Does he-- Do you think doctors love Medicare?

[laughs] Look, the, the, the-- To me, what's interesting about this, Brian, is, and we just talked about Bill Clinton.

Um, it, it, the, the last two Democrat before Biden, the two previous Democratic presidents before Biden both tried to introduce massive healthcare reform.

They both started out thinking maybe in terms of something like Medicare for All, i.e., a national single-payer, a national health service type system.

Bill Clinton thought about it in nineteen ninety-three, looked at it.

The numbers simply didn't add up.

It was gonna be completely impossible and, you know, his healthcare plan, which he tried, actually failed in Congress, but it was much less than Medicare for All.

But has the, the 20 deals, uh, they-- do they look to rebalance an economy in a positive way when you and the smart guys at Wall Street Journal look at them?

Tell us more about that.

Yeah, exactly, Andrew.

The, again, the, the Republicans have a small majority in the Senate, 53, 47 currently.

As you know, of course, only one, roughly one-third of the seats, 35 seats are up, uh, each, every two years in the Senate, so that's 35 seats.

The majority of those seats are currently held, uh, they're pretty solidly safe Republican seats.

Um, so the chance ...

So even though the majority was relatively small, it's 53 to 47, the chance for Democrats to pick up seats looked pretty limited six months ago because they just looked like even though there were some seats that could be relatively easy, easily picked off, they probably weren't gonna make the four-seat gain that they would need in order to give them that majority in the Senate.

More oil getting out.

But why does he continue to prove all his critics right?

I'm not completely sure I agree with you, frankly, there, Caroline.

I mean, I think he's brought out a plan to tackle anti-Semitism.

There have been some serious instances of anti-Semitism.

I don't think he – you say, how did he manage to get elected? He got elected largely on – economic issues.

A lot of people are very unhappy with the state of the economy here.

The plan to deal with anti-Semitism has been criticized, I think reasonably criticized, on the grounds that it doesn't emphasize enough insufficiently anti-Zionism and the way in which anti-Zionism has been sort of weaponized and can become very adjacent to anti-Semitism.

But if that is established, how do you think the president there in the US, Trump, might respond?

I hate to ask, but I mean, is World War III upon us?

Well, look, I think, you know, if you look at the situation around the world right now, exactly as you say, both in the Middle East, and it's not just, of course, now the Gulf with the Strait of Hormuz, but it's, of course, now the war that's picking up again between the Houthis in Yemen and Saudi Arabia and the potential closure of the Red Sea.

You've got that.

You've, of course, got the Russian-Ukraine war going on.

You've got the potential for conflicts elsewhere too.

And, of course, you've got the fact that Russia... and Iran are really allied together.

They're working together.

But what's your take on how this has all unfolded?

But what does this mean for Europe, do you think?

Well, thanks, Tanika.

Look, I think you have it right there in terms of explaining what's happened in Germany and putting it in the global context of this popular revolt against the establishment, if you like.

I mean, the reaction, you heard it there from Chancellor Merz, the reaction across Europe, both from governments and from the sort of mainstream media, is one of, you know, panicked horror, right? Oh my God, the Nazis are back.

The fascists are taking over.

Germany's falling back into its bad old ways.

It's the same all over the continent.

But is how big of an issue is this in America?

So why would-- why do you think it was necessary for you to take this position?

Well, if you read the whole column, uh, uh, my point is not that we have won the, the Iran war.

My point is that anybody who has any certainty about the s-- what's happened after just a month, uh, is blowing smoke, frankly.

We, we, we-- You know, it's ridiculous to say that we've already lost the war.

I've read so many pieces in the last couple of weeks saying this is the greatest disaster, military disaster, you know, in American history, and then I've read...

But it's also equally ridiculous to say we won the war.

Um, we know we haven't won the war.

So he was just trying to explain to people that just because we have oil and gas doesn't mean we have control because it's a global market, right?

George, was, uh, was J.D. Vance right in characterizing that?

I think broadly, uh, Brian, uh, yes, I think so.

Um, look, I think that is-- The, what happened in the last five years was we did have four years where inflation really did take off.

Um, you know, after the pandemic, and thanks to some of the policies of the Biden administration, we saw, uh, inflation really, really accelerate.

That really unnerved Americans.

We'd never seen inflation, Brian, like this for thirty years, forty years.

Um, you know, it re-- almost reached ten percent at one point.

What do you think about what Lee Zeldin did last week with the rollback of, they say, "The single biggest rollback of red tape in American history," with the EPA and rolling back with the emergency situation, the, the executive order that Obama put into play in 2009?

Do you think people w- from th- from what you read and what you understand, do you think people start to feel it in the winter and spring?

Yeah, I think people w- I think people will actually, will, will, um...

You know, I th- I think people are not gonna be, not gonna be content until they actually see prices stabilizing.

Prices are not gonna come down, Brian.

I mean, that's, that's, you know, generally speaking over a long period of time, p- prices don't come down.

That's been the, the history of, uh, inflation in this country.

But they do wanna see pri- they do wanna see, they do wanna see a stabilization of prices, and we haven't seen that right now.

How much can you build in with messaging, and how much just will move as a message?

No one should pay him an iota of attention." Wow.

Wow.Yeah, look, the only other thing I'd say, Bryan, is that this is, um, you know, this is a, this is a gift obviously for Donald Trump and the Republicans.

Um, you know, the Democrats must be absolutely seething about this.

The last thing they need right now, given the disarray that they're already in and the fact that you've got people like, uh, AOC and Zohran Mamdani as kind of leading figures in the party, the, you know, the, the lack of credibility the party now has.

You know, they wanna keep the focus on the issues, you know, they wanna keep the focus on, on Donald Trump, on the legislation that's just gone through, the One Big Beautiful Bill and all of those things.

They wanna sort of...

And along comes, you know, Biden to remi- Hunter Biden to remind us what an absolute disaster all that was, and, and frankly how, again, whatever doubts people may have about Donald Trump, and they may be reasonable and real doubts, you know, this reminds them of, of why Donald Trump was elected and, and just what a disaster that Biden was and what a mess the Democratic party continues to be.

Do you think the, uh, are you surprised the rates aren't lower?

Yep.

... um, you have more control over what happens here, maybe is the way the world is going.

And, and I think maybe the markets and the world are adjusting to that.

The second point, though, of course, uh, Brian, is I think, yeah, he's gonna negotiate these, uh, these deals.

Look, I think the big one, obviously, is with China.

Um, you know, that's where the big tariffs are, basically 145% tariff on China, which the US has, means that there's, there's no trade going to happen.

And, and we're starting to get reports, rather worrying reports, you know, that there's basically, you know, ships are, are not leaving Chinese ports, uh, ships coming into LA and other ports, our major ports, uh, are kind of basically slowing down or to a, almost to a halt, and all the ships are empty.

I want you to.

Why is that?

I think they like this possibility of these- this new form of tariffs that we're gonna get from April the 2nd, Liberation Day, as President Trump says it.

They like that a lot better than the tariffs we've seen so far.

What President Trump is proposing makes a lot of sense, I have to say, unlike some of the other things he's been proposing on tariffs.

The- the- the United States...

He's right, the United States, broadly speaking, with most of its major trading partners, does have an unequal tariff system.

It charges typically on average lower tariffs against the EU than the EU charges against us, uh, against China than the E- than China charges against us, against India, uh, against Mexico.

How do you feel... you feel like ultimately he'll be a plus or minus for Trump?