Cost of Iran War Puts Country at Risk, Paul Says

[00:00:00]37.5. I don't know how that number hits you, but if you do a little quick math in your head, we're asking for about 60 and change in the supplemental budget request.

[00:00:09]Are we signing up for another ten months of work?

[00:00:12]To be fair, I think you're underestimating it.

[00:00:14]He was clear in his testimony that they also want 1.5 trillion as the base budget. Well that's right.

[00:00:20]So he currently spend a trillion. He wants 1.5 trillion.

[00:00:23]That's $500 billion increase plus another, you know, paltry 37 billion on top of the 500 billion no one in in the history of the country has ever asked this why this is more money that you can't even turn it that fast.

[00:00:38]All right. So it's it threatens our country.

[00:00:41]You know, the biggest threat we have right now is our debt.

[00:00:45]We are. Unless we are more in danger of devaluing our currency than we are of Iran invading the United States.

[00:00:51]Well, the defense secretary testified that for national security, it is critical that they get the money that they are asking for.

[00:00:57]What would you say to someone that says the actual danger that the country is?

[00:01:00]I would I would say that he's mistaken. The problem?

[00:01:04]The threat, the greatest threat to our national security is our guard.

[00:01:07]That's what Admiral Mullen said ten years ago.

[00:01:09]And it's gotten ten times worse. It is completely and utterly fiscally irresponsible to someone to ask for a 50% increase in the military, but they're not asking for the approval of Congress.

[00:01:21]We have a war that we have not voted upon.

[00:01:24]No congressional vote. Look, George Bush, at the very least came to Congress. He asked for a war, an authorization for the use of military force for Afghanistan and for Iraq without a vote.

[00:01:35]And yet that he wants us to give him a 50% increase.

[00:01:39]We're $2 trillion short this year. Increasing the military spending by 50% is absolutely irresponsible. So where does that leave the war powers argument? I thought it was interesting that the president sent a letter to Congress announcing the resumption of the war.

[00:01:53]Doesn't that get a 60 day clock ticking again?

[00:01:55]No. The only way it works for the Constitution is the initiation. A declaration of war is Congress.

[00:02:00]The War Powers Act says you can go to war if you're attacked or if you're in imminent danger. The 60 day thing is misinterpreted that you get 60 days to buy door. No, you're not supposed to fight any war unless you've been you're under imminent attack or that there's a self-defense need to do it. 60 days isn't a gift.

[00:02:18]Every time a president says, I want a 60 days to start the war.

[00:02:21]We stopped yesterday. Yes, we'll start tomorrow.

[00:02:23]Give us 60 more days. No.

[00:02:25]The English, the initiation of war. The declaration of war was given specifically to the legislature. So we're not adhering to the Constitution now. We have an unpopular war, and we have a war that's increasing prices for people already pinched by.

[00:02:41]Look, we've had 25% inflation in the last five years.

[00:02:44]Inflation is cumulative. People don't say, oh, I don't care that I had 9% inflation under Biden. They still lost 9% of the first power.

[00:02:51]It's all added up. And even with inflation going down, we've had 25% loss of purchasing power in the last five years.

[00:02:57]So people, let's say you make $50,000 and you have two kids, you're married have two kids, and if you have a 25% increase in wages, you've lost money in the last five years. And on top of that, the gas prices.

[00:03:09]There are a lot of people being pinched. And I think the elections are going to represent people very unhappy that they aren't getting by as well as they did five years ago. Will it if the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz may prove critical and at least getting the energy and gasoline costs people are paying down, why not just try to expedite the opening by finishing the job for good in Iran, going as hard militarily as possible, as the president said? Do you see us closer or farther away from getting rid of militarization? So let's just make the argument, are we better off now or before the war? So before the war, there had been discussion, but never had been a military militarization war.

[00:03:48]You've talked about it for decades, but it never happened.

[00:03:51]So now the Strait of Hormuz is militarized.

[00:03:53]So that I would argue we're worse off. You say, well, maybe we're better off because we have more leverage to get them to give up their nuclear weapons.

[00:04:01]I don't know, I'd see them dragging their heels and being sly and clever with this, and knowing that we're probably not going to put troops in there. If you really want to control the Straits of Hormuz, you would have to send a couple hundred thousand troops.

[00:04:14]And I don't think the president's inclined to do that.

[00:04:16]I think the Iranians know that. Um, I still hope for the best, and the best would be open the Strait of Hormuz and then maybe get them to trade sanctions relief for removal of enriched uranium.

[00:04:28]But I don't think we're closer to that. I think we're actually farther away.

[00:04:31]And if you tell me, oh, well, we just need more bombs.

[00:04:34]We bomb the crap out of them. We have completely and utterly annihilate. We defeated them completely.

[00:04:40]But they just don't care. And you bomb them some more than you think they're going to. My favorite one is this.

[00:04:45]They say, well, the new guys are a lot easier to work with.

[00:04:48]It's like, oh yeah. Oh, you mean the guy whose dad you killed and you blew his leg off and disfigured him?

[00:04:54]And you call him insulting things all the time?

[00:04:57]Oh, he's going to be much more inclined to sue for peace.

[00:05:00]Oh, they're more inclined to battle to the end.

[00:05:02]Yeah. And they know if they allow too much to happen that the regime could be toppled. So I think they will fight to the bitter end. So what's the course of action with everything that you just said? Um, if there's going to be a deal that trade sanctions relief, do we start drawing down our presence?

[00:05:19]Do we start bringing men and women home? They've been hanging out there for five months. Even more than that, Senator, when do Americans see their families again? So I think the military defeat hasn't gotten us closer to a deal. To get a deal, you have to give something. So the trade is this we would have to trade sanctions relief for removal of the enriched uranium.

[00:05:39]Okay. And you could argue that we're in a better position maybe to get that because we've shown our military might.

[00:05:45]I'm hopeful, but not certain that that's where we are.

[00:05:48]But that's a trade worth happening. But realize there are many hawks in my party who don't want any deal with the regime.

[00:05:54]We don't trust these scoundrels. We're never dealing with them.

[00:05:57]Right? That's our attitude.

[00:05:58]Then we've got a whole lot more chaotic, um, you know, news for the world markets.