December 23, 2025 • 41 mins
On today’s show, Josh breaks down the escalating saber-rattling out of Venezuela—why this flashpoint matters, why Americans need to pay attention, and why the president isn’t seeking war but is making the right strategic call. Josh also digs into the surge of strong economic news and explains why the president’s tone will shape how voters feel about the economy as we close out 2025. Finally, Josh unloads on the chaos coming out of The Heritage Foundation, calling out its leader’s decision to defend Tucker Carlson and what that fiasco reveals about the identity crisis gripping the Right.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Is regime change coming to Latin America? Is Nicholas Maduro
going to be in power for much longer in Caracas?
Plus a shockingly good GDP report when it comes to
the third quarter in the year twenty twenty five. Also
a mass exodus from the Heritage Foundation, the latest when
it comes to the Internet sign fighting and all the
(00:20):
chaos within the conservative movements. And Ben Satz, former Center
of Nebraska turned president of University of Florida sharing some
horrific news, but his attitude is an inspiring one. I've
got details on today's episode of the Josh Hammershaw. So
for months now, the United States has been upping the ante,
(00:43):
has impressuring Nicholas Maduro, the successor to Ugo Chavez in
the failed socialist regime in Venezuela. Perhaps you're familiar with
the story by now, but in case you are not,
that essentially goes as follows. For a very long time,
Venezuela was one of the economic power horses, one of
the engines they are in South America. They were punching
(01:03):
way above their weight when it comes to GDP per
capita and when it comes to basic economic resources, primarily
because Venezuela, uniquely among the nations of Latin America, is
blessed when it comes to hydrocarbons. The well known oil
and gas company Citgo. You probably filled up your car
at some point over the years at a Sitco station.
That is a Venezuelan oil company. They are part of OPEK,
(01:25):
the only country in Latin America that really is a
major player when it comes to the global qalanities market
for oil. So for a very long time, Venezuela was
a powerhouse down there in Latin America. Argentina for a
while was that way as well, prior to their own
descent into socialism. We'll see if Javier Malay can salvage
that country. That perhaps is an analysis and a story
(01:47):
for another day. But when it comes to Venezuela, fast
forwarding more or less to the president to the present.
So Madure has been in power for a while now.
There was a dispute election in Venezuela about six and
a half years ago. There was another Trump backed candidate
who almost gone to power, and there have been all
sorts of allegations of corruption. But Udera has been in
powered there for a while now, and the trumpministration perhaps
(02:10):
unexpectedly on the one hand, but not wholly unspectively on
the other hand, and all on path that in just
a second, there has been really pushing quite hard when
it comes to Maduro in Venezuela. And now I say
unexpectedly on the one hand, because when you think of
Donald Trump and as foreign policy, you don't necessarily think
of regime change. You necessarily think of warmongering and swashbuckling
(02:30):
looking to pick fights. However, if you look carefully at
the administration's foreign policies oction especially it's out of the
gates moves. We go all the way back to January
almost a year ago and now the beginning of administration,
it actually was in hindsight at least somewhat easy to
see this escalation campaign against Venezuela coming. And what I
mean by that is that Marco Rubio's very first trip,
(02:52):
his very first foreign trip as Secretary of State, was
actually to Latin America. It was two three different Latin
American countries, if memory, and he did that to make
a point. In fact, Maria Anastasia O'Grady, who is the
Latin Affairs called the Western Hemisphere columnists when at the
Wall Street Journal and has been for a very long time.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
There.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
She pointed this out in the first week or two
of the Trump administration, again going back almost a year ago,
because Rubio, this symbolism was not lost on his first venue,
his first choice of international trip in this hemisphere. And
this goes back a very long time. As we discussed
this on the show May Times. The Monroe Doctrine, which
eponymously goes back to the early nineteenth century President James Monroe,
(03:34):
which was corroborated by the Roosevelt Corollary, which was a
similar proclamation issued by Teddy Roosevelt in the first decade
of nineteen hundreds, and the Monroe Doctor the Trump Corollary,
which both more or less dand for the same principle,
is basically says the United States is not going to
shit back and let foreign powers meddle to mess in
our own hemisphere. You know, Gosh, Darner, We're gonna care
(03:55):
about our backyard. We're going to care about our backyard.
We're not gonna let you which back, and especially in
the era of Monroe, really meant to the European powers,
We're not going to let you meddle when it comes
to our concrete area of interest. This doctrine has actually
only become more important over the past call it fifteen
twenty twenty five years, as the global economy has become
(04:16):
even more interconnected in a post Berlin Wall era, as
global terrorist networks, narco terrorists, shei hottest networks can now
continue to sprawl all across the world and exude a
lot of influence all across the world. Hesvola, for instance,
the Lebanese militia group backed by the Irani regime. Hesbola
has long had tremendous influence when it comes to Latin America.
(04:39):
They are very cosed with many of the leading human
trafficking rings and transnational cartels when it comes to drug
smuggling and things like that. The administration started to look
into this ended up actually, this is quite a scandal
that went under the radar. The Obomba Instration ends up
actually shelving ended up deep sixing their investigation into the
ties between HESBA and the Mexican narco terrorist groups for
(05:02):
the simple reason that they didn't want to actually upset
the apple cart when it came to their sycophantic diplomacy
with the Iranian regime. So pretty pretty crazy stuff, frankly
when it comes to that. But again, Maduro is now
back in the news and trumpstry. The Trump Minstration is
reasserting this Monroe doctrine here. In fact, they actually are
now calling it the Trump corollary. There was recently unveiled
(05:25):
the Trump and National Security Strategy, this formal document that
the Trump Ministration revealed recently, and they're literally calling it
actually the Trump corollary, which is obviously a play on
the Roosevelt corollary from one hundred and twenty years ago.
More or less so, those campaign has been escalating for
months and months. One of the key parts of this
campaign has been a series of narco terrorist strikes when
(05:45):
it comes to the Pete Hechsath Secretary of War led
strikes on many of these vessels that are essentially engaged
in trying to smuggle drugs from Venezuela, worked with the
cartels gain them to the Caribbean Sea, gets to the
Gulf Mexican cog entering god forbid, here in Florida where
I live, or in Texas or one of the other
when the other ports there along the Gulf of Mexico
(06:08):
and the Atlantic seaboard. That is the primary stipulated reason
of the Hegseth led narco terrorist strikes, which we have
assistently defended here on the Josh Hammer Show as a
matter of both foreign policy and as legal principle when
it comes to both statutory and constitutional inherent authority under
Article to the Constitution to engage in such preemptive, prophylactic,
(06:30):
targeted precision strikes. Here we defend that time and time again,
and we will continue.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
To do so.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Part of the or more recent part, though, building off
of these narco terrorist strikes, which there have been now
roughly two dozen more or less of the strikes. Part
of that is an increasing campaign against Nicholas Maduro himself.
So President Trump took to truth social over the past
week or so to announce that there's going to be
a blockade there on Venezuela. It's not entirely obvious exactly
(06:56):
what that means in practice, to the best of my
knowledge of the US Navy does not have the entire
country cordons off when it comes to the seas, but
certainly Donald Trump and and the administration are upping the
pressure tremendously. In fact, Donald Trump actually was just here
in Palm Beach, Florida. In South Florida yesterday, he was
flanked at his sides by Pete Heggsauth, the Secretary of War,
on one side, by Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State,
(07:18):
on his other side, talking tough with Nicholas Maduro. So,
for instance, here was Donald Trump speaking yesterday in West
pomp Beach, Florida.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Why should Maduro take your threat serious seriously?
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And whatever he wants, what's your end?
Speaker 1 (07:32):
What's your end?
Speaker 2 (07:32):
We could do so as he could do whatever he wants.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
We have a massive armada for him, the biggest we've
ever had and by far the biggest we've ever had
in South America.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
He could do whatever he wants.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Whatever he wants to do, if he wants to do something,
If he plays tough, it'll be the last time he's
ever able to play tough.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
So this has been the rhetoric of administration for a
while now. Nicholas Turro, for what it's worth, we played
a clip on the show maybe a week or two ago,
is making very light of the situation. He had this
absurd clip of putting on like a Mexican sombrero looking
hat and singing in English non Spanish the Bob Marley
song Don't worry, be happy, I mean talk about not
(08:17):
taking the threat seriously. You know, maybe he will learn
learn the difficult lesson of not taking down trum seriously.
We shall see. Now another element of what's going on here.
I mentioned that Venezuela has oil connections. Now, the Socials
regime has typically run the oil wells dry, but they
are very close to other major petroleum hydrocarbon exporting countries
(08:37):
such as Iran. Now, Iran is not really a hydrocarbon
exporting country right now because of the various crippling sanctions
that have been on the country for a very very
long time now, but they are still very cozy when
it comes to Iran. In fact, the second oil tanker
that was just seized over this past weekend, and there
are rumors of a possible third oil tanker seizure as
(08:58):
well that also has has alleged Iranian connections there. So
Donald Trump getting asked yesterday in West Palm Beach what
happens again to the oil, A question that he's been
asked before there. But here's Donald Trump again yesterday in
West pomp Beach, far speaking of Venezuela.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
Man oil. What are we gonna do with the oil
that we have?
Speaker 1 (09:14):
I'm gonna do with what the oil that has been seized.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
The United States sees one point nine million barrels of
oil on December tenth.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
We're gonna keep it.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Where's it?
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Are we gonna sell it and put in the strategic.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
May We'll sell it, will keep it, maybe we'll use
it in the strategic reserves.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
We're keeping it. We're keeping the ship.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
So look, and that should be the reaction. I mean,
that should be the stance there if you're going to
get involved in the game of international seizure of oil
tankers sanctioned oil tankers. To be clear, and there is
plenty of legal justification for dealing with the United States
has done. The DOJ isn't working hard to get those
those legal memoranda and papers in place, And so far
(09:54):
I've been pretty persuaded by what I have seen there
from i legal front there. But when it comes to oil,
I mean, I mean, what else are you gonna do.
Of course you're going to take oyal there. I mean
that's kndu's Donald Trump both troll and also taking the
common sense and just utterly logical position. Now the big
question is where does this go from here? Now? I
was filling in on radio earlier today for Mark Davis
(10:14):
on six sixty Am. The Answer the Sale and affiliate
in Dallas Fort Worth, and I brought on a guest,
Rich Goldberg, who's a foreign policy specialist, to talk about
this and other issues. Now. Rich is not particularly persuaded
that there's going to be massive escalatory action there. He
does not takes particularly seriously the threats of Shi Jimpang,
ro Vember, Photon, are various other Maduro Venezuelan allies to
(10:37):
get involved and to potentially meddle further. I think that's
probably accurate for the very simple reason that China and
Russia didn't lift a finger to try to rescue their
Iranian ally during the Israel Iran War during the Twelve
Day War back in June. This kind of went under
the radar a little bit there. But let's not forget
that Iran's vaunted allies. I mean, if you go back
(10:59):
to that and the whole argument that this conflict when
in Gulf America in World War Three, thousands and thousands
of dead US soldier, sailors, marines. That was the whole
Tucker Carlson argument. That argument was predica in the fact
that China and Russia would get involved. Okay, you can't
have World War three if it's just Iran. You need
China and Russia to get involved. There. They didn't. They
(11:21):
didn't lift a finger. They did absolutely positively nothing. So
what exactly these argument that they would get involved then
in venta as well as well. I think that rich
Goldberg frankly is right. I'm not buying the notion that
puter hu Jinping would bother to get involved. Putin still
has his hands more than full when it comes to
Zelenski and the Ukrainian Theater. He's still sitting down with
(11:42):
Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner when it comes to trying
to get some sort of deal inked out, ironed out
when it comes to trying to get off rammed here,
that he can politically live with, that he will not
be toppled for when in the Kremlin, that he can
take back to the Russian people, and that they will
not basically decapitate him out of frustration at at the results.
I don't think she Gimping is really going to get
(12:02):
involved either. H Jinping has plenty of his own problems
there when it comes to the Indo Pacific. The Chinese economy, incidentally,
is is really shrugging right now, and the real estate
market above all. So the notion that China go ahead
and over extend their influence when it comes to trying
to bail out what a socialist backwater that's dried out
the oil wells, I'm not really necessarily buying that either.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
There.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
Now, it's also true that the MAGA coalition, Donald Trump's
supporters did not necessarily vote for a land war. I
think that's a very common sense thing to say, is
that very few people who vote over Donald Trump thought
that they were voting for fresh hostilities and a regime
change war in Latin America. But the point is this.
(12:46):
The point is that there are any number of things
that the United States can do to try to softly
or more quietly, try to persuade Nicholas Maduro to step down,
to abdicate his leadership. Look at what happened to Bashar
al Assade. Now, admittedly that was led by a bunch
of ragtag Chihatis led by this guy al Shara who's
(13:06):
still currently in charge of Damascus. But after assad was
toppled in Damascus just about a year ago. Last December,
he was on the next plane to Moscow, and you
haven't heard his name since then. I mean he's essentially living,
you know, as in the winn Is protection program, basically
Vladmir Putin in Russia style. That's what Bashar Alosad has
(13:26):
been doing for the past year now. So I think
the idea here, if I'm trying to guess what Donald
Trump and Pete had Seth and Marco Ruby are thinking,
is to try to get Nicholas Maduro to take the
Bashar al Assade offer and then to abscond to China
or Russia or I mean maybe even Havana, Cuba, if
you want to get some nice cigars. I'm being tongue
in cheek. I don't think. I don't know why you
(13:47):
necessarily choose there. I think the Cuban regime is probably
on thin ice too, for very similar reasons as Venezuela.
There's a lot of speculation that it could be two
for the price of one. If you get Maduro to abdicate,
maybe the Castro regime in Cuba could be next possible.
Probably wishful thinking, honestly, I mean, given how long they've
been in power. But they are very much tied at
the hip, is the basic argument there. I want you
(14:08):
to understand this point though. There are a lot of
folks in the right of center commentarian who have looked
at the failures of the United States when it comes
to a Rock and Afghanistan, and let's be very clear,
they are absolute failures. I have been critical for my
entire political commentary adult lifetime when it comes to the
(14:29):
foreign policy failures of Iraq and Afghanistan. I have been
deeply critical of the foreign policy doctrine that America has
an interest in exporting and promoting democracy, which is the
Bush two point zero neo conservative creed. That's not my stance.
My stance is basically the Donald Trump stance, which is
a conservative nationals realist form of foreign policy. There. But
(14:49):
a lot of folks who have also been shocked and
horrified by the Iraq and Afghanistan boondoggles have overlearned the
relevant lesson when it comes to so called regime change.
Regime change is not necessarily is not necessarily this horrific word,
hush hush, You can't say it that. A lot of
the folks on the hard isolationist Tucker wing of this
(15:11):
broader conversation want it to be we should be skeptical
of the United States imposing regime change unless, for instance,
they've already been grievously wounded. It would be a very
simple operation, like literally simple, not like quote unquote simple,
like we saw in Iraq and O three and so forth.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
There.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Maybe there's a very very limited case, limited case for
a true US imposed military game change there. But consider
the possibility that many, perhaps most, forms of regime change
don't have to happen from US military force. A regime
change taking a phase value, maybe I'm being literalists. Literally
just means a change in regime, and unless you're a moron,
(15:50):
you should be able to recognize. Indeed, it ought to
be axiomatic that there are various regimes around the world
that the American national interest would be buttressed by, would
be elevated by if that regime were not in power.
Is it not obvious that America's interest in the Indo
Pacific would in theory be better if there were a
regime change in Beijing, If the Chinese Communist Party were
(16:12):
to bow out and you get some reasonable actors in
place there really, of course, the American national interests would
be enhanced by that form of quote unquote regime change.
How about soft regime change in Russia if we got
a leader in the Kremlin who would just make total
peace with NATO. I mean, and this is kind of
(16:33):
like fairy land, you know, like the land of you know,
of unicorn farts and rainbows. Maybe it's kind of a
good dream. But I'm just making a theoretical intellectual point,
which is that, of course there are situations where there
could be a change in regime that were down to
the American national interest. And the very simple point is
that a change of the social regime in Venezuela is
one such case. Is that what's gonna happen here? Is
(16:55):
that how it's going to play out? Are we going
to get Nichols m Duro taking the bashar al asade options,
looking all this pressure around him, looking at Trump with
a tough talk, looking at the naval blockade, Trump talking
about this armada when it comes to the shifts again,
I'm thinking it's a literal three and sixty degree blockade.
But there are there's a lot of US military equipment
and vessels there now in US Southern Commands led by
(17:17):
the USS Gerald Ford Striker Group. Is Maduro going to
get the message? Is he banking on a bailout from
Putin or a huge imping that's not going to come.
I don't know. Your mileage may vary there. But what
I do know is that when it comes to the
notion of regime change, I would caution you against over learning,
against over learning the lessons of a rock in Afghanistan.
(17:38):
There are some regimes that really ought to go. There
are some regimes that, in theory them going would enhance
the American national interest. That is not to say that
is not to say that the US itself has a
moral obligation to impose it the same way that that
the United States can, and in the past sometimes has
provided forms of morals clandestine material and supports to Iranian protesters.
(18:05):
Barack Obama famously said that not doing so in two
thousand and nine during the Green Revolution Iran. Obama famous
has said that was one of his foremost failures of
foreign policy, and he had a lot to choose from
when it comes to foreign policy failures. That's the kind
of thing that the United States definitely can do in
a situation like this in Venezuela. There so the notion
of regime changing, it is not this term to be
(18:26):
feared again. I think it is problematic when the US
does it of its own accord, unless various factors ultimately
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dot Com in other news taking it back to the
(19:08):
home front, because Venezuela is not the only thing going on.
I was doing live radio this morning when the latest
economic report came out, as have we now actually have
official government data on the Q three, that is Q
three twenty twenty five, most recent quarter. The ends when
it comes to the GDP gross domestic product growth. Those
numbers coming in courtesy of the US Commerce Department four
(19:30):
point three percent. The inflation just number is coming in
at four point three percent annualized growth for July through
September twenty twenty five. That is a lot higher. That
is a lot higher than what the eCOM is polled predicted.
The consensus that I saw was roughly a full point
lower than that three point two percent forecast was among
(19:50):
the cocomas polled by the Wall Street Journals a one
point one percent ahead of that. That's even an increase
when the previous quarter three point eight percent. So look,
whatever you might think about truck tariffs, and I think
reasonable minds can vary when it comes to trade in general.
When it comes to this trade off between lower prices
and domestic production, these are these These are these are
value judgments. These are value judgments upon which are reasonable
(20:12):
people who hold reasonable differing values can indeed disagree. But
whatever there is to say about that, the economy is reving, Okay,
the economy is clearly revving. And this is going to
be just further wined at Donald Trump's sales from his
speech at the White House last Wednesday evening, six days
ago where he gave this speech touting the economy and
(20:33):
saying that it's doing really well. And now there is
further evidence, I would say to tremendously really underscore the
exact point that that he is making. Again, the terriffs,
whatever I think of them, are clearly not having an
effect at all at all. For that matter, when it
comes to the gross domestic product, the terriffs went in place,
at least the first slew of them went to place
(20:54):
in early April. That was Donald Trump's so called Liberation
Day speech at the Rose Garden of the White House there.
And now we've had a quarter and a half, we've
had basically two quarters, close to two full quarters when
it comes to GDP data, and guess what, the ECAMI
is still just reving along just fine. Let's got now
in watch Mark Tepper of Strategic Wealth Partners at the CEO.
(21:16):
He was on Fox Business talking about this new GDP report.
We are looking right now at the GDP number at
four point three percent is the actual number versus an
estra of three point three percent?
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Mark Tepper?
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Your reaction, So last week we talked about inflation coming
in lower than expected. Now economic growth is one full
percentage point faster than expected. It was supposed to come
in at three point three, came in at four point three.
This is a direct result of everything President Trump has
put in place. Net exports are on the rise because
of Trump's tariff policy, which is leveling the trade playing field.
(21:49):
AI's increasing productivity, businesses are investing in spending, and the
consumer remains strong. And just think next I think, well,
next quarter they'll end up getting an extra one hundred
and fifty billion dollars in refund checks that they can
then deploy and spend as well. So great number.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Now, the key thing on the economy is this, Whatever
the data may say, as we was playing time and
time again, perception is politics in general, but especially when
it comes to the economy. So at the same time
that this excellent Q three GDP number is coming out,
I mean, four point three percent growth is really quite good.
Is already speaking, what you really seek to achieve in
(22:30):
a first world developed a community like the US is
over three percent growth, four or five or five plus
percent growth. That's that's really desirable, really desirable there. So
this is this is number of the Donald Trump should
be proud of. At the same time. At the same time,
there was a poll that I saw from over the weekend,
a poll that was that was conducted by the American
Research Group that I saw trending on social media that said,
(22:51):
is your household financial situation better or worse off than
it was a year ago? And unfortunately for the President,
this poll showed sixty five percent American and say that
their household finanal situation is actually worse off compared to
last year, compared to seven percent that say it is
better off. The rest say that there's been no real change.
That's a problem. Now, making that connection between actual raising,
(23:14):
elevating GDP, actual macroeconomic data more generally that is trending
in a sound direction when it comes to inflation, when
it comes to GDP, when it comes to all the
various metrics there. Making that connection between that, and then
making the median American person actually feel that that is
easier said than done. That is the role for statesmen,
That is the role for first class politicians there. But
(23:36):
at least when it comes to the messaging, what we've
encouraged the President and his team to do on this
show is to try to show as much empathy as possible.
Don't be raped the American people. Don't say the ecmmyne
is great, you should be grateful for it. That is
the mistake that Joe Biden made. That's a mistake that Kareem,
Jean Pierre and the other idiots of the Biden regime
did over and over and over again. They epically botched
(23:58):
the commune. That's how we got to nine point one
er scent inflation three and a half years ago. In
the summer twenty twenty two, they epically boss you, and
then they say, basically, shut up and be grateful for it.
That's not a winning message. That is not a winning message, guys.
I'm not saying that Trump's doing that, by the way,
but I did hear at least some shades of that.
During his talk at the White House last week. He also, correctly,
(24:18):
into his great credit emphasized this is very much a
work in progress as well, so good, so continue to
emphasize that it's a work in progress. I understand that
some of you are not necessarily feeling what the economy
and the economists tell me is happening with the data there.
We are working every day to make sure that you
can fill up your truck at the pump and not
have to worry about breaking the bank count. I want
to make sure that you can go to the grocery
(24:40):
store and make sure that you're not making any trade
offs when it comes to what to feed your family
over the weekend. You know, basic things like that. Just
show a little more empathy, frankly, and I think that
would actually go a very long way. But for now,
the economic data looking really, really, really good when it
comes to the Trump administration, and that is a tremendous
credit fring. That is to the great credits of Kevin
assets to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and really just all
(25:04):
the folks general there, Scot p Assent of the Treasury Secretary,
all the folks on the economic team, they deserve a
lot of a credit.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
Now.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
I mentioned at the outset, and this is all staying
in Washington, DC. This exodus of talent from the Heritage
Foundation is starting to make some ways so to recavocate
you even follow this story and we'll cut up the
chase quickly here because this happened a while ago at
this point there in late October, shortly after Tucker Carlson
hosted the Neo Nazi Nick Funtiss on a show for
(25:32):
a puffball interview. Shortly after that, Kevin Roberts, the president
of the Herridge Foundation, released a pretty horrific video. And
I don't like christ and Kevin because I've had very
cordial relations with Kevin for many years. I think he's
a decent human being. But he made an egregious error
here in this video. And he basically defended the video
and staid there's essentially nothing Tucker could do that would
(25:52):
make him persona non grata when it comes to a
relationship with him at the Heritage Foundation. And the repercussions
have been nothing less than astonishing. This entire anti Semitism
task force that they had set up a Heritage left.
They lost various members of the board's trustees, a handful
of them actually by now, they lost some of their
(26:13):
most iconic senior fellows at the organization, people like Chris Dumouth,
people like Stephen Moore, And now just over the past
few days, somewhere between a dozen and a half and
two dozen employees, including the vast bulk of the economic
team and the legal team, have picked up and left
from the Herriage Foundation. They've either been fired or they've resigned,
(26:35):
including people who've been affiliate with Heritage for a very
long time. I mean to name just one name, Hans
von Spakowski, who is a specialist when it comes to
election law, when it comes to voter fraud, when it
comes to election integrity, illegal immigration. Hans is a first
rate scholar. He's been a Heritage for a very long time,
one of the national experts in his particular field. He resigned.
(26:56):
He resigned just yesterday, literally hours actually after he was
made the inter head or interim co head of the
Mease Legal Center, because the rest of the Legal Center
was either fired or resigned. By the way, the MEAs
of the Edwin Meaes Legal Center is a former Ronald
Reagan Attorney General, Edwin Mests, who's long and doubted that position.
He actually went ahead himself and took his namesake. He
(27:18):
took the me Center. That is literally Ronald Reagan Attorney General,
took the me Center out of Heritage and moved it
with most of the rest of the staff to AAF
Americans Advancing Freedom, which is the organization affiliated with Mike Pence.
Now we're not huge Mike Penn's fans necessarily here on
the show, and we can quit bal as to whether
or not that organization is going to save the day
when it comes to the American rights. I think probably not.
(27:41):
And I would have liked to have seen some of
these folks who were either shown the door or resign
Heritage end up at some other organization that didn't have
the taint of Mike Pence. But this is just a massive, massive,
five alarm fire at this point for the Heritage Foundation.
And it's very difficult, frankly for me to see how
they can how they can restore their credibility. I mean,
(28:02):
what exactly can you do at this point? You've lost
god knows how much money when it comes to donations,
You've lost god knows how much influence when it comes
to various members of the board who resigns, when it
comes to senior fellows of some of your most iconic people.
There what exactly is left of the Heritage Foundation team?
And I won't reveal sources, but I'm still friendly or
friends with plenty of people inside the building and the
(28:24):
Heritage Foundation headquarters. And what I am told what I
am told is that if bad people are hired to
replace the folks who left. So if they want to
double down on this Tucker friendly direction, they want to
hire a bunch of groper economists, for instance, whatever the
heck that even means, then I think there are going
to be other divisions, other teams of scholars at Heritage
(28:47):
who will exit stage left asap. So this is nothing
less than a catastrophic self inflicted wound. And if it's
self inflicted wounds that came from the place of doctor
Robert speaking of a half Heritage, that they are no
longer actually valuating principles and convictions and policies and subjective ideas.
What it means to be conservative? What is conservatism? What
(29:07):
is the American rights? Why does this matter?
Speaker 2 (29:09):
There?
Speaker 1 (29:09):
Rather announced Kevin Roberts in this now infamous video. He
announced that they are going to prioritize, among other things,
their relationship with Tucker Carlson. And this has been just
part of this now two month long saga. It's a
story that's not dying. I mean, I mean, it's kind
of crazy. Here, We're almost two months after this and
you're still having this mass excess of people from Heritage.
Where does it end? I have no idea, And frankly,
(29:33):
for the folks who are currently on the board at Heritage.
How are you guys letting this happen exactly? I mean,
how are you letting this much damage, this much carnage
happened to the institution. You know, that's frankly another question
that also be asked here as well. But this is this,
of course, happening in the broader context of the turning
Point USA and FEST conference that we spoke about a
(29:55):
great length on yesterday's show. This ongoing debate as to
what the right stand for, what are the parameters, what
who is part of the rights, who is not part
of the rights. Should we listen to certain crank conspiracy
podcasters or should we not? Interesting clip that I came
across from Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, currently the
US Ambassador to Israel, all rounds, good men, good American.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
But where does that come from? You know, there's a
difference between dom and ignorant. Dumb is that a person
cannot process information. They just don't have the capacity. They
don't have an operating system, if I put it, than
computer language. Ignorance is that the data isn't there. What
we're dealing with is not an operating system problem. It's
a data problem. We have not downloaded the proper data,
(30:39):
the correct, the true data, into the minds of younger people,
and we've assumed that they're going to grow up intellectually
curious and intellectually honest, and that they will look for themselves.
But they're not. That's the problem. They're not looking. They're
taking it face value, what some podcaster says, and the
result is absolutely dangerous.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
It's well said, it's well said. Look, our responsibility as
folks in the information business, as we discussed on yesterday's show,
is to elevate you. It is not to deflate you.
We are here to inform you, to give you informed, reasonable,
hopefully at least a semi sophisticated commentary on the day's events,
(31:23):
on the affairs of the day, of the week, the month,
and so forth. There those who are involved in something
quite different than that, who are involved in what I
like to refer to as a brain rot op, in
a sprawling brain rot operation, they do not deserve your respect.
They don't deserve your time, your clicks, your download, or
your concern. And at a certain point, if these folks
(31:48):
who think of themselves as being part of the coalition
are doing so much incredible damage to undermine that coalition's
very vitality, that coalitions very chances of success when it
comes to the ballot box, when it comes of defeating
our actual threats, which is the left something that I
couldn't agree more on than at some point those folks
(32:11):
perhaps not actually in the coalition. At the end of day,
if you were undermining your own purported cause, consider the
possibility that you were actually not part of that cause.
If you are consistently shooting yourself in the foot at best,
or trying to sabotage things at worse, then consider the
possibility that you're out. There's no need to just continually welcome, welcome, Welcome,
(32:33):
into the tent there. So again, I think that there
was part of this is a noble backlash against the
cancel culture wars for a long time, and I was
very passionate about this. I've dedicated a lot of time
speaking and writing and talking legal theory when it comes
to Section two thirty in anti trust and common carriation.
(32:56):
I spent a lot of time unpacking America is big
tech censorship issue been a major major theme of our
show and my writings outside the show for a long time.
But to say that it was wrong for mainstream conservatives
to be censored shadow band or d platforms during the
(33:17):
Jack Dorsey era of Twitter for talking about things like
the Hunter Biden laptop or about how transgenderism is alive.
That is very different. Righteous combination of shadow banning and
deplatforming for things like that. That is very different than
fast forward to today. For saying that it's quote unquote
(33:39):
cancelation to simply criticize someone else within the alleged purporterfold.
Because that's what they're saying about those of us who
don't have a problem speaking up against the Tucker Carlson,
Candice owns a Sammy. They're telling us that we're engaged
in cancelation. What again, No one's trying to cancel anyone.
(34:02):
This is a free country. Go to rumble, go to YouTube,
go to your Instagram, meals, TikTok, whatever the hell you
want to do, go get on there and monetize it
to your heart's content. That's fine with me, That's fine
with anyone. I know. What we're saying here is who
is part of the twenty twenty eight coalition. And the
(34:22):
more that you welcome in the crazies. The more that major,
major iconic concern institutions like the hairsmon Nation play foot
seat with the crazies, the greater the chances of a
president's gavenusmwhere president aocr This is the part that I
wish more people understood. For every eighteen or nineteen year
(34:43):
old basement dwelling graper that you're trying to bring into
the coalition, you're going to repulse three, four or five
relative normies, Hispanics, black men, Jews, all the various groups
that were coming increasingly to the Trump coalition, this whole
notion of the multi ethnic working class coalition. How many
(35:03):
times do we hear that buzzword? We heard a lot
because it was a real thing, young people. For goodness sake,
all these former elements of the Obama coalition have been
trending right word. It's an amazing thing. Don't mess it up.
I see a lot of people, frankly, that are interested,
if nothing else, in trying to muddy the waters, potentially
(35:25):
even mess this up. And that causes me great concern,
not really frankly as a Jew, but as an American
who wants to see America prevail. And the only way
that America prevails is for the right to prevail, and
the right must be capable of prevailing, have the intellectual
fortitude to actually prevail, and that means, frankly, patrolling our
own boundaries. One final notes for today's show, and it's
(35:48):
something of a somber one. Ben sass the former senator
from from Nebraska and he became most recently the president
of the University of Florida. Your mileage may vary on
Ben Sas as an individual. I certainly was not the
greatest fan of all of his exploits in the US Senate.
(36:10):
Sanctimonious Sassis on my former Senate staffers calt him and
those all sorts of investigative work from his time at
the University of Florida showing potential corruption there. Okay, your
mileage to me very like I said there. And I've
had my I've had my own prisons. But none of
that's really relevant for the posts that he posted earlier today.
(36:30):
And it's uh, it's really quite hard wrenching, galling stuff.
So Ben Sas posted I'm only gonna read a snippet
of it. The full thing is available at his at
his x feed at Ben SaaS he writes, quote, Friends,
this is a tough note to write, but since a
bunch of you have started to suspect something, I'll cut
to the chase. Last week I was diagnosed with metastasized
(36:52):
stage four pancreatic cancer, and I'm gonna die. Advanced pancreatic
is nasty stuff. It's a death sentence, but I already
had a death sentence. But before last week two we
all do. I'm blessed with amazing siblings and half a
dozen buddies that are genuinely brothers. As one of them
put it, sure you're on the clock, but we're all
on the clock. Death is a wicked thief, and the
(37:13):
bastard pursues us all. Look, it's a lot longer of
a post. I could read more of it, but I
think you get the gist of it. Frankly from there,
you know. I read this and I thought back to
my childhood. I grew up, among other things, as as
a diehard fan of the New York Yankees baseball team.
(37:35):
My childhood bedroom was something of a shrine to the
New York Yankees. We have partial season tickets. I watch
virtually every game in fact my brother and I are
are childhood baby sitters were actually these two brothers who
were both bat boys for the Yankees in the mid
nineteen nineties. So I grew up steeped in the Yankees
Lord and my favorite player in the history of baseball
(37:57):
was the Yankee great Lou Garrick, who many folks remember
for being the cleanup hitter when Babe Ruth was batting third.
He was rep behind Babe Ruth in the nineteen twenty
seven Yankees lineup, one of the greatest lineups in the
history of Major League Baseball, and Garrigan de was oftentimes
overshadowed by Babe Ruth. He was an extraordinary basil player
in his own right, but as extraordinary as he was
(38:20):
a player, he was arguably even more extraordinary as a
human being. He grew up dirt poor as the son
of German immigrants in New York City and then became
one of the greatest basil players of all time. And
he was dealt a tremendous blow when he was diagnosed
way way too young with als the disease that is
(38:41):
now known as Lou Gharrig's disease. And in this clip
that perhaps you have seen. If not, you should really
watch it. This grainy black and white footage from about
eighty five years ago. Now more or less, they brought
out lou Garrey that thats the Yankees in nineteen forty one,
when he was in the final year ish of his
life for lou Geyrig Appreciation Day. He also, like Ben Sas,
(39:04):
knew that he was going to die. And what Ben's
excuse me, What lou Gareg famously said was he was
not there to cry and to bemoan his bad luck,
his bad a lot in life. What he said was
today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face
of the earth. He said that he may have caught
a bad break, but he had an awful lot to
(39:25):
live for. It's one of the most inspiring things that
I've ever heard from a pro athlete, or one of
most aspiring things that I've ever heard from from frankly anyone.
And I saw shades of that in Ben SAS's post
this morning. The first thing to say is I offer
my whatever it's wor, my absolute sincereous, heartfelt condolences both
the center Sass and to his family, his children. Unspeakable stuff. Truly,
(39:49):
I simply cannot even imagine him. The broader message, perhaps,
is this, this is the most wonderful time of the year.
As we say this stretch between Thanksgiving a late no
November and New Year's Day Christmas coming up this Thursday,
It's a time of the year to take stock of
the most important things of family and congregation and community,
(40:13):
and your children, your loved ones, your faith, God Almighty
in the heavens, and we're all made in the image
of God. That's the truth of Genesis one, verse twenty seven,
the verse that changed all of human history for the better.
God loves each and every one of us. He loved
(40:34):
lou Garrig, not necessarily because Lou Gary was a Hall
of fam Basse player. He loved Lou Garrey because Louke
Garrey was one of his sons. He loves Ben Sas too,
not necessarily because Ben Sas was a senator or the
president of Universe Parry, not because Ben Sas was one
of his sons. He loves me, and he loves you too.
We all have so much to be grateful for, and
perhaps maybe this would be a particularly good time to
(40:56):
give your loved ones a particularly large hug and remind
them that you really, truly do very much love them
as smartophos. Hope you like and subscribe to The Josh
hammershow wherever you get your podcast or video fee if
you're just listening to show our video fee is available
at Newsweek's YouTube page, also available at the Salem News
Channel Salemnewschannel dot com. But for now, Josh Hammer is
(41:17):
signing off Onnday's episode of The Josh Hammers
Is regime change coming to Latin America? Is Nicholas Maduro
going to be in power for much longer in Caracas?
Plus a shockingly good GDP report when it comes to
the third quarter in the year twenty twenty five. Also
a mass exodus from the Heritage Foundation, the latest when
it comes to the Internet sign fighting and all the
(00:20):
chaos within the conservative movements. And Ben Satz, former Center
of Nebraska turned president of University of Florida sharing some
horrific news, but his attitude is an inspiring one. I've
got details on today's episode of the Josh Hammershaw. So
for months now, the United States has been upping the ante,
(00:43):
has impressuring Nicholas Maduro, the successor to Ugo Chavez in
the failed socialist regime in Venezuela. Perhaps you're familiar with
the story by now, but in case you are not,
that essentially goes as follows. For a very long time,
Venezuela was one of the economic power horses, one of
the engines they are in South America. They were punching
(01:03):
way above their weight when it comes to GDP per
capita and when it comes to basic economic resources, primarily
because Venezuela, uniquely among the nations of Latin America, is
blessed when it comes to hydrocarbons. The well known oil
and gas company Citgo. You probably filled up your car
at some point over the years at a Sitco station.
That is a Venezuelan oil company. They are part of OPEK,
(01:25):
the only country in Latin America that really is a
major player when it comes to the global qalanities market
for oil. So for a very long time, Venezuela was
a powerhouse down there in Latin America. Argentina for a
while was that way as well, prior to their own
descent into socialism. We'll see if Javier Malay can salvage
that country. That perhaps is an analysis and a story
(01:47):
for another day. But when it comes to Venezuela, fast
forwarding more or less to the president to the present.
So Madure has been in power for a while now.
There was a dispute election in Venezuela about six and
a half years ago. There was another Trump backed candidate
who almost gone to power, and there have been all
sorts of allegations of corruption. But Udera has been in
powered there for a while now, and the trumpministration perhaps
(02:10):
unexpectedly on the one hand, but not wholly unspectively on
the other hand, and all on path that in just
a second, there has been really pushing quite hard when
it comes to Maduro in Venezuela. And now I say
unexpectedly on the one hand, because when you think of
Donald Trump and as foreign policy, you don't necessarily think
of regime change. You necessarily think of warmongering and swashbuckling
(02:30):
looking to pick fights. However, if you look carefully at
the administration's foreign policies oction especially it's out of the
gates moves. We go all the way back to January
almost a year ago and now the beginning of administration,
it actually was in hindsight at least somewhat easy to
see this escalation campaign against Venezuela coming. And what I
mean by that is that Marco Rubio's very first trip,
(02:52):
his very first foreign trip as Secretary of State, was
actually to Latin America. It was two three different Latin
American countries, if memory, and he did that to make
a point. In fact, Maria Anastasia O'Grady, who is the
Latin Affairs called the Western Hemisphere columnists when at the
Wall Street Journal and has been for a very long time.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
There.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
She pointed this out in the first week or two
of the Trump administration, again going back almost a year ago,
because Rubio, this symbolism was not lost on his first venue,
his first choice of international trip in this hemisphere. And
this goes back a very long time. As we discussed
this on the show May Times. The Monroe Doctrine, which
eponymously goes back to the early nineteenth century President James Monroe,
(03:34):
which was corroborated by the Roosevelt Corollary, which was a
similar proclamation issued by Teddy Roosevelt in the first decade
of nineteen hundreds, and the Monroe Doctor the Trump Corollary,
which both more or less dand for the same principle,
is basically says the United States is not going to
shit back and let foreign powers meddle to mess in
our own hemisphere. You know, Gosh, Darner, We're gonna care
(03:55):
about our backyard. We're going to care about our backyard.
We're not gonna let you which back, and especially in
the era of Monroe, really meant to the European powers,
We're not going to let you meddle when it comes
to our concrete area of interest. This doctrine has actually
only become more important over the past call it fifteen
twenty twenty five years, as the global economy has become
(04:16):
even more interconnected in a post Berlin Wall era, as
global terrorist networks, narco terrorists, shei hottest networks can now
continue to sprawl all across the world and exude a
lot of influence all across the world. Hesvola, for instance,
the Lebanese militia group backed by the Irani regime. Hesbola
has long had tremendous influence when it comes to Latin America.
(04:39):
They are very cosed with many of the leading human
trafficking rings and transnational cartels when it comes to drug
smuggling and things like that. The administration started to look
into this ended up actually, this is quite a scandal
that went under the radar. The Obomba Instration ends up
actually shelving ended up deep sixing their investigation into the
ties between HESBA and the Mexican narco terrorist groups for
(05:02):
the simple reason that they didn't want to actually upset
the apple cart when it came to their sycophantic diplomacy
with the Iranian regime. So pretty pretty crazy stuff, frankly
when it comes to that. But again, Maduro is now
back in the news and trumpstry. The Trump Minstration is
reasserting this Monroe doctrine here. In fact, they actually are
now calling it the Trump corollary. There was recently unveiled
(05:25):
the Trump and National Security Strategy, this formal document that
the Trump Ministration revealed recently, and they're literally calling it
actually the Trump corollary, which is obviously a play on
the Roosevelt corollary from one hundred and twenty years ago.
More or less so, those campaign has been escalating for
months and months. One of the key parts of this
campaign has been a series of narco terrorist strikes when
(05:45):
it comes to the Pete Hechsath Secretary of War led
strikes on many of these vessels that are essentially engaged
in trying to smuggle drugs from Venezuela, worked with the
cartels gain them to the Caribbean Sea, gets to the
Gulf Mexican cog entering god forbid, here in Florida where
I live, or in Texas or one of the other
when the other ports there along the Gulf of Mexico
(06:08):
and the Atlantic seaboard. That is the primary stipulated reason
of the Hegseth led narco terrorist strikes, which we have
assistently defended here on the Josh Hammer Show as a
matter of both foreign policy and as legal principle when
it comes to both statutory and constitutional inherent authority under
Article to the Constitution to engage in such preemptive, prophylactic,
(06:30):
targeted precision strikes. Here we defend that time and time again,
and we will continue.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
To do so.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Part of the or more recent part, though, building off
of these narco terrorist strikes, which there have been now
roughly two dozen more or less of the strikes. Part
of that is an increasing campaign against Nicholas Maduro himself.
So President Trump took to truth social over the past
week or so to announce that there's going to be
a blockade there on Venezuela. It's not entirely obvious exactly
(06:56):
what that means in practice, to the best of my
knowledge of the US Navy does not have the entire
country cordons off when it comes to the seas, but
certainly Donald Trump and and the administration are upping the
pressure tremendously. In fact, Donald Trump actually was just here
in Palm Beach, Florida. In South Florida yesterday, he was
flanked at his sides by Pete Heggsauth, the Secretary of War,
on one side, by Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State,
(07:18):
on his other side, talking tough with Nicholas Maduro. So,
for instance, here was Donald Trump speaking yesterday in West
pomp Beach, Florida.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
Why should Maduro take your threat serious seriously?
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And whatever he wants, what's your end?
Speaker 1 (07:32):
What's your end?
Speaker 2 (07:32):
We could do so as he could do whatever he wants.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
We have a massive armada for him, the biggest we've
ever had and by far the biggest we've ever had
in South America.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
He could do whatever he wants.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Whatever he wants to do, if he wants to do something,
If he plays tough, it'll be the last time he's
ever able to play tough.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
So this has been the rhetoric of administration for a
while now. Nicholas Turro, for what it's worth, we played
a clip on the show maybe a week or two ago,
is making very light of the situation. He had this
absurd clip of putting on like a Mexican sombrero looking
hat and singing in English non Spanish the Bob Marley
song Don't worry, be happy, I mean talk about not
(08:17):
taking the threat seriously. You know, maybe he will learn
learn the difficult lesson of not taking down trum seriously.
We shall see. Now another element of what's going on here.
I mentioned that Venezuela has oil connections. Now, the Socials
regime has typically run the oil wells dry, but they
are very close to other major petroleum hydrocarbon exporting countries
(08:37):
such as Iran. Now, Iran is not really a hydrocarbon
exporting country right now because of the various crippling sanctions
that have been on the country for a very very
long time now, but they are still very cozy when
it comes to Iran. In fact, the second oil tanker
that was just seized over this past weekend, and there
are rumors of a possible third oil tanker seizure as
(08:58):
well that also has has alleged Iranian connections there. So
Donald Trump getting asked yesterday in West Palm Beach what
happens again to the oil, A question that he's been
asked before there. But here's Donald Trump again yesterday in
West pomp Beach, far speaking of Venezuela.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
Man oil. What are we gonna do with the oil
that we have?
Speaker 1 (09:14):
I'm gonna do with what the oil that has been seized.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
The United States sees one point nine million barrels of
oil on December tenth.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
We're gonna keep it.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Where's it?
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Are we gonna sell it and put in the strategic.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
May We'll sell it, will keep it, maybe we'll use
it in the strategic reserves.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
We're keeping it. We're keeping the ship.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
So look, and that should be the reaction. I mean,
that should be the stance there if you're going to
get involved in the game of international seizure of oil
tankers sanctioned oil tankers. To be clear, and there is
plenty of legal justification for dealing with the United States
has done. The DOJ isn't working hard to get those
those legal memoranda and papers in place, And so far
(09:54):
I've been pretty persuaded by what I have seen there
from i legal front there. But when it comes to oil,
I mean, I mean, what else are you gonna do.
Of course you're going to take oyal there. I mean
that's kndu's Donald Trump both troll and also taking the
common sense and just utterly logical position. Now the big
question is where does this go from here? Now? I
was filling in on radio earlier today for Mark Davis
(10:14):
on six sixty Am. The Answer the Sale and affiliate
in Dallas Fort Worth, and I brought on a guest,
Rich Goldberg, who's a foreign policy specialist, to talk about
this and other issues. Now. Rich is not particularly persuaded
that there's going to be massive escalatory action there. He
does not takes particularly seriously the threats of Shi Jimpang,
ro Vember, Photon, are various other Maduro Venezuelan allies to
(10:37):
get involved and to potentially meddle further. I think that's
probably accurate for the very simple reason that China and
Russia didn't lift a finger to try to rescue their
Iranian ally during the Israel Iran War during the Twelve
Day War back in June. This kind of went under
the radar a little bit there. But let's not forget
that Iran's vaunted allies. I mean, if you go back
(10:59):
to that and the whole argument that this conflict when
in Gulf America in World War Three, thousands and thousands
of dead US soldier, sailors, marines. That was the whole
Tucker Carlson argument. That argument was predica in the fact
that China and Russia would get involved. Okay, you can't
have World War three if it's just Iran. You need
China and Russia to get involved. There. They didn't. They
(11:21):
didn't lift a finger. They did absolutely positively nothing. So
what exactly these argument that they would get involved then
in venta as well as well. I think that rich
Goldberg frankly is right. I'm not buying the notion that
puter hu Jinping would bother to get involved. Putin still
has his hands more than full when it comes to
Zelenski and the Ukrainian Theater. He's still sitting down with
(11:42):
Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner when it comes to trying
to get some sort of deal inked out, ironed out
when it comes to trying to get off rammed here,
that he can politically live with, that he will not
be toppled for when in the Kremlin, that he can
take back to the Russian people, and that they will
not basically decapitate him out of frustration at at the results.
I don't think she Gimping is really going to get
(12:02):
involved either. H Jinping has plenty of his own problems
there when it comes to the Indo Pacific. The Chinese economy, incidentally,
is is really shrugging right now, and the real estate
market above all. So the notion that China go ahead
and over extend their influence when it comes to trying
to bail out what a socialist backwater that's dried out
the oil wells, I'm not really necessarily buying that either.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
There.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
Now, it's also true that the MAGA coalition, Donald Trump's
supporters did not necessarily vote for a land war. I
think that's a very common sense thing to say, is
that very few people who vote over Donald Trump thought
that they were voting for fresh hostilities and a regime
change war in Latin America. But the point is this.
(12:46):
The point is that there are any number of things
that the United States can do to try to softly
or more quietly, try to persuade Nicholas Maduro to step down,
to abdicate his leadership. Look at what happened to Bashar
al Assade. Now, admittedly that was led by a bunch
of ragtag Chihatis led by this guy al Shara who's
(13:06):
still currently in charge of Damascus. But after assad was
toppled in Damascus just about a year ago. Last December,
he was on the next plane to Moscow, and you
haven't heard his name since then. I mean he's essentially living,
you know, as in the winn Is protection program, basically
Vladmir Putin in Russia style. That's what Bashar Alosad has
(13:26):
been doing for the past year now. So I think
the idea here, if I'm trying to guess what Donald
Trump and Pete had Seth and Marco Ruby are thinking,
is to try to get Nicholas Maduro to take the
Bashar al Assade offer and then to abscond to China
or Russia or I mean maybe even Havana, Cuba, if
you want to get some nice cigars. I'm being tongue
in cheek. I don't think. I don't know why you
(13:47):
necessarily choose there. I think the Cuban regime is probably
on thin ice too, for very similar reasons as Venezuela.
There's a lot of speculation that it could be two
for the price of one. If you get Maduro to abdicate,
maybe the Castro regime in Cuba could be next possible.
Probably wishful thinking, honestly, I mean, given how long they've
been in power. But they are very much tied at
the hip, is the basic argument there. I want you
(14:08):
to understand this point though. There are a lot of
folks in the right of center commentarian who have looked
at the failures of the United States when it comes
to a Rock and Afghanistan, and let's be very clear,
they are absolute failures. I have been critical for my
entire political commentary adult lifetime when it comes to the
(14:29):
foreign policy failures of Iraq and Afghanistan. I have been
deeply critical of the foreign policy doctrine that America has
an interest in exporting and promoting democracy, which is the
Bush two point zero neo conservative creed. That's not my stance.
My stance is basically the Donald Trump stance, which is
a conservative nationals realist form of foreign policy. There. But
(14:49):
a lot of folks who have also been shocked and
horrified by the Iraq and Afghanistan boondoggles have overlearned the
relevant lesson when it comes to so called regime change.
Regime change is not necessarily is not necessarily this horrific word,
hush hush, You can't say it that. A lot of
the folks on the hard isolationist Tucker wing of this
(15:11):
broader conversation want it to be we should be skeptical
of the United States imposing regime change unless, for instance,
they've already been grievously wounded. It would be a very
simple operation, like literally simple, not like quote unquote simple,
like we saw in Iraq and O three and so forth.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
There.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
Maybe there's a very very limited case, limited case for
a true US imposed military game change there. But consider
the possibility that many, perhaps most, forms of regime change
don't have to happen from US military force. A regime
change taking a phase value, maybe I'm being literalists. Literally
just means a change in regime, and unless you're a moron,
(15:50):
you should be able to recognize. Indeed, it ought to
be axiomatic that there are various regimes around the world
that the American national interest would be buttressed by, would
be elevated by if that regime were not in power.
Is it not obvious that America's interest in the Indo
Pacific would in theory be better if there were a
regime change in Beijing, If the Chinese Communist Party were
(16:12):
to bow out and you get some reasonable actors in
place there really, of course, the American national interests would
be enhanced by that form of quote unquote regime change.
How about soft regime change in Russia if we got
a leader in the Kremlin who would just make total
peace with NATO. I mean, and this is kind of
(16:33):
like fairy land, you know, like the land of you know,
of unicorn farts and rainbows. Maybe it's kind of a
good dream. But I'm just making a theoretical intellectual point,
which is that, of course there are situations where there
could be a change in regime that were down to
the American national interest. And the very simple point is
that a change of the social regime in Venezuela is
one such case. Is that what's gonna happen here? Is
(16:55):
that how it's going to play out? Are we going
to get Nichols m Duro taking the bashar al asade options,
looking all this pressure around him, looking at Trump with
a tough talk, looking at the naval blockade, Trump talking
about this armada when it comes to the shifts again,
I'm thinking it's a literal three and sixty degree blockade.
But there are there's a lot of US military equipment
and vessels there now in US Southern Commands led by
(17:17):
the USS Gerald Ford Striker Group. Is Maduro going to
get the message? Is he banking on a bailout from
Putin or a huge imping that's not going to come.
I don't know. Your mileage may vary there. But what
I do know is that when it comes to the
notion of regime change, I would caution you against over learning,
against over learning the lessons of a rock in Afghanistan.
(17:38):
There are some regimes that really ought to go. There
are some regimes that, in theory them going would enhance
the American national interest. That is not to say that
is not to say that the US itself has a
moral obligation to impose it the same way that that
the United States can, and in the past sometimes has
provided forms of morals clandestine material and supports to Iranian protesters.
(18:05):
Barack Obama famously said that not doing so in two
thousand and nine during the Green Revolution Iran. Obama famous
has said that was one of his foremost failures of
foreign policy, and he had a lot to choose from
when it comes to foreign policy failures. That's the kind
of thing that the United States definitely can do in
a situation like this in Venezuela. There so the notion
of regime changing, it is not this term to be
(18:26):
feared again. I think it is problematic when the US
does it of its own accord, unless various factors ultimately
do come up. The Peddragon Cycle Rise of the Merlin
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dot Com in other news taking it back to the
(19:08):
home front, because Venezuela is not the only thing going on.
I was doing live radio this morning when the latest
economic report came out, as have we now actually have
official government data on the Q three, that is Q
three twenty twenty five, most recent quarter. The ends when
it comes to the GDP gross domestic product growth. Those
numbers coming in courtesy of the US Commerce Department four
(19:30):
point three percent. The inflation just number is coming in
at four point three percent annualized growth for July through
September twenty twenty five. That is a lot higher. That
is a lot higher than what the eCOM is polled predicted.
The consensus that I saw was roughly a full point
lower than that three point two percent forecast was among
(19:50):
the cocomas polled by the Wall Street Journals a one
point one percent ahead of that. That's even an increase
when the previous quarter three point eight percent. So look,
whatever you might think about truck tariffs, and I think
reasonable minds can vary when it comes to trade in general.
When it comes to this trade off between lower prices
and domestic production, these are these These are these are
value judgments. These are value judgments upon which are reasonable
(20:12):
people who hold reasonable differing values can indeed disagree. But
whatever there is to say about that, the economy is reving, Okay,
the economy is clearly revving. And this is going to
be just further wined at Donald Trump's sales from his
speech at the White House last Wednesday evening, six days
ago where he gave this speech touting the economy and
(20:33):
saying that it's doing really well. And now there is
further evidence, I would say to tremendously really underscore the
exact point that that he is making. Again, the terriffs,
whatever I think of them, are clearly not having an
effect at all at all. For that matter, when it
comes to the gross domestic product, the terriffs went in place,
at least the first slew of them went to place
(20:54):
in early April. That was Donald Trump's so called Liberation
Day speech at the Rose Garden of the White House there.
And now we've had a quarter and a half, we've
had basically two quarters, close to two full quarters when
it comes to GDP data, and guess what, the ECAMI
is still just reving along just fine. Let's got now
in watch Mark Tepper of Strategic Wealth Partners at the CEO.
(21:16):
He was on Fox Business talking about this new GDP report.
We are looking right now at the GDP number at
four point three percent is the actual number versus an
estra of three point three percent?
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Mark Tepper?
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Your reaction, So last week we talked about inflation coming
in lower than expected. Now economic growth is one full
percentage point faster than expected. It was supposed to come
in at three point three, came in at four point three.
This is a direct result of everything President Trump has
put in place. Net exports are on the rise because
of Trump's tariff policy, which is leveling the trade playing field.
(21:49):
AI's increasing productivity, businesses are investing in spending, and the
consumer remains strong. And just think next I think, well,
next quarter they'll end up getting an extra one hundred
and fifty billion dollars in refund checks that they can
then deploy and spend as well. So great number.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Now, the key thing on the economy is this, Whatever
the data may say, as we was playing time and
time again, perception is politics in general, but especially when
it comes to the economy. So at the same time
that this excellent Q three GDP number is coming out,
I mean, four point three percent growth is really quite good.
Is already speaking, what you really seek to achieve in
(22:30):
a first world developed a community like the US is
over three percent growth, four or five or five plus
percent growth. That's that's really desirable, really desirable there. So
this is this is number of the Donald Trump should
be proud of. At the same time. At the same time,
there was a poll that I saw from over the weekend,
a poll that was that was conducted by the American
Research Group that I saw trending on social media that said,
(22:51):
is your household financial situation better or worse off than
it was a year ago? And unfortunately for the President,
this poll showed sixty five percent American and say that
their household finanal situation is actually worse off compared to
last year, compared to seven percent that say it is
better off. The rest say that there's been no real change.
That's a problem. Now, making that connection between actual raising,
(23:14):
elevating GDP, actual macroeconomic data more generally that is trending
in a sound direction when it comes to inflation, when
it comes to GDP, when it comes to all the
various metrics there. Making that connection between that, and then
making the median American person actually feel that that is
easier said than done. That is the role for statesmen,
That is the role for first class politicians there. But
(23:36):
at least when it comes to the messaging, what we've
encouraged the President and his team to do on this
show is to try to show as much empathy as possible.
Don't be raped the American people. Don't say the ecmmyne
is great, you should be grateful for it. That is
the mistake that Joe Biden made. That's a mistake that Kareem,
Jean Pierre and the other idiots of the Biden regime
did over and over and over again. They epically botched
(23:58):
the commune. That's how we got to nine point one
er scent inflation three and a half years ago. In
the summer twenty twenty two, they epically boss you, and
then they say, basically, shut up and be grateful for it.
That's not a winning message. That is not a winning message, guys.
I'm not saying that Trump's doing that, by the way,
but I did hear at least some shades of that.
During his talk at the White House last week. He also, correctly,
(24:18):
into his great credit emphasized this is very much a
work in progress as well, so good, so continue to
emphasize that it's a work in progress. I understand that
some of you are not necessarily feeling what the economy
and the economists tell me is happening with the data there.
We are working every day to make sure that you
can fill up your truck at the pump and not
have to worry about breaking the bank count. I want
to make sure that you can go to the grocery
(24:40):
store and make sure that you're not making any trade
offs when it comes to what to feed your family
over the weekend. You know, basic things like that. Just
show a little more empathy, frankly, and I think that
would actually go a very long way. But for now,
the economic data looking really, really, really good when it
comes to the Trump administration, and that is a tremendous
credit fring. That is to the great credits of Kevin
assets to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and really just all
(25:04):
the folks general there, Scot p Assent of the Treasury Secretary,
all the folks on the economic team, they deserve a
lot of a credit.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
Now.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
I mentioned at the outset, and this is all staying
in Washington, DC. This exodus of talent from the Heritage
Foundation is starting to make some ways so to recavocate
you even follow this story and we'll cut up the
chase quickly here because this happened a while ago at
this point there in late October, shortly after Tucker Carlson
hosted the Neo Nazi Nick Funtiss on a show for
(25:32):
a puffball interview. Shortly after that, Kevin Roberts, the president
of the Herridge Foundation, released a pretty horrific video. And
I don't like christ and Kevin because I've had very
cordial relations with Kevin for many years. I think he's
a decent human being. But he made an egregious error
here in this video. And he basically defended the video
and staid there's essentially nothing Tucker could do that would
(25:52):
make him persona non grata when it comes to a
relationship with him at the Heritage Foundation. And the repercussions
have been nothing less than astonishing. This entire anti Semitism
task force that they had set up a Heritage left.
They lost various members of the board's trustees, a handful
of them actually by now, they lost some of their
(26:13):
most iconic senior fellows at the organization, people like Chris Dumouth,
people like Stephen Moore, And now just over the past
few days, somewhere between a dozen and a half and
two dozen employees, including the vast bulk of the economic
team and the legal team, have picked up and left
from the Herriage Foundation. They've either been fired or they've resigned,
(26:35):
including people who've been affiliate with Heritage for a very
long time. I mean to name just one name, Hans
von Spakowski, who is a specialist when it comes to
election law, when it comes to voter fraud, when it
comes to election integrity, illegal immigration. Hans is a first
rate scholar. He's been a Heritage for a very long time,
one of the national experts in his particular field. He resigned.
(26:56):
He resigned just yesterday, literally hours actually after he was
made the inter head or interim co head of the
Mease Legal Center, because the rest of the Legal Center
was either fired or resigned. By the way, the MEAs
of the Edwin Meaes Legal Center is a former Ronald
Reagan Attorney General, Edwin Mests, who's long and doubted that position.
He actually went ahead himself and took his namesake. He
(27:18):
took the me Center. That is literally Ronald Reagan Attorney General,
took the me Center out of Heritage and moved it
with most of the rest of the staff to AAF
Americans Advancing Freedom, which is the organization affiliated with Mike Pence.
Now we're not huge Mike Penn's fans necessarily here on
the show, and we can quit bal as to whether
or not that organization is going to save the day
when it comes to the American rights. I think probably not.
(27:41):
And I would have liked to have seen some of
these folks who were either shown the door or resign
Heritage end up at some other organization that didn't have
the taint of Mike Pence. But this is just a massive, massive,
five alarm fire at this point for the Heritage Foundation.
And it's very difficult, frankly for me to see how
they can how they can restore their credibility. I mean,
(28:02):
what exactly can you do at this point? You've lost
god knows how much money when it comes to donations,
You've lost god knows how much influence when it comes
to various members of the board who resigns, when it
comes to senior fellows of some of your most iconic people.
There what exactly is left of the Heritage Foundation team?
And I won't reveal sources, but I'm still friendly or
friends with plenty of people inside the building and the
(28:24):
Heritage Foundation headquarters. And what I am told what I
am told is that if bad people are hired to
replace the folks who left. So if they want to
double down on this Tucker friendly direction, they want to
hire a bunch of groper economists, for instance, whatever the
heck that even means, then I think there are going
to be other divisions, other teams of scholars at Heritage
(28:47):
who will exit stage left asap. So this is nothing
less than a catastrophic self inflicted wound. And if it's
self inflicted wounds that came from the place of doctor
Robert speaking of a half Heritage, that they are no
longer actually valuating principles and convictions and policies and subjective ideas.
What it means to be conservative? What is conservatism? What
(29:07):
is the American rights? Why does this matter?
Speaker 2 (29:09):
There?
Speaker 1 (29:09):
Rather announced Kevin Roberts in this now infamous video. He
announced that they are going to prioritize, among other things,
their relationship with Tucker Carlson. And this has been just
part of this now two month long saga. It's a
story that's not dying. I mean, I mean, it's kind
of crazy. Here, We're almost two months after this and
you're still having this mass excess of people from Heritage.
Where does it end? I have no idea, And frankly,
(29:33):
for the folks who are currently on the board at Heritage.
How are you guys letting this happen exactly? I mean,
how are you letting this much damage, this much carnage
happened to the institution. You know, that's frankly another question
that also be asked here as well. But this is this,
of course, happening in the broader context of the turning
Point USA and FEST conference that we spoke about a
(29:55):
great length on yesterday's show. This ongoing debate as to
what the right stand for, what are the parameters, what
who is part of the rights, who is not part
of the rights. Should we listen to certain crank conspiracy
podcasters or should we not? Interesting clip that I came
across from Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, currently the
US Ambassador to Israel, all rounds, good men, good American.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
But where does that come from? You know, there's a
difference between dom and ignorant. Dumb is that a person
cannot process information. They just don't have the capacity. They
don't have an operating system, if I put it, than
computer language. Ignorance is that the data isn't there. What
we're dealing with is not an operating system problem. It's
a data problem. We have not downloaded the proper data,
(30:39):
the correct, the true data, into the minds of younger people,
and we've assumed that they're going to grow up intellectually
curious and intellectually honest, and that they will look for themselves.
But they're not. That's the problem. They're not looking. They're
taking it face value, what some podcaster says, and the
result is absolutely dangerous.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
It's well said, it's well said. Look, our responsibility as
folks in the information business, as we discussed on yesterday's show,
is to elevate you. It is not to deflate you.
We are here to inform you, to give you informed, reasonable,
hopefully at least a semi sophisticated commentary on the day's events,
(31:23):
on the affairs of the day, of the week, the month,
and so forth. There those who are involved in something
quite different than that, who are involved in what I
like to refer to as a brain rot op, in
a sprawling brain rot operation, they do not deserve your respect.
They don't deserve your time, your clicks, your download, or
your concern. And at a certain point, if these folks
(31:48):
who think of themselves as being part of the coalition
are doing so much incredible damage to undermine that coalition's
very vitality, that coalitions very chances of success when it
comes to the ballot box, when it comes of defeating
our actual threats, which is the left something that I
couldn't agree more on than at some point those folks
(32:11):
perhaps not actually in the coalition. At the end of day,
if you were undermining your own purported cause, consider the
possibility that you were actually not part of that cause.
If you are consistently shooting yourself in the foot at best,
or trying to sabotage things at worse, then consider the
possibility that you're out. There's no need to just continually welcome, welcome, Welcome,
(32:33):
into the tent there. So again, I think that there
was part of this is a noble backlash against the
cancel culture wars for a long time, and I was
very passionate about this. I've dedicated a lot of time
speaking and writing and talking legal theory when it comes
to Section two thirty in anti trust and common carriation.
(32:56):
I spent a lot of time unpacking America is big
tech censorship issue been a major major theme of our
show and my writings outside the show for a long time.
But to say that it was wrong for mainstream conservatives
to be censored shadow band or d platforms during the
(33:17):
Jack Dorsey era of Twitter for talking about things like
the Hunter Biden laptop or about how transgenderism is alive.
That is very different. Righteous combination of shadow banning and
deplatforming for things like that. That is very different than
fast forward to today. For saying that it's quote unquote
(33:39):
cancelation to simply criticize someone else within the alleged purporterfold.
Because that's what they're saying about those of us who
don't have a problem speaking up against the Tucker Carlson,
Candice owns a Sammy. They're telling us that we're engaged
in cancelation. What again, No one's trying to cancel anyone.
(34:02):
This is a free country. Go to rumble, go to YouTube,
go to your Instagram, meals, TikTok, whatever the hell you
want to do, go get on there and monetize it
to your heart's content. That's fine with me, That's fine
with anyone. I know. What we're saying here is who
is part of the twenty twenty eight coalition. And the
(34:22):
more that you welcome in the crazies. The more that major,
major iconic concern institutions like the hairsmon Nation play foot
seat with the crazies, the greater the chances of a
president's gavenusmwhere president aocr This is the part that I
wish more people understood. For every eighteen or nineteen year
(34:43):
old basement dwelling graper that you're trying to bring into
the coalition, you're going to repulse three, four or five
relative normies, Hispanics, black men, Jews, all the various groups
that were coming increasingly to the Trump coalition, this whole
notion of the multi ethnic working class coalition. How many
(35:03):
times do we hear that buzzword? We heard a lot
because it was a real thing, young people. For goodness sake,
all these former elements of the Obama coalition have been
trending right word. It's an amazing thing. Don't mess it up.
I see a lot of people, frankly, that are interested,
if nothing else, in trying to muddy the waters, potentially
(35:25):
even mess this up. And that causes me great concern,
not really frankly as a Jew, but as an American
who wants to see America prevail. And the only way
that America prevails is for the right to prevail, and
the right must be capable of prevailing, have the intellectual
fortitude to actually prevail, and that means, frankly, patrolling our
own boundaries. One final notes for today's show, and it's
(35:48):
something of a somber one. Ben sass the former senator
from from Nebraska and he became most recently the president
of the University of Florida. Your mileage may vary on
Ben Sas as an individual. I certainly was not the
greatest fan of all of his exploits in the US Senate.
(36:10):
Sanctimonious Sassis on my former Senate staffers calt him and
those all sorts of investigative work from his time at
the University of Florida showing potential corruption there. Okay, your
mileage to me very like I said there. And I've
had my I've had my own prisons. But none of
that's really relevant for the posts that he posted earlier today.
(36:30):
And it's uh, it's really quite hard wrenching, galling stuff.
So Ben Sas posted I'm only gonna read a snippet
of it. The full thing is available at his at
his x feed at Ben SaaS he writes, quote, Friends,
this is a tough note to write, but since a
bunch of you have started to suspect something, I'll cut
to the chase. Last week I was diagnosed with metastasized
(36:52):
stage four pancreatic cancer, and I'm gonna die. Advanced pancreatic
is nasty stuff. It's a death sentence, but I already
had a death sentence. But before last week two we
all do. I'm blessed with amazing siblings and half a
dozen buddies that are genuinely brothers. As one of them
put it, sure you're on the clock, but we're all
on the clock. Death is a wicked thief, and the
(37:13):
bastard pursues us all. Look, it's a lot longer of
a post. I could read more of it, but I
think you get the gist of it. Frankly from there,
you know. I read this and I thought back to
my childhood. I grew up, among other things, as as
a diehard fan of the New York Yankees baseball team.
(37:35):
My childhood bedroom was something of a shrine to the
New York Yankees. We have partial season tickets. I watch
virtually every game in fact my brother and I are
are childhood baby sitters were actually these two brothers who
were both bat boys for the Yankees in the mid
nineteen nineties. So I grew up steeped in the Yankees
Lord and my favorite player in the history of baseball
(37:57):
was the Yankee great Lou Garrick, who many folks remember
for being the cleanup hitter when Babe Ruth was batting third.
He was rep behind Babe Ruth in the nineteen twenty
seven Yankees lineup, one of the greatest lineups in the
history of Major League Baseball, and Garrigan de was oftentimes
overshadowed by Babe Ruth. He was an extraordinary basil player
in his own right, but as extraordinary as he was
(38:20):
a player, he was arguably even more extraordinary as a
human being. He grew up dirt poor as the son
of German immigrants in New York City and then became
one of the greatest basil players of all time. And
he was dealt a tremendous blow when he was diagnosed
way way too young with als the disease that is
(38:41):
now known as Lou Gharrig's disease. And in this clip
that perhaps you have seen. If not, you should really
watch it. This grainy black and white footage from about
eighty five years ago. Now more or less, they brought
out lou Garrey that thats the Yankees in nineteen forty one,
when he was in the final year ish of his
life for lou Geyrig Appreciation Day. He also, like Ben Sas,
(39:04):
knew that he was going to die. And what Ben's
excuse me, What lou Gareg famously said was he was
not there to cry and to bemoan his bad luck,
his bad a lot in life. What he said was
today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face
of the earth. He said that he may have caught
a bad break, but he had an awful lot to
(39:25):
live for. It's one of the most inspiring things that
I've ever heard from a pro athlete, or one of
most aspiring things that I've ever heard from from frankly anyone.
And I saw shades of that in Ben SAS's post
this morning. The first thing to say is I offer
my whatever it's wor, my absolute sincereous, heartfelt condolences both
the center Sass and to his family, his children. Unspeakable stuff. Truly,
(39:49):
I simply cannot even imagine him. The broader message, perhaps,
is this, this is the most wonderful time of the year.
As we say this stretch between Thanksgiving a late no
November and New Year's Day Christmas coming up this Thursday,
It's a time of the year to take stock of
the most important things of family and congregation and community,
(40:13):
and your children, your loved ones, your faith, God Almighty
in the heavens, and we're all made in the image
of God. That's the truth of Genesis one, verse twenty seven,
the verse that changed all of human history for the better.
God loves each and every one of us. He loved
(40:34):
lou Garrig, not necessarily because Lou Gary was a Hall
of fam Basse player. He loved Lou Garrey because Louke
Garrey was one of his sons. He loves Ben Sas too,
not necessarily because Ben Sas was a senator or the
president of Universe Parry, not because Ben Sas was one
of his sons. He loves me, and he loves you too.
We all have so much to be grateful for, and
perhaps maybe this would be a particularly good time to
(40:56):
give your loved ones a particularly large hug and remind
them that you really, truly do very much love them
as smartophos. Hope you like and subscribe to The Josh
hammershow wherever you get your podcast or video fee if
you're just listening to show our video fee is available
at Newsweek's YouTube page, also available at the Salem News
Channel Salemnewschannel dot com. But for now, Josh Hammer is
(41:17):
signing off Onnday's episode of The Josh Hammers
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The Burden
The Burden is a documentary series that takes listeners into the hidden places where justice is done (and undone). It dives deep into the lives of heroes and villains. And it focuses a spotlight on those who triumph even when the odds are against them. Season 5 - The Burden: Death & Deceit in Alliance On April Fools Day 1999, 26-year-old Yvonne Layne was found murdered in her Alliance, Ohio home. David Thorne, her ex-boyfriend and father of one of her children, was instantly a suspect. Another young man admitted to the murder, and David breathed a sigh of relief, until the confessed murderer fingered David; “He paid me to do it.” David was sentenced to life without parole. Two decades later, Pulitzer winner and podcast host, Maggie Freleng (Bone Valley Season 3: Graves County, Wrongful Conviction, Suave) launched a “live” investigation into David's conviction alongside Jason Baldwin (himself wrongfully convicted as a member of the West Memphis Three). Maggie had come to believe that the entire investigation of David was botched by the tiny local police department, or worse, covered up the real killer. Was Maggie correct? Was David’s claim of innocence credible? In Death and Deceit in Alliance, Maggie recounts the case that launched her career, and ultimately, “broke” her.” The results will shock the listener and reduce Maggie to tears and self-doubt. This is not your typical wrongful conviction story. In fact, it turns the genre on its head. It asks the question: What if our champions are foolish? Season 4 - The Burden: Get the Money and Run “Trying to murder my father, this was the thing that put me on the path.” That’s Joe Loya and that path was bank robbery. Bank, bank, bank, bank, bank. In season 4 of The Burden: Get the Money and Run, we hear from Joe who was once the most prolific bank robber in Southern California, and beyond. He used disguises, body doubles, proxies. He leaped over counters, grabbed the money and ran. Even as the FBI was closing in. It was a showdown between a daring bank robber, and a patient FBI agent. Joe was no ordinary bank robber. He was bright, articulate, charismatic, and driven by a dark rage that he summoned up at will. In seven episodes, Joe tells all: the what, the how… and the why. Including why he tried to murder his father. Season 3 - The Burden: Avenger Miriam Lewin is one of Argentina’s leading journalists today. At 19 years old, she was kidnapped off the streets of Buenos Aires for her political activism and thrown into a concentration camp. Thousands of her fellow inmates were executed, tossed alive from a cargo plane into the ocean. Miriam, along with a handful of others, will survive the camp. Then as a journalist, she will wage a decades long campaign to bring her tormentors to justice. Avenger is about one woman’s triumphant battle against unbelievable odds to survive torture, claim justice for the crimes done against her and others like her, and change the future of her country. Season 2 - The Burden: Empire on Blood Empire on Blood is set in the Bronx, NY, in the early 90s, when two young drug dealers ruled an intersection known as “The Corner on Blood.” The boss, Calvin Buari, lived large. He and a protege swore they would build an empire on blood. Then the relationship frayed and the protege accused Calvin of a double homicide which he claimed he didn’t do. But did he? Award-winning journalist Steve Fishman spent seven years to answer that question. This is the story of one man’s last chance to overturn his life sentence. He may prevail, but someone’s gotta pay. The Burden: Empire on Blood is the director’s cut of the true crime classic which reached #1 on the charts when it was first released half a dozen years ago. Season 1 - The Burden In the 1990s, Detective Louis N. Scarcella was legendary. In a city overrun by violent crime, he cracked the toughest cases and put away the worst criminals. “The Hulk” was his nickname. Then the story changed. Scarcella ran into a group of convicted murderers who all say they are innocent. They turned themselves into jailhouse-lawyers and in prison founded a lway firm. When they realized Scarcella helped put many of them away, they set their sights on taking him down. And with the help of a NY Times reporter they have a chance. For years, Scarcella insisted he did nothing wrong. But that’s all he’d say. Until we tracked Scarcella to a sauna in a Russian bathhouse, where he started to talk..and talk and talk. “The guilty have gone free,” he whispered. And then agreed to take us into the belly of the beast. Welcome to The Burden.