Agree or disagree?

Well, I agree, Hugh, and I'll do you one better.

I think if Abdul El-Sayed wins in November, he's immediately going to begin running for president in 2028.

I think that because the Democratic field is so open, I think that he's going to use whatever momentum he has from this election to just dive right into a presidential campaign.

I think he's on that big of an ego trip.

And so this is why the stakes in Michigan are so high.

I think it's the race of the cycle.

Had you seen this stuff about the fact that the Saudis are waxing the Houthis whenever they show up?

What do you make of my premise that they're going to go for it? And what do you make of my answer? We ought to go first.

Hugh, I think we should have kept going on April 8th.

I think historians might look at April 8th and President Trump's decision to halt the major combat operations against Iran as a hinge moment in 2026, because it essentially put us into this low-grade asymmetric warfare, kind of a frozen conflict in the Strait of Hormuz.

Finally, we've settled on the correct policy of maximum economic pressure through the blockade, and through the various efforts of the Treasury Department to separate the Iranians from the global financial system.

But as long as that regime remains in place, they are going to continue to harass naval traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, use the Houthis to go after the Saudis in the Red Sea, and generally spread chaos and havoc throughout the region and the world.

And so I believe we need to get serious about creating a plan for supporting the people of Iran to overthrow the Iranian regime.

Now, I'm often wrong, as every political pundit is, but what's your sense of it?

Oh, I have strong parallels between this election and the 2022 election.

... who knows?

I d- I, I, um, John, I'm glad you brought up 2002 and, uh, George W.'s speech there, uh, because there's something else that's been on my mind that also came out of 2002.

Prior to Bush's speech, you had the release of these two documents that a historian like myself, uh, uh, is very interested in.

Uh, the first was the National Security Strategy of the United States, which came out just, I think literally the week before, uh, Bush's speech, which laid out the doctrine of preemption and, uh, laid out basically the argument that would take us into Iraq in 2003, that in order to forestall the development of weapons of mass destruction, uh, we had the right to intervene and, and change regimes.

But there was another document that came out a couple months before the speech, and that was the 2002 Arab Human Development Report, published by the United Nations.

And so this, again, this is about nine months after the 9/11 attacks, when everyone was wondering where did the attacks come from? Where did Bin Laden come from? Bernard Lewis published his great book, What Went Wrong, about the Middle East.

And this UN report, the Arab Human Development Report, looked at the region of, in the Middle East and said-- and admitted that this region was a mess.

Go ahead.

But when did America stop being able to, you know, take a couple of punches but fight through 15 rounds?

Well, we've lived through this era of the forever wars, these conflicts that seemingly go on for decades.

And in the case of Afghanistan and in this disaster under President Joe Biden, as we beat a retreat in Kabul.

And so I think Americans are skeptical of conflicts that don't have a quick resolution as a result.

But I think, Kurt, it's also we need to explain what we're doing more.

And I was quite happy to see President Trump in his speech to the U.N. General Assembly today say, look, others have talked.

I've acted.

And she can't get there.

that partly also to kind of bring up, since we haven't talked about it, that sort of religious element that I think informs and has informed for many years the right and conservatism.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, I mean, one of the major developments in American politics was the return of evangelical Christians to the political arena.

They had largely left after the infamous Scopes trial in the mid 1920s.

Now, obviously, there were revivalists and there were evangelical preachers who had some role.

Both sides of, say, fights over the civil rights movement.

You could see them present in some of the politics of the South.

Swarms

that partly also to kind of bring up, since we haven't talked about it, that sort of religious element that I think informs and has informed for many years the right and conservatism.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, I mean, one of the major developments in American politics was the return of evangelical Christians to the political arena.

They had largely left after the infamous Scopes trial in the mid 1920s.

Now, obviously, there were revivalists and there were evangelical preachers who had some role.

Both sides of, say, fights over the civil rights movement.

You could see them present in some of the politics of the South, but as a self-conscious, organized force.

Swarms

that partly also to kind of bring up, since we haven't talked about it, that sort of religious element that I think informs and has informed for many years the right and conservatism.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, I mean, one of the major developments in American politics was the return of evangelical Christians to the political arena.

They had largely left after the infamous Scopes trial in the mid 1920s.

Now, obviously, there were revivalists and there were evangelical preachers who had some role.

both sides of, say, fights over the civil rights movement.

You could see them present in some of the politics of the South, but as a self-conscious, organized force, The return of evangelicals to politics in the mid-1970s is one, I think, one of the critical moments in American history.

Swarms

... uh, I, I mention that partly also to kind of bring up, since we haven't talked about it, that, that sort of religious e- element that I think in- informs, uh, and has informed for many years, uh, the right and, and conservatism.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, I mean, one of the major developments in American politics was the, uh, return of, uh, evangelical Christians to the political arena.

Uh, they had largely left after the infamous Scopes trial in the mid-1920s.

Now, obviously, there were revivalists and there were evangelical preachers who had some role on both sides of, of, say, fights over the civil rights movement.

Um, you could see the kind of, uh-- You could see them present in some of the politics of the South.

But as a self-conscious organized force, the return of evangelicals to politics in, in the mid-1970s is one, I think, one of the critical moments in, in American history.

Swarms and AI agents

What do you make of all this?

Well, Mark, thanks for having me.

I think President Trump put it right when he said the other day that he was the hoax buster.

You know, when opinion is going in one direction, it's usually President Trump who says, hey, wait a minute, let's think about this and let's have a common sense approach.

And so right now, when it turns to data centers or when it turns to the frontier AI, the cutting edge AI, you're having a lot of apocalypticism.

You're having a lot of panic.

And it's something that we've seen before.

Matthew, don't you find it odd that we have some Republicans invoking the Constitution of the United States as a basis for government effectively controlling the fourth industrial revolution?

He got canceled for speaking his mind.

Well, we all believe in free speech, but it needs to be applied equally.

In the case of Macklemore, it seems like free speech is running only in one direction.

And that is to say we have many examples since October 7th, 2023, of Jewish intellectuals, writers, artists, Israeli actors, performers, entertainers, comedians being denied a platform.

They're having their.

appearances be canceled, having their books be canceled, having their contracts reduced.

The Israeli actress Gal Gadot has been the subject of several campaigns, boycotts, simply because she's Israeli, simply because she speaks the truth about what happened on October 7th, that Hamas barbarously attacked Israeli civilians, killed over 1,200 people, men, women, and children, and spirited over 200 people.

How do you see this entire moment in the AI tug of war?

[laughs]

Uh, I, I am a fan of Alex Thompson of Axios, however, who is an incredible reporter and indeed one of the few reporters, I can count them on a, the fingers of a single hand, who actually covered the story of Joe Biden's physical and mental decline over the course of his presidency and, uh, is willing to ask tough questions of Democrats a- and the left, including Mr. Piker.

And w- we first got some word of this interview, which is not actually out in public yet as we record this on Thursday, September 17th, uh, the pre... last night, uh, when a report surfaced that it had turned very, uh, contentious, um, because, uh, Piker is never challenged in any platform for all of the reprehensible, disgusting, anti-Semitic, anti-American things he says.

But it seems like Mr. Thompson did exactly that.

Piker told a media reporter that it was the most contentious interview, uh, he's ever had.

I have a personal connection to this aspect of the story simply because the most contentious interview I've ever had was with Piker's uncle, Cenk Uygur, on The Young Turks back when it was just getting started in 2009, and my publicist at the time foolishly booked me on The Young Turks to discuss my then book, The Persecution of Sarah Palin.

And let me just say that was...

We should be expecting, this being the 17th of September, that if people have stuff that they've been saving up to throw, you know, to, to really knock somebody off their, uh, you know, bearings, that's gonna come in the next two, two and a half weeks because it has to start playing a role in the early voting choices that people are gonna make.

Do you think that group can get their act together vis-a-vis Yemen?

Well, I hope so.

I think we've seen an escalation in the war.

I think Iran has opened up a second front via their Houthi proxy and the Houthi terrorist militia making a march to the sea and threatening that second strategic choke point, the Bab al-Mandeb Strait in the Red Sea.

and also threatening the Saudi cross-strait pipeline that was helping reduce oil prices during the conflict in this fight over the Strait of Hormuz on the other side of the Arabian Peninsula.

So something has to be done to counter this.

This is part of an ongoing conflict with Iran.

Should we be acting as the Admiral suggested?

What's your answer?

Well, I think it's because, as Ambassador Oren said, that the Iranians are fearful of what would happen if they began launching missiles at Israel again.

And the Iranian regime knows that Israel would not stand for that and that Israel is ready to go back into Iran and not necessarily follow all of the United States' instructions about targets, about weapons, the type of escalation measures about support for the Iranian people, for example, to rise up against the government that the Israelis followed during the four weeks of full operational activity after the launch of Operation Epic Fury at the end of February.

So I think Israel has successfully deterred Iran.

By the way, Israel has made incredible strides against Hezbollah, the Iranian proxy that's in Lebanon.

And so they're weakening Iran on that front as well.

And meanwhile, the Iranians believe that they can exert political pressure on President Trump, interfering in the election, there's no question, by firing on our vessels, firing on other tankers, and thereby escalating the oil price, getting gasoline prices up higher, contributing to the information space in the United States, which is almost lopsidedly pro-regime and talks about Iranian resilience, Iranian strength, Iranian power that doesn't even exist, to the exclusion of all the good gains our military has made and the tightening vice over the Iranian economy that our blockade of Iranian ports has imposed.

What do you think? One war or many different wars?

did the sense of peril that was in downtown manhattan did that reach the upper west i lived at 110th of broadway at columbia for a summer and that's a long way away for the benefit of people don't know new york it's a could as well be a different world but did the sense of peril reach to the upper west side

Oh, absolutely.

I mean, like I said, you could hear the jets flying above.

Immediately, many Colombians went to the nearby hospital, Columbia Presbyterian, and began donating blood.

There was kind of confusion on campus of course and actually one of our most famous students at that time uh was monica lewinsky she was spotted on college walk kind of talking into a cell phone trying to uh get uh i guess directions or tell people that she was safe too um so it was it was a distraught you know i mean there was certainly a sense of trauma of course i had uh nightmares about the about the day that that went on for for several years but i would say there was also a kind of a um a feeling of resolve a lot of people were think uh joined up uh from that 9-11 generation including including colombians and so uh there was a sense that uh that america had been attacked and of course in those early hours of the morning of 9-11 we still didn't understand the scale of the attack and so there were of course the the reports coming in from the pentagon shortly uh After the plane struck the towers, there was...

We didn't quite know what happened to Flight 93 yet, but there was kind of scattered reports of other attacks in the D.C. area.

I remember Brit Hume reporting.

What do you think?

Fair point for Democrats to have to answer for and Republicans to make.

Democrats in 2007 certainly didn't do anything to stop the burgeoning financial crisis.

I think the Federal Reserve and some earlier policies had a larger hand And what that disaster.

But there is a clear argument to be made, Hugh, that bad things will happen if the Democrats seize one or both chambers of Congress in this election.

The first thing is any progress on reform would stop.

And the Trump administration has made great progress.

Think about it.

What do you think?

What do you think, Matt?

Well, you know, Secretary Besson's been a breakout star of this administration.

Not many people had heard of him despite his very successful career in finance before he became the Treasury Secretary.

But the Republicans have fallen in love.

There's no question.

I mean, not only with Besson's policies and his pro-growth attitude, but also his kind of snappy rhetoric.

And he's deployed that rhetoric against Iran.

How do you see the scoreboard right now in the Senate, Matt Continetti?

think it's very significant,

this news that United States forces have successfully demined the Strait.

That just denies Iran one of the tools it's been using to hold the global economy hostage.

And, you know, it comes on the heels, of course, of news that the amount of oil that has been transiting the Strait, thanks to the U.S. Navy and our layered defenses and coordination, is increasing to multiple millions of barrels a day.

And that's kept the price of oil, not just here in the United States, but also the Brent crude, the global price relatively low.

And so I think what we're doing is pursuing the right policy at the moment.

If Trump isn't going to resume.

Is AEI in that battle yet?

What? To what do you attribute the rise of a Hasan Piker in our society?

Well, I think partly it's the disaggregation of media, Hugh.

It's the rise of streamers, online streamers, gamers who have kind of a constant commentary going on.

YouTube channels you can just kind of dip in and out of and get a flavor of.

of some commentator.

At another level, it's the rise of the far left in the United States, especially among young people on the left.

And now we see transforming and dividing the Democratic Party.

What do you think?

We can fix that, but it's very alarming.

It's an incredibly important story.

I believe the Wall Street Journal, my paper, broke it.

John Ellis publicized it in his excellent newsletter.

But it shows you this new reality.

We've confronted this new reality with Iran, where short-range missiles can really constrain the behavior of the American armed forces, the greatest military in the world.

It certainly can strain our political leadership.

I think actually all of war has changed in the blink of an eye.

But where is that battle for the right today? Do you have to write an appendice to that book and republish it as a paperback?

Well, I'm pleased to say, Hugh, that the book is out in paperback and it's still in print.

So our audience can check it out there.

The book goes through in its paperback edition, the 2022 election.

So there's a lot has happened since.

And I do need to update it to account for everything up to 2026, including Trump's miraculous comeback politically.

in the 2024 election.

What do you think about Governor Youngkin?

Why do you believe that?

Well, Hugh, I believe it because, uh, right now we're in this low intensity conflict with Iran, and I think the low intensity conflict is fine for the IRGC running the Islamic Revolutionary regime.

And that means that they're gonna use this opportunity to slowly rebuild, restock.

Uh, they're gonna use it to try to tighten their control of the Strait of Hormuz.

Uh, they're gonna use it to oppress their own people.

And the goals of Operation Epic Fury, while largely achieved, have still not been fully met, and they include not only securing the, the remainder of the nuclear dust, but reopening the Strait of Hormuz to the free flow of commercial traffic and ending Iran's ability to project power in the region.

So in order to achieve those goals, I do think it's necessary for President Trump to resume major combat oper- operations for a time to cripple the Iranian government to the point where they are in- incapable of harassing travel, harassing the region, and their people have the opportunity to come out and take Iran, oh, back from the mullahs that have ruled since 1979.

Do you share that opinion?

So these two have their own rivalry, but the Houthis are acting on behest, uh, on behalf of the Iranians, right?

Well, the Houthis are a proxy of Iran, Brian.

So of course, anything they do, Iran knows, Iran is behind.

And it just goes to show you that the war is expanding even when we're not calling it a war, even when we're not attacking Iran.

The Iranians have ways through their proxies, really the Houthis, who are extremely damaged, are one of the few remaining proxies left of Iran.

They can mess up things in the other important choke point, which is the choke point into the Red Sea.

So this, this requires leadership, it requires strategy, and I think most importantly, it requires commitment and resolve.

Yes

What's your thought?

Well, I think President Trump has come to the understanding, an understanding he's always had, that the Iranian regime is not interested in peace and it's not interested in changing its ways.

Look, we've had a ceasefire in this conflict technically since early April.

And then in June, we had the Memorandum of Understanding.

And in both cases, the Iranian regime said that they would open up the Strait of Hormuz to international shipping.

And in both cases, they were lying.

And soon after these agreements were reached or in the case of the ceasefire, President Trump declared the ceasefire.

Why? Why has that not happened? And where does that thing even stand right now?

What should our goals be in this conflict? Sure.

We were going to deny Iran the ability to spread terror throughout the world through its proxies.

And then we were going to give the Iranian people the chance to take their government in their own hands and overthrow the mullahs.

As the war developed, Iran played really the only card it had, which was closing the Strait of Hormuz.

And then that forced a new objective into America's sights, and that is opening the Strait of Hormuz, ensuring the free flow of commerce through this global choke point.

And establishing the free flow of commerce throughout the world has been an American interest previously.

Since our founding.

So, Matt, What is the single biggest threat right now, Matt, within the broader right of center fold to the coherence and the ability of conservatism, not just as an ideology, but also as a governing practical philosophy? What is the single biggest threat to that over these next hundred years and how do we fight it?

Were you aware of that fact?

Well, I suppose I was aware that a lot of that coastal topography, uh, as you can see on the map, is elevated, and it's a mountainous part of Iran, which is in general kind of a mountainous country and large country [laughs], but plenty of mountains there.

And so you see the drone and missile teams that have been harassing the shipping in the Strait of Hormuz are, uh, a, able to kind of operate within these elevated conditions, kinda sneak in and out, uh, and fire at shipping.

You know, I think one c- point Congressman H- Harrigan made that stuck with me was, uh, this idea of boots on the ground and how an operation to siege Kharg Island would be different than our incredible rescue operation of the two air, uh, downed airmen, uh, earlier in Operation Epic Fury.

Uh, this would be an operation where we would seize and hold ground, Iranian territory, and that of course would mean that our soldiers would be the targets of drone and missile attacks.

And so if we're, uh, going to pursue that policy, I think every effort needs to be made To prepare for how the Iranians would attempt to, uh, retaliate and attempt to, uh, harm our soldiers.

I think that's one reason why President Trump, of course, has always been very reluctant to put boots, boots on the ground unless he knows that the mission is defined, that there's a time set, uh, and that the objectives can be achieved.

Yes