The Daily Beast Podcast - I Know Why Trump's War Is in Disarray: Wolff

Episode Date: March 11, 2026

Michael Wolff and Joanna Coles discuss Trump’s war with Iran as it unfolds in real time—revealing a commander-in-chief who appears to be running a war the same way he runs a rally: by ad-libbing moment to moment. From the bizarre return of Trump’s old “fire and fury” threat to wildly shifting claims about victory, surrender, and bombing Iran “back into the Stone Age,” Wolff explains why insiders say there is no plan—only improvisation. Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth struggles to explain a strategy that may not exist, Republicans panic over rising gas prices ahead of the midterms, and Trump himself seems thrilled by the spectacle of it all. As the rhetoric escalates and the goals of the war remain undefined, Wolff and Coles expose the chaos, contradictions, and political risks behind a conflict that could end tomorrow—or spiral somewhere no one in Washington can predict. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What does fire and fury mean? For the North Koreans, obviously it meant nothing. And I suppose in this instance, it means more because he is dropping a lot of bombs. But nevertheless, to what point and to what effect we don't know. It's the cliffhanger. And that also becomes something in his own mind as a point of pride. No one knows what I'm going to do next. So everyone is afraid of me.

so that gives me maximum leverage. Having no plan becomes the plan. Michael. How are you? Joanna. Okay, so you have to explain why you have a different backdrop? Because I'm in a different place.

I'm in London. And I'm very curious to get the point of view from London. But first, should we just... And I see I'm using natural light, so I see the shadow. are now crossing my face. Yeah, the shadows are crossing your face, giving you an altogether otherworldly look,

which you always have, but it's slightly more sinister today. Yeah, no. On our thrice weekly trip inside Trump's head, what is going on with this sort of rolling conversation where he just changes his mind, makes things up, pretends he knows what's going on, when it's clear to everybody, he doesn't.

Well, I mean, I think that's what it is. He doesn't know what he, what's going on. There's no, I mean, just, let's just begin at the beginning. There's no plan. He has no plan. He's not really capable of formulating a plan, holding a plan in his head, acknowledging a plan, following a plan.

So he is all, and this is the way, way he lives and I'm I'm sure he'd come up with some more or less positive justification that and that that that he's an ablib guy actually that's he has said that before I've heard him say this to me I'm an ad lib guy he's an ad lib guy you know he's an ad lib runner of a war and and that's you know and I think if you go if you go to the metaphor we often use of him as a performer that's how he sees this. He's on stage and he's making it up as he goes along and very proud of that ability. Which is a considerable ability. No. I mean, the guy can stand on a stage, you know, and talk you into the ground hours later. So yeah, but he's he's taken that mode of thinking

in being and now putting that into a war mode, which is a novelty, to say the least. It may be actually a novelty in history. No one before him may have made up a war on a minute-by-minute basis. What are we going to do? Well, and then he says this, okay, we're going to stop the war, we're going to start the war. We're going to bomb them back into the stone. age, we're going to negotiate, we're going to... We're going to... We're going to have unconditional surrender. No.

Unconditional surrender, exactly, when that doesn't even exist as a possibility in this world. And, you know, I mean, Hegsith was going on about... You could see his confusion. Well, maybe they'll surrender and maybe they'll be a ceremony, maybe there'll be a ceremony, maybe there won't be a ceremony. He's at the center of this. Nothing happens without it emanating from him. And that changes on a moment by moment basis. And so he got to, it was curious, you know, I mean, and obviously I noted that he got to, he got to his old phrase for the North Koreans, which was Fire and Fury, a phrase which I was happy the first time he,

uttered it and that became the title of your best-selling first book on Trump. Exactly. But he's back to it again. He's just recycled that today. And curiously, I would say he's recycled it without irony, although, of course, you don't know. But this is a phrase that that has certainly been pinned on him. And I have been one of the people who have most obviously pinned on him as a point of what would be the word. You know, humor. The first time he used it was a preposterous, and once again he uses it.

And I think he uses it in the context of he doesn't know what to say. So it has no meaning. It's like unconditional surrender. What does fire and fury mean for the North Korea? obviously it meant nothing. And I suppose in this instance it means more because he's dropping a lot of bombs. But nevertheless, to what point and to what effect we don't know. The Iranians have just appointed or designated this new Supreme leader whose purpose seems to be to say we're not going to bend to Donald Trump. we'd rather die.

Right. And also who's more ferocious than his father, whose mother, his wife and his son were killed by Donald Trump and Netanyahu in this war of whatever it is. And who's spent his life very close to the Iran Revolutionary Guard. So it's almost as if you've brought in.

I mean, literally we talk about him as a performer as a producer, this is literally the movie Son of Chamani. He's more ferocious, he's more zealous, and he was, you know, he was in control of the repression where they shot thousands of protesters earlier in the year. The very protesters that Donald Trump said help was on the way. Yeah, so, and now we have two opposing things. He's basically said he's unacceptable,

so we're going to kill him. At the same time, also said, and I think this was last night, he said this said this, he said this, we've almost destroyed them. The war is almost over. So, and all of these things are true in the moment and then reversed or literally not true in the next moment. Well, and if you're Pete Hegseth, who's giving a press conference at the Pentagon with Ray's and Cain, General Daniel Cain, as we're talking, very hard to plan around. I'm not suggesting that Pete Higgs-eth is actually doing any planning.

He's also doing his own dissembling, but he's saying in the meantime, the war has just begun, the bombing has just begun, the best is yet to come. So we have two completely different stories, one from the president, one from Hegseth. And it's as if the moment Trump goes out on stage, nothing his advisors or colleagues have said, It's all about what's going on in the moment. As you've said, he's just ad-libbing his way through the moment to survive to the next moment. Now, there was the Wall Street Journal led with a story this morning that was advisors. Trump's advisors are urging him to bring a fast end to the war.

Now, that's a curious story, which I can interpret because it's not true. His advisors are not saying that to him. They are saying that to the Wall Street Journal as a way of advising him to end the war. And who are these advisors? Are these his billionaire, Francis is Steve Wickoff? Who's saying this? What kind of people are these golf buddies? Are they people in the oil business?

Is this Harold Hamm, the guy who was sitting around the table when they were discussing Venezuela, who Trump said had got some problems? I mean, who are these advisors? I want to be careful here and thread this needle because I actually know who would be, because I know the reporters on this story, so I know who they talk to, and they talk to some of the same people that I talk to.

So, I mean, these are people. So without saying who these are people, so without saying who these are, people are, these are people in the fairly, in the close White House circle who are concerned. Who are, you know, and I, and I think they're concerned about exactly the kinds of things

that we are talking about now, which is to say, you know, he doesn't know what this, what he's doing. Therefore, nobody knows where this is going to go, how this is going to end. but they do know that he is perfectly capable of saying it's end. We've achieved all our goals and victory is ours, which they would prefer him to do than to go on indefinitely heading into, dare I say, a quagmire.

Or very possibly World War III, because it's clear that the Pentagon and Donald Trump, I think, have been surprised by the strength of the Iranian response. Yeah, well, I would say World War III is a, we don't have to go there. I mean, this is still a regional war in any sense. And I don't see the prospect of anybody else joining this war except to defend themselves. So, you know, this is still a very restricted theater in which we have all of the military power. I mean, I think we probably will create a situation in which the Iranians are, their capacity to pose any kind of aggression is going to be limited. I'm sure it has been limited and it may shortly be curtailed.

Now, that doesn't mean there's going to be regime change, which you might remember was a rationale about 10 minutes ago for this war. And I think that that's what, you know, my suspicion is that he's saying, when is the regime going to change? And when are they going to rise up? When is when this, when that, which is none of that is going to happen immediately, if ever. And so, and it's very difficult to explain that to him. It's very difficult to explain anything to him.

Well, he doesn't want anything explained to him, right, according to you. And also, doesn't he, it isn't a danger here that he's just likely to get bored, that this stops being interesting to him. It hasn't had the outcome he wants, at least not yet, which would. be regime change. So he moves on. I mean, this is not Venezuela. Already it's not Venezuela. They would, they would, I mean, it curiously does not exactly sound like that's where he's at now. It sounds like he's enthusiastic about the military, the military imbalance here. We can bomb them back into the Stone Age. There was a great bomb them back into the Stone Age quote of his.

While you're looking for it, there was another quote that I was intrigued by, we want a system that can lead to many years of peace. And if we can't have that, we might as well get it over with right now. I had no idea what that meant. Get it over with right now. We call it a victory and we move away, or we just unleash even more bombs. I don't think that he knows.

and I don't think that he knows what the maximum capability of bombing someone back into the Stone Age. But he says, we will hit them so hard that it will not be possible for them or anybody else helping them to ever recover that section of the world. Back in the early, in the earlier nuclear age, it was that phrase, bomb them back into the Stone Age was very popular. among right wing military type figures. Famously, Curtis LeMay was always bomb. It was a general who was always bombing people back into the Stone Age. And that was a view of the world in which we could bomb.

We had this maximum power to bomb anyone. And the view was that we could accomplish anything and what was, what has been shown again and again again and again and again is the limitations of bombs, that in the end, you have to put ground troops into a situation. Well, it's really that America has dominance in the skies, right? But Iran has dominance on the ground. And they have a million members of the IRGC who know the territory well, whose leader is in power.

and there appears to be no plan, as you said at the beginning or strategy. Yeah, no, no, I mean, this is also, I mean, among the things that could happen here is that the country could be so degraded, all of its services. I mean, there's no no electricity, no water. No Wi-Fi. That it doesn't matter who is, no one can be in charge. you essentially have created a situation of complete chaos and anarchy. And is that the precursor to regime change? Well, nobody knows.

It's chaos. So it seemed to be yesterday the day before that the issue had come down to the fissionable material that the Iranians have created, which would... Enriched uranium. Yes, which would enable them, them or whoever follows them to create a bomb. And then there was the suggestion, well, that that would be the face-saving trade.

We'll give you this material, you'll go away. And that still may be. Or from Trump's point of view, it was, I think, that there was the suggestion, again, these are momentary suggestions, that we would put troops on the ground to obtain that material. And once we did that, that would be success. So among other things, we don't know, and this has been from the beginning, what success is. Regime change, unconditional surrender, to finish off for one. and for all their nuclear capabilities. But we don't know. We don't know. What we do know is that a girls' school that was adjacent to one of the Revolutionary Guard stations was bombed with the loss of life of 175 people,

and it's unclear whose missile it was who took it down. Pete Hagerz spent some part of his 60 Minutes interview on CB. on Sunday saying that it was going to be investigated. And you couldn't say any more than that. When challenged with it, Donald Trump said it was being investigated. Then he said he thought that it could be the Iranians' own Tomahawk missile that took the school out, but the Iranians don't have any Tomahawk missile. So then he sort of fell back on investigating the fact that we were investigating and he would

be good with the results of it. Exactly. I mean, it was probably our bomb. I mean, that, and I mean, I'm not sure, I mean, that's, I mean, that's, I mean, that is a horrible thing. I'm not sure it makes any, any, it's going to make any difference to Donald Trump or to. No, no, I'm sure. I'm sure it doesn't. But what my point was just his obfuscating in the moment and going from saying we were

investigating to already blaming the Iranians to saying they had a weapon they didn't have to going back to investigating. and just, again, stressing that nature of him just, I guess, ad-libbing. But it's like running through a tape in his head, which doesn't have anything on the tape. It's not a good episode of the show, is what I would say. Well, or it's a recipe for a show that everyone is paying attention to. I mean, it's the cliffhanger. And that also becomes something in his own mind. as a point of pride.

No one knows what I'm going to do next. And then that becomes a strategy, strangely. No one knows, and this is, I mean, he's, he basically articulates this. No one knows what I'm going to do next. So everyone is off guard. So everyone is afraid of me. So that gives me maximum leverage. Now, I mean, that's this kind of strange because in this.

So, I mean, what it is is having no plan becomes the plan. Having no plan becomes the plan, right? That's a very good observation about him. And it's truly sort of terrifying. It's also terrifying. I mean, I want us to talk about Pete Higgsath, because Pete Higgsath has been out there and is thoroughly enjoying, as you would expect,

a former co-host of a weekend show on Fox television, to enjoy the limelight. So he's clearly loving these press conferences that he gives with Dan Cain. He gave a full, big interview to Major Garrett, the chief political correspondent of CBS on Sunday night, where he obfuscated and talked in all sorts of jargon. And I just want to remind people,

because it sort of got lost in the midst of war, that Peter Hexeth was a man who ran not one, but two veterans' organisations, both of which ended badly for him. Whistleblowers, accused him of strange accounting. He left both under a cloud. He would socialize a lot at these events,

often drinking so heavily that he would have to be carried out of these events. This is not a man that you want in charge of the Pentagon. I mean, I don't think we have to, there's hardly anyone who would disagree that Pete Hegseth is an incompetent who finds himself in the role he's in by utter chance, caprice, and his willingness to be abjectly loyal to Donald Trump.

His qualifications of this job involve none of the things that one would otherwise say are qualifications for this job. But I thought the 16-minute thing was interesting, both on Hegss's part and on the part of the 60 Minutes correspondent, because they both seen, Hegsseth doesn't know what's in Trump's head. And so it's kind of, kind of, you know, ad-lib, he's ad-libbing that and trying to to avoid the question. And the 60-minute's correspondent wasn't asking the question. So they were both missing the point of what's going on here and of what the crisis is. So the crisis is not really, or the Uber crisis is not the war

in Iran. It's that this war is being run by one person who has no plan and no idea what he's doing. And the 60 Minutes correspondent didn't seem to quite get that and didn't seem to quite know the questions to ask. I mean, he should have, the question that he should have asked is, and where he should have focused is, does Pete Hegseth know what is going on in Trump's head? And then he would have, if he had asked the right questions, he would have shown that, no, Pete Hegseth doesn't know what's going on. more than we know what's going on. Well, and what I thought you saw in that interview is precisely that, that Pete Higgseth knows he doesn't know what's going on. He's as much trying, he's trying to manage the vagaries of Trump as everybody else is,

but he doesn't want other people to know that. He wants to pretend that he knows what's going on inside Trump's head, when in fact he's got, he doesn't have a clue. So you sort of saw him in. a double bind obfuscating and just sort of talking in in jargon that really had no clarity whatsoever none and then the other thing is is to not know what's going on in trump's head but at the same time not to contradict it yes exactly exactly which is very difficult um and because he knows trump is going to is is going to watch that yep yeah and totally yeah yeah yeah

Yeah, well, I think he said President Trump knows, I know, you don't tell the enemy. I mean, he was being asked various things by Major Garrett and he kept saying, President Trump knows, I know, you don't tell the enemy, you don't tell the price, you don't tell anybody what your limits would be on an operation. He can't tell anybody because he doesn't know because Donald Trump doesn't know, right? And also, it's not entirely true. He doesn't tell people. Of all the things that Pete Heckler should say, it shouldn't be that because we know about Signalgate

when he happened to tell journalists and everybody else, and J.D. Vance weighed in and said this wasn't a good idea. By the way, where is J.D. Vance? Do we have any idea where J.D. Vance is on this? Before we go, I want to hit 60 minutes a bit here. Because, I mean, I just, you know, I think the media is in a, is in a curious place because they don't know the questions to ask. because you would not know the questions to ask if there is no structure for what's happening,

if there are no answers. So that's an interesting thing. You don't know the questions to ask because there are no answers that you can get. So how do you respond to that if you're a person in the media? And I don't know the answer to that except that, except that listening to the 60 Minutes correspondent. And it was clear that he was completely at a loss. Well, there was also an amazing moment in the 60 Minutes interview

when Hegzeth is asked something about Trump's strategy and isn't there a danger that this whole thing could escalate? And he literally says President Trump has a knack of mitigating risk, a knack of mitigating risk, as if somehow the entire might of the American military is hinged on Trump's knack to mitigate risk. I mean, it's just nonsense. And actually, I don't like Heggseth, but I felt for him in that moment because he's just caught. He's caught in the whims of Donald Trump.

And he knows he's going to be undermined by Trump anything he says. Now, it would have been interesting if I were the 60 Minutes. Yeah, what would you have asked? I would have focused on the process here. When did you last speak to him? Does he call you up? Does he outline what he wants? How has he expressed this to you? I mean, to understand, I mean, that's the kind of thing, to get at the line of communication, to get at where this comes from. How is he running this war? And I think we would find that this, This war is being run in a way as no other war has been run. I mean, also that it is not really run by the generals. It is being run by Donald Trump calling up and saying, let's do this. You know, there was a point in kind of a moment in military history when Lyndon Johnson started to pick bombing targets.

And that was, everybody realized that was a kind of, kind of whoa moment that things were going wrong. And obviously things went as wrong as they can go in that war. And I think we've well gone beyond that. I think generals are like, okay, you know, we're not taking responsibility here. This is, this is his war. this is on his say-so, this is going to end on his timetable. The goals are what he says today or tomorrow, and we cannot be. We are simply functionaries here.

Well, I thought Pete Hegseth was sounding more and more anxious. And at today's press conference, which I started watching before we hopped on here, he went into a very long prayer. I mean, it was a proper verse of a prayer. It wasn't just, you know, may the providence of the Lord shine upon us or whatever he said at his last press conference. This was a much more heartfelt prayer.

And you felt him clinging on. You could sort of see the white knuckles on the window ledge there as Pete Hexeth is hanging on for dear life with the American military around his ankles, I think. I don't know if that's a good. good metaphor or not, but he looked a desperate man, is what I'm saying. Desperate man, no, very much, and you would be too. I mean, just imagine the role. You're the Secretary of Defense, although

as then he always reminds the Secretary of War. And you're in the middle of waging a war, and you don't know why or for what, or for how long, or actually even. against whom. Right. And I wonder if Pete Higgsath's friends are also saying to him, what is this all about, Pete? What's really going on as if he has any clue? And instead, he's just dancing to the tune of Donald Trump. I'm trying to imagine Pete Higgs' friends.

I guess maybe he must have them. I mean, Donald Trump doesn't have friends, but I guess Pete Higgsith has them drinking buddies. Well, I don't think he drinks anymore now, right? Isn't one of his things that he's determinedly sober after a lifetime of drinking? Would you like to put money on that? He looks like he's a man that spends a lot of time in the gym, as we've discussed. He can't close his arms by his side because he's got, you know, he's been overdoing his pecks. And I don't know.

Well, remember, he was a man. I mean, he had not given up drinking prior to getting this job. It was when he got this job. He said, I'm not going to drink on this job. Right. He said, I'm going to be sober. on the job. Okay. Okay. Let's see how that goes for you, Pete. All right. So now can we please address J.D. Vance? Yeah. Is J.D. Vance and Tucker Carlson having secret conversations?

I'm sure they are. About what is this war about? What is he doing? He's outliving the war. Yeah. No. And I mean, Tucker is a couple of things about Tucker. Tucker. Tucker is on the phone all of the time. And he is, he's, he's good. I mean, he is, he, Tucker is on top of all of the gossip. He's in touch with all of the people he should be in touch with. I mean, he is really, and there have been at various points in the, in the long Trump political career, where Tucker has been one of the main sources for journalists everywhere. I mean, it is not impossible. as I think about it, that Tucker as was a source in that Wall Street Journal article.

Well, and we know that Tucker talked to Donald Trump three times, at least three times before the war, advising him against doing it. Tucker is incredibly plugged in. I mean, I'm sure I think it's not something that people really appreciate that this guy who's, you know, has a podcast is, is, is on the ground in a true sense in terms of his interaction with people who have power. Okay, so we have gas prices going up. I mean, I was going back to the 70s and remembering, do you remember the price of meat doubled at one point in the 70s? I mean, it was just, it's hard to remember how bad it was. in America in the 70s.

You probably remember, I wasn't here. I wasn't here. But it was pretty bad where you came. It was actually worse. I'm sure it was worse, but that's irrelevant. Yeah, I mean, I grew up in sort of brownouts and blackout. And there was, there was, you know, gas lines in America. Yeah, I mean, all I remember on the British television news was watching, you know,

lines of cars snaking out of garages and people standing there with little cans to fill with gas. I mean, we're definitely not seeing that, but we are seeing the pressure of prices at the pump. My first job in journalism was you had to go to gasoline stations in the New York area and go from car to car and say, how do you feel about having to wait online? And then you had to write what was called a gas memo. A gas memo. And a gas memo. And How did people feel? They felt annoyed. We're not at that point.

But the people who are actually annoyed, more than people on getting gas, are Republicans, other Republicans who have to run in the midterms. And there was just over the last couple of days a meeting at Trump's Doral Country Club. This is where he brings all the Republican the Republicans together

for sort of rah-rah as they're gearing up for the midterms? Right, rah-rah, but also a strategy. How are we going to do this? And all of those guys and a few women obviously want to, I mean, see the difficult road in front of them and also want to very clearly, clearly concentrate on the issue that they find most daunting, which is affordability and the economy,

which obviously goes to the price of gas. And Trump is clearly not addressing that and doing everything, it would seem, to exacerbate that problem. So who is the biggest, what's the biggest problem for the Republicans at this point? Donald Trump.

Is Trump having fun? I mean, to your point, he loves to be the center of attention. The world's attention is on this war that he has started, that he has no idea how he's going to finish. Is he actually, you know, when he staggers up from his bed in the morning with his televisions on and he's calling people and saying, how's he playing? Is he actually having the time of his life? I think at this moment he is having the time of his life. I think war is, you know, thrilling. I mean, and he keeps going back to the point that, you know, the United States from a military point is absolutely winning, winning.

You know, there's no opposition hardly. It's, it's, it's, we control, we control everything from the skies. We can bomb anything. We can hit any target. What's not to like? At least if, if you limit your view of war to that. And so far, he has been able to see war only through that lens. Now, that could change.

And I mean, I think everybody around him knows that could change any minute. And obviously, and he is not yet, and he basically says this, I don't have to worry about the price of gas because that's just a momentary blip. And obviously a few more pennies or dollars is worth it to destroy the Iranian regime forever, et cetera, et cetera. But that is obvious, and obviously the Republicans at the Doral Country Club understand that that's not the case, that this is going to defeat them. Gas prices go up, up by what are they, 17%. God knows where they will go at what point, at what point that will reach. And that will defeat very clearly defeat a whole set of individual Republicans in November.

Just that very fact, that number. And does he have to finish up whatever that looks like? in Iran before he moves on to Cuba because they put Cuba on notice now? No, the interesting thing about Donald Trump, which these advisors, air quotes, who spoke to the Wall Street Journal, understand that actually a virtue, sort of, I want to call it a virtue, is that he's perfectly capable of walking away from this. We've accomplished everything we set out to do, and we're coming home, and it's a victory. Great. We don't have to think about the Iranians again. But what is the victory?

Because all that's happened is they've taken the leadership out, which has been replaced. I mean, the victory, there is no victory. I mean, that's one of the reasons that he can't say what the goal is. is here is that there is no goal. There is no achievable goal. But it's Donald Trump so he can say, yes, it's victory, because I say it's victory. But wasn't one of the goals, in as much as there were any goals, to get rid of the leadership? What they didn't anticipate was that the leadership would be replaced by possibly an even harder line leadership. Yeah, but that was never, that was, yeah, I mean, there's all kinds of, you know, peace on earth. Um,

But there was never a realistic promise that that could happen unless you put boots on the ground. So Republicans are in trouble, as we saw at the meeting in Dural. He needs, do you think this ends, if you were to put a timeline on this, could you do that? You mean the war? No, you can't put it. a timeline on it. You cannot, you cannot predict anything because it's Donald Trump. I think it's very possible that tomorrow it's over with. It's as equally as possible that six weeks from now we're still having the same conversation. And then, and then I don't, and then, you know, at some point

then, and that's the interesting thing, at some point where it tips over and we can't get out. That's an alarming prospect. Very alarming. No, I mean, the whole, I mean, obviously the whole, the whole, the whole business is alarming. And then this, I mean, let's remember the people who it is most alarming to are the Iranians. Right. Of course. So you're sitting in London.

What are you hearing in London? Kirstama, the British Prime Minister, the Labour Prime Minister, refused to let the Americans refuel on British air bases. One of the air bases, the British air bases, the British air bases, in Cyprus was hit and the British weren't able to mobilize their ships to get there to help it in time. I think the ship is on its way now.

What are you hearing there? What's the view from London? Well, the view from London is what's the view from the U.S. So, I mean, everybody understands that or everyone certainly who I'm talking to sees the Brits as just bystanders to this and having to have to look for, look for their own face-saving role, face-saving role with Donald Trump, face-saving role with not looking like their, they're just that they have no idea what's going on. And I think that at this point, Starmar looks like a guy who has no idea what's going on.

And no purchase on events, merely a bystander. Well, and he's also likely to be under pressure in the coming weeks because we're expecting the release of emails between him and his advisors over whether or not they should send Peter Mandelson to be the British ambassador in D.C. Mandelson, of course, turned out to be much friendly with Jeffrey Epstein, than he'd hitherto told people, as far as we know. He gets fired. He turns up in very unflattering ways in the Epstein files,

and Kirstehmus under pressure. Well, I'm seeing a particular labor grandee this afternoon, so I will report what I know on Thursday. Okay, good. Well, I'm looking forward to that. And, of course, actually, I thought the last two episodes, I think we didn't even mention the words Jeffrey Epstein.

Well, I mean, I suppose I'm trying to think if that is in Trump's mind. But again, you know, one of the things about Trump is I think that that gives too much in a normal political environment you would say, okay, he understands

that he's changed the subject here. and that's part of the plan. And he does manage to change the subject, but I'm not sure that it is part of a grand plan. He has no plans. I mean, that's the one thing you have to again and again and again come back to with Donald Trump. This is just pure living in the moment.

Okay, well, living in the moment and no plan has spurred our limerick writers, we've got rather a good one here about Christy Noam too this is from Stephen McAnerney Christy Noem I've even forgotten about Christy Noem in just 48 hours right Christy Noam Blowne blown away Corey Lowndowski Floated away on the breeze There's many a poem written about Noam

Just Corey Lewandowski never goes away Always will be back Okay so we have to figure out which which woman he will be back with. What about Linda McMahon, Secretary for Education? That seems unlikely. Seems unlikely. Seems unlikely.

There was a certain transformation of Christy Noam under the friendship, shall we say, of Corey Lowndowski, which I think a lot of people have found fascinating. The long hair, the outfits, It's just remarkable. And again, remarkable, actually, I just want to remind people of the amount of money she spent on that ad campaign

to tell immigrants not to come here unless they were going to come legally. $220 million. At the same time, she insisted that anyone applying for money from FEMA, anything owes me, over $100,000 she personally had to sign off on, which has led to all sorts of backlogs for people. And in North Carolina, which was, of course, very badly hit by Hurricanes in 2024, and they still haven't had the billions of dollars they're entitled to get from FEMA.

There was literally cheering. There was cheering when she was fired. So hopefully that whole backlog of money will get released so people can get some kind of relief. But the mismanagement of the Department of Homeland Security is, I think, now going to come to the fore as we realize how badly she handled it. Yeah. Well, you know, I wouldn't, I would caution on limiting the idea of mismanagement in any way to her. There is essentially mismanagement in every department, every significant department in the United States government. is being mismanaged. Why?

Well, because these people are not managers, I mean, among other reasons. But there is a very clear, you know, these are vast, vast structures that have to be administered. And not only are these not administrators, but they fired the administrators. Right.

Just as they fired the experts on, Iran in the Pentagon. All right, while I was mid-Limerick from Stephen McAnonny, there's many a poem written about Noem. After her culling, it's now time for Mullen. Finally, Noam can go home. I like that. I thought it was slightly unusual Limerick verse, but we got there.

And then here is one from Garfried, and then we have a response to Garfried, which I like. I can't tell you how busy everybody is in the comments, writing poems. This is from Garfried. There once was a war in Iran. Run like, run half like a court of a don, while Rubio frowned and Vance looked around the strategy hid in Kushner's salon. Reaching for the rhymes there, Garfried, I think a bit of reaching, but nevertheless worth a readout. And then we have someone called Helms Park, saying there once was a rhymer called Garfried, whose limericks set off a stampede of sonnets and doggerel, Odes and Villanelle, good word, so none would forget how to read.

Thank you. Exactly. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Oh, we were ambiguous last week when we talked about All Quiet on the Western Front. We had a lot of response to that. You're going to argue with this. We were not ambiguous.

I went back to the transcript. I went back to the transcript. We were talking about the culture of World War II and the fact that Trump's understanding of war is largely formed by having watched World War II movies. And then you remembered that he'd actually told you he'd read a book, All Quiet on the Western Front, which is, of course, about World War I. But then a lot of people wrote it and said,

of course he didn't read it. He saw the movie. I don't get what's ambiguous about any of that. Well, I think the way we said it made it sound as if we thought All Quiet on the Western Front was about World War II, and obviously it's about World War I. It's about the trenches and World War I.

Yeah, I think. they seem to be too sequential things, but okay. Okay, well, whatever. I just wanted to clarify it for people, and there was a unanimous, unanimous assumption that Donald Trump did not read the book, but he watched the movie. You know, I'm just trying to think when was,

were there two versions of that movie? I'm sure that I'm sure there have been several. I'm sure there have been several. Yes, I think it was safe to say he did not read the book. It's a short book. It was probably an assignment that he was aware of the book. He was aware that he had not read the book. He was aware of the fact he had not read the book.

He probably watched it on television. And maybe he got a friend to take the assignment for him. Maybe someone else wrote the essay. I think Donald Trump is just the guy who just didn't do the homework. And he still doesn't do the homework. And it turns out that people really don't care. They liked him anyway. they would still rather have voted for him, knowing all that, than they would the Democrats.

Yeah, no, no, no. Yeah, I think the homework is an interesting aspect of this because he clearly doesn't do it. So imagine in a normal world you're going to war. One of the things that you get, if you're the president of the United States, the commander in chief, is briefing books constantly. This is what you have to know. this is what we are doing this is what we have to know this is the implications of what we do it

these are the scenarios that may play out none of that flying by the seat of his pants well and openly declaring he doesn't want briefings he doesn't need briefings he is the decider he makes the decisions and as we know

it all comes down to him and as he openly says it comes down to me I am the moral end. Yeah, and it's interesting that there are a lot of people, a lot of leader, a mode of leadership that wants you to think that and there's somewhat of a safety net because they're not, they're not making the decisions. They merely represent they are making the decisions and the decisions are made by people

who know what they're doing. But actually in this situation, he is making the decisions. He has no idea what he's doing and he's making the decisions. So the situation could not be more dire. Well, there's also a school of leadership where they say they don't read the briefings and it's down to them. But of course they read the briefings. They just don't want you to know they read the briefings. Well, he doesn't read the briefings.

Proudly so. It's Donald Trump's world, and we all just live in it. And he's a vacancy in the middle of his own world. And yet a vacancy that is fully in charge. So totally, I'm just not sure that this has ever happened. All right. So I don't feel we've gotten to the bottom of where J.D. Vance is. So let's talk about that on Thursday.

Who knows if we'll still be at war on Thursday? and I hope that you're going to skip off into the London sunshine. Is it nice weather there? Because there is nowhere more beautiful than London in March and April when the daffodils are out in St. James's Park. The daffodils are out in St. James's Park. How beautiful. Nothing prettier.

Well, Michael, if you see Andrew, formerly known as Prince, give him a wave for us. I will. I think he's probably very much locked away. somewhere in North Norfolk, but who knows? Leave us a comment. Don't forget to sign on to become a subscriber to our channel. And please don't forget, as our first lady would have a say.

Oh, and Michael, we should catch up on Thursday with where you are suing the first lady. Be beast. So the good news is we have so many Bebeast tier members now. There are too many names to read out. And we really appreciate your support. to our production team, Devon Rogerino, Ryan Murray, Rachel Passer, Heather Pissarro, Neil Rosenhaus.