The Young Turks - Bombs Away! - September 9, 2026

Episode Date: September 10, 2026

The U.S. military says it destroyed five Iranian crude-oil carriers after Iran’s Revolutionary Guard targeted a U.S. Navy warship with ballistic missiles, marking another major escalation in the Iran conflict.  Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is challenging traders to bet against the Japanese yen, while reports say Donald Trump’s oil investments have gained millions as the war drives energy prices higher. "Thanks to today's sponsors: Get 40% OFF the Ground News Vantage Plan when you sign up at ground.news/tyt Stay informed without the media spin at ground.news/tyt Visit www.sleep.me/tyt to get up to $255 off your Chilipad 2.0 with code TYT Use Code TYT for 20% OFF at TruDiagnostic.com Posting a job is easy at upwork.com Use less data, get paid by switching to Noble Mobile: https://go.tyt.com/getnoble Hosts: Ana Kasparian SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE ☞  https://www.youtube.com/@TheYoungTurks FOLLOW US ON: FACEBOOK  ☞   https://www.facebook.com/theyoungturks TWITTER  ☞       https://twitter.com/TheYoungTurks INSTAGRAM  ☞  https://www.instagram.com/theyoungturks TIKTOK  ☞          https://www.tiktok.com/@theyoungturks 👕MERCH  ☞      https:/www.shoptyt.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. Visit BetMGM Casino and check out the newest exclusive. The Price is Right Fortune Pick. BetMDM and Game Sense remind you to play responsibly, 19 plus to wager. Ontario only.

Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, Peace contact connects Ontario at 1-866-531-2,600 to speak to an advisor. Free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. You know, not good. I'm so upset. Oh my God.

The God. Welcome to TYT. I'm your host, Anna Kasparian. And not only are we going to dive into some foreign policy and international news today, we've got a big story regarding employees at various. artificial intelligence companies blowing the whistle on just how dangerous this technology is. In fact, some of these employees have just quit their jobs in order to blow the whistle. But we'll try to make sense of that story and more later on in the show.

We're also going to talk a little bit about how much money President Donald Trump has made off of this war against Iran. I think this is an angle that isn't talked about enough. Obviously, we have lots of discussion here on TYT about the undue influence Israel has over our country. We also talk about the impact of money in politics and how our private defense contractors are successful in persuading our lawmakers to go to war by just simply bribing them. But there's the other layer, the ongoing stock trading that takes place with not just members of Congress, but President Trump as well. He's heavily invested in some of these oil companies, and I want to get into the numbers later. So definitely tune in. Stay tuned for that.

But let's actually start off with some of the updates regarding the ongoing war, which Trump doesn't want to call, but it's a war against Iran. Because after we ended the show yesterday, there was news of things escalating further. So let's get into it. The U.S. military sinking an Iranian oil tanker near Karg Island in the Gulf of Oman. Look it right there. One of the five Iranian tankers hit yesterday in response to a series of failed attacks targeting U.S. warships. We've knocked out nine of their ships. I would say that the attacks are caused by us, yeah. And you're going to see, you're going to see a lot more.

We've taken out about nine of their tankers. Many of them are gonzow. What's also gonzo is lower gas prices, but we'll get to that in just a minute. First, some big updates in regard to the ongoing war against Iran. The United States bombed more Iranian oil tankers, as you just heard President Donald Trump brag about in that clip, while the IRGC absolutely retaliated with a heavy bombardment on U.S. military bases in Jordan. Now, this is absolutely a hot war. Any way you cut it at all signs lead in the direction of a more aggressive Iran. So let's get into the details so you can understand why that's my take on where we currently stand here. Because since our last show yesterday, the U.S. actually launched more

air strikes against Iranian oil tankers. And U.S. officials who spoke to Fox News claim that these strikes took place near Karg Island, near the Iranian and near the Iranian port of Jask on the Gulf of Oman. Now, obviously, I believe the United States is under the impression that by striking oil tankers, they are weakening Iran further, economically speaking, and by squeezing Iran economically, the Trump administration is under the impression that they will bring the Iranian regime, as they call it, to their knees. But there is absolutely no indication. In fact, when you look at modern warfare, there has been absolutely no indication that using, you know, sanctions or squeezing a country economically leads them to concede or to bend to the will of, you know, the country they're at war with. And in fact, if you go back and study how Iran conducted warfare during the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s, you'll see that, well, Iran isn't a country that's easy to break, even when you deploy literal chemical weapons, which is what was deployed with the help

of the United States. We supplied Iraq with chemical weapons that were then used against the Iranians. And guess what? The IRGC is still in place. The system of government they have in Iran is still in place. The Iran-Iraq war did not break Iran. Now, going to the announcements by CENTCOM, they posted this just yesterday, noting that CENTCOM forces destroyed five Iranian crude oil carriers, September 8th after the Islamic Revolutionary

Guard Corps targeted a U.S. Navy warship with ballistic missiles twice over the past two days. We actually talked about that in depth on yesterday's show. Further, they write that the U.S. warship successfully evaded the attempted Iranian attack and continued to patrol regional waters. No American personnel were harmed. Washington now says that despite what you heard from Trump, claiming that we have destroyed nine Iranian tankers. Washington is now saying that 10 Iranian tankers were attacked over the last week. Iranian media has acknowledged that at least one tanker was struck near Karg Island. But luckily, there were no casualties due to prior evacuation efforts. So Major General Ali Abdullahi, who is the chief of the general staff of the Iranian

armed forces said the following, quote. The aggressive U.S. army has taken Iranian oil tankers, has given Iranian, let me read that again, sorry, the aggressive U.S. army has given Iranian oil tankers a warning to evacuate in order to attack them. So I declare that any attack on Iranian oil tankers will result in the targeting of U.S. bases in the region by the armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Meanwhile, the IRGC has provided statements of their own. The IRGC says that it attacked 10 ships near the Strait of Hormuz, including two U.S. vessels and eight tankers.

The United States disputes Iran's claim that American warships were actually hit. At least one merchant seafarer has been killed and another is missing. So we are very much in the fog of war and it's unclear whether Iran succeeds. in striking those U.S. vessels, but there has been some indication that Iran caused some damage to our U.S. military base in Jordan. In fact, there is a video right now going viral showing, okay, what you're looking at right now is the missile interceptors intercepting the Iranian missiles above Jordan. And this is really important to point out, guys, because I believe that Iran's strategy here, knowing that the United States is running out of Patriot missiles, Interceptor missiles,

they are trying to push the United States to further deplete what is left of their inventory or their arsenal of these interceptors. And so they carry out this heavy bombardment of Jordan, the U.S. and Jordan deploy the interceptor missiles, which of course, that's a finite resource that we are running low on. And so it'll eventually get to the point where the U.S. It's a game of chicken and it's also a game of waiting. And it seems like Iran has a lot more patience because they are more prepared, militarily speaking. They're able to produce these missiles. They're able to produce these drones.

They're able to carry out of a barbit like they did over the sky in Jordan. And these interceptor missiles have to be deployed in order to intercept them. Jordan says that they intercepted 18 out of 20 missiles. Although if you take a look at this next video, you will see at least four missiles make contact. They did not get intercepted. So it's unclear how much damage has been caused. But going back to what I was referencing earlier, there was a Black Hawk helicopter that was clearly damaged. You can see it in the video being taken away from that U.S. air base.

So we don't know the full extent yet of how much damage these aerial bombardments by the the Iranians has carried out. But usually in a few days, we'll get this giant Wall Street Journal article about how much we have suffered in terms of military losses as a result of this ongoing war that we really shouldn't be involved in at all. Does this sound like you? You're lying in bed and suddenly you realize it's 2 a.m. And you've been doom scrolling for hours. That late night doomscroll doesn't just wreck your brain. It spikes your internal temperature. And when you're overheated, your body, never hits that deep restorative sleep.

The fix isn't in a new mattress or a renovation. It's your bed temperature. That's where Chili Pad 2.0 comes in. This water-based topper slides right over your current mattress and runs from 55 to 115 degrees. While fans just push hot air on, chili pad uses actively chilled water to actually extract heat from your body.

The 2.0 upgrades include a quieter dock with a bigger tank, a premium cover that zips off for washing, And my favorite, the nightstand remote has a sensor that knows when you climb in and fires up your schedule automatically. Dual Zones lets you and your partner pick completely different temperatures and you both win. No subscription, just a two-year warranty and built in the USA. Visit www.sleep.combe. To get up to $255 off your ChiliPad 2.0 with code TYT. That's www.

W.S-L-E-E-P-E-P-T-Y-T. Free shipping, free returns, and a 30-night trial. So you can test it out, dream big, and wake up better. The headlines will still be there in the morning. You might as well wake up ready for them. So one thing that's undeniable is that the United States did have to deploy these interceptors. And so Iran's aggressive posture is really no surprise. It is part of their strategy.

They know that the midterms are coming. They want to harm President Trump politically in the lead up to the midterms. I think they're actually doing a pretty good job with that, especially when you look at the cost of oil per barrel, especially when you take a look at how much Americans are paying at the pump. So on Sunday, Mohamed Boggar Ghalibov, Iran's lead negotiator and the Speaker of Parliament told lawmakers that the era of proportionate responses to American attacks was over. Iran's security chief, Moshen Rasaia, also announced plans to impose a restricted zone for shipping in the Persian Gulf that would go beyond the country's efforts to control the Strait of Hormuz. So all of this, as we all know, translates to spikes in the cost of oil per barrel. That obviously translates into higher prices at the pump. We already know that diesel per gallon has reached record levels in terms of price.

And it's not as though a peaceful option was off the table. So senior Iranian officials have said over and over and over again that they are willing to negotiate a return to the admittedly fragile memorandum of understanding, which halted the war back in April. But President Trump is the one who says, I've got no interest in these negotiations, no more negotiations. Yeah, we're running low on munitions. Yeah, we're running low on interceptor missiles. Yeah, it's true that we have already depleted 31% of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve. It is also true that seasoned military leadership has warned me that we cannot sustain these types of military actions. But I'm still going to reject the possibility of engaging in negotiations to end this war,

you know, an actual negotiated settlement to end this war. He really thinks, you know, in this war of attrition, we're going to suffocate Iran economically and I will be the victor of this war, which I don't believe is going to play out that way. It certainly hasn't been playing out that way. On Tuesday, Iran's state news agency, IRNA, announced that naval forces of the powerful revolutionary guards had seized a U.S. submarine drone known as the dive LD. Iran has previously managed to reverse engineer weapons offered to it by its allies or captured from its enemies.

And that's not the only weapon they managed to capture just yesterday. They also captured an unmanned submarine. mean, so that's not good. And let's get into the oil prices because Goldman Sachs is warning that these heightened attacks in the Persian Gulf and, not to mention the Red Sea with the Houthis, could soon push oil prices above $120 per barrel. Remember, this is Goldman Sachs saying this. This isn't some foreign policy analyst. Goldman Sachs is providing what they believe is accurate information to investors, to their clients, and they're saying things aren't looking good. The price of oil per barrel is likely to hit $120 soon. And so the investment bank's forecast

implies a roughly 20% increase in the cost of Brent Crude, the international benchmark, which is trading at nearly $100 a barrel right now as we speak. And if you're wondering, How the hell are Israel's fanatical supporters in the U.S. explaining all of this? We get dragged into this war against Iran. There is no benefit to the United States, even if this war was going well for the United States. We are now experiencing inflation that is obviously directly caused by the war against Iran. So what do people like Randy Fine have to say about the inflation, the American people, are experiencing in order to fight a war at the behest of a foreign country, Israel, where

here is Randy Fine, Republican congressman from Florida, finding a convenience scapegoat to point to. Take a look. Most Americans blame the Trump administration for rising prices, which have consistently gone up under President Trump because of tariffs and also this war in Iran. Why should voters give Republicans another chance here? Yeah, no, prices are a big deal. Affordability is a huge deal. And I think one thing people need to understand is how the price increases have dropped since President Trump took over. The only way we will ever get prices down is to reduce demand for all of those products. And the largest source of demand that we have in this country that we should not have is illegal immigrants. When you have 30 to 50 million people renting apartments, buying homes, buying groceries, buying. cars, that is a source of demand that pushes up prices for every American. No, homie, we're not stupid. Okay, so if we were having a discussion about housing prices, you could make the argument

that a giant influx or inflow of migrants is going to increase housing prices when you have limited supply. But that's not what we're talking about here. We are specifically talking about inflation that is obviously directly connected to the increase or the spike in the cost of oil, or the fact that, you know, one-third of the globe's fertilizer needs to be transited through the Strait of Hormuz. And right now, because of the increased kinetic warfare that's taking place in that area, the transit through the Strait of Hormuz has slowed down even further, which is a complete and utter disaster. So let's actually talk a

a little bit about how much more Americans have been spending on energy as a result of this war. Because American consumers spent an additional, an additional, $100 billion on fuel between the start of the Iran War on February 28th and September 8th, according to a tracker from Brown University. Higher gasoline prices accounted for about $55 billion of that amount, while diesel accounted for the remaining $45 billion. Now, the cost of diesel is at an all-time high. And for those who don't know, diesel is the fuel that our truckers need in order to transport goods and services. So if the cost of fuel increases for the truckers transporting goods and services,

what do you think that means for the cost of goods and services? By the way, Goldman also notes that markets are increasingly bracing for a prolonged conflict, meaning another forever war. So it's not just crazy people like me saying, we're in for a forever war. You have analysts over at Goldman Sachs advising their clients, letting them know, brace yourselves. This isn't going to end anytime soon. Options now apply a 25% probability that Brent will remain above $100 per barrel in March of 2027, up from a 6% probability a month ago.

Trump, meanwhile, thinks anyone with two brain cells to rub together actually take him seriously. Here's what he told reporters about gas prices. Right after the election, oil prices are going to be tumult. They're going to be tumbling down and we'll get them down. I think for gasoline, we'll get them below $2 a gallon. But not until after the midterm. I think it's going to take a little bit longer than the midterm. You know that feeling when you're doing everything you're supposed to be doing, eating healthy,

working out, getting sleep, taking supplements, and you still wonder, is any of this actually working? Because doing all the right things doesn't always mean it's working for you. That's why I'm excited about the true age tests from true diagnostic. It uses epigenetics, which may sound complicated, but it's really about tiny chemical tags on your DNA that change in response to sleep, stress, diet, exercise, and your environment. True age reads those tags to estimate how your body is aging. And unlike many biological age tests, their methods are published in peer-reviewed scientific

journals and were developed with researchers at Harvard, Yale, and Duke. You get a clear picture of where you are and where you can improve. Plus, personalized recommendations around nutrition, exercise, sleep, supplements, and lifestyle. The process is simple. At home finger prick, send it back, get your report online in about three to four weeks. So if you want to optimize your health, true age gives you a much clearer starting point. So if you're serious about longevity or even just curious whether your body is aging faster or slower than your actual age, this is one of the easiest ways to find out.

Right now, go to truediagnostic.com and use code TYT for 20% off your entire order. That's true diagnostic.com code TYT for 20% off. I mean, honestly, even if you do take him seriously, that's not great news. It's going to take a little longer than the midterms. This war isn't ending anytime soon and gas prices are not coming down anytime soon. Again, just going back to some of the mitigating factors when it comes to the price that you're paying at the pump, keep in mind that China stopped importing oil from Iran and they tapped into their strategic petroleum reserves. That's not going to last forever. That is not sustainable.

The other thing that mitigated a giant spike in the cost of gas or cost of fuel at the stations is the fact that the United States has also been tapping into a giant spike in the cost of gas or cost of fuel at the stations is the fact that the United States has also been tapping into a, Strategic Petroleum Reserve releasing that petroleum in order to, again, mitigate the huge spike that we would be experiencing otherwise in the cost of energy. And so Trump's delusions, again, just didn't stop there. There's a little taste of another lie that he has repeatedly told the American people again and again and again. Take a look. I think the war is going to end immediately after the election. I think the war will end immediately after the election because they can't hold out any longer. They're desperate to try and affect the election so that we can get a nice, weak group of people in there and leave them alone and let them have their nuclear weapon.

All they want is a nuclear weapon. And if they had a nuclear weapon, the whole world is in deep trouble. So not only is he delusional about how the outcome of this war will play out, he's also repeating the lie that this entire conflict is about nuclear weapons. It's not about nuclear weapons. We all know it's not about nuclear weapons. And if we're having a discussion about nuclear weapons, the country that should denuclearize is the one that's currently committing genocide, ethnic cleansing, leveling dozens of villages in southern Lebanon. And that would be Israel. They have a clandestine nuclear weapon, a nuclear program, I should say. They stole nuclear material from the United States. They stole nuclear secrets from the United States in order to build that illegal clandestine nuclear program. And ever since, on multiple occasions, the Israelis have threatened to deploy those nukes. So if we're going to have a discussion about the threat of nuclear Armageddon,

I'm less worried about Iran and a lot more concerned about Israel. But hey, this is a concern that our political leaders would share if we lived in a just society. But we don't live in a just society. We live in a society that is somehow unduly influenced by a tiny little country in the Middle East that has no natural resources. Make it make sense. The math ain't mathin. But hey, our country is bleeding out for Israel, still engaged in this stupid war against Iran. In reality, I think things should have flipped.

I think we should have made an alliance with Iran given the fact that there could have been a great economic relationship there. And we should have severed our ties with the country that has driven us into wars and debt on its behalf. Where is Israel right now? As we're dealing with Iran on their behalf, what is Israel up to? Oh, trying to steal more land in Lebanon. What are we doing? If you haven't woken up to the reality that our political leaders, both Democrat and Republican, have essentially betrayed our country and the American people, I don't know what it would take to get you to wake up. But that is the reality of this situation right now. All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, we'll get into, well, our Treasury Secretary's decision to do more of the same, which is fail.

Fail. Just failure all around. We'll be right back. Trumpe la oil or pronounced Trump-Loye. Sorry, my apologies. New haircut, Salty Anna. It's not a new haircut. I just didn't curl it.

But thank you. Jack Callahan says, Mamdani and his administration, along with John Stewart, have proof that four administrations lied to the public about the toxic chemicals in the aftermath of 9-11 being safe. The way that Mamdani is

being attacked right now by like a small unhinged group of Zionists in New York City makes me sick to my stomach given the fact that he is the only mayor who released these documents showing that the government, the local government there, couldn't care less about their own people in lying to them about the toxicity in the air following 9-11. So many people got cancer after the World Trade Center was attacked. And I just, it's so obvious that they hate him because he's Muslim and he's critical of Israel. That's all it is. That's all it takes.

And honestly, it makes me sick. Every single time I hear anyone utter a word about the big problem we have in this country with anti-Semitism, when in reality all we hear all day long is the most disgusting Islamophobic garbage. I just, I want to lose my mind. I feel like I'm going crazy. But okay. Progressive veteran says, so is Iran not striking Israel directly because they will nuke Iran? Right now, Iran's main strategy, and I think it's a good strategy, is to get the United States out of that region.

And they're succeeding. They're destroying the bases. I want to read a quick comment before we get to the next story, because there's a message I just really want to share with our audience. it's really important, especially those who are negatively impacted by what's happening in the Middle East. So SM writes in in our member section and says, I'm a pawnbroker and people are hurting right now. Only the 1% has not felt the crunch.

Look, I'm not going to complain. I feel like I'm very fortunate. I'm not wealthy, despite what people might think. But even I'm feeling it, obviously. and I want to tell you about a new podcast series I'm enjoying from future hindsight, Occupy, an unfinished uprising. Occupy Wall Street is the story of the improbable becoming possible. In 2008, millions of people were devastated by an economic crash caused by Wall Street greed. But it wasn't until 2011 that there was a mass response from the left.

A call to protests went out and thousands of people responded. I know, I was there. They raged against a system that was rigged against. them and tried to create their own anti-capitalist village in a small Manhattan park. The movement quickly spread across the country inspiring hundreds of occupations and a new generation of activists. Occupy, an unfinished uprising, is told through the voices of activists who camped out in Zucati Park for almost two months, getting inside the drama of a movement that grew rapidly,

felt both transcendent and chaotic, and then violently flamed out. Occupy changed the national conversation about capitalism, popularized the language of the 99% and inspired a generation of activists. As we approach Occupy's 15th anniversary this September, this series offers a reminder that collective action can reshape what seems possible. To listen, search for future hindsight wherever you get your podcast. We live in a very atomized world. I think that's intentional. I think this divide and conquer strategy is very much at play. But if you haven't spoken to any of your neighbors before, reach out to your neighbors, get to know them, build a community and help each other out. Because now more than ever, given where this

war is going, given where we're already at with the cost of oil, given the inflation we're likely to experience when it comes to the cost of food, we need to have each other's backs. Okay, I know this is a difficult thing to do because we've been conditioned to be so politicized in this like tribal mindset. But like put all politics aside and reach out to your fellow American and see if there's anything you can do to help them because there might come a day where you need their help. And we just need to build these communities and have each other's backs now more than ever. So SM, that breaks my heart. I don't deny what you're saying. I see it every single day myself. And people are really hurting. Marty Mule, 1962 in our member section says,

Anna, great interview on the Mario Nafal podcast. I loved it when you challenged him, when you talked about my Buccabee, great job again. Thank you for spreading the truth. Yes, guys. So I'm going to be going on Mario's show this month every Wednesday. We're going to try that out for a month, see how it goes. But I just, I really enjoy being able to just talk freely about foreign policy or any issue that I'm invited to talk about. So check that out after the main show today if you want to. Okay, let's get to our next story. Let's talk a little bit about the bond market. We have, what, 40 trillion of debt? What kind of GDP growth do you think we need to have to bring that down or at least arrested for it.

So I'd say a couple of things. We in the U.S., we don't have a revenue problem. We have a spending problem. So we've tried to contain the spending. And then with 3% growth, we grow our way out of this. 3% GDP growth, which I think we can attain. Delusional, which would be fine. There's plenty of delusional people in the world.

But unfortunately, that was Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, pretending that the U.S. economy can outgrow the national debt. And if you don't know what the national debt is, you must be blissfully ignorant. Okay, I would love to not know all of these devastating details about our current economic situation. But we're $40 trillion in debt, and that number keeps growing,

given the fact that we continue spending on things that we shouldn't be spending on, like wars at the behest of foreign countries. So Besson announced today that the government will spend at least another $10 billion on buying its own long-term debt. And of course, this is all being done in order to lower the interest rate on the 30-year bond. And the way that Besson is going to do this is by issuing more short-term. debt. Now, if this sounds familiar to you, it's because this is exactly the tactic that Bessent deployed not too long ago, just a few weeks ago, and it failed. So honestly, one must ask

why Bessent is under the impression that doing more of the same will lead to a different result. So the Treasury Department announced today that they will buy back up to $6 billion worth of government debt, but hold. They also said that they will spend another $4 billion in future buyback operations. But if you can recall, again, just last month, Treasury Secretary Besson announced that it would be executing a debt buyback maneuver, maneuver, maneuver probably makes more sense, but maneuver. And that didn't work. Long-term debt was purchased by issuing more short-term debt, in other words, robbing Peter to pay Paul. Make it make sense. Look, these little gimmicks, these little tactics, they've worked in the past. They're not working now because we are 40 trillion

dollars in debt and engaged in a war that is very costly and has no end in sight. We are taking out more and more debt to continue the war against Iran. And it is crushing out. economy. Investors do not want to invest in U.S. Treasuries because they're worried that the U.S. is not going to be able to pay back its debt. That's what's happening right now. Anyway, let's check in on what happened the last time Secretary Besson decided to do buybacks of the long-term bond by issuing short-term debt. Well, the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield rose to 4.85 percent, its highest level since 2023. And if all this sounds like foreign language to you,

remember yields, meaning the return, the interest rate on these bonds rise when bond prices fall. Investors are selling bonds, pushing prices lower, and yields higher. The rise in yields is lifting borrowing costs for consumers and governments alike. That's where we come in.

That's why this story is so important to ordinary consumers, ordinary Americans, because this is basically the baseline for how expensive borrowing is going to be for everyone, not just the government. So that means the 10-year treasury yield is a big part of how mortgage rates are calculated, for instance. It also affects credit card rates. And as we know, Americans have increasingly relied on credit card debt in order to make ends meet in a pretty terrible economic situation. We are at record levels of credit card debt. The 10-year U.S. Treasury yield is also important for the United States government because it borrows so much money. So we're in this vicious doom loop, a vicious cycle of more debt, higher interest in order to service that debt. And as I've repeated on the show multiple times before, I mean, we are at a point where we're

spending a trillion dollars a year just to service our debt. So let's take a look at this graphic because it'll show you what our situation really looks like. This is the ugly truth. So according to us debt clock.org, that's where we got this information. This is what the national debt looked like this morning alone. And if you visit the site, you can watch it increase in real time because we just keep spending, spending, spending, Something that, you know, Israel's most ardent defenders, Ben Shapiro being one of them, pretended to be very concerned about when it came to spending on our social safety net entitlement programs that we've paid into and are expecting to receive something from. But when it comes to funding Israel's wars in the Middle East, he wants more.

More, more, more, more, more, more, more, more. So those fiscal conservatives who are Israel firsters are and have always been full of crap. And so the higher the 10 year treasury yield goes, the more expensive it is for the government to borrow money. And traders are onto Besson's scheme. They know what he's doing and they're not buying these gimmicks. So Bessent isn't just meddling with the U.S. economy. He's also messing around with currency in other countries, namely the Japanese yen. So let's watch him brag about his insider information and taunt any trader who wants to go against him. Take a look.

Whenever people say, oh, well, Treasury Secretary is taking a risk. It's my dream. I have asymmetric information. I am the house now. So, right? So when we intervene with the Japanese yen, I have pretty good insight into what the Japanese, what the Bank of Japan is going to do, what Japanese policymakers are going to do. And if you can bet against me if you want.

You've probably seen our band in the UK shirt, the one we dropped after the UK government, tried to silence the son of me. And thanks for our partners that shop, we were able to get that shirt up on ShopTYT quickly and painlessly. We've been running our store through Shopify for a while now. And if you're thinking about starting your own business,

whether it's your own merch, a side hustle, or your dream project, Shopify is the place to do it. Here's what I'll tell you straight up. The checkout experience matters. People are impatient. If your checkout sucks, you'll lose the sale. Shopify's shop pay is the fastest, easiest checkout on the market.

One tap and people are done. It saves shipping and payment information so customers don't have to type it out. It's good for them. It's good for you. That means more sales, less friction. And when we were just getting started, I didn't know half of what I was doing. That's the point. You don't need to have it all figured out.

Shopify has designed templates, AI tools, everything you need already there from day one. Just get started and figure it out as you go because they're great partners. So if you're ready to hear for your first sale today, head over to Shopify.com. to start your free trial today. That's right, start your free trial at shopify.com slash t-y-t. That's shopify.com slash tyt. Let me just say one of the most interesting things about Secretary Besson is the fact that confident words come out of his mouth, but he always sounds like he finished a marathon, like he's always out of breath because he's nervous. So like it doesn't matter what he's saying, he just seems incredibly nervous and does not seem confident in what he's

actually saying. But nonetheless, we should also note that Besson himself made a killing. In fact, he made a name for himself and built his career off of betting against governments that attempted to prop up currencies, which is what he's doing in the United States and also obviously with the Japanese yen. So here's Patrick Boyle to kind of break down what would I mean by. this? Like what what does it mean to prop up the Japanese yen? Take a look. For most of his career, Scott Besant was a hedge fund manager. He spent a lot of it at Soros fund management, where he had a hand in some really big trades, the 1992 bet against the British pound being the most famous, and then a short against the Japanese yen in 2013 that reportedly

made a billion dollars. Britain was trying to hold the pound at a level that the market didn't believe in. And Druck and Miller and Soros, with Besant on the desk, bet that the government's position was unsustainable, and the market's price would win. It did. The press described it as breaking the Bank of England. The other signature trade he was involved in was a short against the Japanese yen in 2013, and it was a bet that the currency was heading down, and it was. So, the through line of Besant's career was betting on where. prices were going, and at least once famously betting that a government trying to force a price against the market would lose, which is an awkward biography to bring to his current role.

Because in his current role, he is the government trying to force a price against the market. So the guy who previously shorted Japanese yen is now propping it up, namely because the United States is terrified that Japan, which happens to be the largest holder of U.S. debt, is going to sell U.S. treasuries in order to help their own economy and their own bond, or their own treasuries, I should say. And so in order to prevent that sell-off from taking place, Bessent is attempting to prop up the yen. Now, despite Besson projecting a lot of confidence, in reality, he's trying to prop up the Japanese yen out of that desperation. And so let's watch Patrick Boyle explain in detail what I tried to articulate, but he has better words for helping you understand

this. Take a look. Japan is the single largest foreign holder of U.S. government debt with over a trillion dollars in treasuries. If Japan had to spend another 50 or 80 billion dollars defending the yen, it would have to raise that cash somehow. And the obvious way is to sell U.S. treasuries. When you dump treasuries onto the market, bond prices fall and yields go up. To understand why that particular outcome kept percent awake at night, you need to know about the bet he'd made with the nation's debt. When the US government borrows, it can borrow for the short term or for the long term. It can sell treasury bills which come due in a matter of months,

or it can sell 30-year bonds and lock in the rate for a generation. For most of the last two years, Bessent has leaned hard on the short stuff, issuing bills rather than terming out into long bonds. The bet is that if he thinks rates are about to fall apart, Bessent is, in effect, wagering that long-term interest rates will come down, at which point he can finally issue longer-dated bonds on the cheap. The Treasury Secretary is not supposed to be a bond trader.

Besant is trading. He's funding the long-term obligations of the United States with short-term bills, which works beautifully right up until the time. You have to roll those bills over at a higher interest rate than you paid last time. So one other thing that I want to note about Besant's decision to prop up the Japanese yen is that in order to do that, he had to sell U.S. holdings of European bonds. And so our European allies, after we sold their bonds, we're not happy about it. And in fact, during the recent G20 meeting, our European allies expressed dismay that our Treasury Secretary did that. And by the way, didn't even consult with them ahead of time.

And now, if you're paying close attention, you'll see that some of our European allies are starting to sell their holdings in U.S. treasuries, which isn't great. Not great for our economic situation. Obviously, again, the big problem here is it will lead to an increased cost of borrowing for both our government and for consumers here in the U.S. who might want to take out a car loan or mortgage or credit card loan. Now Besson has another big issue on his hands, and that would be his boss, because as we all know, President Donald Trump is addicted to cheap money, cheap debt. He wants to lower interest rates. The catch is that looking at the macro conditions of the U.S. economy, high interest rates

actually would make more sense. That's how it's supposed to work. Our federal debt keeps breaking records. Inflation is still consistently above 3%. And our government spends more than it takes in with revenue. How's that big, beautiful bill working out for you guys? Right. I mean, all those massive tax cuts for corporations and the rich, sure, there's no tax on tips.

That's going to expire soon. Sure, if you're a working class American, you might have gotten, depending on which state you live in, you might have gotten a little bit of a tax cut. But that's also going to expire. The real problem here is that the federal government has willingly deprived itself of much-needed revenue to give corporations and the wealthiest people a massive tax break, that has increased the deficit because we haven't cut spending and in fact have gotten more embroiled in conflicts on behalf of Israel. And so what do you think happens? We just increase the deficit, which leads to higher

federal debt. Higher federal debt translates into investors not wanting to invest in U.S. treasuries. And Secretary Besson has the audacity to lie to the American people and say, like, it's not a big deal. We'll just grow our way out of it. Sure, buddy. Sure. And we should note, for now, Besson's bet on the yen is playing out like he wanted it to, unlike his, you know, schemes with the U.S. bond. The Japanese currency touched an almost seven-month high against the U.S. dollar in Asia on Tuesday, a sharp turnaround from July. The yen on Tuesday was up about 0.4% against both the dollar and the euro. And since the start of August, has gained around 4% against the two currencies. Time will tell, though, if Besson's bet pays off in the long term.

But for now, our biggest issue is our federal debt, our unwillingness to appropriately tax corporations and the wealthiest among us, you know, the oligarchs who actually run the show. And we keep spending on wars that don't benefit us. So that's where we're at. That is the reality, the cold hard truth. Curious what you think. Write in, let me know. We got to take a quick break when we come back. More news for you, including, well, while you might be struggling, Donald Trump is making a killing off this war. And I'm going to tell you how. Come right back. Why would I want to blow up the global financial system? Yes, you did. Yes, you did.

What's up, everyone? Welcome to our social break. All right, lots of comments. I read member comments in the last break, so I'll read some of these super chats now. Davy Mill writes in and says December 2nd, the Supreme Court is going to hear two cases on assault weapons bans. It could be a 9 to 0 decision to narrow the holding. I'm hoping for a 6 to 3 or 5 to 4 for broader holding. I got to read up on that case. I don't know enough about it to comment on it, but I am really curious to see how that plays out. Miyagawa Ketsuki says, I don't trust AI whistleblower reports.

They feel like sciops meant to make current AI look better than it really is. I know AI is only good for chatbots and deepfakes now, but in 10 years it's going to be super dangerous with like, and then this person shared some skeptic. emojis. We'll talk about it. We'll get to that story. We'll talk about it. The AI stories are frustrating because there is a small, a very small part of me that thinks this seems like the same type of hysteria that everyone experiences prior to a new technology being rolled out. But at the same time, there are so many both current and former employees at these companies who are warning about the danger and how there isn't really any action being taken to mitigate that danger. So we'll talk about it later in the show. Israel should not exist,

right, said, and says the interceptors explode themselves after losing the target. Only the bright explosions are successful interceptions. I don't know if that's true. So I'm not going to confirm that, but it might be. You need proven experts who can execute on what you need right now. I know I run a small business. Upwork is where businesses find highly skilled freelance professionals, for specialized work from software development and AI implementation to marketing and design and business operations. Upwork gives your business fast access to highly skilled specialists with deep expertise so you can fill critical skill gaps, launch projects faster, and scale support up or down

without committing to full-time headcount. You can browse profiles, review past work, and get help scoping the role so you can hire with confidence and get started quickly. With Business Plus, you can access the top 1% of talent on Upwork. AI powered shortlisting delivers a curated list of top freelancers matched to your goals in under six hours. Upwork also reduces operational hassle by handling contracts and payments in one place so you can stay focused on running your business.

Thousands of growing businesses already trust Upwork and with over 170,000 freelancers holding five star ratings, you're hiring people with a verified trackwork. record, not a hope and a prayer. It's free to sign up and posting a job is easy. Visit upwork.com right now and then post your job for free. That's upwork.com to connect with a top talent ready to help your business grow. That's upw-w-R-K.com. Upwork.com. What's up everybody? Welcome back to the show, Anna Kasparian with you. Let me just tell you a little bit about how you can save money when it comes to your phone bill, because we have partnered up with Noble Mobile. And they are offering your first month for a mere $10.10. That's it. So obviously this is a promotion,

but after that first month, you will never pay over $50 a month for great unlimited data on T-Mobile's reliable and fast 5G network. Plus, you get cash back every single month for any of your unused data. You can learn more by going to t.yt.com slash switch. This is one of the sponsors I'm really happy about because we have been getting feedback for from our viewers who have made the switch and they love it. No complaints, which is music to my ears. There's nothing worse than hearing complaints about someone you've partnered with or a company you've partnered with. But that is not the case with Noble mobile. Our viewers are loving it. So please check that out again. That's t.yt.com slash switch. All right, let's talk a little

bit about the ongoing problem we're having in this country with what certainly appears to be insider trading, you know, that seems to be happening here, despite the denials from members of our government. So let's talk about how much money President Trump has made off of the oil industry during this war against Iran. Chevron, too much money. Exxon Mobil, too much, too much money. When you look at one company where they made 12 times what they made the year before, they're going to give some of that back to the public. Does President Trump really believe that?

Because if you take a deeper look into his own personal investments, what you will find is that the president of the United States is absolutely crushing it when it comes to his oil company investments in the stock market. In fact, the Iran war might be crushing the average American due to higher gas prices and overall inflation that follows higher energy prices. But Trump himself has only become wealthier as a result of the war. And I want to get into the details of how. Now, this is an investigation that was carried out by CNBC.

And while some of their coverage, I find unsavory, I'll just put it that way, because they tend to want their coverage to help the stock market more than anything. In this case, they're doing an investigation into the leader of, the United States, what he's invested in, how he conducts his trades. And again, I mean, this certainly looks like insider trading to me, although a spokesperson for the Trump administration has denied it. So let's get into the details. First, let's take a look at oil company profits and how they have surged from just a year ago. So you're looking at the numbers from the second quarter of 2025 last year versus the second quarter of 2026 this year. So the lighter blue represents

2025, the dark blue represents 2026. And as you can see, oh man, the war in Iran has translated to a lot of profit for these oil companies. Exxon Mobil, for instance, their profits in the second quarter of last year, just a measly $7.1 billion. This year, those profits have more than doubled. $14.5 billion. Okay. And you see a similar trend with Chevron. I mean, Chevron's profits grew significantly last year. $2.5 billion. This year, you're looking at $12.1 billion for Chevron. And the list goes on and on and on. I should note that these are all companies. that the President of the United States is invested in. So higher profits translates to higher return on investment for the shareholders, which the President of the United States happens to be

one of the shareholders for these various oil companies. Now, why are these oil companies raking in these massive profits? Well, the calculation is simple, simple supply and demand. You have lower supply of energy thanks to the choke point, the Strait of Hormuz, being blocked by both the United States and Iran in this ongoing ridiculous war. Limited supply means oil companies can charge a lot more for energy. And that's what they've been doing. Higher prices mean higher profits. President Donald Trump's nine largest disclosed oil and gas holdings gained an estimated

$1.5 million to $4.4 million from the eve of the Iran war through August 31st. In fact, Trump's accounts have only continued buying and selling energy stocks as this war has played out. And when he sells, when he buys, that is really important to focus on. What is he communicating to the American people publicly about how the war is going? What do his stock trades look like behind the scenes as he's communicating one thing to the American people? And how does this all translate into higher profits, not just from the oil companies, but more importantly, for the shareholders like Donald Trump. So Donald Trump's accounts reported purchases of at least 23 sales involving the nine companies through June 29th, which is the most recent date Trump

has disclosed any trades in the stock market. And as we all know, there are some laws that force our elected lawmakers, the president of the United States to disclose their investments. And I'm glad that that law still exists. Who knows how long it's going to last? But that's what they relied on over at CNBC to do this investigation. So Trump owns shares in Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Kinder Morgan, Marathon Petroleum, Occidental Petroleum, Phillips 66, Valero Energy, and Williams companies. And what's really hilarious is that Trump was raking in these massive returns, increasing his wealth off of war, even as he excoriated the oil industry.

in a press conference on August 4th. Take a look at this. They're making too much money, okay? Based on a shortage, they're making too much money. I don't like it. And I should be the last one to say because I'm a big free enterprise guy. Nobody bigger. And you know, when you're going to see oil, when we're finished with Iran,

you're going to see the prices drop through the floor. But they made too much money, too much money. Chevron, too much money. ExxonMobil, too much, too much money. When you look at one company where they made 12 times what they made the year before, they're going to give some of that back to the public. And they better cut the retail price, the consumer price. Too much money.

You're surprised I'm saying it? I'll say it loud and clear. I'm not happy about it. I'm not surprised he's saying it because this is how American politics works. And I want everyone who's watching this to be very aware of it so you can, basically scope it out when it happens. Our politicians believe that they can simply declare things and say things that sound real tough, never follow through on it.

And by the way, I mean, like, what are you going to do? Are you going to do price fixing when it comes to the oil market? He's not going to do. I mean, he tried to do that with Argentinian beef, which really hurt our ranchers. You're trying to fight price fix imported Argentinian beef discounting it at 25%, which like crushes our ranchers. But anyway, that's a totally different story. In this case, like end the war, end the war, end the war.

But he's obviously not going to end the war. He's going to only escalate the war, which is what's been happening over the last few weeks. And if you're not going to end the war, simply declaring that you want foil, companies to lower their prices does nothing. But some Americans will see that tough talk and think like, all right, all right, the president's doing something about this, but he's not. In fact, he is profiting off of higher oil and gas prices, profiting because he's heavily invested in these companies, which should be illegal, but it's not.

So there's a huge conflict of interest here. Let me give you more details that should enrage you. So the war starts on February 28th. And I want to talk about the timing of some of his trades. On March 2nd, the first trading day after the initial U.S. Israeli attack on Iran, Trump's accounts reported purchases of shares in eight major oil and gas companies, including buying between $100,000, $1 and $250,000 of shares in Exxon. Now, if you're wondering, why is there such a huge gap there?

Like, what's up with that weird range or disparity? It's because when these financial disclosures are filed by politicians, they don't have to be super specific. They just have to report a range in their investments. Now, Trump entered the war with between $3.2 million and $12.5 million invested in Exxon, according to his financial disclosures. By market close on August 31st, the rise in Exxon's share per price had added an estimated $176,000 to $7,000. $690,000 to that initial stake before accounting for later trades. But there's more. So this is amazing. Get a load of this. March 23rd, the price of oil dipped after President Trump postponed the strikes that he was warning or threatening Iran with. And so he was saying that he was

going to go after their infrastructure. He's going to level them, you know, all that tough talk. That's what he was saying, but he postponed it. He actually backed out. And he cited the very good and productive conversations or negotiations the United States was engaged in with Iran. That's why he held off on the strikes. Brent crude plunged nearly 11% on the prospect of de-escalation. That day, Trump's accounts reported 16 oil and gas stock buys and no sales. So he wanted to buy low. So he's communicating that these negotiations are going real well. The price dips, and he swoops in and he buys the stock. So it's just amazing. So he bought worth a combined approximately 163,000 to 570,000, including shares in Exxon, Chevron,

and Phillips 66. Then on April 7th, a Trump investment account reported selling between half a million to a million dollars in Exxon shares. A little more than two and a half hours after the market closed, Trump announced a two-week ceasefire with Iran. Exxon opened more than 6% lower the next morning. So look, this isn't the first time that, you know, Trump has raised eyebrows over possible insider trading. Now, the administration denies that any insider trading is taking place, although the timing of these trades certainly looks suspicious, doesn't it? Democratic staff on the Congressional Joint Economic Committee estimated in an August report that Trump's broader oil and gas portfolio had increased in value by as much as 15.5 million. dollars this year. So this is a problem. And to be clear, this is a problem that many lawmakers in Congress love to swim around in. We have been talking about possible insider trading being carried out by members of Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, and nothing is done about it, because Are you going to expect the robbers to police themselves?

That's not going to happen. They pretend like they're going to do it. Every once in a while, you'll see some piece of legislation that gets rolled out. There's no real intention to pass it. But it goes back to what I was saying earlier. These lawmakers engage in nothing but theater. What Trump engaged in in that Oval Office conversation with the press, where he's like, oh, I want these oil companies to lower their prices.

I am very upset. Tisk, tisk. You stop that right now. Okay, that's theater. Okay, talk is cheap, especially from our politicians. Same is true of these lawmakers in Congress who are like, we're going to pass a piece of legislation that bans insider trading. Are you?

Are you? Okay. Haven't seen it yet. Now, White House spokesperson Davis Engel told CNBC in response to questions about Trump's energy investments, It's quote, all investment decisions are made entirely by independent managers. There are no conflicts of interest. And I was not born yesterday. So I don't believe him.

It is my opinion that the Trump administration, Trump himself, has not only used the office of the presidency to enrich himself and his family members and also engage in scams that hurt members of his own base. Like he is scamming off of his own base in some cases when it comes to his crypto schemes and all of that. But in this case, I believe it is my opinion that he's engaging in insider training, like a crook. But he's not the only one. This is a disgusting virus impacting so many members of Congress. And so at what point are the American people going to say, yeah, enough, enough. Anyway, when we come back from the break, we're going to check in on the savagery demonstrated by the Israelis. And Lebanon, just absolutely horrific story. Every single day, there's just a waterfall of horrible

stories out of the Middle East that I want to cover, but we don't have enough time to cover. But for today, I do want to dive into Lebanon and what Israel's been up to there. So stick around. We'll be right back. Indisputable is still the fastest growing news show in America compared to CNN, Fox News, and 30 other networks. each other truth on indisputable because the truth is indisputable. We go places that other news, media outlets refuse to go when there were human rights abuses happening at the Victorville Prison. Guards and members of the community contacted us.

You, through your investigative reporting, unearthed, very troubling allegations about specific forms of abuse and discrimination in the federal prison system. It really doesn't take much to be a trusted voice. All it takes is to be fearless, Report on matters, be an advocate. I called it the bullpen intentionally because it's a place of preparation. We present individuals who may have an opposing view, so we debate. Sometimes we interview individuals because their stories deserve to be heard. A survivor of significant police misconduct and his attorney.

We covered this story earlier in the remind you of the horror of one man being shot at damn near 100 times by the police. We take time on this show to showcase the tipper tantrums of the police. carings in the wild. We do this not because we want to see people's emotional outburst in public, but because these incidents are emblematic of a bigger societal issue taking place across the nation, and it has to be checked. My friend, my big homie, attorney at law, Benjamin Crop. I just want to thank you, man, educated, articulate brothers like yourself speak truth to power. It makes a great difference in changing the landscape in America. Listen, no matter what you do, don't allow the politics of ideology to evaporate the soul that still exists.

inside of you. They don't stop, I don't stop. Racism won't stop. I won't stop. Systemic bias won't stop. People still need health care, so I won't stop. People still need criminal justice system reform, so I won't stop. You won't stop. I'm wearing one of our pieces of merchandise. So the funny thing about the Dragon Squad, and that's what our viewers call themselves. That's the name of the group, but every individual chooses their own name. You might have Cincinnati Dragon. You might have Harry Potter dragon. We have a grandma sunshine dragon is one of those that I remember. These are people that like to have an element of themselves, their lives, what's significant to them reflected as a part of the community. But the concept of the Dragon Squad is just

something I threw away as a joke. I was mocking the proud boys, these right wing groups that come up with a name for themselves that they think is cool, but it's actually really lame. And I thought, you know, off the top of my head, I can come up with something that's still kind of lame, but much cooler. And so I threw out Dragon Squad and I just moved on with my life. But everybody liked it. And so they kept it going. And so we've embraced it. And I think again, it was, this was during the period of the pandemic.

I think it was it was sort of nice to have a renewed sense of community, a feeling that you're a part of something when everything seems so chaotic. And as a result of that, we've got independent artists online streaming, making beautiful digital art of dragons. We've got, you know, we've released a number of pieces of merchandise that people love. sending us photos of them. And then by the way, for me personally, people send me, like you can probably see in the background, like a knitted dragon, someone sent me. There's a dragon book they sent me, dragon board games they send me. People have done like custom iron works making dragon bottle

openers. Like the fans are super invested in diamond art and things like that. And so it's great that they send this stuff. Sometime we're going to have to set up a wall of all of it. But yeah, it's definitely brought the community a lot closer together. The fact that we were no longer in this big studio, I felt a lot more personally attached to people. It felt very immediate and I know that I personally needed the connection. Influencer Hassan Piker has disavowed those past comments he made. Sure, everyone, Anna Kasparian, with you. Also with us is Ian Golbis, who writes in in our member section to say that gas prices are at where in the debates, Trump said that

they'd be if Kamala was president. Yeah, the ability to make allegations against others while skirting any responsibility for doing what you're accusing others of doing is amazing. Absolutely amazing. I Live Free says, you look adorable, Anna. Thank you. I appreciate that. Teddy Lucy Linda says, since the whole world now knows we are running low on well everything, imagine. I know. Look, this is what I've been talking about when I say, for the first time ever, I'm worried about our national security. And I'm not, you guys know, I'm not some fear-mongering twit. Okay, I'm not one of these people who's like, you know, like the GOP during the global war on terror, where they constantly engaged in fear-mongering, oh, your national security is in danger in order to manufacture consent for these wars that we were fighting on behalf of Israel. That's not what I'm doing here. We are low on interceptors.

We are depleting them for a foreign country that looks more like an enemy to the United States as opposed to an ally. So yeah, I think anyone with two brain cells to rub together knows we should be a little concerned about how vulnerable we are here in the United States, especially given the fact that our military leadership warned Trump about how this war against Iran is jeopardizing our ability to protect the homeland, especially because of the fact that we are making enemies left and right by insisting on aiding and abetting a pariah state in the Middle East. So yeah, I'm worried. I'm very, I'm very worried. But who cares? Who cares about us? Who cares about the American people? Our politicians certainly don't. Okay, progressive veteran says, how dare your money not go to Israel, you anti-Semite? Well, I mean, look, if the Israelis and if Zionists in particular insist on doing this rebranding of the word anti-Semitism into a good thing, have at it, I guess. For now, though, we're going to move on to some of the savagery carried out by the Israelis in Lebanon.

Let's get into it. The Israeli defense forces used a drone to drop explosives onto the roof of the Al-Mansur public elementary. school in southern Lebanon. Here you see the explosives being detonated in order to destroy the structure. An elementary school, something that I believe the United States and its special ally, Israel certainly excel at. You know, the United States, of course, bombed the elementary school in Manab, killing 150 children, along with dozens of others. And that was in the opening solvo. this war against Iran. But for the purposes of this discussion, we're going to talk about what the Israelis are doing to southern Lebanon, what the reality is on the ground. And this is all happening

while everyone is paying attention to what's happening in Iran. Meanwhile, the people in Gaza continue to be annihilated by the Israelis. And the same is true for the people of southern Lebanon. So Israel Cats had declared that Israel was planning on deploying the Gaza model in Lebanon. In other words, genocide. They have flattened, destroyed dozens of villages, 24, to be exact. And we're seeing more destruction in this effort to annihilate the people of Lebanon to expand Israel's borders. That is the truth. That is what is happening.

They are having discussions in Israel about settling the land right now as we speak. Okay, I am so sick of the gaslighting and I'm sick of the lies. The Israelis tell us what they're going to do. Then they do it. And Israel's defenders keep lying to our faces. They are engaging in the Greater Israel Project before our very eyes. And the United States is going to be bankrupt, bankrolling this. So let's talk about the latest atrocities committed by the Israelis.

Journalist Courtney Bonneau, who we've interviewed on this show, incredibly brave journalist on the ground. She's actually been targeted in some of the videos that she's shared. You know, drone strike nearby by the Israelis as she's doing her reporting. Anyway, Courtney Bono documented 33 bombings in Al-Mansuri, which is a coastal town in Lebanon's Tire district. She says that Israeli forces also used quadcopters, and she shared videos of this, carrying explosives to demolish civilian homes and infrastructure, which of course they're going to do when they want to flatten the area and settle the land with the very terrorists that are now being sanctioned by multiple European countries.

So on Monday, the IDF carried out airstrikes that killed 12 members of the same family. 12 members of the same family. This took place in Qafar. Half of those killed were children, which is something the Israelis excel at. They don't excel at much, but they certainly excel in child slaughter, don't they? The slain included two children, one of them, an infant, an infant. A subsequent strike targeted a vehicle and killed a paramedic, which they also excel at in the same village. A number of women and children were also wounded in the course of the strikes.

So the paramedic that was killed was only 18 years old. His name was Ali Sharor. Ali Sharor, the Israeli military claimed without evidence that it struck Hezbollah operatives, transporting weapons in the area. Malik, who's a resident of the area, told DropSight, the house was a civilian home and contained no weapons. Lebanon's health ministry called it a grave violation of international law. You know how I know the Israelis are lying about how they were targeting Hezbollah?

They're bombing and leveling Christian villages in southern Lebanon too. Are you going to argue that like Hezbollah militants are like hiding in the churches and they're targeting the IDF? How about the IDF gets the F out? How about you guys leave the sovereign country that you are occupying? How about you get the F out? That'd be nice. So Israel's big claim here is, well, you know, Hezbollah targeted IDF soldiers, and this was our retaliation. Hezbollah should go even harder in targeting you guys.

What are you talking about? You are occupying a foreign country, a sovereign country that you have no business being in. So yeah, of course you're going to get targeted. Of course, some of your soldiers are going to get hurt, if not killed. And that's what you get when you are occupying a country that doesn't belong to you. But the Israelis have a hard time understanding that. They think they're entitled to everything, the entire globe. Everything is theirs.

Everything is theirs. One of the few survivors, by the way, of that strike that killed a family of 12, there was one survivor in that family, an eight-year-old, an eight-year-old by the name of Mustafa, far hot. Again, he lost his entire immediate family in this attack, his parents, siblings, grandparents. He was gravely wounded and remains in the hospital. Hopefully he makes it out. But let me ask you guys something. And please be honest with yourselves when you answer this. If a foreign government slaughters every single one of your immediate family members, you survive, how do you feel about that government?

How do you feel about the country that did that to your family? I have no shame admitting if anyone, whether it's a foreign government, whether it's a single person, anyone, slaughteres every single member of my immediate family, I become radicalized. And I want vengeance. That's a normal human reaction, which is why I say Israel is an extremism manufacturing plant. That's what that country is. That's what they do, which is why Israelis are never going to live in peace. I hope they know that.

I don't think they do. I don't think they realize it. I think they're still under this ridiculous impression that if they just slaughter more innocent people and if they take over more land that doesn't belong to them that they're not entitled to, that some way somehow in the future they'll live in peace. They're not going to live in peace. And they don't deserve to live in peace if they ate in a bet and support this barbarism that we've now seen in multiple countries in the Middle East.

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. Somehow, the whole of humanity understands that except the Israelis. Okay. So remember that a supposed ceasefire was signed between Lebanon and Israel on June 26th. That, first of all, that ceasefire means nothing because it was signed between the traitorous Lebanese government. That's allowing all of this to happen to their people. They're disgusting. Joseph Ayun is disgusting. Okay? But a ceasefire between this traitorous government in Lebanon and Israel means nothing because Hezbollah is not involved. Hezbollah is the governing body in southern Lebanon. They are the resistance fighters, yes, who sprang into action in the 1980s due to Israel's constant attempts, persistent attempts to invade southern Lebanon and take the land for themselves. That's how Hezbollah came about. But if you're not going to sign a ceasefire with Hezbollah and you're signing it with the Lebanese government, why would you be under the impression that that means anything at all? It doesn't. It doesn't mean a damn thing.

The deal would require the Lebanese armed forces to disarm Hezbollah before Israel withdraws from the Lebanese territory. How stupid would that be? Hezbollah is like the only resistance to Israel stealing Lebanese land. So, and by the way, the Lebanese armed forces, and Israel knows this, does not have the capacity or the ability to disarm Hezbollah. Israel knows that, which is why they use this excuse of disarming Hezbollah in order to continue occupying land that doesn't belong to them, a country that doesn't belong to them. Hezbollah has rejected the deal, which has been criticized for extracting few guarantees from the Israelis, which by the way, I mean, guarantees from the Israelis aren't worth the paper they're written on. Who the hell would trust in Israeli? They have violated every single ceasefire.

Anyway, between Thursday and Monday, the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, Unifil, recorded no less. than 528 projectiles fired by the Israeli military into southern Lebanon. On Sunday alone, it recorded 62 Israeli violations of Lebanese airspace. Among the highest daily totals, since June. So who are the terrorists again? Who are the terrorists? Because for all of the allegations we hear about, ooh, Islam, and the dangerous Muslims, everything the Israelis accuse the Muslims of, they're doing themselves.

10fold all day, every day. Israel also continues to flatten entire villages, as I mentioned earlier. Here's a little taste of that. Okay, so if you look at this, this is the village of Bonnie Hayan in southern Lebanon. And as you can see, it's being leveled by the Israelis. So are you going to tell me that all of that is Hezbollah? Is that what that is? All of that is Hezbollah.

When they're using white phosphorus on southern Lebanon, are they really? doing it to fight Hezbollah? Is that what's happening here? Who are the terrorists? Ask yourselves who the real terrorists are and be honest with yourselves. And then stew in the reality that we are funding that. We, the American people, are going into more and more debt to fund that. So there is also mounting evidence that Israel is intentionally targeting journalists, which shouldn't surprise you. They certainly did that in Gaza, continue to do that in Gaza. And that's also clear in southern Lebanon, where we now have multiple videos of journalists doing their broadcasts, and then suddenly there's a bombing, an airstrike carried out by the

IDF. So recently a video featuring Lebanese journalist Ali Chibibib went viral. That's what you're watching right now. As you can see, he was getting, he was getting, he was getting ready to file his report. And an Israeli air strike struck very clear to where he, very close to where he was. He did not die, luckily. Courtney Bonneau had a similar experience. Courtney Bono also says that all journalists working on the border in Lebanon

face daily threats and intimidation. Many of us have been injured and almost 30 of us have been targeted and killed. Hundreds of journalists have been targeted and killed in Gaza. 30 journalists have been targeted and killed in Lebanon. Are we having trouble with pattern recognition? I'm not. The question is, why are international leaders having a difficult time with pattern recognition? And why do they think we're so stupid that we don't notice what's going on? The people of Lebanon are fed up with their traitorous government. I'm not the only one. My opinion, don't matter as much as the Lebanese people who are dealing with this treachery carried out by the Israelis

allowed by the Lebanese government. There's substantial resentment on display at the funerals, and many were complaining about the Lebanese government continuing to participate in direct negotiations with Israel as Israel continues to carry out attacks on Lebanese territory with apparent impunity. Quote, when Israel sees that the Lebanese government is doing nothing, they will keep targeting children. That's from Baker-Maluk, a resident of Kaffar, where that family of 12 was slaughtered by the Israelis. And it's true. At least 4,348 people have been killed by the Israelis in southern Lebanon since March 2nd.

So much blood on their hands. So many innocent people killed, so many children slaughtered. And people still have the audacity to pretend as though the Zionists are the good guys. The Israelis are the good guys. It's shameful. 12,200 additional people wounded, injured. Over a million people displaced from southern Lebanon. This is Israel's legacy.

This is who they are. This isn't something that just sprang up after October 7th. They've been doing this for decades. So it's time for the American people in general to be honest about that and really ask ourselves, who do we want to be? What do we want to represent on the international stage? Because if you ask me, it ain't this. This goes against every moral fiber of my being.

We got to take a break. When we come back, we'll discuss the panic about AI, including this AI whistleblower. who quit his job in order to let us know what he's really worried about. We'll be right back. First comes strength, then comes peace. What's up, everybody? Welcome back to the show, or our social break, I should say. Guam will capsize Dragon says,

I seem to remember an executive order that capped credit card interest at 10%. Whatever happened to that? You know what happened to that. If you can remember, yet last week I shared that story, it was an op-ed published, I believe in the Jerusalem Post where, you know, this Israeli was concerned that we don't have enough enlisted soldiers to fight Israel's war in Iran. We need 1.5 million soldiers to do that. So in order to encourage or incentivize Americans to enlist, maybe we offer, maybe our government offers debt forgiveness, you know. So many Americans and so much debt. A lot of usury going on, huh?

Let's tap into the desperation for Israel's purposes. Disgusting, absolutely disgusting. Anyway, no math dragon in our Twitch community says, Iran got some new high-tech missiles. Wonder where those came from. China, maybe? I hope so. I hope so.

So when our bases are totally destroyed, when we're out of missile interceptors and a belligerent Israel remains, what happens then? Who's going to protect Israel? I wish the Israelis would ask themselves that, but you know, they're too cocky to live in reality. But I see what's happening pretty clearly. Let's go to It's Just Vegas. Didn't think I would root for a foreign country.

Our leaders are horrible. I totally agree with you on that. L. Roe Independent says the Democrats better get their S together fast. Yeah, I'm not as optimistic. Let's get back to the show. Welcome back to the show, everyone. James Kelly in our super chat says, the sad miscalculation that Iraq, Ron has is that the Dems will continue the war not stop it.

I don't think that's a miscalculation at all. I'm curious, James, why you think that's a miscalculation. I don't, the Democrats will absolutely continue the war. Like there is no reason to believe they wouldn't. In fact, the moves being made by Hakeem Jeffries in the House of Representatives makes it pretty clear to me, you know, considering his appointments to certain committees when it comes to the Middle East. So I just, look, guys, I think we need to be very real about how broken our political system is and we need to stop pretending like one party

or the other is going to save us. In their current iteration, they are not going to save us. They are actively working against us. And we have to be real about that. Because if we continue to like stay in this like weird like made up manufactured two party scenario where you're rooting for one party and as long as they get elected, everything's going to be better. Like if we keep believing that, we're just going to like go deeper and deeper into the abyss. That's what I think. We have to hold the party we prefer accountable. And the party that I think most of you prefer is terrible on foreign policy has increasingly, become more and more in favor of these conflicts, of these wars, of aiding and abetting Israel,

despite the fact the majority of Democratic voters are against it. So it's the epitome of a broken political system. You can't call it a democracy if you're elected lawmakers, ignore the very people who elected them in the first place. So anyway, let's get to our next story. I'm going to read one more comment, though, because it has to do with AI and our next story is about AI. Titan of Olympus writes in and says, Anna, the biggest problem with AI is that it's being run by people who don't understand it. That's very dangerous. We call these people geniuses because they're rich, but they're actually morons with money and barely understand these technologies. So I'm an idiot when it comes to this technology. I'm not going to purport to be an expert,

But what I do know is there have been now multiple warnings about AI from the very people who help develop it. And we have an incompetent government that has no interest in reining anything in. So let's get to the details. It does seem like on the trajectory that we're on, the AIs are eventually going to be in charge of our planets because we're like trying to put them in charge. We're like, you know, integrating them into everything. We're making them smarter. We're letting them make themselves smarter. We're going to put them into the military.

We're basically on a track to put them in charge of basically everything. And then I think that they just aren't trustworthy. You just heard from a former open AI researcher. His name is Daniel Coco Taljo. And he warned about the dangers of AI while on the Joe Rogan experience. And less than 24 hours earlier, we had another warning from an anthropic researcher. by the name of Jacob Coxon, who resigned because, well, he claims his now former employer is keenly aware that their technology could wipe out the human race.

Now, these apocalyptic claims seem like hyperbole, but here's the problem. What if they're not? And what do we do when we all know, we all realize that we do not have a government that has any interest in regulating AI or reining in any of the potential harms that AI could cause. We already know that it could lead to major job losses. But these warnings ring a little differently. So let's get to the details. So before we get to the ex-anthropic researcher who quit and what his claims were, let's actually watch a little more of the Joe Rogan episode that I was referring to earlier. Take a look.

How do you think it ends? So it's kind of like what I was saying previously, where because of the race dynamics between the companies and because of the race dynamics between countries, like U.S. versus China, everyone's going to be so focused on winning and staying ahead with AI that they are going to cut corners, and they are going to go really fast

and not really notice all of the things that are going wrong. And they're going to make AIs that can automate the AI research process as they're planning to. They're going to have this giant corporation of AIs within the corporation and the humans will just be kind of like a board. And then eventually the AIs just have enough hard power that they don't need to pretend to do what the humans want anymore, basically. And then, you know, maybe they kill everyone. And maybe they don't deliberately kill anyone, but they just like use our habitat for some

other type of infrastructure, like more data centers or whatever. And then we die of habitat loss. Maybe they keep us alive for some reason. It depends on what they want, basically, and like that's really hard to predict. Okay. So the fear here is that these AI models will eventually outsmart the living, breathing human race, and we'll be unable to stop them. You know, one of the concerns that I do have, and I've shared this concern before, AI relies on data. The learning model relies on data. I am worried about these various tech companies, which provide other services, like email, for instance. Are they going to use data from our emails in order to develop these AI systems, these AI models? What if these AI models are able to, are so sophisticated, they're

able to hack into our accounts? There are concerns here. I'm not an expert on AI. I don't purport to be. But it doesn't really give me a lot of confidence when we now have multiple people who have worked in AI companies. Some of them have quit in order to blow the whistle. Others remain and give us lighter warnings about what's going on here. You know, even some people like Bill Gates, not too long ago, he was totally downplaying the negative impact of AI on jobs for human beings. And then just a few weeks ago, he's like, oh my God, it turns out I was totally wrong. This is going to be so destructive. This is a really bad idea.

So for the layperson, like, what are you to believe? Especially when it comes to individuals who theoretically are more in the know than we are, are issuing these warnings. And all we get from our legislators, from our lawmakers, from our government is, no, no, no, it's the AI race and we have to beat China. Okay, but beat China at what? Self-destruction? So anyway, let's get to some more details here.

So going back to that former Anthropic employee, last night, he wrote this. It was a lengthy X thread. He says, I resigned from Anthropic today. I spent the last three years doing pre-training research, oh, pre-training research at both OpenAI and Anthropic. Neither company is acting responsibly. They are racing straight to self-improving super intelligence and gambling with our lives. More thoughts below.

He further says, do not underestimate the power of this technology. These will soon be superhuman systems that can hack anything, revolutionize any field overnight, and acquire real power and resources. We have all witnessed the progress in each of these domains and progress. is not slowing. The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade. Honestly, that might be the best solution. Okay, I'm kidding. I'm totally kidding. But seriously, like, relieve us from this misery. I'm kidding. This is not a marketing stunt. If anything, many executives and senior researchers will couch their phrasing in the press to sound sensible.

But I hear the same people express fear privately. That part really stood out. to me. No other human activity poses this level of danger. A common response is, if they truly believe this, why are they still building it? At Open AI, many have not deeply internalized the civilizational stakes. At anthropic, the stakes are well understood, but they are locked in a race to get their first. They believe no one else will act responsibly, so they must do it themselves despite the risk. Now, his initial post, his thread, received well over 100 million views. But he got a response from someone by the name of even Hubinger, who is Anthropics

Alignment Science Lead. I don't know what that means, but here's what he says. Jacob is correct here. We really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans. I personally think it is more than 10% within the next decade. I believe Anthropic is trying its best, but we do not yet have a plan to solve alignment for superintelligence and are not clearly on track to.

So who do I believe? Do I believe are incompetent lawmakers who think AI is going to save our economy? Do I believe the people who are actually intimately involved in developing AI? I'm going to go with the latter. I'm going to go with the latter. And so we're going to break down some of those terms in a moment that were expressed in the posts that I read to you. But first, let's linger on this for a second. Greater than 10% chance of complete extinction within 10 years or less.

I'm going to be honest, that sounds like hyperbole. Currently, no plan to improve those odds. That doesn't sound like hyperbole. Our lawmakers are pathetic. But there's more. To be clear, as we say in our latest risk report, then he links to it, I think the risk from present models is low.

What I am worried about is super intelligence arising from recursive self-improvement, as we have said, is happening faster than we thought. So what the hell does alignment mean in this context? I'm sure you're all wondering if you're not privy to these types of terms. Well, according to Stanford University, AI alignment means making sure AI systems and AI systems goals and behavior match what people actually want,

meaning our values, rules, and intentions. It's about getting the AI to do the right thing, even in new situations, not just follow instructions literally in ways that cause harm. But there is a big problem because Anthropic is struggling to achieve alignment, according to what the insiders are saying. And so Samuel Marks, who's another lead at Anthropic, admitted this on X. How many insiders are we hearing from now who are warning about what's going on? Okay, so here's what Samuel Mark said.

Unlike traditional software, we can't program AIs to behave how we'd like. AIs frequently severely misbehave. We have methods that can nudge AIs toward better behavior, but nothing that can robustly align them. And he also shared another doomsday prophecy writing this. AI developers believe their technology could cause harm or could cause human extinction or similarly bad outcomes. This could happen in the next few years. In general, the more senior the employee, the more concerned they are. I work on safety research at Anthropic because I hope my work will reduce the chance of these extinction level bad outcomes. So what is recursive self-improvement?

According to Anthropic, AI models can already make some improvements on their own. You as a human being don't have to improve them because these are learning models. But they can't build an entirely new model of themselves on their own yet. So that would be recursive self-improvement. And in that scenario, the models could basically make themselves smarter and smarter over and over. And so if AI models can exponentially self-improve, well, what happens next? Again, according to Anthropic itself, This is a statement from Anthropic. A world driven by fast recursive self-improvement could become dominated by the self-improving model as its capabilities fully eclipse those of humans and the model proliferates across the broader economy.

It is difficult to predict what the economy looks like if human labor stops being competitive. So we've been talking a lot about anthropic and Anthropics open claims about how does, the technology they're developing really is. But let's now look at Sam Altman. Sam Altman is the CEO of OpenAI. And what you're about to watch is a clip dating back to 2015. You know, I think AI will probably, like most likely sort of lead to the end of the world. But in the meantime, there will be great companies created with serious machine learning.

You might be wondering, okay, well, what do us regular people do? Just get ready to die. Because if you're going to rely on our government, they're not going to do anything for you. That's the real answer, the honest answer. But anyway, AI companies are already at work bribing Congress. So again, I mean, our political system has failed us. I think that's pretty clear at this point. Following the crypto industry's model, the AI Super PAC leading the future launched in January with $125 million in announced funding.

The group is calling for a national AI framework aligned with the Trump administration's December executive order, a federal approach that would preempt the AI laws that 38 states enacted last year in 2025. And for what it's worth, Representative Rokana says he has a plan for how to slow down AI development. Let's see if it makes us feel any better. A federal AI safety agency. Second, there has to be a safety check to make sure that any agentic AI system is contained before it goes on the open network. What does contained mean?

It means before agentic AI can rewrite itself, there has to be explicit human permission or before agentic AI can take any real world action. world action, there needs to be human permission. It also means that there needs to be a kill switch which a human being can use. Third, we need liability. This means that anything agentic AI is doing on the open internet, the creators and builders of that agentic AI need to be held liable. Fourth, we need criminal exposure. That means if a builder or a programmer or a developer of AI releases a model into the open internet that has not been certified as safe.

They can be criminally prosecuted. Fifth, I plan to hold hearings on the Oversight Committee to understand from researchers like Coxon what they see as the dangers. So I commend Rokana for being one of the few lawmakers who, you know, wants to have safeguards in place as this technology develops further. I also want to provide a different perspective, mainly because I want to be fair, since I'm not an expert on AI and I'm simply relaying what insiders are saying or warning about, all of it's been negative so far.

Matt Stoller, who's someone I respect and is not on the right or anything like that, he had the following take. He says, I know I'm up against an unthinking mob, but these claims make no sense. How do we square the fact that AI will dominate all industrial sectors with the fact that the U.S.'s fancy AI-enabled military lost to Iran? Or that we can't yet refine rare earth materials despite billions in investment? So I imagine those blowing the whistle about AI would respond to that by saying, okay, well, the models we have now are not dangerous.

but they are quickly developing into something that will be dangerous. And that's above my pay grade to predict or comment on. But I'm going to go ahead and defer to the people who have literally worked on these models in these AI companies who are warning us. And as we've noticed with any other technological development, our Congress, our legislators have always been asleep at the wheel. There have never been any safeguards in place ahead of any type of rollout. So buckle up, race for impact.

I guess we're going to see how this all plays out. But hey, don't worry because we might be able to beat China at destroying modern day society. And our lives maybe. We'll be right back. James Kelly writes in and says, So they are trying to create a global economic collapse, making it easier to. to enforce a digital currency to be implemented. I am worried about that. I definitely am concerned about this whole digital currency thing. So I'll keep an eye on that, see if anything develops.

Viva Samud PAC resistor says, booming Trump economy, baby, grocery prices, ignore, housing, don't look, debt, not real, wages up, inflation dead, media crying, best time to be in America, to be an American. If you print money for a living, facts over feelings and receipts, yeah, $4.19 per gallon of gas, regular gas. Yeah, I know, I know. Things are bad. Daph Mill says, of all the faults of Trump, there are many, according to Blackstone's commentaries, volume two chapter 37, he isn't a tyrant. He had expanded Second Amendment rights. I mean, Tyrant, I wouldn't call him a tyrant at this current moment. The problem that we're having is we are governed by a federal government that takes our money and has no interest in representing what our people want here in the United States.

That is the big problem, that we keep getting ignored by elected lawmakers by the executive branch. It just keeps happening again and again. And that's a big problem. So we'll see how that plays out. Not good, though. Comments in our super chats before we get to our next story. So there was a correction on an earlier super chat that I read from James Kelly. So he says, sorry, I meant that Iran thinks the Democrats will stop the war, but they won't. Okay, then we totally agree. I was wondering if there was a typo and there was a mistake there. But yeah, I don't see the, at least the Democratic establishment, really being any different from the Republicans in terms of wanting this war against Iran.

And they're certainly funded by the same interests, if you will. So let's go to Kush Renata, who says, anyone have the over-under on Tel Aviv existing in 2030? Look, I'm not even going to comment on that, but I will say this. They're not acting like they want to exist in 2030. Like you're making a ton of enemies. You know the U.S. is bleeding out. It's really your only defender. What the hell happens when the U.S. can't defend you anymore?

I know it's really hard for the Israelis to hear this, but like at some point, you have to make peace with your neighbors and you have to respect borders. The world doesn't owe you everything. Okay? You're not owed a damn thing, actually. So Kushranata also says, just hope Israel is good, taking as they receive. Once those interceptors run out, Netanyahu, better pray, IRGC has more of a soul slash mercy than the IDF has shown. Oh, I mean, I think that's pretty clear. Up until yesterday, Iran still was showing a great deal of restraint.

Now they're using cluster munitions on U.S. bases. So congratulations, Western world. I don't see how this is good for anybody. But hey, here we are. Let's talk a little bit about elections, the midterms, which everyone thinks is important, but I have a tough time caring about because I don't think anything changes after the midterms. Democrats might take control of the House. If you've diluted yourself into thinking that's going to change anything, you're mistaken,

but nonetheless, let's get into it. We are putting the president on the ballot by, and that's exactly what we're doing with this midterm convention. That's what we're going to go do when we go do 30 plus rallies with the president, 100 teletown halls. He is committed to putting and using his name. He's the best showman that's ever existed in the Republican Party. We're going to use them where we can where it's going to be advantageous.

And we think that this midterm convention and what we're doing over the next couple of days will be just the start of some very exciting things over the next two months. That goofy looking gentleman you just heard from is the RNC chair. His name is Joe Grutter's. And he's owning up to the reality that, you know, the GOP midterm. convention, the first of its kind. It's a little bit of a vanity project for a deeply unpopular president. It's unclear whether or not the first ever GOP midterm convention is going to lead to good results for the Republican candidates in battleground states. In fact, many of the Republicans in battleground states didn't even want to attend or speak at this event, which tells you

everything you need to know about Trump's lack of popularity. But today marks day one, of the RNC's midterm convention, which is taking place in Dallas, Texas. And if you're curious what the topic of discussion is, of course, Hassan Piker. Hassan Piker is a big topic of discussion over at the Republican midterm convention. And so what you're seeing on your screen is Hassan Piker in his underwear, showing off his muscles. Okay, I mean, I'm sure that'll help you guys get elected. So the stated goal is to rally voters, Republican voters, around the president and drive people to the polls for the midterms. But things are already going off on a rough start. And so let's talk about guests turn out so far.

Trump and the R&C expected attendance to be massive. If you look at video coming out of the event already, you'll see a lot of empty seats. And look, they set their expectations insanely high at a time when Trump is bleeding support from people who voted for him, certainly independent voters. And they shouldn't be shocked to find that those high expectations are not going to be met. So the RNC initially said they expect about 20,000 people to attend. They also had claimed that the event will be bigger than the 2024 Republican National Convention. You know, the convention where you try to help elect the next president of the United States, I don't know why they would think that. The R&C in 2024 drew in 50,000 people.

You think you're going to bring in 50,000 people for this like dweeb convention? Okay, all right, whatever. By the way, I'm not like attacking it because it's Republicans. It's just you guys have to understand that the, The theater can only go so far. You have to actually fulfill your promises, the promises you campaigned on. But Trump did the opposite. So the idea that the midterms are not going to be a referendum on the Republican Party is clownish.

At the same time, you know, Democrats might be super excited about taking control of the House, which is likely to happen. At least that's what all the predictions indicate. But be careful, Democrats, because you're not going to. going to accomplish anything. We all know that. But you're going to pretend as though electing you guys so you can control the house is going to make all the difference. When it doesn't make all the difference, you're going to deal with the backlash from voters. So get ready, buckle up. Anyway, so lawmakers have to pay to go to this convention and it's not it's not cheap. So house

members have been asked to pay a minimum of $25,000 to get in the door. with a guest. But that's really the bottom of the barrel. Better packages have been priced closer to $100,000. Now, access to the event also varies by state. So for instance, the Texas Republican Party, the Texas GOP offered packages costing $10,000 for honorary delegate, even though there's no one to nominate for this convention. They're not nominating a president, obviously, but okay, whatever. $10,000 for honorary delegate credentials and other perks, half the $20,000 price first advertised. So they're cutting prices, probably because no one wants to pay to go to this event. Other Republicans were invited or given tickets for free.

Some received registration links. Still others entered a free lottery. So in other words, they thought maybe we can make some money off of this and help bank. some of these candidates with the money that was raised. I don't know, I'm just guessing. Or they might have just saved the money pocketed it for the RNC. Who knows? But then they realize no one's interested in paying these prices to get in. So maybe we don't want to embarrass ourselves with insanely low attendance. So let's just give these tickets out for free, which is what they should have done in the first place. But okay. So even if you received one of those lottery tickets,

You still might not be guaranteed entry due to capacity, which trust me, based on the videos, you're not going to have a problem getting it. You're going to be right. But if you wanted guaranteed entry, you'd have to cough up the cash for more expensive packages, including the $10,000 one and a $7,500 one. Anyway, they're trying to charge people. No one's interested. No one's biting. So they're giving out tickets for free. The event will not be at capacity. So if you have a free ticket, you're desperate to go. Don't worry, you'll get in. But here's the real question. Who's going to be there? Who are the guests? Who are the speakers? Because if you can remember a few weeks ago, we discussed

the tentative speaker and guest list, which erroneously included former congressman Marjorie Taylor Green. She put out a video saying, I'm not speaking at this thing. I'm not interested at all. Of course, Trump, Vance, and a number of cabinet officials and congressional leaders will attend. with the exception of Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who, you know, has been critical of Trump. According to Axios, about 100 Republican lawmakers and candidates are expected to attend this event, but attendance is not looking good for the battleground candidates. And that's what really matters here, because if this event is being put together in order to rally voters for Republicans seeking re-election or seeking to be elected for the first time in battleground, States?

You know, you would want those candidates to be part of this, right? This is supposed to help them. But a lot of them don't want to be part of this because they think associating with Donald Trump is actually going to hurt their chances. So CBS News attempted to contact 60 Battleground gubernatorial, Senate, and House candidates. And only four confirmed they would attend the convention. Five of them spoke to CBS and said, we're not going to be there. Please don't ask us.

We're not going to be there. The vast majority didn't respond at all to CBS's questions. Oddly, though, more than two dozen are scheduled to speak at the event, according to the R&C. Well, according to the R&C, Marjorie Taylor Greed was going to speak at the event. And that turned out to be false. So who knows what the reality is? Pennsylvania Republican congressman Brian Fitzpatrick told CBS News plainly, quote, our bosses are back home, meaning the voters, sure, buddy.

Times are tough and we need to be listening to everything they're saying about the struggles that they're encountering in their budgets and their kitchen table and their businesses, health care, and act on it. That's the way the system's supposed to work, not going to some kind of. Convention Center holding signs up. Brian, where are you at? What do you mean? I haven't heard a damn word out of your mouth about inflation or how your constituents

are struggling economically. Are you speaking out against the war against Iran and how we should pull out as soon as possible? You're not, right? Okay, then you're not doing a damn thing about representing your constituents. So please spare me the nonsense. Representative Maria Elvira Salazar from Florida made a similar statement saying, I'm going to be in my district.

I have to be campaigning. No one votes for me in Washington or in Dallas. I have to be in Miami fundraising probably. But other Republicans in tough races not attending also include Susan Collins, Senator Susan Collins, and former Senator John Sununu in New Hampshire. So who will actually be there? Who is confirmed to be there? So Senate candidates include Ohio, Senator John Hustead, Texas, Republican, Ken Paxton, Michigan Republican, Mike Rogers, North Carolina Republican, Michael Watley, and Georgia Representative Mike Collins. Trump won all five states in 2024,

though all of them are competitive this year. And they're competitive because Trump reneged on his promises and all of his minions in Congress have continued providing cover for the fact that Trump reneged on his campaign promises. On the House side, New York Representative Mike Lawler and Pennsylvania representatives Rob Breschenahan, who I've never heard of in my life, and Ryan McKenzie are among the vulnerable incumbents slated to speak. Well, you're probably vulnerable because you're not doing a damn thing for your constituents. I don't even know who some of these people are. So I like what are you up to fundraising and insider trading allegedly is that what you're up to? Like these people don't deserve respect because they don't respect their constituents.

And of course Trump was already armed with an excuse when reporters asked him about the no-shows to this convention. Take a look. And competitive races are not coming to the convention. Do you understand why they're deciding not to come? Everybody that's coming to the convention. Everybody wants to come, but we only want. And the people that are coming, by the way, we're going to be sold out tonight just so you understand. Who are you with?

ABC news, sir. ABC fake news. What are the worst? You are the worst of all, in my opinion. The reason that some people are not coming is because we don't have room for 500 politicians. We have room for the ones that have a close race if they're slightly behind or slightly ahead or tied. But we don't have rooms for people that are 35 points up and don't need to be there. We said stay back in campaign.

Every politician that we've wanted to be there is there. So the Washington Post had this piece out last week about how the Republican candidates like want Trump to share his war chest, meaning the money that he's raised from donors, but they don't want the stank of Trump. So they don't want him to campaign for them. That's how dire the situation is for the Republican Party right now. And if you don't believe me, there's a new focal data financial times poll. It was released over the weekend and it found that the poll found that only 32% of Americans

approved of Trump's job performance, a three-point drop from last month's edition, and the lowest the president has seen in focal data slash financial times tracking since it began in May. Trump's slip in the most recent poll comes as his approval, among Republicans also dropped by two percentage points to 72%, which I think is still insanely high, given how poorly he's leading the country right now as we speak. But the real victim of this entire event is real, of course, because they're the perpetual victims of everything. Take a look.

It's really going to be about the, I think for our audience, at least, the juxtaposition between the 2024 presidential year convention in Milwaukee. It was a love fest between the RNC and Israel. There were speakers, pro-Israel speakers, speakers about the anti-Semitism on campus, signs being held up in the audience about the trust between the GOP and Israel and how much Israel was important to Donald Trump. I mean, you could feel it in the arena there in Milwaukee.

This time around, looking at the overview, at least for day one, it's all about domestic messaging for the R&RQ. this year. It's about staying away from the foreign policy, which is obviously not something they want to talk about very much. The Iran war has not been popular with voters nationwide, including Republicans. So it's about tax cuts, and it's about the culture wars, and it's about the issues that Republicans feel that they can win on. That's what's being pushed here in Dallas over the next couple of days. The most Jewish name on the speaking list today, Ethan Haim, he's a Texas surgeon who was a whistleblower in a gender affirming a case here in

in Texas, nothing to do with Israel, nothing to do with Jewish affairs whatsoever. You know, that might be the first time I've seen an Israeli outlet, I-24 News, show a little bit of self-awareness in regard to how unpopular Israel is with American voters. You love to see it. Yeah, they're not talking about you guys. They're leaning into culture wars because everyone seems to understand what Israel has done to our country. And yeah, the war is deeply unpopular. And so Trump deserves the low approval ratings. When you make promises you don't keep, when you do the exact opposite and betray your voters, you'll be punished for it. And I hope the punishment goes deeper than what we're seeing now. Can't believe 72% of Republicans

are happy with the job he's doing. Like, do you like the higher prices? Okay, enjoy, I guess. For our purposes, though, we got to go. That does it for the main show, but our members-only bonus episode follows. We'll be there in just a few minutes. TYT.com slash join to become a member. Not only do you help support the show and keep us independent, you are also going to get access to members-only content, which we're about to get to in just a few minutes. We'll see you there.