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April 2, 2026 - RadixJournal - Richard Spencer
15:34
Mar-a-Lago Face

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit radixjournal.substack.comRichard and special guest Basil join a Wednesday livestream to watch and react to President Donald Trump’s special address on the U.S.’s military actions against Iran, under “Operation Epic Fury.” The panel critiques Trump’s aggressive rhetoric, incoherence, and the risk of undermining the postwar global order. They also discuss Trump’s desire for appr…

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Trump's America First Rhetoric 00:10:46
May God bless the men and women of the United States Armed Forces and may God bless the United States of America.
Thank you very much and good night.
Whole lot of nothing, if you ask me.
Yes, but there was something in there.
The Europe, the Europe thing.
Well, the Europe thing was not in there.
It was, it was, well, if you have such a problem, you go take it.
Yeah.
Well, let's talk about all this.
Okay, I've got you.
Yeah, sorry, I was just looking to get the setup right.
So there were rumors, and you actually retweeted one of these rumors coming from Anonymous, which is that this speech was going to be about the pulling out of the NATO alliance.
Now, NATO was not mentioned here.
And I had seen that.
I even think like Polymarket mentioned something like that.
That was really floating around today, but that did not happen.
And Daily Mail reported it as well.
Oh, Daily Mail.
Well, they.
I mean.
They've reported on a lot of things.
TMZ is saying that my well, they did break the Christy Dome story, so that is true, and that seems verified.
So, that is weird.
It is as an aside like the National Choir will get like nine out of ten things, like just radically, bizarrely incorrect, but then they'll like win a Pulitzer Prize.
I forgot what they won one for, but they actually were getting at the facts.
But anyway, it only takes one, it only takes one, yeah.
Um.
I should win a Pulitzer Prize because everyone copies me five, ten years later and they give me no credit.
I'm looking to the Pulitzer to finally credit me with my takes, but I think I'll make a call on that a long time.
But anyway, NATO was not mentioned.
However, that was fairly sinister in the sense of like, we asked you, we wanted you to be involved, but you weren't.
So sad.
And the idea of demanding that.
Basically, Europe.
I mean, I don't think, from what I have read, Chinese bound vessels are getting through.
China is dependent upon the Strait of Hormuz in a way that we aren't physically dependent.
Obviously, everyone's dependent on it in the sense that it's 20% of oil and the price is set globally.
So you can't just like, it's not like we can have all the good oil and, you know, it won't be reflected at the pump, but it will be reflected in like Berlin or Beijing or whatever.
It doesn't, the price doesn't work that way.
But That was fairly sinister.
I mean, it's like you should go over there and take it.
I mean, he seems to be imagining this world.
And I do think that there's an id to Donald Trump where he imagines things are just about, he imagines the world is just like taking shit, you know?
And that was very early.
You can find early clips of Trump in 2012, which I would still consider early.
It was 15 years ago.
It was 2012 when there was discussion, or maybe it was 2010, actually.
And there was discussion that he might run for president.
And I think he was floating it and so on.
Like, you know, Iraq was terrible, but we should have taken the oil.
He said that again in 2016, early 2016, when he was denouncing the Iraq war, which, you know, we all were excited about at the time.
But he also mentioned taking oil.
And I think there are actually older clips where I think this is how he thinks, for better and for worse.
He has a sort of like id energy of conquest and rape and like possession and so on.
I do think he thinks in these terms.
Whereas the Eurocrats and freshly coiffed hair and dark suits and blue ties, they don't think in this way at all.
And so I think statements like that are actually quite provocative and sort of unsettling for those type people.
So he's not pulling out of NATO, but he's basically demanding that the NATO countries go rogue.
Take the.
In a way, by encouraging them to act on.
Their own and in their own interest, it almost is kind of an accelerationist multipolarity type of argument.
It's like, go be a pole of power then.
Oh, you think you are not our vassals?
Go do it.
Go do something.
Why do you need us to do it for you?
We don't need it.
Yeah.
But like any normal unipolar type of president would be like, well, no, we have to because we have to safeguard Europe's interests.
We're going to do this in concert with our allies that came out of the Second World War.
And that's what George W. Bush tried and pretty much failed to do with the coalition of the willing during the Iraq war.
But it was an attempt to do something.
I mean, people forget that the Korean War was authorized by the United Nations, it wasn't authorized by Congress.
And where did George W. Bush go to the United Nations?
Like, let's get everyone on board.
He wanted NATO to be involved.
NATO was actually, Article 5 of NATO was actually triggered.
During Afghanistan, I believe, because we were under attack and so on.
The Iraq War was something different.
So there was this like holdover.
You didn't mention Afghanistan, I noticed.
You didn't mention that.
No, you know, that one took about 20 years, didn't really go the way you expected.
Glory be to the Taliban.
It's interesting with Afghanistan, just to go on a little bit of a tangent here, because I don't know if you remember early 2017, he gave an address like this, where he basically said, you know, like, there are a lot of talk about America first, but then I talked to generals and people in the CIA, and they were like, no doing, we can't get out of there.
And it was a sort of like, I want to leave, but we can't.
It would be worse to leave than staying, more expensive, et cetera.
And then, of course, the plans to withdraw from Afghanistan were drawn up by the Trump administration.
And who is the guy who used to be fat?
And he's like a big neocon from Kansas.
I'm forgetting his name at the moment.
Anyway, he's from Kansas.
Yeah.
He's a fat Christian Zionist type.
We don't all know each other.
Right.
Pompeo.
Yes.
Thank you.
Someone.
Oh, yeah.
He's now thin due to the power of Ozempic.
Uh, but he looks worse, he's better.
That's what every another tangent upon a tangent.
Everyone has taken Ozempic looks worse.
They were better.
You gotta tell yourself, Richard.
Whatever you gotta tell yourself, I do right.
I think you look great.
I think you look amazing.
I won't lose weight because I look better, fat.
No, um, I'm not fat.
You'll see me in person, man.
Yes.
Man strength.
You'll see me in person, actually.
So you can.
You said it.
You said it.
The cat's out of the bag.
Illusion going on here.
Yes.
So true.
So true.
Okay.
Where was I?
So, yeah, Pompeo drew up the plans and negotiated the withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Biden could have reneged on all of those deals, potentially at least.
But I think he too was ready to get out of there.
And then, of course, Trump, MAGA, and the Republican Party attacked Biden vehemently.
I did not.
I was one of the lone voices defending Biden's withdrawal.
Because, first off, just on the basis of continuity, like we made these deals, let's complete it.
But also, let's get out of there.
What are we accomplishing?
And also, this notion that like a withdrawal from a war zone is going to be hunky dory, I think is totally unrealistic.
You know, like, of course, there was this whole mess.
Even the whole leaving the weapons behind and leaving the stuff behind, like that was smart and strategic.
That gave the incoming government.
A disproportionate asymmetrical power balance, which prevented a replay of the 90s, where Afghanistan fell into a civil war.
In this way, the Taliban was, you know, there was no question in questioning their ability to maintain a monopoly on state violence.
Very good point.
But so, yeah, it is funny that he didn't mention that.
So, this whole thing seems incoherent.
But the other thing about Trump, and I mentioned that he has this like id energy of like, we're just going to go and take shit and like, we're going to rape you.
We are going to fucking kill you.
Like, he has.
He's going back to the Stone Age where you belong.
Exactly.
He has that energy in him.
On the other hand, Trump is multifaceted.
And I think he also just desperately wants to be loved.
He's like a kid.
He's like my son who has the excuse of being eight for being like that.
You know what I mean?
Like, on some level, they want to win and they get mad when they lose.
They're like, oh, you cheated or whatever, you know.
And on another level, they have a kind of like childlike brutality, you know, where, you know, just take stuff and whatever.
But then on another level, they're a kid and they want to be loved, they want approval.
And affirmation.
And Trump, whatever he says about the fake news media, he desperately wants to be praised by the fake news media.
He needs their plaudits.
He doesn't like these poll numbers.
These poll numbers are crushing to him because it's about being loved.
That's his little secret.
That's like if you were to manipulate him, and I don't think he's like a Russian asset because I think he is totally unreliable as like a spy or.
Like a Manchurian candidate, or so I don't believe that at all.
But he is someone who can be manipulated, and it's not just flattery, it's love.
It's like, oh, you're loved, you're the best.
Everyone, as he gets older, it becomes less about his actual reputation and becomes more about his legacy.
The Illusion of Regime Change 00:03:59
So that's why a lot of this has to be about, you know, the peace prize, and I've ended the most wars, and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, because it's no longer just about.
In the moment, or what are the poll numbers?
Everything is now becoming more and more about I'm going to die, and what is my legacy going to be about that?
And not going to heaven, not going there.
Well, you never know.
You never know.
He did say it.
But, and also, what I noticed too is that it is this kind of, like you mentioned, this kind of duality of we're going to send you back to the Stone Age, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
We're going to take it, blah, But at the exact same time in framing Iran, it's all of these post war, you know, type of they're the bullies, they are projecting their power, they're a rogue state, they're whatever.
It's like they're crazy.
But we're crazy and we're going to do it to them.
You know, it's very schizophrenic.
It's exactly like earlier today, or I believe maybe yesterday, Heg Seth saying, Oh, yeah, we did regime change in Iran.
They just don't know it yet.
Right.
Where it's like in Venezuela, a decapitation strike is not regime change.
But in Iran, a decapitation strike is regime change.
They just don't know it yet.
It's like this esoteric neoconservatism.
It's like it's everything all at the same time.
Yes.
And even the Venezuela thing is extremely ambiguous.
And I think a lot of it just had to do with the fact, and I say this as praise, that we're dealing with Latinos as opposed to Muslims.
And I mean that kind of seriously.
Like, you know, we put it, what is her name?
Like, it starts with a D, the new leader of Venezuela, Delcy.
Oh, I couldn't give a fuck.
Last, whatever her name is.
Delcy Rodriguez.
Delcy Rodriguez.
Yeah.
Like, that was a weird regime change.
She is from the Maduro apparatus, basically.
And she's now in charge, and she's like, oh, yeah, like, You got a lot of refineries from the Gulf Coast.
Like, yes, Venezuelan heavy crude.
We're going to send it over there.
Like, it was a sort of, it was like the weirdest kind of regime change because you let it be like going to Iraq, but making sure that the Ba'ath Party stayed in power.
That's like quite literally what they did.
But I do think that Venezuela is a success because you can sort of, and I say this as praise, you can sort of act this way with Latinos.
You know, you can kind of like.
I think Latinos are less ideological.
In this sense, they're more like us in that sense where they don't really believe in anything.
It's, you know, they're very, they're postmodernist the way that we are, in the way that Muslims, Iranians, especially in this.
And, you know, I think it's, I think the Emiratis and the Saudis are more like this now, are more like Latinos.
But the Iranians and the Taliban are not like that.
They are committed to their ideological core.
Yes.
So it just doesn't work with Iran.
I mean, he said there has been a regime change.
He's like, we didn't use the word regime change.
They did say, now is your moment, rise up, Iranian people, and have a bright democratic future.
They did say that.
But I think what he is trying to communicate is that these Iranian leaders are going to be good guys.
They're going to be like, oops, you know, dad was really bad, but like, I want to be friends with you.
And I do not see that as the outcome at all.
And yeah, I hope I'm wrong because I don't care about any of this stuff.
I don't have anything at stake with anything in the Middle East.
I don't want us doing this nonsense.
So, yes, a good outcome in the medium term would be a friendly Iranian regime, but I just don't think that's how it works.
And I mean, there's this huge elephant in the room of the tolling that's going, that Iran says that they're going to do.
I mean, it's a complete, absolute failure, regression, backstep.
Why Middle East Diplomacy Fails 00:00:48
You know, it's just complete.
The only thing that we got in that sense was the challenge to Europe to do something about it.
But if Europe doesn't do anything about it and Iran moves forward with keeping a toll in place, not only is that a huge failure in terms of the strait itself, it's a huge failure in terms of.
Free trade of this, like, you know, the open seas and free trade.
It's like a complete, it's like the first really huge blow to that.
Yes.
There were some very famous tolls throughout the Middle Ages, you know, through straits and things like that.
I think there was a very important one in Denmark.
I would have to go look back on this.
There's obviously the Suez Canal, but it's very interesting because it is a sort of regression to older forms of.
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