Iran War Press Conference Turns into TOTAL DISASTER for Trump

Late Tuesday night, President Trump and the Iranian regime agreed to a two week ceasefire. At least each side agreed to a version of a ceasefire agreement. It's not sure if they agreed to the same thing. Double sided. Double team ceasefire. We'll dig into all the details in a second. But first, John, let's just see how the financial media was processing Trump's threat to take out the entire civilization of Iran. Let's watch.

Here's a clip from CNBC. The that President Trump has sat 8 p.m. Has threatened to destroy a civilization How does an investor process that is it is it a bigger upside risk or downside risk

Well, Sarah you're always gonna want a short civilizational collapse, yep, that is just that is 101 Yeah, I'm long war crimes, but I'm short genocide. The political version of this is Trump did a genocide. Where's the bounce? Coming to a Harry Enten segment near you. I sent that to some of my college friends

who are in the finance world. And one of them said,

honestly, I've been asking myself the same question.

You know, there's like an entire like Goldman Sachs desk like trying to figure out, I mean, of course, there were reports that like Citigroup was sending out analysts to see if the Strada Hormuz was closed, whatever, a lot of money is like going through the Strada Hormuz,

so we shouldn't be surprised at all. at Crooked Media, we will commit to not making financial bets based on genocide. That's something we're not gonna be focused on or covering as a network.

At least today.

And if you wanna support that kind of coverage and reporting and analysis, please consider subscribing to Pod Save America here on YouTube. And if you wanna become a subscriber to our Only Friends subscription community,

you can click join on YouTube or you go to crookedoked.com slash friends at the number one thing you could do to help. That's a good place where you can put your money. Yes, that's a good bet. It's a good way to bet your money that isn't mass death, so consider it please. We need to laugh because it's been a horrifying few weeks, but like let's now let's dig into what happened last night and why the ceasefire feels very fragile at the moment. So as of this recording, Iran is now saying the Strait of Hormuz is closed until the Israelis agree to stop bombing Lebanon.

Trump, however, told Liz Landers at PBS News this morning that no, Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire deal. So that seems like a big problem. And again, like, so the Pakistanis who facilitated this agreement, they explicitly said that Lebanon was part of the deal. This is from Prime Minister Sharif tweet last night, quote, with the greatest humility, I am pleased to announce that the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the United

States of America, along with their allies have agreed to an immediate ceasefire everywhere, including Lebanon and elsewhere, effective immediately. That seems pretty cut and dry. Yeah, apparently no one told the Israelis that. Literally. Did you see the Wall Street Journal story about this?

Yes.

I've been thinking about this. I feel like we are back to exactly where we were right after Trump gave that weird primetime address last week, which is, remember in that speech, he was basically like, well, we destroyed everything, and the straight will open up on its own, and we, remember in that speech, he was basically like, well, we destroyed everything

and the strait will open up on its own and we don't need the strait, and we did everything we needed to do and that's that. And that's basically where we are right now. We just had a threat of genocide interrupting that in the middle.

But all that's happened, it seems like, is the United States has stopped bombing stuff and Iran Iran said that they would open up the street, but now they've closed it. And even if they open it again, Iran controls the street and is charging a toll. Yeah, we gave them the de facto. I mean, basically, Trump seemed to concede in his statements last night that Iran is now in control of the street or who was. Yeah, we mentioned this earlier. The Wall Street Journal reported that the Israelis were furious

that they were not part of the ceasefire negotiations. They weren't consulted on the final text of the deal before it was done. And they have basically insisted that they're going to keep hitting targets in Lebanon. And to that point, this morning, the IDF tweeted, quote, the IDF completed the largest coordinated strike across Lebanon since the start of Operation Roaring Lion. And they said they hit 100 targets in 10 minutes.

And so a lot of geopolitical analysts I follow are wondering if this is Israel trying to collapse the entire deal by bombing the shit out of Lebanon in the moment after it happened. I don't know if you've seen some of the videos too from- It's horrifying. It's like in Beirut, in densely populated areas of Beirut. People saying it's like apocalyptic there right now.

What's happening in Lebanon is staggering. I mean, a million people have been displaced from the South. Israel is now saying they're gonna occupy like territory that stretches like 15 miles into the country.

The media always calls it a buffer zone, but it's an invasion and an occupation of another country, it's crazy. And they're doing the thing they did in Gaza, which is like every target is Hezbollah, everyone is related to Hezbollah, it's all Hezbollah, it's all terrorists, any death you see is all Hezbollah.

And that's, you know, I was talking to a friend who is Lebanese and his or in Beirut wants to rent out an apartment to someone they don't know because God forbid they are tangentially or directly connected to Hezbollah. And all of a sudden your apartment building is bombed because you let this person stay there. So it's exacerbating all these sectarian tensions. I think they killed a senior party official from the party that is opposed to Lebanon the other day. And they're like, well, he wasn't part of the target. Well, that makes sense. That's a great way

to do it. Well, President Trump, he doesn't seem worried about these details. This morning, he truth, a big day for world peace. Iran wants it to happen. They've had enough. Likewise, so has everyone else. United States of America will be lots of positive action. Big money will be made. Iran can start the reconstruction process. We'll be loading up with supplies of all kinds and just hanging out in order to make sure that everything goes well. I feel confident that it will. Just like we are experiencing in the US, this could be the golden age of the Middle East. President Donald J. Trump.

Hey, hey, Middle East, you don't want to experience this golden age. Let me tell you, we're a year and a half into it. There are, it's just, he's such a lot, like. Big money will be made? He just goes into people. He can say like three things, you know,

which is like, peace will come, peace is everywhere, I will destroy you and everyone will make money. That's it. Those are like the only three messages he has and all of them are always bullshit. It's just he's a disgusting person. Pod Save America breaking news is brought to you by ActBlue. ActBlue provides Democrats up and down the ballot with the tools they need to run effective campaigns and win. Fundraise, organize, build campaign websites, and donate with solutions that are easy to use. ActBlue's been helping campaigns for a long time now.

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and causes you believe in at actblue.com slash crooked. So this morning, Pete Hegseth, America's Secretary of Defense and most decorated war criminal slam poet. And then Dan Cain, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, they did one of their briefings. They were trying to spin the deal as a victory, even though just days ago they were bragging about all the additional targets we had to hit.

It was interesting hearing them trying to split the difference of like, Hegseth made it sound like the entire thing was over. There was kind of like a great work everybody, you know, feeling to it. And then Dan Cain was like, we stand ready. But regardless, I thought this exchange is actually the last question and answer was pretty instructive. Let's watch. Go ahead. Yes. Yes. Two questions, actually, for you.

So during this time, is the President still are you still encouraging civilians to rise up against the Iranian regime? Are they satisfied with this new regime change? Or is this a two-week period to kind of see where that leads? Also, talk about the enriched uranium going in there. Would that require special forces or other military, our service members? Who would be basically going in there and trusted to going in there to get that uranium out?

Again, on the uranium, we're watching it. We know what they have, and they will give it up, and we'll get it, and we'll take it. If we have to, we can do it in any means necessary. So that's something the President is going to solve for. We already have.

We have Midnight Hammer with the place we put them in and the reason it's in the situation where it is. The second one was about the people. Listen, I would love to see the Iranian people take advantage of this opportunity. They have been oppressed by the previous regime and they'll have a new opportunity with this regime that remains to be seen. That was not our objective in this effort, but they're brave people. Horrible things have been done to them

by the previous regime. Tens of thousands targeted and killed and assassinated in a way the government never should. And we wish them the best, absolutely. Thank you all very much.

Appreciate it.

Yeah, I mean, you know, the new regime will be holding town halls all throughout the country. They're going on a listening tour. So people have an opportunity to speak their mind.

Kick the tires. Let them know what kind of changes they're hoping for. They know that the sun is just much more liberal

in so many ways.

Froyle, GBT, I guess.

Exactly, than the father. And they have a great opportunity

now that a lot of their infrastructure has been destroyed and a couple thousand people have died. All is well. Yeah, that whole exchange, it just tells you what a mess this is. So there's no plan to get Iran's highly enriched uranium stockpile, which- The point of the whole thing.

Far and away the most important priority of the mission. So that's, put a pin in that one. And then a regime change. Trump went from saying, I want to pick Iran's next leader, remember that phase? To actually there was regime change and the new guys are cool and we're working with them.

And then Hegset there is like, it actually would be great if the Iranian people would rise up.

So best of luck. We got a dozen or so senior Iranian officials sunk a hundred or so ships, a couple thousand ballistic missiles. That's it. That's it.

That's $40 billion we spent.

At least. Thousands of people dead, including 14 Americans, 365 Americans wounded. And basically we looked at this terrible regime in Iran that was pursuing a nuclear weapon and said,

hmm, what if we gave them a new toll road in Hormuz?

What if we gave them some more money

and then we're watching that thing?

What if, yeah, what if this international waterway where 20% of the world's oil goes through, we gave this regime that we're saying is so dangerous, we gave them control and then they could charge money. And then we blow some shit up and maybe degrade their traditional military capabilities

a little bit temporarily, and then we'll call it quits.

Yeah, so let's dig into this financial piece. So the Wall Street Journal said two vessels had gone through the Strait, dozens more were preparing to, but now it sounds like the Strait is closed again. I don't know, by the time this goes out, this recording goes out, who knows what'll happen. The bottleneck though is like 400 plus ships, massive ships.

And it seems unlikely-

Imagine waiting in that line.

Well, have you read the stories about the guys who are stuck on these ships? Yeah, I know, it's awful. It is horrific, they're starving. There's one guy had a heart attack, he couldn't get rescued and men and women from far from countries usually who are doing a tough job because they need the money.

So it seems unlikely this trade is going to get to full capacity because Iran's just not going to let it happen. So there will be some sort of relief for financial markets and for global oil supplies, but it's not going to return to the status quo anytime soon.

And then, as you mentioned, the Financial Times is reporting that Iran is going to demand that shipping companies pay tolls in cryptocurrency. Another three cheers for the crypto, guys. Some reports say it'll be $1 per barrel of oil. I've seen other estimates of $2 million a ship.

That is going to add up to a massive amount of money that Iran can use to rebuild its military. I saw one expert, one analyst did some kind of back of the envelope math and found that like even kind of the lower range would be three times Iran's current stated defense budget. So this deal gives them de facto control of the strait and a huge financial windfall potentially. And Trump is like, oh, it might be a joint venture. That was his thing to Jonathan

Carl today at ABC News, which is based on nothing. And control of the Strait also damages the global economy because it brings about or leaves unpredictability and uncertainty. These ships, in order to go through the Strait, yes, they need now Iran's approval and to pay the toll, and they also need to get insurance. And they're still not issuing insurance to these ships because they don't know. So say that we're recording this and it's closed,

then it's opened, and then two weeks later it's closed again. What kind of certainty do you have

if you're trying to ship oil through the Strait of Mersa?

Would you feel safe?

Yeah, or you're trying to insure those ships. And so like the markets can do all they want today, great. And like hopefully the price of oil falls. But I think on the economic front, we are, it's not just like, oh, it's going to take some time to get back to normal. I think we are nowhere near out of the woods on the economic consequences of what's going on. Yeah, it's completely uncertain. And what we've learned is that all Iran has to do is one missile at a ship and they de facto close the thing down and like rightly so if Imagine you're the captain of a ship full of gasoline You're not gonna mess around with getting a you know attacked

No

so Trump also said in that post on Tuesday night that the US and Iran are far along on a final deal to end the war and he said that this Ten-point plan that Iran had put forward was quote a workable basis on which to negotiate So let's just talk through this Iranian list of demands. A permanent end of hostilities, guarantees that the US and Israel won't attack Iran again,

ceasefire agreements that includes Israel's war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, all sanctions on Iran should be lifted, all sanctions lifted on Iran's allies, Iran takes control of the Strait of Hormuz, Iran can charge fees on crossings through the Strait. The toll money is used for Iran's reconstruction. The toll

fees in Hormuz will be shared with Oman. Not sure what that means. So I realize this is a maximalist opening position from the Iranians. But Trump even accepting that proposal as a starting point is a huge win for these guys. Yeah, and well, and now, and he's like walking it back this morning, he's like, beware of the 10 point plans and the papers that are out there. You shouldn't believe anything you see

because all the real stuff is happening behind closed doors. And so obviously, like, I'm sure the Iranians are probably fudging it, Trump's lie. Like, again, once again, you don't know what the truth is because there's some stuff going on behind closed doors, but like, and then every side's trying to just like, you know, try to show that they're winning. But like, I think, I don't see how a deal, I don't see how a deal gets done.

Yeah, I, Trump will come in with a maximalist set of demands too. It'll be like no nuclear enrichment, it'll be no ballistic missiles or some sort of like limit on their ballistic missiles It'll be no support for proxy groups like Hezbollah or Hamas or whatever. It'll be similarly maximalist maybe they can get to some agreement, but I just it feels like there's almost every scenario ends with Iran in the stronger position Than where they started in part because they know Trump Sees this as a political disaster and wants more than anything to declare a victory and walk away.

And he's not a details guy. He's a press release guy. And this is, this gets us back to where we were when Trump was threatening to eradicate the civilization, which is for us to get back to a good place for the United States would be for them to give up the control of the Strait of Hormuz. So in what world would they give up the Strait and give up control and stop the tolls? Well Trump, then it gets back to Trump being like, well, if you don't give it up, then

we will destroy, kill you all. Which is the only card he has left to play because he doesn't want to order a ground invasion of Iran or Karg Island or the rest of it, and they don't want to hold it. And so, again, we're right back to where we were, which is a place that we got to because he decided to start this fucking war. Yeah, everything is worse than it was

the day before they started this conflict. So yeah, big picture. Let's just take stock again before we conclude of what we've accomplished. Number one, number one goal, prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. Obviously, like, look, the nuclear sites are more damaged than ever before. But there's 900 pounds of highly enriched uranium sitting in Iran. Most analysts think they will be more

motivated than ever to seek a nuclear weapon as a deterrent. So yeah, so it doesn't seem like that's a big win. Number two, destroy Iran's military, like certainly we did a lot of damage there the US and Israel did to the Air Force,, air defense system, ballistic missile stockpile, and to the industrial base that they would use to rebuild it. But Iran, before the ceasefire, was reportedly still firing 15 to 30 ballistic missiles a day and 50 to 100 drones per day.

So even the Hegseth in his briefing today had to concede that like, they can fire a shot at any time and create all this economic disruption. Number three, end Iranian support for proxy groups like Hezbollah. The support they provide them is usually financial and weapons. As we just discussed, Iran might weep a financial windfall that could go towards the proxy groups. Doesn't seem like a good setup.

No. I remember these guys being mad about a pallet of cash from Obama.

Well, now they...

Small numbers.

Now they're cool.

Takers of cash from Obama. Well, now they're smaller numbers. Now they're cool. Takers of cash. No, it's crypto cash.

Yeah, takers of crypto.

Takers of crypto. For regime change, remember Trump said he not only wanted regime change, he wanted to pick the next leader of Iran. But we traded Ali Khamenei, who was 86, for his son. Younger model. Who's the younger, more harder line. You know something keep calling him disfigured. Yeah, that's because they want it

They want you to think he's dead or that he does he's not really there They want they want they want to like weekend at Bernie's um, yeah, but there's all the reports today You know, this is an axios. I think talking to Israeli sources say that hominy personally signed off on this ceasefire deal Yeah, so seems like he's well kicking or maybe maybe not kicking, but maybe it's And then finally Iran as you just said is more control of the Strait of Hormuz and global oil shipments than ever before So lots more lots more thorns than roses there Tommy. Yeah, I don't feel like this was a good idea Would be my takeaway fucking idiot like and you know

It's wonderful that we we walked back from the brink of genocide. And our genocidal crazy president didn't go through on his insane fucking threats. Yes, obviously.

Everything else still sucks.

Yes, everything still sucks. And it's frustrating as a Democrat to sort of prosecute the case against Trump and against this war, because I think there's been some pushback to people being like, I taco'd again, right?

Because you don't want to bait him into doing something crazy, but also we have to be honest that this was an absolute fucking disaster. Like we're not playing, like we're still not bumper bowling for Trump politically. We're not gonna like pretend he did a good job.

Well, it's even, I mean, people, the line on Trump is that he creates a problem and then he solves the problem. He gets the credit. Yeah, and then he gets the credit for solving the problem. But in this case, he didn't even solve the problem. No, didn't even solve the problem. He created the problem. He threatened a disaster, like a fucking catastrophe.

And then he walked it back to a huge problem.

Yes. And meanwhile, this scenario, let's say the war ended today, I think that's the best outcome for the world. It is the worst outcome imaginable for the Iranian people because Trump has now left them with a decimated country, an even more hardline regime that is going to crack down on any dissent harder than ever before

and they all know goddamn well that the United States and Israel won't do a goddamn thing about it because they don't actually give a shit about the Iranian people and there might be an agreement not to attack them again. Yeah. And do we think that like Israel is safer,

that the Saudis are safer, that the UAE, like all of the Gulf countries, do we think that like some kind of ceasefire or even some deal is going to protect them now that Iran has just... Remember their other big goal is to stop Iran from projecting power in the region. Do we think Iran is not more powerful than it was before?

No. And look, I do think, you know, they did some real damage to their industrial capacity in their sort of for sure their ability to build drones and missiles and things. I think they will build that like the Shaheed drones are not complicated thing. The fucking lawnmower engines with a warhead on the front that fly wherever they want. And they will also, I am positive that Iran will now get support from the Chinese and the Russians

to help them build back whatever they need to build back.

Go back better.

Build back better.

Great work everybody. Good job. Thanks, maybe don't put a drunk weekend Fox News anchor in charge of the Pentagon. That might be one lesson from this. God, he had a lot of gel in his hair.

A lot of gel. So shiny. I wonder if you touched it, it was just like pew.

Yeah, I wonder if you let a match nearby. Thank you for watching this episode Thank you for watching this episode of Pod Save America here on YouTube.