179. Trump’s Iran Talks Are Breaking Down - Who’s in Charge?

14:36Katty Kay:So a little stronger, I believe.

14:38Anthony Scaramucci:I don't think so.

14:39Katty Kay:Okay, so let's have that debate. So to me, I think they have scared the daylights out of the Chinese. The Chinese AI systems failed on the battlefield. The Chinese anti-missile technology failed on the battlefield. And I think that the American military technology and the fighting power of the American military has scared the daylights out of these guys. And let me just say something about the Americans, and it's a brutal thing to say. This is a killing force. This is a fighting force. This is a group of people that have been at war since 2001, October, and they've been fighting for 25 years. There's no other military on the ground anywhere in the world that fights like the Americans or has the American military capability.

15:29Katty Kay:So you disagree with that?

15:31Anthony Scaramucci:No, I agree with that. I agree with that.

15:32Katty Kay:So he may be in a weaker position from a public opinion perspective, and he may be, he looks like an imbecile, and he's not wearing the orange makeup properly anymore, and he sounds like a nut job when he's sending out the tweets about killing civilizations. So I'm talking about Trump. I'm talking about the United States and its killing power and its military structure has scared the daylights out of the Chinese. I really do believe that. They're not ready. And by the way, the Chinese have not been in any wars. I mean, to defend the Chinese for a minute, they would say, hey, the Middle Kingdom, all we're trying to do is create some economic growth for -

16:13Anthony Scaramucci:They've not just exhausted their supplies of munitions on a war that has not necessarily helped them very much.

16:18Katty Kay:I understand that. But when you are a military strategist or a general in China, looking at the killing capability of the Americans, and you're looking at the way the Americans have got them set up, and you look at the 82nd Airborne, which they could drop anywhere in the world, okay? And you can ask your friends like Mark Polymeropoulos, these guys know how to kill people, okay? And they're the strongest killing force in the world. And so this is why this would work, Ad.

16:47Anthony Scaramucci:Let me make the case for why I think he goes in a weaker position, though, why the United States is now in a weaker position. The one thing I agree with you on the military, the American military has shown itself to be formidable and formidably powerful. But geostrategically, if you look at the outcome of this war, the countries that have benefited are Russia and China, the countries that have lost is the United States and possibly even Israel as well. and maybe the alliance because it's shown that what we used to call the West, the great Western alliance that has held the West together since the end of the Second World War, the combination of Europe and America is split.

17:30Anthony Scaramucci:Division can't be healed between those two blocks. That's a big problem for the West. That is great news for China. The one thing that America had that was asymmetric compared to China was a system of allies since the Second World War. That's been eroded. Every time that the Chinese tried to push against that system of allies, I've been told, it worked against them. It pushed those allies closer to the United States. This war has pushed those allies further away from the United States. And if you look at the polling this weekend, this extraordinary poll that came out from Politico this weekend, America's former major partners in the world all now think that China is a more reliable partner than the United States is at the moment.

18:12Anthony Scaramucci:That can change. But I think, yeah, you've got the power of the military. Sure, we knew that the American military was strong. But geo-strategically, America's lost out to China on this one.

18:22Katty Kay:Okay. So again, this is not... Everything you just said is true. You have the data to support what you're saying. But again, you got to think like a long-term leader. And I would look at the situation and say, well, America's definitely diseased. America's got huge issues. I've got a book coming out in September to talk about how we got there. But if I'm a European leader, I'm looking at this and I'm saying, okay, China sounds more sane, sounds more normal, different system than ours. They're not into Western liberalism and Western individualism like most of the people that vote for me. And the Americans still have pockets of people that live there that are still into that.

19:04Katty Kay:And maybe that group of people can win back the government. So I'm in a polished position on America. And I definitely got to deal with China because if America goes fourth Reich status, I've got to have partners away from America. But, but Cady, hear me out for a second. The Russians do not want that war to end. The Russians are delighted with this war. Okay. And so this is another reason why you need China because China would lean on Moscow to not spoil any deal. Okay. Beijing has leverage over Putin that unfortunately we don't. Okay. And I believe that this could be a moment that would surprise everybody by Donald Trump.

19:46Katty Kay:He goes to Xi. He helps Xi emerge as a Middle Eastern diplomat, a peacemaker alongside of Trump. He prevents the United States from being bogged down in the war. Okay. And what does he get out of it? He gets co-guarantor status on the nuclear situation, okay, where the Americans and the Chinese are now working alongside of each other to prevent a nuclear bomb being created by Iran. He gets long-term security guarantees by the GCC and the Americans that he's going to get his oil out of that region, okay? And then he gets to participate in the reconstruction rights of what happens eventually in Iran.

20:31Katty Kay:As they go to rebuild Iran, they also got to rebuild the liquid national gas production facility in Qatar. And then there's coordinated sanctions.

20:41Anthony Scaramucci:A lot has to go right for this to happen.

20:43Katty Kay:I understand that, but that's what you're supposed to do in government. You're supposed to think entrepreneurially in the government and you have to think realistically.

20:52Anthony Scaramucci:And where do you see the evidence of the last six weeks that this government is doing either of those things?

20:56Katty Kay:They're not, which is why I'm sitting here making this proposal on our podcast.

21:01Anthony Scaramucci:Waiting for the phone call from President Trump to say,

21:04Katty Kay:Mr. Scaramucci, please come back into office. I'm not waiting for any phone call. See, you're too sharp and stinging this morning. You're too refreshed. Okay, we got to take you down two cups of coffee. We got to get you back in the flow here.

21:20Anthony Scaramucci:No more holidays.

21:21Katty Kay:No more holidays. This way you're a little slower on stinging me. But here's what I say. They're out of control. They're fighting with each other. They're rat-effing each other. And nobody has a plan. And they're fighting for Trump's attention. The imperialists are fighting for Trump's attention, finish the job. And the doves are really nowhere in sight. But there's a blended strategy here where you could pound them a little harder. You have degraded them, Katty.

21:50Anthony Scaramucci:Although I've heard they still have half their missiles and half their drones. You've degraded them, but you have not annihilated them.

21:56Katty Kay:Okay. So you haven't done what Donald Trump has said that you've done to them, but you have degraded them. But you've put the hardliners in charge. Yeah. I think the bottom line here is think outside the box and come up with the strategy that gets you everything that you want, which is a contained, more secular Iran that's controlled by the two world superpowers with oversight. You recognize that this is a radical regime that is threatening its allies in the region. It's hurting the energy security of the globe and specifically China. Bring them to the table, okay? And this would be a way of thinking outside the box in a Nixon-Kissinger-esque sort of a way.

22:45Anthony Scaramucci:First of all, I think that's a very good idea. I'm not sure that this team is able to think this. Honestly, looking at the last six weeks, I'm not sure that this team is able to think of a strategy beyond the next three hours, because actually, even if there are people in the administration who are thinking of strategy, they get overruled, as the Wall Street Journal reported so brilliantly. Do read that piece, guys. We'll put it in our newsletter, by the president who sends out truth socials with total disregard and no communication with the national security apparatus. So, you have two tracks going on in the White House.

23:17Anthony Scaramucci:You have the president sending out truth socials, and then you possibly have a national security apparatus, which has been degraded. And it would also end up, if it happened, it would end up giving more power to China, which would be acting as a guarantor, would be acting in the region as much more of a guarantor. And I don't know in the long term, if that's what the United States needs to be doing at the moment, why give more power to China rather than less?

23:43Katty Kay:Because the alternative is unilateral pressure that takes longer, that costs more. It's true. And has a lower probability of success, okay? The Nixon China idea is also framed with containment. It's framed with containment. And so to me, you're going to have to deal with the Chinese whether you like it or not. and if you're cooperating with them in the Middle East, okay, you're less likely to have a conflict with them in the Indo-Pacific, okay? And whether you like it or not, unless you are going to try to destroy China while you're trying to destroy Iran, and it's just not going to work, Katya, okay?

24:26Katty Kay:Roosevelt wouldn't do it. Eisenhower wouldn't do it. Kissinger wouldn't do it. okay i get the fact that you want to control that oil i understand that uh and i think you could take some military steps still to further degrade iran but you got to get everybody to the negotiating table and if you bring china into this situation okay i think you are going to surprise people with how successful it would be because you have a mutuality of interest and then you have a balance of power. And I just want to remind everybody listening in, what did Kissinger write his doctoral thesis on at Harvard? He wrote it on von Metternich, okay?

25:05Katty Kay:Because what did von Metternich do with the Congress of Vienna in 1815? He balanced the power of a group of people that were fighting with each other for a thousand years. From Charlemagne to Napoleon, they were beating the hell out of each other. And he was able to secure some level of peace. Yes, There was a Franco-Prussian War in the mid-1800s, but generally there was European peace until the beginning of the First World War.

25:31Anthony Scaramucci:I think at the moment the White House is imbalancing power and not in a way that benefits the United States. Okay, we're going to take a quick break and come back and talk about whether Trump has a competency problem in his cabinet.

25:52Anthony Scaramucci:Welcome back. So another thing that struck me, Anthony, while I was away, I came back and kind of caught up on reading on the flight back from Salt Lake City yesterday and read that Atlantic article about Kash Patel, which alleges heavy drinking and how members of his security detail haven't been able to wake him up because he was intoxicated and have had to bang on his door and say, where are you? Mr. Head of the FBI, we can't get hold of you. Details, Kash Patel freaking out because he got locked out of his computer and thought that the White House had fired him. It turns out it was a routine IT problem.

26:28Anthony Scaramucci:Lots of impulsive announcements, prematurely declaring the detention of a person of interest in high profile shooting and then having to row back on it. And everyone in the FBI basically waiting for him to get fired. I thought the article was interesting. It didn't surprise me that much, but it did make me think, wow, here we are at a time of war and let's run through who is at the top of some of the biggest national security agencies in the administration. We've got Kash Patel at the FBI. We've got Pete Hegseth at the Department of Defense. And we've got Tulsi Gabbard, who is the DNI, Director of National Intelligence, who has basically not been heard of in the Iran war for the last few weeks.

27:12Anthony Scaramucci:And how much confidence do you have in the ability of those people who, when they were nominated, everybody, including in the Republican Party, was questioning their credentials for their jobs? I don't think there was anyone in the Senate on the Republican side who would have come forward and said, Kash Patel is uniquely qualified to run the FBI. Pete Hegseth is uniquely qualified to run the Department of Defense. And Talcy Gabba, the former congresswoman from Hawaii, is uniquely qualified to run the country's intelligence.

27:46Katty Kay:All three of them have something in common, and I'm going to agree with you that they're not uniquely qualified to run these roles, but they are. And the question I have for you is actually, are they uniquely qualified to serve Donald Trump?

28:01Anthony Scaramucci:Well, that's the issue. So what do they have in common?

28:04Katty Kay:Yes. What do they have in common, Katie? Tell us. They have absolute loyalty to Donald Trump and promises made to him to do things that Donald

28:14Anthony Scaramucci:Trump wanted. And that loyalty combined with the fact that none of those three people has the kind of experience you would normally find in a cabinet member in that position makes them indebted to Donald Trump. They have their jobs because of their loyalty to Donald Trump. They do not have their jobs because of past experience, which qualifies them to do their jobs. And Donald Trump knows that. So he has chosen people who he can put in those positions who know that they are only the head of the FBI, the head of the Department of War, Defense, the head of dni because they are loyal to him which gives the him a enormous amount of power over them right i mean that that's why they have their jobs so you are a seasoned journalist

29:10Katty Kay:and sarah fitzpatrick who i read her byline often i believe that she is a seasoned journalist and she has written that he is so drunk that they've had quote unquote breaching equipment where they couldn't wake him behind locked doors.

29:30Anthony Scaramucci:This is his security detail you mean has to get special equipment in order to be able to break the door down.

29:35Katty Kay:Breaching equipment. This is in the article.

29:38Anthony Scaramucci:Like you do in a hostage situation or something.

29:40Katty Kay:Exactly. Okay. They're coming at the door with a big hammer to blow the door open to make sure that he's not dead. And we do have video of him on a junket to Italy where he's celebrating with the U.S. Olympic team. What is he doing in that video, Kat? Do you remember?

29:57Anthony Scaramucci:He's not drinking glasses of milk.

29:59Katty Kay:You know, let's go to the ethics handbook. Not that the president threw that ethics handbook out. But in the DOJ ethics handbook, it prohibits employees from habitually using alcohol or intoxicants to excess. so caddy he's suing her he says maybe he will maybe he won't he was on maria bartiromo's show over the weekend denying all the allegations praying his crime fighting skills and blah blah blah but uh is she a talented journalist and do you think she has her facts straight and do you think she has her facts well documented and do you think the lawyers at the atlantic after reviewing all her sources and methods and approve the article.

30:42Katty Kay:Where do you think this is going to go, Katty?

30:45Anthony Scaramucci:Trump's playbook is often to launch lawsuits that then either fizzle or have to be retracted. And he's in a host of them at the moment with various news organizations. He hasn't yet won one against a news organization. The Atlantic, she says, and she put out a tweet this morning saying that she's standing by her story and they have all of the facts. Given the way that people are dissatisfied with Kash Patel and are leaking from inside the FBI, and the details of her story, generally when you read a story, it's the details, right? It's things like the security detail has taken breaching equipment in order to make sure that they can get him.

31:25Anthony Scaramucci:Those are the kinds of things that make you think that a story is more likely to be true than not. And then I think you can look, this is where the background comes into play. If Kash Patel had been nominated and there had been across the board recognition that he was well qualified for his job just because of who he is and his background and his experience, and that there were no allegations of impropriety before he got the job, I think people would see this story with a little bit more skepticism. But even during that interview with Maria Bartiromo, what is he keen to say? Maria Bartiromo asks him, what's the latest on whether the 2020 election was rigged?

32:10Anthony Scaramucci:Interesting question from a TV host, but anyway. And he says, we've got all of the details. We're going to present it. We know the 2020 election was rigged. That's why he's in the job. He's in the job to enact retribution. He's in the job because he is the guy that came out and said, FBI instigated January the 6th and needs reforms, right? Okay.

32:29Katty Kay:Was the 2020 election rigged, Katty?

32:32Anthony Scaramucci:63 different lawsuits filed by the Trump administration, by the Trump team found, were thrown out of court. No, the 2020 election was not rigged.

32:41Katty Kay:And we've had experts explain why, and we've had people explain the whole polling situation. But was it rigged? But was Donald Trump's ego hurt by the fact that sleepy Joe Biden beat him when he was a sitting president?

32:58Anthony Scaramucci:And did he want a director of the FBI whose main job would be to enact retribution against his political enemies, prove that the 2020 election was rigged, and prove that the FBI instigated the Capitol Hill riot of January the 6th? I think it's fair to say that's what he wanted.

33:14Katty Kay:Yeah. And there was another article over the weekend. I want to give a shout out to Jesse McKinley. We'll put it in our newsletter. but the title of the article was in trump's orbit women aren't the only ones concerned about their looks why are you laughing katie because i are you happy to be back i saw their headline wasn't

33:32Anthony Scaramucci:that fun i thought yeah are you happy to be back katie look at you look at all of these things that i missed i missed the fact that it's not only the women who are concerned about their looks so

33:41Katty Kay:there is for donald trump okay he's checking you out katie k you could be a woman or you could be a man, but he's checking you out. And he's checking you out for a quote unquote, and I'm taking this from the article, flashes of vulnerability about how men dress. You like that, Caddy? So this is a crazy show. I'm just asking you because George W. Bush, you've met the man. Do you think he was extremely focused on how the men were dressed in his cabinet?

34:16Anthony Scaramucci:Barack Obama, was he extremely focused?

34:19Katty Kay:Joe Biden.

34:19Anthony Scaramucci:Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush.

34:25Katty Kay:So what is going on, Caddy? What is going on where we have incompetent people that are well manicured? Okay. What is going on, Caddy? You tell me. Particularly what's alarming is that we are at war at a time where manicuring is more important than competence.

34:45Anthony Scaramucci:What's going on is that these people, when they were nominated, they were found to be unqualified for their jobs, but they are a reflection of Donald Trump's ego. They're there because they reflect Donald Trump's ego. He wants you to come across well on Fox News. Why is Pete Hegseth the Secretary of Defense at a time that America's in war, Anthony? And I think we could have a very serious debate about how helpful Pete Hegseth has been over the last six weeks framing this as a Christian crusade against Iran. I'm not sure that anybody would suggest that that, including Christians, would suggest that was the most effective way to frame this war.

35:26Anthony Scaramucci:but he has single-handedly been the person in this administration who has spoken up in terms of making this some kind of a holy war against the 90 million people of Iran. Why does Pete Hegseth have his job? And how helpful has he been as Secretary of War?

35:44Katty Kay:Pete Hegseth has his job because he's a manicured television presenter. But I've got some trivia here. I have to ask you these questions. The first question is the easy question. Okay. If I say the word looks maxing. Oh. What does this word mean, Katty K? Looks maxing.

36:05Anthony Scaramucci:This is the Gen Z word of men wanting to maximize their looks by getting plastic surgery and injectables and various supplements that they're taking. That's what they're doing. All right. All right.

36:18Katty Kay:Let's not knock the injectables on this program. Okay.

36:22Anthony Scaramucci:All these supplements.

36:23Katty Kay:I'm looking for a Botox sponsor, somebody, okay? Somebody out there listening. We like the looks, Maxine. All right. So now, ready? But it's a male thing. Another word for Caddy K. Ready? Mogging. M-O-G-G-I-N-G. What does this word mean, Caddy K? Oh, I don't know.

36:39Anthony Scaramucci:Tell me. I like that word. Okay.

36:40Katty Kay:So this word is a new word for me as well. It means dominating another male in appearance. and this is now steadily percolating through the manosphere and this is something that pete hexeth is so concerned about that he has pushed photographers out of the pentagon who in his mind have taken unflattering pictures of him as he is looks maxing and he is mugging katika mugging Okay. So this is where we are in our society right now. Now, again, Donald Rumsfeld wasn't well-dressed, okay dressed, but he was an imbecile and he did cause us a disaster. But this is going an extra step in my opinion.

37:30Anthony Scaramucci:Well, I think it's going an extra step because in Pete Hegseth, there is an ideological crusade that goes along with this. That is, if Pete Hegseth just sat there and looked pretty for the photographers, that would be one thing. But Pete Hegseth is in the Pentagon, not just focusing on whether he looks good for Donald Trump and the cameras and the photographers. He's also focusing on whether he can frame this whole war in a way that is not helpful to the person that he is serving.

38:00Katty Kay:I want to go to one more thing, if you don't mind, because I know the show's ending, and I did miss you, Caddy. I did miss you. That's why you're throwing unheard of words. Even though you've hit me over the head a few times here and I have little lumps on the top of my head like a cartoon, Yosemite Sam, with the little things coming out after the hammers hit the head. But Caddy, let's go to Tulsi Gabbard for a second because Tulsi Gabbard, I think, is the one that has surprised me the most in a good way. Okay, and let me hear me out for a second. Mm-hmm. Yes, she's trying to be loyal to Donald Trump.

38:36Katty Kay:Yes, all that other stuff, but Tulsi knows. And if I had a hat and I had a red hat, I would have on the top of my hat, Tulsi knows. Now, what does she know? She knows that the election wasn't rigged. She knows that there was no threat from Iran from an intelligence point of view. And she knows that what Ratcliffe said farcical, the plan of going in and unilaterally striking Iran and causing a regime change, Tulsi knows. Okay. And Tulsi also has kept her job because she knows Katty Kay in silence. And I'd like to get you to react to that.

39:20Anthony Scaramucci:I think you're right. Of the three of them, in a way, the one that surprises me the most that she's kept her job this long is Tulsi Gabbard. We know that she's a critic of the war in Iran. Everybody knows that because of her statements prior to going into this administration and because of her silence over the last six weeks because she's not been out there talking about it in public. But I don't know that you can give Tulsi Gabbard a totally free pass because in order to make sure that she carries favor with Donald Trump. She's taken a little bit of Kash Patel's brief and has tried to get in on the act of proving that the 2020 election was rigged by going down and looking at investigations of voting records down in Georgia.

40:08Anthony Scaramucci:She has had a team working for her tasked with investigating claims that Venezuela hacked voting machines in Puerto Rico, a claim that hasn't been substantiated. So she's kept her job by being silent on Iran, but I'm not sure that she gets off scot-free on the skill with which she has run America's DNI, apart from in a purely political sense for herself.

40:31Katty Kay:She's stayed in the game. She's stayed in the game. And she knows.

40:34Anthony Scaramucci:Unlike Kristi Noem and Pam Bondi, who have not stayed in the game. Okay.

40:38Katty Kay:But Caddy? Yeah. There is one person that is literally like the universal donor. He's like the O positive. He could play anybody. He could play Byron Noem, the husband of Christy Noem. He could play Maduro. He could play the head of Iran, Marco Weathervane Rubio. I think the guy, Let me blow into the microphone. I mean, because you know the weather, it's whipping around up there. Okay. And there's just so much to say on this guy, Caddy Kay, that we're going to do two special episodes on Marco, the Weathervane Rubio, the everyman of the Trump administration, wearing those loose shoes with the high heels, Caddy, that were bought for him by Donald J.

41:30Katty Kay:Trump.

41:31Anthony Scaramucci:What does Marco Rubio really want? What does Marco Rubio really stand for? And can Marco Rubio fulfill his ambitions of being president of the United States?

41:42Katty Kay:Okay, so this is for our members. You got to go to the rest of politics, US.com. Okay, come on, join our membership. You know you want to. Okay, help us out here.

41:51Anthony Scaramucci:We're going to leave it there, guys. We will be talking about Marco Rubio. We're going to be actually going through a whole series on different members of the Trump administration. But Rubio, we're going to start with. He's somebody I have known since I first interviewed Marto Rubio when he ran for the Senate in Florida in 2010. I think I was the first foreign journalist to go down there and spend time with him driving around. And I asked him even in 2010, are we looking at the next president of the United States? And he chuckled. That is certainly the job that he wants. We're going to leave it there.

42:19Anthony Scaramucci:Join us for that. You can sign up, but the rest is politicsus.com to become a founding member. Thanks for listening, guys.

42:25Katty Kay:All right. We'll see you guys later in the week. Thanks again. Thank you.