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Ilhan Omar’s stunning answer to MSNOW · 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Three Martini Lunch.
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: Grab a stool next to Greg Karambas of Radio America
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: and Jim Garrity of National Review.
• 0:10
  Speaker 3: Three martinis coming up. So glad you're with us for
• 0:14
  Speaker 3: the Thursday edition of the Three Martini Lunch. And Jim,
• 0:19
  Speaker 3: what a weird day in politics yesterday. But we start
• 0:22
  Speaker 3: in Minnesota. We know, of course, you and Craig talked
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: about the federal raid on Ilhan Omar. We talked about
• 0:28
  Speaker 3: Barack Obama's Odd, extensive defense of Omar and his hypocritical
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: calling out of government for targeting people for their political beliefs.
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: But there seems to be drip, drip, drip coming out
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: of this investigation. I would prefer to have that all
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: behind the scenes until any charges come out. But nonetheless,
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: it looks like, at least somewhere along the way, Ilhan
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: Omar's last name may have been different, but it was
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: the same as the man that she buried earlier. a
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: while back, not her current husband, which is feeding into
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: the idea that she actually married her brother. So yesterday,
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: she finally emerges for an interview on MS Now with
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: Chris Hayes. And there's a long form and a short
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: form of this, but just in fairness to everyone, here's
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: the long form.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: Who was this man that was your husband? When did
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: they start saying that he was your brother?
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: Why?
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: It started with the Somali blog that I don't know
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: if it still exists, but somebody put in there that,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: you know, that he had to have been my brother
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: or something to that effect. And right wing people. And
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: conspiracy theorists in Minneapolis got a hold of it, and
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: they just kind of went and, like, found random people
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: who were like, she introduced us. You know, she introduced
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: him to us and said he was her brother, which is,
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: you know, insane. I mean, I don't know those people
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: that they talk about.
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: You were not related to him at all?
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: Not to my knowledge.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: That was the big gotcha, right, in terms of what
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: you're talking about promising. Like, we're going to nail her
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: on the marriage.
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah, let's listen to that one part again.
• 2:14
  Speaker 4: You were not related to him at all.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: Not to my knowledge.
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: Jim, are you married to your sister? I'm not married
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: to any blood relatives. I know that for a fact.
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: Not to my knowledge.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: No, and I'm... I'm feeling very much like a Ghostbuster
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: right now. If someone asks if you're a god, you
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: say yes. If someone says, are you related to your wife?
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: You say no. And although I did find out that
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: the non-Irish part of my heritage over, I thought it
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: was from, you know, it's Polish. Found some family documents on,
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: you know, Ancestry.com. And apparently we were from Lviv. Now,
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: you may have noticed Lviv is not part of Poland today.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: It is part of Ukraine. And so my wife's heritage
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: is from there as well. So we're not quite as
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: far apart geographically as I expected on that part. But no,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: we are not related. And the kids did not come
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: out with two heads or anything like that. Um, but
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: like this, so here's the thing. First of all, remember
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: when Chris Hayes did the interview with Graham Platner and
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: Platner did not handle it well. Like is Chris Hayes
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: just the go-to guy where your hand has been caught
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: in the cookie jar. You can't blow off the press
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: any longer. You're going to have to be interviewed by somebody.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: And you know, Chris Hayes is the guy, he won't
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: even toss softballs. He's going to, He's going to put
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: it up on a tee and with a big plastic
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: red tee and you just take a swing and you
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: just do your best. And unfortunately, Ilhan Omar, are you
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: related to your husband? Not that I, as far as
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: I know, no, but, but really like, you know, 99.99%
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: of the population would just say no and not leave
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: any wiggle room or something like that. There was a
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: almost Bill Clintonian answer, you know, that, uh, So, look,
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: we'll see. Again, like you, I don't love the.
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: Drip, drip, drip.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: If there's a crime there, say so. If there's not
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: a crime there, don't pursue someone. Don't strategically leak information
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: or anything like that.
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: But.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: it's getting very, you know, but that was a really
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: curious answer. Um, just very different from what most people's
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: would be on the fairly. I mean, by the way,
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: my understanding, I just got a statement over the transom from, um,
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: Troy Jackson, the, uh, the democratic Senate candidate in Maine.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: And he said, uh, it's all relative, uh, Troy Jackson,
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: who of course is had children with his second cousin.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: It's a second cousin. It's totally different, you know?
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: No, that's incredible. You know, it kind of reminds me
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: of that meme involving Natalie Portman and the guy that
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: played Anakin Skywalker, where he says something and she's like,
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: you mean this, right? And he just has a blank
• 4:53
  Speaker 3: stare and she's like, you mean this, right? And so
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: Chris Hayes, who could come at this as a, you know,
• 4:58
  Speaker 3: an adult and a mature journalist saying, did you marry
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: your brother? And say, you didn't marry your brother.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: You're not related to your brother, to your husband, right?
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: And she's like, probably not.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: It's it's look, I there were a couple versions of
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: this joke I wanted to put in today's morning, Joel,
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: that I said, you know, what one version that I
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: did not use was Republicans. This is what you get
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: for spending years insisting Democrats don't have family values. They're
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: trying to bring families closer together.
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: Oh, my gosh.
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: If your family tree does not fork, you may be
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: a redneck.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: Exactly. I don't know. If this continues to have legs
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: and there's an indictment here, I feel like we're weeks,
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: maybe a couple of months away from, well, you have
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: to understand the culture.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: That's right.
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: Really?
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: I don't think so.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: Look, I understand if you call up Omar's office because
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: you want answers to this. The hold music is the
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: theme to Deliverance.
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: See, I'm not doing Somali jokes, you know, politically correct types.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: I'm doing redneck incest jokes. It's totally different and it's
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: totally OK. It's not a racist joke. All right.
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: Well, if, you know, that kind of family affection leaves
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: a bad taste in your mouth and it should, may
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: I suggest Lorinco? Lorinco is better for you. Chewing gum
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: that uses the same mineral your teeth are made of.
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: To support daily enamel health, I love the toothpaste. Just
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: finished a tube the other day. I love the gum.
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: You know, like I said, one little piece, great flavor,
• 6:35
  Speaker 3: lasts a really long time, but you can pop another
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: one too. Also great.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: Nano-hydroxyapatite has nothing to do with family relations. It is,
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: in fact, the enamel that your teeth are made of,
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: and Lorraine Co. uses that, and it strengthens your enamel,
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: and it repairs the damaged teeth. Lorinco gum comes in
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: tons of flavors, including mint, cinnamon, bubble gum, and berry.
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: And they have a really great fluoride-free toothpaste as well.
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: Right now, Lorinco is offering our listeners up to 50%
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: off at buylorine.com slash 3ML. That's buylorine, L-A-R-I-N-E dot com
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: slash 3ML for up to 50% off. All right, Jim,
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: since Graham Platner dropped out, I don't think there's another
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: Senate race that's gotten more attention on this podcast than Michigan.
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: And for very good reasons. Yesterday, I think, was the
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: final debate between Mike Rogers and Abdul El-Sayed. And Mike
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: Rogers definitely has his foot on the gas in pointing
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: out not only the Muslim Brotherhood ties from Abdul El-Sayed
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: and many other members.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: Of his family.
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: But just that Abdullah El-Sayed never gives you a straight
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: answer on anything. Here is one of Roger's statements last night.
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 7:47
  Speaker 4: I mean, this is just so rich. Uh, Everything that
• 7:50
  Speaker 4: he said, A, is not accurate, not correct. But, you know,
• 7:53
  Speaker 4: when you ask somebody, a new investigator, about how you
• 7:56
  Speaker 4: figure out if somebody's honest and willing to tell you
• 7:59
  Speaker 4: the truth, you go through a series of questions. Did
• 8:02
  Speaker 4: you lie on your resume? Yep, did. He lied about
• 8:04
  Speaker 4: being a physician. Did he lie about his relationships with
• 8:07
  Speaker 4: an organization that should give us all pause? Yep, he did.
• 8:11
  Speaker 4: He lied about being an Egyptian dual citizen. He lied
• 8:15
  Speaker 4: about some of his stances on these positions as he's
• 8:18
  Speaker 4: flipped again. This is a pattern that we need to understand.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: Thank you very much.
• 8:24
  Speaker 4: To trust this candidate.
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: And one issue is that whole Medicare for all, which
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: is kind of his signature issue. Just last month, Jim,
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: Charlie was subbing for you. And we had El Sayed saying, oh, no,
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: if you like your private insurance, you can keep that. But,
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: you know, we're really going to go with the government
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: single payer option. Now, not so much, which is more
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: honest from him, but a complete flip flop.
• 8:43
  Speaker 5: You guarantee government health care for everyone.
• 8:46
  Speaker 4: Why?
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 8:47
  Speaker 5: Number one. It means you're going to have health care.
• 8:49
  Speaker 5: Number two, government's big enough to be like, you're not
• 8:52
  Speaker 5: going to raise the rates anymore because we're the only
• 8:54
  Speaker 5: one paying. You know what a monopoly is, right? Monopoly
• 8:56
  Speaker 5: is when there's one seller of a good. The one
• 8:58
  Speaker 5: seller gets to be like, here's what I'm selling for.
• 9:00
  Speaker 5: So you got to buy. There's this other thing we
• 9:02
  Speaker 5: don't talk about called a monopsony, which is the one
• 9:05
  Speaker 5: buyer of a good. If the government is everybody's insurer,
• 9:08
  Speaker 5: it's basically buying for everybody.
• 9:10
  Speaker 4: So you remove the insurance companies and the government is
• 9:13
  Speaker 4: now the insurer.
• 9:13
  Speaker 5: Government becomes the insurer. Insurance companies can do what they want.
• 9:16
  Speaker 5: They want to offer a luxury.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: Product for a couple of folks. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 9:19
  Speaker 5: But you don't rely on the insurance system.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: See what I'm saying?
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: I can keep it for a couple of luxury procedures, Jim.
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: This guy can't keep his story straight no matter what
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: he's doing.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: No, look, if you decide we, the government, are going
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: to be the loan. We now have stepped in. We
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: have pushed the insurance companies out of it other than
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: the luxury market. Well, first of all, It's going to
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: be very hard for the insurance companies to stay in
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: business if they're only doing plastic surgeries, I suppose. This all,
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: by the way, takes us further away from the real
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: problem in healthcare, which has been the people who are
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: purchasing it are not actually the ones who are paying
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: the price for it because the insurance company is paying
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: most of it. Insurance companies do not cover LASIK eye surgery.
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: As a result, you ever see ads for LASIK eye surgery?
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: They tell you the prices, right? It's not like they
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: tell you, oh, you need heart surgery? Come to visit Dr. John.
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: These are his prices, right? There's no transparency in pricing.
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: There's no comparison shopping. Now, certain health care things you're
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: not going to be able to shop around for. You
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: get shot, you need to go to a hospital very quickly,
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: and you need an action taken very quickly. But all
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: the things that work for the market for everything else
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: don't really exist in health insurance, and that's what is
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: causing the problems here. But as for that, look, it's
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: a very interesting contrast, I think, between here and, say, Texas.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: I don't know if Mike Rogers is going to win.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: I don't think you can say Mike Rogers has run
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: a bad campaign. I think, if anything, maybe he's got
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: a problem of El Sayed being such a target-rich environment.
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: That the question is, what do you want to focus on?
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: Do you want to focus on, you know, taking away
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: private health insurance? Do you want to focus on ties
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: to the Muslim Brotherhood? Do you want to focus on
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: his extremist comments and his hurt people, hurt people? Like,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: there's a wide variety. And I think if anything, maybe
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: the problem with the Rogers campaign is that they've been
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: spread over a whole bunch of different themes. I think
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: tying it all together, that in the end, you can't
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: trust Abdul Al-Sayed. He basically lies about everything. The moment
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: something becomes inconvenient for him. The moment he has to
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: tell people something that they're probably not going to want
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: to hear, i.e., yeah, I was a member of the
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: Muslim Brotherhood. Yeah, I was a dual citizen and all
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: these other issues. Now, all of a sudden, he starts lying.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: And also, you never really know where he stands on anything.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: I think that could be an effective line of criticism
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: on him. The contrast down in Texas, where you have
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: a comparably deeply flawed Democratic candidate, but unfortunately... Not as
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: effective a Republican candidate. I think it's very clear there.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: And I think we'll see how it goes, how it
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: shakes out. Right now, I feel like I would never
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: have thought to find myself in mid to late October, Greg,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: thinking Republicans have a better shot in Michigan than they
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: do in Texas.
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's not usually the case, is it? And El
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: Sayed's got one of these tactics. You see it all
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: the time when somebody's attacking them. And in this case,
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: it's obviously true from Mike Rogers. But they just kind
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: of give you that little head shake and like... Kind
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: of like, can you believe this guy type thing? And
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: then you're like, if it's your candidate that's doing the
• 12:09
  Speaker 3: head shake and the sighing, you're like, okay, next time
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: it's his turn to speak, he's going to set the
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: record straight. And then he doesn't.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: He just goes in a totally different direction. It's like,
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: maybe he was landing punches there. And all you can
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: do is shake your head and pretend it's not true.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: Or he gets mad, as we saw in the interview
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: with NBC's Tom Llamas and stuff like that. How dare you?
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: Like the outrage, you know, instead of actually answering the question.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: But yeah, I think the all-time champion of that was
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Mitt Romney, who would always have this, you poor, poor man.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Your mental problems are so severe. I hope you get
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: the help that you need. More in sympathy than in anger.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: It's like he's seeing a crazy person on the street
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: yelling that his dog is telling him to kill someone
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: or something. Yeah, unbelievable.
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: So Michigan voters... I hope you're seeing things clearly there.
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: And we only got a couple of weeks to go.
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: And early voting is a factor there too. So, all right,
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: let's talk about something more serious than that even. And
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: that is that in your community and in communities across
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: the country, there are women who are scared right now.
• 13:12
  Speaker 5: They are pregnant.
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: They did not plan this pregnancy. They don't know about
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: their finances. They don't know about whether they're going to
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: have support if they have this child. And that's where
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: you can come in because Human Coalition can provide the
• 13:23
  Speaker 3: help that they need, but they need your help to
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: do it.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: When a woman reaches out to Human Coalition, she's connected
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: with trained nursing and counseling professionals. Nothing gets outsourced. Human
• 13:33
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• 13:36
  Speaker 1: network of pregnancy centers who are trained to help women
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: facing these abortion decisions. And their support does not stop
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: after the baby is born.
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Human Coalition has already helped more than 35,000 women
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: choose life, but obviously there are so many more to reach.
• 13:50
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• 13:52
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• 13:56
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• 13:59
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• 14:05
  Speaker 3: martini and give today. All right, Jim, we just talked
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: about the Russians a little bit yesterday. Now we're going
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: to focus a little bit more specifically on the war
• 14:18
  Speaker 3: with Ukraine. This is the subject of your morning jolt today.
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: The Ukrainians have access to about 50 F-16s, thanks to us.
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: But after about 300 hours of flying time, according to
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: the Wall Street Journal, those F-16s basically need to go
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: through some routine scheduled maintenance. It's known as phase inspection
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: to keep the engine, avionics, hydraulics, fuel lines and other
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: systems in working order. they have basically contracted this work
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: out to a Belgian firm known as Sabina Aerospace Engineering
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: up to the tune of $ 235 million, as you write today.
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: Usually phase inspection takes two to six weeks when our
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: guys do it. In Belgium, it's taking as long as
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: 40 weeks. And right now, about half those F-16s are
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: out of commission. They do a great job when they're
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: functioning against Russian drones and other aerial threats, but it's
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: kind of hard to do that. We're in the shop.
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: So I'm on a text chain of various folks who
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: are following the war closely, pro-Ukrainian voices. And I kept
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: seeing comments of those darn Belgians and worse versions of that.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: And I was like, OK, so what's what's going on
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: with this? Today's Morning Jolt is a very deep dive
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: into this. I was able to speak to a couple
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: of experts, including retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Mark Montgomery.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: He's with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. He regularly
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: travels to Ukraine and speaks to Ukrainian defense officials. And
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: he says, you know, there are some legitimate reasons of
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: why this is taking so long. This is kind of
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: this is, you know, NATO probably underestimated how long it
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: was going to take to do this. They were studying
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: a peacetime environment compared to a wartime flight plan. These
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: are decades old planes and they're having combat experiences. So
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: they are, you know, as one person put it to me.
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: to use cowboy variants. They're ridden hard and put away wet. Basically,
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: there's not a lot of maintenance going on when they're
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: out there hunting Russian drones and shooting them down before
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: they can hit Ukrainian civilians. So it's up to this
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: Belgian company, Sabina. But there's also, indisputably, some fault of
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: Sabina here. They probably underestimated the amount of time it
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: was going to take probably were optimistic in their assessments
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: of how fast they'd be able to do this in
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: their capacity. They said they'd be able to do four
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: planes a month. Montgomery says that's just not realistic, but
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: based on the size of their facilities, it really doesn't
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: think two planes a month is realistic. Now, as I said,
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: you mentioned how much it normally takes. Vermont Air National
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: Guard just a couple of years ago was talking about
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: how they do the same maintenance on the same planes.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: They say it takes them 18 workdays. Now, Greg, I
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: know the Europeans, they have a lot of vacation days.
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: They like to stop and have coffee in the cafes
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: in the afternoon. But if it's taking the American Air
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: National Guard like 18 work, let's say you take weekends off.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: That still comes out to like, you know, less than
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: a month.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: It should not be taking you the better part of
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: a year to complete this on a plane. And, you know,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: this is one of the best tools the Russians have
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: to shoot down the drones. By the way, a weird
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: little wrinkle is that the F-16, so it can go
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: as fast as Mach 2, but I think the slowest
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: speed before stall is like 130 miles an hour. So
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: the irony is that the new jet-powered Russian drones go
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: faster than the traditional propeller-based ones. Well, it turns out
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: the F-16s are actually better at the newer, more advanced
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: ones because their speed is more aligned with the speed
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: of the drones. The old drones are slower. which the
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: F-16s actually can't, it's like they can't go slow enough
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: to tail them accurately well enough to get behind them
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: to shoot them down. Anyway, just, you know, if you're
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: into aviation type stuff, this is the kind of stuff
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: that I spent a good portion of this week, you know,
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: digging into. So there are some legitimate reasons for this
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: being complicated, but it's still an exceptionally slow pace. And
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: then there are lots of weird little details like, you know,
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: Norway back in August, 2023, we're coming up on, you know,
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: more than three years ago, They said they're going to
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: transfer six F-16s to Ukraine. By the way, almost every
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: NATO member, a bunch of NATO members are upgrading to
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: the F-35s. So they have these F-16s that are relatively,
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: you know, we're not going to need them anymore. They're
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: the old models. By the way, Greg, have you ever
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: seen the pictures of the boneyard out in Arizona where
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: the US military stores all of the old jets and
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: it's like this giant field in the desert full of them?
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: We have 340 F-16s that we're not flying anymore. Now,
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: they're old i'm sure they're in rough shape but if
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: you're the ukrainians and you could use some spare parts
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: that's got to be home depot that's got to be
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: yeah look around in the back i'm sure you can
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: find you you need a gear or or something like
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: that you can probably find it on that they're just
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: sitting out there in the desert i don't understand why
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: we wouldn't be saying to the ukrainians any parts you
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: need anything like that go use them again 340 just
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: sitting there um compared to an existing flight of the
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: Ukrainians that has 50, and as I said, about half,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: so probably around 25, at any given time are sitting
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: in Belgium waiting to be repaired and stuff. So a
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: very frustrating process. I go into other problems of Belgian
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: policies and stuff like that. More than you probably ever
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: wanted to know, but nonetheless, look, I've had a lot
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: of beeps with the administration. There are a lot of
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: things the president has said lately. But some of our
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: NATO allies could be doing a little bit more. And
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: when you sign on to the job to keep the
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: Ukrainian jets in working order, you really got to do it, man.
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: You got to go. This stuff is matter. This is
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: not something, you know, this is not something you could
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: be doing at a leisurely pace.
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, sometimes those mothballed aircraft work. I remember in Top
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: Gun Maverick, there were a couple in perfect working order
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: in a country that totally wasn't Iran. Yes, couldn't be
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: any of them. Yeah, exactly.
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: They were flying MiGs, by the way. So it's conceivable
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: they were some former Soviet republic or something like that.
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so maybe one last waffle, Belgians. Get back to work.
• 20:04
  Speaker 3: All right. In a moment, some breaking news from right
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: here in Virginia. All right, Jim, just before we started
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: recording today, we got breaking news from Bill Malusian over
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: at Fox News that says breaking update. Virginia's Democratic Senate
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: president pro tempore Louise Lucas has been arrested by the
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: feds and is now in federal custody. She is charged
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: with drug trafficking, money laundering, fraud and firearms charge. You
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: may remember that back in May in Portsmouth, Virginia, the
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: FBI raided the office that she has there, as well as,
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: I think, a pot dispensary that she or her family
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: or both were operating down there. So Louise Lucas is
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: one of the more odious public officials in Virginia. I
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: remember when they passed through the legislature the gerrymandering map
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: and people were complaining about it. And she didn't do
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: the acronym for bleep around and find out. She just
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: flat out did it. She's about as obnoxious and crude
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: as they come. which is not criminal. But in this case,
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: it looks like she very may well be.
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: We'll see.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: Firearms charge, Greg. Our state attorney general, he just talks
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: about shooting people. She might be even more dangerous in
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: light of that. In fact, this is handed to me
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: from Jay Jones. She's crazy. She's crazy. Be careful. So
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: for those that don't recall, Jay Jones is the one
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: who talked about shooting Republican officials so that they would
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: understand the need for gun control. we've got some real
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: winners in this state. Look, you know, this is only
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: an indictment. This has to be proven in a court
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: of law, presumption of innocence, blah, blah, blah. But no, Luis, like,
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: it's interesting because, you know, you and I have all
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: kinds of beefs with Mark Warner, Tim Kaine, most of
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: the Democrats in this state, but most of them are
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: not you know, frothing at the mouth, verbal bomb throwers.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: They generally have that Virginia genteel tone to them, even
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: if they are, you know, they vote indistinguishably from Democrats
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: everywhere else. Luis Lucas was not one of those. Luis
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Lucas was a bomb thrower. Luis Lucas was someone who
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: Seems like she steps right out of the comments of
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: a Daily Kosak comment section or something like that. So
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: like this is not someone we're like, oh, oh, it
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: doesn't seem like. And I got to say those crimes
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: in there listed, though, drug trafficking, money laundering, fraud, firearms.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: Like what was she? I can't wait to read this
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: indictment in full. We'll see this late breaking. Don't have
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: everything yet. Stay tuned. Very likely to be a topic
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: of this podcast in the future.
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: You know who's probably not heartbroken over this is Abigail Spanberger,
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: who thinks she's the top Democrat in the state. Louise Lucas,
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: who's been in the legislature forever, has basically been fighting
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: her to go even more left than she already has,
• 22:49
  Speaker 3: which is seemingly hard to do. I remember there's some
• 22:52
  Speaker 3: conservative reporters in Richmond and Abigail Spanberger usually does the
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: I can't even see you routine and just walks right
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: past them. So the day of the raid, she like
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: walks up and can barely suppress a smile of, oh, oh, well,
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: we just have to see how the facts go. And,
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm not going to jump to any conclusions here. Yeah,
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: she's trying not to laugh too hard today, I think.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: There was a rumor that Spanberger, who famously said she
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: didn't want to do redistricting and didn't see any need
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: for redistricting of the U.S. House, you know, congressional districts,
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: that she didn't really want to do it, but she
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: was pressured into doing it by Luis Lopez. Now, I
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: don't know if that's, you know, just making an excuse
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: or whether that's actually the case. But again, like, you know,
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: if you're Spanberger, insert the Seinfeld gif here. That's a shame.
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: You didn't have to go along with it, Abigail.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: You had to sign it to get on.
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: The ballot before it passed and before it got struck
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: down by the state Supreme Court. But you didn't have
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: to go along with that. Anyway, Jim, as you said,
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: we'll probably learn a lot more about this today and beyond.
• 23:49
  Speaker 3: So see you tomorrow.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: See you tomorrow, Greg.
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: Jim Garrity, National Review. I'm Greg Karambas of Radio America.
• 23:54
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• 23:56
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• 23:58
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• 24:00
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• 24:03
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• 24:16
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