Trump's Biggest War is Against the American People

[00:00:01]Hello and welcome to Words Matter. I am David Rothkco. I am your co-host. Well, partner, I don't know how to describe it. I sit here with Norm Orstein and we talk about what's going on in the world.

[00:00:13]And I know people really want to hear Norm, but I provide a little bit of chance for him to catch his breath and have a drink. Um, uh, so, uh, how you doing, Norm?

[00:00:24]>> I could use a drink.

[00:00:26]>> [laughter] >> I'll bet I'll bet you could. I see you're wearing a button. What is the button, Norm?

[00:00:32]>> The button is 117. And uh my uh late son, Matthew, who died on January 3rd, 2015, and who was a national champion high school debater with his partner Alex Berger, uh had for reasons unknown, 117 as his favorite and lucky number.

[00:00:55]So, all kinds of people, former debate uh friends, uh friends from college and elsewhere, all do 117 sightings, but we now do this summer debate camp for public school kids in the Washington DC area. And we created a 117 club for those who have been at the camp for three years or more. There are now more than 60 of them. We had one who' been there for 11 years through from basically rising into sixth grade all the way through uh high school and came back to teach in the program over the summer. We have others who've been there for seven, eight, nine years and uh now over 60 of them for what amounts to close to 300 kids now. Half of more than half almost twothirds of the people we have uh teaching in the program are alumni of the program. They uh come back to uh pay it forward.

[00:02:03]>> That's fantastic. It is a great program.

[00:02:06]And was did didn't somebody make a documentary or something about this program?

[00:02:11]>> There is a documentary called Immutable.

[00:02:14]And if you go to pbs.org org. Uh you can find it or you can find it on YouTube by just searching for immutable or you can go to our website for our foundation in memory of my son mornstein.org and find a link to it there. It's free.

[00:02:39]It's heartwarming and inspirational. And if there are two things in short supply these days along with moral core and ethical behavior on the part of Republicans in Congress or any of those in the Trump orbit, it is uh what you'll see in this documentary.

[00:02:58]>> Well, I think that's fantastic. I've seen it. It's a great documentary.

[00:03:02]People should see it. The work you guys do is great. And uh based on my uh intensive research in the past 30 seconds, 117 uh January 17th is Benjamin Franklin's birthday on top of all of that. So, I I can tell you, I hope I'm not uh spilling a uh secret here, but Matthews debate partner, Alex Burgerer, um a brilliant young man, uh is a uh an executive producer and writer for a really good show on CBS called CIA.

[00:03:38]It actually follows a show called FBI and they're both brainchildren of Dick Wolf who has god knows almost 117 shows on the air right now. Um but Alex finds a way when he writes u one of the episodes to weave in a 117.

[00:04:01]he's being held hostage at 117 Baker Street or some other way of doing it.

[00:04:08]And uh it's always a hoot. That is a cool tribute and it's a little bit of an Easter egg that everybody here can listen for when they're listening to CIA. U let's switch the subject a little bit. Uh we you know I I was thinking of you because I was thinking I'm I'm doing an event tonight with a member of Congress and I was thinking well they're going to leave soon and then I was thinking they'll be gone for most of August and then I was thinking they're back for a couple weeks in September and then I was thinking they're gone for all of October and they've only got like 15 working days between now and the election. I mean this Congress is coming to a rapid conclusion >> and working is a term that should be uh in air quotes. Um, we are actually potentially heading for another uh uh big speed bump because the House uh under the vile uh Mike Johnson, worst speaker ever, which is really saying something, um is now trying to do a couple of things. One is a spending bill that will take it past the election into December.

[00:05:28]um they don't have the votes for that.

[00:05:30]They want because in part they don't have the votes because their Freedom Caucus rightwing uh knows that adding another uh almost half a trillion to the defense budget with no offsets um adds to the debt and they care about that only when it's uh not cutting out uh vital programs for poor people or uh tax cuts. Uh the second thing they're trying to do is somehow shoehorn in their SAVE act uh this voter suppression measure that they uh you know I'm watching some of these uh people who have very limited intellectual capacity uh saying things like you need an ID to uh get the all you can eat pasta at uh Olive Garden as if that's comparable to the need to pay $165 for a passport to be able to vote under the Save Act.

[00:06:34]>> Now, wait a second. You're saying Steve Scaliz, who is the guy who said that, is it dope?

[00:06:40]>> Uh, let me just say that Steve Scaliz has self-identified, this is his term, not mine, as David Duke without the baggage. And it's only half accurate because the baggage is there.

[00:06:57]>> Uh but it's also Cynthia Lumus uh and uh Anna uh Paulina Luna.

[00:07:05]>> Yeah. Yeah.

[00:07:06]>> Uh and you know a host of others and Mike Lee of course the vile Mike Lee. Um but they can't get that done uh with >> but that's that's not going to happen. I mean Mike Mike Lee is different because he's in the Senate. The Senate's not going to approve that.

[00:07:23]>> No. And they also um you know want to pass something that uh will uh satisfy only their members and leave town until midepptember and leave the Senate holding the bag with a bill that the Senate says is a non-starter. So we may uh be careening towards a shutdown uh before we know it.

[00:07:50]Yeah. Well, we may I I have serious doubts whether the this Congress could pass gas um without medical intervention. Um and you know, as I look ahead, >> but but wait a second, explosive diarrhea happens for them every single day.

[00:08:11]>> Well, they created it. We call that Trump diarrhea around here.

[00:08:15]>> Yes.

[00:08:16]>> Um and they they made that possible. But when you look at the Senate, the, you know, uh, Marowski said she's not going to support the Save Act. Um, I'm not sure whether what I I don't know when Lindsey Graham's sister gets to vote or not. Um, uh, although I thought it was interesting today she said she was not going to support the same issues he supported. She was going to stick to kitchen table issues. Um uh but but it it doesn't look like there's enough Republicans in the Senate to pass anything.

[00:08:50]>> I'm sorry to interrupt, but I really have to tell you about our Substack. The DSR Network Substack is the absolute best way to follow deep state radio. The DSR Daily Words matter, Need to Know, Siliconious, AI, Energy, and Climate, and the Daily Blast. Sign up to get notified every time a new episode drops and stay uptodate on the latest news and expert analysis. You can also support us by becoming a paid member. Paid members get [music] an ad-ree listing experience, select episodes 2 days early, access to live streamed episodes, and 50% off of David's Need to Know Substack. Please consider joining us at dsrnetwork.substack.com.

[00:09:35]That's dsrnetwork.substack.com.

[00:09:40]Thank you. And back to the show. I think that's probably accurate at this point.

[00:09:46]Uh the the biggest problem they're going to have is whether they can somehow muster the possibility of doing a third reconciliation bill under the budget act, which means that they could expedite it and do it with the majority.

[00:10:01]It's not clear they have the wherewithal to be able to do that. But of course, the Senate has a different agenda and that includes confirming or not Todd Blanch. And there we have a very interesting phenomenon with Lindsey Graham gone. If a single Republican in the judiciary committee votes against the confirmation under their rules, that's it. Now, there are ways around that, but most likely that would kill the the nomination. We have two people in particular on the Senate Judiciary Committee who were watching. One is John Cornin. John Cornin was a complete Trump loyalist, all in on the cult uh until Trump uh stabbed him in the chest and supported uh the unbelievably vile, corrupt, disgusting Ken Paxton.

[00:11:03]Um, and every time you hear about Graham Platner or hear about any of the other Democrats and all of the tutt that goes on and now the uh guy who succeeded Platner, we're seeing all kinds of stories that he's got a terrible temper.

[00:11:18]Just think about Ken Paxton who spent his July 4th overseas with his latest mistress, another quote unquote fundamentalist Christian who left her husband and children to go gallivanting with Ken Paxton. That was his July 4th. uh after of course having been indicted, convicted, uh clearly a criminal, uh just impeached, what all of that, let's put that to the side. John Cornin has every reason to stick it to uh Donald Trump. He's going to be retiring. John Cornin was a pretty distinguished lawyer and officer of the court in the past.

[00:12:07]uh he said some harsh things about uh Todd Blanch. The odds of him voting against Todd Blanch, I'd put around 20%.

[00:12:18]Uh now then we have Tom Tillis of North Carolina retiring who has been more outspoken and critical of many of the things Donald Trump has done than almost anybody else. And first Tom Tillis said that he was leaning towards uh supporting Todd Blanch. But first he had to get a commitment that Blanch would meet with the survivors of the Epstein predations which Todd Blanch in his hearing said he could not do. He was not allowed to do it. Then somehow magically he turned around and said he could and then stiffed these victims.

[00:12:59]And did that stop Tillis from supporting him? No. Tillis has made other demands of him. Blanch has basically given him the middle finger daring him to vote against. And I do not hold out a lot of hope that Tom Tillis, who's said many good things, has the moral wherewithal or the courage to actually follow through. They all know that Todd Blanch is a disgrace. What Tillis asked for the last time was commitment in writing that Blanch would kill the uh more than billion dollar slush fund, which everybody in the Senate almost opposes.

[00:13:47]Blanch has said, "You have my word." His word is worth nothing. And when Tillis said, "I need you to confirm this." He wouldn't. So, we're going to see. He's playing a game of chicken with Tom Tillis. And right now, I would guess that Tillis becomes the chicken.

[00:14:07]>> Uh, so you're you're actually sort of thinking that that Blanch will get through.

[00:14:14]>> I am scared to death that Blanch will get through. And it's not that the world will change dramatically if Blanch gets through because he's still been confirmed as deputy attorney general. He will stay in that position and until Trump nominates another attorney general prospect who then gets confirmed. Blanch remains acting attorney general and he's got all that power. But a rejection of him is more than symbolic.

[00:14:45]It really does say that a Republican Senate looked at him and said, "No, you do not have the qualities appropriate for an attorney general." And after that, there's at least a chance, of course, if he had any sliver of a soul, he would take that as a sign and resign from his post. Unlikely to happen, uh, but it's still more than symbolic.

[00:15:15]Um it it's a lot to take in for the average person.

[00:15:22]Um one of the elements of it is something that I find almost impossible to believe is the Pentagon is now saying they don't have any money. Um that they've run out of money because they've been spending billions and billions on this war. And so part of the idea of this u uh budget is to pump first of all uh potentially insane amount into the overall budget of the defense department up to 1.5 trillion but also just even in an emergency basis almost a hundred um billion dollars more to pay for this war which is as of right now the least popular war in American history. But when asked about this today, Senator John Thoon um a man who does not look like um Mitch McConnell but acts like him in every respect um said, "Well, we have to honor our troops," which you know to me is a nonsequiter, but but it's really at the core of all this.

[00:16:29]It's worse than a nonsequiter.

[00:16:32]The Pentagon under Pete Hgsith covered up injuries just in the last couple of weeks to more than a hundred American service men and women. They let us know about the deaths of two young wonderful people clearly, but not about the injuries. And we know that many of them, including injuries that go back to the earlier stages of this war that are serious and debilitating and will probably destroy a lot of young lives.

[00:17:07]They didn't even tell us about it. They haven't had a briefing on this war in a very long time. Pete Hgsith is lower than low and he is a clear and present danger to American national security. We also know that this feckless, unnecessary, stupid, dangerous, debilitating war is not only cost us hundreds of billions of dollars has drawn down our defense stocks to a highly dangerous level. If any other country, China for example, decided to do a military adventure, we are incapable of dealing with it. We also know that if Trump really does decide to escalate, including sending in ground troops where we will have huge numbers of casualties, but even trying to do more to protect the bases that we have in Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Oman, uh because it's our bases that have been attacked that have created these enormous uh injuries.

[00:18:22]and in Iraq, northern Iraq, u we do not have the capability with our Patriot missile system or others to defend against their ballistic missiles. We also know, of course, that in the first venture into Iran, Trump and his White House said, "Anybody who claims that we have not completely destroyed Iran's nuclear capability is spouting fake news." Now, he's saying, "Well, we have to go further because we have to take out their nuclear capability." We're getting information that they've moved huge numbers of centrifuges around. We've done nothing except destroy the lives of thousands of innocent Iranians by taking away their uh water supply in the middle of summer by destroying the lives of families with 175 kids that they've lied about. And we know now we targeted probably with a second strike because of faulty data that they refuse to update. All that money isn't going to give us a greater capacity.

[00:19:37]And we know that it's going to take us years to recover from the radar systems and the other sensitive uh uh listening posts that we've had in the Middle East, from all of the infrastructure that we've built there from the depletion of our weapons stocks. And we also know that we are way behind the curve compared to other countries in 21st century warfare. What Trump wants is to build more aircraft carriers and destroyers that will have his name on them, that will be shiny objects just like the golden glitter that he's put into the White House or his proposed arc to Trump, which will do nothing for American national security during the coming decades. The damage is just so great and it goes on and on. And John Thun says we have to honor our troops.

[00:20:33]>> What a clown. Truly, if we wanted to honor our troops, we would say they shouldn't fight in an illegal war. We would try to protect them, which we have been unable to do. We would try to ensure >> um that, you know, what they were doing was focusing on advancing US national interests, which they are not doing. Uh and in fact, the war they're fighting in is actually putting Americans at risk.

[00:20:57]Uh I it's it's it's it's as bad as you say and it's worse because you know in addition to not destroying the Iranian nuclear program, we introduced to them tools that are more potent than nukes, the control of the straight of Hormuz and their ability to uh launch massive drone attacks. Uh they have a major drone industry there. They have the ability to use uh weapons we are not targeting in ways we are not targeting.

[00:21:30]uh but we helped teach them that they have this and it's uh possible uh with recent actions by the Houthis that this is now going to spread further as the Houthis try to stop Saudi oil flows into the Red Sea which would then lead up to the Suez Canal and that there are now moves of foot of other countries including the Saudis to say well if that's the case we have to control that region let's go into the horn of Africa and try to offset this. So, here is a war we shouldn't have started, that is illegal, that we have not been successful at, that we are getting deeper and deeper into, that is costing billions, that is [ __ ] up the world economy. And here's what the president's response to that is. Let's just keep going. Let's keep doing more of what we're doing. And at a moment, we're three months from an election. three months from an election, gasoline prices going up, food prices going up. What does the president do today, Norm? He starts launching tariffs again, big tariffs against Canada. Now they're talking about more tariffs on more countries. Um because he this is he's not quite a one-trick pony, but he's only got two or three tricks. And what is this going to do? Push up prices.

[00:22:51]There has probably never been during an election campaign more of an effort by a US government to push up prices and punish American consumers in the months leading up to an election.

[00:23:07]Let's take it just a couple of steps further. First of all, something we've talked about before, but continues to uh need more emphasis. Our uh oil stocks are at the lowest level in decades.

[00:23:21]We have we produce oil. We export a significant amount of it and it's because we need to have the the oil that we get refined and we don't have the refinery capacity and this war is destroying even more refinery capacity.

[00:23:40]So I'm expecting oil prices and gasoline prices to go up even more. We had a temporary dip. Trump did his victory dance. It's hard to even think about the jiggling in that dance, but he did. It will not last. And that is going to be a problem that will be there for a very long time. And we're going to see oil prices rise. We're going to see fertilizer prices rise. We're going to see even more increases in uh food prices. At the same time, we know that these tariffs he wants to impose against Canada because there are two reasons here. One is simple ego. Trump goes to the final of the World Cup, goes down onto the stadium floor with the victorious Spanish team and gets thunderous booze. the co-host of this World Cup, Mark Carney, the prime minister of Canada, gets cheers. So, he's going to punish Canada. But the second reason, which is even more bizarre, is we know, and those of us in Washington know, because the air quality is not what it should be. My friends in Minnesota have it even worse. those in Ohio. Worse yet, because there are horrible wildfires. Canada has an enormous quantity of forests, many of which are inaccessible.

[00:25:16]Climate change has brought forest fires.

[00:25:20]Trump keeps saying what he said when there were California fires. They didn't clear out the brush. It's their fault.

[00:25:27]Somehow when there were horrible fires in North Carolina, a red state, he didn't say anything about that. Now it's the Canadians haven't maintained their forests. We're getting the effects of it as if they're blowing the wind down south. Uh so it won't be there. So, he's going to put in 50% tariffs, which under the North American Free Trade Agreement he signed, calling it the best deal ever, are flatly illegal.

[00:26:00]But that never stops him. But let's note, he violates a treaty that he signed. And what does that tell anybody in the world about signing a deal with Donald Trump? It's meaningless. He won't keep his word or his signature to mean anything at all. And that is not going to change throughout the remainder of his presidency. And if somehow we get through this and get a credible president, everybody around the world is going to look at the agreement signed by an American president with skepticism, knowing that it could be revoked in another four years. We are so [ __ ] by this guy that it's just hard to even imagine.

[00:26:47]Well, you know, we talk a lot about this in Washington terms because, you know, you're a fancy Washington guy and although I'm a simple guy from New Jersey, I try to keep up. But there are other implications of all of this, you know, and I saw something earlier today um which was a budget analysis of the first nine months following last year's reconciliation law. And the result was that the number of people receiving SNAP, what we used to call food stamps, fell by more than 4 and a.5 million. And based on the data, the estimate of the economists who put out this study is that 1.5 million American kids are now off, are not getting food aid, do not have enough to eat because we wanted to give tax cuts to Elon Musk and the rest of the Epstein class. And I just, you know, it sometimes it sounds like we're talking about a lot of high fallutin stuff, but to me a million and a half kids who don't have enough to eat is crushing.

[00:28:03]It's sadistic and not pro-life, shall we say. But let's note that a good part of the reason that these 4 and a.5 million people are no longer getting food support is because they tried cleverly to put in such ownorous paperwork requirements for people who are clearly eligible and not slackers.

[00:28:32]They just need the support because food prices are high and they don't have the income. And now the barrier to be able to get it.

[00:28:41]You and I, educated as we are, would have trouble deciphering this paperwork.

[00:28:48]So they're sticking it to people using nefarious means. And I I got to add one other thing because this is an issue I followed for a very long time. We've had we had a really uh strong study in North Carolina some years ago because North Carolina's public schools have different times each month when they do testing of the public school kids. So they were able to do a study where they could look at the first week or two with families getting food stamps when the food stamps were there and they had enough ability to provide adequate food for their kids where it dwindled as you got to the last two weeks. And they were able to test uh kids when they had enough food in their bellies compared to testing the same kids when they were food deprived. And the results were striking because the test results were dramatically better when they were fed compared to when they were hungry. Now what does that tell us?

[00:30:05]What it tells us is that we are creating a generation enough people who have all the qualities we would want to be productive in a workforce and sending them far back. And I mention all of this not just because these are monstrous people doing these monstrous things and this is just the beginning. It gets much worse after the midterm elections. And we also know the vile Mike Lee among other things has said publicly he wants to get rid of social security, Medicare and Medicaid.

[00:30:39]And the rest of them just want to cut them. They want to reduce them. But if you're the business community, which is standing behind Donald Trump cuz they get tax cuts and they get uh breaks on regulations and they know if they're under investigation for something and they send a couple million dollars into a Trump account, the investigation goes away.

[00:31:06]This is the workforce of the future that's being undermined with the immigration policies, with the attacks on public education, with now what they're doing, which is trying to completely undermine Head Start and turn it into a uh Trump propaganda operation, take it away from large numbers of kids.

[00:31:26]We are eating our seat corn in this administration. It's the business community that will suffer along with all the rest of us who believe in a humane and decent society. And what do they say? Nothing. They don't give a [ __ ] Greedy [ __ ] traitors. No, they are they don't they don't really give a [ __ ] You know, when you look at this, you look at the cuts in key programs, whether it's to veterans or SNAP programs or programs to invest in the schools, the desire to shut down the Department of Education, but other programs as well. There's a story in the front page of the New York Times today, um, which is about how they want to cut a billion dollars in Medicaid funding to two states because they're blue states.

[00:32:12]One of which, by the way, is Minnesota.

[00:32:14]The other is California. What does that mean? That's not a number. It's old people suffering and dying for political reasons. And when I think about it and I think about the war on these old people and the war on these kids and the war on veterans and the war on people in schools, Trump's bigger war is not with Iran. It's against the American people.

[00:32:42]If you had sat down with Vladimir Putin, which apparently Cash Patel, our FBI director, is about to do, I want to give him the Aldrich Ames chair uh at the FBI >> weeks before the election.

[00:32:57]>> Yeah. And you wonder what he's going to discuss. Uh anyhow, um put that to the side. If you'd sat down with Vladimir Putin several years ago and said in your wildest dreams, if you could have a president who would do everything you wanted to undermine America, its role in the world, its national security, its ability to function as a society, what steps would you like to see taken? And it's like Donald Trump has the checklist.

[00:33:28]Everything that he's done undermines America's security at home, security abroad, and piled on that is a level of corruption that has to make even Vladimir Putin and Medyadev and the other oligarchs in Russia envious.

[00:33:49]He's walking away with billions, openly violating the law and the Constitution, as his family is doing. He's selling pardons and he's selling national security in return for money. And we can't leave this without noting that he took unconstitutionally this $400 million gift uh of a plane and spent 400 million in taxpayer money to presumably bring it up to snuff and then ended up flying it. And one wonders where the Secret Service was because when they put it into a position where it could be flown again, they didn't add the highly sophisticated counter measures against ballistic missiles or other attacks that are on every Air Force One to protect a president. He flew it rashly over to Europe. And then when they realized that they didn't have that protection, they wouldn't let him fly it back home. He lied about it, of course. And now they're sending it in to be retrofitted again. And I mention that because they're going to have these sophisticated measures that will probably add another 500 to 700 million dollar in costs to taxpayers for a plane that we didn't need right now that he likes because it's fancy and will be his. and he claims after he leaves the White House will be on display at his library.

[00:35:24]Why do we need to spend $1.1 billion or thereabouts of taxpayer money to upgrade a jet that is not going to be flown in two years? And it's all to satisfy his ego. And it's like our taxpayer money is another piggy bank for this pig.

[00:35:47]>> No question about it, Norm. I'd go on and on because there's a lot to complain about here and you're on a roll, but you also have all these hundreds of kids who are in your debate camp who need you over there because you are helping to do what the education department of the United States is not and that is prepare them for the future and also ensure that we've got a group of people who can argue for the interests of average Americans in a way that um is not adequately being done right now. So, let me once again congratulate you on the debate camp and wish you well with it and thank you and say we'll talk to you more next week and say the same to everybody else. We'll be here every day.

[00:36:32]Um and uh we hope you'll be with us for all of that. Until then, bye-bye.