Trump Panics as War Goes Sideways

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2:46Ben Meiselas:Donald Trump is panicking. He's trying to get a ceasefire from Iran. He's trying to essentially surrender while pretending that he accomplished some big victory in Iran. But the war rages on. Three ships in the Strait of Hermoz were struck by Iran this morning after, remember, Donald Trump and all his regime were saying, try to go through. It's patriotic if you go through the Strait of Hermos. Three ships were hit by Iran. And what Donald Trump told Axios this morning is there's practically nothing left to even target of Iran. They've been so decimated, so obliterated that the war is basically over and there are no additional strikes happening from Iran into any of the neighboring Arab nations, which is not only 100 % false, but it is deeply, deeply dangerous to be lying like that.

3:42Ben Meiselas:Just take a look at what's happening this morning. Three ships were hit by projectiles from Iran near the Strait of Hermoz within three hours, as DropSite explains. The UK Maritime Monitor is saying three commercial vessels were struck by suspected projectiles within roughly three hours early Wednesday near the Strait of Hermoz. According to alerts from the UK Maritime Trade Operations, the cargo vessel Express Rome, the bulk carrier Meori Nari, and the container ship that's name is not yet disclosed. Also, if you look what's going on in Oman right now, their largest oil facility was struck. Unclear, it seems that it was struck by an Aradian drone, but not sure if it was from the Houthis or from elsewhere.

4:27Ben Meiselas:But you can see right now the main Oman storage facility right there being hit. The national average price of diesel in the U.S. has reached$4.81 per gallon, its highest level since December 15th, 2022. I mean, take a look at what that port looks like in Salal right now in Oman after this attack. And look, the British are, well, Donald Trump's like, nothing's going wrong. Everything is amazing. The British military confirming that these cargo ships are ablaze in the Strait of Hermoz. They're providing accurate updates to their people. And what the Iranian military is saying is that they are switching from what they've been referring to as reciprocal hits.

5:10Ben Meiselas:And I think they use that name because Donald Trump calls his tariffs reciprocal tariffs. They go, we're switching from reciprocal hits to now continuous strikes. And Iran is saying that their goal is to drive oil prices to$200 per barrel. They're saying, Our goal is to make you suffer economically. This is a war of attrition, and we're not going to stop. The details include Iran saying that U.S. will not be able to control oil prices. We won't allow even one liter of oil to reach the U.S., Israel, and its partners. An Iranian military spokesperson said any vessel or tanker bound to them will be a legitimate target.

5:51Ben Meiselas:Iran says that if you pass the Strait of Homoz, you need the permission of the Islamic Republic. Iran appears to be shifting their military strategy as oil prices were starting to decline, but now they're back up over$90 a barrel. And you can see right here, I mean, this is the statement from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy chief who says, after hitting those three ships that I mentioned at the beginning of this video, were these ships assured that they could pass through the Strait of Hermoz? Asked the crews aboard the ships, the Mayuri Nori and the Express Rome, who today trusted empty promises, ignored the warnings and intended to pass through the strait, but were caught.

6:34Ben Meiselas:And who was giving them those empty promises? All of the Trump regime officials, MAGA Republican senators, American business leaders, you know, who were aligned with MAGA were saying, just go through it. It's patriotic. And those three ships have now essentially been hit very hard, if not destroyed. And we're learning more about the Iranian drone attack in Kuwait that killed U.S. service members in the early hours of the war. Remember, it killed six. There was a seven soldier who died in Saudi Arabia. Six died in the drone attack in Kuwait. There was another service member who died of supposedly mysterious illnesses.

7:14Ben Meiselas:And then there are 150 wounded right now. But we're learning more about that Iranian drone attack in Kuwait that killed U.S. service members in the early hours of the war with Iran. It was far more severe than anybody had previously known, with dozens suffering injuries that included brain trauma, shrapnel trauma, and burns, per sources. More than 30 remained in the hospital, even as of yesterday, with battle injuries. And so real, real serious injuries that were taking place there. Amid all of this, we have the International Energy Agency launching the largest oil stock release ever in its history amid the Strait of Hermose shutdown and the Middle East war.

8:01Ben Meiselas:However, the international agency said its 32 member countries, including the U.S., Japan, Germany, France, the U.K., South Korea and Canada, agreed to release more than 400 million barrels of oil from emergency reserves to try to stabilize markets disrupted by the Middle East war. In other words, right now, oil would be$200 a barrel. But the United States and all of its allies are trying, or former allies or whatever, are trying to flood the market now with these emergency reserves. The problem is, if the war continues to go on and Iran realizes this, and now the emergency reserves have been drained, then what happens next?

8:44Ben Meiselas:Then if the war still goes on, you could see$250 a barrel. That's why the same way when Donald Trump handled COVID like a miracle, it's all going to go away. Just saying and pretending that the war is over as Donald Trump is trying to do is not actually a solution. The move marks only the six coordinated emergency stock release in the agency's history after previous actions in 1991, 2005, 2011 and twice in 2022. But this is by far the largest oil release that we've seen yet. So by them, the largest emergency oil release in history. So what is Senator Rick Scott saying? What is MAGA Republican Senator Rick Scott saying?

9:28Ben Meiselas:Well, he was on CNN and they said, well, why isn't the U.S. Navy escorting ships through the Strait of Hermos? Isn't this what you said they were going to do? Isn't this what the Secretary of Energy said? Isn't this what Donald Trump said? He made all of these promises about the Strait of Hermos. So what's going on? Rick Scott here, play this clip.

9:45Donald Trump:Senator, if it were possible to do so safely at this point, why isn't the U.S. Navy escorting ships through the strait?

9:57Donald Trump:I can't tell you the answer to that, but I think right now it's still a dangerous situation. It's going to take a while for us to get control over the strait of Hormuz. The most important thing we can do right now, and our job right now is we'd love to get gas prices back down. But the most important thing is destroy Iran's ability to produce a nuclear weapon, destroy their military, their ballistic missile capability, and hopefully we end up with a country that wants to work with the world community and not be constantly destroying through all their proxies. So, I mean, we all want gas prices to come down.

10:36Donald Trump:Nobody wants gas prices higher. This president doesn't want gas prices higher. but we have to be realistic. If you believe that Iran was going to use nuclear weapons against us, we had no choice but to do this and there are problems short term.

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12:02Ben Meiselas:They make for an amazing gift and with a 30-day money-back guarantee, there's no risk. That's trymiracle.com slash Midas, code Midas at checkout. Thanks to Miracle Made for sponsoring this episode. And then Rick Scott says, yeah, just unfortunately, we're just going to have to live with it. Prices are going to be up. This is just what it's going to be like for a while. Here, play this clip right here.

12:22Donald Trump:It's fascinating to me that Democrats now talk about gas prices under Obama and under Biden, they tried to destroy the U.S. oil and gas industry. So So we want prices to come down. I think, unfortunately, prices are going to be up for a while until this ends. But with Venezuela coming on, with American oil and gas coming on, with hopefully a positive resolution to this conflict, then prices will come down even further.

12:47Ben Meiselas:And we heard from Doug Burgum, the secretary of the interior, who for some reason talks about, you know, all of these wars and things. uh here's what doug bergham's like people have never been happier in the middle east about the

13:02Donald Trump:united states here play this clip when these gulf states know their refineries being targeted and their uh and the oil storage being targeted what do you say to our gulf state allies at this time what's your advice to them well i think our gulf state allies have never been happier than they have now to have u.s military presence in their country and have a strong relationship uh both economically and in terms of energy industry with the United States, they understand, you know, who supports them and who supports their growth and prosperity.

13:33Ben Meiselas:And then he was asked, like, were you guys caught by surprise by all of this? Like, were you were you caught by surprise? Here, play this clip. There's a lot. I'm reading The New York Times today, and they're claiming that you guys were

13:43Donald Trump:caught by surprise that the price of oil went up. Is that true? completely fake news there obviously but one thing i would say with president trump who's been focused on bringing prices down since the day he took office affordability has been a central part of this inheriting these high prices across the board but whether it's energy prices prescription drugs this entire administration has been focused on driving down prices and the way you do that is with supply up and of course under president trump u.s now number one oil producer in the world number one LNG producer and exporter in the world.

14:19Donald Trump:American citizens need to know that U.S. energy, we've never been in a more dominant or secure position in the history of the country than we are right now with President Trump.

14:28Ben Meiselas:So, by the way, even on Larry Kudlow, who is a MAGA sycophant, a Trump bootlicker, he said the following on his show with Newt Gingrich. If they can keep the Strait of Hormuz open, This war will, in fact, be an American defeat before very long. As Carl Tkitania says, that's a rare downbeat from Kudla, who's a Trump propagandist. Just the reality of what's going on. It's what we've been reporting now for a long time, and we've been cutting through the propaganda for you right over here. Also, farmers, the latest Farm Journal explains farmers are facing skyrocketing fertilizer prices because they get a lot of their fertilizer from the Middle East.

15:09Ben Meiselas:And so farmers are getting screwed yet again right there. Like it wasn't enough that Donald Trump's tariffs against the world screwed the markets that farmers could export to or that the input input costs were far higher by Donald Trump's tariffs against the world. Now, fertilizer prices are going to be much higher. And then the Trump sycophants, these MAGA Republican senators, though, they've been making their rounds on TV saying, look, at the end of the day, freedom isn't free. and we need to, y 'all need to sacrifice everything that we've just been talking about in this video. Just sacrifice.

15:45Ben Meiselas:This is sacrifice for Trump is what they're saying. Watch these MAGA Republican senators, what they say. We need to sacrifice on CNN here. Play this clip.

15:52Donald Trump:Right. I mean, I just ask because you described it as a hiccup, the gas prices and the change in the oil market that we're seeing. I mean, if they're lifting sanctions on Russia, clearly they're worried it could last longer than just a brief period, don't you think? I don't, Caitlin. I think you're really reaching here. I think just as quickly as we took those sanctions away, we can put them back on. So I think, again, it's one day at a time. You live in this little ivory tower here. I don't think that you're dealing with the real world that President Trump has. We don't know when the war is going to be over.

16:22Donald Trump:We don't know when the sanctions should go back on. But I think the president on a day-to-day basis is trying to do what he thinks is best for Americans. I'm asking you about gas prices that Americans are paying that are extremely high and having wild swings, in part because of the war with Iran that the president started. Right. So again, freedom is not free. Americans are going to have to make some sacrifices, but we're operating from a point of strength. Isn't it great that compared to when I was growing up in the 70s, we were so dependent upon Middle East oil. But now we're the largest producer of oil in the world, that we're the second biggest exporter of oil in the world.

16:57Donald Trump:So we're not going to be shut out economically from this. We at least have the oil here. Yes, it's a worldwide commodity, but this is one of the prices of war. Are we willing to stand here for 47 years and let Iran beat the heck out of Americans and kill thousands of Americans? Or are we willing to stand up and say enough of this?

17:15Ben Meiselas:And finally, there's also reports that China right now is, get this, they are getting very upset at how disorganized the Trump regime is, even for the state visit that is planned to China. And Donald, you know, so Trump's whole thing is he wants to go to Beijing. And normally, these state visits require like a lot of planning. So, you know, they look good. And there's a lot of kind of diplomatic things that take place before. Right. And so because Trump doesn't plan anything like in Beijing, they're just like, what are you even doing? Like setting aside all the other horrible things that Trump is doing.

17:55Ben Meiselas:China is irked by last minute scramble to plan the Xi Trump summit with three weeks until Donald Trump is supposed to meet Xi Jinping. Beijing is frustrated by what it sees as insufficient U.S. preparation that may limit the landmark summit to trade agreements and leave key diplomatic and security matters untouched. The Trump regime doesn't plan anything. Donald Trump doesn't. There's no planning to anything at all, even a state visit that Donald Trump wants for his own propaganda purposes. In any event, let me know what you think about this all. Hit subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers.

18:27Ben Meiselas:Thanks for watching.

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