with us tomorrow for the Moore Buds conversation. I included the question of the week earlier in the program. So that's for Thursday's your turn.

All right. That's going to do it for today. I'm Peter Mansperch. Thanks so much for listening. Talk to you again in about 24 hours.