All Episodes
Previous Next
June 20, 2025 - Dinesh D'Souza
58:52
REIGN OF TERROR Dinesh D’Souza Podcast Ep1109
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
Coming up, Debbie and I are going to look at various aspects of the Iran-Israel conflict, including the interesting question of whether the Israel of today is the same Israel as the Israel of the Bible.
We're going to talk about the Supreme Court's recent decision on transgender rights, the Federal Reserve's decision to spurn Trump and keep interest rates the same, the Air India crash, and whether the baby boomers destroyed America.
If you're watching on YouTube or X or Rumble, listening on Apple or Spotify, please subscribe to my channel.
Hit the subscribe, the follow, the notifications button.
I'd really appreciate it.
This is the Dinesh D'Souza Podcast.
Most of us think Medicare is something to deal with.
Someday, one day, well, that's kind of how I felt, but I'm now 64, and the moment you hit that number, well, it begins.
The mailers, the robocalls, the TV ads with actors you barely remember.
None of it makes any sense.
And the more I looked into it, the clearer it became to me.
This Medicare system is not designed to be easy.
And this is why I turned to Chapter.
They walk me through everything.
No pressure.
No sales pitch.
Chapter is independent.
Their advisors compare every Medicare option out there to help you save money and remove the stress.
And the cost to you?
Nothing.
So if you're turning 65 or even if you're over 65, do what I did.
Call chapter, Get Peace of Mind.
Here's how you do it.
Dial pound 250 and when prompted, say Dinesh.
That's the pound sign.
And then 250, keyword Dinesh.
Don't let Washington or big insurance make this decision for you.
Take control.
Call chapter today.
That's pound 250.
And when prompted, say Dinesh.
America needs this voice.
The times are crazy.
In a time of confusion, division, and lies, we need a brave voice of reason, understanding, and truth.
This is the Dinesh D'Souza Podcast.
guest.
Music.
you you Debbie and I are ready to roll for our Friday roundup.
And, of course, the big issue of the week, the conflict.
Between Israel and Iran, the potential for America to get involved.
But I want to kick this off by talking about something that came up in the Tucker Carlson, Ted Cruz conversation, where Tucker asked Ted Cruz, is the Israel of Netanyahu, the Israel of today, the Israel of the Bible?
Because Ted Cruz had said something to the effect that Christians believe That we are supposed to bless Israel.
And Tucker goes, well, of course.
But, and Tucker was implying that Netanyahu's Israel is not the same Israel.
Now, let me make that case.
Tucker didn't make it, but I'm going to make it so we can discuss it further.
I guess the way to make that case would be to say that the New Testament...
The ancient Israelites are now in the rearview mirror.
They are a thing of the past.
This is a new Israel.
This is an Israel created by secular and socialist Zionists who pushed for this in the 19th century.
They got in the middle of the 20th century.
This has nothing to do with the Israel of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.
Well, so this controversy also in the Christian community is called replacement theology, meaning that the New Testament has now replaced the Old Testament.
Right.
So let's make clear about that.
The people who hold that view hold the view that somehow Israel is now the church.
The church, correct.
And that the nation of Israel has nothing to do with the Israel of old.
Right.
Now, how do you think about all this?
I mean, I know how I think, but I think we are pretty close in the way we think about it.
What's your take on it?
So, you know, when Ted told Tucker, you know, in the Bible, it says that those who bless Israel will be blessed, those who curse Israel will be cursed.
Tucker was like, where is this in the Bible, right?
And so, of course, that's Genesis 12, 3, where it says where God promises to bless those who bless Abraham's descendants, right?
And he says, Whoever curses Israel will be cursed, and of course that is the reference in 12.3, but it also is referenced in Numbers 24.9, where God does promise to bless Abraham's descendants, Israel, and to curse those who curse them, right?
So, as you know, the cornerstone for me is the Bible, and I don't view the Bible separately.
I don't say the New Testament is the only thing that I read.
I don't read the Old Testament, right?
Because that's just...
No Christian holds that view.
And to be clear, look, there are certain things in the Old Testament...
We don't do Jewish dietary rites.
We don't follow the Sabbath in the way that we keep kosher.
But that debate was held between Paul and the apostles, and it was settled in this way, that we don't have to do these things.
But would anybody with a straight face say, That we've repudiated the Ten Commandments?
That we've repudiated the prophet Jeremiah?
This is absurd.
No, and the relationship between God and the Jewish people actually explains the hatred that has gone on today called anti-Semitism.
I mean, it explains it.
The people, the people that are rejecting God at, The rejection of that, the hatred of that is what drives anti-Semitism today, I believe.
Let's come back to anti-Semitism because I think there are going to be people who are triggered, as they say, by anti-Semitism.
Are you calling me an anti-Semite?
Let's hold off on that.
To me, I would make two points about this.
One is, and we have quite literally seen this for ourselves, right?
That the...
The Jews today are the direct descendants of the Jews who lived in Israel, were chased away by a series of the Romans destroying the temple, a bunch of other things.
These Jews scattered and then they returned.
And here's the point.
It's the same people who returned to the same place.
And they now speak the same language.
They have maintained, if you will, and some people don't like this, but they have maintained their tribe.
They have held together as a people.
They haven't become dissolved the way so many other ancient peoples have.
And moreover, the reconvening of the Jews...
In other words, the Bible says, and this is actually quite remarkable because it seems to me that prophecy is, in a way, inspires wonder to the degree that it's implausible, right?
So the Bible goes, this implausible thing, the temple is destroyed 70 years after Jesus, or actually more like 40 years after Jesus' death, and the Bible predicts these very same people will Go away, and they will come back.
So who's come back if not the Jews?
Is there some other return that we don't know about?
Right.
Well, you know, I mean, this is what we believe.
Obviously, there are people even on our side that don't believe this, right?
My thinking is, look, I read the Bible.
I am a literalist.
I read it, and I literally believe what God is saying to be the truth, right?
And I also believe in redemption and I also believe in forgiveness and everything that Christ says in the Bible, right?
So for me, I am not going to take the position that somehow I'm going to, you know what, I'm not going to bless Israel or the Israeli government or the leaders of Israel because somehow that's not the same.
And God knows that in my heart, I do love Jews and the old Israel, but I don't love the new Israel.
I'm just not going to take that position.
I'm just not willing to.
There is, in Christian commentary and discussion, a key distinction, I think, here.
There is an Old and a New Covenant, and there is an Old and a New Testament.
The New Covenant does replace the Old.
But the New Testament does not replace the Old Testament.
And this is a key difference.
So God does have a New Covenant.
A New Covenant is a sort of a new contract.
And the New Covenant, we all know what it is.
the new covenant is Christianity.
But nowhere In fact, why is it in the Bible at all?
Or abrogated, right?
It's not abrogated.
It is not even superseded.
It is rather incorporated into the New.
So, this is a very different understanding, by the way, than Islam.
We talked about it this morning.
In Islam, there is a notion of abrogating, a notion that what comes underneath is sort of obsolete, and we can kind of safely ignore it and just focus on these revelations to Muhammad and so on.
This is not the view of Christianity.
Not at all.
Which incorporates the entirety of the Old Testament as true and valid.
That's right.
So, yeah.
So, you know, I'm not really quite sure why this view – I get that.
I get that we don't want to pay for another war.
I get that, too.
But I don't understand the—I guess the division between— What biblically a Christian is supposed to do versus what a secular person is supposed to do.
You know what I mean?
Because like I told you before, yes, the Israel government does have a lot of lobbyists in D.C. because they are talking self-preservation.
Because as you can imagine, this little piece of land the size of New Jersey needs protection.
Because All of these countries, not all of them, but most of them hate Israel, right?
And think about how since the inception, since 1948, think of Israel has been so vulnerable for so long because all these countries want to take it out.
It's the same rhetoric over and over and over again, right?
I found it odd.
I mean, this came up with Ted Cruz, you know, the issue of AIPAC.
And I want to say a couple of things about that.
I mean, I do think that there is a lot of foreign lobbying in the country.
And I do think that we have to be very alert to all that.
And I have no problem with it.
If the Israeli government was behind Epstein and Mossad, I want that exposed.
And I want that raised in a confrontational way with Israel.
To column on it, if that is, in fact, true.
Ted Cruz, though, made a pretty good counterpoint.
He says, well, you know, you're saying that AIPAC owns Congress, right?
He goes, well, if AIPAC owns Congress, then AIPAC would own the Democratic Party.
And the Democratic Party would not be...
Yeah, AIPAC would just come in and go, you know, you do that, you're finished.
But AIPAC doesn't have that kind of power.
And Tucker was forced to go, yeah, I guess you're right.
So this, I think, was a very, well, brilliant.
Counter example by Ted, which deflated, not Tucker, but deflated a big talking point, which is that AIPAC owns the politicians.
And Ted Cruz goes, well, here's an example to prove that it's not true.
It's not true in the case of the Democrats.
The other thing that came up was this issue of spying.
And I will say that all these countries now, by the way, this is true of Germany, of Great Britain, of Israel.
They have these big intelligence networks.
And we do too, right?
And so, we listen into what is going on with Macron.
And we listen into what the German Prime Minister is saying, you know, in a private meeting.
And they do it brilliantly, by the way.
And they do it brilliantly.
They're really good at it.
They're really good at it.
But the point is, and Ted Cruz goes, he goes, you know, we weren't born yesterday.
We live in a world where countries which have created these intelligence apparatuses, they do this.
And they don't just do it to their enemies.
They also do it to their friends.
That's right.
And Tucker was about to say, well, why do we allow it?
And part of the problem is we're doing it!
Our intelligence agencies do it.
Exactly.
What is the CIA if not our allies?
Exactly.
So it becomes a little hypocritical to say, well, guess what?
You know, I've got a little bug in your bedroom, but I don't want you to be We just can't.
There are too many people that want to wipe us out that if we become isolationist in every sense of the word, meaning like, you know, see no evil, hear no evil.
All of those things.
We're going to become targets.
And I personally do not want for North Korea or China or even Russia to have a kind of a head on over us because that is scary.
That is really, really scary.
And again, we live in a day and age where a lot of these superpowers have nuclear weapons.
And we're just trying to prevent...
One that is not afraid to become a martyr to have a nuclear weapon.
Yeah, I think that this is a case where, and this is just, you know, right out of Clausewitz or Sun Tzu or any of the great writers on military power.
When a nation state becomes powerful enough, your calculation has got to change.
Right?
So there's an old saying, what do you call a dictator who has nuclear weapons?
And the answer, ironic, is sir.
Right, because once a guy has nuclear weapons, you have to treat Now, Iran hasn't got there yet.
Not yet.
Iran will be in a completely different place once they get there.
And the people who are saying, I think, stop, stop, stop, are, as a practical matter, going to allow Iran to get there.
And not only that, they are, as a practical matter, going to save a regime that appears to be on the edge of falling.
So consider the great blunder, and I'm just going to be kind and call it a blunder, that installed the Khomeini regime.
Oh, Jimmy Carter.
That ejected the Shah.
That's right.
That gave us really 50 years of uninterrupted...
And now we have a chance to undo that, right?
And people go, oh, you know, we're not for regime.
I'm actually for regime change in this case.
Especially because we are on the verge of having it.
And so are you literally going to say idiotic things like Iran has a right to defend itself?
What are you doing?
You're protecting Khamenei.
Against not only us, not only Israel, against the Iranian people.
You're trying to leave this horrific regime in place.
You're trying to save it when it's about to or close to going down.
And let's talk about the proxies that Iran has, that Iran supports, right?
Yeah, tell us about those.
That's a big difference from Iraq versus Iran because – so – In fact, beyond that, Iraq was fighting with Iran.
Yes, exactly.
But Iran, I think what you're getting at, and you can give us some details on it, Iran is really, in a way...
Right.
Which is different than Iraq.
Right.
So let me just go back to Iran and Venezuela.
Because, you know, I've talked a lot about that.
In fact, I had Joseph Humeyer on, you know, last year.
Sometime last year or maybe a couple years ago.
I can't even remember.
Time goes by so fast.
He's going into the defense department, right?
He was appointed to be in the defense departments, which is amazing.
But anyway, we talked about...
Well, we talked about Iran.
What is Iran's endgame, right?
And from it stemmed Hezbollah, which Hezbollah is a Lebanese organization, but they're funded by Iran.
So let's not get confused here.
It is an Iranian proxy.
And they have done damage like nobody's business to Central and South America for decades.
Decades.
Well, this is right there.
Let's pause for a moment because, look, we have Hamas is widely understood and correctly to be controlling things in Gaza.
Now, Hamas also has tremendous influence in the West Bank, but Hamas nevertheless is confined to Israel.
In that region.
That's right.
Right.
But Hezbollah, you're saying, has projected its power so far that they not only can shoot rockets into northern Israel, but they are in Venezuela.
They are in Mexico.
They are in other parts of South and Central America.
Right.
They are doing bad work in our backyard.
Right.
True.
And these countries, Argentina in 2019, they actually named this a terrorist organization, as did Colombia, as did Honduras and Guatemala.
Notice I don't say Guatemala or Honduras.
Okay, sorry.
That's okay.
You can be normal.
Say it your way.
Right, right, right.
And so these countries have, you know, Hezbollah has wreaked havoc in these countries.
Right.
And so like in Argentina, for example, there was a bombing in Buenos Aires that killed 29 people.
And more than 200 wounded in 1992.
And then in 1994, the Jewish center there in Argentina, in Buenos Aires, there was a bombing that killed 85 Jews.
And this is why, like, Malay is on the rampage.
Yes, exactly right.
And so Peru, same thing.
Panama.
Now, Venezuela has a very cozy relationship with Iran, and so they have a very cozy relationship with Hezbollah.
Hezbollah has training camps in Venezuela.
They have training camps in Mexico as well and probably other Central American countries, but primarily Venezuela because of the close relationship that Hugo Chavez started with Ahmadinejad.
Venezuela is a little bit like the Taliban.
Remember, the Taliban was like the training ground for the 9-11 terrorists.
And the other point I think people should know is that Iran has this history now.
Of 45 years of uninterrupted incidents, one after the other, against Americans and against American allies.
That's right.
It started off, of course, with the hostages, which is pretty much the first thing that the Revolutionary Guard did in 1979.
The Beirut bombing, you've mentioned before.
The other bombings, hijackings, Khobar Towers, which was the facility in Saudi Arabia.
So, Iran is a menace.
It's a menace.
And I have to tell you about this.
So, I found this Time Magazine article that is actually dated October 8th of 2009.
Which is around the time that I kind of was like, what?
You're kidding.
I would talk to people.
You know, obviously I've been following Iran and the terrorism that they ensue everywhere.
But I didn't even know about Venezuela and Iran until this, right?
So what started happening is through friends and family, they were like, And I was like, Farsi?
What do you mean?
I mean, why would it be in Farsi?
People in Venezuela speak Spanish.
I should not speak Farsi.
And then I started reading about And then, of course, Chavez's obsession with Hitler.
And so I was like, okay, this is not good.
The other thing you told me about was...
Oh, yes.
That started coming next.
From Tehran.
So these flights would come in from Tehran.
They didn't know what was in the flights.
It wasn't people.
It was things, right?
More like something.
And they would go to a different terminal.
Nobody knew what was going on.
This all happened about this time.
So they asked Hugo Chavez about this.
And he goes, so he basically joked about the relationship and also, like, how's the uranium going for Iran?
Because, as you know, Iran needs enriched uranium to have nuclear weapons, right?
And so you don't use enriched uranium for just a nuclear power.
It's for weapons of mass destruction.
And who has the uranium?
Venezuela has uranium, right?
We have uranium too, by the way.
We have a lot of uranium, but Venezuela has a lot too.
And so ever since Chavez announced that he was seeking Russia's help to develop nuclear energy, this all kind of became a thing, right?
And he joked about the fact that, you know, that he was going to help Iran give them uranium and all of that, you know.
This was in 2009.
And of course, I was concerned.
I was like, is the United States like at all concerned with this?
Because let's face it, I mean, we could be talking about, you know, Israel and the Middle East and Iran.
Okay.
But a lot of people are going to go, well, Debbie, that's in the Middle East.
Who cares?
Right?
And then I was like, well, you know, Venezuela is 1300 miles away from Miami.
If they're able to do something with nuclear weapons and they position them in Venezuela because Venezuela hates us, at least Hugo Chavez and Maduro do, then I'm not okay with that because they just need short-range missiles.
for that, right?
They don't even need...
No.
And so I...
And I'm like, where is the United States in this?
Why haven't I heard anybody in the State Department talk about this?
This is the level of commentary that we're getting these days.
I see a post just yesterday, I think it was, Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut.
He goes, all of this is proof that we should have gone.
With Obama's Iran deal.
That would have prevented Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.
And I'm just reading this and I'm thinking to myself, I don't understand.
Are you so clueless about Obama that you don't realize that Obama was very self-consciously committed to an ideology to undermine America?
And a religion.
Okay, I said it.
Well, let's leave the religion part aside.
Promote this anti-colonial view that we should be strengthening our enemies because they keep us in check.
We are the rogue elephant that needs to be corralled, right?
Iran having a nuclear weapon will help to do...
And you know who said that recently?
Netanyahu.
Netanyahu for the first time came out and fingered Obama.
That's right.
And with unerring instincts, he goes...
So here you have this buffoon, Chris Murphy, and he's like, oh, listen to Obama.
And I'm like, I don't know if you're a useful idiot or if you are another kind of sly Obamaite who recognizes that you guys have been trying to get Iran a nuclear weapon and you're actually mighty upset now because your dream is not becoming a reality.
Yeah, yeah.
And notice the year I read about Chavez in Iran.
09. When did Obama come into presidency?
Right about that.
09. So I think Obama knew about all this.
And I think he kind of kept it on the down low.
That's just my opinion.
Because nothing happened.
The United States didn't question Hugo Chavez about this.
Nothing happened.
And I think it was under his State Department.
Obama's.
There's been a national focus on eating only the healthiest foods.
That's a very good thing, and it's great news for Balance of Nature.
Their method of producing a vibrant nutritional supplement is second to none.
While so many others use chemicals and additives, Balance of Nature is made solely from whole food ingredients.
That's this, fruits and veggies in a capsule, really easy to take.
Now, while other methods sacrifice nutritional quality for the sake of profits and volume, balance of nature's advanced vacuum-cool process involves freeze-drying the fruits and veggies into a fine powder, helping to retain as much nutritional value as possible compared to other inferior methods, which cut corners at your expense.
Balance of nature packs a nutritional punch, and that's the whole reason for taking balance of nature, getting the most nutrition for the sake of your health.
It's America.
You get 35% off plus free shipping and a money-back guarantee.
Call 800-246-8751.
That's 800-246-8751.
Or go to balanceofnature.com.
When you use discount code America, you get 35% off plus free shipping.
As you know, our friend Mike Lindell has a passion to help everyone get the best sleep of your life, and he didn't stop by simply creating the best pillow.
He also created the best bedsheets ever.
These are the Geezer Dream sheets.
They look and feel great, which means an even better night's sleep for me, which is important for my busy schedule.
Now, Mike is offering the best deal on his Geezer Dream bedsheets.
Any size, any color, just $49.98.
That's right.
You can get queens, kings, split kings, cal kings, any size, any color, like I said, just $49.98.
But order now, because when they're gone, they're gone.
Also, for a limited time, when your order's over $100, you get $100 in free digital gifts.
Call 800-876-0227.
That's 800-876-0227.
Or go to MyPillow.com.
Don't forget the promo code.
It's D-I-N-E-S-H Dinesh.
Use the promo code and you get the amazing offer.
$49.98 on the Geezer Dream sheets.
Any size, any color.
Hey guys, remember to make sure to hit the subscribe button down below to stay up to date on everything I've got going on.
Hey, we want to get the show out to as many people as possible.
So subscribe, hit the notifications button to get updates as soon as we post.
All right.
Let's shift gears and talk about the Supreme Court, this important decision on transgender, allowing the state of Tennessee, and by extension, any other state, to ban these transition treatments.
But I think what's fundamental about it, and this is what has implications for sports and bathrooms, basically what the Supreme Court said is, first of all, all these discrimination laws, They protect race, and they protect sex.
And the court said, let's look at the definition of sex.
The definition of sex is male and female.
That's what it's always meant.
That's what Title IX means.
If you're being, if girl sports are being discriminated against, that implies that there's such a thing as a girl, right?
So there is no way to understand these laws without using the...
And guess what?
This whole, I'm going to transition in, I'm going to detransition out.
You're not a legitimate group for this kind of consideration.
This, I think, is kind of a legal bombshell.
Yeah, it is.
From the court.
It is.
The court is going all in on this.
This is the strong statement.
And then comes Amy Coney Barrett.
And I've got to say this, because people have been kind of dumping on Amy Coney Barrett.
I've seen all these articles.
It was a big mistake for Trump.
I've never thought it was a mistake.
Even though I recognize that Amy Coney Barrett is not as hardcore as Alito, she's not as hardcore, but I think she's actually better than Roberts.
And the proof of it is that not anyone.
Roberts is not that bad.
I think he's the most liberal, wouldn't you say, of our conservative so-called judges?
Yeah, but when I say he's not liberal, he is right of center.
He's just not as right of center as the others, right?
So I would say Alito.
And Thomas occupy the far flank.
And Gorsuch.
Gorsuch is right there with them.
And then, of course, you'd have to put Kavanaugh and then Barrett and then Roberts.
You would think Kavanaugh would be the most after what that man went through.
I mean, are you kidding me?
Here's the difference.
Basically, I think, see, Clarence Thomas and Kavanaugh, Exactly.
Clarence Thomas basically looked at what happened and he responded the way I would.
Clarence Thomas responded by saying, all right, look, you can do this to me.
Just wait.
You can draw on all these historical analogies of the dangerous black man, the predatory black man.
You can play the race card on me all you want.
But guess what?
If you fail to get me across the finish line, And that's what he's doing.
That's what he has to do.
That's right.
Kavanaugh is almost like one of these, I'm too much of a gentleman.
It doesn't matter what you said to me.
I'm going to be a judge.
A judge is supposed to read the Constitution.
So these are two different personalities.
And they approach the law.
In a somewhat different way.
Even their jurisprudence is different.
Clarence Thomas is more like a natural law jurisprudence, and Kavanaugh is a little bit more of a kind of original intent type of jurisprudence.
But my point is, Amy Coney Barrett came through big time on this Scrimetti case, and her opinion is sparkling, hardcore.
To the right of Roberts.
And it's the kind of opinion that I think Alito would look at and go, wow.
He approves.
He approves.
Yeah, yeah.
No, I mean, you know, as I was telling you the other day, a couple of days ago, I'm on hormone replacement therapy.
It's called HRT.
But I am on hormone replacement therapy, not because I was a man, but because I was once...
And now I'm not.
And so, you know, after a woman goes through perimenopause, premenopause, menopause, and post, we don't have estrogen anymore.
I mean, it's very, very low.
And we get all kinds of issues, headaches, joint aches.
Thinning hair.
I mean, you name it, we get it, right?
So it's really sad.
Oh, weight gain.
May I not even forget that one?
And so anyway, so I'm on that.
I have been for a few years, all of which we pay out of pocket.
The insurance does not pay for – it pays for estrogen.
It does not pay for testosterone.
It doesn't pay for all the others And um But it seems like These men that want to be Women Um It used to be paid for in the military.
I think they're trying to stop that now.
But in your right, judges have ordered in prisons that you allow this to happen.
And it's like, okay, well, why do I pay the full amount?
Hello, I'm a real woman.
And then I go on Google, which is now all AI, and I say, what are the levels?
Because I think my level of estrogen is – okay, this is probably – Why are you discussing this?
Why are you discussing personal matters on the podcast?
What you're getting at is you put in a question about estrogen for women.
Yeah, yeah.
And what comes up?
So what comes up is in transgender women, the recommended estrogen level is – Yeah, I was like, You're not contemplating a journey down the transgender path is what you're saying.
No, so anyway, so it really has overtaken not just our culture, but just even just our like ethos.
I mean, it's like crazy to me.
Yeah, it's very deranged.
And hopefully we're, there is a policy pushback on it now.
The court, I think, has made this important step.
The culture, I hope, kind of goes along as well, that we begin to see a cultural pullback.
I think there is.
Because look, even though, you know, there was an article, I guess, in the Washington Post, you know, the Supreme Court weighs in on this polarizing issue.
But when you consult the American people, it's not so polarized.
The overwhelming majority And so it is an unpolarizing issue.
That's right.
And then to further that, the transgender athlete issue is even more so because...
All on the same side.
All right, let's talk about money, about the Federal Reserve, and about interest rates.
So the Federal Reserve, I think, you know, Trump is annoyed with Jerome Powell.
He calls him too late.
That's his nickname for him.
Because his point is that Trump would like to see interest rates lower.
And Trump can point to a number of indices, including the fact that inflation has been lower than expected.
So when inflation is lower than expected, you can lower rates.
By and large, higher rates are there to curb inflation.
But Powell won't do it.
Powell's view is, let's keep it the same.
And you're saying it's political.
I'm saying that Trump suspects it's political and Trump is right.
In other words, Powell, who is, by the way, I mean, these are the, you know, Democratic appointees will do things favorable to Democrats, even though, in theory, the Federal Reserve is supposed to be independent, nonpartisan.
The fact is, it does play the fiddle for its own team.
Now, Powell's appointment comes up next year.
Trump will be able to name his replacement.
And that guy will get six years.
So that's the way the system is.
But Powell was lowering rates in the months leading up to the election.
And what does that tell you?
He was trying to...
Right.
He wanted to help Kamala Harris win the election and he failed.
And now that it's Trump...
See, I think if Kamala Harris were president right now, Powell, the same guy with the same facts, the same inflation, the same unemployment would be lowering rates.
So I think this is giving us a window into how these institutions, although they...
The media operates under objectivity.
The American Medical Association, objectivity.
The Bar Association, objectivity.
And all of it is lies.
There's no objectivity in any of those institutions.
Look at the American Pediatric Association.
They're screaming about the court decision on transgender.
They're like, the science!
The science!
And you know when they say the science, they don't mean the science.
What they actually mean is the money.
We know that.
They mean the money.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right.
So with regard to the Fed and the economy, it looks like we're beginning to see a, you know, there was a lot of uncertainty around the tariff issue.
And these tariff deals have still not really been announced.
So that remains a question mark.
But there is some pretty good tax relief in the big, beautiful bill.
When is that going to happen?
Well, it is passed the House by one vote.
It is in the Senate, and it's Thun's job to get it through.
Now, interestingly, the Senate, which is normally sort of more rhino-ish than the House, But in this case, the Senate is trying to cut spending out of the bill.
They actually want the bill to be more conservative.
So it has to go back to the House now?
Well, the Senate has to get its version.
How long does this take?
I mean, come on.
Come on, man.
You know, I know, I know.
But I think once the Senate converges on its deal, this is kind of how it works.
The Senate has to converge on something that can get a majority.
Once the Senate...
there's unstoppable momentum for it to go through.
So then what's going to happen is Mike Johnson is going to go back to the House, and if there are some holdouts, he's just basically going to, like— This has already gone through the Senate.
It's on the verge of being signed by Trump.
We are not tolerating any holdouts at this point.
So some people may lose some of their, you know, their, you know, bridge in Long Island or whatever it is.
Well, too bad for you.
I think that even though this bill is not a perfect bill, it is on balance a good bill.
It's better to have it than not to have it.
And I think we're going to get it.
But you're right.
It's taking its time.
Oh, yeah, because then if it has to go back to the house, Then, you know, they're going to take their time there, and then it goes back to the Senate, and then it becomes a bill.
Mr. Bill, remember?
I am only a bill.
Okay, sorry.
I know, but I mean, think about when we learned all that, the innocence with which we thought, oh, you know, we thought you got these two houses of Congress, they look at what's good for the country, they pass the bill, and, you know, there's no mention in the song of all the lobbyists and all the special interests.
No, because I think back then in the 70s, Obviously, I was a child, so I had just come from Venezuela when I started watching this.
By the way, I watched a lot of this stuff to learn English, so I could pick it up.
Of course, it was a little confusing, but hey, I think it worked.
What do you think?
No, it worked.
Well, I think the smart decision on the part of your mom was – Si, senor.
And there is an accent.
In fact, not only an accent, there is a whole Spanglish in the valley, in the Rio Grande Valley.
But your mom consciously sent you to Iowa, which I think is important.
Now we talk about Americanization.
Your mom made a decision, and that is, hey, I want Debbie to speak like everybody else.
And so you went to Iowa for several months.
You lived with your uncle.
And that's the way you speak?
Mom and my brother, yes.
Yeah, and the way you speak the way you do now.
That's right.
Well, I don't speak like I'm from Iowa, but...
Probably not.
Yeah.
Let's talk about airplanes and the Air India crash.
Oh, as you know, we love...
That's a bad word.
Yeah, it sounds like you're about to say we love airplane crashes.
No, no, no.
We love watching the airplane disaster show only because we think it's so interesting that from the time that the plane crashes until they find out what caused the plane to crash, it's so intricate and all the engineers are like, they're dissecting everything.
They put the plane back together.
They do all kinds of things to come up with why the A new phenomenon of our time.
Like if we were having this conversation, let's say 1990, you have an airplane crash, then everyone's like, this is terrible.
And then you have to wait like two years for a report.
And this preliminary report, final report.
And until that, you don't actually know anything about what happened, right?
But in a social media age now...
I mean, very interesting and highly educated judgments about What seems to be the case.
That's right.
And we've watched a few of these videos.
Well, one of them in particular, his name is Captain Steve, and he spells it with two E's.
Steve.
Right.
So, he's very good, by the way.
He's very good.
He's very lucid.
He is.
And he's very fair-minded.
And he's also, he's willing to tell you what he doesn't know.
That's right.
So, he will tell you, look, this, in fact, at the beginning of the Air India crash, He came out and he said, look, there are three theories about this crash.
Three possibilities, yep.
And he was leaning to the first one, which is the one that we mentioned.
Yeah, the flaps.
Namely, the flaps were not in the proper position, right?
And he saw the same thing.
He's like, look, look at the wheels, look at the flaps.
And then he offered a second and a third theory.
That's right.
But then he made a subsequent video where he said, and I thought this was very interesting.
He goes, you know, the old my old video was based upon like, when you look No, no, no.
Right.
He was saying that I've given you three options and there's like one strong point in favor of each of these options, right?
And he goes, but it's much better to make a case, just like if you're making a murder case.
You don't want to base it on one thing.
The guy had a motive and therefore he did it.
But what happened was he was looking at a grainy video.
That's right.
Because he was looking at a video of...
So someone took a video of a video.
And so it was very grainy.
He couldn't really tell what was going on with anything.
But when he saw the original high-resolution, more high-resolution footage of the airplane going down, he realized that the rat had been deployed.
I don't know what the RAT stands for.
Do you remember?
No, but I know what it is.
It is this little lever that comes out of the plane that supplies power.
It's a little fan.
It's a little fan.
Supplies minimal and temporary power in an emergency where the power goes out.
But it has to be where the engines fail, correct?
It has to be where the engines fail.
So, you know, we go through this interesting little detective thing where we were like, I think at the first glance, one of your first questions was, is this some kind of a jihadi pilot?
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Right, because we've been talking about the possibility of these jihadi pilots.
And hey, look, it would not be, it's Air India, right?
That's right.
This is a very live issue in India.
So we looked at that and we're like, no, rule that one out.
No, because the pilot came on Mayday, Mayday.
And so there was a video that I didn't get to watch.
A couple of nights ago that Captain Steve has, what causes a plane to lose both engines?
Right.
And also one of the things about this whole discussion, I think, is that whether it's the flaps or whether it's engine failure has a huge impact on is it the pilots who are to blame or is it the plane, right?
In other words, is it the pilots or is it mechanical?
Of all the different airplane episodes we've seen, it's about 50-50.
It's about 50-50.
Sometimes it's the pilot.
And so if it's the flaps, guess what?
It's the pilots.
That's right.
But if on the other hand, you lose power in both engines, you could be the most superb pilot.
I don't think, I don't, and they said it's either that the engines lost power on their own for some hydraulic failure or something like that.
Right.
Or the pilots took.
Those are the only two options, right?
So very, very interesting.
But one thing, too, that I watched yesterday about this was a reporter, this was another podcast, a reporter started talking about Air India in specifics, like talking about how that airline has gone downhill, dirty, the airplanes are dirty, they look run down.
And I'm like thinking, man, we've flown Air India before.
I came to America on Air India.
I'm not sure I want to go on Air India.
I came to this country on Air India.
And I'll tell you, it was...
She did.
Yeah.
But you know what it is?
Part of it is that They love nationalization.
That was one of the big cries of the second half of the 20th century for these socialist-leaning governments.
And when you have socialism, and this is a point that Ludwig von Mises made, More than 100 years ago.
He goes, the problem with socialism is it doesn't have a price system, right?
It doesn't tell you when something is working or not.
So, for example, is Air India profitable?
Answer?
Nobody knows.
Well, we don't know, right?
Nobody knows.
But wait, but it's not socialist anymore.
So what's up with Air India?
Because even though India has liberalized and opened up its markets and it's now got technology and I think it's not fair to call it a socialist country.
This is a legacy of its socialism.
still has a national airline.
We have Delta.
We have United.
We have American Airlines.
but we don't have a government run airline and that's a good thing.
Countries that have national This is my thinking.
If we did...
Well, no, to be honest, it would be much worse.
Because even Spirit Airlines, you know, in fact, Justin says, and I agree with him, he goes, Mom, you keep making fun of Spirit Airlines.
He goes, how many times has Spirit Airlines crashed?
He goes, not even once.
Point taken.
How many times has Spirit Airlines had a window blowout?
Not as far as we know.
How many times has Spirit Airlines made emergency landings?
Not many.
Not that often as far as we know.
Yeah, we don't know.
So we shouldn't be too hard on spirit.
So scary.
Let's talk about the baby boom generation and whether the baby boom generation, the boomers, are the source of America's problems.
Now, this is an interesting issue because I think...
Well, am I a boomer?
You are a boomer and I'm almost a boomer.
I miss it by like a month.
I sort of disavow the boomer generation.
Here's why.
Because I might be...
Right.
No, you're a boomer.
Right.
Yeah.
But I always...
I mean, I closed the boomer generation in 1960.
Now, I realize that there are some people...
So it's supposed to go...
If it's 64, then I miss it by a year.
But you're saying you narrowly escaped the boomer generation and I fall at the very end of it.
But I hate to identify with the hippie generation, the cooking generation.
So do you identify then with Gen X?
Yeah, I identify.
Well, I look at it as, I see myself as part of the Reagan generation.
Right?
Why?
Because So we're Gen X. Yeah, we're really in the generation of the 80s, not the 60s.
That's right.
And Hillary, Bill, these are the ugly creatures of the 60s.
And I think the legacy of the boomers was made by them, right?
The legacy of entitlements.
I mean, look, this is a generation.
The bohemian hippies.
They had it easy, right?
They came after World War II.
They were raised in an affluence that the country had not seen before.
I think the bad news is they were spoiled by the greatest generation.
So the greatest generation is in part at fault.
They produced these spoiled brats.
They gave them everything they wanted.
They allowed them to do sex, drugs, and rock and roll.
This is also perhaps the most selfish generation of history.
They tried to This is a generation that put off having kids, it wanted feminism, it wanted abortion, it loved birth control.
Everything that made your life easy, everything that had immediate gratification.
Everything that's said to you, don't save money, borrow money instead.
I mean, look at these boomers now, right?
They have no money, some of them, and yet they're going on a cruise, spending their last $1,300.
Or there's a lot of commercials about reverse mortgages.
Reverse mortgages, classic.
In other words, you start off doing the traditional thing of saving money so that you can own your house and maybe pass it along to the next generation.
Oh, no.
And then along comes a reverse mortgage.
Guys, listen.
Why do you care about your kids?
They're grown.
You don't owe them a thing after they're 18. So go ahead.
Spend the money down.
We'll give you...
I mean, this is...
Right.
Right.
And what I think gets me the most is that not only are they these It's a repulsive generation.
But no generation is more full of itself.
Right?
So it's one thing to be repulsive.
It's kind of like a guy who's unbelievably super ugly.
And that's like, okay, you're ugly.
That's not a good thing.
But if the guy then says to himself, I'm better looking than Brad Pitt, that's even more offensive, right?
So the boomer generation, while exhibiting one set of characteristics, is full of itself.
They ride their moral high horse.
They think they're full of compassion.
They think that they care for the world.
They don't care for the world.
They would never lift a finger.
Exactly.
They're greedy.
Even those of them that did sort of idealistic things almost always, like, think about, I was very idealistic.
I refused to fight in the Vietnam War.
That's idealistic.
You run away to Canada to avoid being drafted.
Regardless of what you think about the war, this is not like a compassionate or idealistic move.
It's self-serving.
You didn't want to find yourself in a jungle.
I understand it.
Now, let's be clear.
There are some boomers that I adore.
Of course.
Again, I said I'm not talking about individuals.
Look, in any cohort, you're going to get...
And I also think, though, that the Gen X generation has spoiled the millennials and the Gen Zers a bit as well.
You've got to admit that.
I do, but I do...
If I had to find...
I do admit that, but I think that if you are trying to find Look, our culture now is in such a tailspin, right, with all this neglect of children.
And then, of course, children who are neglected don't like their parents.
And you can hardly blame them because they've been mistreated at the time when they really needed their parents'attention, not just their parents'resources, but their time.
They didn't get it.
And so they're resentful.
right to feel that way to some degree.
Not to disrespect their parents, but they are right to So my point is, this has been going on, in my view, for like 60 years.
But when did it start?
Who started it?
When did the break in our culture come?
If I had to put a single date on it, I would have to say 1968.
Right in the middle of the boomer era.
that's the turning point.
If I had to write a book on the year in which America Right?
That's right.
Isn't that as good a choice as any?
That's right.
That Woodstock, you know, the whole.
Yeah, absolutely.
It was all portrayed as liberation.
The bohemian era.
It was all portrayed as a form of self-actualization, but even some of the positive things, like self-actualization is a good thing, but you always have to ask at what expense?
What obligations are being, like, ignored, shunted aside, camouflaged?
And you're right.
I mean, I think in large part, the family took a toll because it was the whole free love, rock and roll, you know, the whole like...
I mean, there were people who deserted their wives.
The spirituality of the 50s was very thin.
So I don't mean to suggest that the 50s were this wonderful time and then the 60s was horrible.
No.
But nevertheless, Nevertheless, for all its flaws, if we could go back to the America of the 1950s, that ethos, I don't mean that, you know, we necessarily want to all be drinking like milkshakes, but if you go back to that ethos, we'd be much better off than we are now.
True that.
▲
Export Selection