 I had to do a show, I had to start the show up by saying, told you so, I guess we don't have a World War III. I guess we're not going to war with Iran. I never thought we would. I never thought this would turn into anything big. I told you they would probably miss their targets, although you could argue that they wanted to miss the targets, but I told you Trump would back off and back, Trump passed back off. I guess I'm playing the same 40 chess game that Trump is, I'm starting to be able to predict his next moves. Nothing happening. And I expect we return to the status quo. The diplomatic channels have already opened up. The Trump administration is already in negotiations with the Iranians to have another nuclear deal. I think the Iranians are ready to negotiate. And I expect a meeting. I expect a lot of high-profile stuff. I don't know that we'll get a deal before the election, but certainly movement towards a deal before the election. I think the Iranians don't really have any incentive to get a deal done before the election, unless they could get one done really quickly. Remember, the economy is really hooding. And this is, and of course you also saw the Iranians, it looks like shot down the Ukrainian airliner. This is not a Canadian airliner, it was a Ukrainian airliner. And it looks like the Iranians shot it down by accident. Look, the point I was trying to make last time, and it was hard, is the Iranians are incompetent. They run an incompetent military that has no real substantial capabilities. Yes, they've got a lot of these ballistic missiles, but it's dubious the extent to which consistently they could hit their targets. And these missiles could be knocked out of the sky if we had placed a missile defense system in Iraq to defend our troops, which we have it. We do have such missile defense systems, I think in Qatar and guarding some of our other bases in the Middle East. So there is nothing, there was nothing, there is nothing to fear from the Iranian military other than their capacity to just wreak havoc in the world out there. People said, oh, the Middle East is gonna be destabilized by killing of Suleiman. I mean, this is the Middle East we're talking about. Not exactly a bastion of stability. So who cares if it gets a little bit more destabilized given how unstable it is and how anti-American it is. I guess my point is almost everything you hear about the Middle East in the media. Almost everything you hear about the Middle East in the media, left and right, generals, former SEALs, former CIA agents, I don't care, is for the most part wrong. The United States, the media in particular, almost always overestimates America's foes. They almost over, they almost always overestimate the power of Middle East countries. They almost always overestimate the technology that other countries have. There's a reason Iran didn't do that much. It's because they're petrified of the United States taking out. The economy is, as I said, in shambles, they're GDP shrunk by 10% last year. They have nothing, they produce nothing, they make nothing. The last thing in the world we should be afraid of is a war with Iran. Now, what I find is the whole stance of the administration, I mean, the Democrats are even more pathetic, but the whole stance of the administration is truly pathetic. I mean, we don't want regime change. That was repeated again. We want to negotiate. That was repeated again. So what's the point of taking this guy out? I mean, okay, so retribution, fine, I'm all for retribution, it's not horrible. What's the point of taking him out? If you don't want regime change, what's the point of taking him out? If you're not willing to confront the regime, what's the point of taking him out? If nothing's gonna change, you replace one bastard by another bastard, the next guy is gonna come in and do the same thing that's still amended. So there is nothing here. The whole mess that was created by Trump was useless and pathetic. Now, it's interesting, because Trump has kind of the right, let's call them instincts, right? So I saw this Prince Goff, it's where he said, I don't understand why they make such a big deal about cultural institutions. They can kill our soldiers and we can't destroy their cultural institutions. I mean, he said, and then he said, oh, but it's the law, so I'll follow the law because I care about the law as if, as if he cares about the law. So he has the right instincts, it's right. You can kill people, but don't bomb that building because it's got a historical status. Really, that's pathetic. But he says it and presents it and doesn't follow up on it in such a way that it's meaningless that he says it. It's meaningless. Yeah, the rules of war, the modern rules of war presented in the world are ridiculous, absurd, a stupid, okay? But what are you gonna do about it? Oh, I'm gonna negotiate with an enemy that's been our enemy for 40 years and he said it's been our enemy for 40 years. He says all this stuff, he knows. Maybe because he's being fed by Pompeo and stuff. It turns out Pompeo is the one who really wanted this guy dead and has really lobbied Trump to get this guy dead. But again, no strategy. These things are meaningless with no strategy. It's not the US law, Jennifer, it's the international quote law. It's the law of war, so-called. This is what I wrote about in Just War Theory. You can read that in the book, Winning the Unwinnable War. So, it's all just a waste because nothing was done, nothing is being done. Again, no strategy. No idea of where we're heading. No idea of what to do. Again, the strategy is negotiate. Negotiate with evil. You'll start to deal with evil, you'll start to deal with evil because he, Donald Trump could do a better job, better job than Obama did in negotiating a deal. Is that really the issue? All right, then let's see. Few other things around this. One is, just again, the ridiculousness of the left. The shooting of Solomon and anything else. It was an act of war. Again, Iran has been a war with the United States since 1979, they haven't stopped. We need to recognize we're at war, and yes. And then there's the issue of should you get permission from Congress? Absolutely you should get permission from Congress. What the Trump administration should have done is they should have gone to Congress two years ago and said, we're at war with Iran. They're at war with us. They started it. They've been going after us forever. We should, you should authorize the President of the United States to engage in the necessary self-defense actions in order to eradicate and eliminate the threat posed by the Iranian regime. And they should have voted on. Instead, now Trump administration is claiming they don't need to notify Congress. They don't need to ask permission from Congress, even if no matter who they kill in Iran, no matter what they do. Because Congress and the presidents have basically completely defaulted on the separation of powers, completely defaulted on this issue of its Congress's job to declare war, not the president's. So as a consequence, Mike Lee today, a Republican, you know, who was briefed by the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of State, said it was a travesty. He said it was the worst debriefing he's had in his all his years as senator. He said it was pathetic. They wouldn't answer the questions. They wouldn't commit to anything. They basically, completely, utterly ignored the Constitution. And this is Mike Lee. This is not a Democrat. And I think he's absolutely right. But of course, Congress doesn't care either. Nobody at this point, nobody at this point cares about the Constitution of the United States. And this conflict with Iran has just brought that to the forefront. Congress is pathetic, but the president doesn't even try. Make the case, make the case to American people. Has anybody tried to face the American people, make the case that Iran's been in war with us for 40 years and it's time we took it seriously? No. Instead, they kill this person, then they kill one general, then nothing happens. He's replaced. Nothing will have changed in the Middle East. Their influence in Iraq is not going to change. Their influence in Syria is not going to change. The only thing that will change their influence in Syria is the Russians. The Russians don't want them there. Okay. Iran is incompetent. And the shooting down of the Ukrainian airplane is a good example of that. Now what should be done about that? Nothing in the context of we're not doing anything about anything. Iranians kill Americans all the time. We do nothing. Iranians arm all our enemies. We do nothing. Iranians advocate for terrorism all over the world. We do nothing. Iranians fund terrorism all over the world. We do nothing. They build mosques all over the world. They preach the most vile form of Islamism and hatred of America. We do nothing. So they shoot down an airplane, not even ours. Well, of course, we're going to do nothing. Who's going to do something? The Ukrainians? They've got their hands full with the Russians. And the Russians sure aren't going to do anything. The only people doing anything to try to protect themselves are the Israelis, where every time the Iranians get a little close to Israel, the Israelis go out there and bomb them and kill them. But even Israel doesn't do very much. Should be doing a lot more. Should be a lot more aggressive. But to a large extent, they're not that aggressive because the United States won't support them. So the United States has not had a foreign policy in 70 years. It does not have a foreign policy today. It suddenly does not have a foreign policy with regard to the Middle East. It has no idea what we're doing over there. It's Trump is as bad as they come, but it's not like Bush Obama had a proper foreign policy. It's not like Pompeo knows what he's doing. Somebody asked what I think of Pompeo. He's a very mixed bag. I think he's generally been good on Iran. And I think, again, if he were president, I think he would be better than Trump on Iran. But I think he's going along with Trump's awful behavior in North Korea. He's going along with sucking up to the Saudis. So Pompeo's turned out to be a lot weaker. Plus, he's one of the people who wants to try to get Snowden into executing him for treason. So I'm very mixed on Pompeo, just like I'm mixed on a lot of these guys. But he has a more realistic view of Iran than do most other people in the administration, including Trump. But I don't like him. But that's not a standard. I don't like anybody. They all get it wrong. I mean, it's just another example. It's just another example among almost every issue we cover here, where the answers are not that hard. But people are not interested in answers, and they're not interested in dealing with problems. They'd much rather evade. They'd much rather pretend. They'd much rather look the other way. They'd much rather pure as some kind of peacemaker. Let's see. Iran, I agree with you on an aggressive, deterrent-based foreign policy. But could you still man the argument for the Obama-era approach? Thank you. I mean, there is no excuse for the Obama approach. Obama's approach was we don't lead. There's nothing special about us. We intervene in other countries. But only if other countries will intervene with us or only if we take a backseat to the French and the British and the other Europeans, which is what we did in Libya, we never pursue our own self-interest. And we view, we see moral equivalency all around the world. I mean, one of Obama's worst speeches and one of his most awful speeches was one of his first speeches, a speech I think he gave in Cairo, where he basically made complete moral equivalence between the Arabs and the Israelis, between the Muslim brotherhood who invited in the audience and between the secular regimes. I mean, complete moral equivocations. So there's nothing to give a best explanation of Obama. Obama was just a complete anti-I mean, I said at the time, Obama was the first anti-American president. Anti-American president in every dimension. He didn't believe America was special and he didn't want to protect America, particularly above anything else. Obama was the first anti-American president. Now there have been many anti-American presidents by the standard of Americanism. But by the standard of just America, the country, and what it stands for, Obama was the first explicitly anti-American. And some of you think I'm tough on Trump. I mean, I'm tough on Trump, partially because he's a Republican. But I'm hugely, hugely tough on Obama and was throughout his administration. All right, how does the commanding chief act on time-sensitive information and needs action if he has to get the green light from Congress? Well, if it's time-sensitive information, then he can act. But then, if he expands that action beyond that, he has to get Congress's approval. But this is the thing about the Middle East. We have thousands of troops there. Indeed, we have thousands of troops all over the world. None of those troops have been authorized by Congress with the exception of some in Iraq and in Russia. In Iraq to fight ISIS. What you need is an authorization that during this war, call it Bush's name, the war on terror, I hate that name, you grant the commanding chiefs certain powers to deal with certain countries and certain institutions and certain people in a particular way. Or that's why you have to go to Congress and say, we're generally at war with Iraq. I need permission to deal with it. Not any specifics, not I need to kill this general. I need permission to deal with it. And that gives you an open agenda to deal with it in the way appropriate. You have to get some permission for Congress for these troops to be in all these countries and to act, but to act in a way that defends America. So you have to be able to present to Congress the case that they are necessary, they are necessary out there in the world to defend America. The problem is what we use as imminent threat is an excuse. We place the troops there because there's imminent threat. Then there's no imminent threat, but they're already there. So by being there, they've created an imminent threat. And it just continues forever and expands all over the world. So we have troops in 120 different countries and the imminent threats every single country, the US troops, there's imminent threat, but almost my definition. And you can't, it's not a constitutional government if you do that. There's no separation of powers if you do that. You've got to have some sanction by Congress. Now, the real sanction would be to bring back most of the troops to bring them back home. And then only to engage in those situations where there's truly is an imminent threat you have to act and then get permission from Congress to deal with the situation, but that means to go to war. And the problem is that we don't want to go to war. We don't believe in going to war. We believe in police actions. We believe in just temporary things and wars against terrorism, as if there is, you need to go to war against certain regimes and replace them. And you need to go to war against certain organizations like Akaita and ISIS and Hamas and Hezbollah, but you can't phrase it narrowly. What the US Congress should do is a declaration of war against Islamism, against Jihadism, against Islamic totalitarianism. And then anybody who's in that net get captured and that's easy, then you take care of it. Then you don't have to have a war against Saudi Arabia, no war against Iran, no war against ISIS, no war against Hamas, no war against Islamic Jihad, no war against Al-Qaeda. You just have one war against all those groups and countries that promote and support and endorse Islamic totalitarianism. And then you go to win and you go over and it's over very quickly. I said after 9-11, this does not have to take years, months and it's over. And the fact that it's 20 years is an indication of the utter complete failure of the military, of the American foreign policy strategy and the American military for not being able to eradicate the threat that we face. Not even trying, something they didn't eradicate. They're not even trying. What we need today, what I call the new intellectual would be any man or woman who is willing to think, meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason, by the intellect, not by feelings, wishes, wins or mystic revelations. Any man or woman who values his life and who does not want to give in to today's cult of despair, cynicism and impotence and does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist growth. Using the super chat, and I noticed yesterday when I appealed for support for the show, many of you stepped forward and actually supported the show for the first time. So I'll do it again. Maybe we'll get some more today. If you like what you're hearing, if you appreciate what I'm doing, then I appreciate your support. Those of you who don't yet support the show, please take this opportunity, go to uranbrooksshow.com slash support or go to subscribestar.com, your own book show and make a kind of a monthly contribution to keep this going. I'm not showing the next.