Curt Mills
speaker
190 appearances
3 recordings
3 series
first heard Jan 2025
last heard 25 Mar
Curt Mills’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Mar 2026 with 1.
Appearances
Yeah, I don't know her personally, but what I will say is the role of most Pentagon reporters has always struck me since I've done this as extremely hierarchical. I mean, it- What do you mean by hierarchical? It almost felt like the reporters worked for the Pentagon.
So, I mean, in any place that I've worked that had a Pentagon correspondent. And that was the only way you stayed in the room. And- Isn't this a democracy thing?
I think it's fast moving. I mean, you didn't see criticisms or skepticisms of the military from the right until the very last few years, including from the new president, including from organs of conservative media. I think it started with Mark Milley, but also the sort of- Well, some of us were at it before that. I know, but in public opinion- It was considered a fringe position.
I think he overperformed his polling. He was insane. He was polling a certain... He was ahead, and the Bush family came in. That's when it was the last stand for Mr. Jeb in February of 2016. And George W. Bush campaigned finally for Jeb. And it was like, we've got to keep him in the race. We're going to make our stand. And he did... the big fat mistake that is Iraq debate.
And I think Trump was up 10 or 15. I think he won by over 20 in that debate. Don't quote me on that, but it was something like that. It was right before the primary. It was over the polling. So like, not only did he not go down,
There's a cynical bet though, I would say, and it's a cynical bet on Trump, and it's a cynical bet on Americans, and it's a cynical bet on Republicans and independents. Let's use the actual language of center-left or left-wing media. It's a cult. And once the cult leader leaves, we can just go back to 2005 and implant the same old free trade, open borders, endless neoconservatism.
And actually, the people that are driving the opposition to these selections in the Pentagon agree with President Trump's critics in spirit and in practice.
No, I don't agree with the cynical bet. I think it's a bad bet. Yes. Which is why the tactics are increasingly hysterical.
They won't say full-scale. They'll say that the Ayatollah has to go. It's very important to use as scary words as possible. Ayatollah, the Mullahs, the Islamic Republic emphasize, you know, and again, like...
basically the bin laden who's dead runs a country even though these different ethnicity and a different religion and so it doesn't really matter you're stupid and uh we need to do this again and like i they won't say an invasion but uh again some of the people pushing uh this stuff didn't say an invasion in 1996. they softened the ground for it.
There wasn't a debate.
Oh, so you're referring to— The Shiites. I just don't think as a rhetorical matter it's quite as easy— Should we address the actual allegation? Yes. So Wyckoff, I believe, took his real estate firm, took some sort of investment from Qatar. Okay. So first of all, I would say throughout the Trump entourage, a lot of them have worked with Gulf states.
And as far as I can tell, the real estate business— is rife with investments from Gulf states. And then additionally, as far as I'm aware, this is hardly that man's net worth.
Well, with the Qatar argument specifically, I mean, I think it's an unusual place. It was supposed to be the 8th Emirate. So it is separate from the UAE. It is the most conservative of those Emirates, I would say, at least in terms of the government. They have a perspective. They spend money on media. They spend money on press junkets. They have an influence operation. No question.
Um, but the idea that this small jetting, uh, you know, uh, LNG dependent, uh, you know, uh, peninsula, uh, controls US foreign policy, hook, line, and sinker, top to bottom, um, If you think that, I don't think you're extremely curious.
Yeah. Right. Okay. So. Yeah. But making the allegation, though, is a kind of armor, though. It makes you seem informed. It makes you seem like sort of a spymaster. You know, like, I know something you don't. I'm more serious, quote-unquote, than you. Everyone traffics in that nonsense. Yeah, yeah. Like, let's not have a conversation. And it's very anti-democratic, small d. Of course.
It is not agreeing to disagree. It is not saying we have different values than, you know, shaking each other's hand and walking out of the room. It is... It is shutting down the spirit of the system.
I think a lot of it is effective in Republican politics. Yes. Because, you know, so you were there for the inauguration I observed a week ago. And, you know, I've always observed that... is usually when I meet someone from a red state, like a deep red state, Oklahoma or Alabama, it's often their first time in Washington, D.C. It's very like a Roman province visiting Rome for the first time.
Totally. I'm here from Gaul. Show me around. Yeah.
uh versus uh i would say blue state america actually has a lot the coasts have a lot more familiarity with dc yes back and forth i think that's right et cetera et cetera so when they hear uh the argument going on in the capital there's actually a de facto trust um there that might be not as much there on the democratic side there's actually there's actually more
Showing 121–140 of 190 · page 7 of 10
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