Donald Trump and his administration has made strong statements in response to North Korea's increased rhetorical threats toward the United States. Sean covers the latest including North Korea's attempted plans to strike Guam. The Sean Hannity Show is live weekdays from 3 pm to 6 pm ET on iHeartRadio and Hannity.com. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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This is how we rule North Korea.
Best not make any more threats to the United States.
They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen.
Is he saying that he's going to nuke North Korea?
I don't know what he's saying, and I've long ago given up trying to interpret what he says.
Holding them accountable.
Sean gets the answers no one else does.
Freedom is back in style.
Welcome to the revolution.
We're burning down the mashing bullets at the moon, baby.
This is how we rule the new Sean Hannity show.
More behind the scenes information on breaking news and more bold, inspired solutions for America.
All right, glad you're with us.
And wow, we got a lot of news today.
Pre-dawn raid of Paul Manafort's home.
I'm going to tell you what the biggest mistake Paul Manafort made in the course of the program, but it's probably not what you think it is, but we'll tell you about that.
And we've got the latest on North Korea.
A lot of it's not good.
And also today, we have other breaking news that we are going to get into.
And the least of which is, well, let me even start here with Mitch McConnell.
Well, let me start with the pre-dawn raid, which is something that I'm going to get to in details later in the program.
So this is the headline.
Racing to my computer.
Pre-dawn, FBI conducted pre-dawn raid of former Trump, former Trump campaign manager, chairman, Manafort's home.
Now, when you think of pre-dawn raid, well, that's the, you know, the raid's target.
What are you thinking?
Armed, dangerous cops taking in, you know, busting down the door, taking control.
The entire house is swarmed in seconds, guns out, blazing, ready to roll, because the dangerous perpetrator, friend wrote me this today, is asleep.
In reality, of course, Manafort had already fully cooperated with the FBI, just as with the congressional committees, and he was at a congressional committee the day before.
And if anything, the FBI was thinking, and I have great respect for the FBI.
I'm not blaming them.
They're doing their job as being ordered, whatever they're told to do.
They got to do it.
That's their job.
They're told to arrest somebody.
There's an order to get whatever.
But Manafort made a big mistake here.
And his big mistake is not understanding what the new rules are.
And there are new rules.
And the new rules are very simple.
He should have deleted subpoenaed emails like Hillary.
He should have used bleach pit and acid-washed his computers like Hillary.
He should have taken hammers and smashed all of his devices like Hillary.
He should have, if he gives the FBI anything, any devices, he should have given it to them without SIM cards, like Hillary.
Or he should have used Debbie Wasserman-Schultz's strategy, which is have your IT guy who overbilled, double-billed, and put people on the payroll that had no IT experience.
And he should have, you know, he should have just had him take the government property to his house and smash the hard drives.
And then the government can come in later and try and put the pieces back together, which is extraordinarily hard.
So that's the number one mistake that I see that Paul Manafort up to this point, and I know people rush to judgment.
We have no idea what this is about.
We really don't.
And I really don't think it has anything to do.
At the end of the day, it's probably going to have nothing to do with Russia collusion, Russia collusion, Trump-Russia collusion.
In the end, I don't think it's going to be anything about that.
And I think liberals are going to be very disappointed.
Time will tell.
I think we would have heard a lot more, especially with all the leaking that goes on.
But if Paul Manafort would have just taken the Hillary Clinton right out of their playbook, subpoenaed emails, deleted them, and he should have made a comment.
He should have said these emails, oh, the ones I deleted, oh, they weren't bad at all.
I went through them one by one with my lawyer, even though Hillary said it, she never did it.
And I only wanted the convenience of one device, and Hillary said it, but that wasn't true.
And I deleted 33,000 emails because they had to do with a wedding, a funeral.
And you may not know this, but I've been taking yoga classes for years.
And I email my wife who doesn't have an email account, and that would have sufficed for the subpoenaed emails that he deleted.
And then the fact that he used acid wash, bleach bit, you know, that would have been fine because Hillary did it.
Hillary got away with it.
And if he smashed a few devices with a hammer or had an aid or somebody do it, well, that wouldn't have mattered either.
And if he handed over iPhones and Blackberries that don't have SIM cards, that would have been fine too.
And I guess the reason for the pre-dawn raid was because they thought he was going to do all of these things within seconds of them coming to the house in the pre-dawn raid.
So, and of course, that's leaked, which apparently had happened way, way back then.
And anyway, leaked is, you know, a different.
Yeah.
How do all these, when did we ever get to the point when, that we're leaking to such an unbelievable degree that the transcript of the president of the United States of America talking to prime ministers and presidents is now leaked.
And what I've been saying on this program, that there are so many obvious crimes that have been committed, felonies that have been committed here.
There's so many.
It's not one.
It's not two.
It's a whole bunch of them.
And I'm really worried for the state of the country because you got all these conflicts of interest.
You got a deep state leak a day, including conversations with our president and the presidents of other countries, Mexico, prime minister of Australia, all leaked.
How does the president, how does any foreign leader have a conversation with our president now without thinking it's going to be leaked?
We've got more surveillance, more unmasking of political opponents, more leaking of intel of political opponents.
We've now criminalized all political differences here.
In the case of Democrats, whether it's Uranium One, $145 million, obvious connections, does anybody ever check where the money originated from?
I'd like to know.
I think at some point you answer that question and you've got to the bottom of the Uranium One deal.
Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Hillary Clinton, email server, it's illegal to mishandle classified top secret special access program information.
Five foreign intelligence services got it.
All of this goes on and nothing happens.
Nothing.
If you're a Democrat, nothing happens.
Hillary Clinton, nothing.
You know, nothing is getting done in the meantime because of deep state leaks.
85% of the president's time and those around him are spent dealing with the daily nonsense of the illegal leaking, intelligence leaking.
We're watching with the unmasking.
You know, how is it possible that Samantha Power, a U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, is unmasking hundreds and hundreds of people in an election year, and a lot of them related to the Trump campaign.
For what possible reason would she ever have that power and authority?
Or Susan Rice or Ben Rhodes or James Baker now being investigated, the special counsel for the FBI, and James Comey and everything that he did to get his buddy Mueller into place and Mueller's conflicts of interest.
I mean, the whole thing stinks to high heaven.
And I'm really frightened at this point for the country.
I'm really frightened about the future of the country we all love.
I'm frightened about our Constitution.
I'm frightened about whether or not we're shredding it.
Fourth Amendment protections are being, you know, just squandered and just gone.
Forget about, you know, the idea that you need, you know, you can't have unreasonable search and seizure.
Just go out and steal it and leak it.
Just go out and surveil and just release it.
You know, I'm worried about, you know, with all the crimes we know committed here, no equal justice under the law.
Not one person is prosecuted.
And you keep hearing poor General Flynn, not only his life and career ruined, but it all emanates from and all it's all the foundational discussion of it begins with a leak that was illegal and a crime that was committed.
I'm frightened at this point for our country.
And I'm going to tell you something.
God help this country.
God help the world if the United States of America is not strong, honorable, true.
It's really sad to me.
It really is.
Anyway, 800-941 Sean.
Now, I want to play something for you, and that's Mitch McConnell.
But before I do, I want to read it to you.
And I want to just put this in context because I am so livid.
Literally, I'm feeling the emotions rise from deep down in my solar plexus.
I mean, it's just irritating me.
Because for seven long years now, Republicans have said repeal, replace, repeal, replace, repeal, replace.
We're going to be ready.
Give us the House.
Give us the Senate.
Give us the White House.
We'll get it done.
So eight months in, when McConnell gets back from his latest vacation with about 25 days on the legislative calendar or 30 days on the legislative calendar, when he finally gets back from his vacation, now we got to deal with the debt ceiling.
We haven't even touched the president's economic plan to get Americans, the forgotten men and women, back to work that desperately need jobs in poverty on food stamps.
They can't buy a house.
Forget them.
Nothing happens for them.
And he can't keep even John McCain in line and can't say, John McCain, you don't keep your promise here that we all made and you're going to hold the whole party hostage, even over a weak skinny repeal or a skinny, you know, dumbed down, if you will, version of repeal and replace.
You can't do that.
Then everyone's going to suffer politically because of your actions.
I'm taking away your chairmanship.
I'm sorry you're not feeling well.
I'm taking away your chairmanship.
Lisa Murkowski, taking away your chairmanship.
But you got a guy that is so lacking in being engaged, so ill-prepared for the moment to lead.
And this is the worst part.
He goes out, I know everybody's saying that, you know, we've been here and we haven't done anything, which I find extremely irritating.
This is Mitch McConnell.
And I'm going to tell you why I'm irritated.
A Congress goes on for two years.
Part of the reason I think the storyline is that we haven't done much is because in part, he goes on to blame Trump.
The president and others have set early timelines about things need to be done by a certain point.
Really?
We're overreaching here that a seven and a half year promise can't be done in eight months, now going on nine months.
And then by the time he even had a vote on it, it ended up being not.
You didn't talk about healthcare savings accounts.
They never talked about these cooperatives I've been telling you about.
They offered no unique, really great solutions that could inspire the American people at all.
Then McConnell goes on.
Now our president has, of course, not been in this line of work before.
So insulting.
I view that as a huge plus.
I think had excessive expectations because he expected a seven and a half year promise to be done in eight months about how quickly things happen in the democratic process.
Wow, he needs to go.
So bad he needs to go.
So part of the reason I think people, you little people, feel like we are underperforming is because of too many artificial deadlines unrelated to the reality and the complexity of the legislative process that may not have been understood by you mere mortals.
And of course, our political adversaries would love to say that anytime not fully understood as he then mumbles.
So what I'm asking you is to judge this Congress when it finishes.
How much have we done to make America competitive again and grow again?
And that's part of making, you know what he's not realizing?
You know what, Senator?
You're not one of the Americans in poverty, are you?
You're not one of the six and a half million that decide to pay the fine instead of get Obamacare.
You're not one of the millions because you get your health care that had to pay $8,000 on average premium increases.
You don't live in Arizona with 116% increase last year alone, on average, 30% around the country.
You know what, Senator?
You've never worked in the real world, have you?
Because that's not how business gets done.
And you just sound like you've lived in the swamp your entire life.
And it sounds pathetic.
It really does.
Senator McConnell, with all due respect, you need to retire.
We need somebody with a sense of urgency and vision and passion to keep the basic, simple promises.
Somebody that can motivate and inspire their caucus to keep their word.
So pathetic.
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I'm going to ask for a show of hands, but I know everybody's saying we've been there, haven't done anything, which I find extremely irritating.
And I'm going to tell you why.
Congress goes on for two years, and part of the reason I think that the storyline is that we haven't done much is because, in part, the president and others have set these early timelines about things need to be done by a certain point.
Now, our new president had, of course, not been in this line of work before, and I think had excessive expectations about how quickly things happen in the Democratic process.
And so, part of the reason I think people feel like we're underperforming is because too many kind of artificial deadlines, unrelated to the reality of the complexity of legislating, may not have been fully understood.
And of course, our political adversaries would be about to say that anytime.
So, what I'm asking of you is to judge this Congress when it finishes.
How much have we done to make America competitive again and to grow again?
And that's part of America, making America great again, which is what the president talks about so much.
I don't know how that makes all of you feel.
You know what it is beyond anything else?
It's a letdown.
It's a disappointment.
It's a frustration.
There's a certain shock to the system that they really can't be that weak, that visionless, and that bad.
You know, I keep saying the difference between Donald Trump and the Republican Party is this.
And the president went out there hard and he fired back at McConnell's complaint here.
And he literally, really, high expectations, excessive expectations after seven years repeal and replace.
Why isn't it done?
This president has an identity.
He has an agenda.
He's fighting for it every day.
He hasn't varied in his agenda.
He says he's ready to sign it.
He wants to keep his promises on everything else.
He doesn't need help on.
He's keeping them.
Republicans don't.
What a colossal failure and disappointment.
Sean gets the answers no one else does.
America deserves to know the truth about Congress.
All right, 25 till the top of the hour, 800-941.
Sean, our number, you want to be a part of the program.
Really, you know, it's really funny that there are so many people that just don't get me and don't get you and don't get the country and don't get the election and don't get the election results.
They just don't get it.
It's almost been a mass psychotic, emotional breakdown collectively.
There was something that was written, it wasn't Victor Davis Hansen, it was somebody today, and it was basically like the elder-educated elites, and they're, you know, they just are fixated on Trump and Trump and Trump and Trump and Trump.
And to a certain extent, it's all true and it's all right.
And they think, I'll give them the best motivation.
I think they think they're right and they just can't see the forest through the trees anymore.
And it is, there's nothing, Donald Trump can't do anything right in their minds.
And those that support him can't do anything right in their minds.
And everybody's motives are deep and dark and nefarious and wrong.
They just don't understand us.
And I don't think they want to understand us.
And I don't think they ever will understand us.
You know, I think this goes to the heart of the deep, deep desire by the left to silence conservatives.
This is now bordering on a psychotic meltdown on their part.
But it's real, and it's something we have to, we obviously take seriously.
But as I look at this, I'm thinking, do you not understand?
You had eight years of Obama.
You had everything you wanted.
You got Obamacare.
Do you not see the premium increases?
Do you not see there's a story today?
Six and a half million Americans would rather pay the fine than get on that crappy service.
Millions lose their care.
Millions lose their doctor.
You have X number of percentage of counties in the country.
They have one plan to choose from.
We're already looking at projections for 2018 and again, another 30% increase.
Over $8,000 on average, $6,000 to $8,000, depending on where you live.
Interestingly, the states that subsidize the most, like New York, are one of the lower premium increased states.
Arizona, 116%.
That's what just, I'm so shocked.
John McCain just doesn't seem to care.
And I'm looking at it.
I'm like, wow, 13 million more Americans on food stamps under Obama's policies.
8 million more in poverty under Obama's policies.
Lowest labor participation rate in the 70s under Obama's policies.
You know, lowest home ownership rate in 51 years.
Obama's policies.
And then you've got what else?
We got the worst recovery since the 40s.
Obama's policies.
A doubling of the national debt.
So much for $9 trillion being irresponsible and unpatriotic.
So they've had all of this time to fix it with the greatest hope and expectations.
And the belief, the lofty rhetoric, the crowds, the chanting, the words got everybody stoked.
It would have been great if all of it worked.
Socialism never works.
Redistribution never works.
Government regulation stifles industry.
You know, the best thing Donald Trump has done to date, among many others, fixing the VA among them and a few other things is that he's gotten rid of burdensome regulation.
And Donald Trump is, you know, everything else that he's able to do by himself.
And you just have to wonder and worry and think, What part of this is helping the men and women in this country in poverty?
What part of this is helping the men and women in this country on food stamps?
What part of this is helping create a ladder of success for people?
What part of the liberal agenda of hatred towards Donald Trump is helping a single human being?
Is there one thing besides a bumper sticker that they probably spent hundreds of thousands of dollars focus grouping?
A better way or this better way or a better, better way, whatever it is.
It's a platitude, a bumper sticker, a slogan.
Doesn't mean anything to people.
You're not even willing to work with the president because you hate the president.
Liberals are supposed to be caring about those that are not doing as well.
Why aren't they looking for solutions to help those men and women that are forgotten?
Those men and women, I mean, when you have 50 million in poverty, 50 million on food stamps, so many people out of the labor force, we don't count them in the unemployment number, and you got all these people suffering.
And, you know, I know it's not a big deal to, you know, these think tanks or people that are out there spreading their political hatred, but they even care about people that lost their doctor and their plan, and it was the biggest lie ever told.
Do you guys ever care about that?
You say you do.
Do you care about the life of men and women that are suffering?
Do you know, have you thought about the benefits of America being energy independent, of America not having to count on countries that hate our guts for the lifeblood of our economy?
Have you thought about the security aspects of that?
Have you thought about America, the hundreds of thousands, millions of potential jobs in the energy industry as we become energy independent?
Good paying career jobs for people.
And America now using its resources for the betterment of its people.
Have you thought about the benefits of any of that?
And how we could pay down debt and stop robbing our kids and grandkids?
Have you thought about keeping America safe?
Open borders.
How does that keep Americans safe?
How does it keep America safe not to identify who our enemies are that want to blow us into smithereens to the point they'll put strap bombs on their own children?
You know, it's mind-numbing to me that, and this goes back to Mitch McConnell.
You know, I could just look at this statement of him and I'm saying, wow, you are so swamped in.
You are such the swamp creature.
And I'm like stunned at it all.
And I just, I can't believe that, you know.
Everybody's been saying we've been here.
We haven't done anything.
I find this irritating.
Oh, I'm sorry you're irritated that we see that you take too many vacations.
You guys are lazy.
You have no sense of urgency.
You don't seem to care about the American people.
You can't get a simple job done.
You have no control over your caucus.
Even Lindsey Graham said, yeah, I think that Trump's right on this one.
Yeah, I think after seven and a half years, we don't have excuses.
Even I like Mitch, but for eight years, we've been saying we're going to repeal and replace Obamacare.
It's not like we made this up overnight.
Said this to my buddy Brian Kilmead.
We've been working on repealing Obamacare all year talking about this and their inability to get it done.
The idea put forward didn't pass.
It was in many ways ill-conceived, an ill-conceived idea.
I'm not moving on.
I'm not giving up.
President Trump's not giving up.
There's no way to sugarcoat this.
The Republican Party promised for eight years to repeal and replace Obamacare.
We failed.
And if we give up, shame on us.
Yeah.
Right for now, Lindsey Graham's got his own bill.
It's not totally ill-conceived.
The idea is to give it back to the states.
And the idea is that the states could do a better job.
And I actually agree with that.
But the problem is, is they're going to keep all the Obamacare taxes.
And they're going to end up funding it to such a ridiculous degree that it's just another entitlement that's going to bankrupt us.
It's very frustrating.
Anyway, let me move on.
I spent a lot of time yesterday.
I don't think I have a whole lot to add, except that, you know, you've got to understand something about this North Korea situation.
You know, a friend of mine wrote me last night, we're having a long discussion and going off on my argument that I don't think there are any good options here.
And there really aren't.
And if you love human life and you believe in human life, and I do, and I think we're all God's creatures in many senses, and the human experience is one of good and evil, and there's been a lot of evil in the world, and 100 million human souls destroyed, as I mentioned yesterday, in the last hundred years alone.
Fascism and imperial Japan and Nazism and the killing fields and radical Islamists.
I mean, it just goes on.
But you're talking about perhaps tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, maybe in the millions in a worse, in a scenario that could actually unfold in our lifetime.
That to me is not a game.
It would be a tragedy beyond anything mankind has seen.
But we don't have any options here.
You know, people are criticizing Donald Trump because he said fire, fury, the likes of which the world has never seen before.
Well, how else do you deal with the fact that a maniac?
I mean, John McCain was actually making the argument, oh, Donald Trump, I don't know if this language is good.
We've got to be careful because it may piss him off.
I'm like, may piss him off?
You mean words are going to send this guy over the cliff and Donald Trump better watch his words?
Well, that's what appeasement has done.
Diane finds this is bombastic.
It's only going to isolate him.
Well, that's the position Bill Clinton put us in by trying to bribe his way or bribe the North Koreans not to get any nuclear weapons.
Of course, they took the money and of course they lied.
And now they have them.
And so now you got a rogue mad regime with all the hatred that Kim Jong-un happens to have towards the West.
And we don't have sufficient missile defense at this point after the Obama years.
Just a fact, not a political commentary that he cut back on.
You know, Nuke Gingrich was talking last night about the need for redundancy.
When he talks about redundancy, he's saying if they launch a nuke towards the United States, New York City, or they launch a nuke towards Boston or anywhere in the continental U.S. or Guam or Japan or China, you know, we better be ready.
Do you know that if three nukes, literally three nukes, and remember, he hates the U.S. like no other country.
He's been born and indoctrinated into hating the U.S. His whole family has.
They haven't gotten over the United States' involvement in Korea years ago.
You have three nukes explode in the atmosphere above the U.S., don't even touch ground.
And the resulting EMP pulse would destroy every bit of electronics, destroy the power grid.
It would be down for months, maybe years, and potentially millions of people could die.
Hannity, what are you talking?
You're scaring people.
No, that's what apparently Brian Williams Lion Brian wants to do over at MSNBC.
So I guess that John McCain and Diane Feinstein aren't going to like what Mad Dog Mattis said today any more than they like what President Trump said yesterday.
And he was talking about Korea.
They better choose to stop isolating themselves, stand down in pursuit of their nuclear weapons.
He said they should cease any consideration of actions that would lead to the end of its regime and the destruction of its people.
The United States and our allies have demonstrated the capabilities and unquestionable commitment to defend ourselves from any attack.
Our State Department is making every effort to resolve this global threat through diplomatic means.
It must be noted that the combined allied militaries, what we now possess, the most precise, I'm sorry, precise, precise, got it.
Rehearsed, robust defensive and offensive capabilities on earth.
North Korea's regime's actions will continue to be grossly overmatched by ours.
He's right.
But if you have to do it, even if you had a coalition of the willing, including China, and even if it was including Russia, Israel, Western Europe, and we could absolutely take them out.
But here's the problem: you're going to incinerate North Korea.
And God only has to worry about, and not even if you use nukes, you can incinerate them.
And then if the nukes explode that they have, well, God help the nuclear fallout.
It's going to impact people for generations.
This isn't a game.
Real lives, real people, real destruction, real death.
100 million people died because of war and evil in the last hundred years.
And yes, it can happen again.
At that point, it doesn't really matter if you're a liberal or conservative does it, or a Democrat or a Republican does it, because it's going to impact your life and it's going to impact your family and it's going to change the world forever.
It's pretty, pretty chilling and pretty frightening.
You see the Trump haters coming out of the woodwork as this North Korea crisis heads up.
I'm glad to see everybody really jumping on board when the country is in a crisis.
Top CNN pundit warned Democrats are in complete disarray.
Yeah, we know that.
We'll get to all those today.
All right, 800-941 Sean.
We'll talk about our options in the next hour.
Also, the other news of the day, we'll have some fun later in the program.
Katie Hopkins is back and much, much more.
800-941 Sean, you want to be a part of the program?
Trying to be, I'm just trying to be realistic.
You know, you have to, there's a biblical saying, you shall know the truth and the truth will set you free.
And the truth is, the world is dangerous.
The truth is, there is evil in the world.
The truth is, human history has proven a lot of darkness and a lot of death and a lot of pain and a lot of misery and also human suffering.
And then it's also shown points of brilliance and heroism and greatness and goodness.
It's part of this human experience that I don't think we'll know the complete answer to until one day we head on home.
All right, we all, all the news of the day, much more straight ahead in your calls.
North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States.
They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen.
He has been very threatening beyond a normal state.
And as I said, they will be met with fire, fury, and frankly, power, the likes of which this world has never seen before.
Thank you.
I'm usually one who puts a lot of blame on Trump.
Look, there have been three previous presidents that have negotiated with North Korea and every time said, okay, we've got it settled.
We're all friends now, et cetera.
And obviously, we were not.
I take exception to the president's comments because you've got to be sure that you can do what you say you're going to do.
In other words, the old walk softly but carry a big stick, Teddy Roosevelt's saying, which I think is something that should have applied, because all it's going to do is bring us closer to some kind of serious confrontation.
I think this is very, very, very serious.
And I think that the rotund ruler in Pyongyang is not crazy, but he certainly is ready to go to the brink.
Is he saying that he's going to nuke North Korea?
I don't know what he's saying, and I've long ago given up trying to interpret what he says.
But what he's saying is obviously fire and fury.
But what about Seoul?
What about South Korea?
What about Kim Jong-un's capability to really inflict serious damage on South Korea?
So all I can say is that I don't believe that President Reagan or President Eisenhower or other presidents that I've admired would have said the same thing.
They might have done as much as we could, but not that kind of rhetoric.
I'm not sure how it helps.
Okay.
But the three previous presidents, especially in the case of Bill Clinton, that gave him billions of dollars in energy aid, and he told the American people, we just made a good deal for the American people.
World is safer.
They're not unlikely now to get nuclear weapons.
And then, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Yeah, a lot of talking.
And by the way, if Donald Trump's words can push this guy over the edge, he's already over the edge.
Words of an individual can't push you.
You know what?
Donald Trump so pissed me off, I'm going to fire nuclear weapons.
Unbelievable.
John McCain, sadly, has just decided he's going to go all-in angry anti-Trump.
And he wants no success for this president at all.
And it's obvious where he's coming from.
So what is the strategic plan on all of this?
Anyway, Harry Kazianis is with us, Director of Defense Studies at the Center for National Interest.
He joins the show today, along with Jonathan Gillum, host of the experts, former Navy SEAL FBI agent, federal air marshal.
Harry, let's start with you and ask you, I don't see a lot of good options here.
And the best option would be if somebody was already some type of spy in a position to take him out.
I assume that would have happened by now, too.
Then you have even a best case scenario, a coalition of the willing, including even China, Russia, let's say our Western European allies, Israel, and you take out the nuclear sites.
Number one, it would incinerate the entire country of North Korea, may impact South Korea, depending on the winds, and you risk nuclear fallout.
And on top of that, then you risk if you don't do it fast enough, this lunatic that could get so angry at Donald Trump's words, he may start a nuclear war.
That same guy would launch into South Korea, Guam, Japan, or even China.
What do we do?
Sean, well, it's good to be with you.
Two things I'd offer right off the bat.
The first thing that we have to do above all else, Sean, is I'm so tired here sitting in Washington, D.C., two blocks from the White House, and people still have the gall to say that we still have more time, that North Korea doesn't have nuclear weapons, or they can't hit the United States.
The fact of the matter is, Sean, that Washington Post article yesterday was devastating, and it shows that the North Koreans have the technological capabilities to hit the United States.
They might be missing a couple technical ponents here or there, but we have to assume from here on in they have that capability.
Because if we don't, every couple of days, people are just going to keep saying we can kick the can down the road a little bit longer, a little bit longer, and this situation is going to get worse.
So that's the first thing.
Second thing I'd offer is, look, we don't have a lot of great options, as you laid out.
Any of those options, we're talking about millions of people dead.
And I don't think anybody wants that to happen.
But our best option right now is a very simple one.
China has signed on to eight United Nations Security Council resolutions, including one last weekend.
It is time for Beijing to actually step up and prove that it is not an international pariah and actually enforce the sanctions.
Because if they did that, that would take the billions of dollars away from Kim Jong-un to develop the next generation of nuclear weapons, which is a hydrogen bomb and a three-stage ICBM that could actually hit all of the United States.
Now, those aren't perfect options, but that at least sets the stage for the president to act boldly and swiftly to at least contain this problem.
What do you think, Jonathan Gillum?
Do you agree that millions can die here?
That's my greatest fear.
No, I mean, it's obvious that millions could die, especially in Seoul, Korea, where there's 27, 26, 27 million people 30 miles from the border with North Korea.
There's no doubt that this is something, Sean, that's been, it's not a problem that's just risen immediately.
This is something that's been going for over 50 years that many predecessors.
Yeah, but the problem, Jonathan, I don't mean to interrupt you, but when Trump came in office, he was told by Obama, according to reports, that he was four or five years away from this problem.
And now it's upon us within eight months of his presidency.
Well, it's been one failure after another with these different individuals in the seat of the president.
I mean, John McCain's sitting there criticizing the president, but John McCain, this problem's been going on and slowly escalating.
Isn't this the same John McCain that chanted bomb Iran?
Isn't that the same guy?
Same guy.
And, you know, he just is taking swipes at the president.
And, you know, I think, Sean, here's here's the thing, along with what your other guests were just saying there about the sanctions and getting as a name, you know, Jonathan.
You don't have to talk to Ruins.
His name is Harry.
You could say Harry.
Not that hard to remember.
Forget his last name.
Nobody can say it.
No, nobody can.
But going on with Harry's comments there about the sanctions and getting China involved, I absolutely agree with that.
I do think, though, that we need to consider a tactical option as well.
And one thing I would definitely look at is, especially in the case of Seoul Korea, who has politicians there that have thrown curveballs as well with defensive measures to stop missiles.
I would definitely look at the type of armament that they have where they could immediately start lobbing munitions over into Seoul, Korea.
And I would completely demolish that portion from the border over to eliminate any chance of getting weapons.
Do you agree with me that the only way to really stop them is...
Look, I guess we could live with mutually assured destruction.
I guess that's an option.
And we certainly, Newt Gingrich was pointing out that a space-based missile defense program that gave you a redundancy of 20 or 30 or 40 shots at taking that sucker out is key.
I'm a big believer in missile defense.
Our Thad anti-ballistic missile system works well, but if you missed the shot, you missed the second shot.
Sounds like we could potentially get hit in New York or Boston.
That's not enough redundancy for my safety and security and peace of mind.
Ultimately, if you tick the head off of the snake, that would probably cause the most destruction that you possibly could if you actually assassinated Kim Jong-un.
But the thing is, it's almost impossible to get into that country.
Now, I would assume that maybe the Mossad has somebody in there.
I mean, I trust the Israelis more than anybody when it comes to this type of warfare because of the conditions that they live under.
But North Korea has not exactly been their focus and their main threat.
Right.
When it comes to warfare, Sean, one thing we've definitely proven over since World War II is that if you don't fully think through the tactical options that you have and be prepared to make the first move, chances are you're either going to lose or you're going to create a vacuum somewhere.
So we need to consider these options.
I will tell you, having Mattis back the president is spectacular because that sent a message of strength that even John McCain can't bolster, can't stop.
What is your reaction to that?
And how quickly do you think we could put together a missile defense system with the redundancy that Newt Gingrich was talking about, Harry?
Well, you know, Sean, I think it would take a number of years.
It would probably cost hundreds of billions of dollars.
And frankly, look, that's a lot of money, but it's something we should have done starting back in the 1980s, you know, under Ronald Reagan.
But as Reagan left office and it went to George W. Bush won and then to Bill Clinton, you know, the memory of the Soviet menace started fading away and we went to this whole unipolar moment where we thought we were basically omnipotent and we forgot about these threats.
We're basically having to relearn history all over again.
And that's really the challenge.
Now, I just want to jump back over to John's point talking about some of these tactical options because he's spot on.
We have to think about what happens if we're in some sort of day one military confrontation.
But I want to offer another point that I think is very important here and it gets lost in the mix of all this.
We need to keep in mind our experience in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Because keep in mind, the United States is very good, Sean, at winning wars.
We have the most powerful military on the planet.
We have B-2 stealth bombers.
We have nuclear weapons.
We have all this great stuff.
We can win the war.
But what happens after the war?
Keep this in mind.
It would cost trillions of dollars to rebuild North Korea.
And we're not even just talking about the financials here.
They'll try to do it.
It's their region of the world.
Why do we have to always get involved?
No, I'm not talking about putting up the money.
Oh, no, no.
I'm not even going there.
But just think about how that would have to be reorganized.
South Korea's got a lot of money to do that.
So I'm not so concerned about that.
But think about as well about if that went nuclear and all the amount of radioactive fallout that would be all through Asia.
You're talking about millions of more people dying.
And then thinking about just trying to reintegrate the North Korean society with South Korea.
How would the Chinese respond if you have a united Korea?
Because I will tell you, Sean, I've talked to Chinese officials.
That is their greatest fear.
So the danger of all this is we're opening the ultimate Pandora's box.
They've got to pass here.
Stay with the Pandora box issue.
We got to take a break.
We'll come back.
We'll continue.
And also, we'll get to your calls coming up as well in the next hour, I promise, 800-941, Sean.
All right, as we continue with Harry, Kazianis is with us and also Jonathan Gillum.
And we left off at a point, Harry, I want to get you a chance to talk about that.
And we'll talk about options, Pandora's box, and what do we open up here with North Korea?
Sure.
I mean, basically, the point is this.
This is why every administration going back from really like the 1950s till the end of the Korean War until the present day always made the North Korean issue the fourth, fifth, or sixth biggest problem because it's so hard to actually wrap your head around.
And I have to give the president a lot of credit to make this his number one foreign policy challenge.
That takes guts, to be honest with you, because walking into it, there is no easy solution.
So no matter what part of the aisle you're on, you have to give him credit for that.
Well, you do agree with that, Jonathan Gillum?
Absolutely.
And in fact, I've agreed with everything that Harry said so far, with the exception of one thing.
America, as we know it, is great at fighting wars, but we are not good at winning wars because in order to win the war, we have to complete the fight.
And for the first time in a long time, this president and his Secretary of Defense.
It doesn't sound like this is going to be a long war, though.
It sounds like it's going to be over.
It sounds like the type of weapons America will have to use, considering the weaponry that Kim Jong-un has and North Korea has, that this has to be a war that ends quickly.
There doesn't seem to be an option.
And that's correct.
But the first thing you have to do in these cases is name the enemy and set the parameters for the reality of what we're actually looking at.
That's what this president's done.
I have not seen this from a president since Reagan.
Well, I haven't either.
But I mean, I guess the fear that I have, the greatest fear that I have, and you know, there was somebody on TV, I guess, last night or this morning, I don't even remember because I was just half asleep, you know, saying that, oh, this isn't going to happen.
You guys are overreacting.
And I'm like, really?
I don't think so.
What's so funny about a madman having nuclear weapons, Harry?
And then Diane Feinstein, this is bombastic rhetoric of the president, fire, fury like the world has never seen before.
And this will further isolate Kim Jong-un.
It's like McCain suggesting that Donald Trump's words will set him over the edge.
He'll tip him over the tipping point.
If you're that close to insanity, you're already there.
You know, the challenge with this is something that I've encountered here in Washington is that people continually try to put their viewpoint onto Donald Trump.
Now, look, let's be honest.
Donald Trump is a very different type of president than we've had in a long time.
He was never a governor.
He was never a senator.
He was never a vice president.
He was never elected to office.
The way he speaks to the American people, and quite frankly, to the world, is very different than everybody else.
So if we're going to apply this, whatever, this presidential logic, and maybe apply to how Barack Obama spoke to the world or the American people, it's completely different.
You know, I take the president's comments yesterday about fire and power and all this stuff.
It's very clear what he said.
You don't need a PhD from Princeton to figure it out.
He's telling Kim Jong-un: look, if you fire a nuclear weapon at the United States or one of our allies or Guam or whatever, you're signing your own death warrant.
Now, I was able to figure that out pretty easily.
My wife, who is not an international relations expert, was able to figure that out pretty easily.
But of course, the media has to blow it up and make a big controversy over it.
That does not serve anybody.
If you don't like the president, that's fine.
That's your right to do that.
All right, Harry, welcome to the program.
Great job.
And Jonathan, you were just okay.
You could have been nicer to our guests, but we really appreciate you being with us.
I mean, you even guest host here.
Maybe I'll have to let Harry fill in because I thought you'd be nicer to our fellow guests.
Oh, Sean, you're in very older Australia.
I'm from Southern, so it's hard for me to believe.
Yeah, that's all right.
Jonathan Gillam knows I can give him a run for his money in spite of, oh, I got to show you some tapes I got from today.
You're using blade and firearm training day today.
You're going to like it.
800-941, Sean Tolfrey telephone number.
Well, that's some fun, the Gabby one.
You know, with all this talk of nuclear war, I just need a five-minute break in a smile.
That's next.
You had to sign an order authorizing the appointment of a special counsel, and you said that he was authorized to investigate any coordination with Russia, and I want to put these words on the screen, any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation.
My question is, does that mean that there are no red lines that Mueller or any special counsel can investigate under the terms of your order, anything he finds?
Chris, the special counsel is subject to the rules and regulations of the Department of Justice, and we don't engage in phishing expeditions.
Now, that order that you read, that doesn't detail specifically who may be the subject of the investigation because we don't reveal that publicly.
But Bob Mueller understands, and I understand, the specific scope of the investigation.
And so, no, it's not a fishing expedition.
I understand it's not a fishing expedition, but you say any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation in the course of his investigation of the issues that he is looking at.
If he finds evidence of a crime, can he look at that?
Well, Chris, if he finds evidence of a crime that's within the scope of what Director Mueller and I have agreed is the appropriate scope of his investigation, then he can.
If it's something outside that scope, he needs to come to the acting attorney general, at this time me, for permission to expand his investigation.
But we don't talk about that publicly, and so the speculation you've seen in the news media, that's not anything that I've said.
It's not anything Director Mueller said.
We don't know who's saying or who credible those sources are.
I don't like criminal investigations to start on hoping that you have the target.
Maybe we'll find the crime.
Maybe we'll find the statute.
If we can't find the statute, we'll stretch the statute to fit the person.
That sounds like Lavrentiberia and Joseph Stalin.
Show me the man and I'll find you the crime.
I don't want to ever see that come to America.
All right, Clint, you're with us.
800-941 Sean on top of North Korea.
One of the other big stories today, obviously, the FBI in the dark of night, early morning dawn raid of Paul Manafort's computers.
And Paul obviously didn't get the memo.
Paul Manafort made a huge mistake.
He didn't know that if something is under subpoena, he has the right.
Apparently, I didn't know this law was passed.
I must have missed it.
To delete 33,000 emails and just claim it's about yoga classes, some wedding he was planning, and a funeral, and that he's e-wit mailing people that don't have email addresses.
And that would have gotten him off the hook.
If he would have acid-washed and bleach-bid every computer he had, he would have been off the hook.
If he would have taken a hammer to any devices left, he would have gotten off the hook.
Or had the IT guy smash government property and hard drive, he would have gotten off the hook.
And one of the issues, I don't know what is going on, why it's going on, it was the day after he volunteered to go before one of the Senate committees and involved in the never-ending Russia-Russia-Russia conspiracy, which is not going to end well for the Democrats.
And it's not getting to where they think, and they're going to have a lot of egg on their face, is my prediction.
Anyway, at some point, somebody's got to point out the double standard.
Do we have equal justice under the law?
Is anybody really going to get to the bottom of the deep state about a leak a day, including conversations the president of the United States has with the president of Mexico and the prime minister of Australia, including as much negative raw intelligence that takes a guy like General Flynn and ruins his life, which was illegal from the get-go, or the unmasking of hundreds of people by a UN ambassador, Samantha Power,
then the investigation into the general counsel of the FBI, James Comey of the FBI, James Baker of the FBI.
And then, of course, we've got Susan Rice, Samantha Power, Ben Rhodes, James Clapper, who made it easier for all this to happen.
And I want to see where Brennan is at the end of all this also.
And just will ignore the entire issue of Uranium-1 collusion and pay for play in that case.
It's unbelievable.
And I just, I really worry if we're shredding a Constitution and equal justice under the law and Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure, whatever happened to the need for a warrant, whatever happened to the laws and the rules governing surveillance and unmasking and leaking of raw intelligence.
And what about the conflicts of Robert Mueller?
Oh, that's right.
He's best friends with James Comey.
Whoopsie-daisy.
Oh, that's right.
He's hired eight people that have donated heavily to Obama, Hillary, and to other Democrats.
One of them was Hillary Clinton's old attorney.
One has ethical problems.
How many Republican donors?
Zero did he hire.
He didn't hire one of them.
Now, joining us now is Matthew Whitaker.
He's a legal commentator, former U.S. attorney, directs the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust and a conservative ethics watchdog group.
And is Mueller's investigation going too far?
I keep bringing up the issue of mission creep and military matters, investigative creep when it comes to special counsels, et cetera, et cetera.
How are you, sir?
I'm doing well today.
There's a lot to talk about, isn't there?
There really is.
Well, I tried to lay it out.
What part do I have wrong here?
Well, I mean, I think, you know, your listeners, I'm sure, take all of this and they want to understand the common threat.
And the common thread is that we, you know, it appears that we're starting to live in a society where the rules only apply to certain people.
And if you, you know, are a political ally of the elites or those that control various institutions, then, you know, a different set of rules apply than it does to sort of the rest of us in this country.
And it can't be like that.
It's what our founding fathers felt was wrong when they were a colony of a foreign power.
And I think that fundamentally, you know, this investigation by Bob Mueller needs to be limited.
It has to be limited.
And anybody who is saying that Bob Mueller looking into unrelated financial transactions of the president, his family, or his associates before he seeks to get an extension of his authority is really trying to shred the Fourth Amendment because, you know, we cannot have the FBI and the Department of Justice going on fishing expeditions and essentially just trying to find out.
Is this now a fishing expedition?
What did you think of the pre-dawn raid of Manafort?
Well, I mean, it's interesting.
First of all, it's another leak.
I mean, we, you know, sort of it happened.
It didn't happen yesterday.
It happened in July, as I understand it.
And, you know, that is typically the way you do investigations, is you do execute search warrants on targets of investigations and you gather their information.
And the thing I can't figure out is it appeared that Manafort was trying to cooperate and give them everything they wanted.
It seemed a little heavy-handed if that's the way they were going to treat him.
Well, what about one of the things that's really frustrating me is the idea that we're supposed to have equal justice under the law.
I believe it's so obvious that Hillary Clinton committed multiple felonies.
I think the fact that 33,000 emails deleted, they're under subpoena, then the bleach bit, acid washing, and then, of course, sends the FBI phones and BlackBerries without SIM cards and then busting up with Hammers devices.
And, you know, I'm looking at all of that, and I don't even mention Uranium One, which is real Russia collusion and seemingly a quid pro quo to me, 20% of our uranium.
And I'm looking at that.
I'm looking at masking.
I'm looking at intelligence leaks.
I'm looking at Wasserman Schultz.
I'm looking at all these cases, and I don't see anything going on in those cases.
So I'm wondering, have we now politicized political, have we criminalized rather political differences?
And is Donald Trump being singled out and we're ignoring real crimes that have real evidence of other prominent people because of their politics?
Yeah, well, and wasn't it interesting in your opening there to this segment?
I'm sure your listeners heard that the hypocritical nature that Hillary Clinton's destroying evidence and what appears to be an obstruction of justice, plain and simple, clear as day.
As soon as you apply it to somebody else like Paul Manafort or even sort of anybody close to the president, suddenly it sounds a lot more sinister and a lot more like what it was at the time, which was Hillary Clinton trying to prevent the American people from seeing what she was doing on the private email server.
And so, I mean, I think you're absolutely right.
We really run a risk here where the prosecution is used as an instrument to harass political opponents.
And that just can't be in this system of everyone's equal under the law.
For example, isn't it illegal to mishandle classified top secret special access program information?
Isn't that illegal?
It is.
And Hillary did that, didn't she?
She did.
I don't think there's any doubt in it.
No ambiguity.
Did she destroy such when she deleted the 33,000 emails under subpoena and isn't deleting emails that have been subpoenaed?
Isn't that illegal?
It is.
I mean, and it's an obstruction of justice.
That's exactly what it is.
And when you break devices or varying devices or you decide, I had never heard of bleach pit before Hillary Clinton, did you?
I had not.
No.
It's sort of like acid washing your hard drive, right?
Yeah, well, she thought it was more like wiping it with a Kleenex.
You mean like with a cloth?
I remember Ed Henry asked her that question.
Did you ever wipe your server clean?
Well, do you mean like with a cloth, Ed?
Like with a cloth?
When she knew darn well what they were talking about.
So all of those would be potential crimes.
All of that would be obstruction of justice.
All of that would be mishandling.
So we have these laws on the book.
Is it illegal to unmask Americans for political purposes?
For political purposes?
Quite, you know, it might be.
I mean, those, you know, obviously those are protected secrets.
Well, we know if you leak intelligence against Americans, that's a violation of the Espionage Act and a felony, right?
Correct.
And we also have laws that we shouldn't be surveilling without a search warrant or any other type of warrant of U.S. citizens.
And when surveillance, incidental surveillance occurs, we're supposed to practice something called minimization, where you minimize what it is that you're actually hearing from the American citizen.
And standard operating procedure and protocol would be that when you write up the report, you say an American.
You don't identify who the American is, whether you know him or not.
Yeah, and the analogous situation would be if you had a wiretap.
It's very similar to that.
Yeah.
And don't you need, for example, if we believe in the Constitution and Fourth Amendment rights, don't you need a search warrant to do such?
You do.
And either a FISA court warrant or a regular search warrant?
Yeah, and they're very limited to both scope and time.
And so you can't have these, you know, open-ended and sort of a vacuuming of all communications.
Can I ask you, Mr. Whitaker, can you think of any circumstances under which a United, a U.N. ambassador, an ambassador to the United Nations, in this case, Samantha Power, in an election year would need to unmask hundreds of people, the majority of which are related to Donald Trump?
Can you think of any rational reason for that?
No rational reason except for the obvious political intent that it was for.
All right.
Thank you, sir, for being with us.
We appreciate it.
Matt Whitaker, and you can get his column on Hannity.com.
Matt, thank you.
Appreciate it.
800-941-Sean.
We'll hit the phones when we get back.
We'll change course at the top of the next hour.
We'll have some fun with our friend Katie Hopkins.
A little parenting advice coming up straight ahead here on the Sean Hannity show.
And as we continue, Sean Hannity Show, let's get to our busy phones before the Gobby one joins us as we say hi to Stan is in St. Louis.
He's in Missouri.
Stan, the man, how are you?
Welcome to the show.
Hey, Sean, it's a pleasure and an honor to speak to you.
Yes, sir.
Honor is all mine.
What's going on?
Well, you know, we're just, you know, I represent Middle America out here.
And we're concerned.
We're furious about what's happening.
We see the left's attempt to seize this election from us.
And the only way that I see that we can turn this about and really get Washington's attention as opposed to all out bloodshed or violence, I want a national strike, Sean.
I want to see a national strike.
And I say that because if we don't, this is a precedent.
There's a precedent that will be set here by the left.
And they'll use these tactics to attack any conservative that's elected in state positions, local positions, or national positions from this point forward.
I think it's irreversible if we allow them to win.
Well, look, I don't know about the National Strike Day.
The reason I never call for that sort of thing is because somebody's going to end up being permanently hurt.
They can't afford it.
And I don't want to see somebody get fired.
So I try to think through those things.
As an employer, as an employer, we see the need for drastic action.
No, for those that want to volunteer and do something and send a message.
And most employers, they want Trump to succeed.
They want his policies to succeed.
And I think they'll be far more tolerant of this than you believe and more accepting of it.
Maybe we need a march on the Capitol and say to the likes, if they're going to keep Mitch McConnell, I am so frustrated and so disappointed and so annoyed and so let down.
And I think he's weak.
He's spineless.
He doesn't keep his promises.
I tweeted it out last night.
And people are like, well, Hannity, you said you'd be quiet against your political adversaries for 12 hours.
And I wasn't talking about him, and they took it the wrong way.
But I can't even tell you the level of disappointment I have.
They couldn't even get the skinny repeal through.
And now he feels like he's a burden.
The senator's burdened.
He has the vapors over the fact that, oh, people are holding him accountable at town halls.
And why didn't you get repeal and replace done like you said you would?
It's so frustrating to me.
I feel it's a letdown of monumental proportions.
And I'll be honest, I really think this is crunch time.
Either the Republicans are going to get their act together, and I see no indication they will, or they're just going to pay a price, many of them, in the upcoming election.
And I just think people like McConnell don't care.
And if McConnell thinks it's such a burden to have to keep his promise and that the president overpromised, he didn't do anything.
I honestly, it's time for him to retire.
It's time for him to go.
Let's get somebody in there with the energy and the fight and the love and the passion and the desire to move and shake things up and keep promises.
Not that hard.
It's not that complicated.
All right, 800-941, Sean, our toll-free telephone number.
You want to be a part of the program.
The gobby one, Katie Hopkins.
She has some parenting advice when we get back.
And then we'll get to your calls, comments next hour.
news roundup information overload wide open telephone straight ahead this music but it only means one good thing and that's like the gobby one katie hopkins our friend from uh our british friend is back How are you?
I'm very well, thank you.
And you will grow to love that music.
I know you will.
No, I'm not going to grow to love it.
I did watch Prince William and Prince Harry talking about their mom, and I thought it was extraordinarily touching, actually.
I don't know if you saw that documentary.
Did you see it?
Yes, I saw it.
What did you think?
You know, I suppose there's what is there?
It's like a, we have this reserved thing, don't we, being British?
I mean, I don't really have the reserved bone in my body, but we like to think of our royals as private or shy or retiring or at least somehow remote and detached from all of us.
So I find it quite hard when they over-emote on TV.
Well, I didn't even find it over-emoting.
I mean, their mother was well-liked and loved, and I think they all feel that the father kind of screwed her over a little bit, which I think he did.
And they obviously was a tragedy what happened to her.
And I didn't remember how big the wedding was, but the wedding was massive, and the funeral was massive.
And then here are these two young men that just talk very, very openly and honestly about their mom.
Why do you call them mums?
Well, like a mummy?
What is a mum?
Well, what would you call her?
Mom.
Mom.
What's up, Ma?
Mom.
Do you have to do like a really you guys do a little bit of a business?
I hate to say it.
It depends if I was not listening to her.
You want to know how incorrigible I was as a child?
My mom would tell me not to leave the house.
I said, I'm not listening to you.
And I'd walk out of the house.
How horrible is that?
Well, I think it's perfectly acceptable.
But yeah, we say mom as in M-U-M.
We say ma'am as in M-A-M.
The way you say it almost makes it sound ridiculous, and I almost like mum better, considering you're mocking the way we say mother.
Well, some people say mother and father.
I have friends of mine in the South that still refer to mom and dad as yes, ma'am, no, ma'am, yes, sir, no, sir.
And I kind of like that too.
I love that.
Yeah, I love that too, but I don't get that.
I totally adopted that.
So I adopt that here.
So anytime someone's kind of pissy with me or not very happy with me or maybe a bit grumpy or being typically British, then I try and kill them with kindness, which is essentially just the way I'd treat people.
I kill them with kindness.
Of course.
And then they get the whole shebang.
So they're like, oh, my daughter's about to be 16.
I get their eye roll now, and I'm like, really?
I don't want the 16-year-old eye roll.
It's annoying as hell.
I know.
I just pull them up on that direct.
So I say, look, look, look, I can do that too.
And then I eye roll right back at them.
And then I go, yes, ma'am, no, ma'am, all the way to the bank.
So the best thing to do with kids today, and I'm not saying I'm parent of the year.
What the hell do I know?
And that's the thing.
There's no handbook how to be a parent.
I'm sure there are books written, but there's really no handbook.
It's kind of learn as you go.
But the best weapon I have, now my father's best weapon was called his belt.
He used to take it off and rip me to shreds and whack my legs, my arms, and my backside.
And he chased me all around the house and around.
I used to, I remember instances, you chasing me around the table.
Did you ever get that?
Yes, that's so funny.
So my mother would kill me if she heard me now, but she used to chase me with a hairbrush.
And one time, the hairbrush broke.
And I remember her saying to me, Look what you've done now.
So, yeah, I used to get whacked with a hairbrush.
What is the worst thing you did as a kid?
I'm just, no doubt we would have been friends because we were both incorrigible.
So the worst secret that I have, and I still haven't told my father this, so it's worth me sharing it with you privately, given that we're just having a private chat between you and I. 15 million people, 550 radio stations.
I'm sure he won't hear about it.
Oh, my dad.
It's okay.
He'll be like demented by the time they catch up with him.
So I remember coming home from town really, really late one night.
So it was past when my dad said I had to be home, which was at like 11 o'clock at night.
And I came around the corner with my boyfriend then, Matthew Cornish, he was called.
And looking up the garden path, looking up towards my house, there, illuminated against the lights of our hallway, was my naked father.
Oh, no.
Looking out for me, Daniel.
Your father went out of the house naked?
No, he was stood in the hallway, but because there was a backdrop of light, he was like illuminated like this giant naked fat thing looking at me and my boyfriend hiding behind a tree in the garden.
And I haven't told him that yet.
You know what my father did?
Because he was an old Navy guy.
He'd wear his skibby shirt, his white t-shirt, and boxer underwear and walk out of the house with that and shorts or walk out of the house.
And, you know, in his older age, he had a nice big stomach.
And it was so humiliating.
Like, get back in the house.
It's embarrassing.
But did you kiss this boyfriend?
How old was he?
Oh, yes, we did.
We were 14.
But I remember thinking how the heck I was going to get back in the house given my father was there kind of monopolizing the hallway in his nudity.
So I had to wait for him to go to bed before I could speak in.
So it was all very complicated.
But my parents are still alive now.
God only knows how.
And I guess now that I've kind of I'm a mum myself and they say that my second child, my middle child Poppy, is punishment for me being me because Poppy is very like me.
You see, but the weapons parents have today are very different than the hairbrush for you or the belt for me is you just take away your kids' electronics.
Yeah, or turn off the Wi-Fi I found to be particularly effective.
So you don't even tell them, you don't mention it.
You just go in, turn off your Wi-Fi and let them suffer and then ask if it's broken.
I think, you know, children are very much like dogs.
So you need to call them by a name that you would use for a dog with one syllable like George or Mark.
And then you run them twice a day and you feed them twice a day.
And that's essentially my kind of parenting tips to all new parents.
Oh, you feed them, say that again.
You feed them once a day and you what?
So you need to, first of all, when you're naming your baby, like don't think of something cute.
Don't think about what your father was called or your grandfather, any of that nonsense.
Just think of a name that sounds really good when you shout.
Well, what did you name your kids?
I go for things like George or Max.
George, that's a, by the way, that's really born out of originality there and creativity.
It's one syllable.
Like Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean.
You can shout that.
How do you say it like that?
What are you doing?
Do you need a one-syllable name for your child if you're pregnant?
Bear this in mind.
One syllable only.
Well, I made my kids' names Irish.
I mean, Patrick and Mary Kelly, I mean, can't get any more Irish, can it?
Yeah, Mary Kelly, that's useful.
How do you shout Mary Kelly when you're flying?
Like, oh, it is.
No, MK, get down here.
MK.
See?
Yeah.
So sounds a bit like an automated sort of rifle.
But anyway, but the difference between boys and girls are this, is that with my son, you know, I tell him to stop doing so.
I could yell and yell and yell and yell and yell.
And until I took his PlayStation or his Xbox away, I wouldn't get his attention.
And I even, I'm not going to lie, there's been one or two smashed in my driveway over the years also.
And, you know, just to make a point.
But it would take a lot to get his attention with my daughter.
Hey, I just do that and she's like in tears.
And I feel guilty and horrible.
That's so cute.
You know what?
You know what's so sad?
I actually think that my son bore the brunt of me being an inexperienced parent more than my daughter.
Do you feel that way?
I think you're overthinking that.
I suspect that you're a fantastic dad and they love you, love you dearly.
No, they think I'm a pain in the neck and that I'm strict and that I have very high expectations of what their jobs are.
And I don't care what dad did when he was young.
Dad didn't have the parental supervision or opportunities I'm giving you.
Do your job.
Yes, well, I agree with it.
And if they think you're strict and a nightmare, then you've done a really good job at being a parent.
You try being me.
Look, I have two girls and they are 12 and 11.
And I don't want to discuss their assets, but let's just put it this way.
They have bigger boobs than I do.
My little lucky cleaner, she puts away my underwear in my 11-year-old daughter's drawer.
That's humiliating.
That's the sort of stuff I've got.
Well, what do you wear?
Like Granny Janny underwear, like old lady underwear?
No, it's just that because my assets are considerably less than the daughters that I've given birth to, everyone gets muddled in the underwear department, and it is humiliating.
In fact, I just sent you guys something we ran on the Daily Mail earlier where there was a restaurant in China that was offering a bigger discount the bigger your bra size or the cup size that you wear.
So if you have like really big boobs, you've got a 65% discount.
All right, this is way out of my league, and I don't want to talk about this, especially in light of the political correct atmosphere.
You know, you can't even tell.
I mean, this is a part of life.
I mean, wow, that really looks nice on you.
What?
Sexual harassment.
I swear to God, I know somebody at some company, and I'm not going to tell you where, where a guy at work said to a girl, Hey, would you like to get a drink after work?
And the girl literally said, went to HR and said, I felt uncomfortable.
He asked me to go get a drink after work.
It's so disappointing.
I can tell you, vaguely as a woman, it's so disappointing, Sean, because women are going to end up litigating themselves out of the workplace entirely.
Because why would you employ a woman if this is the sort of stuff you're just going to get endlessly thrown at men who are just trying to be kind of good creativity?
Well, but in fairness, though, there are guys that are horrible.
I mean, there are people that are horrible.
And there are women that are horrible, too.
But, you know, we all need to stop this relentless running to HR.
I do think HR is the source of much malevolence in large organizations, but that's my personal view.
You know, I've been to these sessions, you know, so the last time I wouldn't go to the session because I've been there year after year after year.
So the guy came to me and I literally went through, so I can't say this, this, this, this.
And I went through the whole thing.
And it was really over the top, like insane.
The guy laughed and said, I think you got it.
And he walked out.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, I think we saw the same.
We saw the same, didn't we, with the Google memo?
You know, right?
Well, Steph hold that talk.
You know, I'm glad we talked about parenthood because I just need a break from the constant politics here.
It's driving me nuts.
All right, Katie Hopkins is putting a smile on my face.
Parent of the year.
Obviously, I'm not.
I probably needed a brush.
I don't think the brush hurt as much as the belt, but we'll talk about that when we get back in the other news of the day.
And we'll get to your calls coming up.
800-941-Sean.
Hannity Headlines.
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To sign up today for Hannity Headlines.
Go to Hannity.com.
All right, as we continue, Katie Hopkins.
She's the gobby one, 800-941-Sean.
We'll get to your calls at the bottom of the half hour.
So, what is Great Britain saying about the constant assault and attacks on this president?
Are they watching it closely?
Are they worried?
And what are they saying about the showdown with North Korea that's looming?
Yeah, I think there's, you know, we just suffer in this country from a sort of bias across our mainstream media, as you know, and are well aware of there.
Is that, you know, this country seems so set against Trump in terms of the media and the liberal left.
And so the views we get, the voices we hear are very skewed.
But there is also, of course, a massive Trump support base of which I want to be and aim to be one of the champions.
And for many of us, we feel like, and I certainly feel like, it's time someone stood up to North Korea.
It's time that someone said, no, you're not going to carry on threatening people in that matter.
We will stand up to you.
And you know, bear in mind, this is a guy that, you know, sent kind of missiles to kill his own uncle, then destroyed the whole of his uncle's family.
You know, it's utter madness what we've let him get away with so far.
And I think it's about time someone stood up to Fatboy Kim and said, no, listen, there will be fire and fury if you mess around with any of our territories.
I was so happy he said it.
But Katie, I really worry in this sense.
I mean, this is not an easy operation.
Even if we say, we know we can count on the Brits.
We know we're going to have the Israelis.
We know we'll have probably even most of Western Europe because they better realize this is a threat to them too.
I even imagine that we'll get China and Russia if he really keeps saber-rattling.
But let's say we even created a military coalition.
We took out the nuclear sites.
Okay, you're going to obliterate and incinerate North Korea.
Then you're going to have nuclear fallout.
Then you've got to worry about whether or not this lunatic is able to launch nuclear weapons into South Korea, Japan, or Guam, or even China.
I mean, it's a pretty frightening scenario with no good options considering we're stupid enough not only to allow him to get them, but fund him getting them by trying to bribe him out of getting them.
So stupid.
Absolutely.
I totally agree with you.
And nobody, you know, should be in any way looking forward to any kind of weird showdown between two big leaders or whichever groups appear to sort of defend democracy and freedom.
And I don't know.
There's part of me that doesn't count on Western Europe as backing up anything anymore, only because I think I've lost faith a little in Western Europe and its ability to stand strong in the face of anything, having seen another six soldiers run down by a car today in Paris, another terrorist attack.
Yeah, so but I do think maybe there is another means of taking out King Jong-un.
And I think doing that with special forces sounds very reasonable to me.
I just don't know why we would allow someone that despicable to carry on having a place in any kind of leadership position, especially when they're as unstable as he clearly is.
Yeah.
How many times have you written things that you come under fire in Great Britain?
Because you're even more PC than we are.
Yeah, absolutely.
We are more PC.
I had this conversation.
We're not far behind anymore.
You know, all these liberal groups are always trying to get me fired.
You know that, right?
I know that.
I know that.
And it breaks my heart.
And I, you know, there's so much of me that rages when they go after you, when they go after others.
And you just want to say, why can you not have opposite views?
Because they don't want an opposite view.
They're the most intolerant people.
Liberal fascism is real.
They want to silence every conservative voice.
Absolutely.
And it does break my heart.
And I think there is something really terrifying about watching these voices disappear from social media forums, from Twitter, from YouTube, watching the kind of menacing, overarching, Orwellian approach that says if you're from the right, your voice may not be heard.
And we're going to bring in these people to police you when it seems that the real terrorists are left to walk around, you know, without being policed or without being cautioned or without being given warnings.
Whereas someone like me, just like someone like you, is under fire constantly by the sorts of people that look to silence the things, the opinions that you and I have.
All right, we got to break Katie Hopper.
So one of these days, you got to make it to New York, and we'd love to see you in person and put you on the TV show and get to know you a little bit better.
Yeah, of course.
The Gobby one, Katie Hopkins, she's going to go talk to her mom after this.
Quick break, right back, we'll continue.
I'm going to ask for a show of hands, but I know everybody's saying we've been there, haven't done anything, which I find extremely irritating.
And I'm going to tell you what.
A Congress goes on for two years.
And part of the reason I think that the storyline is that we haven't done much is because, in part, the president and others have set these early timelines about things need to be done by a certain point.
Now, our new president had, of course, not been in this line of work before.
And I think had excessive expectations about how quickly things happen in the democratic process.
And so part of the reason I think people feel like we're underperforming is because too many kind of artificial deadlines, unrelated to the reality of the complexity of legislating, may not have been fully understood.
And of course, our political adversaries would be loves to say that anytime.
So what I'm asking of you is to judge this Congress when it finishes.
How much have we done to make America competitive again and to grow again?
And that's part of America, making America great again, which is what the president talks about so much.
I feel it's rising from my solar plexus, the anger and the frustration.
And, you know, you don't understand, you people, the complexity of legislations and legislating.
I am sitting here and I'm listening to this man of the artificial early timeline, artificial deadlines.
And, you know, you're thinking we haven't done much.
And the excessive expectations of the president and others.
And I've been here a time or two.
I know exactly what we're doing.
No, Senator, that's not true.
It's just not true.
You're not getting your job done.
You'll be back.
It'll be the ninth month when you return.
And you can't even get done a seven-year promise.
You can't keep your coalition together.
You can't even get a skinny repeal bill that was bordering on next to nothing.
But you can't even do that.
And then you lash out at the president, who's done everything he could possibly do.
And they wait and you wait and you wait and you vacation and you have your long lunches and you have your stupid meetings.
And you weren't ready for the moment to lead.
You weren't ready.
You didn't do your job.
You're not up for the job.
You don't have the urgency for the job.
And frankly, you look tired and angry at anybody that's pointing out you're not doing your job.
You're supposed to be a public servant.
The idea that you can't get this done and the idea that it took so long to get so many of the president's appointments put through, it's breathtaking to me.
Nobody in the real world lives like you, Senator McConnell.
You know, I have excessive expectations.
I don't think after seven years of hearing repeal and replace, the president tweeted out, why is it not done?
Now, okay, our president hasn't been in this line of work before.
He's had excessive expectations.
How quickly things happen in the Democratic process.
So part of the reason I think people feel that we're underperforming is because there's too many artificial deadlines, unrelated to the reality of the complexity of legislating, may not have been fully understood.
Wow.
Now, the president, to his credit, firing back, you know, excessive expectations, he said, I don't think so.
And the president's right.
Seven, seven long years.
Give us the House.
Give us the Senate.
You know, Lindsey Graham also dismissed McConnell's blaming Trump on Wednesday.
I like Mitch, but for eight years, we've been saying we're going to repeal and replace Obamacare.
It's not like we made this up overnight.
You know, we've been working on repealing Obamacare, he said to Brian Kilmead, my buddy.
But then he goes, the idea put forward, the idea put forward didn't pass.
It was in many ways ill-conceived.
Yeah, you think?
They mismanaged this from the get-go, just like in the House, but the House at least fixed it.
Not to my expectations, not to what I wanted, but at least they got the job done.
He's on vacation this week.
He's talking with constituents.
I'm sure they let very few people in.
They control the crowd.
All right, let's get to our busy phones.
800-941.
Sean is a toll-free telephone number.
You want to join us?
Lisa is in Phoenix, 550 KFYI.
What's up?
Lisa, how are you?
We're glad you called.
I'm good, Sean.
Thank you for taking the call.
I just wanted to share something that I found to be very interesting.
I have a child that serves in the military.
And as part of their training, they have built full-size-scale cities, villages, where they train with hired civilians from the general population to come in and act as friend or foe.
When it's the job of military to go into these training exercises and determine who is a friend or a foe and do all of that kind of stuff.
Well, what my child told me when they did their training several weeks ago was that in all the years that they've had this facility up and running, they've always hired Middle Eastern civilians.
And this time around, they've got all Koreans in there.
Well, first of all, your son is a hero.
And I'm sure every day, every night, most people, I don't think can relate to this, but I know every parent that I know that has kids in the military, they're up all night.
They're scared all night.
Of course.
And God forbid, if the phone rings late from a friend, you know, you're absolutely thinking the worst.
And so they're now in preparation mode for this, is what you're saying.
Well, I don't know for sure, but, you know, it scares you on one end of the spectrum.
And on the other end of the spectrum, you feel good that they're actually taking it seriously and actually preparing them for something that could very well happen.
All right.
The only thing, and I'm trying to think about this.
I actually advised a kid recently, and I've never done this before in my life because I've been such a big supporter, I think, as you know, the military.
I am so angry at how our military treats our veterans.
You know, General Kelly is the new chief of staff in the White House.
And I told the story on air.
I don't know if you heard it.
So his son was killed, if you know, in Afghanistan.
I don't know if you know that.
Yes.
And four days after his son died, he was giving a speech, and he asked one thing before the speech: could you please not mention my son and what happened to my son?
And first of all, I don't know how you talk after four days, but this is what distinguishes military from the rest of the civilian world, which is 99 point some odd percent of people will never serve in the military in this country.
And I just put them on a very high level of the highest level of service because they're all risking their life.
Everybody risks their lives if you go into the military.
And so he said that.
And then at another point down the road, and I had one conversation with General Kelly, only once in my life, and I brought this up with him.
And then I, and I know he said, I don't want to, you know, isolate my son.
He's only one of 5,500 whose families have suffered because of death in this war.
He's no better.
In a sense, he's saying they're all heroes.
And I just know how hard it is.
If there's one thing I can tell you, and even, you know, we got to remember, Lisa, even launching these weapons can kill you.
That's the danger.
And that's another huge fear of every single military parent that I'm in touch with is that not only you fear about launching the missiles, but all of the accidents happening in training.
Every single person in the Navy and the Marines that's been killed lately has been in training accidents.
Yeah.
You know, look.
So it's a matter of funding as well.
And their level of professionalism is beyond off the hook.
Here's my only point.
I do believe that if God forbid what I'm fearing happens, it's going to have to end quickly.
It's just, it's not going to be long, drawn out, protracted, mission creep like Vietnam or in the case of Iraq and Afghanistan.
It's going to be in and out and over.
And the results could potentially be beyond devastating.
Does that make sense?
And I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
I mean, there's no, I've been saying there's no good result here.
Even winning and everything going our way is still an incineration of a country.
And who knows how many tens, hundreds of thousands or more die.
There's no good answer.
But it's our hope that we're able to just go in and assassinate him quietly and help with a humanitarian effort.
I don't think that's an easy task either.
I don't think so either.
I don't think so either.
But as a parent of someone in several family members serving in the military, that's the best case scenario.
Lisa, you and your son and your family are in our prayers.
God bless you.
And I know that this is hard for you.
And we'll be praying for all these people, okay?
Back to our phones.
Utah David next on the Sean Hannity show.
David, what's going on?
Glad you called.
Sean, a North Korean attack on a single U.S. city doesn't frighten me as much as a Korean high-altitude electromagnetic attack, which would wipe out our electrical system, and then the rest of the infrastructure collapses.
And within a year, you've got about over 300 million dead.
Well, the sad thing is I've read too much on this too over the years.
And people are saying, well, I don't know what that means.
If this guy does this, you know, and you've got to remember the mindset of this guy.
His father raised him, Kim Jong-il, from a young age to get revenge for the battle with America and North Korea, et cetera, et cetera.
And he wants to see the U.S. burn.
And that's how he's been trained, and that's how he's been brought up.
And I got to tell you something, the threat to the U.S. economy and the world economy, you know, you take three nukes, three, exploding just in the atmosphere above the United States.
The result would be an EMP pulse that would destroy every bit of electronics.
The entire power grid could be down for months, maybe years.
And the estimates are that millions can die.
Now, you know, you and I just read too much, David.
Not many people know what we're talking about here.
Well, Sean, the one book that Ted Koppel put out, Lights Out from last year.
Did you happen to read that one?
I didn't read Koppel's book.
He's not exactly on my happy-to-do list after he burned me with that interview, but yeah.
Well, the other thing would be the Congressional Commission report from 2008.
They haven't acted on it in nine years.
And maybe this will just be the prod that'll get Congress to do something.
We can only hope and pray.
Yeah, well, you know, maybe we'll do a show about this whole issue.
And I know others in radio have done it over the years, and they all get labeled bizarre conspiracy theories.
It's just a fact.
You know, if you have an EMP pulse that destroys all our electronics, our entire power grid, life as you know it, probably for the rest of your life, is now over and different.
And nobody's thought through that.
All right, David, I got a roll.
Thank you.
800-941 Sean, Stan, also in Arizona.
How are you, Stan?
Glad you called.
Hey, Mr. Hannity, thanks for taking my call.
Yes, sir.
What's going on?
Hey, just real quick on Mitch McConnell.
You know, it's not like he's a custodian and he has these really high expectations to take care of his job, but he's a U.S. senator.
And for him to come out after in December and January saying that day one, they were going to take care of the repeal and even giving him the benefit of the doubt, it wasn't like Trump had made those demands and saying on day one it was going to get taken care of.
It was his own words.
And I just find it he's just, he's turned into a joke.
Yeah, it's very, look, it's very frustrating.
I just agree with you.
I don't even think there's anything more I can say except that, okay, this is our life.
This is our world.
This is the failure.
This is one of the greatest political disappointments.
If he thinks he can turn it around and get it done before 2018, good luck.
But I think the period to have gotten it all done is now long past.
And him being angry and arrogant is beyond frustrating.
Nathan, Ohio, we got about 40 seconds.
All yours.
Go.
I was wanting to talk to you about some media bias that I'm experiencing.
Yeah, welcome to my world.
Go ahead.
So I'm taking a class at a local college here near my hometown, and my college professor in political science is devoted his whole entire class to basically trashing the entire Trump agenda.
He actually called him a bleeping lunatic that doesn't have a bleeping clue of what he's talking about.
Well, it's so nice of him to be fair and balanced and objective and not indoctrinating a group of captive kids in a classroom.
How nice of him.
I'm actually very inspired by his stupidity and his bias.
It's so typical, though, isn't it?
Sure is.
Well, my advice is you either regurgitate back everything that they're saying and make it seem like, yes, I agree with you and get your A to move on to bigger and better things, or you take them on and be willing to risk a lower grade.