S2 Ep1040: Bill Kristol: A Golden 747 from Hamas's Sugar Daddy
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Who are the hosts and what is the episode about?
Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. A quick shout out, we do have that Nashville event coming up May 29th. Got some tickets available for that. Chicago sold out. I decided to make a little family weekend out of it. So that might be something for you to consider as well. Come hang out with us in Nashville. Go to thebulwark.com slash events today. We've got a lot to discuss. The liberation of the American economy is on a 90-day pause. We're borrowing a new Hamas Force One from Qatar. Socialist price controls are good now. American hostage is free. Russian propaganda about a Keir Starmer cocaine vendor. A tenuous India-Pakistan ceasefire. The zone has been flooded with shit, and we're here to wade through it.
It's Monday with Bulwark Editor-at-Large Bill Kristol. What's up, Bill?
How are you, Tim? Busy weekend, you know? Busy morning today even, right? Terrorists, Air Force One, drug prices magically going down. It's really something here in Trump's America.
I know. It's brutal, you know. Today was the first day where I was like, in a while, I was like, oh, okay, I guess we got to wake up and care about this shit. But here we go.
And I want to say to you over the weekend, I feel like we're overwhelmed. Of course, they have the whole federal government like doing stuff for them, you know, and we have like the board. The fine team that we are, that will work as staff. And Congress has its small staffs trying to fight back. It is a big advantage being president of the United States. And for all their clownishness and incompetence, you know, having some people who know what they're doing and loyalists who are willing to do everything Trump wants and foreign leaders who want in some ways to – Work with Trump or, you know, use Trump, let's put it that way, you know, and give him some token victories occasionally or not rub his face in it. It is a big advantage being president.
If you think of your four years in office as, you know, just defeating your enemies and rewarding your friends, not doing something good for the country, it does feel like they're constantly coming at us with a lot of forces. Yeah.
Yeah, plenty of opportunity for that. And one other thing, I mean, this is a little bit, you know, kind of an obvious at this point observation, but it just feels particularly acute today. It's just like the reality show element of it. It's preternatural. I don't even know if it's actually strategic. I just think that he is a reality show figure. And you just have all this stuff that we're about to get into that like... wouldn't have even been news in other administrations, right? Or like, wouldn't be anything that regular people would have to care about, you know, because it would be, there'd be negotiations happening behind the scenes in Switzerland between the trade representatives. It's like only super nerds would care about it because you aren't doing like, it's 150%, it's 12%, right? Like this whole, the show of it all, I think is really, is wearying.
What are the recent developments in US-China tariffs?
also it's a good point and you know i don't watch many reality shows i'll be honest but i get the impression they keep everyone interested and excited based on ludicrous little things right oh the couple broke up i don't know and some like married you know whatever the thing is married at first sight and oh they didn't break up they're having a fight you know it is like that i mean trump obviously has internalized what you keep people interested with with what are if you step back for two seconds are trivial or you know not important things but hey there's drama you know
All right, so let's go through it. We'll go through today's reality show because it is our burden. It's our rock that we have to push up the hill. So, Liberation Day has come and gone. The U.S., after some negotiations in Switzerland over the weekend, has decided to reduce the China tariff to 30%. China's reduced the U.S. tariff to 10%. For context, this means there's an additional 20% tariff over the pre-Trump status quo for products coming into the U.S., The China State TV summed it up this way. The outcome of the trade talks with the Trump team shows China's firm countermeasures and resolute stance have been highly effective. China gets nearly all tariffs off for doing very little other than agreeing to talk.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
Who are the hosts and what is the episode about?
0:13–2:57
2
What are the recent developments in US-China tariffs?
2:57–9:49
3
How does the fluctuating tariff policy affect the economy and businesses?
9:49–17:21
4
What is the controversy surrounding the new Air Force One gift from Qatar?
17:21–24:31
5
Why is Qatar's involvement in funding Hamas and US campus protests significant?
24:31–26:59
6
What are the legal and ethical implications of accepting a foreign gift like the Qatar 747?
26:59–34:18
7
How might the Qatar 747 gift impact US foreign policy and Trump's personal interests?
34:18–55:22
Speakers
3 identifiedMore from The Bulwark Daily
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