The Bulwark Podcast - Tom Nichols: Trump's Trashy 250 Celebration

Episode Date: June 25, 2026

The POTUS speech to kickoff the "state fair" in honor of America's 250th year was all about how the country is great because of him. Meanwhile, Hegseth is continuing to purge the Pentagon of some of our best warfighters for political and cowardly reasons. Plus, Bill Cassidy caved to Trump yet again, another son-in-law is following in Jared's footsteps and angling to get in on the family's hustle, some love for George Washington, and the administration's levels of corruption are so epic it's like Watergate every day. Tom Nichols joins Tim Miller.show notes Tom on making the 250th "small" Tom on the capitulation to Iran Netflix's "The American Experiment"

Welcome to the Bullwark podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome back to the show for the 37th time, the most decorated guest in the history of the Bullwark podcast. He was discussing as a large prostate with me in the Green Room with the staff writer at the Atlantic and Professor and Narratus at the U.S. Naval War College. It's Tom Nichols. How are you doing, sir? Where's my 37 timers jacket? I know. They're 50. I feel like at 50, we've got to give you a watch or something. All right. And then I get this. I was just curious the other day. I was like, who's been on the most? And I put in some names.

You've got it. You're the leader of the clubhouse. I am honored. And I also, as I say with genuinely, that I always love doing this because it's fun, because we always have a good time. Well, we're going to have some fun. I have for you. And it'll be good the whole time. But I have the final topic category on my outline is silly stuff.

So we've got plenty of, and there's plenty of that. And I guess the first topic is silly stuff too. So that's just the nature of where we are in our idiocracy. The Great American State Fair. You stayed up for this last night. because you're a glutton for punishment. And Jeffrey Goldberg has you and like, as you in some rains and he's got a whip.

He's kind of like, yes, Nichols, you're staying up for the Great American State Fair speech. And so you did. I think it was more like, yeah, I'm going to need you to be staying up. That'd be great. Yeah. Because you have a cover sheet on your draft.

Yeah, if you could just. file that. That'd be great. No, I mean, I'm kind of the designated night owl for a lot of stuff because I am a night owl. And I said, sure, I'm happy to do it. And also, you know, I have this long history. I kind of pride myself on being a Trump watcher. You know this. I used to live tweet all of his press conferences. So I stayed up and watched it. And it was, I mean, it was trashy. The whole business was trashy. And I know that sounds, oh, that's snooty and elitist, but no, it was, it was, it was, it was just trashy. And his speech was small. That's what I wrote about last night. He took, he took this thing that could have been grandiose, you know. I started with a quote from George

Washington. Actually, it wasn't a quote. It was, it was from George Washington's last will in testament. And I think it's really important as the fourth approaches for people to know this, that George Washington in his last, he said, I, George Washington, and he didn't say, you know, father of our country, great guy. He said, a citizen of the United States and lately president of the same. For him, that was the most important thing, to be a citizen, you know, and he understood, like, that we were all sharers in this great adventure, this great experiment. And Trump just doesn't understand any of that. He made it all about me, me, me, and I got no tax on tips. And everybody was laughing at us two years ago and now we're hot.

And I totally trashed the Iranians, even though that yesterday, the Iranians told us to go suck an egg about nuclear inspections. I'm going to get the vandals who hurt the reflecting pool. I mean, it just went on and on, Tim. As little as I think of Stephen Miller, I don't want to tag him with this speech if it wasn't him, because whoever wrote this, it was a real achievement in crap. But, you know, the few times that Trump tried to be elevated or that he tried to, you know, be presidential, he said things like from the storied alleys of Boston to the streets of Philadelphia. Okay, first of all, anybody who's lived in Boston, there's no such thing as these storied alleys of Boston.

They have some stories and we won't tell them. Yeah. But to the streets of Philadelphia. I'm sorry, wasn't that a Bruce Springsteen song about a movie about a guy with AIDS? You know, I mean, it just went on and skyscrapers and railroads and Normandy and Saratoga. But then he would go right back to the really petty, small, you know, look at me, look what I did. And I'll finish with one serious comment, which is that it shows that Trump and his people, they don't understand the difference between patriotism. and nationalism, that patriotism is love of one's country for itself, for what it is, for its eternal characteristics. Nationalism is my tribe is better than all other tribes. And that's the only

way Trump can conceive of this. He kept saying, we're better than everybody else. We're the hottest. We're the biggest. We're the best. He can't just say America is worth our loyalty and our love because of the great thing that it is that makes you so proud to simply say I'm a citizen of the United States the way George Washington did. I'm a sucker for that. I'll be cloying for a second. One of the first things after I finished being a political hack and started doing journalism and writing, one of the first things I wrote about, I wish I'm going from memory now, but it was about how there's like a disagreement between Washington and Adams. Adams wanted him to be called something like his excellency or something ridiculous.

I remember that, but it was something like his, it started with His Highness, you know, the protector of the American people and their rights, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Correct. And Washington's like, no, Mr. President. Mr. President will be fine. And yeah, and there is something really moving about that, about what the country is supposed to be

and what we should be aspiring to and what the office is supposed to be. That, I mean, it goes without saying our president has literally no respect for interest in or the opposite. It's kind of surprising to me that he hasn't tried to rename it, frankly. That might, I hate to give him that idea. Yeah, let's not, let's not speak that one into reality. And, you know, just to put in a nice word for Adams, and when Adams was beaten by his worst enemy, who got people to publish stuff about him, like maybe he's a hermaphrodite, you know,

just in case you think our elections were always nasty. In MBS, I also think might be a hermaphrodite. I don't know. I just said something that I've heard. Well, okay, I'm going to, I'm going to leave that one right where it fell. and say, you know, what did he do? He, like all good presidents, he packed up his stuff, and he moved out of the White House, and he went back to his farm and said, okay, I'm done being president. Thank you very much. I'm going to, you know, Trump does not understand it. Trump thinks that America is great because he is great. And he made it great. You know, there's a metaphor that I didn't want to use in the piece, but it's, it's sort of like, it's like marriage. You look at your spouse and

you say, I love this person because of who he or she is, just because this is the only one for me. This is, because this is a wonderful person that I know deeply in love. Trump's like the guy who says, you know, my wife's prettier than all those dogs. Yeah. You know, well, that, that lasts right up until, you know, you put on a few pounds or you get a few wrinkles. It's this very superficial. love of country that says as long as I'm making it great, then it's worth loving. And when it's not, you know, two years ago, did you love your country? And, you know, they're laughing at us. They're a joke.

You know, one thing that patriots really understand is you don't care if they're, that one of other countries think of you. That's, you know, you don't, you don't spend your day, you know, chewing your nails and saying, what did, you know, what does Russia think about us? we'll do a plug for you right now on this point you i guess are making an appearance so you're contributed to a new netflix series called the american experiment honoring the 250 i'm just going to be candid with people i'm a little bit better about it you know you keep getting into all these shows like you're in succession you're in a netflix series honoring the country's 250 my phone's

not ringing i don't really know what it is is it's something about your the way you carry yourself i don't know i got 20 years on you though tim so you know you got to you got time. I guess. Your hair is too dark. You got to get some gray. I don't know. I feel like I could be a, you know, I could bring some wisdom to a documentary about 250 or I could play a bit part and a show. I'm available for bit parts. It's a very cool documentary because you're, you know, it has a lot of, there's a lot of folks like me, right? Like, you know, Lindsay Trevinsky, the head of the George Washington Presidential Library and, you know, Diane Freeman, a professor and, you know, there's professors and authors. But there's also like Ted Cruz. Ugh. Well, but what? Ted Cruz? And then Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris and Mike Pence and Jamie Raskin.

And so they really went another way to say, listen, we are going to have everybody across the space. Even people you hate. And they're all going to be talking about the same thing, which is the greatness of the American experiment. And it works. Look, Ted Cruz says some stuff in this documentary that you lean back and you go, oh, yeah. I remember when Ted Cruz wasn't awful. You're going a little off Hollywood on me. You know, Mike Pence, of all people, you know, I mean, Mike Pence says these very kind of measured and thoughtful things.

Hillary Clinton does not drive you up the wall. You know, Kamala Harris has the Al Gore. Again, Jamie Raskin. Love our friend of the pod now, Al Gore. So there are all these politicians, you know, as well as a lot of civil rights leaders, you know, talking about the early founding. It's a remarkable group of people, and I was proud to be able to tag along. If anybody's curious, by the way, we shot my scenes, because the sets are gorgeous. We shot my scenes in a house in Boston, in historical landmark, the Prescott House.

And it's, you know, it's only five episodes long, and it's a great thing to start the Fourth of July season with. So thank you for plugging it. But I was just so proud to be part of it. Seems like the spirit is a bit in contrast to the other things that we were hearing last night. At the great American state fair, our Secretary of Transportation took the stage last night. I want to play at two different clips from the same remarks, you might notice a contrast. You might just, you might notice some tension between the arguments that he's making former reality show star Sean Duffy last night. Let's listen.

A big round of applause for our military band in singing. way better than those libtards that canceled on us. So much better. Thank you guys. Brilliant. American spirits there. President Trump will make you famous. Our young people have been lied to.

They've been told that they would be fulfilled with hookup culture or some get-rich-quick scheme or they could find fame and social media and that would fulfill them. But I'll tell you, They found that that's a false promise. That's a lie. And they've sought truth.

And in seeking truth, they have gone to church. They've found the Holy Gospel. They've prayed, and they have found God. I'm finding Jesus right now after that one, man. I actually said at the time, of all the people to deliver this message, the guy who, you know, gets his start on the real world. You know, get rich quick schemes and shortcuts and social media. I'm like, do you people have no sense of self-awareness?

No concept of irony, none? President Trump will make you famous. Didn't you just say that's bad? But also famous and fulfilling. Also famous and fulfilling. Half the country that didn't vote for us, you guys are libtards. But also, a nice thing to do is to find God. And find God.

Go to church so that you're not like those libtards. It's like, it's just. That's a famous passage in the Bible to all the publicans prayer. Dear God, please don't let me be like the libtards. What a deep thing. It's all show. This is what I meant about trashy that, you know, instead of getting up and just saying, it's wonderful to be a citizen in the United States.

And we are blessed, you know, in my younger days, I spent a lot of time going back forth to the old Soviet Union. And I don't mean Russia. I mean, you know, the evil empire. And man, you crossed over a couple of times I went in through Leningrad and a few times in Moscow. The minute you disembarked, man, you held on to that blue passport with love. You just said, you know, I have something everybody in this country wants, and it's one of these. And it's because of this that I can walk freely and go home when I want to and do all these other things.

And, you know, it really meant something. And instead, you get up and say, oh, stupid lid tarts who canceled on us. It's like, yeah, that's what being an American's about is being mad at Martina McBride. With Bride. You know, give me a break. If you want to know what's really worth your time when it comes to losing weight, skip the guesswork and get weight loss by hymns. Hymns offers access to an affordable range of FDA-approved GLP-1 medications that now include the Wagovi pill and Wagovi pen,

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We've changed the name to Department of War. Started one war, lost it. You know, I shouldn't laugh at that, but that, I mean, there is a... It's what happened. It's what happened. Yep. There's some purges, more purges. There's been a bunch of purges happening.

The one this week, your colleague at the Atlantic, broke this story. Pete Egg Seth fired General Chris, C.D. Donahue, widely seen as one of the Army's rising stars. He's expelled from the Pentagon. He's the last man in Afghanistan, literally the last. soldier on the ground in Afghanistan. This is the latest at a long list of purges. And you kind of started with the DEI purges.

If you're black or a woman, you were going to be on the chopping block unless you would pay an homage to Donald Trump. And now, I guess he's trying to get rid of anybody that is, you know, threatening his sense of self. Yeah. Yeah. Somebody, anybody scares him. There was some talk that this actually came from the new chief of staff of the

army. Nobody knows quite, but you know, there's no explanation. And, you know, some of the people that are twisting themselves into into pretzels here, they tried to say, well, hey, nobody complained when Obama fired McChrystal. Well, yeah, because McChrystal gave an interview to Rolling Stone where he crapped all over the commander chief. You know, even McChrystal kind of knew that he stepped on a landmine there. I mean, that happens. You go on, you're going to, you're in a, magazine and you dump on the commander in chief, you're probably not going to have a long career ahead of you. Much love to the late Michael Hastings who wrote that great guy. Yeah, right. That's, yes. I was at the war college at the time and, you know, what was the lesson that we were all discussing?

You know, don't haul off on the commander in chief in front of a reporter if you're a uniformed officer, probably not smart. But no one's explaining this other than, well, you know, he was in Afghanistan. Yes, but he was. wasn't in charge of it. He wasn't the things that he's been accused of by some of the people online. Turns out not to be true. As you said, they're just getting rid of people that make Pete Hegseth and his circle. You're either in Pete's clubhouse or you're not. And I think, you know, guys like Donahue probably intimidate him just by existing. There are a lot of good people we've got serving the military and, you know, the country has survived worse than this. but I think it's kind of an underrated challenge, you know, if we get through this period,

is the degree and the scale of the purges across the various security and military elements of the government is pretty severe. I mean, like we've talked about a bunch on the pot about the FBI. Obviously, DOJ has had a lot of purges happening at the Department of War. It's a little challenging to cover because they are not being transparent about it. you know, the people who have gotten purged. And not every case, but in most cases, don't want to talk about it, right? Because they've got legal challenges to the administration.

And so it's like a little bit hard to wrap your head around it. But when you talk, like when I have Carol Lennig on who like really is deeply reported inside DOJ, I mean, when you talk to people who are, who know these institutions, it's pretty bad, the scale of the purging. And the military, just to add to that, the military, obviously, there's a cultural norm which says, look, if the president and the sect don't want me to be a four star anymore, I don't talk about that because there's

nothing illegal or improper about that. Right. Right. I mean, so I'm not going to do that. I think people getting fired at DOJ and FBI and, you know, ODI and I and places like that, they have court cases because there are, you know, speaking as a former federal employee, they do have rights and protections. They can't, most of them can't just be, you know,

fired with a snap of the fingers. You know, it's funny when you talk about purges, but I think that the problem's going to have to go in the other direction, you know, when these folks finally leave government, if the Democrats have the discipline and the wherewithal, they're going to have to say now, how many of the people that are embedded in the justice system you have to go, right? You know, that there's going to have to be this kind of thorough review of cronyism, of people who were put there by, you know, you. name it Cash Patel or Pete Eggsteth, wherever it was. And it's going to take a long time to

recover from this because the one thing we had, and the Trump people don't want to admit this, but that the system actually worked pretty well as a nonpartisan meritocratic system. Yes, of course it made mistakes. Every personnel system does. There are people have made it to the heads of corporations that are morons who have run companies into the ground. But by and large, you know, the nonpartisan. Sam Lumpin never really did anything. Now he's running the most important company in the world. It's like he had the failed four square competitor. It can happen, you know, but I would say this is the worst politicization of the U.S. military. I mean, I don't want to say since the days when we elected our officers in the Civil War,

but certainly in the modern era, since the emergence of a modern American military, this is the worst attack on civil military relations that I think has ever occurred. And the damage is significant. How did the election of officers work, war professor? Well, because remember, a lot of these were state militias. It was a kind of a patchwork, right? I mean, you know, the 71st New Hampshire volunteers showed up. You know, who's your captain? Jed over there.

Right. You know, by the way, this is one of the things, just to go back to George Washington, Washington really didn't like the militias. When he gets to Cambridge in July of 1775, and he looks around at the New Englanders who are like, right, they bunch of, yeah, that's our captain, you know, Bob's our captain over there. And Washington looks around, of course, Washington is a lifetime British officer, you know, he's very proper guy. And he looks around and he says, these New Englanders are trash. They're ruffians.

They're, I can't, I can't make an army out of this. And a year later, after he fights with them side by side, he says, give me New England men any day. that's where it comes from. I mean, you know, Lincoln was, you know, chosen by the men to lead them, I think, in the, drawing of blank. I think the Blackfoot Wars, I mean, but if my history is wrong here, I apologize. And that changes over time as the United States after the Civil War, you know, becomes a country of a single army, a single Navy. But even that, where, if you see the movie Glory, remember the movie Glory? Yeah. You know, it's like, well, my father spoke to the governor. So I'm going to get command of the 54th Massachusetts because Governor Andrews, blah, blah, blah. You know, that's how it was done. One of the things that's made the American military great is that we overcame that. Right. That we were promoting officers because of talent, not because of family ties or nobility or royalty or titles or whatever.

And now we're going back to it. Now we're appointing people because they make Pete Hegsseff comfortable. The only disappointing thing to me about the manner in which Pete Higgs-Seth has changed how the Department of War is run. You have to say it that way too, right? Department of War. You do. Is that he did not get the flu himself. Because they're scared of vaccines now, because of COVID nonsense, they did not require flu shots for the military.

Do you want to guess what happened? Tom? Do you know, have you heard what happened after they didn't require flu shots this year? Well, Sir Bedavir, I am not wise in your ways of science. I assume that many of them weighed less than a duck and that they were suddenly had small dwarves living in the pits of their stomach. Of course there was an outbreak. Of course they, and you know, look, it's not funny. I mean, flu is a nasty business, even for young, healthy people. There's a reason you get shots for it. But, let's point out the bigger problem that when you get 220 people in a military unit or military community getting sick you've just taken a hit to readiness you have a problem

you have 220 people and their families that are now you know this this is why they get vaccinated in the first place oh I thought it was because fouchy made them do it and it was the woke scientist it was it's for a reason it was the fouchy it was the fouchy it was the Fauci mind trick. Oh, you know. For readiness. These are the vaccines you're looking for. That makes sense.

The real infuriating part of this. Pete Hegseth knows this. Pete Hegseth is a grown man who went to Princeton University. This was sucking up to the president, to MAGA world. This is part of, look, I'm as crazy as all of you. Don't fire me. Look at what a brave thing I'm going to do. And look at all the cool feedback I'm going to get online.

And from the podcasters and the insubsters and the influencers that I canceled this jab, this, this poisonous vaccine. Well, okay, then a couple hundred people get sick. Next thing you know, very quietly, we're all going to start getting the vaccine again. And it only took one outbreak. Somebody died. I don't want to say, I'm not a doctor. I don't know if they died from something else or because they got the flu. But we know that well over 200 people got sick. So we ran a science experiment on a bunch of volunteers. on a bunch of Air Force volunteers. This sounds like a lot of hooey-fooey from a professor,

kind of this you and your expertise. I don't know. I mean, it could have been random, right? Or maybe Bill Gates put the virus in the water at the Air Force base in order to create this narrative. To try to turn them all into gay frogs. Have you thought about that? Well, I have.

Usually at about 3 a.m. after a bottle of scotch, yes. Maybe they had an imbalance of bodily humors and we just ran out of leeches. Could it be. I mean, you know, the strategic leech supply has been very low. Well, we get it through the Persian Gulf. So that's a problem. It's been stuck in Oman. Do you know that I would walk into Soviet and Russian pharmacies in the 90s and the 80s and 90s?

And they would have jars of live leeches. Really? I kid you not. That's scary. That gives me the hebie-jeebies. Well, no, actually, I'll say one thing, again, because I'm learned it in the ways of science. There are certain things that leeches actually do, like for certain kinds of cuts and abrasions where they sort of kill off dead skin and all that stuff. I'd rather have the dead skin. Yeah, personally, I'll take a pass on the leeches, but I will tell you that I have seen in a pharmacy jars of live leeches. leeches ivermectin

should we talk about Marco or do you want to talk about the war first I guess we'll talk about the war then we'll come back to Marco and Oman we've had two war powers votes Congress is so stupid used to work in the Senate this is why I never worked in Congress

it's just exhausting it's exhausting it's exhausting they have a war powers vote two days ago now and it passes 50 to 48 in the Senate limiting Donald Trump's

war powers, something they should have done at the beginning of the stupid war on, but they finally got the votes to do it thanks to Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, who we'll get to in a second. But that, for some technical, you know, Robert's rule of order reason that I don't care to understand was not the real vote. There was another vote that had to happen the next day for the war powers resolution to actually get to the president's desk. And on that vote, Rand Paul flipped. Principal Libertarian, Rand Paul,

who had voted for the War Powers Resolution every time, up until the one time that it counted, now flipped his vote because he takes Donald Trump at his word that he doesn't want to do any more war. So I'm going to do a totally uncharacteristic thing and I'm going to give Rand Paul the benefit of the doubt. What he said was, now the president's negotiating.

I'm going to get out of his way. and not not saddle him with this vote now that combat operations soon be over and that he is in the middle of negotiation. And, you know, there's an argument to be made. Look, you're talking to the guy. But Rand's against the war. Wouldn't he want to saddle him? Wouldn't the point? No, because the point saddling him? Because what you're saddling them from doing is bombing Iran again and extending the stupid fucking war that Rand Paul says that he's not for. Okay. But if you're trying to negotiate and get a better deal, you don't want to do things over the president's shoulder. that tells the enemy, by the way, we're going to yank his leash at any moment.

I think this is one of these things. It's kind of like, we are helping the president. Okay. And I'm going to tell you that, you know. By putting some, sometimes the president needs some bumpers put on his impulses, you know. But Tim, I can't be a hypocrite about this in 1990. Well, you can. Was the president Donald Trump in 1990?

Who was the president in 1990? It's been a minute. George H.W. Bush. He's a guy. See, I can, I can do the impressions. That's why I get on. Netflix. Except that I always end up sounding like Dana Carvey. Broke bread with the man, not a Hitler.

My boss, John Hines, wanted to. He said, wouldn't it help Bush if we just invoke the law of the land, the War Powers Act, so that everything's kind of legally above board. And I said, the War Powers Act is a really bad piece of legislation. And you don't want to go into this war telling Saddam Hussein ahead of time, we're only coming in first. at best 60 to 90 days. Now, if it had been somebody other than George Bush, I might have said, well, if you really want to restrain the president and you think it's a bad idea. But I said, don't do it. It's probably not constitutional. I still think the war of powers that probably isn't constitutional. So I'm willing to say that Rand Paul actually thought this one over and said,

okay, there's no point. I thought this one over. He's been he is not Tom Nichols. He's Rand Paul. He has voted for this thing every time up until now. Would not that same argument? that you're making now that you don't want to limit Trump's optionality have been true a couple weeks ago? The last time they voted on this? You know, that's a good question, Tim. Thank you, Tom. I appreciate that you're trying to be fair-minded. This is why we want to have you on, but I'm sorry, Rand Paul is doing Donald Trump is solid because he doesn't want Donald Trump to bleed about him, I think, or whatever.

I don't know. Or he's got a staffer that wants to get invited to the fucking club. John Jr. started. See, this is why I shouldn't do this show. This is because I just walk right. But, you know, as the late Paul Song gets used to say, that's an excellent question, now let me evade you. I think there is an argument to be made that the War Powers Act,

you know, that if you thought Trump was out of control and you wanted to stop him from putting American lives in danger, you triggered the War Powers Act. If you've gotten what you want, and basically the war is over and Trump's going to negotiation, I can see where a libertarian, you know, small L libertarian kind of guy says, you know what, I'm not going to get in the president's soup while he's trying to get out of this. I think that's a shaky argument, especially considering

that Donald Trump never operates in good faith with the other members of the American government. As Bill Cassidy learned the hard way. So, you know, I mean, do I think it was kind of craven? Yeah, but intellectually, I kind of buy it. But like I said, I'm not a huge fan. I think the war Powers Act ought to be repealed and replaced to begin with. So that's part of my problem. Also, the Senate is stupid. We maybe should just eliminate the Senate. Thoughts on eliminating the Senate? What's it doing? Maybe we should just eliminate the Senate. Well, the whole article one branch seems to have, you know, gone to Disney World. You know, Mike Johnson, wasn't it just like yesterday? Mike Johnson said, well, yeah, he does what he does. I have other things I do. No, I'm sorry. That's,

that is not how the Constitution was written. Like, oh, the president could do whatever he wants. And over here in Congress will, you know, we'll make origami ducks. You know, that's not how it goes. And the whole Congress is just AWOL under these guys. And I hope that the Democrats actually fulfill something like an oversight capacity, you know, if and when. Although given, you know, what the Democrats have been up to lately, I have my doubts there. The House Oversight Committee will do great. We love Robert Garcia and Sue Haas.

They got their head on straight. Everybody else? I don't know. I don't know about everybody else. Where was I going to go with the Iran? Bill Cassidy. Oh, Bill Cassidy. Thank you. You can host the show for a second. So Cassidy. 37 times I'm practically there. So Cassidy abucked Trump in the original war powers vote, which didn't count because we had to have a follow-up war powers vote because of parliamentary procedure and the parliamentarian and Robert's Rules of Order. But Donald Trump was still mad that Bill Cassidy bucked him in the vote that didn't count. and Donald Trump went to the Senate lunch yesterday.

He and Bill Cassidy had a confrontation, apparently. It was pretty funny. Let's just listen to how Bill Cassidy describes the confrontation. You have not told the American people what's going on. It was supposed to last four weeks. It's lasted four months. Our original objectives have not been achieved. And I want to know what's going on.

He didn't have particularly care for my comments. Raised his voice. I lost my temper. He goes on to talk about how he's Irish, and I won't be bullied. He lost his temper. Called the president. I mean, I don't know. I mean, if he has this Irish temper, it's kind of weird that it didn't show up between

2021 and June 24th, 2026. Irish temper you would think would have flared one other time against Donald Trump in the intervening five years, but happy to see it. I know about the Irish temper. Half Irish myself. Been there. Same. But yeah, I don't know.

I mean, do we have to hand it to Cassidy? It's good, I guess, that they're yelling at each other. Apparently, Donald Trump told him to sit down. He wouldn't sit down. Called him a lunatic. Kind of projection. The president called the U.S. Senator, a lunatic. Now, on the one hand, if you look at the life of Kennedy and Johnson and Nixon,

presidents have called senators a lot worse than lunatic. And I mean, I'm sure there are senators that have called presidents, things like. lot worse than brother. To do it in the Senate, you know, this is not a couple of guys after hours, you know, arguing over some bourbon and branch water. This is, this is bad. Do you have to hand it to Cassidy? You know, no. No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I mean, I just, he's honest way out the door. Well, I regret my vote for Pete Hegseth and Bobby Kennedy. Well, thanks. Yeah, well, no shit, by the way. Pete Hegseth was a weekend talk show co-host. It's like, I can't, you can't tell me that this was

unforeseeable that Pete Higsept would be hiding the ball with you on matters of war and peace. It's just like, advise is the word and advise and consent. Advises there on the front end. It's not consent and regret. It's advised and consent. You've got to be honest, though. You've got to be fair.

Nobody could possibly have known that Robert F. Kennedy was going to have some problematic views about raccoon penises. I think that's the first time. I'm in public I've ever said the words raccoon penis. I don't think I've ever said it privately either. I'm not sure what other contexts you would have said it in. This is what happens when you put somebody like Bobby can't Bobby. Can you do a Bobby impression?

Can you do it? No. And I, you know, the man has a, that's a health problem. So I'm not, I'm not going to make fun of that. So you also don't make fun of. Is that also something you don't make fun of? Well, I have lazy eye. I have lazy eye too.

This is kind of worse than that, though. He's got like a full like quasi-modo kind of. Mark Hurtling the other day had a eye problem. And I said, we're all looking like Colombo now. We're all doing the column. Good. Mark Hartling's on the men, though. We love General Hurtling.

You're right. So that was what happening. Bill Cassidy voted against Trump on a meaningless vote and then yelled at him. Too little too late, but we appreciate it. The thing that gives me hope is, does that mean he might lose? Like, the fact that matter is, okay, fine, does it really matter? And you don't have to give it to Bill Cassidy and all that stuff we just said, right? on the other hand, Trump's not going to get the Save America Act.

No, no, of course he's not. And that's, you know, every little bit of tiny, you know, nanogram of spine that then cascades out to other issues, I think is important. Totally agree. So let them yell at each other, but something doesn't matter. Totally agree. I totally agree with that. He's not going to get the Save America Act, but in a weird way, I'm going to talk about this tomorrow, is also impacting this housing bill where Trump is having a temperate. tantrum over that as well. I've had some feedback that like and you know I hate to be wrong about this about how I should have a little more alarm on the Save America Act. My alarm bells are ringing everywhere.

This thing isn't fucking fast. It's just not it's not happening. Now I think considering that we're in the summer not in time to really do anything that even if it passed. I potentially in some of these red states, the thing I do come back to is I worry in the Senate, I think the house is a different animal. In the Senate, a lot of the key elections are in places where Republicans control everything, aforementioned Texas and the Ken Paxton race, Iowa, Ohio, the other Republicans that are in the state are like relatively pre kind of Trump Republicans. So maybe not Alaska. So anyway, there's some key Senate states where the Republicans, I think, are going to do monkey business. But I agree with you.

Just on the war in general, I mean, we've just flogged this horse ad nauseum. But you wrote about the whiplash of Trump's Iran capitulation. the other kind of news item coming from the Hill related to the war is that Trump's now asking for $88 billion to cover the war costs. Do you think we got $88 billion worth of value out of the war? I think the value were the friends we made along the way. Well, J.D. said that. Yeah. They're nice.

They're good people. They care about the country. You won't even believe how cool it is. You don't believe how cool it is. It is so cool. I got to meet the people that were murdering their own protests. in the streets just like five months ago. And I'm nice.

I mean, you can have a beer. Well, you can't have a beer with them, but like, because they don't do that. But you can have a tea. You can have a tea with them. And it's like, whoa, holy cow. We both had fathers that abandoned us. We could kind of bond over few things. We've both changed our name three times.

Just got to go there. Yeah. I think, you know, that was the first thing I mentioned in this piece about Wiplash. It's like, I'm sorry, this was, this is existentially the worst regime of the most terrible tyrants, their presence must be scoured from the earth with bombs and guns and missiles. But now they're pretty good guys. And Trump, Trump's trying to have it both ways, as he always does. He said, I never cared about regime change. But I actually did accomplish regime he always reminds me of White Goodman and Dodgeball, right? I'm just kidding, but I totally have it.

But I'm not. But I am kidding. But I'm not kidding. And now he's saying, you know, these are, rational. These are reasonable people. They care about their country. It's the same people. The IRGC hasn't gone anywhere. The Ayatollah is the son of the Ayatollah. There is no regime. He's basically decided, and this was the point of writing, because, you know, I got kind of halfway through that piece and I was like, you know, I could sit here all day talking about all of the ways that Trump has reversed himself. You know, we must destroy these missiles. Iran's missiles are the And, you know, Marco, he's the guy who keeps saying this, right? He and Kane and others, they've said the very rational thing of.

The real concern here is that the Iranians build a conventional missile fortress on top of their nuclear program, that they become this conventionally armed porcupine. Okay. So we're going to get rid of all those missiles. Can't threaten Israel anymore. Can't threaten the Gulf states anymore. And then Trump out of nowhere says, well, you know, you got to, they got to have them. everybody has them can't say that Iran can't have them Saudi Arabia has them what am I going to say the Iranians can't have them yes that's what you said two weeks ago you can say it we know you can

say it because you've said it already I got through all that and I realized this is the ultimate expression of everything that Trump is in terms of his shallow empty transactionality this war was a good idea because it would have been good for me now it's not not good for me. Right. So I want out and I'm going to do a fire sale. I'm going to sell my Iran stock at pennies on the dollar to my creditors and get out. He basically treated the Iran war like a failed casino.

You know, sell the, sell the furniture, fire all these people, get us out, demolish it. And then we will never speak of it again. And that's what he's doing. That's what I was talking to John Gans about the other day. And, you know, he's like, there's Trump is impulsive. and he's an actual thinker, writer who has ideological priors, and he wants to project ideology under their opponents and critique the ideology.

And he's like, well, it's hard to do with Trump. And it's frustrating because he's so impulsive. I was like, yeah, he's impulsive, kind of. But he also is just a megalomaniac is like the truth. Like, oh, he just cares about himself. His brain doesn't even process how things affect other people besides himself. I'm colorblind. It's like when my daughter used to tease me by holding up socks

and saying, what colors are these? I'm like, I can try really hard, but I can't do. I can't see it. And, you know, there are people who when it comes to morality or the ability to see other human beings as human beings, he doesn't have that gene. He doesn't have that part of the human brain that processes that the world around him is not a big movie set. He's not the Jim Carrey. And so he's just saying, you know what? This is a good idea. I think, that's one of the reasons that he's really soured on Netanyahu. Again, it's not hard to process.

Netanyahu is like, you're going to be this great man. Right. You're going to bring tarot. We're going to vote statues to you across the Middle East. You're also, you know, you're not only going to have statues, but you'll probably have golf course in casinos and as well. You know, and it's like, oh, wait, and that's not happening anymore. What, what?

You know, you're not useful to me. I'm going to throw you overboard. You're Michael Cohen. It's just, he's just world leader of Michael Cohen. Well, you made me look bad. Yeah. You can always see Trump with every bad idea. He looks around the room and he says, which one of you idiots told me to do this?

Yeah, right? You know, suddenly it's a whole room full of Jackie Gleason's. Ha, ma, ha, ma, ha, ma, ma, ma. But, I mean, for people to understand, why is he doing this? Why would he? Because you get these Republicans especially, and some of them, I'm sure, I still genuinely believe that Trump is some sort of patriot who cares a lot about why, you know, who knows why they say, why would he make such a deal?

for the same reason that he didn't pay all his debts in New Jersey and closed all his casinos and sold everything for bed and just said, I'm out, I'm done, it didn't work, I'm going on to something out. Build another skyscraper, put my name on it. That'll work. And now we're just waiting to see what the next skyscraper is. It's frustrating that we're the only ones to understand this, Tom Nichols.

Rubio's doing a cleanup tour through the Gulf States, and there's so many clips I could play from it because I just, I love watching Marco Squirm. And he was doing that. And also because he's wearing uncomfortable shoes because of the wrong size. Extremely uncomfortable shoes. He was there in Bahrain. He's meeting with the Omani.

He's like, there's this one clip where it's where he's like, you know, things are going great with Oman. We have good relationship. And then the reporter follows up. And it's like, didn't Trump threaten to bomb them a couple weeks ago? And he's like, well, I can only speak about today. I can't speak about two weeks ago. Let's not argue about who killed him. And then there was.

this one. I had to play this audio because it just caught me blindsided. Rubio gets shouted at coming out of a working lunch working lunch in the Gulf States and he's asked about one of the other attendees of the lunch. Let's play that.

You should clarify what the role of Michael Blumbois today? Mike was just Michael Buloz? He started to see his brother lives here. He was just starting to see me and catch up. No, no, no. But there was a working lunch, right? There was, but he wasn't, but the conversations around him had to do with, he was just here because his brother lives here.

And I'm a good friend of Mike, so we had a chance to catch up. Mike, you're talking about Mike? That guy, Mike from down the block. He just had he end up there at this bilateral meeting. Mike on the block. Yeah, Michael Bullos, if you don't know, is Tiffany Trump's husband, businessman, recanture. And he just happens to be that. It's just like, you know, hey, if you're a friend of Marco, if your brother lives in Bahrain, you can just get on the plane.

with the Secretary of State, you fly over there, you sit there, it's a working lunch, maybe you make a couple deals, maybe you get a little bag from the Qataris or the Kuwaitis or the Bahrainis. Like the scale of the corruption of these fucking guys, like, we've barely even scratched the surface. And that's why I just like that clip. It's just like this random shit, it's like, wait a minute, Tiffany's husband was at the bi-lap? Just happen to be there.

You know, Tim, the last time I went through Abu Dhabi, you know, and I missed each other by about five minutes, right? I mean, it was just, you know, Tim Miller? Of course he was. It's like you remember when Marvin Bush was there, all of George W's bilateral. That's right, wasn't he? Sure.

Neil Bush was just kind of on the plane, Dora. Listen, it's a small world. We bump into each other. I think when this is over, as I think it will be sooner rather than later, this is going to be a bonanza for forensic accountants. Oh, my gosh. Because there's going to be a lot of stuff that gets feel back.

I think I'm less astonished at the corruption than I am at the casual way that we have all, all of us, you know, I mean, this is a watergate a day. This is watergate on steroids once a day. And we've all learned to just say, well, I mean, you know, in a way, Tim, we're sitting here laughing about it. And we shouldn't be. I mean, it's 20 years ago, we'd have been shocked. It's outrageous. It's outraged.

And now it's- I'm outraged still. I know, but we've just been so fire-hosed about it that, you know, is it what? worse than hiring some Batman villain to redo the reflecting pool? You know, is it worse than, you know, the president accepting emoluments from foreign countries practically as a condition of doing business? I mean, you know, it becomes exhausting. And that, I think, is always the danger with this administration's and Americans, even the ones who care a lot, even people like you and me who follow the news every day, that, you know, it just wears us out to the point of saying there's almost nothing you can do about it. And I,

don't want to get that way. I agree with that. If you want me to be outraged, I want to flag one more thing. We don't know what Michael Bullos is getting. He's on the take. I don't think he was just visiting his brother, but we'll see. We'll learn. Here's something we do know. This was a near time story. It was from a couple months ago, but it kind of was recirculated on social media and I got my dander up about it again. And I think in the context of what I mentioned earlier, you put it this way. Trump's asking for $88 billion to cover war costs. Okay. That's our money. with a stupid fucking war that had no purpose, that in the end we're going to be worse off than the world

we started, 13 Americans died. 88 billion is coming from us. Simultaneously to that, the lead negotiator managing this war, his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is pulling in an extra $5 billion from Gulf states for his investment fund. So the Trump family is pulling in $5 billion, at least, from the same region,

while they're taking $88 billion from us. I don't know. I feel like we can pull out our old kind of Republican green eye shade outrage over this. And it is, it's insane the use of our money. It's appalling. And what's appalling is, first of all, I think they count on that the average, that this is too complicated for the average citizen to follow. And that's why I said it like that. That's pretty easy, though. 88 billion from us, five million to them. I got, yeah, right.

But, you know, again, I think the average. person is going to say, wait a minute, Jared Kushner's, what now? How? Where is it? Yeah, sure. I'll tell you where all this should have stopped was the minute Trump said, I'm sending a real estate guy and my son-in-law to handle matters of war and peace is where everybody should have stopped, you know, where there should have been the big needle scratch right there and saying, what? You know, not only is this improper. Not only does this open the door to all kinds of potential corruption. But I'm sorry, these are not people that are qualified to do this. The security of the United States is at stake here. And you're sending two guys, you know,

that don't know which way is up to Russia, to Iran, to go up against some of, you know, the real, looks, you don't have to hand it to the Russians or the Iranians, but their negotiators, their experience at this, they're professionals. This is like, you. sending in little league coaches, you know, against the Yankees or the Angels or something. I mean, this is, I'm using a sports ball metaphor, which is weird for me. But, I mean, you really are sending in complete amateurs against complete professionals. They're saying, yeah, boss wants to get out of this. Boss is mad at you about Ukraine.

Do what you can? And in the meantime, what's for lunch and what kind of deals can we make for ourselves? Silly stuff rapid fire. You have one minute on each topic. Number one, Tulsi. Any thoughts on our national intelligence being subject to the mind control of a Hawaiian cult leader named Guru Chris? You know, I retweeted that story on social media. And Tulsi has all these defenders are like, oh my God, no, she's a patriot.

She would, I'm sorry. The only thing the Washington posted was nailed down all the rumors that had been circulated around her for years. Yeah, I said when Trump first mentioned her, she's a very weird person, I think. at least in her public perception, public presentation, totally unqualified to be DNI. I think the good part of her being in that job was that she didn't know what she was doing because you have to have some knowledge

of the organization to do real damage to the organization. And that's why I'm not that worried about Bill Pulte. Pulte's going to fire a bunch of people and he's going to crash around and stumble and break pottery and then he'll have to go away. But I always think of something someone said about Ben Carson when he was at Trump's first term and he was at HUD. Someone said, it's actually good that the secretary doesn't know a single thing about the department

because that limits the damage he can do. So, yes, but I think, I think, you know, the Tulsi story was inevitable. And, you know, the fact that, again, we're just kind of shrugging and saying, oh, that's cool. I mean, it also tells me that when it comes to the Trump administration, security clearances are a quaint thing of the past. No, there are none. Do you have an alibi from the night that there was a 350-foot gash cut into the great American flag blue reflecting pool? I am not here to answer your question, Senator. 350-foot gash.

No cameras on the mall. That was the name of my college dead Kennedy's tribute band. Topic three. Does George Conway's loss in New York 12 stamp out any remaining hope that you have that you'd spend your golden years in Congress? No. And I'm glad George did it. I'm glad he got out there and, you know, carried that flag. I don't think, I'd never thought George had much of a chance in, you know, very blue district where, you know, there was going to be this residual kind of, you know, you were a former Republican can't vote for you. I mean, I think it's, I think it's unfortunate that Democrats still think that the never Trumpers, like you and me and George and others, are part of some secret cabal to restore Republican greatness. And in fact, the person that would have been in that seat, the person who would have been the biggest pain in Trump's ass, would have been George Conway because he knows where all the,

again, he knows where all the levers are. He knows where all the bodies are buried. On the other hand, George didn't make it, but neither did Jack Schlossberg. So, you know, there are. Yeah, I feel like he could have done it in northern Virginia. There are certain districts where it might have worked. It would have been nice.

The leaders and I want George to be there is that I feel like we deserve a congressperson and now someone else has to carry this mantle who will file 100 articles of impeachment 104. I want one for every week of the next of the next Congress. 104 articles of impeachment.

It used to be his thing. That would have been George. And so now someone else has to raise their hand and do it. They'll get attention from the board podcast. But Tim, you're talking about New York City where they're going to send two, no kidding, you know, whack-and-doodle socialist. At least one. I mean, yeah.

two, yeah. At least one. I shouldn't say that, you know, but I don't know. The other two, but, but at least one socialist who has some pretty out there. Yeah. I mean, I mean, wasn't going to be George's here. I mean, I didn't have done anything about Ukraine. I mean, I get a whole list of of a crazy thing yesterday and I didn't even hit half of them. You know, let's say, COVID came from France. It's like, come on everybody. She thought COVID, she said COVID came from France. Don't want to blame the Chinese. This is going to end. Final topic. I hear that you keep the air conditioning in that house. You're right now at 67. 67. Yeah. It's in sometimes lower. Lower? Yeah, sure. Sometimes at night,

I like to sometimes at night in the middle of July, I'd throw a blanket on, Tim. That is, are you concerned at all about, are you doing carbon offsets? Are you, what's happening on your extremities? Have you met me? What are, what's happening on your phalanches? What the hell kind of question is that? What is happening on your fingers and toes? My extremities would be so chilly. Okay, but now I will. say this, that I do have to kind of manage, I'm looking in my air conditioner right now, I have what's called

sometimes called European air conditioning. I have to use those mini splits. Okay. Because my house is not old enough to have ducts. So I don't have central air. I have units. So I have to kind of

sometimes keep some of those colder than others because I'm air conditioning a bigger space. I like my house cold. I, I, I, I like it nippy, you know. And maybe part of that is, well, okay, first of all, I love that scene and dogma where, you know, Jason Lee stands there under the, you know, the greatest sin ever, the greatest thing ever made. Totally under a video. I grew up in the 60s without air conditioning, begged my dad for it.

He thought air conditioning was for the weak and the rich, and he wouldn't do it. My soft-handed boy. Yeah. Once. Well, my father was also Greek. To him, anything, you know, below 95. was winter. But also, I spent 25 years working in a very poorly ventilated government building where I had to wear a tie in a jacket most days and sweat through one of the admirals I worked for

you. So what's the greatest thing we could do for the Naval War College? I raised my hand and I said, fix the air conditioning. And he just looked at me like, if I could throw you off this boat, I would. So I've always been in these very uncomfortable environments, both growing up and working. And now my house, I can chill a soda on my desk. And if I need a carbon offset for that, you know, I'm just going to say, I'm 65. Climate change is not my problem. Oh, my God. Tom Nichols.

Oh, my God. It all does go back to our coming of age. You know, because I think I'm the opposite. I like things hot. And I think for me, I had a job. that I don't think I was allowed to have by law for a campaign manager's friend owned a liquor store. And so I was paid through the liquor store and they would have me work in the fridge. Like I would stock the beer in the fridge.

And I don't think my core temperature ever recovered. Like I was so chilly. I think my core temp has remained below like equilibrium ever since. And my students would ask me, my younger, my undergraduate students would say, you grew up in the 60s man that must have been cool that must have been awesome what were the 60s like and I said warm you know there was no my there was no air conditioning and people smoked in hospitals and so now that I can have clean pure crystal cold air blowing into my house at will I'm going to do it and I'm very sorry about climate change and I'm sorry

if Miami is going to slide into the ocean because of something, you know, 60 years from now when when Charleston, you know, finally falls into the sea. You can blame me, but I won't be around to hear it. That's Tom Nichols, currently the leader in the clubhouse for most visits to the Bullwark podcast. On tomorrow's show, I told you when you get to the housing. I want to get to this fucking outrageous situation in Texas and a bunch of other stuff with the person that is currently the leader in the clubhouse for most audio downloads of a single Borg podcast episode, dominating Tom Nichols on that front. And you'll have to see what

is tomorrow. Thank you, Tom. Wow. I challenge accepted. We'll see all the peace. I'm feeling throw your opinions and the trashbacks come. Man, they tell me what I do it. What I'm thinking. Throw your opinions in the trash bags. Come back. The Borg podcast is brought to you. Thanks to the work of lead producer Katie Cooper, Associate producer Ansley Skipper, and with video editing by KD Lutz and audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.