Congress Doesn't Work, Newt Wants Nukes, and More!

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Hey, it's Reed. Before we get started today, guys, we have less than 200 days

until election day, 200 days until the midterms.

And I need you to help me keep the union in the fight.

I need you to go to join the union dot us slash donate that's join the union dot us slash

donate and make your contribution today. Guys, help us out. Help keep us in the middle of what

is yet another incredibly important midterm. And now on with the show. Welcome back to the home front.

I'm your host Reed Galen. Well, gang, I'm coming to you solo today.

Sorry about the miss last week. I was on the road longer than I expected.

But I am glad to be back with you all today. I'll get another episode out later this week as well.

But I hope everybody is safe and happy and healthy and dealing with the world one day at a time.

And sometimes that's the only way we can do it. All right. I've got a few things to talk about.

So the first is just general government dysfunction. And I think that that's playing out in

where we see airports now. You're seeing the Austin airport. You're seeing other places where

TSA officers have not been paid in a couple of weeks. Incredibly, long lines is now they

cut back on TSA pre check and the other things. And, you know, this is all a result of an

impasse, one that makes sense, but one that needs to get resolved about ice funding in the wake

of the two shootings in Minneapolis earlier this year. The Democrats say we're not going to fund

ice until you make these changes. And the Republicans are saying we're not going to make these

changes. People can suffer. Well, it's not surprising that Congress often has less of an approval

rating than your run of the mill sexually transmitted disease. And it's not going to be any better

because of this. And I think it comes down to the idea of no one wants to compromise. Now,

I think in this case, not surprisingly, most of you knowing my worldview that the Republicans could

get this done by offering a few things that frankly are civil liberties related individual liberty,

which is always a very important thing to conservatives. But they just can't look like they're

backing off, even though they did not get the desired result. And they did have a desired result

in Minneapolis. And Greg Bavino, aka Stephen J. Lockjaw, just announced that he's retiring,

which he would not be doing if he was in the good graces of the president, the White House,

Stephen Miller, and everybody else. And I think that it's now time for Republicans. And I know I'm

saying this and it sounds silly to just decide, okay, you know, what we're going to make these

changes. We're going to let this bill pass, right? Now, here's the other part is for the

administration, I'm not entirely sure how they could spend $175 billion on ice funding and not

be able to figure out how to reprogram some of this. This is an administration that has utilized

money already appropriated. However, they wanted to sometimes they've actually just not spent it

or they spent it another way. So to me, the idea that they could not somehow figure out how to do

this is nothing other than political gamesmanship, which of course Americans continually get caught

in the crossfire of. And so I see this, but again, it's just yet one more indication, right? We saw

it last March. We saw it last fall. We're now seeing it again. And here's the other part.

Travel is already, you know, a pretty tough experience. Look at someone who spends a lot of time

on the road, right? Like I'm used to airports. I'm used to lines. These things are what they are.

But if you're trying to go on vacation, if it's spring break, right? It's spring break time. If

we're seeing the insane shutdowns or temporary shutdowns of Washington DC airports or the weather

that's been insane for the last couple of days, it just makes everything that much more difficult.

It adds that layer of stress that I think a lot of people who again are not regular travelers

already take to the airport with them. It leads to frustration. Then of course, you got the

folks who are working TSA who let's be clear. Like most of those people probably aren't appreciated

for the jobs they do in the first place. And now they're being asked to do them without pay.

And I think that, you know, let's just like, let's just get back to basic principles here,

King. Like you have a job to do. If you don't want to do the job, don't do it. I also think that if

federal employees who are, you know, unionized, if they are civil servants, if they're not getting paid,

if there's a government shutdown, then maybe we shouldn't pay members of Congress who continually

get their paychecks and continually are able to go to any doctor they want and not pay for it

because they have gold plated health care. And I think this is one of those things where I really

believe this. It's not just a political stance. I think it's, it's an observation that we are

in an anti-establishment and popular stare on. I think things like this are the reason for it.

You have an immigration problem that has now been solved through force and harshly,

but has also spilled over into flat out violence against American citizens. I think we're now

up to three American citizens who have been killed by ice. And even Republicans are unhappy. In

fact, I saw this quote from a Republican member, excuse me, a White House official last week

that the White House is now telling Congressional Republicans not to use the words mast deportation.

That's how unlucky they have been in trying to prosecute this. I think Unlucky's the wrong word.

This is how badly they have done this. This is how badly they have prosecuted something that

I think the majority of Americans would probably agree. We've had lines on a map for thousands of

years. I should probably know who's coming in and out. I think also we shouldn't shoot Americans

in the face. I think those are two worlds that can absolutely live together. But in the world of,

you know, this Republican party with its leader, they can't do that. They won't do that. And now they're

throwing in the Save Act, which is this voting act that Republicans are pushing very hard. Members,

Republican members of the House say they're not going to vote anything on anything from the Senate

until the Senate passes the Save Act. There are a few Republicans in the Senate, including

majority leader John Thune who don't want this. And the Save Act is essentially a solution without

a problem. Voter fraud in this country has not been a problem. It's not going to be a problem due

to the nature of our system. And the idea that you're going to have to present a birth certificate

to get your voter, you know, to get your voter registration. And especially for women who have

changed their names and sorts of like this, I did a, I did a talk with, with a couple of folks

last week for big tent. And we were talking about that so much of this stuff guys isn't about

outright saying you, Mr. or Mrs. Smith can't vote. It's by increasing the friction just a few

points, just a few degrees to say, I want to do something and turn that into it's not worth the

trouble. And it doesn't take much. Just think about what any of us have done, like go into the gym,

right? Like it's raining. I'm not going because it's raining anything, right? If you're not already

inclined to be passionate to do something and you find a reason not to do it, there's a really

good chance you just say no. It's the same reason why they say, well, maybe they'll have ice agents

there. You know, you drive up there, you see guys with guns, maybe you're like, you know what,

not today, I'm just not going to do it today. Does my vote matter anyway? In fact, yes, it does.

You may not feel like it matters in the, in the singular, but if all of us believe in the singular

that our vote doesn't matter and you know, show up, then bad things happen. And we're already

batting about 500 as far as voter turnout is concerned in midterms, only 50% of eligible

people are showing up to begin with. If that got to 52, 53, 55, God knows what we could get done.

So that's what things like the SAVAC are doing. And so I think Congress continues to be,

you know, if we have three branches of government, Congress continues to be the third branch

with the executive running wild, the Supreme Court, the judiciary, allowing them to do most of what

they want to do. And the Congress, the Article 1 branch, the branch of the people either cannot

or will not figure out what they need to do. And that's why if you're part of a five calls program

or if you send regular emails to your members, please continue that stuff, right? I know it feels

like it doesn't matter, but it does. If you're looking for something to do, this is a safe, easy,

and quick thing to do to stay involved. All right. Let's move on. So we're now into week three of

the war in Iran. And it has not gone the way anybody thought it would go unless you were paying

attention, in which case when you start a war on pretty thin pretenses without a strategy

for what it is you're trying to accomplish or how you're going to end hostilities, then things

like this happen. The strikes killed the Iranian leader. And then what happened? Iran started

shooting back and they continue as I am recording this. I think I saw on social media earlier today

that the US Embassy in Baghdad had been rocketed. The defense system missed the Dubai airport,

which is the busiest airport in the world, had to send out a notice last night saying it was

shut down and for people to please avoid coming to the airport. If somebody out there knows how,

you know, this will ripple through the air traffic or the airline industry. Please send me an email

at thehomefrontmediaatgmail.com. I'd really like to understand what the ripple effects of

something like taking up one of the biggest hubs in the world really does. But there's one other

thing that's come up several times with the straight of hormones being closed and it goes from the

ridiculous to the insane. And this is, and I say this mostly on social media, the casual nature with

which people are throwing around the idea that the Israelis may lob a couple of nuclear weapons

at Iran. The insane post by former speaker Newt Gingrichu in a former life I knew and my dad

worked for for many years, saying we could just create a new straight or a new canal if we just

dropped a whole bunch of nuclear weapons through the Arabian Peninsula. This is really like bad.

We should not fool around with this kind of talk. I mean, throughout the entire cold war,

I mean, you read the history and some of you may be old enough to remember it, but you read the

history of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Like, these were end of days kinds of things. And now you have

morons, including Newt Gingrich, who should know better, just talking about casually, yeah, you know,

we'll drop up Newt Keir, we'll drop a Newt there. Maybe the Israelis will do this. They even have a

name for which I can't recall. But like, as soon as one of those things lights off, like, that's it

game. Like, that genie doesn't go back in the bottle. Lots of bad things happen. And it's almost

impossible to stop them once they do. And the idea that like, this is just something that social

media and people who should know better are just tossing about as if it's, you know, we're going to

drop another bomb or shoot another Tomahawk is destructive as all those things are now we're

going to light off a several megaton weapon in Tehran or somewhere in Iran is just beyond me.

I commend to you if you don't want to sleep for a while to read Annie Jacobson's book called

Nuclear War. As the whole thing takes like 45 minutes. So there's a part of it that's really scary.

There's another part of it that says like, don't worry about it. Like, what are you going to do?

That's me going back and forth between like being informed and being sort of, I don't want to say

nihilistic, but fatalistic maybe. But again, these are people that should know better. The speaker

of the house, the former speaker of the house, like he should know better. Exactly. Mr. Speaker,

how long is it going to take for the radiation in that area to dissipate after, you know, you do

this and like how many boats are going to want to sail through it, you know, through all the fall

out and radioactive dust and all the sand that you turn to glass and everything else. I'm like,

what if it doesn't work? Then you've just nuked half of Saudi Arabia to create yourself a big ditch.

I mean, it's just beyond me guys. We are now getting into the era of what I would call

eulocity. I don't even know if that's a word, but I'm making it up. Dangerous ridiculous

eulocity. Like, keep it to yourself unless you know what the hell you're talking about. Like,

I'm not an expert on anything. I have found lots of interesting people to follow on social media

about what's going on in the Middle East. If I have a particular interest in something or particular

take on an issue, I know something about. Yeah, I'm probably going to spout off about it. But for

the most part, I don't know how a KC 135 tanker works. I don't know how the toilet system on the

Gerald Ford works. I don't know how interceptors work other than, you know, it's a radar shooting,

you know, aiming a missile at another missile. I don't know how any of that works. I have friends

who've been in the military. They explain things to me. I appreciate that they do that. We have

friends who have taught, like Tom Nichols, who taught at the Naval War College, who explains things.

A Robert Pape, who's a professor over at the University of Chicago, who's been very good about

this. Some really interesting people talking about supply chains and, you know, the Strait of

Hormuz is not just oil, but it's also 30% of the world's fertilizer. So there is a lot of

learning to be done. But I just think this idea of, oh, yeah, the Israelis will just, you know,

shoot off a nuclear missile at the Iranians and everything, you know, like, what's to what end?

Like, I mean, this whole thing is to what end? Right? Like, it's going, it's going on. We're,

we've started week three. Like, when is this going to stop? Because Trump's going to say, I'm ready

to go home. I don't think the Iranians care anymore. Right? Like, you killed their guy. And now,

they're going to shoot as many drones and missiles and everything else as they can. And as many

people as they can, and guys, it will take years, years to unwind this. Right? Not just the damage

in Iran, but the damage in Israel and the damage in the UAE and Saudi Arabia and Bahrain and

Kuwait and Qatar. Like, all of these countries will spend billions of dollars and years fixing

all of this stuff. And for what? For what? Right? Like, we've got dead Americans. We've got more

wounded Americans. We've got thousands of dead people in the, in the region. Like, what was this

all about? And, and I just, to me, it's like, it's, it's, it's too easy. And it goes, I'll just say,

I'll call back to one thing I said about Congress. Like, it's your job to decide whether or not

the president of the United States can declare war. Not his. And you just let him do it. And now

they're going to ask for another $50 billion. And people are going to be running scared trying to

make sure that they look like they're for the troops. Right? And they're going to take votes that

they don't really like. But they're going to be afraid politically that they'll be punished for it.

Like, you're going to be punished for making the wrong decision. Right? You're going to be

punished for making the wrong decision. I bet there are a whole bunch of Republicans because

this is the kind of cowards they are who are sitting in committee rooms or in one another's

office is going, how the hell are we going to get out of this? Right? How the hell are we going to

get out of this? The president asked for $50 billion. Well, let's get the checkbook out. It's just,

it's just no way to run a country. And we're seeing that our friends and allies around the world

are saying no to everything we've asked for because they're finally after 80 years saying you got

yourself into this mess. You can get yourself out of it. Right? And if you were, if you were in

Italy or you were in Spain or you were in Germany or you were in France, would you do that?

Would you put your own country, your own people at risk for that for Donald Trump? I don't think

many people would. All right. Let me get out of the complaining and out of the explaining and into

the what we can do. All right, guys. So as I noted at the top, we have less than 200 days to go

until election day. There are primaries that are now starting to roll out every week. There are

groups like field team six run for something. The union, as I noted, that need help. They are

doing incredible work day in and day out to make sure people are hearing what they need to hear,

knowing what they need to know and learning how they can and must vote at the union. Guys, we are

starting to recruit poll workers and poll watchers. And I hope that you will go to join the union.us

and sign up. You can sign up to do just about anything, just about anywhere. And I hope that you

will take me up on that request. Frankly, that plea, we really need the help because it's going to

be yet another big year. There's going to be hundreds of, actually, I just wrote about this on

sub-stack ad watch is expecting 11 billion dollars to be spent on campaign advertising this cycle.

That's more than in 2024. 11 billion, but you know, advertising, especially television advertising

is a blunt instrument. You're never going to convince me that a well-deployed, well-run

ground game cannot win close races when nothing else can. And that's what we are trying to do,

and I hope you will join us in that effort. All right, guys, if you're watching on YouTube,

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And I'll see you next time.