Vance Is Stuck Between Trump and Thiel

0:00How do we fix this country? How do we come back together? I'll tell you something that's going to get me in trouble, but I couldn't care less. Irreverent news talk opinion satire. It's Newsweek Radio. I'm Jesse Edwards, and I cannot get enough of that cut. I don't know where it's been hiding all these years. I don't even know where it's from. It doesn't really even matter. Because it's probably the most truthful statement I've ever heard fall out of Donald Trump's mouth hole. I couldn't care less. Heading down to the comments section of my latest opinion article at Newsweek titled, Iran Destroyed the Trump-Vance Bromance, where I point out how Vance is being incredibly careful playing both sides of the MAGA Trump versus the Murica First crowd divide by being strategically ambiguous on a surgical level.

0:39User T4MePoleez commented, quote, I'm having a hard time believing Vance is smart enough to adopt this position out of careful considerations, but I guess he's seeing the writing on the wall. Keep your distance. And my response is that that's a fair critique because I make a pretty big assumption that there's any form of real intelligence behind this amateurish behavior that we see from figures like Trump and Vance out of the White House, but I'm also confident that billionaire oligarch Peter Thiel is not going to let his pet project investment go to waste. J.D. Vance is like a political Manchurian candidate, and that's why I think it's dangerous for people to write him off as a joke just yet, especially if he's planning an early departure because Trump gives his endorsement to Rubio.

1:20There is no way we are going to allow a con artist to take over the conservative movement, and Donald Trump is a con artist. Assuming that Trump is still alive, or at least of enough sound mind, to form a coherent sentence by then, I get more downloads talking about Trump, but my gut is telling me to keep a very close eye on J.D. Vance at the moment. I could be completely wrong, I'm more than willing to own that, but I've come too far to start second-guessing my instincts now. Somebody asked J.D. Vance about his support for the war in Iran, considering just days ago Trump told the entire world this, I would say philosophically a little bit different than me.

1:56I think he was maybe less enthusiastic about going. Here's the exchange with the reporter. Are you completely on board with the current war on Iran? I know what you're trying to do, Phil. You're trying to drive a wedge between members of the administration, between me and the president. What the president said consistently, going back to 2015, and I agreed with him, is that Iran should not have a nuclear weapon. Yeah, he sounds quite a bit more defensive than he needs to be. The reporter isn't intentionally trying to drive a wedge into the administration. He's just pointing it out. He's calling out your inconsistencies between your past statements on fighting endless wars in the Middle East and your tectonic shift in philosophy since Trump pulled you close in to make you think that you were the heir apparent so he could eliminate you as his biggest potential enemy.

2:40Because you were a never-Trump guy. We all remember. I'm a never-Trump guy. I never liked him. And nobody believes you now, Mr. Vice President. So the reporter presses him yet again. There's no hesitation given your past statements with the current operation. What do you mean there's no hesitation with my past statements? Well, we're glad you asked, Mr. Vice President. What the reporter is referring to is the mountain of past statements that you've made on camera over the last 10 years like this one. We had a long experiment in our foreign policy that traded national defense and the maintenance of our alliances for nation building and meddling in foreign countries affairs.

3:21I'm sorry. Even when those foreign countries had very little to do with core American interests. The Trump administration has reversed course. No more undefined missions. No more open ended conflicts. returning to a strategy grounded in realism and protecting our core national interests. If that doesn't sound like America's first manifesto, then I don't know what does. J.D. Vance gave that speech less than a year ago, back in May of 25. And now he's trying as hard as he can to make it seem like he's on board with this war in Iran. And it's kind of like watching a toddler being forced to eat lima beans and peas.

4:00Yuck! Two of the worst foods on the planet, in my not-so-humble opinion. But let's go back to this reporter who is daring to ask J.D. Vance about his obvious shift from no more nation building to licking Trump's boots while trying not to trigger Murica first. Given your skepticism of more adventurism, you were a critic of the global war on terror previously. Well, I think one big difference, Phil, is that we have a smart president, whereas in the past we've had dumb presidents. And I trust President Trump to get the job done, to do a good job for the American people, and to make sure that the mistakes of the past aren't repeated, absolutely.

4:31Oh, Trump was smart and they were dumb. That's probably the stupidest thing I've heard all year, which is saying something. Because I listen to a lot of stupid shit from these politicians, like I know a lot of you do too. But it's not quite as idiotic as that second part there that's easy to miss in this nonsensical shitstorm of competing agendas. He just had to add that little zinger there at the end to cover his ass. To make sure that the mistakes of the past aren't repeated, absolutely. To make sure the mistakes of the past aren't repeated. Well, they already have been. sir. And he's being so incredibly safe here yet again that I almost feel sorry for the weirdo because he must be absolutely miserable trying to walk this fine line without destroying what little influence he has left over the movement.

5:15In trying to appease both sides of the Magamerica first divide, he runs the serious risk of alienating himself from both, as they inevitably begin to see him as the slimiest opportunist to breach the White House since Trump himself. But again, I don't believe that his virtual creator, billionaire oligarch Peter Thiel, will let that happen to his Manchurian candidate creation. Picture Peter Thiel less like a donor and more like Geppetto in his workshop, carving away at a block of wood until J.D. Vance starts to resemble something lifelike enough to send out into the world. I'm a real boy! The strings are never obvious, and that's the trick, because a puppet that knows it's a puppet is useless.

5:53So Vance walks and talks and climbs like it's his own doing. Like he woke up one day fully formed and ready for power. When in reality, every moment feels just a little too precise. Every pivot just a little too convenient. Like he's being guided from somewhere off stage. And by the time he's standing in the spotlight, convincing enough to fool half the country to believing he's real, Geppetto is already in the background, smiling quietly. Because the goal was never to control him in plain sight. It was to build something that looks independent while never truly being free. If J.D. Vance ever fully realizes what it means to be pulled between Donald Trump and Peter Thiel, then something's gotta give.

6:33Because you can't serve two masters who both think that they're the sun without eventually burning up in orbit. Shut up about the sun! Shut up about the sun! That tension creeps into every decision, every public statement, every moment where loyalty is tested, and there's no clean answer that satisfies both sides. For somebody with real ambition, that kind of pressure is unsustainable. It forces a reckoning. You either pick a lane and break hard, consequences be damned, or you try to keep threading the needle until the contradictions start stacking up and the whole thing caves in on you. History doesn't look fondly upon people who think that they can balance that kind of split of allegiances forever.

7:09It usually ends in a decisive break or a very public unraveling because at some point, the act becomes impossible to maintain. It happens every time one of Trump's followers wake up and become torn between the truth and lies. And it doesn't take long for the inevitable break. Just look at his most recent fallings out with Elon Musk, who lit the fire under the Epstein scandal himself. I think it's really time for the country to get onto something else, really. Look at Marjorie Taylor Greene, his most vocal and fierce supporter in Congress, cast aside like a redheaded stepchild. What is happening to the man that I supported, you supported, the man that denounced what happened in Iraq, the man that said no more foreign wars, No more regime change.

7:51Promise it on the campaign. I couldn't care less. And now his director of national counterterrorism, Joe Kent, jumped ship, saying that Trump is now following orders directly from Israel. Here's what Trump had to say about the guy that he was responsible for hiring in the first place. I always thought he was weak on security, very weak on security. Well, then why in the hell would you hire somebody that you believed was always weak on security? I always thought he was weak on security, very weak on security. Unless you are actively trying to destroy the country from within. I think the bigger problem is the enemy from within.

8:28There I go speculating again. And oh hey, would you look at the time, we're out of it. So until we can do it again, it's Newsweek Radio. I'm Jesse Edwards. Catch you next time. Bye. But I couldn't care less. Newsweek Radio is a member of the Trust Project. We have a smart president, whereas in the past we've had dumb presidents. Nobody knows this stuff better than me. Nobody knows more about taxes than I do, and income than I do. Nobody knows more about construction than I do. Nobody knows more about campaign finance than I do. I know more about drones than anybody. Nobody knows much more about technology, this type of technology, certainly, than I do.

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