 fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights. This is the Iran Book Show. All right, everybody. Welcome to Iran Book Show on this Thursday, November 9th. We are casting to you from sunny and cold Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah. Looking out, the sky is blue, but it's like 30-something degrees. Way too cold for me. But sound is tiny. Sound is tiny, tinny. Still no video? Yeah, no video. All right. There we go. There's the video. All right. So, again, thank you for joining. And let me just center this better. There we go. Give it a little distance. All right. Sound should be good. Everything should be good. We've got good internet connection today. Sorry about yesterday. Day three of my tour, you know, in the U.S., today's show will be short because I am on my way. I've got a talk at around noon here in Utah, at the University of Utah for the law school, the Federalist Society. I'm giving a talk on free speech and Western civilization. So that'll be today. Yesterday, I gave a talk at the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago for the Adam Smith Society. And the talk was on inflation, the Fed, kind of more of an economic talk. But it was a good discussion, good group. Our kids, obviously some of the leaders of the future, Booth School of Business MBAs, tend to do very, very well in their careers. Following school, so an impressive group of young men and women, primarily men, a few women. So Adam Smith is like the Federalist Society for Business School for MBA programs. And then the day before that, Tuesday night, I gave a talk at the University of Illinois Champaign. Some of you were there. Jennifer was there. We got Hunter Hunter was there with his wife. And they drove up from Alabama. So thank you guys for joining that. I hope you enjoyed it. I know for those of you who traveled there from a distance, there was quite a road trip. But I really appreciate you being there. I really appreciate the effort. I thought that was a really good talk. So it was a talk about, ultimately, altruism versus egoism. So it was very much focused on morality. The Q&A, as always, focused a lot on capitalism rather than on the morality. It seems like the questions the student have are actually more regarding the economic issues. But I thought the Q&A was particularly good. A lot of energy. I'm hoping once I get the video of that, I'll put it up. I'm still waiting for videos from Europe to put up. So we've got plenty of content to put up. Yeah, everything was recorded, including yesterday at Blue School of Business. Everything will ultimately go up. Particularly the Q&A, I thought was good. So Christian, hopefully, who is listening, I hope that would be a great Q&A to break up into questions, which you still need to do for some of my other talks, and put up the short videos of just the questions and the answers. Particularly the answers. Because some of the, I thought, the interactions around the Q&A were particularly good at the University of Illinois. Dave Rubin's, as far as I know, the Dave Rubin interview is not up. But, you know, Dave Rubin interview, yeah, it wasn't up. I mean, the good thing about it is a lot of people will watch it because it's Dave Rubin. There was nothing exceptional about the interview itself. Let's see. Tomorrow, so I'm giving a talk in a little while. Then I go to the airport. That'll be the, I don't know, fifth flight in three days or whatever. My travel schedule's been a little insane. I fly to Denver tonight. Tomorrow, I'm giving a talk at the leadership program with Rockies on capitalism. And Saturday, I fly home. So that is the schedule. All right. Let's try to catch up on some of the news in particular in what's going on in Israel in Gaza. But also some news about, you know, there was a debate last night. I didn't watch it. I've seen some highlights. I've read about it. The debate was on while I was running to the airport to catch a flight. But a lot is happening in the Middle East right now. We'll catch up on that. And again, we'll catch up a little bit on elections in the United States. And yeah, and I'll take your questions. So Super Chat is open. Please feel free to use it to ask questions, but also to support the show. Haven't had a lot of opportunities for you guys to support the show this week. So here's an opportunity for you to step up and support what I am doing. Ultimately, the Super Chat is how I fund these shows and how I fund my time. All right. A lot of news out of Gaza. As you know, as we talked about in the past, the Israeli forces have basically cut off Gaza into the north and south. Haven't circled pretty much Gaza City and some of the towns around it. And as of this week, entered into Gaza City, basically have closed off the coast and have entered into Gaza City. And there is basically there is street to street fighting in Gaza City right now. And my guess is we don't know yet. But my guess is that over the next over the next few days, we will hear about increased casualty levels among the Israeli forces as a consequence of kind of the street to street fighting, which is not easy, very, very difficult. As Israel is pushing into Gaza City, they're getting closer and closer to El Shifa Medical Center, which is a large complex of buildings that includes a hospital and a variety of outpatients facilities. But it is believed that in El Shifa Medical Center is the Hamas headquarters for the Gaza Strip, that the leadership of Hamas is there. Of course, it could be that they've already escaped to the south. But it is believed that there are hundreds of Hamas fighters there. It's also believed that quite a few of the hostages are probably in the tunnels, in the bunkers under El Shifa Hospital. So El Shifa Hospital is a major target for the Israelis. And they are moving closer to that target. They are being super cautious, careful, as you know, with regard to civilian casualties. The primary reason for that is that with increased civilian casualties, increased pressure on Israel to compromise, to sell out and to stop its offensive. The priority in Israel right now is to get the terrorists and to do what they can in order to kill as many of the Hamas and the Hamas, leadership of the Hamas, terrorists as they can. And to do that, they need to continue the operations that they're engaged in. So a lot of street to street fighting. It's going to be very intense. A lot of tunnels there. The tunnels are well hidden. The entrances into the tunnels are well hidden. Israel is not bombing the El Shifa Hospital. Again, you saw what happened when Israel didn't buy a hospital, but the hospital got damaged and how much hate was oriented towards Israel. Israel is not bombing the El Shifa Hospital. And as a consequence of that, Israelis will die. Israeli troops will die in trying to take it without bombing it, without air support, without the kind of air support they need. So street to street fighting. And again, going to be very, very intense. In the north, we continue to see kind of the sporadic fighting here and there, missiles coming in, Israel bombing, nothing major. Israel is still not engaged in the kind of preemptive strikes that they need to, that I believe they need to. Hezbollah is still sitting on 150,000 or so missiles that they could be launching at Israel in any moment. Israel is giving Hezbollah the strategic initiative under the assumption that they will avoid attacking Israel because what? Because they're afraid because it's not in Iran's interest right now to do it. But again, that gives them, the terrorists, Hezbollah, the strategic initiative and it takes it away from Israel. Other things that are going on and we'll get to pauses and ceasefires. Yeah, let's do that about Gaza. So the big story right now, breaking right now is that Israel has agreed to a four-hour daily pause. So every day there will be four hours in which Gazans can evacuate and go to the south. I'm just looking at the news stories that Associated Press has the story, Israel agrees to four-hour daily pause in Gaza fighting to allow civilians to flee. Of course, the picture that they associate with is an injured child, their father carrying an injured child with panic and hysteria on his face. He's a young man. I mean this is a young man. Who knows if this young man is not a Hamas fighter? Who knows if this young man is not a terrorist or if he's not a terrorist? Who knows if he didn't participate in the celebrations after October 7th and the beating of hostages and the abuse of women. Who knows if he's not one of the people who went into Israel? We don't know. But every time you agree to one of these pauses, Hamas fighters are moving south. They're moving away from where the fighting is. They're moving to safety. They're moving to where they will get humanitarian aid. And it allows Hamas to continue to survive. The reality is that Hamas are not dressed in military uniforms. It's not like you can differentiate between Hamas fighters and civilians. Basically, every young man in Gaza is a suspect no matter how they're dressed because the reality is that Hamas is dressed like everybody else. The people who invaded Israel in October 7th were all dressed as civilians. They weren't dressed in uniforms. How does Israel differentiate between civilians and non-civilians? It is actually, at least when it comes to young men, men 18 to 30 or 35 to 40, it's impossible for Israel to do so. Anyway, every day because of the Biden administration's pressure, every day Israel will provide four hours of pause in fighting. Now, it's a bit of a joke, right? Is Hamas going to provide the four hours of pause in fighting? If Israel stops operations for four hours, is Hamas going to stop operations for four hours? Does it just give Hamas the opportunity to barricade itself in, to gain strategic advantage over the Israeli forces, to move its people around so that it can, after the four hours of pause, kill more Israeli soldiers? I'm sorry, but this is sacrificial. It is sacrificial in the part of Israel. You've already seen over the last few days, if you've been watching and reading, that Israel is facilitating the movement of Palestinian civilians from the north to the south. They've opened corridors to facilitate that. Again, who knows who's moving along those corridors? What stopped Gaza's civilians from evacuating Gaza is Hamas, not Israel. When Israel provides them with the secure passage, securing from whom? Not from Israel. Israel doesn't want to kill a bunch of civilians. Securing them from Hamas, it was preventing them from leaving because they're being used as civilian shields. They're being used as human shields. Hamas doesn't want them to leave. So every time Israel supplies them with a corridor to leave, they leave. But then who else is leaving with them again? So it's a double-edged thing. Hopefully, by them leaving and by providing this for our window, this will provide Israel with greater flexibility and greater ability to go into those areas that are free of civilians, if you will, and destroy whatever left of Hamas. They're much easier and with lower casualties because they don't have to worry about civilians around them. So I very much hope that this works in Israel's favor. I also very much worry they're going to see a spike in civilian casualties. All right, so that is Gaza. That is the pause. Note that the pause is, you know, the credit for the pause is being taken by the Biden administration. There's a sense in which Israeli lives that are going to be taken as a consequence of these pauses on the Biden administration's hands. This is their doing. This is the pressure they're placing on Israel. Of course, they are being put under a lot of pressure from the Arab world, but they are choosing like every American administration before them, every American administration before them, they are choosing to succumb to the pressure that's being placed on them by the Arab world and they are putting the pressure on Israel to compromise and to appease. All right, just again, breaking news. You know, currently their air raid shelter is going off in the southern city of Israel in the tip of Israel on the coast of the Red Sea. That is the city of Elat, a town, really, a city that I spent quite a few years of my childhood in. I lived there for a while. A beautiful, beautiful city. There are air raid sirens going off there. Several explosions heard over the city. And it seems like the whole region around Elat is under attack. It's not clear if that attack is coming from the Houthis in Yemen. They've been trying to reach an attack in Elat. I do know that one missile has already hit a building in Elat and we don't know by casualties. But the reality is that the southern tip of Israel is under attack and the Iron Dome and Arrow defense system, air defense system are being deployed in order to protect the city and its inhabitants. It's also a tourist city. I don't know how many tourists are there right now. All right, let's see. In addition to Israel fighting on the Gaza front, in addition to having air defense system alerts on the southern Israeli front, we've also got a Lebanese front where there's constant activity and there's constant fighting going on. But also Israel is engaged in the West Bank in arresting Hamas members and arresting other terrorists that are involved in the West Bank and trying to keep the West Bank from imploding and adding another front to Israel. But there was constant fighting in the West Bank and arrests of many Hamas leaders in the West Bank going on as well. Let's see. So yeah, a lot going on, a lot going on at several fronts. Israel is advancing, advancing much slower than I would like. It's very, very cautious. And there is now this four-hour humanitarian pause and fighting every day and all of that kind of stuff. And all of that is slowing down kind of the strategic goals, the achievement of strategic goals that Israel has. All right, so that is really where we are in terms of Gaza. Happy to answer, of course, questions that anybody has with regard to that. And I will get to that in a minute. Let's see. All right. So yeah, tons going on in Gaza, tons going on in different fronts. You know, for a lot of Americans, I think, it's already being forgotten. If anything, the war is morphed into kind of an eternal war. The issues of anti-Semitism, the issue of so many Americans supporting Hamas, particularly on campuses, that is the focus as it should be and it should be fought and a lot of our focus should be on addressing and dealing with the anti-Semitism and the anti-Israel and the pro-Hamas sentiments here in the United States. But at the same time the war is raging, people are dying. Israel has to, I think, ultimately long-term its survival depends on it achieving its strategic goals, which means the complete destruction of Hamas. I don't think Israel can stop there. It needs to take al-Khizballah and ultimately I don't think even there it can stop. I think ultimately it needs to take on the Iranians as well. But we'll get to Iran. Well, let's get to Iran now. We talk, as we speak, and really every day, all day on a consistent, constant basis. U.S. troops in Syria and in Iraq, and U.S. does still have troops in Syria and Iraq, it still works with the Iraqi military. Those troops are constantly under attack. They're constantly under fire. Drone attacks, missile attacks, IED, explosive devices on the side of the road, trying to kill Americans as they patrol with the Iraqi troops. It was an attack just earlier today. Also, so far the number of Americans killed in these attacks have been minimal. A lot of injured servicemen, but very few. But the United States continues to show its troops, continues to show the world and Americans in particular, that it doesn't give one iota, one iota about the lives of its own soldiers. America does not care. It treats, and I get angry about this, it treats its soldiers as sacrificial lambs, sacrificial lambs for what? Who knows? For American appeasement, sacrificial lambs for what? For displays of trying to appease and befriend the Arab world and more importantly, avoid war with Iran at all costs. Dozens and dozens of attacks against Americans. There was one story I read today about a drone that basically hit a barracks of U.S. troops, a barracks. Luckily for them, the drone did not explode. If it had exploded, we would be seeing dozens of casualties, dozens of dead Americans. Now, what was the headline? The headline was something like, we got lucky because not because lives were saved, but because if the drone had exploded and Americans had died, shit, America would have had to do something about it. And then we might have got into a war. And then, you know, that would have been really devastating. America has no self-esteem, no self-respect, no self-confidence. And you can all say, oh, this is Biden and if Trump was the president, this wouldn't be happening. I don't believe that for a second. The reality is that this has been going on for decades. Americans can be killed in the Middle East. It's a free fall. America doesn't care. You know, the main objective of America is to have troops somehow in the Middle East for some reason, why they're there, who knows. And then when they're killed, to backtrack, to escape, and to avoid a wider conflict. The main goal of America is to avoid a wider conflict while still having troops everywhere. Right, if you have troops everywhere, why do you want to avoid a wider conflict? Aren't they there for a purpose? And the only way to attain that purpose is ultimately to engage in that wider conflict. The reality is that we know who's attacking American troops in the Middle East. It's Iran. It's Iran-backed groups. It's Iran-sanctioned groups. Americans are going to die so far. We've been lucky, pure luck, that more Americans have not died. Now, you could ask the question, why are Americans in Iraq and Syria? And given that we have no strategic objectives, given that we have no strategic plan, given that we don't know what we're doing, I have no idea why they should come home. But given that they are there, it is the job and responsibility of the American government to protect them. And if that means launching massive strikes against the Iranians, disabling their capacity for war, from the air, do it from the air. And yes, they will launch all kinds of missiles and stuff. We have the defense capabilities to protect ourselves from that. But destroying their capabilities. I mean, yesterday, I think it was yesterday, or maybe the day before, the U.S. attacked the base of this terrorist organization that's attacking the U.S. forces, even though we know it's Iran. And then the Secretary of Defense said for the second time in two weeks, if they do it again, we'll really get tough on them. And then the next day, they did it again. Today, they did it again. And the United States is doing nothing. We're a paper tiger. Nobody is afraid of us. We appear pathetic in the world. We should appear pathetic to ourselves. It is a disgrace. If you want to, if you're going to have troops there, protect them. If you're going to protect them, that necessitates, that necessitates engagement with Iran. You don't want to call it a war. Then at least, you know, make them suffer the consequences of what they're doing. And you can do that without engaging in full blown war. All right. That's me venting because it infuriates me because these are young kids. These are young kids who are dying. Nobody in America cares. The American government doesn't care. The American military doesn't seem to care. They're just counterfeiters. They're just sacrificial lambs. Not even clear what they're sacrificial for, but they're treated as sacrificial lambs. The United States better get serious about defending itself. It hasn't since the Bush administration, it hasn't since really Ronald Reagan in the Middle East. It hasn't been willing to defend its own people. People remember that in the Middle East, 241 Marines died in Beirut in 1983, and Ronald Reagan did nothing about that. And that was Iran. That was Hezbollah. And to this day, nothing is being done. And every time Americans die in the Middle East, nothing is done. And when 9-11 happened, very little was done. And we in Israel are still suffering the consequences of that fact that we refuse. We refuse to actually defend ourselves. We refuse to actually take out the clear, our clear, unequivocal enemy in the Middle East, Iran, which has been at war with us for, you know, it appears that I'm going to be doing a debate on should America go to war with Iran with Dennis Kasinich. Do you remember Dennis Kasinich, the leftist? Anyway, it appears that I guess he was an advisor to RFK Junior until recently, and we were debating should the United States go to war with Iran probably at the end of this month, so that'll be available at some point. All right, let's see. Okay, finally, and then I'll take your questions. And again, I have to rush here. We don't have a lot of time. Finally, when was it on Tuesday? We had elections in the United States, and there was a ballot initiative in Ohio on whether to make abortion, basically a constitutionally protected procedure in the Ohio Constitution. There was also a governorial, an important governorial election in Kentucky. And there was state, House and Senate elections in Virginia. You know, all of these elections, I think, ultimately, were heavily influenced by the issue of abortion. The reality is that Americans are pro-abortion. That Americans believe that abortion should be a legal, legally protected. And the details of what trimester, what month, all of that, I think there's a lot of disagreement. But the fundamental issue of should women have the right to an abortion, Americans support that unequivocally. Everywhere where it goes up to a vote, Americans support it. Even in red states like Ohio. Ohio went for Donald Trump in 2016 and in 2020. Ohio has become a pretty red state. And yet, proposition one, I guess, issue one, which was to guarantee the right to abortion in the Ohio Constitution passed by a pretty solid majority. It wasn't really close. And this is in Ohio. And this is because a lot of women who vote for Republicans for a variety of other reasons Republican women, independent women, this is an issue that's important to them. It's also because this is an issue important to young people as it should be. They're the ones who are probably most likely to need abortion. And as a consequence, they come out to vote. So the abortion issue is a major, major positive issue for Democrats. It is a major, major, major negative issue for Republicans. And here we have it in Ohio. It's now constitutionally guaranteed. I'm not sure what would happen if the federal government passed a law that banned abortion, whether it would still be protected under this ballot initiative. I don't know the legality and the details of it. Same, you could argue that potentially, it's not clear exactly, but potentially something like this also happened in Kentucky. Kentucky is about a solid red state as any state out there in the union in the United States. And Kentucky has had for the last four years a Democratic governor and he was up for election. He had a real challenger, a Republican challenger who, you know, many people thought would beat him. Again, it's a solidly red state. And yet he ran to a large extent on the issue of abortion and protecting abortion rights. And as a consequence of that, he won, or at least that's one theory. I mean, he might have won for other reasons that have to do with him being a good governor. I don't know the details. But the reality is that Kentucky continues to have a Democratic governor, which is unusual again for a very, very red state as Kentucky is. And then finally, in Virginia where Yonkins is hailed as this amazing Republican governor, he's believed to be a future presidential candidate. Everybody loves Yonkins. He won as a Republican. He won in a Democratic state and he became a Republican governor. There was hope and belief and confidence even. There was real confidence that Republicans would gain the Senate and the House of Virginia. They would control the entire legislature of Virginia. Yonkins heavily, heavily campaigned for this. And there was belief that because of he is popular, Republicans would get excited and some independence on their side and that they would take the legislature. The exact opposite happened. Democrats won the legislature solidly, both the House and the Senate. And again, one of the big issues in Virginia that allowed the Democrats to win was the issue of abortion. Now, since Dobbs, Democrats have done way better in elections across the country, red, blue states, much, much better than you would argue they should have, much, much better than expectations. This issue brings people out. This issue is an issue, again, young people care about. This is an issue women care about. This is an issue that even I think people who usually vote Republican care enough about to not vote Republican. This is a right that women do not want taken away from them, do not want violated. And as a consequence of that, it's a winning issue for Democrats. Republicans have no idea what to do with it. They cannot turn their backs on abortion because it is a core issue for them and their base would not tolerate, except if you're Donald Trump. I guess Donald Trump is the only candidate who could actually come out and in a sense not be anti-abortion and still win and still get the base. Nikki Haley is trying. It's one of the reasons I support her. All the candidates out there, she seems to have, she's the one most willing to present a nuanced position on abortion. I still disagree with her on it fundamentally, but it's better than the rest of them. But the rest of them have no clue. And of course at the state level, at the other level, Senate campaigns, particularly House campaigns, Republicans have a real chance of losing. In some cases losing big because Americans fear that at the federal level we will get a ban on abortion somehow. So this is a big issue. I've been telling you this since Dobbs. And we've been watching the campaigns and we've been watching what's happening and time after time after time after time. This is an issue. This plays against Republicans. It's time to wake up. They don't, they won't, and they don't, and they can't. There's a sense of which they can't because they be holding to their base. But, you know, it'll go down that Dobbs probably did more damage to a Republican party than even Donald Trump. And of course Donald Trump is responsible for Dobbs with the people he appointed to the Supreme Court. All right, let's jump into the, to the super chat. We have made our goal. Thank you, Sylvanus. Sylvanus is coming with $100 and got us over the goal. We really appreciate that. So let's start with his, with his question. Sylvanus says that the risk of sounding conspiratorial. How likely do you think it is that the security failure of October 7th was premeditated to justify wiping out Hamas and went out of control? It defies logic that the system could be, could be that incompetent. I think the probability of that being conspiratorial or done on purpose in a sense is basically zero. Israel is not capable of such conspiracies. Israel is a sieve when it comes to keeping secrets like that. You have to think about the number of people that will have to be involved in something like that. Think about all the soldiers who died because they were overwhelmed, not just the civilians but the soldiers. There is literally somebody who was in the Israeli, Israeli intelligence and was in the Israeli army. There's literally a zero probability that this was done on purpose. This was a massive intelligence failure. It's not the first intelligence failure that Israel has suffered from. The Yom Kippur was another example. This one is worse. It has to do I think a lot more with the fact that Israel was distracted by this whole judicial reform issue. The demonstrations, the upheaval that that has caused. Again, it is not. Failures on this scale happen and they're not that unusual. Government is not very good at what it does. When it does a lot, as the Israeli government does, as the US government does, it even gets very, very sloppy and bad at the things that it typically is good at, like military and police. The more the government gets distracted with other things, the worse it becomes. I'll also add, as I've said in the past, one of the reasons for this failure was the fact that Israeli troops were moved out of the Gaza Strip, away from the border with the Gaza, to the West Bank to serve other domestic political challenges that the Israeli government created. This is a massive failure of the Israeli government, but it's also a massive failure of intelligence. We'll see how much, because there are some rumors, and I believe these more than I do that it's a conspiracy. There are some rumors that suggest that Israel was warned about this, both from Egyptian intelligence and from its own intelligence, and for reasons of hubris and reasons of arrogance and reasons of stupidity, that it ignored those rumors, and I believe all of that. So again, stupidity and incompetence is a much, much, much, much more likely explanation of what happened than any conspiracy, any conspiracy. And having served in the IDF, I know how stupid commanders can be. Having served in the IDF, I know how ignorant and how blind they can be, even at the cost of massive human life. I also think that one of the things that maybe is being hidden from us is the Iranian involvement, maybe even Russian involvement in hacking and silencing some of the surveillance equipment that Israel had. That is speculation on my part, that I don't know, but again, much, much, much more likely that the Iranians with Russian help hack the Israeli security system to allow these breaches than it is that there was any kind of security. There was any kind of anything else. Let's see. That was Sylvanus. Thank you, Sylvanus. We really, really appreciate the support, and let's see. Andrew asks, how do you explain that being pro-Israel does not mean anti-others? Well, I mean, I don't know how you explain that, but it is true that being pro-Israel does mean your pro-self-defense of Israel, that Israel defending itself, and that does make you anti-certain things, right? It does make you anti-Palestinian terrorism. It does make you supportive of anti-stuff. So being pro does have anti-implication. It depends how they define those anti. You know, one thing to do is to differentiate people who are peace-loving, right? Pro-I, Iran, pro-I. Oh, how do you explain that being pro-I does not mean being anti-others? Okay, yeah, I mean, that's relatively easy, because what you do pro-I means pro-me. I was thinking, I'm still thinking as well, Hamas. It's easy by showing how valuable others are to you in every dimension, from romantic love to friendship to just the trade-off principle of others producing to the benefits you get from capitalism, from just everything and everybody else and what they produce and what they create and how much it benefits you. So it's relatively easy to show that being pro-I actually means being pro many, many, many others, but productive of others. So just show how others add to your own life. Bradley, too, he was smart and worked hard, but resentful, possibly because he was physically weak and bullied. Many great men, jobs, must, going at, had the same experiences, but seemed to channel them productive. Yes, I mean, the reality is that we're not products of our environment. We're not products of how other people treat us. We're products of a particular genes. We are products of the choices we make. And there is no, well, why did he make that choice? Because he just did, because that's what he chose. That's what makes you, you, the choices that you make and the primary choice that you make, that jobs, must, wanted, makes and the reason Tui is different, is the choice of whether to engage your mind or not engage your mind, whether to be independent or not be independent, whether to succumb to the abuse of others or not to succumb to the abuse of others, whether to stand on your own two feet or not to stand on your own two feet, or boils down to fundamentally the choice to think or not to think, to accept reality or not to accept reality, to engage with reality or not engage with reality, focus or not to focus. Those choices, those fundamental choices of thinking or not, set the course of your life and you do them when you're very, very young and you repeat them over life and you have to engage with that choice every moment of your life and every moment that you default on that, that you don't engage, that you don't think, that you don't use your mind when it's necessary, is a moment where you lose a little bit. It's a moment where you become a little bit more like Tui and a little bit less like the heroes of the books, like Howard Walk. Daniel, thoughts on UNWRA, a UN agency funding was almost stopped in an amendment to HR 4665, Perry, Republican, Pennsylvania. U.S. tax dollars are still funding pro-Hamas propaganda on social media through accounts affiliated with the UN. Absolutely. I mean, the very fact that the United States is a member of the United Nations is a travesty. I've talked about it in the past and we'll talk about that in the future. It keeps coming up. The very fact that we fund United Nations agencies that provide money to Hamas and to other Palestinian organizations that are clearly anti-American and anti-American interests and promote the killing and ultimately destruction of American lives is a travesty. America should stop funding the United Nations. Every single frigging agency in the United Nations, every one of them, it should stop immediately and it should recognize explicitly the danger they represent to America and to its interests. It is, again, truly, truly horrific. Just breaking that the coups-missile attack on Elat, which I commented on earlier, was a coups-missile attack launched by the Houthis in Yemen. At some point, Israel's going to have to respond. The Arrow air defense system shot them all down. The explosion above the city of Elat were a consequence of the air defense system actually working and keeping the civilians safe. But the Houthis, I mean, it's ridiculous that they can get away with this and nothing happens to them. At some point Israel will have to free up its own ballistic missiles and maybe air force and go to Yemen and take care of these bastards. I hope they do it. Maybe they won't in the end because of U.S. pressure, not to expand the conflict. Israel's not expanding the conflict. The Iranians are with the Houthis and Hezbollah and Iranians directly. And this is all an Iranian conflict. And yet, let's take our head, bury it deep, deep, deep in the sand and pretend that it doesn't exist. Jennifer says, how come the monopoly question always seems to come up more than any other question? Any halfway honest economist knows monopolies are not a problem in a free market, but this confusion still prevails. Well, because it's taught in every econ 101 class, it's always an issue that anti-capitalist promoters raise. It is a big issue with the Biden administration because of Lena Hahn. So it's in the news constantly. When they're in high school and they take economic classes in high school, they talk about the evils of monopoly, the evil of standard oil, the evil. It's in every economics textbook is this idea of perfect competition and the idea of monopoly rents. It's just everywhere. It's in the culture. It's in every single class when they learn history and they learn about the 19th century and the Robert Barons monopoly is raised. And of course, they read the news and they watch TV news and they hear about the evils of Amazon and the evil of Apple and the evil of Google and that evil is derived from, of course, the fact that they are all monopolists or at least that's the story. So it's very, very difficult to get away with. My videos are monopoly are some of the most watched videos I ever do. I need to talk to Christian about making more videos about my Q&As, particularly the ones answering the monopoly question because I think this is the kind of video that can really be promoted and pushed out there into the world. All right, Andrew, it's Veterans Month of all the so-called aggrieved groups. It's veterans with problems for whom I feel most empathy. They speak about the damage that just war theory does to actual soldiers. You know, I've spoken about this a lot and, you know, let me say I don't have a lot of time right now, but let me just say the unbelievable injustice that's committed to them. You know, not only do soldiers die in war and that is horrific and it's horrific for the loss of their lives and it's horrific for their families and for their friends and people who knew them. It's just a horrible loss of life for no good reason because of just war theory, because of American weakness and meekness and because of the pathetic nature of American foreign policy more broadly. But for every person who dies, there are, I don't know, I'm just going to guess, five to ten people who get injured. Some of those injured are relatively mild. Some of those injured are severe. And I don't think that even includes the number of soldiers that have PTSD, post-traumatic stress. The numbers are just staggering in terms of the tens of thousands of Americans that have been damaged by this since 9-11 in the field in Afghanistan, in Iraq and now in Syria. And all the consequence of the fact that America is timid, America is weak, America doesn't protect their lives, America doesn't care about their lives. You know, I've talked about this in the past about Afghanistan and how, yeah, I mean how generals and how Commander-in-Chief just didn't care. They just let them die. They just put them in positions where there was no other option but to die. And just the staggering cost in human life, in human life, not just in terms of ending, but just in terms of just less quality of life. You know, they go into battle with their arms tied behind their backs and blindfolds on their eyes. They go into battle without the tools to defend themselves properly, without the backing of the US government. It is why I'm not a big fan of you guys having your kids go and volunteer for the US military, which under other circumstances I would be. It's because I know how they're going to be treated by the people above them. And I just think it's horrible. And I don't think any child deserves to be treated that way by the United States government. And therefore I can't recommend serving in the US military. So yeah, the consequences of their lives are horrific psychologically and physically. And it's just quality of life snuffed out because, again, America won't defend itself, won't protect themselves. And those who don't quite understand what I'm talking about, please go find my essay on just war theory, just war theory versus America. Please go and read my evaluation of the damage just war theory has done to the United States of America and continues to do. Alright, David says, Turkey's a member of NATO. If Turkey makes good on their threat to enter the war, an Israel responds. Does that mean NATO countries have to attack Israel and protect Turkey? Theoretically, yes. That won't happen. But theoretically, that is the case. It is why it makes zero sense for a country like Turkey to be a part of NATO. The United States should extract Turkey from NATO, should kick them out. I know strategically that would be difficult because of US bases there, the nuclear weapons stationed in Turkey. But it is time to identify Turkey for what it is. It is a regime ruled by an Islamist, by an autocrat, by somebody who is much more sympathetic philosophically to the terrorists than he is to the United States. Maybe he doesn't have the balls and the guts to act on it quite like the terrorist act on it. But his sympathies ultimately lie there. I don't believe Turkey will act on it. I don't think they'll attack Israel. They're not suicidal. But the very fact that they are threatening that should be enough to justify kicking Turkey out of NATO. I mean, what the world needs, and as I said, I'll do a show on this, is a complete geopolitical strategic realignment. And until that happens, we're going to continue to suffer from these wars. We're going to continue to suffer from just unbelievable instability and uncertainty. Okay, Jacob asked this yesterday, so let me quickly answer this, but I didn't get to it. Jacob says, if all Jews live outside of Israel, then no Israel, all Jews are at risk, absolutely. Given unprecedented rise of Jew hate, should we Jews all be living in Israel? I don't think that's a definitive statement. I think it's something that all Jews should consider doing, given the hatred towards Jews that is rising up in the West. You have to make an assessment. Is the value of living in, let's say, the United States worth the risk of anti-Semitism versus the value of living in Israel? That is, Israel is a good country. It's a great country, but in many respects, it's also a very difficult country. One of the difficulties is you went to every shelter every few hours right now, and some of the difficulties are you just have less opportunities in Israel than you do in the United States. And just other social issues that Israel brings to the table that don't exist elsewhere. So it's all a risk-reward trade-off that you have to make. Life is full of these. And I think one risk-reward trade-off of people who are identified by others as Jewish, whether they are self-identified or not, is whether the risks of staying in the West justify the benefits of being in the West vis-a-vis the alternative, which is to live in Israel. And I can't make that choice for you. I've made the choice for myself, and each person out there needs to make the choice for themselves. Andrew says, showing support, enjoying the shows. Thank you. Wyatt says, So your name on an INRAM Museum Foundation public recording, Texas. Are you at Liberty to talk about it yet? A RAM Museum is such a great idea. Wow. I mean, how did you get to a public record in Texas? No, I'm not at Liberty to talk about it yet. I'm hoping to be at Liberty to talk about it later this year. Let me just say that if the idea of an INRAM Museum excites you, it really makes you excited, not just a museum, but a place in which you would have regular activities, a place that would house the INRAM University, a place that would become kind of a center of gravity for all objective activities in the world. If the idea of such a place and the idea of such a place in an architecturally significant building excites you and you have money, big caveat. And you have a lot of money and are willing to put a lot of money into such a project. And here, a lot of money, I mean seven figures. If you're willing to put in a million plus into such a project to make it happen, then please, please, please contact me. But other than that, no comment. Gail, very concerned about the new Iranian human rights leader in the UN. Yeah, I mean, that's right. UN is the leader of the Human Rights Commission. UN is a travesty and should be abolished. Frank says Ben Shapiro said your name at his talk in Madison, Wisconsin. It's not surprising. Ben knows me. He's interviewed me. We've exchanged emails here and there. It sounds like he was asked a question about the Adler Shog movie. I have been in communication with Ben Shapiro's people and the people working on the movie in the past. I haven't heard from them in a long time, so I don't know what the status is. But it doesn't surprise me. Ben Shapiro knows who I am. Certainly on certain issues we're allies and certainly on certain issues we disagree fundamentally. Fizzle says, coming from a place of neutrality on this one, but what if Ayn Rand was aborted? Then she wouldn't have existed. I don't understand that question. She wasn't. That's all that matters. You know, you don't make law based on the idea that somebody could be the next Ayn Rand and therefore you, we have to enslave you to raise them and be their parent just in case. That is not how rights work. A woman has a right to her own body. And a fetus is a part of her body and she has every right to eliminate that fetus. She has every right to preserve her bodily integrity by having an abortion. And that right should be protected and preserved certainly without any question for the first 20 weeks and I believe even beyond that, but certainly for those first 20 weeks where 98% of all abortions happen anyway. And I find the anti-abortion perspective, particularly in those early trimesters, to be beyond the pale. Paul says, if the House goes to the Dems and Trump wins, will he be impeached again? Sure, but what difference does it make? The Republican Senate will never impeach him, will never try him. And my fear is that if what happens is you get a Democratic House, let's say, and Trump wins and he still wants to get stuff done, he will do a lot of unconstitutional things. He will engage in more authoritarian action in order to get around Congress because he will not tolerate being said no to by Congress and that will just make him even worse. But of course that's better than if he gets what he wants, which if he gets a Republican House and a Republican Senate, who knows what kind of laws they will pass in that case. Urum says, do you know the YouTube channel Traveling Israel? I do not. It seems to me, have good understanding of Israel's history and a war against Hamas, you should check them out. Interesting, I'm not surprised. Look, Israelis know, even leftists in Israel know. They know who they're up against. They know their own history. They know they're not colonizers. They might disagree with this policy or that policy. They might generally think Israel could have been better to the Palestinians and cut deals with them. And all of that I think ultimately is legitimate, but fundamentally they know. And in this crisis particularly, they know who the good guys and who the bad guys are. They know what their history suggests. They know who they are in a way that I don't think even Americans know about themselves. So it doesn't surprise me that you'll see a bunch of good Israel channels that know the history and others. Okay. You know, does America have a foreign policy and rest? No, not in the sense of a long-term strategic thought-out, clear agenda. No, it is a by-the-knee reactionary, unprincipled, unstrategic, non-strategic policy that they engage in with the world. I don't think America's really had a foreign policy since World War II. It gets caught up in wars for no reason. Korea, Vietnam, Iraq. It does not have a strategic vision for the world. And when it tries to have something assembling that, it usually is a terrible altruistic vision, which leads to more death and destruction and is a bad influence on Americans a long-term strategic purpose. All right, now I know some of you have sent me emails with questions. I will get to those. I can't do those in these short shows. I will try to get to those once I get home on Sunday. I'll get to some of the questions you guys have sent me by email. I also know some of you would like to ask me questions who are not watching live. What you can do is you can make a contribution by PayPal and send me a question. I promise I will try to answer all of those questions. It does take me a little time to get to them because in the flow of the show, I forget about them and I focus on the super chat. But I will dedicate a portion of the show to answering those kind of questions. You can also do an applause on YouTube and send me the question by email and tell me that you did the applause the equivalent of a super chat. So they have them. So I will have those questions next time to do. PayPal is a means by which you can support the show. Go to PayPal.com. You can sign up there, make an account and then support the Iran Book Show. You can just look for Iran Book Show under PayPal and you can become a supporter of the show through there. You can also, of course, use Patreon. You can support the show generally anywhere you want and then send me questions by iran at iranbrookshow.com. Iran at iranbrookshow.com. That's my email. Send questions there and just let me know how you've made payment for the question and then I will answer it. And I know I've got a backlog of these and I will get to them. I promise I keep getting reminded emails from some of you. But that'll happen when I get back to Puerto Rico and we have a little bit more time and I can breathe a little bit because now I have to pack up my stuff here and run to meet the student who's picking me up and taking me to my talk here at the University of Utah, which I think is a private talk. It's a Federalist Society. Potentially you could just show up and come but I don't have with me the specifics. You would have maybe the Federalist Society of the University of Utah but it's happening. The talk is like in half an hour so it's maybe a 12.30 Utah time but it's very soon. All right. I will see you guys. I'm going to try to do a show tomorrow from Denver but certainly on Sunday when I get home I will do a show on Sunday. So see you guys soon. Thank you to all the Super Chatters. You were great. We made our targets. Keep it up and thanks guys. Thank you.