The Last American Vagabond - IMA: Iran War Justifications & The Global Implications

Episode Date: March 14, 2026

Today, the Independent Media Alliance (IMA) brings you a panel discussing the most recent round of hostilities against Iran, how the initiation of this conflict was long-sought by Israel, and what this may mean for the global order. We also discuss the legalities of this war, and whether the conflict is in the interest of the US government, the Israeli government, or the American people—or none of the above.Source Links:(21) Rapid Response 47 on X: “.@SecRubio: “The president made the very wise decision—we knew that there was going to be an Israeli action, we knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we https://t.co/Jp5rqpRH4T” / XNew TabIAEA Director General Grossi’s Statement to UNSC on Situation in Iran | International Atomic Energy AgencyTulsi Gabbard Says Iran Not Believed to be Building a Nuclear Weapon - NewsweekNew TabIran may be activating sleeper cells outside the country, alert says - ABC NewsWhite House blocks intelligence report warning of rising US homeland terror threat linked to Iran war | Daily Mail OnlineNew TabXNew TabUS/Israel Illegally Bomb Iran Killing Over 100 Schoolchildren(21) Highway on X: “@TLAVagabond Minab is in the south in a temperate climate without mountains like that What the Zionists are posting looks very different to the region in the videos and photos of the school. https://t.co/jnBe7a0JPU” / XNew Tab‘Execution at sea’: Was IRIS Dena, Iranian frigate sunk by US in the Indian Ocean, unarmed? - The StatesmanA History in 4 Psy-Ops: Has Iran ALWAYS Been a Member of the Club? – OffGuardianIranians rethink the price of regime changeHORMUZ STRAIT Ship Traffic Live MapWas Jeffrey Epstein the Father of Programmable Money? | Solari ReportThe Road to Serfdom by Friedrich A. Hayek | Goodreadslibertas.earthThe Last American VagabondExposing the Iran War Hype: Lessons from a One-Sided Debate with Naomi Wolfx.com/asmartbrunette1/status/2032235701777871101(100) The Last American Vagabond Substack | SubstackRep. Mark Harris on X: “Sharia Law is not compatible with Western civilization.” / X(1) The Last American Vagabond on X: “Any updates Alex? I am super excited about these clearly not fake “big, Big, BIG” actions coming... Oh and is Obama in jail yet? Since you claimed that was a sure thing? Asking for a friend...” / Xx.com/afshinrattansi/status/2032162360601825792XBitcoin Donations Are Appreciated:www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/bitcoin-donation(3FSozj9gQ1UniHvEiRmkPnXzHSVMc68U9f) Get full access to The Last American Vagabond Substack at tlavagabond.substack.com/subscribe

We're going to be discussing the idea of the false binary. What an illusion of choice does, establishes the baseline assumptions and nobody questions. This is part of the fifth generation warfare that we've talked about, voting for the lesser of two evils. Definitely an emotional, psychological trap that people are in. You're cheerleading for an insane ideology because you think you're winning. The role we have is media. How do we help everybody understand? This is theater and you need to get back into the real world. If you're opposed to the agenda, you should oppose it regardless of who's selling it to you.

Welcome to another panel brought to you by the Independent Media Alliance. We're here today to discuss the Iran War and the justifications for it, the conversation of global implications, and just about another 15, 30 different possible connections to this very large story. So just to frame to start in general, the great article is written by Kit Knightley. In history in four siops, has Iran always been a member of the club? Just heads up, guys, I'm still getting a little feedback from somebody's mic, just keeping mute while we're going around. You know, it's an important framing of this, right? And the idea of whether this is a larger conversation, just one country being taken, you know, attacked or it's a larger kind of transition of society.

I think it's an important thought to have. But so today we're coming together to discuss what all this means and what the implications may be. And so I'd like to start personally. And as always, guys, we can go wherever we'd like. But I want to start by reading off something that Ian put in the chat. able to make it today, Ian Davis. And so I wanted to read off what he put forward as a good thought. And then we can get in, you know, really just kind of start with where this kicked off in the first place, with Rubio's statements and the ideas of the potential for Israel acting

and how that all kind of kicked it off. But first all, these statements. To question a war is not to claim it is fake. To doubt the causes spell, I, to consider the wider implications and to ask who benefits is not to downplay the human cost. Taking a side, taking a A more possible simply as a matter of self-preservation. It may even be the moral position. But history shows us that wars are not fought for moral reasons. Finance, economic, political ambition, dispute over land and other resources have commonly been the causes of war.

Rarely has a war been waved to humanitarian reasons and human beings always suffer as a result of war. While millions have died and the worst atrocities have been committed to wars, wars always benefit some. Insistently, they further empower and enrich a tiny class of oligarchs and financiers. History also teaches us that the same class has manipulated population and consciously engineered wars for their own benefit. It is naive beyond measure to ever automatically assume that alleged hostilities between nation states or their proxies, supposedly triggering war, are the real or the only explanations for international conflicts. If we repeatedly fall into the trap of simply supporting one side or

another. We are not thinking critically about war. And if failing to do so, we are likely to condemn ourselves to more war without reason. Well put it. So I'll throw it to whoever wants to jump in next about kind of the starting point on this. My thought was the Rubio statement of Israel. Maybe bombing first so we had to react and how it was the ball, but take it where you will. Who wants to jump in? I mean, I feel like the entire thing has been the propaganda version of mission creep since they started teasing it because originally right it was for the liberation of the oppressed Iranian women the ever repetitive we're two weeks from having a Iran having a nuclear weapon is you know something that that was done ad nauseum but now it's shifted from any of that they're

still trying the the nuke nonsense but it shifted mostly from that to um you know, existential threat or they were going to protect our partners or, you know, attack our partners to service members being told that they're there to protect American interests in the region and to limit Iran's ability to become a superpower, which isn't our job. We have no mandate for. Definitely isn't our business. and has nothing to do with the original propaganda and justification for bombing a sovereign nation in the first place. Well, the vagueness has very much been part of the exercise.

They're not clear on why they started the war. They're not even clear if it is a war. There was a debate about what they were going to call it. Some people refused to even call it a war to begin with. And vagueness is very useful in a propaganda exercise because it allows you to evolve as you go. You can start the war and stop the war on a dusterer. If you haven't even told anybody why you started it. I'll just, I'll just add.

I mean, we've all, this isn't our second rodeo, right? 2003 Iraq. And I just feel it's so clown world cartoonish. Like everything they say is on its face lies and, you know, just on steroids compared to 20 years ago. And so the official narrative is completely false on all levels. false on all levels and something else is going on and there's a lot of people chiming in saying Iran is great reset. It's the new COVID. So I think really that's to the part of it.

Can we address the propaganda side of this? Because I'm not on social media, so I don't get indicted with this. But even just people contacting me directly through my website, I have had several people in the lead up to this war and a couple of people even now. trying to convince me that, no, you don't understand, James. The Iranians want this, and they want regime change, and almost applauding it. I even got an email from someone who I've corresponded with before, who is a member of my website, who has told me that, well, I saw this on Facebook. It may be an AI-generated video, but this person seems to really be happy with what's going on right now. So maybe, hmm, as if we should justify the slaughter of innocence because I guess the

Iranians want it. And America and Israel are really about regime change this time. I find it difficult to believe that any thinking human being is falling for any of this crap right now. But I don't know. What do you guys think? Can I just add in real quick? Ryan, I just dropped the link if we can pop it on the screen. If we have a chance, there's actually a brand new article that came out from the financial times.

It's directly addressing what James is saying. As far as the fact that I'm surely we can find some Iranians who do support or at least initially supported what the U.S. is doing, you can find mainly many of them are expats in the US who left and say, yeah, you know, you've seen the conservatives, the MAGA crowd going around showing these protests. And then, of course, there's people at home. This article that just came out today, it's showing how it interviews different Iranians in Iran. And of course, they're anonymous because they're trying to protect themselves.

But it basically says that they're rethinking regime change and how they were initially like, okay, yes, if the U.S. is going to come and help us from our, you know, government that plenty of people don't like, as well as some who do like for whatever reason, that now they're like, okay, well, they're not just going after the government. They're not just, we're not, they even say, we don't, how come Venezuela got a clean regime change and we're getting civilian bombings? Because for those who haven't got the message yet, the U.S. has been bombing desalination, desalination plants, schools, hospitals.

And there's reports of at least a thousand dead Iranian civilians, you know, as far as what we're getting from that Financial Times article, and there's others. But it's kind of, to your point, James, where it's saying, some of them may have initially thought this was going to be in their favor. And then now they're like, okay, the U.S. and Trump's own words, like, and Pete Hankseth, they said, we're going to, we're punching them while they're down. And that's the way it should be. And they're like, we're going to destroy everything for generations to come. And this clearly isn't about trying to liberate them. They're trying to just destroy everything they can. So I think that's just an important thing. Because you're right, James, there probably are AI generated propaganda videos. And then surely there's going to be some people who say, I do think this is good and others who are against it, who are of Iranian descent. I was talking to an Iranian friend just a little bit. to go about his opinions on it. And he said just as much, there's mixed opinions like there are mixed opinions in America, right, for any issue. But it does seem like now some of those folks are starting to rethink their initial support. But I would like to add, though, for my immediate

impression, and those of us that have been following this long enough, you know, like, like I Vore was pointing out, this is not, this is, we've been here before. And we've seen the lies build, and then we've seen the reality behind it when they fell back. And I think it's certainly possible today that there's more Iranians that support this than usual. But, from moment this from day one on this this version of it i didn't believe that i was open to the possibility and then of course when you see the way that this went down it started with the same old tactics with the same you know protest movements based in real things of real iranians who were angry with certain things happening and the the unions were stepping in and supporting them and the moment

we started to see you know masked foreign people according to the ronian people on the ground according to the unions who pulled back and said we no longer support this it became clear there was outside elements. We have Massad, we have even Pompei elements in the U.S., publicly saying they're arming these people. And so my point is, I think early in this, if not, if not it didn't even happen to begin with, that they had no support. And I think that's worth considering that this was just completely whole cloth manipulation. But the point to always be made, I guarantee you there are some Iranians, whether because they're incentivized for one reason or another, or just because they think this is the right thing, who do support it. We should always be okay saying that. But it's

obvious, in my opinion, that it's not even close to the majority in at all. I mean, even the Shaw support is basically non-existent. And so that brings back the point of the propaganda, the need to lie to everybody and then how that's succeeding. Because I'm with James and everyone else. I don't think this is affecting, I don't think anyone's buying this, like, less than ever. I mean, isn't it a bit odd that that story isn't the financial times already 10 days in? Yeah. I mean, somebody mentioned Iraq War 2003 and 10 days into the Iraq War, there was no way a story like that appears in a mainstream paper. But doesn't that point, though, in a way?

Like, I get your point, is it possible that could be ultimately the, you know, and we should always be doing this as well. Are we falling for their narrative? Is this some kind of, you know, sci-op situation? My thought, though, is that that's because this is failing. You know, like, as always, the corporate media, the mainstream alternative, you know, there's a level, they need some level of clouds and influence. And when these things fall on their face,

there's usually a moment when it's sort of like showing you what we all kind of already know. That's how I read that. But what do you guys think? So let me bring up the fact that it might not be failing. So I don't think Trump is running this. I don't think Trump has agency and nor does the U.S. government have sovereignty. It's not. I mean, the central bankers control the cash flows.

So what we've watched are three things going on in the Straits of Hormuz. You see, Lloyds of London and the city shut down traffic by shutting off the Western insurance. Now that doesn't shut down all the ships, but it shuts up most of the trade. Then we see the Iranians saying they're going to shut down trade except for the boats they want to have go through. And we're watching now the United States, which has for the last two decades, had a half a trillion to a trillion dollars a year of investment in military capacity, say that they can't keep the straits open one. In fact, anybody who runs a reserve currency knows that if you don't control the sea, lanes, you don't have a reserve currency. So the idea that the U.S. is not prepared to handle this

is either the grossest of incompetence or somebody wants the straits closed. We just had Goldman Sachs say predict the straits would be closed for another 21 days. That means no provision is going to get through to the fertilizer plants in the U.S. and Europe, and fertilizer won't be available for the planning season. And when it finally gets through, it's going to be too late. So whether you're looking at what it's going to do to this supply chain, that the energy is not flowing or the materials for agriculture are not flowing, you know, you're talking about something that could bring in a worldwide famine. And there are only two possible explanations. One is absolutely gross incompetence or else somebody

wants to do that. I think on that last point, some of the headlines we've been seeing just the past week, Vietnam, Thailand, other Asian countries, Denmark, Europe, UK now are bringing back COVID-era policies. Stay home. And work from home, getting us prepared for fuel rationing, food rationing. And so I think it's the latter. I think they're doing this intentionally. Well, there's an important point to add to this. And I agree entirely with you, Catherine. And the interesting point, though, is that Serted for Moose, as you kind of said there, is not actually closed. It's just restricted heavily based on threats, which is weird to me how roundly it's been reported that it was closed, like from the very beginning. And so it's interesting to think about that because the traffic is still there.

This is as of right now. But what you're saying is very important, Catherine. And I think that's the way they're playing this is Iran is playing this very strategically. I think they know that they shut this down, just block aid. The whole world will have issue with that, as opposed to just... Right. Right. So one of the reasons I'm so interested in Kitt's latest start a call, which I think is very important, is I'm watching Iran and the city of London work together to throttle the trade through the straits, and that could last for a long, long time, with very dramatic implications on the ability of the people who rolled up all the small guys in Main Street during the pandemic, coming back and doing it in an exponential factor this time with this kind of lockdown. And so you feel this is by design as like a coordinated like involving Iran kind of situation?

Not not necessarily because there could be other things at play. I do believe that ultimately this is the central bankers trying to move us into the control grid. So there could be there could be many explanations and the gross incompetence on the part of the U.S. military is a feasible possibility. So I'm not sure. And that's why I wanted Kit to describe this article because I think it's very important. to understand, for example, the role that Iran played during COVID. Well, let's throw it to Kit then to discuss this, but I want to come back to how this ties back into what, you know, the very idea of them being played in a way.

And whether that's what we think this is, we can come back to the statement by Rubio, but I think the framing is important. So go ahead, Kit, if you'd like to discuss this. I mean, if you'd like to, we can go directly to the, oh, I'm sorry, you're muted, Kit. I'm sorry, you're muted. Well, you'll never know what I said, but it was really interesting. I was just going to say on the straight-deformed moves, I think it is clear that this was like the most powerful piece on the board.

It was the point because there was this strange push and pull of propaganda on it. Our press reported it was closed before a rant said they were going to close it. And that everyone said they weren't going to close it. And then the insurers basically forced it to be closed in a very strange move, probably the most interesting move of the war so far, very odd things do. But then Trump said that he would cover the insurance. So there is clearly some push and pull

in the straight-of-form moves that makes it the most interesting aspect of what's going on. With regards to Iran's global role in COVID, that it was very, very important. If you go back to March 2020, Iran was the second country outside China to really take it seriously. It was the first or third after Italy

to start racking up the numbers. And Iran's position in that pulled a lot of people from what I suppose you would call our world into accepting it as it was being presented at the time because Iran wouldn't go along with a Western Saoat. And I think Iran has played an interesting role in global Saabs for a long time as an excuse to increase military spending as a big, as the big enemy for Israel in the area. if they hadn't been there, there was always would have been a need to put them there. And there's a long history that we talked about for hours about that kind of thing. I'm not sure we should go into everything I wrote in the article, but from like the installation, and this is something that was new to me when I started doing the research on it.

It was obviously well before I was born. But the power swap from the Shah to the Aitoula was very interesting. I had no idea how involved Western governments were in that before I started reading about it just last week. but yeah it does create like a different impression of iran through the decades once you know that right i'm always so interested of mazadec before 53 and at least as it's written you know it's hard to know for sure but apparently was very enamored by western culture had pictures of himself by the liberty bell was like very and it just turned out he wasn't the one willing to play ball

and so they wanted that's always the story isn't it finding the groups that are willing to turn on their own people and claim that's the one that's you know the good guy in the situation but it's very while you're setting up and establishing the opposition groups too. Yeah, right. So let me ask you a question. Can I have one quick point, Catherine, what are you saying? Just add to all we're saying about the same thing with Strait of Ramuz. Another example of that, I just recently saw the point of Trump coming up and saying,

you know, no minds in the straight. It hasn't happened yet. There's no indication of that, but no mind. Less than 24 hours later, oh, there's minds being discovered. I feel like he's discussing or suggesting that it's sort of being set up to seem as if they're doing more when I don't feel like that's likely going to happen, what they are likely doing based on the way I see it anyway. So I think a lot of those things are happening like Kit was saying.

Go ahead, Catherine. So one of the things I think which we really need to think about is that we have now seen the BRICS alliance bombing each other. So you have India make a very important deal with Israel that puts it sort of on the wrong side of the bricks in this thing or the wrong side of Russian China. But then you have Iran bombing the UAE, which is a member of BRICS.

So what does this do to the BRICS alliance? Well, I guess the question is, is that even really a genuine resistance to the larger plan? I think it is a genuine piece of the programmable money play. So Iran's on board for CVDC. And so I think pulling apart the payment systems

that BRICs have been putting together and pushing them closer to other systems, this could absolutely be part of this. Well, unless you want to continue on this vein, because there's so many directions we can go, you know, the interesting part to bring it back to whether they were played. Because, you know, one of the things that stood out to me that this, I just, it needed to be highlighted for people that hadn't picked up on it,

was the narrative was essentially first that Israel was going to act. And so they were essentially, their calculus was we should have to act first before Iran bombs us after that. And so right there, even the guy was sort of, of the follow-up, even from the Republican side, was that's showing you right there that Israel's influencing policy, at least through Donald Trump, and we know it's bigger than that. I thought that was an important thing to see that that was their excuse to sort of make it seem like they had to do that. But then, you know, where that really ended up, Rubio insinuating even nukes might be used.

Then Trump came out and said that he actually acted first. And so I can play that clip to set that table. And then if we want to talk about that and whether we think Israel is in fact driving this and then did that wind up the agenda? So I, I, We have a commentary on the website that is, it's called was Jeffrey Epstein, the father of programmable money. And it's a very well done substack by a guy who's writing under the synonym of ESC. And he does the best job I've ever seen of describing how the Rothschild network works. And I use the European pronunciation, so forgive me, the Rothschild network. Okay.

As far as I'm concerned, so some of the Iranians have been called. calling this, referring to the U.S. administration is the Epstein syndicate. But I think of it as the Rothschild syndicate. And I point you to that substack because it does such a great job of describing them. I think this administration is very much part of that syndicate, you know, and has been for a long time. It comes very much related to the Epstein operation. I don't think that Trump and his people are making the key decisions here. I can completely agree with that. That's kind of where we're going with that is the possibility. And even within that point, even if we're just going to agree that it's clear that Israel's the one deciding the actions, how does that fully flesh out?

So Israel, to me, Israel is like the pit bull on the leash of the guys who run the Rothschild Syndicate. And they use that group to do a lot of the criminal work and a lot of the ditt tricks and whatever. But they're on a leash. They're not, you know, the Ross Shield Syndicate is running this. The central, that's the equity around the central banks. That's what's running this. And Israel is, you know, some, you know, as psychopathic as they are, they're on a leash. And so you think that is being, so in that, in that scenario, then, is that that's what's guiding or driving or.

So. So. So let's go back to the money. The U.S. has $6 trillion a year of expenses, $4 trillion a year of revenues, $2 trillion coming directly from the bank. and part of that flow is going to Israel is how long can Israel go without that flow coming through from that pot of money? So who controls that pot of money? That's what we're looking at. And what do they need? What do they need to keep this game going? I just wanted to add just previously what Kit mentioned was interesting before we leave that.

Apparently there's a quote from the Shaw where he said, if you lift up Khomeini's beard, you will find made in England written under his chin. But just to this point, I've found a lot of articles going back decades from Council on Foreign Relations, Foreign Affairs, talking about the need to create a Middle Eastern Union. And so I find the timing as well interesting as we're witnessing in the Western Hemisphere. I thought this was crazy news.

Last weekend, Hexat came out and declared the greater North America. Yes. And so the timing is also interesting. If they're rapidly working on the North American Union tech name, that kind of seems like the timing here is interesting because you go back and you'll find decades or more. For an affair is saying, we need to create an EU-like Middle Eastern Union and Middle Eastern NATO. And then to what everyone is saying, Iran is, you know, everyone else is technocratic in the region, UAE, Saudi, Israel, Gaza now. And so they need to.

And there was an article someone sent me from CFR last week that said, we need a technocratic opposition in Iran. So it's like they just need to what they've done to Venezuela, what they're doing everywhere else to destroy the old order to bring in the new updated operating system of technocracy. You know, what I was setting this up, you know, just the show and the, I wasn't sure where we were going to take this. My mind is obsessed with this topic, where this is going right now.

Like this is where I see everything leading. And I don't want to make it so like, you know, it's obviously confirmation bias in some ways or whatever else. But this is every single thing I see going on in this conversation lead to that point right now. And it's not and it's not all the same necessary agenda. You know, you could point to Zionism and greater Israel and their element of it. And, you know, there's different parts. But I agree with you entirely, man. The greater North American union, greater Israel, you know, even the conversation right now with how what they're using to sort of at least attempt to bring together the elements against.

Iran in the Middle East. Like, I think all of it guides in this direction. So I guess the question is, you know, to what end is we top it on? This is just all globalism? So no, we're talking about 1031 swaps all over the planet. So let's point out they just took down the oil sanctions on Russia. So Russia's now getting another 150 million plus a day in revenues. They didn't kind of deal for the EU when they did it. And if you look at their use of munitions, they have nothing left to get. give to NATO and the Ukraine, presumably. So now is that not giving Putin a straight line to go take Addessa? I mean, are we standing down in the Ukraine? That's what it looks like to me. What I'm curious about is how this all comes together to one cohesive agenda, if that's the implication. Well, the U.S. takes America from Greenland down to Antarctica. You reconfigure somehow, you know, Russia down to the Middle East on the middle. And then we should ask James about this, but China takes Taiwan and is the hegemon in the South China Sea. Oh, so sort of a

global agreement sectioning the volcanization of the world. Yeah, so it's calling, Terry Sons called going from the G7 to the C4 slash five, the five being maybe Japan gets in and maybe it doesn't. I think it probably gets in. But what, what do you see happening with Taiwan? Taiwan and Asia now that the U.S. is embroiled in the Middle East. Yeah. Well, predictions, predictions. And the worst part about predicting the future is that it's the hardest thing to do. So I'm not going to make my pronouncements on it.

But all of the military strategization, at least on the U.S. side, has for some weird reason, been weirdly precisely focused on 2027. And all of these simulations they've run and all of these war games they've done have all centered on China taking Taiwan in 2020. I don't know why that is per se. But anyway, yeah, this is what World War is. World War is not just everyone agrees at the same time to come to some one big battlefield and duke it out. No, World War happens when there is a war over here that lets other people over here do the thing that they were already planning to do because now that person is distracted over there, which means that that person can go over here. And so, yes, it's the never-ending polycrisis that just balloons out into basically everything.

every corner of the globe. So if China was thinking of taking Taiwan, from this point on, it certainly it seems like a prime striking territory time for them to do that because of the U.S. over extension in the Middle East and Ukraine, or are they pulling out of Ukraine at this point? Who knows? That's what World War III is, and that's how it starts. If they do that, James, what does that mean to Okinawa? Well, it means that essentially we here in Japan are sitting ducks. because precisely because the political calculus has changed so drastically, even in just the past five, six months. So late last year, the incoming, then incoming prime minister, Takaichi

here happened to make some remarks in a cabinet meeting about what, you know, what would Japan's role be if China went for Taiwan? And she did not follow the strategic ambiguity, whatever magic words you're supposed to say in such a situation. She went out and said, something to the extent of Japan would come to the military aid of Taiwan, which is the big no-no, you're not supposed to say huge diplomatic brouhaha and China is absolutely livid and foaming at the mouth about it, canceling flights to Japan and all of this diplomatic fallout that's happening. So there's no doubt that Japan has painted a big target on its own back here in the past several months, presumably on the concept of the old world order where don't worry, Japan.

is firmly under the U.S. umbrella. You know, it's the U.S. proxy in the region. Whatever happens, the U.S. has its back. But now, of course, now in 2026, we've seen absolutely every card taken off the table. Everything is now on the table for potential play. And the idea that U.S. would have Japan's back in this is not there. So I think, you know, China, I don't know. I genuinely do not know what Japan would do if it happened to date.

Precisely because that calculus doesn't exist. So we're pulling the THAAD system out of South Korea to use in the Middle East. And of course, South Korea paid a terrible price for allowing us to put it in. What is that, what is the message to folks in Asia? Can you tell? Well, it's quite obvious, but if you want me to spell it out, it's that, yes, the Uncle Sam does not have your back. You are a nice proxy location for us to, for the U.S. to stick bases and weapons, but they will pull out if and when it's strategically necessary for them to do so. But even more, than that, I think what this current conflict is showing is that the Thad, Patriot, Interceptor, missile,

all that concept, that entire concept of warfare is outdated. Exactly as, you know, suddenly in, World War II, we're finding out that the old verities of World War I didn't exist anymore because everything had changed with the aerial attacks. Well, now we have the drone attacks. And that absolutely changes the calculus where a billion-dollar system can be taken out by $50,000 of drones. it's a completely new stage of warfare at the moment. So I think obviously everyone and all the military strategists are still in that old mentality of the thads and the interceptors and that sort of thing.

But I think everyone's going to have to recalculate now. Yeah, and I think that played a major factor. And this is where mine comes back to again. I want to get into whether we think that Trump is a willing participant or how we see that playing out with the kind of bringing it to the immediacy of it. But the drone part about in regard to the use of the, weapons and the, you know, diminishing what they have and the argument, essentially, that we had to do this because they would eventually be able to surpass us with legal weapons that they can

create legally, which I find an interesting argument that we have to do something illegal because they're going to legally build up their supplies. But, you know, so how do we see that playing in with like the Trump part of this, like back to the beginning, like with all that we're discussing? Or just, just let's put it to be nonpartisan, the U.S. government. You know, why do you see that being a factor? Go ahead. I think specifically Trump has been kept in this very protection. let's call it a Habad Lubba bubble and nothing

will permeate the Hababab bubble as far as information that gets into Donald Trump's ears. He's constantly in the company of his son-in-law of Howard Lutnik, a number of other highly influential Habadniks.

And I think with the possible exception of his personal faith healer, there aren't too many people that really permeate that luba bubble and that's partially driving it. I also tend to think that he's been heavily compromised since he went to college, if not before. And he's been groomed for this spot. Go ahead, Captain. So, you know, there's an indication that they've been feeding him fake poles, which I would not be surprised if that was true.

but I'll tell you what we'll cut through all of that bubble and fake polls and everything else is the oil price. Well, yeah, I mean... The oil price is driving Trump crazy. And to Trump's credit, one of his good qualities is he's good at math and he does understand what those prices mean. But I think Trump has been played hard on this. I think he went into this thinking they're not going to close the straightforward moves.

that this was some kind of like rule, some kind of, you know, rule of engagement before they started, which is why he's always coming from Trump's side to say, no, no, no, no, straight to foremost is open because he knows that if he taxed the world economy over this, that's his legacy done. Like, he's not going to be the mega president anymore. That's obviously gone. He's not going to be the president that fixed the economy anymore. That's obviously done. He is, he is screwed. And they have peopled the American leadership with like the greatest, crassist, hymbo morons that you can possibly imagine ever. getting into these positions of power.

I don't know why they appointed Hegsseth, except to just look like an idiot. You get to the point where these people honestly have no idea what they have done. So. And don't realize that they are going to be blamed for it. So Kit, Mike Huckabee and Heggseth, when they chose them, not now, but they look like,

remember, most of the army, the boots on the ground come from seven southern states. And they were chosen to appeal to, young recruiting from those seven southern states. Now, I don't think that strategy worked out, but I think that was their goal. And clearly, Trump didn't want somebody who's competent. He wanted somebody was saying yes. And I don't know you see the latest headlines. I just mentioned this for amusement. Hegseth has thrown the press photographers out of the Pentagon because the staff thinks their photographs make them look bad. You know, it's not the murder or the indiscriminate

bombing, of course. It's never that. It's the photographs from a bad angle. Yeah. But, you know, what I think is really important about this to consider. I agree. Incompetence, I think, is the most obvious part of all this. But it's a part that we have to consider in all these conversations is whether or not they not even, you know, like we said at first, dictating the choices, but don't even have a

choice. Like, is this some outside element ultimately controlling these choices or doing it in a way where Trump's not aware that it's happening? And I tend to see the Bondi, Gnome, Cash, Bongino, all of it as examples of sort of stacking it to the degree one. So they just tell Trump what he wants. to hear, but they're also controllable from a different angle, but also it creates an error that we are incompetence. And I think there's another angle to that. But to the point about the, you know,

Hegseth, you know, all the ideas and the information coming from them, you know, I think it's, it's literally about trying to create the collapse of what the influence. And I think that it's, well, also about Trump and the information back to that point. As I wonder, you know, is this coming through Hegseth and the rest of them in order to create an error that Trump is in charge when reality it's coming from Israel and is it something that he's allowed to think. You know, it's like, I want to, I want to go further on the idea of what Trump actually knows and whether it's something that he's involved in making these choices. I'm curious what you think. I think as we said earlier, he's, he's the floor, the store, what do you call it, the floor manager? But aware of it,

though, like, do we think that Trump is somehow aware that he's being played? Like, is that, like, right now, one thing I was thinking about yesterday is that I see that this, I'm wondering whether Donald Trump is becoming aware that he is being played and that might be affecting the way he sees this playing out. But oil prices is what brought that to mind because the reporting came out interestingly that suddenly he was outraged, didn't even think that that would happen, which makes no sense to me. How can we possibly think that they don't know that might happen?

You know, so that seemed like a false narrative to me. Well, how would Trump not possibly think that the gas stations, the oil companies in general, wouldn't take advantage of this opportunity to just egregiously price gouge people like they've done every always the price at the pump in the united states of america on march 12th has absolutely nothing to do with what's going on in iran not only do we not get what 90 to 94 percent of our oil doesn't come from the strait of hormones if anything leaves the strait of hormus it takes a minimum of 25 days to get to an East Coast seaport. We haven't been in the conflict for 25 days.

This is just raw naked opportunism. And they are. They're playing in Trump's face with it. So I'm sure he is upset about that. I've got to remember. Can I ask you, recently there's been a private equity liquidity crunch in the last week. Is this coincidental or what is,

Is there a tie to what's happening in the Middle East? Is this oil price related? Is it coming from the city of London? I mean, what is happening? So this is a very excellent question. I just spent the hour before jumping on here with Tiffany Sianzzi doing an update. We did a three-hour private equity overview two months ago, and we just did an hour update, which we'll publish next week.

So since February, we had some trouble a year ago, and there's been trouble quietly in both the private credit and private equity markets, which clearly are tied at the hip. And we've seen in the last month unraveling. So you've seen redemption stopped at a couple of Blue Al funds. You've seen Redemption stopped at the Black Rock Fund. You've seen Blackstone Fund have to come up with more equity for the second time. You've seen Cliffwater Fund have to stop redemptions. you know, that's sort of how the great financial crisis happened, started. And there's similar sort of trouble in the private equity market. And now J.P. Morgan has just come out and said, no more lending to private credit companies.

So once upon a time, the banks made the loans. And then after the financial crisis, given the change in regulation, many of the loans started being made by the private credit companies with the banks, then financing the funds. So the banks became the wholesaler and the private credit became the retailer. So we just saw Deutsche Bank's stock slashed because of what they're doing in private credit. And if you look at the stocks of the big private equity and private credit firms, Apollo, KKR, Blackstone, they're down over 30 percent so far year to date. So there's real trouble. I would say there's real trouble at the same time. They've been rolling up to small guys.

And so if you want to keep consolidating into more and more. more billionaires, this is a great way to roll up many industries in the United States. Now they own more than 50% of the funeral homes. What they've rolled up in health care and hospitals is tremendous. So, you know, when I go back to if the 21 days and the sort of stalling of the global economy is intentional, we just put out a big study called plunder on how you would plunder the United States. And this could be the beginning of a major push to plunder the United States. So, you know, I think plunder is on. I've spent a lot of time in the last month that state legislators trying to lobby for protection of cash and against programmable money.

And it's clear that the continuous increase of political power into billionaires and the mega rich and the sort of divide and wealth, you're seeing more and more legislators just sort of do what the mega rich tell them to do. So it smells like plunder is ready to get going fiercely. But it also feels like because there's so much trouble in the markets, and now the Fed just loosened the capital requirements for the banks. So it does have that beginning of the financial crisis feeling. And I keep thinking with that movie and wag the dog when they can't afford headlines over what's happening with the president's politics,

so they decide to have a war. So I'm not saying that's happening, but it has that feel. And I think there is tremendous push to get the control grid in place because the thing is unraveling in a variety of ways. And so, you know, there's a little bit of hysteria about what's happening in terms of getting the programmable money. I would mention one other thing. Has anybody here been watching the rollout of digital tokens and stable coins? Derek, you've been watching. So the Genius Act is not, was past last year to do stablecoins.

We have a great stable coin briefing at Salary if you're interested. But the regs won't come out to the end of next of this year or the beginning of next year. And the Clarity Act has stalled. There is a very fierce fight between FinTech and the banks and a very fierce fight. So it's stalled, but expected to sort of get resolved somehow in the next two months. The market is not waiting for that. The market is exploding digital assets to trade securities as well as stable coins, and there is great debate about whether states can put up guardrails or not.

That's what I've been involved in. If you look at what they're proposing to do, it looks to me if they're successful that you have never seen a financial bubble as big as what they intend to create with digital assets and stable coins. So with stable coins, they intend through the mobile payment systems to basically try and persuade every citizen they can reach globally to get off of their local currency and onto trading the equivalent of a little crypto treasury belt. And with digital assets, so I just got an offer from Coinbase that if I would put a minimum account in Coinbase, I could get 14%. Now, to say that that's an above market rate is nuts. I never looked for the details.

But Coinbase has said that they are going to offer 20 times margin to trade global stocks using their digital assets. So, you know, in theory, if that's correct, you can go in and buy one share of IBM and control 20 shares. I mean, that's unbelievable kinds of margin. I know they're planning through the Stablecoin network to make tremendous loans, all around the world if they can get it going. And then finally, Cracken has just made a deal with NASDAQ to do 24-7.

Coinbase is doing 24-7-2, but 24-7 trading through your mobile phone and mobile payment systems with margin to trade global stocks. Now, what looks to be building is a tsunami of credit, the likes of which we've never seen, even during the financial crisis.

if that's the case you know they are going to blow the whole global markets in a bubble bigger than anything we've seen yet bigger than derivatives yep

because it's going to be combined with derivatives well think about it you've got a $250 trillion global stock and bond market and Larry Fink not that I trust him on anything says he's going to create a digital twin or a digital asset for every one of them,

that's $250 trillion. Now, they have been completely vague about exactly how they're going to do it and how they're going to connect B-Title. And to this day, I cannot figure out what they're going to do and how they're going to do it. But if you look at just what they've said, you know, to me as a customer on a street level of what they're offering to do, you're talking about an enormous bubble.

Do you see a tie in here where the justification could somehow be what happens throughout this conflict to bring a collapse, to justify the change? And I'll tell you the one that worries me the most. It's not the private credit and it's not the private equity. If they continue to get, I mean, they have been trying both in Europe and the United States to consolidate every small farmer and small rancher, you know, under central control. you know, you can't control the money unless you can control food because we can create our own currencies. Yes, Derek knows how to create its own currencies, right? We don't need their money, but they have to control food. And if you look at the push right now, what the straight shutdown and the other things that going on is doing to the American and the European farmers, this could be a major, major push to get the kind of food control they need to implement their financial model.

And I hate to say it, you know, when you buy people into programmable money, they're not going to do us by rounding us up and putting in camps. They're going to do it with honey. It's a honey trap. You know, I offer you 14% to move, you know, out of your local credit union or out of your local bank. And you're going to hear Ross Perrault's giant sucking sound, right? Right. And here's the terrible thing. It's going to take you, you know, if you've got your money in a community bank, they're lending that money and they're circulating money to all the small businesses and small farmers. If instead you move out of your local bank into a stable coin, all that money moves into a treasury bill and it doesn't circulate on Main Street.

you've got you know if that if that deposit is multiplying into 10 or 20 dollars one dollar multiplies to 10 or 20 loans to small business and small farmers now it's a sucking sound and that you know it it collapses that 10 or 20 dollars i just have a question on that to clarify so if the blowout happens does that mean the one's going to get blown out are the old uh the local banks and this new sort of fintech stable coin will remain intact, and that's where they're going to want us all to be? So the big fight right now in the Clarity Act is the fintech firms want to offer interest rate and rewards, and the banks don't want them to be able to.

And that's because, you know, essentially that money is going to leave circulating credit in the economy. If you want a local area to be successful, you want to create as many banks as you possibly can, One of the reasons Germany for many years was successful after the war is they just had mammoth amounts of small banks that ended up financing private family enterprises that were great at exporting. And that's where the industrial sort of base of Germany has developed. You put those banks out of business or consolidate, whether it's into a CBDC or these kind of stable coins. And you collapse a huge amount of the local credit because that's what creates the money supply. So you're going to shrink the money supply by moving at all. into treasury. And if you come to the United States, the thing that has really throttled the economy

is more and more of the money goes up to Washington and Wall Street and then comes back with all sorts of terms and conditions and control through the treasury market and that's shrinking small business, shrinking small farms, and that's what's shrinking the economy. And it doesn't have to be that way. It's very destructive to the economy. And that's why all of this consolidation through the federal credit is really shrinking wealth. It's creating billionaires, but it's shrinking wealth. And all of that in and of itself is alarming. But for people who are understanding all of this, tie it back for them to what's going

on with the war and Iran. Okay. So let me say one thing, and then I'll come back to the war. You are all too young to remember when the wall came down to Berlin. Is anybody here alive when the wall came down to Berlin? Okay, okay, so the wall came down in Berlin, and I was at the White House, and everybody was talking about it's going to take 20 years to have treaties and get together and figure out how to merge East Germany and West Germany. And what the Chancellor did, West Germany, is he offered a very sweet premium to all the East Germans to come into the Deutsche Mark. And the country was unified in 48 hours.

He unified the country through the currency. Now, the United States is planning to do that with every person around the world. So, or I shouldn't say the United States, the dollar syndicate. With stable coins, they're going to offer everybody, get off of your local currency and come into stable coins. And literally, they're going to try and tender for the global population through the currency, the same way the German Chancellor did in 1989. That's what they're going to try and do. before James has to leave, he wanted to jump in and make a final statement,

and then we can continue on with that point. Go ahead, James. Yeah, sorry to interrupt. That's just I have to get going in a few minutes. So I just wanted to put this out on the table because I think it's important. Obviously, everything that we're talking about, everything that we're covering here is vitally important. But I want to take the 20,000 foot overview because back at the beginning of World War II, I'm sure all of the reporting that was going on about this and that move on the geopolitical chessboard or the monetary chess board were fascinating and interesting.

but we don't remember any of it today. What do we remember today? We remember the message that lasts. And I think to myself, if I had one message that I think is valid and vital that people understand right now, what would it be? And I cast back for, okay, so what message from World War II has survived? And I would like people to, as I will, it's been decades since I've read it, but I'm going to go and reread it, the Road to Surfdom by Hayek, which came out, it was published in

1944. So they're at as the war is reaching its peak and starting to wind down and people are starting to think about what's coming next and we fought these evil Nazi fascists. So what do we need to bring in to change the world once it's done? We need socialism and we need, you know, more government control over everything. And Hayek saw exactly what the war was really about and what was really happening. It wasn't about Germany versus America or anything like that. No, it was about these ideals of different oligarchs who are fighting for different ways to manage and control people. And this was a surprisingly popular message because people saw that it cut through the garbage. It was rejected by multiple publishers, but eventually, once it got published,

it became a huge smash bestseller for the University of Chicago Press. So take that for what it's worth. Anyway, go back and reread his message as he was sitting there towards the end of World War II and penning the words, when the course of civilization takes an unexpected turn, when instead of the continuous progress, which we have come to expect, we find ourselves threatened by evils

associated by us with past ages of barbarism, we blame naturally anything but ourselves. How do we not all driven according to our best lights and have not many of our finest minds incessantly worked on to make this a better world, have not all our efforts and hopes been directed towards greater freedom, justice, and prosperity? If the outcome is so different from our aims, if instead of freedom and prosperity,

bondage and misery stare us in the face, is it not clear that sinister forces have foiled our intentions, that we are the victims of some evil power which must be conquered before we can resume the road to better things? And he goes on to say, while all our energies are directed to bringing this war to a victorious conclusion, it is sometimes difficult to remember that even before the war, the values for which we are now fighting, we're threatened here and destroyed elsewhere. As in, hey guys, wake up. The real war is not the war of the bombs that are going over our heads. It's the war of our would-be leaders against all of us. And if we lose sight of that, we are going to lose the real war.

This is a war for our minds, more than a war about any piece of geopolitical territory. So if I were to try to summarize or distill or put forward such a message like this today, sadly, it would probably not be in book form because people do not read anymore. It would probably be in short form video form. And so I would like to direct people's attention to Libertos. Which is now the homepage for the Philosophy of Liberty video that people may or may not be familiar with. It's now in, what, 48 languages and counting. And it's right up there for people to take a look at that.

James, the war for everything. Libertos. What? Libertos. It's up here. I'll include the show notes for everybody as well. So that would be the message that I hope will survive these times

and that people will look back in the future to remember what this war is really about. You're here. Thank you, James. Appreciate you joining today. On the note, I've got to go. See, guys. Well, Catherine, if you wanted to pick up on that point

or if we wanted to ship to some of those. So let me bring it back to the war. I think if you look at the vision, it's 2030, and we have no assets. If you look at the vision of completely flipping to a serfdom model or technocracy model, whichever you want to call it, I just think this is,

somebody said at the beginning, this is part of the reset. This is the next phase of the reset trying to get to that place of central control. And so my focus is on the programmable money, but there are many other pieces to the control grid. We have a collection at Salary called the Faster Prodig, digital control grid and and whether you know whether we're looking at the

incompetence and then the plunder of America or we're looking at bottlenecking the trade routes like putting down the straits to you know further consolidate food and chip manufacturing and energy I do think this is part of the reset and you know and and they're pushing to get that control done by 2030 well I ask you and anybody else if you see how this may like the thoughts that come to my mind and this what i was saying earlier is that i don't want to you know make this about the you know point being as i think that we all can see this connects my mind would go further in the way that i see it as potentially connected to the network state agenda the freedom city smart city great reset all of that so

katherine or anybody else do you think that there's a connection there between the idea of you know the pernamos capital funded sort of prospera network state like reimagining of the way our society operates point or is that something separate as you see it? Can I just throw it? I just want to kind of add a point to what Catherine and what Jorvae was saying earlier about the connection between, you know, the things we saw during COVID and of course agenda 2030, how we know that, whether it's a plandemic, scandemic, or war or fake alien invasion or whatever they want to pull out, it's all aiming in the same direction to move towards these systems like the Catherine's talking about program of money and then, of course, track and trace society.

And I do think it's interesting, as Yorbe touched on earlier, that the, I think it was you that mentioned like how like the Strait of the Hormuz is already bringing back this work from home in Vietnam and Denmark and other places. And they're even saying like, oh, it's bringing back this familiar thing like we saw during COVID. They're not being very subtle about it. I also just want to mention, and I'm sure I'm not the only one here thinking about it. Of course, not with any sort of predictions or anything like that. But the very, what I feel is a very real concern about a false flag event coming very soon. I mean in the coming weeks.

I've also been sort of in the back of my mind. If it doesn't happen in the next couple weeks, which let's pray it doesn't, the 250th anniversary of the United States is coming up this summer. I have felt for a long time that if they wanted to pull something off then, then why not do it on this big anniversary that Trump and his administration are going to make a big deal out? And of course, obviously we saw this attack on the synagogue today. That's going to be great for people who want to talk about anti-Semitism spreading. And just this last couple days, ABC News reporting Iranian sleeper cells are getting activated.

remember they reported that a year ago too and now they're bringing it back up again so all the sort of pieces are being laid for us to see something and it could be if they do go with this sleeper cell stuff where there's an attack at major cities all around the u.s and you know they shut the country down i don't know again i'm praying not but we know these people are psychopathic and i think whatever path they use whichever path to persia they're going to try to get you know that that same end goal that we know that they've been working on whether it comes through false flags whether it comes through messing with energy and with oil flow and then using that as an excuse. So that's kind of where my mind has been out lately.

I've even seen them use the phrase new normal as well recently, financial times. But I've heard some people have chimed in that this is not verified, but where some of the Iranian missiles fell into Israel, some of those locations were maybe geared for 15-minute city type. So that kind of stuff needs to be verified. be almost like Iran is helping Israel set up its 15-minute cities and vice versa. That came up as well, that point, because that argument there is there was more so of a collaboration of sort of like, you bomb here, you bomb there, and we'll both back away kind of idea, and that that was one of the kind of chose the locations that would help them in that direction.

I heard the same thing. Interesting. We had a sort of quasi-relationship like that, going back to Syria in 2015, like when Trump notionally destroyed Syria's chemical weapons in 2018 with strikes, they radioed a head to say, we're going to strike there, basically make sure there nobody there. And then after Soleimani was killed, Iran did the same thing. We're going to strike these places. Please don't put any troops there because we really don't want to kill anybody.

There was a push and pull and that kind of thing for years. Yeah, and I find that really interesting. And I don't think that's necessarily all working together. Like, I think that happens in even adversarial positions, but it's worth very much considering that. In regard to the point that Derek brought up about the false flag overlap, I find this really interesting that before, like, the last couple of days of this big push. This came out on the sixth claiming the White House was blocking

an intelligence report warning of that very thing, which to me just rang wildly hollow. Like how, in what past point had they ever not been like waving what they could in front of your face? So I was curious what I think about that. Like is that more of- That's trying to weaponize the Streisand effect. That's exactly what that is. Yeah. But I'm curiously, anyone thought that that was maybe an example of the opposite. Like is this, like we were saying earlier, that maybe Donald Trump is in fact, you know, seeing how we might be being played and trying to pull that back. Like that's one of the thoughts that I had on that. So I think one thing we can do for our audience is help them to see the

absurdity of many of the cover stories that are happening. So if you look at how much surveillance that United States has funded and operates, it's extraordinary the surveillance. And I remember, Ryan, when you did the briefing for us on the monthly legislative briefing about the control model, I think you scared a lot of people to death because the surveillance is so extraordinary and invasive. But somehow thousands of Iranian third column can come into the country and support themselves with income and no problem living and somehow the United States can't do anything about it. You know, that's a contradiction. The contradiction that an empire that can slant drill for purposes of oil drilling or mining down hundreds of hundreds or thousands of yards, if not miles, can't deal with tunnels under Gaza.

And on and on and on. Or a country that spends a trillion dollars a year on military can't keep the straits open, even though that's the primary function of anybody who runs a reserve currency. So the cover story of incompetence again and again and again and again has reached a level of absurdity that is ridiculous. You know, we're back to black teenagers are bringing drugs into the city, but the military can't stop it from coming across the border, right? You know, so all of these...

We've spent a fortune on I am down, but we can't stop handglided with lawnmower motors getting into our airspace. We decimated the Iranian Navy, but there are ghost fleets off the coast of California, loaded down with drones ready to take out San Francisco in L.A. There you go. I think there's got to be, I don't know, it's almost like we need to do a comedy show

on the ridiculousness of the incompetence cover story. So what do we think? That's called AM Wake Up and it's live Monday through Thursday, 7 to 10 on the West Coast. That's what we do. It's one of the fascinating things about propaganda is studying contradictions because of a sort of a flag of any propaganda tribe will be a massive contradiction which A claims that the people saying it are totally competent to know exactly

what they're doing and also have totally fucked up and missed it all up completely. So has anybody here ever heard the story of the Dog King? So Michael Jan put me on to this. Michael and his wife, Massaco, came and spent a couple weeks with us in Netherlands. We had a wonderful time. but there is a myth it's a story and I think it's Swedish where I think it was the Swedes

the Norwegians captured the Danes and they wanted to beat the Danish population into submission. You can find this on the internet and so they created a dog. They made a dog the king and passed laws that said if anybody

doesn't treat the dog as if he's the real king they'll be murdered, they'll be killed. So the whole population had to pretend that the dog was truly the king. And if not, they would be subject to terrible punishments. And I have to tell you both, you know, we are progressively dealing with dog kings in the United States. Okay. So again, the same point to the other point. What are we seeing the implication is in that, right? That this is, you know, actually before I even say that, but there's an opening, let me play this clip

ties together the two points of both the threat, false flag, and incompetence as well with what Trump has to say here, which we can all collectively laugh at, because it's insane and a nothing answer, but also seems to suggest that they're doing nothing about what they know as a threat. Iran's sleeper cells, there could be inside the U.S. right now. I have been, and a lot of people came in through Biden with this stupid open border. But we know where most of them are. We've got our eye on all of them, I think. If it doesings.

They came in through the open border policies of Sleepy Joe Biden. he basically repeats that one more time. But the point is, you know, we know where they are. Maybe some of them, you know, and we're watching them. I think that's kind of an insane answer. What they either do something or don't or, you know, so that's this incompetence angle, you know, is that Trump? I also find it really hard to believe that Trump would intentionally make himself look stupid. I don't even feel like he's borderline capable of that with how narcissistic he is.

But, you know, where do we place all this? What does it truly mean the incompetence we're seeing? I suppose you'd say that, you know, the deep. State is a tiger that an awful lot of nurses think they can ride. And Trump right now is where Hillary was in November 2016. He's just, he's been screwed over by the machine that he thought he was running. I don't think he expected this to go this badly. I think he expected to have won his war by now. I agree. And I think he feels like a fool and he probably should. And so from there it becomes what does he do now? You know, is he being blackmailed, Epstein file style?

Is he unable to respond or is he now suddenly pushing back, which is what I'm trying to, you know, consider with what we're seeing. Because the actions don't line up in a lot of ways, even within what we're discussing. And so you wonder whether that's about to shift. And if it does, what will that look like? You know, because look, it's pretty clear that everything they're doing in Iran is wildly against U.S. interest and what American people want. So at one point, we had a cartoon of a bus and there's a guy driving the bus. And then his steering wheel doesn't connect to the wheels. And downstairs the other guy driving the bus and his.

steering wheel does connect to the wheel. So Trump is the guy up front and he's got to explain to people what's happening wherever the bus goes because he doesn't want to admit he's not driving the bus. And I don't know if you see the one where he says, they ask him, is it a war and there's an excursion? He says, well, it's an excursion, but it's also a war, but it's an excursion. And that's what happens when you're driving the bus and your steering wheel doesn't connect. I don't think he knows what's going to happen next. Right. I always use the Maggie Simpson analogy from the Simpsons opening, you know, with a little fake steering wheel. Same point, you know, just not really in charge.

But, you know, I don't know. I just, I don't feel like this adds up for me because I feel like that Donald Trump's the kind of person that is either completely compromised and unable to do something or would be doing it all the way he wants it. You know, I just a middle ground doesn't line up for me. But where we are right now, it's hard to tell, you know. So, I mean, I think there's a lot of, a lot of other angles we can go into. I'm not sure how long everybody wanted to go today.

But, you know, I think that we've talked about a lot of really important parts of that this that aren't necessarily the, you know, surface level, like, because we could have discussed about the illegalities of how it started or, you know, and I honestly think that we started, I think those are very self-evident right now. I think people see the obviousness of that. And so I'm glad we focused on sort of the bigger picture here about where it ends up going. So we want to kind of go into that to wrap in general, like, you know, where do we think this will end up? What, what, you know, where is it going to go from here? I think a lot of the, a lot of the people like Trump or most politicians are just forced to react and go along with the deep state. And there's a lot of chatter

in the comments about false flag. And again, the sleeper cells, you know, what I experienced a few weeks ago here in Mexico, it almost felt like, you know, driving in church and almost driving around half a dozen narco blockades. And they're talking about Iranian sleeper cells coming up through Mexico. And it's almost like, what if they were, you know, that was an operation Gladio, they were practicing for what they might unleash on the U.S. and then, you know, talk of tactical nukes. And so I think if they're going to do something, you know, it's possible they might launch something on the level of 9-11 or COVID in the sense of, you know, biological or chemical weapons to eviscerate what's left of the constitution. And then some people are putting out that

maybe this will be used to take down America. And, you know, when I say, you know, see Netanyahu today saying, what did he say? We will make it to the return of the Messiah. And it's almost cartoonish. And myself as a Christian, I feel like this Zionism, political Zionism that's attached to this American faith Christianity, it's almost like it's also trying to take down Christianity with it. And then this will maybe all blow up and be used to take down the U.S. to move towards the multipolar, as I call it, totalitarian. and federalized multipolar world state. I don't know.

I agree. I agree. That's where I see this aiming as well. And I think it's alarming how clear it seems to be that it's drifting in that direction. You know, the sleeper cell point to focus on that, since you brought it up, you know, I think it's clear that this, I don't see in any world where that would be in the interest of Iran in any way, whether it's publicly known they did it, whether it was done secretly and not known.

I don't see how that in any way lines up with what they would want, you know, is it in their interest at all. So the worry is that that's exactly what we've always seen, that this is done to make Americans fearful to paint a picture of what they want you to think the big boogie man is of Iran, even though most everything they say about Iran. And it's not to say that they're good guy versus bad guy, but they just lie about them. It's self-you know, it's provable. So I very much worry what that will lead to, right? The creation of that collapse of this to lead to the larger point we're making today. Go ahead. Well, you could, the most interesting thing of the results of any false flag would be how they actually cover it. Because right now, I've been glad to think that any

force flag that happened in America. Most papers wouldn't say this is Iran's fault. I think they would say this is Donald Trump's fault for starting war in the first place. I think that's the place where we're at right now. And yeah, I can see it being like this is the last

American war essentially. So unless there is some kind of awful collapse into a kind of civil war which could happen. I mean, they've teased a second civil war in America for years. And I could see that eventually. just organically breaking out.

But yeah, I think five years down the line, we will be talking about the ex-American empire, and I think they have started that process now. Well, if the United States does devolve into civil war, everyone come out to

Northern California, will reclaim the state of Jefferson, and we'll go from there. We'll go from there. This is, I mean, this is absolutely a march to, you know, balkanized one world global tyranny. I don't, I find it very difficult to see it any other way, especially since it seems like

the last 25 years of global war on terror was priming the pump for this particular conflict. Everything that's been thrown at us along the way as far as the digital surveillance state and the technocratic prison goes, is. part of this eventual partitioned one world government entity and the what Catherine refers to is the B system is being rolled out in every country there are what 193 countries and 193 of them signed on to a handful of different global compacts that all effectively implement the one world government style policy and eventually currency without effectively coming out and making a statement that this is one unified body. Right. And that includes Iran. That includes a ram.

Exactly. Yes. All the world leaders that were unlikely to sign up to that agreement all suddenly died of heart attacks in March 2020. Mostly in Africa, right? Yeah. Well, I mean, the religious part of this, which we really didn't get into, which is, you know, very clear. It's not even being, you know, that was something that was. sort of a conspiracy theory until now it's being proudly discussed by Hegzeth, you know,

that this is a religious war. You know, this is Armaged, and we're fighting God's war. And there's tons of military personnel are outraged about that. But you get two angles of it, right? You've got the Jewish Zionist perspective of this, which ultimately is, you know, the Messiah has never come. And ultimately the second coming from the Western Christian perspective. But what's interesting is, this is what this is a important point to leave you with as we wrap this up, is that we have people in the Trump administration, like Hegsa, 3%, they're religious Zionists and the belief being that the West has to essentially collapse

before the end times. And that's a strange thing to somehow make, you know, reconcile with America first. I think that's worth considering. But you know who's been strangely absent from all that talk, of course, is J.D. Vance. He has shut himself up on a bunker somewhere. He doesn't want to do with this.

He's very embarrassed about it, I'm sure. But here's the thing. The bankers always, you know, All wars are bankers wars, and it's really central bankers, not bankers. But Brian, they can't just say, look, we're going to kill you and steal their stuff, right? They need, the mandate of heaven suggests that you need some philosophy that describes why you have the mandate of heaven. And that's why they get all these crazy people in cooks and pay them a lot of money to say this crazy stuff. You know, that's where Paula White comes from.

And it's just, it's like flack. It's just, it's info flack. Of course, I mean, if we are talking about the decline of America, then anybody with any sense doesn't want to be captain of the sinking ship. So they're going to appoint disposable morons. I mean, it's just the way it is. And this comes back around to the whole, the 2016 argument that a lot of us were floating around that Trump was picked to bring down this country. You know, and oh, no, the administration ended. We moved on.

Oh, maybe not. You know, well, they think longer than one administration apparently. And I think that that's, obviously. I think that's a very important thing to consider, whether this. is that exact long term. And interestingly, as we all seem to somewhat agree on, this aims toward the Great Reset or whatever we want to call it, does the Republican flavor, or, you know, whatever they need to coerce you with right now, it goes in that very same direction. That's again why I think that connection point to the larger sort of, you know, tech-led mindset to these governments are

part of that. That's just the way I see that, though. But either way, the Great Reset seems to be in full effect. And I just add on the apparent religious, Christian religious, I can't say of some of these leaders. You know, I just can't but think, I don't think some of it is genuine. We look at George Bush back in the day, Skull and Bones. You know, this guy's on the face of it, not a Christian, but he says God told me to invade Iraq. So I think some of these guys believe in other things,

and before we do leave, it's a shame Derek left us, but I think we do have to mention his debate with Naomi Wolf, and I couldn't get past 10 minutes when he mentioned Operation Ajax, which is a fact. You can read the 30-page CIA document. And he mentioned Greater Israel, where last week, Yaira Lapid was asked, yes, we want to go to biblical

boundaries, Greater Israel. And Naomi Wolf was like, well, you presented evidence. You presented a argument without evidence. I'm like, what are you talking about? And so... In the opening statement? Is that what you mean? Is that what you're talking? Yeah, no. She had

zero concept of even the most basic ideas of what a debate is supposed to be. She, if, if my, my theory is that about 20 seconds into Derek's opening statement, she realized she was in way over her head and went to, uh, you know, underhanded tactics of trying to destroy credibility, character assassination, ad hominem, gish galloping, interrupting. Yeah, all, and then she did this weird, like, talk down condescending things. thing that was almost like misandrist in its

delivery and I believe it was intentionally delivered that way to try to bait Derek into some sort of reaction, not realizing that if you're actually self-funded independent media for

as long as Derek has been something that elementary and banal isn't going to break you. So I just want to say that Naomi Wolf has always been a good friend and someone I liked, and this is completely out of character. Yeah.

That seems to be the general consensus, Catherine, all around. Yeah. We watched the live view and we're, you know, I agree. And I think it's there for people to watch. It speaks for itself. And I was taken aback by, you know, opinions I even had. It was shocking to me. And it's worth watching for everybody.

And the question is why, you know, the evidence is there. I mean, the great point you made right there about, I mean, is anybody pretending like, we don't see the Zionist element to this point or Israel's involvement with Iran war. You know, it's amazing the pushback you get from her and others that if you simply bring up Israel's involvement is somehow like a, oh, here we go. And it's like, and so it shows you this unwillingness to engage with the reality of the situation for whatever reason. So, you know, people should watch it if they want to. Go ahead,

Catherine. I would make a suggestion because I don't know this because I haven't talked to Naomi about it, but I would strongly recommend you watch one of my favorite documentaries in the world. It's called Defamation. Does anybody here seen it? It was made by an Israeli filmmaker, and it was his exploration of what is anti-Semitism and where does it come from? And it's quite extraordinary. It was documentary of the year on the Salieri Report.

I was so impressed with it. But it will help you understand why there is a real terror among many people in the Jewish community. community who feels that if Israel is determined to be less than perfect or less than excellent, that somehow it will put them a terrible risk. And you see how that philosophy has gotten marketed and inculcated. And I will say this, I have very dear long-term friends who, in the Jewish community, who right now do feel terror about what's happening and believing they'll be blamed. And I keep telling them, look, we're dealing with a criminal syndicate here. And, you know, it shouldn't be interpreted as being representative as a Jewish community.

But the Jewish community is used by a shield as a shield by that criminal syndicate. Defamation describes that brilliantly as to how that's been engineered. And so I do think it's very important. I feel that people in the Jewish community not live in terror. and anything we can do to get them out of that would be worthwhile. I agree. And this is a gigantic conversation that we've all probably tackled in their own way in, you know, over however many years. But it's worth just noting that, you know, it's very important to see that difference

and recognize that what she's describing there is how Zionism uses that as a shield, as you're discussing. And I just think that, at least that's speaking for myself. And I think that's very important to see how that is, you know, the trap about creating the idea that the Jewish people at large are somehow the only responsible element to all of this, when a reality is the Zionism overlap to all of these things. And I think that's really important to understand. And as I agree with you entirely, Catherine,

the ultimate point is that, you know, there's that push to create that framing in order to get the pivot from the real focal point. You know, and yes, there is, there are areas of action. And it's unjustified, you know. I don't know if you've ever heard me, I don't know if you've ever heard me say this, But, you know, I'm from Philadelphia.

And Netanyahu graduated from Cheltenham High in Philadelphia. You know, so I just see him as a Philly mobster. I don't see him. I don't even raise it to a philosophy. Like, you know, Zionism is a philosophy. I don't, I just see him as a criminal syndicate. But any kid in Philadelphia would have told you never give a nuclear bomb or a nuclear arsenal to a kid from Cheltenham High School. Never do that.

So, there you go. Anyway. Well, I don't know. We shouldn't give you the Russell to any kids at all, to be honest. Yeah, yeah. But I think people come at that from the other way as well. If you start talking about Iran, you'll get an awful lot of people saying, how can you say this, thinking about the poor civilians in Iran.

And there is a mental trap we can all fall into where we don't separate the idea of nations and peoples from their governments. Right. When we talk about Iran and Israel, we're talking about the governments of Iran and Israel, and we'll just say Israel as a short end. And we'll say Iran as a short hand. But there is an understanding, and obviously I think most people have it instinctively, and I think we all share it, that the people in those governments have much more in common with each other than they do with the people they represent. And we have much more in common with the ordinary people of Israel or Iran than we do with our governments. Well, yeah, exactly.

That's so offensive to the people who think otherwise, interestingly enough, which speaks for itself. But, yeah, I think it's very important to see that. And, you know, I think this is a good place to kind of wrap. And if anybody else, you know, if we want to have any final thoughts, jump in. Otherwise, I think it's a good place to kind of wrap up. Anybody in the final thoughts? All right. Well, it's going to.

I have one. I have one final thought, actually, just one. He came in like Colombo. James ended with a quote. And I would like to end with a quote as well from a book published about the same time. George Orwell, 1984. I think it's a very important quote. War, it will be seen, is now a purely internal affair.

The war is waged by each ruling group against its own subjects, and the object of that war is not to make or prevent conquests, but to keep the structure of society intact. I think that's something we should all think about. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, good. We'll leave it there for today. Plenty more IMA panels coming your way, guys. I'd imagine we're probably going to have another conversation about Iran if this continues.

So thank you all for being here. And as always, everybody out there, question everything. come to your own conclusions. Thank you. Sorry, go ahead, Catherine. I didn't mean to cut you off. No, she's saying thank you. Sorry.

Thank you. I know how hard it is to organize these, and I think you do a wonderful job. I deeply appreciate it. Thank you. And thank you, everybody, for tuning in. See you next time, guys.