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The Big Weekend Pod · The Hugh Hewitt Show: Highly Concentrated

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to today's podcast, sponsored by Hillsdale College. All things
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Hillsdale at hillsdale.edu. I encourage you to take advantage of
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: the many free online courses there. And of course, to
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: listen to the Hillsdale Dialogues, all of them at Hugh
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: for hillsdale.com or just Google Apple, iTunes, and Hillsdale. Morning, glory,
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: and evening grace, America. Welcome to the Big Weekend Pod.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewitt. We've got our regular Week in Review guest,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: John Ellis, the founder and editor-in-chief of News Items. If
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: you don't subscribe to news items, you're kind of missing
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: out on the easiest way to stay abreast of all
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  Speaker 1: the news that matters. I've also got Eli Lake in
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  Speaker 1: to talk about what the Battle of Hormuz being won means.
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  Speaker 1: Admiral Brad Cooper announced that this week, that the Battle
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  Speaker 1: of Hormuz had been won, and the Strait is open
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  Speaker 1: to our allies, and all imports except humanitarian imports are
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  Speaker 1: closed to Iran. I'll also be talking with Matt Continetti,
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  Speaker 1: with Ben Dominich, about the same subject. So it's our
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  Speaker 1: typical week in review, but this, as we approach the
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  Speaker 1: 25th anniversary of 9-11 next Friday, we're in a good position,
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  Speaker 1: or two Fridays from now, we're in a good position
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  Speaker 1: to say that the worst enemy we've got in terms
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  Speaker 1: of being a hair-trigger enemy, not a strategic enemy, but
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  Speaker 1: a tactical, fanatical enemy, has been brought to heel for
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  Speaker 1: the time being. And Scott Besson's Operation Economic Outcast is working.
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  Speaker 1: It's beginning to bite. And every bank doing business with
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  Speaker 1: Iran is finding out the hard way. They fooled around
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  Speaker 1: and they're finding out. And if you stay tuned, you'll
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  Speaker 1: hear all of our experts talk about that on today's
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Big Weekend Pod. Morning glory and evening grace, America. I'm
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Hugh Hewitt. Welcome to the weekend and our Big Weekend show.
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  Speaker 1: As per usual, when we are lucky, I begin with
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  Speaker 1: our first guest, John Ellis. John is the founder and
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  Speaker 1: editor-in-chief of News Items. Every single day, I begin my morning,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: my news dive with News Items, a newsletter which you
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: can get at Substack. Just Google John Ellison News Items,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: along with about 50,000 other really smart Americans. It might
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: be more than that. But normally, John tells me the news.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: I have a bit of news that happened since News
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  Speaker 1: Items came out, John. I want to begin with your
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  Speaker 1: reaction to this. It's a great story. This hour, Governor
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  Speaker 1: Bill Lee... of Tennessee and the Nashville International Airport announced
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: that Nashville's airport, in conjunction with the Dollywood Foundation and
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: Imagination Library, will be changing their library name to Dolly
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  Speaker 1: Parton Airport. So I think there automatically ought to be
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  Speaker 1: direct flights to John Wayne Airport and to Ronald Reagan Airport.
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  Speaker 1: What do you think?
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  Speaker 2: I think that's a very good idea. I would add
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  Speaker 2: George H.W. Bush Airport in Houston.
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  Speaker 1: I would, too. The only trouble is you have to
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  Speaker 1: go to Houston in that deal. Otherwise, you get to
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  Speaker 1: go to Orange County in the nation's capital or Nashville.
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  Speaker 1: What does one do in Houston?
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  Speaker 2: Well, there's very good Mexican food, and it's hot and muggy.
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  Speaker 2: My daughter lived there for, I think, seven years, and
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  Speaker 2: it's definitely, in the summer, it's almost unbearable.
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  Speaker 1: Well, the fetching Mrs. Hewitt's favorite president is George H.W. Bush.
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  Speaker 1: And so I'll get corrected on my post about that.
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  Speaker 1: But I think Dolly Parton, I'll ask you this, John.
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  Speaker 1: Dwayne has taken to calling her one of the last
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  Speaker 1: universal Americans, meaning that everybody liked Dolly Parton. Can you
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  Speaker 1: think of anybody else in that category? I think your
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: friend Katie Couric might be in that category. Who else?
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  Speaker 2: Nothing like Dolly. I mean, that's a different category, I think.
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  Speaker 2: I really can't think of anyone else. who was universally
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  Speaker 2: loved in the way that she was. And it's a
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  Speaker 2: great loss. She lived a great life. And the stories,
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  Speaker 2: her stories of her early life are worth looking up
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  Speaker 2: on YouTube when she's interviewed by various people. It's an
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  Speaker 2: incredible story. And she was not just a great country
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  Speaker 2: western star, obviously. She was also a terrific entrepreneur and
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  Speaker 2: enormously successful.
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  Speaker 1: There are very few people who stop the news cycle.
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  Speaker 1: You know, when Michael Jackson died, he stopped the news cycle.
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  Speaker 1: When Princess Diana died, she stopped the news cycle. John
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  Speaker 1: Lennon was assassinated. He stopped the news cycle. There just
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  Speaker 1: aren't many people who do that. Dolly Parton did that. John,
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  Speaker 1: let's get to the serious news. And I want to
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  Speaker 1: begin with, you sent me a story. I was unaware.
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  Speaker 1: I've known about CTE, the brain dysfunction that accompanies repeated concussions.
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  Speaker 1: I knew it was prevalent in the NFL, because my
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  Speaker 1: old law firm represented a helmet maker. And they've done
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  Speaker 1: everything they can. Literally everything that science can do, they do.
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  Speaker 1: But these statistics are still unnerving. Tell people about it.
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  Speaker 2: Well, the British medical journal, BMJ, published an article that showed,
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  Speaker 2: that revealed, I guess, at least one quarter of people
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  Speaker 2: who play in the NFL will be brain damaged after
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  Speaker 2: their careers have finished. And they think the numbers are
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  Speaker 2: even worse than that. So it's, you know, it's a
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  Speaker 2: truly troubling development or finding. And it's, you know, NFL
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  Speaker 2: supports an enormous infrastructure. Broadcast networks basically couldn't exist without
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  Speaker 2: NFL football. Advertisers depend on it to get messages out
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  Speaker 2: to vast audiences as opposed to selected audiences. This finding,
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  Speaker 2: it's really a question of the parents. If the mother
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  Speaker 2: or father of a very talented young athlete thinks that
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  Speaker 2: their son is going to be involved in a sport
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  Speaker 2: that will lead him to be brain damaged, they're going
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  Speaker 2: to push that very talented young athlete to play basketball
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  Speaker 2: or baseball. or soccer, God forbid. So in terms of
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  Speaker 2: the talent pool, it's not going to happen tomorrow. It's
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  Speaker 2: not going to happen next year. But I wonder if
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  Speaker 2: over the next 10 years, we don't see LeBron James, say,
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  Speaker 2: or some great NFL quarterback playing goalie in the Premier
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  Speaker 2: League in England.
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  Speaker 1: I think you're right. I also think that liability insurance
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  Speaker 1: is going to drive secondary football, high school football, and
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  Speaker 1: college football into the unaffordable category. I mean, the NFL
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  Speaker 1: will be able to afford it, but I don't know
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  Speaker 1: if you're not Division I in the top 50 teams
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  Speaker 1: if you'll be able to afford your liability insurance. I
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  Speaker 1: haven't seen any study on that. Let me go then
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  Speaker 1: to story number three, which you sent me. I'll give
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  Speaker 1: the bad news from Tehran before we get to the
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  Speaker 1: bad news in the United States. Long queues have formed
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  Speaker 1: around petrol stations in Tehran I don't think it's going
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  Speaker 1: to get better, John. I think it's going to get worse.
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  Speaker 1: How does it go for them?
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  Speaker 2: I just don't see a way that suddenly the prices
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  Speaker 2: go down. Inflation is at 70% in Iran. The currency
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  Speaker 2: is wallpaper, essentially. Before the war began, you had a
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  Speaker 2: very rested population to begin with. I can't imagine that
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  Speaker 2: waiting in a two-hour line to get half a tank
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  Speaker 2: of gas, and then when you get, you know, some
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  Speaker 2: people get to the pump and it's empty, that's not
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  Speaker 2: going to lend support to the regime. And the most
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  Speaker 2: interesting thing that happened, I guess, in the last 10
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  Speaker 2: days was one of the Iranian political figures, not an
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  Speaker 2: IRGC figure, said that now is the time to negotiate
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  Speaker 2: a peace with the U.S., That was shot down by
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  Speaker 2: the IRGC people, but I think it's indicative of, you know,
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  Speaker 2: public dissatisfaction, if you want to call it that, with
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  Speaker 2: the regime's economy.
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  Speaker 1: John, do you by chance, the News Items newsletter comes,
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  Speaker 1: and it's got 15 to 20 items and many quick links,
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  Speaker 1: and that's where I get my news in the morning.
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  Speaker 1: Are you able to track which ones of those attract
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  Speaker 1: the most click-throughs to the primary sources?
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  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, I am.
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  Speaker 1: And does AI win, or does national security win, or
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  Speaker 1: does economic news win? What wins?
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  Speaker 2: Well, what wins is, to begin with, are the quick
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  Speaker 2: links at the bottom, because people can pick and choose
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  Speaker 2: what they want to click on. But the stories that
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  Speaker 2: get by far the most attention are the stories from
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  Speaker 2: the world of science. It's... When I talk to people
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: about what they like about news items, I would say
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  Speaker 2: that 80% of them say the science news. And that's
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: a function of, you know, people don't read Nature magazine
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  Speaker 2: and Scientific American and Quanta. We do, and we pick
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  Speaker 2: out the most interesting ones. A lot to do with
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  Speaker 2: Alzheimer's and dementia and things like that. We have an
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  Speaker 2: older audience that's very... keen on that subject and then
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  Speaker 2: cancer is a big one gets clicked through and then
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  Speaker 2: just wellness stuff gets clicked through you know this this
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  Speaker 2: uh this regime exercise regime is good and this is
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  Speaker 2: you know how you should sleep better all that all
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  Speaker 2: of that science stuff is uh really gets a lot
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  Speaker 2: of attention ai gets a lot of attention And people
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  Speaker 2: tell me that they want more of it. But, you know,
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  Speaker 2: if you did what's available on any given day, it
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  Speaker 2: would be the whole summer. So I try to keep
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  Speaker 2: it to two or three.
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  Speaker 1: You know, I pull one or two items a morning
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  Speaker 1: out to share with my ex-account. Today I pulled out,
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  Speaker 1: I had never heard of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.
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  Speaker 1: I'd never heard of it. I can't wait for it
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  Speaker 1: to go up. I don't even know who it's named for.
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  Speaker 1: But I just thought, wow, that's fabulous. And I don't
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  Speaker 1: know how you find this stuff.
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  Speaker 2: Well, I have our science researchers, a young woman named
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  Speaker 2: Joanna Thompson, who is a proud graduate of Appalachia State University.
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  Speaker 2: She's now a freelance science writer in New York, and
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  Speaker 2: she's a space freak. She loves all things space. So
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  Speaker 2: every morning, there's usually from her file, there's usually one
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  Speaker 2: or two items about space. And I hadn't really paid
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  Speaker 2: that much attention to it. And the more I read
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  Speaker 2: what she filed, there's a lot going on out there
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  Speaker 2: in space.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, my goodness. And last story of the week, diesel.
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  Speaker 2: Diesel, I did not realize, is.
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  Speaker 1: At $ 5. 62 a gallon as of Wednesday. That's 53% higher
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  Speaker 1: than a year ago. Of course, diesel, we've got a minute, John.
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  Speaker 1: That's in everything. Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, when people talk about, as we do, talk
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  Speaker 2: about the price of gas and how that's going to
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: impact the elections and so on and so forth, you
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: and I can drive less and therefore pay the same amount.
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  Speaker 2: But diesel goes into the trucks that move everything around
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  Speaker 2: and they have to move all that stuff around. So
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: if the price is 50% higher... That's going to get
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: tacked on to the stuff that the Walmart truck is delivering,
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: the stuff that the Amazon truck is delivering. So that
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  Speaker 2: has a significant impact on inflation. And as you know
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: better than most, inflation is the battery acid of American
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  Speaker 2: politics for.
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  Speaker 1: The party in power. And it's also going to make
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: it into every item in every food store in every city.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: John Ellis, good to talk to you. Follow John on
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: Exit Ellis Items. If you want to subscribe to News
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: Items and join the 50,000 of us who are smart
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: every morning, look up News Items, John Ellis, like and subscribe.
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: You'll thank me. Thank you, John. I'll be right back.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: Eli Lake is next. Welcome back, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt,
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: joined by Eli Lake. Eli is a contributor to the
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: Free Press, which you can subscribe to at dfp.com. Like
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: News Items last segment. This is the new media on
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: which you can rely. Eli can be followed at Eli
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Lake on X. He's also the host of the Breaking
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: History podcast. Eli, I want to work it in somewhere,
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: so I'm going to play for you in the audience.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: Admiral Brad Cooper dropped this video last night, cut number five.
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  Speaker 4: Hi, I'm Admiral Brad Cooper, commander of U.S. Central Command,
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  Speaker 4: here with an operational update on two ongoing missions in
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  Speaker 4: the Middle East. Many of our 50,000 U.S. troops operating
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  Speaker 4: across the region are doing outstanding work executing the naval
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  Speaker 4: blockade against Iran while maintaining commercial traffic flow through the
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  Speaker 4: Strait of Hormuz. As recently announced, the U.S. military has
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  Speaker 4: achieved a major milestone in the Strait of Hormuz. We
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  Speaker 4: have successfully cleared sea mines in the Strait's international shipping
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  Speaker 4: lanes that were laid months ago by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary
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  Speaker 4: Guard Corps. Internationally recognized transit routes in the Strait are
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  Speaker 4: free of Iranian sea mines thanks to the incredible work
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  Speaker 4: of the U.S.
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  Speaker 1: Military. So that is the bottom line. It's open, Eli,
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  Speaker 1: and the price of crude is at $ 82 a barrel.
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  Speaker 1: I think a lot of people are slow to credit this.
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  Speaker 1: How do you react to it?
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  Speaker 5: Well, it's not quite fully open yet because there is
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  Speaker 5: still going to be the issue of insurance and there's
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  Speaker 5: going to be threats to vessels from you know, the
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  Speaker 5: short-range missiles and drones that the Iranians have fielded, although
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  Speaker 5: that has been diminished because of the strikes earlier this summer.
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  Speaker 5: I think this is a big deal. What it shows
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  Speaker 5: is that over time, as my colleague Aaron McLean has
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  Speaker 5: sort of made this point early on, you can open
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  Speaker 5: the straight. It's just not going to be, you know,
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  Speaker 5: a Hollywood ending. It takes time and it's gradually... clearing
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  Speaker 5: those mines is really significant. I think it's also significant
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  Speaker 5: that we haven't really seen the Iranians try to go
• 14:35
  Speaker 5: back to that. I think that's because of pressure from China.
• 14:40
  Speaker 5: I can report that that is part of it, at least.
• 14:44
  Speaker 5: So in that respect, what you're seeing is, and we
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  Speaker 5: said this on this broadcast, Hugh, that the straightforward moves
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  Speaker 5: for Iran is a diminishing asset. This is important because
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  Speaker 5: There's a school of thought, I would associate it with
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  Speaker 5: Robert Pape, the University of Chicago political scientist, and others
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  Speaker 5: that are kind of gleefully saying that Iran won the war,
• 15:07
  Speaker 5: that Iran came out on top. No, they have not.
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  Speaker 5: I think what we're seeing is that slowly but surely,
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  Speaker 5: the United States can open the Strait of Hormuz enough,
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  Speaker 5: and then there are these other routes, as we know of,
• 15:22
  Speaker 5: that are being, you know, like gangbusters, whether they're pipelines
• 15:26
  Speaker 5: or other kinds of things, that will basically mean that
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  Speaker 5: Iran will not control the flow of the global energy markets.
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  Speaker 5: So that was their trump card, and it's looking less
• 15:37
  Speaker 5: and less like a trump card. That's a very good thing. Now,
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  Speaker 5: add to that, the nuclear program, pretty much gone. A
• 15:45
  Speaker 5: lot of their conventional weaponry, pretty much gone. They remain
• 15:49
  Speaker 5: diplomatically isolated because of their own actions, because as much as,
• 15:53
  Speaker 5: There was an effort at times for the Saudis and
• 15:56
  Speaker 5: others to maybe try to make nice. They were still targeted,
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  Speaker 5: and so they remained diplomatically isolated. And the price, as
• 16:05
  Speaker 5: you pointed out, $ 82 a gallon is not a catastrophe.
• 16:08
  Speaker 5: There hasn't been a global recession. There hasn't been a
• 16:12
  Speaker 5: massive kind of energy catastrophe. All of that to the benefit,
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  Speaker 5: I think it would be foolish to sort of think
• 16:20
  Speaker 5: we've won the war yet, But it's certainly looking better
• 16:24
  Speaker 5: than I think it looked a month ago.
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  Speaker 1: So you're much younger than I am, so I don't
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  Speaker 1: know if you remember very well the surprise of 1989
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  Speaker 1: when the Warsaw Pact fell apart and the Soviet Union
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: two years later. But we were all surprised. No one
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  Speaker 1: saw it coming. Do you think a year from now
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  Speaker 1: the regime will be essentially the same in Iran as
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: it is today?
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  Speaker 5: You bring up such a great point. I hold out
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  Speaker 5: hope because I do think that, again, on the one hand,
• 16:53
  Speaker 5: the horrific massacre in January of the Iranians who were
• 16:59
  Speaker 5: protesting their regime, I think was maybe a temporary win
• 17:05
  Speaker 5: for the regime in that it reinstilled this kind of fear.
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  Speaker 5: But on the other hand, especially if you look at
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  Speaker 5: the Shia faith and Iranian culture, you've created the families
• 17:16
  Speaker 5: of 40,000 martyrs. And that's yet I think it's going
• 17:22
  Speaker 5: to further kind of deepen the enmity that most of
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  Speaker 5: the Iranian people feel towards their regime. That's the first point.
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  Speaker 5: Second point is it was a failing state before. It's
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  Speaker 5: even more of a failing state now. They have a
• 17:34
  Speaker 5: drinking water crisis. They have a banking crisis internally that's
• 17:39
  Speaker 5: been unraveling because of all of the corruption in their
• 17:43
  Speaker 5: country and the fact that the Revolutionary Guard Corps controls
• 17:45
  Speaker 5: so much of the economy. So all of the kind
• 17:49
  Speaker 5: of warning signs are there. I don't want to predict.
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  Speaker 1: It could be a year.
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  Speaker 5: I hope it's less than a year. But you bring
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  Speaker 5: up this point, which is that anytime you're talking about tyrannies,
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  Speaker 5: when you're talking about closed societies, when you're talking about
• 18:03
  Speaker 5: authoritarian regimes, from the outside, they always look stable until
• 18:08
  Speaker 5: the moment that they begin to collapse. And it's very
• 18:10
  Speaker 5: hard for us to see from the outside what's going
• 18:12
  Speaker 5: on there. So I think it would be foolish for
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  Speaker 5: American strategists to just presume that Iran is going to
• 18:19
  Speaker 5: kind of continue like this indefinitely.
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  Speaker 6: All right.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: I want to close with Abdul El-Sayed, the Michigan Senate
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: candidate and his quote running mate, close quote, Hassan Piker.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: He did it again today. Piker did a new tape quote.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: I have no problem with the Houthis. If you think
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: I'm a terrorism supporter for that reason, then yeah, I'm
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: an effing terrorism supporter. Close quote. I don't know if
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: you can ruin your reputation more than zero. a null set.
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: What do you think?
• 18:48
  Speaker 5: This is his brand, Hugh. I mean, that's the thing.
• 18:51
  Speaker 5: And all the Democratic candidates, and we should add Democratic
• 18:56
  Speaker 5: journalists or left-leaning journalists and podcasters, they all sidled up
• 19:01
  Speaker 5: to him. They knew what they were getting into. This
• 19:03
  Speaker 5: is what this guy does. I mean, there's a gazillion
• 19:07
  Speaker 5: quotes like this, and to focus on just one is
• 19:09
  Speaker 5: almost unfair. because this is his entire oeuvre. I mean,
• 19:13
  Speaker 5: this is somebody who was once said, what's your favorite flag?
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: The Hezbollah flag.
• 19:18
  Speaker 5: This is somebody who, you know, he defends Mao Zedong,
• 19:22
  Speaker 5: one of the worst monsters of the 20th century, and
• 19:26
  Speaker 5: dresses in Mao suits, and he's an ignoramus who doesn't
• 19:30
  Speaker 5: really understand the concepts that he tries to talk about,
• 19:33
  Speaker 5: but he is on, you know, clearly kind of reviving this, like,
• 19:36
  Speaker 5: I want to be wrong, I'm going to be on
• 19:38
  Speaker 5: the wrong side of.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: History as much as I can.
• 19:40
  Speaker 5: Everybody knew that going in and everybody knew it was
• 19:44
  Speaker 5: going to be a problem in the general election for
• 19:45
  Speaker 5: someone like El-Sayed in a state like Michigan. This is
• 19:49
  Speaker 5: what they get. I thought it was interesting that you
• 19:51
  Speaker 5: saw a number of Democrats seizing onto atrocious comments that
• 19:55
  Speaker 5: suggested somebody is going to start attacking America. They've already
• 19:58
  Speaker 5: started attacking American Jews because of their fanaticism about the
• 20:03
  Speaker 5: Middle East. But yeah, that's the kind of thing. that
• 20:07
  Speaker 5: is offensive to a lot of Americans. I hope it's
• 20:09
  Speaker 5: not just Jews. And I would just say, I don't
• 20:12
  Speaker 5: want this to be when you're having a conversation about
• 20:14
  Speaker 5: Al-Said and Hassan Piker is not just a conversation about
• 20:18
  Speaker 5: American Jews and how uncomfortable they are. It's about whether
• 20:21
  Speaker 5: or not you're going to allow unpatriotic anti-American factions within
• 20:27
  Speaker 5: a major political party.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: And if he ends up winning, that's what we get.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: I'm going to talk with Eli during the break about
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: one question, give him a couple of minutes to answer.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: I think if El-Sayed wins, it's the death of the
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: Democratic Party. I'm not overstating that. We need a healthy
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: two-party system. The Democrats cannot become a party of dumb radicals.
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: And that's what El-Sayed and Hassan Paika represent, ignorant radicals.
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: I'll ask Eli for what happens to the Democrats if
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: El-Sayed wins. Stay tuned. So I am back with Eli Lake. Eli,
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: I've made the observation at least Marx, Lenin, and Mao
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: were well-read. Piker is not. Abdul El-Sayed is not. What
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: happens to America's Democratic Party, the party of FDR and JFK?
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: And it's a great political tradition. Scoop Jackson, Sam Nunn.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: What happens to this party if El-Sayed wins?
• 21:25
  Speaker 5: Well, I would just point out, though, and you mentioned, say,
• 21:28
  Speaker 5: Scoop Jackson, right? Scoop Jackson, in my view, makes his
• 21:31
  Speaker 5: name for two things. One is the Jackson-Vanik Amendment. which
• 21:35
  Speaker 5: was absolutely heroic. And he takes on Henry Kissinger at
• 21:38
  Speaker 5: the time to try to have sanctions on the Soviet
• 21:41
  Speaker 5: Union connected on whether or not they let particularly Jewish
• 21:46
  Speaker 5: Soviets leave the country. So the question of immigration. But
• 21:49
  Speaker 5: the second reason that we know of Senator Jackson is
• 21:53
  Speaker 5: because he represented in 1972 the call of the old
• 21:58
  Speaker 5: Democratic Party of FDR and Truman to in a moment
• 22:02
  Speaker 5: when the party was being taken over, very similar to today.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: By radicals. And that's the moment that we're in.
• 22:09
  Speaker 5: I think when the Democrats put forward McGovern in 1972,
• 22:14
  Speaker 5: it was a gift to Richard Nixon, running for his re-election,
• 22:16
  Speaker 5: as you know. And I love that line. I forget
• 22:20
  Speaker 5: exactly who said it, but the line of the Democratic
• 22:24
  Speaker 5: Party is acid, abortion, and amnesty.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
• 22:27
  Speaker 5: But that's really... It's the return of the post-68 Democrats,
• 22:34
  Speaker 5: the people who were rioting in the streets of Chicago
• 22:38
  Speaker 5: in 68, had taken over the party, and we're seeing
• 22:41
  Speaker 5: something like that today. It took the Democrats a generation
• 22:46
  Speaker 5: to recover. It took the Democratic leadership, the DLC, Democratic
• 22:50
  Speaker 5: Leadership Committee, and Bill Clinton for them to finally shake
• 22:54
  Speaker 5: free of the kind of remnants of the radicalism and
• 22:59
  Speaker 5: the identity politics that made it impossible for this party
• 23:03
  Speaker 5: to win national elections for the most part, with the
• 23:06
  Speaker 5: exception obviously being Jimmy Carter coming after Watergate. So the
• 23:10
  Speaker 5: question for the Democrats right now is, it's sort of like,
• 23:14
  Speaker 5: you know, you can become another McGovern party, but unless
• 23:19
  Speaker 5: you think that the American population, the American voters have
• 23:23
  Speaker 5: changed so dramatically that this is now going to be acceptable,
• 23:27
  Speaker 5: then you really are consigning yourself to a kind of
• 23:30
  Speaker 5: national wilderness for a long time. I don't know the
• 23:33
  Speaker 5: answer to that, because it's possible that, you know, the
• 23:36
  Speaker 5: results of... Because what do the radicals do, Hugh, in
• 23:40
  Speaker 5: some ways, when they were in sort of, you know,
• 23:43
  Speaker 5: they were purged, you could argue, you know, in the
• 23:46
  Speaker 5: beginning of the Cold War, they go to the universities.
• 23:48
  Speaker 5: They take over the universities, and that becomes apparent, by
• 23:51
  Speaker 5: the way, 50 years ago in the 70s.
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: So.
• 23:54
  Speaker 5: Maybe the institutional capture of things like teachers' unions and
• 23:57
  Speaker 5: unions and universities and, you know, bureaucracies and so forth
• 24:03
  Speaker 5: is strong enough for them to really have a, you know,
• 24:06
  Speaker 5: to actually make it so that McGovernism will become a
• 24:09
  Speaker 5: kind of winning strategy. On the other hand, I just
• 24:12
  Speaker 5: think that it gets into, you're rubbing up against something
• 24:16
  Speaker 5: that's very American about how we understand ourselves. We don't
• 24:20
  Speaker 5: think of ourselves as the villain of the country.
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: They can't live in Fortress Crazy. They can't survive off
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: the land. It'll be hard. Eli Lake, great to talk
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: to you as always. Follow Eli at Eli Lake. Maybe
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: he'll do a breaking history on what happened to the
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: people around the 72 McGovern campaign. What happened? Did they
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: have a future? I hope not. Thank you, Eli. Stay tuned.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: Welcome back, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt, joined now by the
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: estimable Continetti. Matt Continetti is the head of domestic policy
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: at AEI. He's a Wall Street Journal columnist. He's the
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: author of the book The Right. He's the author of
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: many other things. And so, Matt, it's always good to
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: see you. I want to begin with a big 30,000-foot question.
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: I went on Twitch this week. I even broadcast one
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: segment of the show over Twitch just to see what
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: it was like. Have you ever been on Twitch?
• 25:11
  Speaker 7: I can't say I have, Hugh.
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: No, I haven't.
• 25:13
  Speaker 7: I'm not a gamer, and I'm not very good at technology.
• 25:17
  Speaker 7: So no Twitch for me.
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: Well, I had Dwayne help me because I couldn't have
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: made it work without Dwayne. But I got on there,
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: and the thing is, it's disaggregated thoughts. It's sort of
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: like a jumble of a thousand people, and because you
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: can only hear one side of the conversation, Hassan Paik
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: or whoever is the narrator talks, and you can't hear
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: the other side. It's the death of reading. It's the
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: death of logic. And that leads me to my observation,
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: which I just made to Eli Lake. At least Marx, Lenin,
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: and Mao were well-read. I don't think, Ahsan Paik or
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: Abdul El-Sayed, I don't think these people are well-read, do you?
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: No, I don't.
• 25:55
  Speaker 7: I don't think many people on the socialist left are well-read.
• 26:00
  Speaker 7: You might have a few magazine editors who are steeped
• 26:03
  Speaker 7: in Marxism, a few professors, but the sorts of activists
• 26:07
  Speaker 7: who are driving this lurch to the left in the
• 26:09
  Speaker 7: Democratic Party, they live online, they're on streaming, they're on YouTube,
• 26:16
  Speaker 7: they're listening to Piker over podcasts and whatnot. They're not
• 26:23
  Speaker 7: reading books. Of course, if they were reading these books,
• 26:26
  Speaker 7: it wouldn't make them right. Marx was well-read, but he
• 26:30
  Speaker 7: was still an atrocious thinker and influence on history.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: You know, Matt, a couple of weeks ago, you mentioned
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: Russell Kirk's The Roots of American Order. I just got it.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: In the meantime, I got The Conservative Mind, and I've
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: been listening to it as well as taking notes from it.
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: there's a whole chapter on how Disraeli and Marx were
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: in London at the same time. And you know what
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: they were both doing? They were both reading and writing.
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: Do we have that culture anymore where people read and write,
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: no matter where they end up? Obviously, Disraeli, a great
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: cultural conservative, and Marx, a radical. But do we have
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: that culture of reading and writing anymore? There are readers.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: There are writers.
• 27:07
  Speaker 7: But no, our culture is past that, sadly. It lives online.
• 27:14
  Speaker 7: It's mainly image. It's mainly oral. You know, for someone
• 27:18
  Speaker 7: like me who loves radio and podcasts, I can consume them,
• 27:22
  Speaker 7: but I also read books. But a lot of people,
• 27:24
  Speaker 7: their cultural lives, Hugh, as you know, are governed by
• 27:27
  Speaker 7: the online algorithm. And that's feeding them usually inflammatory and
• 27:32
  Speaker 7: negative information about America. It's reinforcing beliefs rather than challenging them.
• 27:40
  Speaker 7: And I think it's contributed to kind of the climate
• 27:43
  Speaker 7: of our politics. Certainly, it's contributing to the rise of
• 27:46
  Speaker 7: the DSA on the American left and all of the anti-Semitic, anti-Zionist,
• 27:52
  Speaker 7: anti-American tropes that they use when they're talking about politics today.
• 27:58
  Speaker 7: That's because they live online. That's where they have their
• 28:00
  Speaker 7: relationships rather than the real world.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: You know, the algorithm feeds you what you watch. And
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: it is now feeding me Between Two Ferns. And I
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: never watch Between Two Ferns, but I watch almost every
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: clip that it sends me. And it's funny, and it's hilarious.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: But I think about people who read left-wing crazy or
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: Nazi stuff. What must they be getting in their algorithm, Matt?
• 28:25
  Speaker 7: Well, they're getting the lie that Israel perpetrated a genocide
• 28:29
  Speaker 7: in Gaza. That's absolutely defamatory.
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: It's wrong.
• 28:32
  Speaker 7: They're getting the lie that Israel helped a famine in Gaza.
• 28:35
  Speaker 7: That's completely wrong. They're getting lies. They're getting lies about
• 28:39
  Speaker 7: American oppression, American injustice. And they feed off of each other.
• 28:45
  Speaker 7: And next thing you know, you turn around and you think, oh, well,
• 28:48
  Speaker 7: if we elect these DSA types, then we're going to
• 28:51
  Speaker 7: somehow have a revolution. And that's really what they stand for.
• 28:55
  Speaker 7: It's not just Piker that El-Sayed needs to be confronted with.
• 28:59
  Speaker 7: It's these socialist beliefs he has. He says he's not
• 29:02
  Speaker 7: a socialist, but why then does he support Medicare for All,
• 29:06
  Speaker 7: which would end private health and employer-provided health insurance in
• 29:09
  Speaker 7: this country? More than 100 million people affected. Why does
• 29:13
  Speaker 7: he entertain great ideas about changing our system of governance,
• 29:20
  Speaker 7: packing the Supreme Court? Where is he on guns? I'd
• 29:24
  Speaker 7: like the Second Amendment to play a bigger role in
• 29:26
  Speaker 7: this campaign. I know that El-Sayed has, I think, deleted
• 29:30
  Speaker 7: social posts that show that he was not a protector
• 29:34
  Speaker 7: of Second Amendment rights. So Republican candidates, when they go
• 29:38
  Speaker 7: after these socialists, they need to go after... them directly
• 29:40
  Speaker 7: on the issues as well as their associations.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: I will be right back with Matt Continey during the break.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: I'll ask him the question about unanimous Americans that Dwayne
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: gave me earlier. So don't go anywhere. Stay tuned. He'll
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: be back on the other side of the break on
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: the Salem News Channel. Available on smart TVs everywhere, Roku, Samsung, Pluto,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: Amazon Prime, and the radio, Salem Radio Network and all
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: of our affiliates. Stay with us. Welcome back, America. Matt
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: Continetti is my guest. Matt, Dwayne came up with a
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: term to describe Dolly Parton, a universal American, a unanimous American,
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: not a unanimous American. Everybody liked her. Who else is
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: in that category? I nominated Katie Couric, but.
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: Uh john ellis said.
• 30:28
  Speaker 7: You're not counting my vote then are you okay i'm
• 30:31
  Speaker 7: not with i'm not with you on that one you
• 30:33
  Speaker 7: i just love her i think she's sweet dolly uh
• 30:37
  Speaker 7: i mean that's why dolly is so special and why
• 30:39
  Speaker 7: so many people are mourning her her death and feeling
• 30:43
  Speaker 7: sad in ways maybe they didn't expect i didn't feel
• 30:46
  Speaker 7: to uh i didn't expect to feel as sad as
• 30:48
  Speaker 7: i felt when i heard that she had died and
• 30:50
  Speaker 7: I was just a casual fan like most people. Unanimous Americans,
• 30:55
  Speaker 7: I don't know. I mean, maybe you'd say Walt Disney,
• 30:59
  Speaker 7: the person.
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: Maybe they're going to be alive. Oh, alive? Right now?
• 31:05
  Speaker 7: The closest I would say would be maybe Clint Eastwood.
• 31:07
  Speaker 7: But that's hard because a lot of Democrats have turned
• 31:11
  Speaker 7: against him. But yeah, I don't know. Did Dwayne have
• 31:13
  Speaker 7: any others?
• 31:14
  Speaker 3: No, but that's... Yes, he does.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: He just comes up with questions.
• 31:18
  Speaker 8: Carol Burnett, Dick Van Dyke, and Julie Andrews. That's the
• 31:21
  Speaker 8: only three.
• 31:23
  Speaker 7: Well, Julie Andrews, that's it. Definitely, I'd say she's up there, yeah.
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: Well, I want to pass along the news, Matt, that
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: Governor Bill Lee announced in consultation with the Nashville Airport
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: Authority and the Dollywood Foundation that Nashville Airport will now
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: be Dolly Parton Airport. So I want a Ronald Reagan-Dolly
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: Parton John Wayne, triple ticket. You can just travel between
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: those three places. And John Ellis wants to know, George.
• 31:51
  Speaker 7: If President Trump, he could have been more creative. He
• 31:55
  Speaker 7: could have renamed Lake Ontario Lake Dolly and maybe it
• 31:58
  Speaker 7: would have played a lot better. And Tom Hanks is
• 32:03
  Speaker 7: the only name that I'd add to Dwayne's list. I
• 32:05
  Speaker 7: think Tom Hanks is the only one.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: I think you're right about that.
• 32:07
  Speaker 8: Too controversial now. He went too woke, too anti-Trump.
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: No, I think he's okay. Uh-oh, uh-oh, Tom. Say it
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: ain't so. No, I think that if you narrate all
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: the World War II series and you do Saving Private Ryan,
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: you're kind of immune to a misstep politically here. How
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: about the Fonz? Well... Hans, yes. I put him up there.
• 32:35
  Speaker 7: The problem is you have to be well-known at this time,
• 32:38
  Speaker 7: I think. That's how I'm amending Dwayne's rule. So that's
• 32:41
  Speaker 7: why the Carol Burnett, yeah, I get it, but a
• 32:44
  Speaker 7: lot of young people don't really recall who Carol Burnett is.
• 32:48
  Speaker 7: So I would say Dolly, Tom, Julie Andrews. They're still well-known, yeah.
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: That's the triptych. All right, America, stand by. I'll be
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: right back. And to serious subjects ahead with Matt Continetti.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Stay with us. Welcome back, America. Reeling in the years.
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: You know, as reeling as Iran. Matt Continetti is my
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: guest from AEI, the Wall Street Journal Free Expressions columnist. Matt,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: last night, Admiral Cooper dropped a two-minute video, which we've
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: edited down to one minute. Here is Admiral Cooper, cut
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: number whatever it is.
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: Hi, I'm Admiral Brad Cooper, commander of U.S. Central Command,
• 33:25
  Speaker 4: here with an operational update on two ongoing missions in
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: the Middle East. Many of our 50,000 U.S. troops operating
• 33:32
  Speaker 4: across the region are doing outstanding work executing the naval
• 33:36
  Speaker 4: blockade against Iran while maintaining commercial traffic flow through the
• 33:41
  Speaker 4: Strait of Hormuz. As recently announced, the U.S. military has
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: achieved a major milestone in the Strait of Hormuz. We
• 33:49
  Speaker 4: have successfully cleared sea mines in the strait's international shipping
• 33:53
  Speaker 4: lanes that were laid months ago by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary
• 33:57
  Speaker 4: Guard Corps. Internationally recognized transit routes in the strait are
• 34:02
  Speaker 4: free of Iranian sea mines thanks to the incredible work
• 34:05
  Speaker 4: of the U.S.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: Military. What do you think, Matt Continetti? How significant the announcement?
• 34:12
  Speaker 7: Oh, I think it's very significant. This news that United
• 34:15
  Speaker 7: States forces have successfully demined the Strait, that just denies
• 34:19
  Speaker 7: Iran one of the tools it's been using to hold
• 34:22
  Speaker 7: the global economy hostage. And it comes on the heels,
• 34:26
  Speaker 7: of course, of news that the amount of oil that
• 34:30
  Speaker 7: has been transiting the Strait, thanks to the U.S. Navy
• 34:33
  Speaker 7: and our our layered defenses and coordination is increasing to
• 34:37
  Speaker 7: multiple millions of barrels a day. And that's kept the
• 34:42
  Speaker 7: price of oil, not just here in the United States,
• 34:45
  Speaker 7: but also the Brent crude, the global price, relatively low.
• 34:50
  Speaker 7: And so I think what we're doing is pursuing the
• 34:53
  Speaker 7: right policy at the moment. If Trump isn't going to
• 34:56
  Speaker 7: resume combat operations, this is the best bet. That is,
• 35:00
  Speaker 7: you maintain the blockade on Iranian ports, while also getting
• 35:05
  Speaker 7: as many ships out safely through that southern channel as
• 35:10
  Speaker 7: you can. It helps stabilize the oil price, and it
• 35:14
  Speaker 7: exerts economic pressure on Iran. And then you layer on
• 35:17
  Speaker 7: top of that Scott Besson's announcement this week that he
• 35:21
  Speaker 7: is going to be playing hardball with Iran's trading partners
• 35:26
  Speaker 7: in order to exert more pressure. So the question is,
• 35:29
  Speaker 7: do we have the will to sustain what I think
• 35:32
  Speaker 7: is a very good policy in the coming months. So far,
• 35:37
  Speaker 7: that's exactly what we're doing.
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: Matt Cotten, you are with the American Enterprise Institute. For
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: those who don't know, that's the fortress of free enterprise
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: in the heart of Washington, D.C. It's Fort AEI. And
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: from that fort comes a variety of different things about
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: tariffs and everything else. But do they have an opinion
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: on data centers? Because it seems to me They're absolutely
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: integral to the success of the United States over the
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: next 50 years. And China is attempting to poison the
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: well of ideas here. Is AEI in that battle yet?
• 36:11
  Speaker 7: Well, AEI doesn't have an official position on data centers,
• 36:14
  Speaker 7: but Matt Continetti does. And as I write in the
• 36:16
  Speaker 7: Wall Street Journal Free Expressions column today, I think President
• 36:21
  Speaker 7: Trump has it right, Hugh, on data centers for this reason.
• 36:24
  Speaker 7: One is President Trump's populism has always had a strong
• 36:28
  Speaker 7: pro-growth element. A lot of these populists who want to
• 36:31
  Speaker 7: expand government forget that President Trump is a tax cutter,
• 36:34
  Speaker 7: and he believes in deregulation. He believes in private investment.
• 36:39
  Speaker 7: And so that, of course, is what data centers are
• 36:41
  Speaker 7: all about. But President Trump also believes in competing with
• 36:46
  Speaker 7: China for the frontier technologies. And so that, of course,
• 36:50
  Speaker 7: is the data center construction boom as well, because they
• 36:53
  Speaker 7: are behind this AI revolution that, yes, has a lot
• 36:58
  Speaker 7: of effects that we need to study and argue about,
• 37:00
  Speaker 7: but it's certainly been a boom for the American economy
• 37:04
  Speaker 7: and helps us compete against our geopolitical adversary, China. So
• 37:09
  Speaker 7: I think that this is an area where people need
• 37:13
  Speaker 7: to be armed with facts against many of the accusations
• 37:16
  Speaker 7: against data centers. There's no question they have costs. Everything
• 37:20
  Speaker 7: has costs. But in the long run, if you want
• 37:23
  Speaker 7: a strong America and a prosperous economy, by the way,
• 37:26
  Speaker 7: a prosperous blue-collar economy, because these data centers provide tons
• 37:30
  Speaker 7: of jobs for master electricians, skilled carpenters, engineers. So if
• 37:35
  Speaker 7: you want that type of blue-collar economy, then you should
• 37:38
  Speaker 7: support the data center boom.
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: I also asked my friendly chat GPT, what is the
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: average tax increment or increase in revenues from taxes of
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: an average data center between $ 5 and $ 30 million annually?
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: You know, Matt, if that is rebated to the local jurisdictions,
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: property or sales taxpayers, these things will become very popular.
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: If the government just spends it, it won't. But Trumbull
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: County's whole budget, my home county, is $ 76 million a year.
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: If you build two data centers, you've doubled their budget.
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: Why in the world aren't they selling?
• 38:12
  Speaker 7: Well, you know, look, Loudoun County, which neighbors us in
• 38:15
  Speaker 7: northern Virginia, is the data center capital of the world,
• 38:18
  Speaker 7: and the data centers provide up to half, I think,
• 38:21
  Speaker 7: of the property tax revenue there. So, yes, there are
• 38:23
  Speaker 7: ways in which the data centers can pay back their communities,
• 38:27
  Speaker 7: and we're seeing that in places like Loudoun County and
• 38:29
  Speaker 7: other localities that house these data centers. I have one suggestion,
• 38:33
  Speaker 7: which is I think we need to incentivize the data
• 38:36
  Speaker 7: center companies, the tech companies, to either camouflage or beautify
• 38:40
  Speaker 7: the data centers, because they're certainly not very pleasant on
• 38:44
  Speaker 7: the eye. And so here, I think, is an opportunity
• 38:46
  Speaker 7: for President Trump. We know he loves classical architecture. We
• 38:50
  Speaker 7: know he loves this upgrade to Washington, D.C. that he's
• 38:52
  Speaker 7: been involved in for the past year. I think you
• 38:55
  Speaker 7: should say, look, tech companies, let's find ways not only
• 38:58
  Speaker 7: to give back to the community, but also to make
• 39:00
  Speaker 7: these data centers more attractive.
• 39:02
  Speaker 3: To look at.
• 39:03
  Speaker 7: That would solve part of the political problem.
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: All right, I saved my last question about Hassan Piker
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: and Abdu'l-Sayed. You may have to go into the break, Matt,
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: and I'll give you that time if you do. Today,
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: new clip of Hassan Piker, quote, I have no problem
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: with the Houthis. If you think I'm a terrorism supporter
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: for that reason, then yeah, I'm an effing terrorism supporter,
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: close quote. I think he's going to kill Syed's campaign.
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: And if Syed somehow wins, I think that's going to
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: kill the Democratic Party. What do you think?
• 39:32
  Speaker 7: Well, first on Piker, I'm glad he admits it. And
• 39:35
  Speaker 7: let's take him at his word then. I mean, he's just,
• 39:38
  Speaker 7: he's a terrible, terrible person and a bane on American politics.
• 39:43
  Speaker 7: And he's an anchor on El Syed's campaign. And so
• 39:46
  Speaker 7: El-Sayed is playing defense this week. There's no question because
• 39:51
  Speaker 7: of his association with Piker. And it's not as though
• 39:54
  Speaker 7: he can simply pretend that he's ready to move on
• 39:56
  Speaker 7: to other subjects, Hugh, when he spent his entire primary
• 40:01
  Speaker 7: emphasizing his ties to Piker and demonizing the pro-Israel community
• 40:06
  Speaker 7: in this country at every opportunity. So it's right for
• 40:09
  Speaker 7: Mike Rogers to call him on this association. But I
• 40:12
  Speaker 7: will say this. Mike Rogers also needs to talk about
• 40:15
  Speaker 7: Medicare for all. He also needs to talk about the
• 40:18
  Speaker 7: green socialist agenda. He needs to talk about the open
• 40:21
  Speaker 7: borders agenda, and he needs to talk about Second Amendment rights.
• 40:24
  Speaker 7: It will be issues that will defeat Syed in addition
• 40:27
  Speaker 7: to his associations.
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: I think you're right, Matt Continetti. Thank you. Follow Matt
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: on Exit Continetti. Read him in the Wall Street Journal.
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: twice a week. Follow his work at the American Enterprise
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: Institute and follow me in the next segment here on
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  Speaker 6: Only on Salem Now. Featuring one of Charlie Kirk's final interviews.
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• 42:41
  Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewitt, starting off this portion of the Big
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: Weekend Review program. with our friend Ben Dominich, who is
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: the opinion editor at The Daily Wire. He's a Fox
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: News contributor. He's the host of the Big Ben podcast,
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: and that's on a July-August hiatus, I think owing to
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: the fact there are babies running around the Dominich household. Ben,
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: I want to start with a question I've reserved for you,
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: because you know sports and a lot of my guests don't.
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: I am too close to the Deshaun Watson catastrophe to
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: comment on it. Did it break through to national news?
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: If so, how is it framed, and what do you
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: think about it?
• 43:17
  Speaker 3: It's absolutely broken through the national news, and particularly because
• 43:22
  Speaker 3: of that press conference. The idea that at this point,
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: at this stage, you would have Deshaun Watson coming out
• 43:30
  Speaker 3: and basically saying, don't boo me, at the same time
• 43:34
  Speaker 3: that this whole situation is playing out in front of us.
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: It's an embarrassment, unfortunately, I'm sorry to say. By the way,
• 43:41
  Speaker 3: I have a lot of respect for that franchise. The
• 43:43
  Speaker 3: draft that they've done recently in particular, their talent selection
• 43:47
  Speaker 3: has been great. So it's the kind of situation where
• 43:50
  Speaker 3: if you had a stable quarterback in that role, it
• 43:53
  Speaker 3: would be something that could be– they would be a
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: frisky team considered going into this season.
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: Frisky. Did you watch Taven Green last night? Sorry? Did
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: you watch Taven Green, their fourth quarterback from Arkansas? He's
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: got legs. Six foot six and a 44-inch jump.
• 44:10
  Speaker 3: I saw him at Arkansas, and he does, yes. But look,
• 44:15
  Speaker 3: here's the situation. You know, Sean Watson, at this point,
• 44:20
  Speaker 3: we have to just say, he is something that has actually,
• 44:24
  Speaker 3: I think, been somewhat beneficial to other owners in the NFL.
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: Oh, okay.
• 44:30
  Speaker 3: That deal is the signature deal for why you do
• 44:34
  Speaker 3: not have guaranteed contracts. which is something that the players
• 44:38
  Speaker 3: obviously wanted, something that they would like to move in
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: the direction of the NBA and of other leagues. He
• 44:48
  Speaker 3: is a number one, sort of the absolute avatar of
• 44:53
  Speaker 3: why you do not do that. And I think he's done.
• 44:58
  Speaker 3: And the other thing is, it's not just the attitude,
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: it's not just the fact that I just don't think
• 45:04
  Speaker 3: he's ever going to be the quarterback that he used
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: to be. But I think that his attitude toward the city,
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: you have the right as a fan, Hugh, to boo
• 45:14
  Speaker 3: that man. You are paying the freight to get into
• 45:18
  Speaker 3: that stadium. If you don't like the way that he's playing,
• 45:20
  Speaker 3: if you don't like the guy, you can boo him.
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: And the other thing is the comparison has been made
• 45:26
  Speaker 3: over the course of this by ESPN and others to
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: the experience of Michael Vick. Well, I'm a Michael Vick fan.
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: I was a Michael Vick fan when he was at
• 45:32
  Speaker 3: Virginia Tech. I was a fan throughout his NFL career.
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: I wasn't a fan when he hung an enormous amount
• 45:39
  Speaker 3: of points. It was one of the greatest starting plays
• 45:41
  Speaker 3: of all time, thrown at Son Jackson on my Washington Redskins.
• 45:46
  Speaker 3: But it's one of these situations where Vic went to prison.
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: He actually paid his due for his crime in terms
• 45:54
  Speaker 3: of what he went through, and no excuses for it.
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: He gets a chance to make a comeback, and that's
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: what he did. Lots of people go through bad experiences
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: in sports. They make mistakes. They do bad things. But
• 46:09
  Speaker 3: they pay for it. And in the case of Deshaun Watson,
• 46:12
  Speaker 3: I think even though he has paid out a significant
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: amount of money, I don't know what the actual total
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: amount is, over the course of the scandal, I don't
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: think that people feel like he actually paid the price
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: for it. And I think that today is going to
• 46:26
  Speaker 3: be something that still continues to hang over him.
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: Okay, I have a question for you about Vick. Did
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: he ever express remorse? Because I think the thing that
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: broke me, I didn't like the deal, I've never liked
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: the deal, but what broke me is in the course
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: of the self-pity press conference from Saturday, he said, he
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: was asked, do you have any regrets? He said, I
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: have no regrets about anything in my life.
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: That's insane. Of course, no, Vic absolutely expressed remorse. The
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: only thing I'll say in Vic's defense is that the
• 46:57
  Speaker 3: vast majority of the worst things that were happening were
• 47:00
  Speaker 3: things his friends were doing that he was allowing to happen,
• 47:03
  Speaker 3: but he was allowing it to happen. And so the
• 47:05
  Speaker 3: thing that, that, you know, you, you have going on
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: there is one where, you know, this is a guy
• 47:09
  Speaker 3: who came from a very poor area and, and unfortunately
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: had a lot of bad friends, which is the kind
• 47:14
  Speaker 3: of thing that you see in sports quite a lot.
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: But when it comes to the Sean, he absolutely should
• 47:18
  Speaker 3: be full of remorse and have a ton of regret.
• 47:20
  Speaker 3: And he's never had that conversation with, you know, with
• 47:24
  Speaker 3: any of the fans and, and now to be so
• 47:26
  Speaker 3: defensive and, and to be acting as if he's the
• 47:30
  Speaker 3: victim because he's getting booed, I just think it's absurd. And, yes,
• 47:33
  Speaker 3: it did break out nationally. And I think for a
• 47:36
  Speaker 3: lot of people who pay attention to this, look, not
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: a lot of good things happening in Ohio related to
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: the NFL lately, in case you hadn't noticed.
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: Okay, I've got one more question for you on this.
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: I've been trying to think of a legitimate football. I
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: want Todd Muckin to succeed. He's 62 years old. He's
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: never been a head coach in the NFL. He's put
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: in his dues. He's a motivator. He's a smart offensive.
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: I want him to succeed. I thought maybe their play
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: was let Watson play a few games, get some value,
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: and trade him to a desperate team that's in a
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: playoff hunt before 11-11 trade deadline and get a third
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: or fourth round choice. That's not an option now. He's
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: going to get blown out of the stadium in two weeks.
• 48:20
  Speaker 3: Three weeks. I think you're completely right, and to be honest,
• 48:23
  Speaker 3: quite honest, that would have been a smart play for
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: them just given the experience that we've seen in recent
• 48:28
  Speaker 3: years where you're hauling, you know, can we give a
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: call to Phillip Rivers?
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: Right. Joe Flacco.
• 48:36
  Speaker 3: Joe Flacco getting traded, you know, within the season. Bo
• 48:40
  Speaker 3: Nix going down right before, you know, an AFC championship
• 48:44
  Speaker 3: with a situation where, you know, if they had a
• 48:46
  Speaker 3: better backup, they might have been able to make it
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: to the to the super bowl. And I think that
• 48:49
  Speaker 3: that's a situation that is absolutely going to happen again
• 48:52
  Speaker 3: this season, you know, knock on wood that it's not
• 48:55
  Speaker 3: your team for all the listeners, but it's, but it
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: is something that they could have done. I think in
• 49:00
  Speaker 3: this scenario, now that he's made himself even more toxic somehow,
• 49:04
  Speaker 3: I just don't think that that's something that's in the cards.
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: And I don't think anyone wants him. That leads me
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: to Hassan Piker, the second radioactive person of the week.
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: Hassan Piker today said, I support the Houthis. If that
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: makes me an effing terrorist, then I'm a terrorist. That's
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: the latest. It's like the greatest hits parade of a psycho.
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: Is he hurting the Democratic Party nationally or just al-Sayed?
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: And if al-Sayed wins, what kind of a disaster is
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: that for the Democrats? Because I think he's a radical
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: and I don't think he's very bright.
• 49:36
  Speaker 3: So I think Ahsan Piker is hurting Democrats nationally. And
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: the reason that I say that is because had El-Sayed
• 49:42
  Speaker 3: not won, I don't think that he would be as
• 49:45
  Speaker 3: useful to Republicans as part of the narrative that they
• 49:49
  Speaker 3: are starting to establish. Alex Castellanos was on a special
• 49:52
  Speaker 3: report earlier this week, and I thought that he made
• 49:54
  Speaker 3: a very good point, which is that Republicans now have
• 49:57
  Speaker 3: a narrative about radicalism on the Democratic side that they
• 50:02
  Speaker 3: did not have previously. That, you know, even when you've
• 50:06
  Speaker 3: got candidates, House candidates who are saying crazy things, who
• 50:09
  Speaker 3: are winning in various places, that's fine. But when you
• 50:12
  Speaker 3: nominate someone for the Senate in Michigan who has the
• 50:15
  Speaker 3: views of El-Sayed, and he's got all these people around him,
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: including most prominently Hassan Piker, who is right now the
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: equivalent of like an online, the influence level that he
• 50:25
  Speaker 3: has is significant. You should not underestimate it. He is
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: Rush Limbaugh at this point. for the online podcast streamer
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: audience uh... on the left and that's something that i
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: think uh... allows republicans basically point and everything that he
• 50:41
  Speaker 3: says and say well what do you think about that
• 50:44
  Speaker 3: you campaigned with them you know are you cool with
• 50:46
  Speaker 3: this and that's something that you know has been used
• 50:48
  Speaker 3: against republican candidates of the past by people that they've
• 50:51
  Speaker 3: campaigned or.
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: Tied a cat and christine o'donnell and uh.
• 50:55
  Speaker 3: mark holland but but this now gives republicans nationally i
• 50:59
  Speaker 3: think a narrative about the nature of the Democratic coalition
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: that is one that they should feel uncomfortable with. And that,
• 51:06
  Speaker 3: you know, combined with the sort of hostage video approach
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: from Hakeem Jeffries in reaction to just having a casual
• 51:13
  Speaker 3: conversation with Jared Kushner, who doesn't even have a job
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: in this administration, is something that I think indicates where
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: this party is going and the nature of the radicalism
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: of their base.
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: So, Ben, this week on Monday, Just to make sure
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: I knew what I was talking about, Dwayne helped me
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: get on Twitch, and so I streamed a segment of
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: the show. Not doing that again. It's insane. It's so chaotic.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: There's no linear thought. There's no argument. Do you ever
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: go on Twitch?
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: Only when I have to for a news-related reason, let's
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: put it that way.
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, so... No, I'm not a fan. It can't possibly
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: produce good thinking. It's too chaotic.
• 51:53
  Speaker 3: Oh, of course. And it's also designed... to reward sort
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: of the worst instincts of the way that people interact.
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: You know, it's just, it's fly by night. It's crazy. It's,
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: you know, it's constant. It's, you know, pinging and it's,
• 52:09
  Speaker 3: you know, doing all these different sort of, it's a
• 52:13
  Speaker 3: cacophony of people just yelling things. And it just, I
• 52:18
  Speaker 3: understand why some people are addicted to it. I find
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: it to be both depressing in the fact that it's
• 52:26
  Speaker 3: as popular as it is, and also I think that
• 52:29
  Speaker 3: it's mind-numbing. I do not like Twitch at all.
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: I think it's a stupid machine. I think if you're
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: on there, you will become stupid.
• 52:37
  Speaker 3: Well, to me, it's the equivalent of the person who's
• 52:40
  Speaker 3: sitting at the slot machine in a really bad game.
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: Oh, well said.
• 52:43
  Speaker 3: Great. Hitting the button over and over and over again.
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: Great analogy. I'll be right back with Ben. I'm going
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: to talk to him during the break about our unanimous
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: American category. And then on the other side, we'll be
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: talking about the success in the battle for the Strait
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: of Hormuz. Don't go anywhere, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt. That's
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: Ben Dominich. Follow Ben on Exit B. Dominich. Like and
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: subscribe to Big Ben Podcast. Read him at The Daily Wire.
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: I'll be right back. I am back with Ben Dominich.
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: You know, Ben, I've got the greatest non-producer as a
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: producer in all of broadcast, Dwayne, radio blogger, a.k.a. Generalissimo.
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: And whenever he wanders in, you know, every third week
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: or so, he has an idea every six weeks or so.
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: And his idea was, Dolly Parton is one of a
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: small group of unanimous Americans, meaning Americans for whom the
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: vast majority of Americans will feel sadness at their passing.
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: Who else is in that category, Ben Domenech?
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh. That's a really good question, and certainly
• 53:41
  Speaker 3: none of them are going to come close to her.
• 53:43
  Speaker 3: You know, it... When you look back at the way
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: that these approval ratings kind of work, we had, at
• 53:51
  Speaker 3: certain points in American history, more universal approval for various people.
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: You might throw Martha Stewart or Oprah or something like
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: that on that list at various points in their career.
• 54:04
  Speaker 3: But I think that when it comes to people who
• 54:08
  Speaker 3: every American will be sad to see go, then I
• 54:11
  Speaker 3: think that's a pretty short list. I will give you
• 54:14
  Speaker 3: my one answer because I think that it's true, and
• 54:18
  Speaker 3: that's Mike Rowe. I think Mike Rowe is the unanimous American.
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: Absolutely.
• 54:24
  Speaker 3: I don't think that there is anyone in America who
• 54:27
  Speaker 3: doesn't like or have a positive opinion of Mike Rowe
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: if they have an opinion.
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: Okay, I'm going to nominate Chuck Grassley. Dwayne, who do
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: you have in your list, Dwayne? Tell.
• 54:37
  Speaker 8: I was saying it was three, maybe four. Julie Andrews,
• 54:41
  Speaker 8: Dick Van Dyke. Carol Burnett and Mel Brooks.
• 54:45
  Speaker 3: Okay. Yes, you're going old school. I 100% agree with you.
• 54:51
  Speaker 3: The only thing is the Youngs don't necessarily know who
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: they are, so they won't feel the same sadness or
• 54:58
  Speaker 3: something like that, though I will for all of them.
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: What about Seinfeld and Eastwood? Are they too political now?
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: They're considered too political now somehow. That might change. I mean,
• 55:11
  Speaker 3: it's been a while since Eastwood has done anything.
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: And how about Tom Hanks?
• 55:16
  Speaker 3: You know, quite honestly, I think that there's some people
• 55:18
  Speaker 3: who are tired of him now.
• 55:19
  Speaker 8: Damaged goods.
• 55:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah. And I will put, if I was going
• 55:24
  Speaker 3: to rank Dwayne's list, I think Dick Van Dyke's the
• 55:27
  Speaker 3: top of the list. And the other thing is, actually,
• 55:30
  Speaker 3: of all of them, he's the one likeliest to have
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: young people aware of who he is.
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: Sure.
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: He's in Night at the Museum. and so he's in
• 55:38
  Speaker 3: some stuff that has a little bit more reason.
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: Well, I've interviewed both Carol Burnett and Julie Andrews, and
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: I've got to tell you, Carol Burnett was a joy,
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: and I was scared to death interviewing Julie Andrews. Scared
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: to death. The only time I've ever been nervous in
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: an interview was with Julie Andrews.
• 55:54
  Speaker 3: I love that that's the one time that you've been scared.
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: Oh, my goodness. Well, I was scared on the set
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: of Colbert, but I kept my mouth shut, so I
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: knew how to play it. By the way, the algorithm
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: now thinks I like Between Two Ferns, which I do.
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: I watch every... Did you like it at the time?
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: I thought it was funny, but it's not necessarily my
• 56:13
  Speaker 3: type of humor. Awkward humor is an acquired.
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: Well, do they know what they're... Are they all in
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: on the joke?
• 56:21
  Speaker 3: Yes, yes, they're all in on the joke. That's part
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: of the reason. I tend more toward the absurdist. I'm
• 56:30
  Speaker 3: more of an always funny guy.
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: Okay, you're like, you know, the only person in America
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: who liked Sherlock Holmes with Will Ferrell was my wife
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: because of the scene when they put Queen Victoria into
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: the trunk. And she also embarrassed me in Ace Ventura
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: Pet Detective because she laughed louder than anyone in a theater.
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: I mean, it was so embarrassing.
• 56:52
  Speaker 3: Your wife sounds fine. All right, back on.
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: With Ben Dominick. Stand by.
• 56:57
  Speaker 10: But just how long can I keep singing this same
• 57:03
  Speaker 10: old song? I'm going back to Kansas City.
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: Welcome back, America. It's my weekly music test for Ben Domenech.
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: If you have any idea who this is and where
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: it's sung, Ben.
• 57:18
  Speaker 3: I've seen this before and I've heard this song before.
• 57:22
  Speaker 3: I do not remember. I'm sorry.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: It's Kansas City by the New Basement Tapes, featured heavily
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: in the new Ted Lasso.
• 57:28
  Speaker 3: Okay, I want to say something. I am now one
• 57:31
  Speaker 3: in three, which is embarrassing for me, I believe. So
• 57:35
  Speaker 3: Dwayne can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe
• 57:37
  Speaker 3: I am now one in three.
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: You're one in three.
• 57:40
  Speaker 8: You're dead to me after not knowing Tedeschi Trucks, I'm
• 57:42
  Speaker 8: telling you.
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get serious. Here is.
• 57:46
  Speaker 3: I still, I want to get that song from you.
• 57:49
  Speaker 3: I need to find out that song from you that
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: you referenced last week, because it was a good song.
• 57:54
  Speaker 3: That was the ACDC one.
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: Live Wire.
• 57:59
  Speaker 6: Yes.
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: Live Wire by ACDC.
• 58:01
  Speaker 3: I'm going to look that up and add that to
• 58:02
  Speaker 3: my Spotify.
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: All right, now I want to go and play for
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: you a shortened version of Admiral Brad Cooper, CENTCOM Commander,
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: from last night. This dropped late. I don't know how
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: many Americans have seen or heard it. Let's play it.
• 58:13
  Speaker 4: Hi, I'm Admiral Brad Cooper, Commander of U.S. Central Command,
• 58:16
  Speaker 4: here with an operational update on two ongoing missions in
• 58:20
  Speaker 4: the Middle East. Many of our 50,000 U.S. troops operating
• 58:23
  Speaker 4: across the region are doing outstanding work executing the naval
• 58:27
  Speaker 4: blockade against Iran while maintaining commercial traffic flow through the
• 58:32
  Speaker 4: Strait of Hormuz. As recently announced, the U.S. military has
• 58:37
  Speaker 4: achieved a major milestone in the Strait of Hormuz. We
• 58:41
  Speaker 4: have successfully cleared sea mines in the Strait's international shipping
• 58:44
  Speaker 4: lanes that were laid months ago by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary
• 58:49
  Speaker 4: Guard Corps. Internationally recognized transit routes in the Strait are
• 58:53
  Speaker 4: free of Iranian sea mines thanks to the incredible work
• 58:56
  Speaker 4: of the U.S.
• 58:57
  Speaker 3: Military.
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: Ben Domenech, do you think it's possible America might win
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: a war and nobody know about it because the media
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: doesn't want Trump to get credit?
• 59:06
  Speaker 3: The media has decided that we lost this war a
• 59:08
  Speaker 3: long time ago, Hugh. And that is the narrative that
• 59:12
  Speaker 3: they're going to run with, regardless of the eventual outcome.
• 59:16
  Speaker 3: You know, one of the things that I think an
• 59:17
  Speaker 3: interesting question about this going forward is, you know, we
• 59:22
  Speaker 3: learned a lot about U.S. readiness during this conflict. And
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: I think that the things that we learned were largely
• 59:31
  Speaker 3: disappointing in terms of both how quickly we ran through things,
• 59:35
  Speaker 3: which is not a surprise to me because you and
• 59:37
  Speaker 3: I have been paying attention to this for a long time,
• 59:40
  Speaker 3: but also about American military capability and the fact that
• 59:43
  Speaker 3: apparently we would have needed to rely more heavily on
• 59:47
  Speaker 3: the Europeans for their mind-sweeping capability and perhaps in order
• 59:52
  Speaker 3: to clean this up faster than it has been. I
• 59:55
  Speaker 3: think that it's a phenomenal success. that they have done this,
• 59:59
  Speaker 3: and I do believe that it's going to be ultimately
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 3: viewed in retrospect as a war that, while it was
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 3: costly in terms of resources, was actually not costly to
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 3: us in terms of American lives, and it's going to
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 3: be something that is viewed as a benefit in terms
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 3: of setting back the Iranian regime in so many different respects.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 3: But that's not the narrative that the media is going
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 3: to run with. It's certainly not the one that they're
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 3: going to run with before the midterms. Maybe they'll admit
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 3: it three years from now when Donald Trump is out
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 3: of office.
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: All right, so today Secretary Besson announced he is sanctioning
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: a bank in the United Arab Emirates and one in
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: Hong Kong. Economic outcast, Operation Economic Outcast, is going to bite.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: It's really going to bite. And so the big question is,
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: do you think the Iranian regime that we are looking
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: at right now will be there in a year?
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 3: You know, I think that it actually will, unfortunately. I
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 3: wish it wasn't the case, but I'm just going to
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 3: make that bet. I do think that the regime has
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 3: just shown... so consistently its resistance to these types of
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 3: economic effects just by the regime, not by the people, obviously,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 3: who experience the brunt of it and the different people
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 3: on the ground in Iran who are going to be
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 3: affected by it are certainly going to feel it. I
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 3: think that you're also going to see it felt by
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 3: a lot of powerful people within the regime. But again,
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 3: their ability to survive this, These types of things have
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 3: been proven in the past, and I'm not sure that
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 3: this approach is going to end up doing the kind
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 3: of things that would lead to any type of regime change.
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: Okay, Ben, we'll make it. We'll mark it on August 28, 2026.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: Hugh Hewitt is predicting by September 1, 2027, there will
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: have been a coup in Iran. We may not like
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: the government, but it's not going to be the IRGC.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: It's going to be our test generals.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 3: Running the place. I hope for the sake of the
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 3: country and for the sake of the world. that Hugh
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 3: Hewitt is right and that I am wrong.
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: All right, last question is to politics. Ossoff, who stepped
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: in it with Natalie Harp, had a 13-point lead when
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: he started that. Two and a half weeks later, it's
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: down to five and a half to six points. He
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: had to condemn Ahsan Piker. I think he's actually in
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: a lot more trouble than we think. And Patrick Ruffini
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: points that Republican enthusiasm has closed the gap by three-quarters
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: of the gap with Democrat enthusiasm. What's the best worst
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: case analysis from Ben Domenech for Republicans in November?
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 3: Well, I think that the Senate situation is going through
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 3: a lot of upheaval right now. And look, you know,
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 3: I've said what I've said about the CDC of not
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 3: nominating Ken Paxton in Texas, just because I think it
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 3: was a true creation of risk for Republicans that they
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 3: did not need to do. But at the same time,
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 3: I think that ultimately there's going to be a lot
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: of money spent there. You have this Dallas convention, which
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 3: I'll be at. I don't know if you'll be there
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 3: in September.
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: I won't be, but I will talk to you from there.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 3: They want to do a reset. They want to sort
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 3: of set off the starting gun for the rush to November.
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 3: And that's something that I think would be very beneficial
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 3: in Texas. And so I think Paxson ultimately might be
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 3: able to pull it out. even though there is polling
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 3: now that shows him down significantly, even while in the
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 3: same poll it shows Abbott winning by seven to nine points,
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 3: depending on what you look at. I think that this
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 3: is a situation for Democrats where they might see the
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 3: Senate just slip out of their grip. They were very
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 3: optimistic about a month ago, just based on the nomination choices,
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 3: the way that they felt about things. But I think Ossoff,
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 3: and I agree with you, I actually think he's in
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 3: a lot more trouble than people have recognized. And I
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 3: also think He comes across as very inauthentic. He comes
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 3: across as someone who is entirely manufactured. And that is
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 3: not what people like in this day and age in politics.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 3: And we know how that can backfire on you.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: And I think Chris Pappas is in trouble in New Hampshire.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: But I want to end on this.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 3: I agree.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: Dan Sullivan is a friend of mine. And he's a
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: great senator and a great Marine and a great person
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: to represent Alaska. They have used every trick in the book.
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: It's dirty tricks up there.
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 3: It's ridiculous.
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: Do you think he pulls it out? I do, because
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: I think Alaskans are pretty serious.
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 3: I do, and I think that it thankfully has gotten
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 3: enough attention, the dirty tricks have gotten enough attention early on,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 3: you know, to a point where I think people are
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 3: going to know them by Election Day and that they
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 3: will understand, you know, what the real story is of
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 3: this election. Dan Sullivan's a good senator, and he's a
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 3: good fit for Alaska, and it's ridiculous that he's even
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 3: at any risk The problem that I see is that
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 3: Republicans are going to have to spend in a lot
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 3: of places that they shouldn't have to spend or they
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 3: wouldn't have to spend if they had nominated, you know,
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 3: a candidate who I think, you know, just had more
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 3: talent for politics. But that's been, you know, a story
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 3: that has been running for the last couple of cycles
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 3: in a lot of different places.
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: Not everyone is Susan Collins.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 3: Not everybody has that tool.
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: Not everyone has got superpowers of knowing everybody in the state.
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: Ben Dominick, it's great to talk to you. Someday we'll
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: find a song you know. You're kind of slipping out
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: of touch, Ben. Are you worried that it's the babies?
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 3: I am worried because you know what the thing is?
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 3: The last two songs you've picked, they've both been from
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 3: TV shows that I would have watched if I had
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 3: had the time. Yep.
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: Babies do it. Babies take you out on the thing.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Ben. Have a great weekend.