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Chapter 1: What recent events have shaped the US-Iran conflict?
what's up what's up everybody welcome to a brand new episode of part of the problem i am dave smith he is robbie the fire bernstein we got a good one for you today how you feeling rob where are you
I'm currently still on the road and by my buddy in Pittsburgh. And this was a fantastic weekend of porches. Got in and out of Canada without any problems, which was surprising. But that show was a blast. And I got upcoming porches this weekend in White Bear Lake, Minnesota. Then I'm doing my FBI presentation after you and I run in Denver, Colorado. Then you got Raleigh, Hampstead, Myrtle Beach.
You can go to porchstore.com and see all the dates.
Hell yeah. We had a lot of fun up there in Toronto, and I'm glad you've been having fun on the porches as well. And of course, the next big date for us is out in Denver. June 18th, one night only, we'll be out in Grenwood Village. And then the 19th and the 20th of this month, June, we'll be out in Denver at the Comedy Works. This was...
Chapter 2: How did Trump's NBC interview reflect his stance on war?
you know, one of, if not the best weekends of comedy me and you have ever done together last year, sold out every show. So hoping to do the same this year, please come on out and see us in Denver, Colorado. Love that place. Let's go over what's happened this weekend for a little bit, Rob, because it has been quite an eventful weekend. You know, I almost don't even know where to start.
The, you know, when this war first broke out, I think the first thing I said about it was what a horrible way to be vindicated, you know, and that like, that has been kind of a feeling throughout this whole thing. And maybe that's, I don't know, maybe that's not what I should be focusing on, but it is a weird thing that just as this thing goes on and on, and I've experienced,
this a lot over the years with major issues where we were like staking out a position and the kind of mainstream institutions are calling us crazy for staking out this position and then little by little it's like you're like yep god damn it of course of course that's what it was okay a lot happened this weekend and i think we've kind of entered a new phase of this ridiculous war
um this was entirely predictable and we've been talking about this for for months at this point but at least to me rob iran has emerged as more of the winner more clearly the winner of this war after this weekend than even at any point throughout it even though it's been pretty obvious so far that like iran actually stands to win this asymmetric war
Let's go over it real quick, and you can kind of interject at any point, Rob, or correct me if I get the timeline of anything wrong here. But essentially what happened this weekend is, as we've been talking about basically since the ceasefire, the ceasefire first broke out, Iran is insisting that Lebanon is a part of it.
The Pakistanis backed up the Iranians early on when the ceasefire was first tentatively reached. That, yes, this was also part of it.
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Chapter 3: What role does Israel play in the current geopolitical landscape?
Donald Trump weeks ago had made a big show of announcing that he is forbidding Israel from attacking Lebanon. And as we've been covering over the last week and a half, Israel's response was to light Lebanon the fuck up. So Israel's been given an opening, in a sense, to sabotage these the peace deals. Israel does not want peace.
They want regime collapse in Iran and they want to conquer southern Lebanon. So this is working out great for them. Again, we already knew who we were in bed with for many, many decades, let alone Donald Trump during the 12 day war. He experienced this attacking the same country with the same partner, with the same dynamic. Nothing new here. Over the weekend, a lot happened.
So number one, Israel attacked southern Lebanon again. Iran responded by attacking Israel. Donald Trump then attacked.
said that israel is forbidden from responding to attacking iran and israel shockingly rob responded by attacking iran donald trump has now responded to that by saying hey you both got it out of your system we're all done everyone's ready for peace negotiations now and interestingly the iranian government's official response was absolutely let's negotiate
You know, there's a lot to kind of break down here.
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Chapter 4: How has Iran positioned itself in the ongoing conflict?
And maybe this is a major theme of kind of what's going on that I could elaborate on more later. But it is amazing how much just in terms of just the optics, the public relations of this whole thing, the larger propaganda war. It is amazing how much Israel is caught with their pants down right now. It's clearer than ever that they dragged us into this war.
It's clearer than ever that they're the reason we can't get out of the war. The other thing, Rob, that's really become crystal clear over this weekend is that Donald Trump is full of shit with his threats. Like, I don't know. Listen, it was very clear.
It was very clear as we covered in real time on the show the day after promised bridge and power plant day when Donald Trump, you know, when his bluff got called and he went, OK, instead, I'll concede to all of your plant, your demands and then walk that back. It was obvious he was full of shit, but it really became clear this weekend.
I don't know that I've ever seen a president look weaker while prosecuting a war, including, oh, Biden's withdrawal from Afghanistan. I don't know if I've ever seen a president look weaker than Donald Trump over this weekend. The guy has been talking so much shit about the destruction that he will rain down on this country if they don't capitulate.
For two straight months now, Rob, they have at every single turn wagged the middle finger in his face and gone, yo, we're not doing that. Including, by the way, this weekend, an unprecedented action of attacking Israel after they had attacked a different country.
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Chapter 5: What are the implications of Trump's foreign policy decisions?
not attacking Iran, but responding to that. Iran is stepping up their attacks. They have, over the last week, decided that they have a new doctrine now, which is not that if you hit us, we're going to hit you back, but it's the 1.5 times, as they call it, doctrine, which, by the way, doesn't exactly mean 1.5 times. It means if you hit us, we're going to hit you harder.
That's where they're at after all of these demands and threats from Donald Trump. And at every turn this weekend, Donald Trump went, OK, fine. But please don't do any more. OK, fine. But please don't do any more. OK, fine. But please don't do any more. OK, fine. But please come and negotiate. It's very clear, Rob.
Chapter 6: How do public perceptions influence political narratives?
Donald Trump don't want it no more. He just wants out. He knows that the only thing that can happen from more escalation is more escalation. Anyway, your thoughts on any of that stuff. Feel free to jump in.
You and I very rarely don't see things the same way, but I have a very different read on this. And I want I want to be clear. Donald Trump's very tricky to predict. So I say I don't say any of this is absolutes. But the read I have on the moment is that the negotiations are coming down to one side has to actually admit defeat.
Donald Trump is saying, we're not sending them any money and we're not doing anything until they play ball with us. And the Iranians are basically saying, we don't trust you at all. You got to release some money first. And so both sides are kind of saying to the other one, this does not move forward until you admit that we won and you play by our rules.
Donald Trump is doubling down on really making a trip for him to send the many money as he continues to go off about the fact that Obama had sent the money and how bad of a deal that was.
Chapter 7: What economic factors are affecting the US response to Iran?
And that was just used on nukes. Now, here's where I'm going to get a little bit more conspiratorial. I think that all of this Israel tension is theater as Donald Trump is trying to weasel restriking Iran. I think that the supposed friction of him yelling at Netanyahu reported by Axios, which has done nothing but basically do fake coverage for Donald Trump in this war.
I think that that's basically that was a theater story. And I think that this New York Times thing was potentially a theater story as well as Donald Trump wanted to take out the new, I guess, air support that Iran has. And so he got Israel to go ahead and do that.
And I think Donald Trump's playing the same game he's always been playing, which is hoping that there's some targeted strike that they can do that. changes this and gives us some momentum and creates some sort of an opening because I think Donald Trump is not actually prepared to walk away from this and make a deal because there's no good deal to be had at this time.
And he refuses to admit defeat. So my read on this is, listen, you just don't know. And I don't know if Donald Trump will go back to the warfare route, but I actually think we're at the worst moment that we've been in thus far because Donald Trump's just not willing to actually be sending them money.
Okay, so I do have a slightly different read on it than you. I agree with you that the Axios stuff is garbage. I don't buy at all that there are these tensions between Trump and Netanyahu, or I don't buy at all that the phone call was real or that this is the moment Trump's about to turn on Israel or something like that.
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Chapter 8: What are the potential outcomes of the US-Iran situation?
I feel a little bit differently about the New York Times piece. We'll get into that in a second. But I will say that, look, I think part of what's going on here is that, you know, like if you remember, it was Breitbart, Andrew Breitbart's, I believe it was his phrase that, where he said, politics is downstream from culture. And I never liked that phrase particularly because I thought it was,
I don't know. I thought it was oversimplistic and not accurate. Uh, I thought there's an important point to be made when you let people know that like culture really does affect politics. That is true, but it's not, it's, it's not sufficient to say politics is downstream from culture because obviously oftentimes culture is downstream from politics.
Um, and politics has huge impacts on culture and vice versa, but there is some impact that culture has on politics. And, um, perhaps this is the, you know, we've played a role in this, but the fact is that the Israel issue is just out in the open now in a way that it's never been before.
And with this war in Iran, it's just, it's more clear than ever that the Israel lobby and the Israeli government have kind of dragged America to this point and are trying to keep them here. And I think part of that is why you see these phony stories. OK, like it's not real, but Donald Trump needs to kind of give the impression that he's not being bullied around by these other people.
In fact, if you saw in his interview yesterday with the Financial Times, he just straight up says, I'm in control. And Benjamin Netanyahu isn't, which is a really weird thing to have to say. You know, like there's just there's never been. For example, how many times have you heard Donald Trump in an interview say, I'm the commander in chief, not Pete Hegseth. I'm running this, not Marco Rubio.
I'm in charge of this operation, not, you know, London. You know, like how many times has he has he had to make it clear that Brussels isn't calling the shots when it comes to European policy? Right. Like there's there's an admission in the denial in a weird sense.
But so I think that, you know, I think like what's going on here essentially is that Donald Trump is trying to control the narrative and change it and, you know, kind of reassert his perceived dominance.
Right.
That being said, what exactly? Like, OK, Rob, when Donald Trump comes out and says Israel do not respond and then Israel responds. OK, well, if what is the theater here? Is he trying to make himself look like like there's there's essentially two options here. Either Donald Trump is really telling Israel not to do it and they are doing it anyway.
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