The Daily Beast Podcast - I Know Who's Really Influencing Trump's War: Wolff

Episode Date: March 6, 2026

Go to https://zbiotics.com/BEAST and use BEAST at checkout for 15% off any first time orders of ZBiotics probiotics #ad Michael Wolff and Joanna Coles break down the chaos surrounding Trump’s war with Iran, a conflict where even top officials, allies, and the media seem unable to explain what the strategy actually is. They unpack Trump’s obsession with “winning,” the backlash building inside MAGA world, and why rising gas prices could quickly turn the political tide at home. Wolff argues the real key to understanding Trump may not be in the Pentagon or the intelligence briefings—but inside the mind of Jared Kushner, the one person he believes truly understands Trump’s thinking and the potential Gulf money and postwar deals at stake. They also dive into the uneasy body language of figures like Marco Rubio and JD Vance, the confusion among world leaders, and the political stakes back home—from the Texas Senate battle to a stunning Kristi Noem hearing that may have been the final straw for Trump to fire her as DHS Secretary. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There's not a paragraph, a briefing paragraph that could describe his strategy or his goals. And he has consulted with nobody. Nobody knows what is going on. I think Jared Kushner knows what's going on. I think he is probably the only person Trump listens to because he has a credibility derived from having gotten $2 billion out of the Persian Gulf. In any way when you look at what Trump does, why he does what he does, it is always smart to look at what he can get out of it. What is the personal advantage to Donald Trump?

Michael. Joanna. Michael, I can't take it anymore. I really can't take it anymore. It is pouring with rain here. It has been the longest winter in living memory in New York. Every damn day, the snow. or rain or ice.

The sun seems to have disappeared. We're at war. I hear on social media that it's going to be an early spring, however. Oh, please God. I just need something. If you trust social media, which clearly we should not. Is it AI slop saying it's going to be an early spring? I don't know who it is.

It's like last night and this morning everything bad came together. the Knicks lose, we're at war, pouring with rain, which is terrible for the hair. And I've had lots of comments about my hair recently saying that it's in my eyes, which it is. So I went to have it cut at the weekend, and it seems to have grown longer since the haircut. So anyway. Well, let's talk about the war, and let's just try to do a review here, which is not easy because you're reviewing a situation in which nobody, literally nobody, has any eye. what is going on, why it's going on, where it's going to, and clearly what the end result will be,

because no one really has imagined any particular end result. It is run by, so here is a war entirely 100% run by someone who really doesn't give a shit, doesn't give a shit about any of the rules, the guardrails, the way of thinking about war, about conflict, about the international order, just doesn't care. I'm literally sure he couldn't find Iran on a map. This week, or yesterday I interviewed John Bolton, who as you know was his national security advisor in Trump One.

And he, and I really urge everybody to listen to it because he's so. frank about how awkward Trump always felt, something you have said when he's in the room with generals and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and he knows they know more than he does, but he can't stand it. And so he just dismisses it. And as you have often talked about, and Steve Bannon has talked about, the sort of determination to keep information out at the one time when you need as much information as you can possibly get. And, well, he's thrown that paradigm on its, on its ear and taken the position that, A, he doesn't need to have information, that actually information is, in some ways, the enemy.

Information and the data and the decision matrix that foreign policy professionals have used for so many generations has only resulted in calamity. Which is arguably, by the way, at least in part true. And that's the irony, really. The other argument is that we're still here. The world didn't end. The superpowers did not come to a collision. The economy in the, actually throughout the world has only improved.

Living standards have only improved. And that it is other than a few forms. forever wars, and I don't mean to minimize this, a kind of remarkable time. But nevertheless, obviously, there are those forever wars, which, just to make clear the context here, Trump ran against in a way he became one element of him becoming president both times, was to say that there would be no more forever wars. he would not go to war. War was for smaller minds than his,

and he could solve any conflict that might lead to war. Right, because for him, foreign policy is simply a matter of his relationships. He likes Vladimir Putin. He and Putin get on. It's all great. He's going to see Xi.

He's going to have the biggest parade in Chinese history. It's all great. That's how he sees everything through the lens of his relationships. Right. Now, you know, we've discussed before. I mean, the other day I noted how much winning is important to him.

Winning defines him. That dominance is the theme of, certainly, of this second Trump administration. The more dominance you can show, the more dominance you can display and prove. That means the more dominant you are. And the more dominant person has more leverage and therefore, and therefore the more dominant person gets more. So that's also part of the background, the Trumpian background in the fundamental Trump contradictions, which lead to this present moment in which no one can interpret what he's doing or why he's doing and how he will proceed from day to day.

Well, and the messaging of why we are doing this really has changed moment by moment. So, you know, and it seemed to ratchet up yesterday to Trump almost shouting that the reason we were doing it was because Iran was about to launch a nuclear war, which is, you know, completely unfrored. And that's also contradicted by everything else. So everything is contradicted here and everything is walked back, but none of it matters. Well, it matters in terms of serving it up to the American people, though, doesn't it? I mean, we've mentioned on Tuesday and the split. it has only become greater, that MAGA, particularly the factions sort of led by Tucker Carlson and Megan Kelly, are really against this war and they don't feel they've been sold it properly

either. And it seems like Netanyar who's said to Trump, we're ready to go in, and Trump immediately sort of bustled up to the table. I mean, this doesn't feel like it's been American led to it. And then he reversed that, of course, and said that he, that they, that they, followed that he forced the Israelis to follow us. So it's, yeah. But that felt very much like a reaction to the fact that someone had said, you were following Israel and he was like, no, I wasn't, no, I wasn't. They're following it.

I mean, it's just, it's unbelievable. But then there is that Trump baseline, which he repeats on a, I understand, within the White House on a constant basis. Everybody loves a winner. So, so if he can win, then. everything goes away, then he has achieved what he wants to achieve and that consensus will say he's a great man and, and I suppose, should get the Nobel Peace Prize. And there's a, there was a piece in the, in the journal this morning, which, I mean, this is, of course,

of course, the Wall Street Journal, which is the bastion of neocons. But rather convincingly, went through, went through, went through, the details arguing that, in fact, we are winning this war, that actually other than six American soldiers have died, which is, of course, bad, but it's not 100 and it's not 200 and it's not the 5,000 that died in Iraq, that everything is going well. We are winning. We are in essence, achieving every military goal that we might want to achieve. Oh, how I wish this product had been around when I was in college. It's called Zbiotics, pre-alcohol probiotic drink, and it's the world's first genetically engineered probiotic, invented by PhD scientists, and here's how it works.

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I mean, my older son, who never pays attention to prices. In fact, I don't think I've ever had a conversation with him ever about. any kind of price, called me yesterday and said, Mom, gas is $6 a gallon at the pump in California, which is where he's living in L.A. And I do think, in fact, Hugh Docherty, who many viewers and listeners will know, pointed out this morning that the gas is so interesting, not only because it's one of those things that you literally watch as the price, as the ticker goes around in front of you as you're putting the gas in, but men end up doing it. It women are largely responsible for most of the household costs, but actually gas is something

that men pay attention to, and the price of gas is up significantly. Yeah, I mean, that's clearly one of the variables here. How long does he have? And who's he winning with? Because he may be winning on the international stage in some ways. But there's very little to suggest that Maga wanted this, even though he says, I am Maga, the MAGA is me, MAGA will do what I want them to. Well, no, I absolutely, and that's a, I mean, I hear that argument, and it's a cogent argument,

but the other argument, his argument, everybody loves a winner, is also, you know, I mean, it has also worked for him. And we are in this situation. And it's somewhat asymmetrical. The opprobrium that's being heaped on him in so many quarters from not just Democrats and liberals, but also from the Magaside and also from people at the gas pump, is stands in this kind of the split screen with the fact that everything is going well in this war. I mean, and many of our listeners are going to say, oh, no, no, no, that's terrible. That's, you can't mean that and just anticipating the liberal point of view here, and which I entirely agree with except on a strictly tactical military base. Yeah, and the fact they took the leadership and then the sub-leadership out in one go on Saturday is clearly impressive.

And the other thing I think is interesting is that unlike 2003, This is also playing out against the backdrop of the terrible images we saw of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, which felt like a terrible losing moment for the U.S. I mean, even though it was actually Trump's plan, Biden carried it out. And it's arguably the moment when the Biden administration fell apart. Yeah, yeah. And you remember those terrible images of people clinging. onto the wheel cavities of planes and falling off and the desperation of people trying to climb

over those barbed wire fences and the babies being passed over. I mean, harrowing photos. And you can see why any president or secretary of war is really fighting those images. What did you think of Pete Hegseth's press conference? Well, I think every one of the people in this administration has to decide how they are personally going to respond to this. You know, Marco Rubio looks stunned all the time. Like, where am I? J.D. Vance clearly whipsawed by this. Which side of the divide am I on?

And Hegsith is like, like, I'll do anything he says. He tells me to do. I'm in it. Win it for the Gipper. Win it for the Gipper. I will say, I mean, so much, you can tell so much just by looking at them. And Marco Rubio's speech patterns, normally very fluent, very confident, have started to imitate a machine gun's rapid rattle. They come out in bursts.

He seems much less confident, I would say, than usual. I mean, the weird press conference that he had that seemed to be in a random place where someone had caught him in the Capitol. And then no one knowing whether or not Trump is just simply going to undermine them and contradict them. And this is not just them. This is literally everyone in the world, other world leaders, allies or enemies, the Israelis. I mean, the Israelis are like, okay, we better get, we better take what we can right now because this could change tomorrow. So hurry up. Well, and poor Keir Stama, the British Prime Minister, he's having a terrible time.

Terrible time. He's on the wrong side of every decision. Peter Mandelson bounced as his ambassador from Washington, as we know, which is causing great stern and drang at home. And then, of course, Donald Trump has his far side chat in the oval, in the golden oval, with the German Chancellor and leans forward and says he's not very happy with the UK right now. and in fact, Kirstama is no Winston Churchill. Withering words for poor Kirstama, withering.

And of course, you know, British base gets attacked in Cyprus, which I think the Brits hadn't anticipated. And so they're sending out a ship, but it won't get out there until next week. The whole thing feels just like poor Kirstama's been caught on the back foot yet again. And now Trump is weighing in on the Chagos Islands. You know, we have this thing. I mean, he's gone into this in a little,

unilateral way. In the past, the, or actually the custom in recent generations has been to assemble a coalition of allies, I mean, if only for your PR cover. But everybody was kind of semi, at least on the same page. That was the effort. That was the diplomatic effort. Well, because there is no page, Trump has no page. He has no, there's not a paragraph, a briefing paragraph that could describe his strategy or his goals. And he has consulted with nobody. Nobody knows what is going on. Literally zero.

Nobody knows. I mean, you see this reflected in the media now on a daily basis. It's like, what do we say? And it's endless streams of speculation. But, yeah. I'm going to let you make your comment, because I'm not going to interrupt you, but then I'm going to say, I think I know who knows what's going on. But you first.

Okay. Well, all I was going to say is that the sense that nobody knows what's going on is also reinforced by the fragmentation of the media. So, you know, whatever you see on online, you're not quite sure where it's come from. You're seeing clips posted by other people. Half the time you can't tell if it's AI slot because the AI is so good now. And it's very confusing to find things. It used to be that you would go to places, even CNN and you would have a sense of actually what's going on.

And it's very clear they don't know. And at this point, CNN is still on the air? CNN is still on the air, but it's really just a series of incredibly long and depressing images of people supposedly looking happy with a series of illnesses. Do they still have those panels on CNN? No, they've sort of stopped with the panels. ...a hundred people sitting on a soundstage? No, I think that's probably too expensive for them now.

So they just have anguished-looking hosts ringing their hands about what's going on. And then they have actually, to be fair, they have a very attractive suite of foreign correspondence, I would say. Nick Payton, Walsh, Jeremy Diamond, you know, I'm very happy to hear what they've got to say. But there's very little of it. Because they may pass into history in any second now since CNN now has a new owner or will shortly have a new owner. We'll eventually have a new owner, yes. Anyway, it's just very difficult to get a sort of, from the news media, it's very difficult to get a straightforward sense of what's going on. Yeah, but that's not just that. It is literally, literally nobody knows. I mean, you cannot, nobody knows because Trump doesn't know.

So the one man making all of the decisions doesn't know what the next decision he will make is going to be. So who's the person you think, because you tantalized us with a sense of you think you think you know. who it is, who knows what's going on. I think Jared Kushner knows what's going on. I think he's the only person truly inside Trump's head, inside his, in this case, of course, his father-in-law's head. I think he is the person who Trump most turns to on this, probably the only person Trump listens to because he has a credibility derived from, let me not put too fine a point on this,

having gotten $2 billion out of the Persian Gulf. And I think that in anything, in any way when you look at what Trump does, why he does what he does, it is always smart to look at what he can do. get out of it. What is the personal advantage to Donald Trump? You know, and I have, I have watched this now for incredibly, you know, since the beginning. I remember, I remember, you know, in 2017, you know, the first visitor to the, the first foreign visitor to the White House was MBS, the then crown prince of Saudi Arabia. And ever since the focus, and people with, the White House talk about this rather casually, the focus has been, or a consistent focus

has been on the Persian Gulf wealth. So the UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia. That's the crescent for Trump of opportunity. And is that why Iran is bombing them all? Well, yeah, I mean, I think so. I mean, I think that they are clearly Trump allies. They clearly want to be Trump allies. I mean, often he is as confusing to them as to anyone else. But that is, and they will be direct beneficiaries if things go right or even mostly right in flattening the current leadership in Iran. So, and then, so I think then you have to ask, and I don't know the answer to this, but I bet Jared knows the answer to this.

What actually, what's the prize in Trump's mind? His eyes are on the prize. The prize will be what benefits him, him personally. So perhaps the prize is a new Trump hotel on the edge of the strait of four moons. Sure, that's like a biprope. But I think when he thinks about this, you know, there's a whole discipline, I mean, historical, military, tactical, you know, born of immense experience of how you think about foreign conflicts. I mean, I mean, you know, it is the discipline

that has developed since the Second World War, full of mandarins and bureaucrats and experts and people who actually are very smart about all of this. And Trump is not thinking any of that. Well, first thing, he doesn't know what that is. So how could he possibly? And he wouldn't be interested. No. So the textbook he hasn't read.

But what he does think about and what he has thought about for his entire career is, is, you know, deal-making, real estate. I think he's probably added oil to that now, sources of capital, and how do you put all this together in a way? And I think that he probably believes it will be to the benefit of America. But he also believes that what is to the benefit of America should also benefit him personally. Right. So follow the grift. And I'm sure the two brothers are Don Jr. and Eric are also worth paying attention to. And we haven't even begun to talk about the impact on. They just collect the money. I mean, it's Jared, you know, if you wanted to say, who is the brains of this operation? And let's, within the context of

using brains in a very relative sense, it would be Jared Kushner. The deal maker, the deal guy, as he likes to describe himself. And I was just going to. throw in before you did actually interrupt me, that isn't it Don Jr., who's an advisor to Kalshi, and the betting markets are on fire over Iran and all sorts of money being made there, which is also a new thing going on that you can bet online. I would use the word advisor advisedly when it comes to Don Jr. I want to ask one more thing about and just keep an eye on this about the war, which is that question that came up before, how long does he have? You know, and clearly in his mind, I mean, they're talking four or five weeks. That's the timeline we've been given. And it probably is a reflection of how long they think they have. But, you know, the thing about war is that it's, you know, It's unpredictable.

The thing about Trump's war, it's even more unpredictable than other wars. And at some point, I think that this could end up. It could be the exit from Afghanistan in the Trump administration. I don't know when that is, but it would be good to keep an eye on that. Well, first of all, we know that Trump himself is going to get bored of the war, right? as he once famously said to the American people, you're going to get so bored of winning. But he may well have had enough. I mean, remember three weeks ago we were still talking about Greenland and Minneapolis and, you know,

Venezuela and we've moved swiftly on from Venezuela. And Epstein. And Epstein will always come back to Epstein. But he will be bored by it. And then there was a somewhat ominous piece in the Wall Street Journal, I think, yesterday, saying that, you know, Trump is now controversial. contemplating a role for the US in Iran, not something that he had hitherto suggested, but I'm sure that's triggered by Jared pointing out there may be some economic opportunities. I do think it would be hilarious if Trump put up a hotel on the straight of Hulmuz, which is now on everybody's lips. It's such a wonderful sounding place, isn't it? The straight of Hormuz, where 20% of the world's gas passes through every day, though not at the moment. But I like the idea of a whole Iranian Riviera to match.

Perhaps you could get points if you stay at the Gaza Riviera. You can go on. It's like a timeshare, a whole Gulf timeshare, Trump properties. Yeah, well, I mean, just the reconstruction alone will keep the Trump family in billions for many years. Well, perhaps he can build another Trump ballroom out there too. And of course, the money will all come from other countries too. I wonder, and I would like to be a fly on the wall of his next reconvening of the Board of Peace. I would offer that we will never again see the Board of Peace.

I mean, what's happened to their membership dues, their $1 billion membership views? And literally the following week, they start being bombed. I mean, I don't think any of them saw that coming. All right. So I think we should at least do a drive-by on the Texas, on the Texas primaries. The Republicans, it hasn't been sorted out yet. They've got to have a runoff. But we've got Ken Paxton and the incumbent John Cornyn, who's possibly the most boring senator of all time.

No, and it's devastating for him that he's been forced into a run all. off. With a crazy person, a corrupt and a crazy candidate. And an incredibly successful politician in Texas. I mean, a politician who's a political obituary has been written even more times than Donald Trump. And yet he continues and he prevails and almost in some official capacity represents the worst that politics can offer at any time in any place. So he could be a potential Republican presidential candidate then. Yeah, you know, and I mean, even within the White House, within the Trump circle. So Trump has announced that he is going to endorse Pax's,

one or the other of the Senate candidates, and which will possibly likely actually tip the race. And it could very well. I mean, within the White House, Paxton is thought of as all of these things, corrupt and crazy, but useful, loyal, useful, and on their. side. And he's narrowly missed all sorts of censures as Attorney General. Yeah, and he has been

indicted and, I mean, he narrowly missed one because his his wife voted for him. Were she not to have, I mean, his wife who was in the Texas legislature, he needed her vote or he would have gone down. but and which was always problematic because they have a lot of domestic issues. Well, he's, he's, what is the word, adulterous, I think, which, I mean, we haven't even gotten into Tony Gonzalez and that crazy story of the congressman who's, who was harassing, at least as far as we can tell from texts that have been released, one of his junior employees, they then embarked on an affair and then she set herself on. on fire and killed herself, leaving an eight-year-old child behind, which is truly devastating

story. Yeah, Jesus. But the, the Paxton thing is also interesting because that is the possible key to flipping the Texas Senate race to the Democrats. So, I mean, he, I mean, I mean, I mean, Paxton is a highly, highly. highly polarizing candidate whose ceiling is, whose maximum ceiling could mean that the Democrat wins for the first time in Texas since the early 90s. Right. And his selling point is that he's crazy and at the same time, obviously compelling,

but it may be that people have just had enough of crazy. And James Tullarico, who's a member of the Texas state legislature, beat Jasmine Crockett, who's the congresswoman from Texas for the Democratic primary ticket. I interviewed both of them. They're both incredibly lively, intelligent. Kamala Harris endorsed Jasmine Crockett, which clearly didn't. Well, we don't know if it made any difference, but it didn't make enough difference to get her the ticket. But again, you might say about Kamala Harris.

What was she thinking? Well, you might say that. And James Tellerico is, you know, enormously articulate. He's finishing off in seminary. And he's a former teacher. And he's very appealing, very mild-mannered. And feels like he might be able to swing Texas if anybody could. Well, it's a bet on, you know, on, you know, moderation.

I mean, that's that schism in the Democratic Party between should we, we go to the middle, should we go to the moderates, should we go to people who might possibly have some kind of a populist appeal and appeal to disenfranchised mega voters, which is all kind of, you know, hope and a dream, of course. But versus the other thing, which is, you know, Crockett was, you know, a firebrand troller, you know, bring it to Trump, et cetera, et cetera. Right. So, but I mean, this is, were the Democrats to take the Senate? And if they took the Senate, they would end Donald Trump's, I mean, I've said this too many times in my Trump.

career, but let me say it again, they would end Donald Trump's political career if the House and the Senate had democratic majorities. And the secret, one of the keys to winning the Senate is Texas. They can't win the Senate basically without flipping Texas. Well, you can be sure that a ton of democratic money is now flooding into support James Tala Rico there. In fact, the first text I got this morning when I woke up was from his campaign asking for money. So they're clearly on the case and very conscious of his potential moment in history. And let's just hope he doesn't go down in flames like Beto O'Rourke does. Do you remember in 2018, he was going to be the great new hope? The dream that never dies and the dream that never

comes true. So when you got your solicitation, you got a text solicitation? I got a text solicitation. Let me see if I still have it. Hey, it's James Talarico. I got it, too. Did you get it too? Our movement won, but flipping the seed will take everything we have. Do the Democrats really think that these constant stream of texts, I get certainly 10 a day, do they think this endears them to anybody? I mean, the Democrats are stupid just about everything. But I would say in this, they're exceeding stupidity. This doesn't work.

It can't work. stop it. As a matter of fact, I spend most of my day going S-T-O-P. It doesn't make any difference if you do that. They just pop up again. And some other thing. Colin O'Read was the worst. Completely.

This is a grift. Everybody knows it's a grift. I, you know, it's, you know, shoot yourself in the head as the Democrats so often do. Okay, so let's move on to a really remarkable hearing this week, that of, the Secretary of Homeland Security, Christy Noam, the likes of which I'm not sure I've seen before watching John Kennedy and Tom Tillis, two Republicans, going after her in a really, well, it was, first of all, it was gripping television. Tom Tillis doesn't care because he's now leaving. So he just laid it all out on the table. In fact, you're like, well, where's this guy been for

the last, you know, X number of years. It was, it was incredible. And she just sort of sat there batting those idiotic eyelashes. She looks like an idiot. I mean, she looks like something has profoundly gone wrong with her surgery or, or generally, or generally with her intelligence. Well, you say that, but we can't remember what she looked like before. Remember this is a media, you see those things. Of course, could be AI, but she looks like a perfectly normal, presentable, even intelligent person until she's been, until the makeover has turned her into a Martian. Well, she really does look like, unfortunately, the Barbie doll that the Daily Beast has consistently said she is because she loves to change outfits, whatever she's doing. So there's Coast Guard, Christy, there's, you know,

ice, Christy, all of it. But my favorite bit, I think, and I'm sure you have your own favorite bit, too, was where Tom Tillis goes after her for the accounts in her book of her shooting cricket, her 14-month-old dog, and then shooting the family goat. And he just said, he trained dogs. This was a bad judgment in her, in his opinion of her, and that she was bringing that bad judgment to run. ice. It was a very compelling argument. And now, of course, there are all sorts of conversations about will she last, will she last? And is this the wrong time to get rid of her? Let's just, could we do Tom Tillis for a second? Because I think that that is emblematic of something. I mean, Tom Tillis is now turning out to be an intelligent, reasonable United States Senator asking the questions that should be asked, taking positions that any rational person, even a conservative person would reasonably take. And so why now? Why now? Because he's not at risk.

He's not, he's not running. So this was, so these past, these past five years, you were just doing what, Tom Tillis? So you're as corrupt as everybody else and good riddance to you also. True, but at least he's going out hopefully with a bang, and it's possible that his performance may, in the end, take Christine Home down. Yeah, but yeah, but I mean, you see the point here. Obviously, the past five years, he didn't believe anything, anything that he said. So that is, I mean, frankly, I'd rather have, I'd rather have someone, someone who actually believe this Trump junk rather than, rather than someone who has been utterly cynical about it. Well, we don't know what he was doing behind the scenes to try and weaken Trump

or to try and create alliances, though I will say it hasn't been very effective if he was trying to do that. That's ridiculous. Come out and say what you believe, you know. I mean, this is easy, easy stuff. But we know that people can't do that because then they get primaried. I don't know why I'm defending these people. I don't care. So then you're going to get primaried.

Right. Then find another job. It shouldn't matter. It doesn't matter. It shouldn't matter. Stand up, be a man. Well, the point is that regardless of whether or not Tom Tillis is a man or not a man, his performance has led Trump apparently to do what you say he does, which is to call up people and say, what do you think about Christyneum? What do you think about Christyneau? There was a report in Punchbowl this morning, Thursday we're recording this,

saying that she could be for the chop, but the trouble is that this isn't a great time while the Democrats haven't renewed funding for the Department of Homeland Security, and they're in a sort of partial shutdown that this isn't the right time to fire her. No, and this is in the background of Trump has been so far been adamant within the White House, and as he discusses all of these personnel issues, nobody gets fired. He doesn't bend. Nobody is going to force him. And if you are loyal and she is loyal to a dogish level,

which doesn't mean that Trump couldn't shoot her like she shoots the dog. But so I think I'd be interesting to see what happens. My guess is that she will survive another dogish day. Well, the only interesting thing, however, to counter that is that John Kennedy, the senator from Tennessee, whose voice I love, it's that incredible, deep Tennessee accent, sort of like flowing like molasses, made the point and in fact questioned her rigorously, if slowly, over this advertising campaign that she put up where she suggested that people self-deport. because that way it would just be easier for everybody if they could just do her job for them. He then made the point that this was an advertising campaign that was largely about Christy Knoam

and asked her if the president knew about the advertising campaign. She said that he did. Trump is apparently denying that he did behind the scenes. And this was, I think, you know, an advertising campaign that cost more than $200 million. dollars and one of her colleague's husband stands to gain a lot of money from this campaign by being an advisor to it. So again, corruption from which Dakota is she from? North Dakota, South Dakota, West Dakota. I think she's South Dakota because it was Doug Borgham from North

Dakota, right? It's South Dakota. It was South Dakota. So South Dakota corruption in this advertising campaign, and Trump now saying he didn't know anything about the campaign. And let's not forget Corey Lewandowski here, the lover slash advisor who is putting together these campaigns. And we can assume taking his percentage off the top. Well, incredibly, they also got asked about their relationship and shown pictures of one of the jets that the department, which appears to have a bedroom at the back for television screens where apparently

Christine O'Mon Kori Lowndowski have spent a lot of time together. But let's just just just flag. I mean the other interesting thing about listening to her is is how stupid she sounds. How incapable of actually answering these questions, how bewildered by them, how dear in the headlights she is. Going back to, and we also, it's as often as possible, I think it's important to flag the moronopracy that Trump has assembled around himself. Well, I would like to point out also that the Daily Beast got a shout out because we had written a report that Corey Lewandowski was spotted taking the garbage out of Christine Ome's apartment. We should also add that both of them deny that they are having an affair with each other.

You know, during the campaign, there was a, and actually this spelled the end of Corey's bid to take over the campaign, is that he had inserted himself basically taking over the campaign, basically with Trump's tacit approval, although we don't really know this, because Corey just announced that he was taking over the campaign, Susie Wiles and Chris Lasavita kind of retreated to another floor because they didn't know who was running the campaign. And Corey moved in, started to fire people, started to move them around desks. If your desk was the here yesterday, it was somewhere else today. And he seemed like that was a moment he was going to take over the campaign, except that he then brought Christy Noem in for a tour of the offices, showing her everything. Clearly, they were in demonstrating every aspect of being with someone

in a romantic relationship, or at least the public aspects. And that was what Susie Wiles and Chris Lhavita then went to Trump. and said, hey, and Trump decided for them, rather against and against Corey Lewandowski, because of Christy Noam. Well, and he's, as they refer to him, her special advisor. And all I would say is, Christy, good job. You've got him well trained. He's taking out the trash from your apartment.

That's what a woman wants, a man, to take out the trash. Should we mention your friend Robert Kennedy, Jr.? Well, I think we should keep our eye on him because he has certainly been muzzled. Go on. He has been told. And actually, this is an interesting example that they have looked at the, they have looked at the, at the, at the Vax numbers, the anti-Vax numbers. And they're incredibly dangerous for politically dangerous for, for, for Trump. and for the midterms and for all MAGA candidates.

It is a flatly unpopular position. So he's been told to focus on food. I mean, literally, no VACs, food, anything you want to say about food. So it's the Maha stuff that now is his issues. issue. You can mention that. No Vax. No anti-Vax. We don't want to hear about it. Well, he tried to take on Dunkin' Donuts this week, which inspired a lot of memes. He said that there was too much sugar in some of their drinks, which, I mean, alarmingly, he's right on the very biggest, sweetest drink you can get from Dunkin' Donuts. But Mora Healy, the governor of

Massachusetts, immediately put out a meme saying, come and get it with a picture of an enormous Dunkin' Donuts coffee. And of course, people love Duncan. America runs on Duncan. It's a perfectly good, in fact, rather delicious for the most part, substitute for Starbucks, much cheaper than Starbucks, and there's lots of them. And the idea that Robert Kennedy Jr. thinks it's going to be a winning campaign to take our Duncan. I don't think that's the right target for it. Well, no, I mean, it's just an interesting, again, to keep our eye on it, is the moronocracy being reigned in. And, I mean, is there a perception, and there is a perception,

I mean, there's a perception within the White House, there's a perception within the congressional leadership, that this is a moronocracy, that these are the stupidest people ever to achieve high office in American government. And for Trump, that's been a kind of badge of honor, a proof that he can, that he's the dominant guy. he can do anything he wants.

Putting clearly unqualified people into significant jobs is just proof that it's his government and he's in charge and no one can say otherwise. And I was going to say, I think that you sort of saw that with Hegseth's press conference. There he is. He's up there in his funny little suits with his sort of arms that don't quite fit by his side. He's got his stars and striped pocket kerchief on. He just looks like an American girl doll. He's an American boy doll.

I wanted to just read this. We've taken control of Iran's airspace and waterways without boots on the ground. But when a few drones get through or tragic things happen, it's front page news, he said. And that sense of, I get it, the press only wants to make the president look bad, as if somehow the death of sense. six servicemen is being used by the press to trigger anti-Trump statement when, in fact, is being recorded as, you know, what has always been the casualty of war. It's also being used by the press as an indictment against Donald Trump and his conduct of this war.

So, I mean, in that respect, the secretary of war is correct. tired to go after the press at this point. Well, tried and true. Possibly. I mean, it has been one of the things that has singularly worked for Donald Trump. I mean, for and for good reason, because it's the press. Nobody likes the press. The press is no idea what it's doing and is as, as, is, is, you know, is, you know, is,

is in its own way as Christynomish as Christy Gnome. On Tuesday we discussed and I, I think, misdiagnosed the unpleasant rash on the back of Trump's head, which I think is why he appeared a couple of times without a tie unusually for him. But we had lots and lots of comments from people, including comments from doctors, saying that the preventive cream that the White House doctor Sean Barabella was talking about might actually be something to do with some kind of lesions on the back of Trump's neck, I bet picked up from golf and maybe some preventive creams against skin cancer or some early symptoms of skin cancer, which wouldn't be surprising because he is 79, as we always point out.

You were the diagnostician of this dermatological occurrence. I was because I thought it was stress psoriasis because he'd started a war. But now, of course, I realize he's not remotely stressed by the war. In fact, he's enjoying the drama of the war and winning, as you say. And I'm now falling in line with the doctors I've read and many of our commentators that it may be a preventive cream for some kind of lesion or symptom of skin cancer. Not unusual at that age. Well, that's, we should wrap up on skin cancer always and legions and dermatology. Well, we could possibly wrap up on a limerick.

Go for it. All right. This is from Edits, who's a bee beast member. The whole world's ablaze and conflagrations, explosions, destruction, abominations. But never you mind, it'll all just be fine now that Malani is running the United Nations. I thought that was quite good. And then Garfried is back. Garfried, thank you.

A president hooked on the win. We got a nice note from Garfried. We got a very nice note from Garfried. We really did. And he's been incredibly encouraging of other commenters who are leaving their own limericks online. And we just haven't been able to collect all of them and read all of them out.

But I love the fact that we're creating some kind of poetry with this podcast. This is from Garfrey. our Limerick laureate. A president hooked on the wind declared victory loud with a grin. With wars like TV

and Maga is spree, the chaos was always the spin. Fantastic. Thank you. So the good news is we have so many Bee Beast tier members now. There are too many names

to read out and we really appreciate your support. And thank you to our incredible team whose names I'm always on the edge of my seat for fear that I won't remember.

Devin, Ryan, Rachel, Heather and Neil. Can you remember any of the words from the Moka test that we know that Trump aced and takes three times a year? Legs, cotton, white. School? I didn't remember school. Tomato. Tomato.

Legs, cotton, white school, tomato. I think that might have been the five. not bad you're not yet demented michael wolf not yet demented tomorrow we will see everybody on saturday