Iran Strait of Hormuz Crisis and Trump Ultimatum Explained

0:00Attention, you're listening to the Todd Huff Show, America's home for conservative, not bitter talk and education. Be advised the content of this program has been documented to prevent and even cure liberalism, and listening may cause you to lead to the right. And now, coming to you from the full suite wealth studios, here's your conservative, but not bitter host, Todd Huff. conservative, not bitter indeed, my friends. It is my pleasure to be with you here today. I'm going to take a little bit of a pause. I've been really enjoying. I hope you have too. I've been really enjoying what we've been doing here on this program for the past. I guess it was eight episodes. I think that's right. Talking about some fundamental underlying ideas upon which we can build our political philosophy and framework.

1:09And it's a framework that we can provide to others as we try to explain these concepts. Because again, as I've said on this program throughout this series in particular so many times, there's such an inclination in today's world to make politics about something that's emotional for people. And people have strong feelings, but really not a whole lot behind those feelings as far as it concerns the logic of where they land on a particular issue and so forth. Anyway, we're going to put that on I guess pause here for today because I just I owe it to you to keep you informed, which I know you stay informed, but to talk about some issues that have been happening out there. And I want to give an update on what's happening here in the war with Iran. I also want to talk about Robert Mueller, who passed away over the weekend and Trump made some comments that I want to address.

2:13Those are the main things that I want to get to and I appreciate you tuning in here with us today. You know, one of the biggest challenges for conservatives is finding ways to ensure your values align with everything that you do. That's why I love what the team at 48 financial is doing because investing, by the way, is one of the things that we have to make decisions on. It's one of the things, one of the just financial decisions or decisions upon how we use our money, how we invest our money. It's one of those important areas that sometimes gets overlooked, but they specialize in something called a biblically responsible investing. They screen out companies that do not align with your faith, your values, so you're not funding things that go completely against what you believe in. They do the heavy lifting, they help align your investments with your purpose and your goals. And the best part is they'll help you find out if your current investments actually reflect your values or to what degree they reflect your values.

3:23Is it near 100%, is it 50% or is it what we all fear down around 0%. So you can take a quick and easy assessment. All you have to do is head on over to 48financial.com slash Todd. That's 48financial.com slash Todd. It's a quick and easy assessment that you can do there, my friends. 48 financial because your money should work for your values and my friends certainly not against them. So that being said, let's talk here about what's happening, what's happening in this conflict with Iran. Since we last spoke about this, even over the weekend here, Iran has fired two ballistic missiles at Diego Garcia. Now, Diego Garcia is a US military base. I think it's a joint military base with the UK, I believe.

4:25But it's in the... Right, Oz? Look at Oz and Oz. Oz is tuned in today. And it's in the Indian Ocean. It's approximately 2,500 miles from Iran. Now, I point this out because it was previously believed that it runs capabilities. Their range for their ballistic missiles was about half this range, somewhere around 1,200 miles or so. So these missiles, two of them were fired at Diego Garcia. And these to be pointed out, nothing was hit, nothing was damaged. One of the missiles actually failed. The other was intercepted by missile defense systems. Now, depending upon who you listen to, where you tuned in, all that kind of stuff,

5:25what if you listen to the mainstream media, of course, this is a concerning development because it shows that Iran has demonstrated an extended range for their ballistic missile capabilities. Now, I'm not here to argue that too much. I don't know. Listen, we... Who knows what we actually, inside the intelligence community, know about these things? The most important thing to note here is that the missile did not hit its intended target. Now, you can say a lot of things. You can say that this was to demonstrate to the world that the Iranian military capabilities, capacities, that they are better than what we realize in the United States and around the world.

6:26Respectfully, I say that that's hogwash. I say that that's hogwash because, again, I live in the world of... Well, Russ used to say he was the mayor of realville. And I think I've assumed that title. Listen, if the missiles aren't hitting our bases, all you're really showing here is that you've got to... Well, that you've got the potential to get a missile a certain distance. It's not able to do damage, though at least these weren't. I'm not here to say that it never can. I'm simply here to say that this is being overblown if it's being framed as a major Iranian win. So that's happening, but the main... Look, the main issue that we're dealing with right now is what is happening in the straight of Ormuz.

7:30Now, for those of you who followed politics for some time, you've probably heard of the straight of Ormuz, or if there is some geography nerds in our group, I gotta tell you, my son, my son, because of his fascination with aviation, and because of the fact that he's on flight radar or some sort of program like that, some sort of app, the kid has learned geography. Like, I've never... Listen, I feel like I have a pretty good idea about where many places are. There's some countries you could name that I would say I don't know where I could point that out, but on a map, but he can. I'm amazed just by looking at maps and flights as much as he's done. He's learned these things, but the straight of Ormuz is something of a geographical... It has a high geographical importance, and it's located in off the coast of Iran,

8:37and it is in... Basically, it's a very narrow, very narrow waterway. It's a choke point for where oil and other things, by the way, but particularly oil is shipped, leaving the Persian Gulf and heading into the Gulf of Oman. Now, this is... It takes a really sharp turn. Again, it's a very thin body of water, but that's relative to the Persian Gulf size and the Gulf of Oman. And when you look at this on a map, you can say close to what a 90-degree turn, and it's a choke point. So the Iranians basically have... For all intents and purposes, shut this down.

9:39And so roughly 20% of the world's oil is reported to flow through the straight of Ormuz. And what this is doing to the price of a barrel of oil is causing it to skyrocket. Like you've already seen and felt the pain at the pump. The prices for regular gasoline, I believe, average somewhere in the vicinity of $3.60 to $3.90 nationally. Diesel is significantly higher. In fact, in my part of the country, diesel prices, depending upon whether you get it from a gas station or a truck stop, truck stop diesel is, I will say... I will say almost always, but I think it's practically always more expensive there.

10:39It's over $5.00, at least here. We have a couple of truck stops that are not too far from me. And I think both of them are around $5.50, somewhere $5.30, $5.40, I think maybe even up to $5.60, a gallon. And so this is the highest that I've seen. In fact, the last time I remember gas prices doing this was in almost this exact time of year in 2022. I know this because we were traveling on the true tour and we were in New Mexico. And I remember seeing diesel prices there hit and eclipsed $6.00, $6.00 a gallon. I remember this very well because I was... Again, I don't want to say shocked. This was in the era of bidenomics and everything that was going on there. This is a different phenomenon. By the way, this is a great lesson.

11:40A great teachable moment for those who want to understand economics. So I've long explained on this program what inflation is. Now we've gotten lazy. We've gotten lazy today in the media. And I would say intentionally they've been intentionally deceptive to try to get us to believe inflation is just any time the prices rise. And that from a practical perspective, I get it. If you're paying for something at the grocery store, if you're paying for gas at the gas pump, whatever. And the price is increasing at some level. Not just at some level. It may be conceived and maybe considered to be some sort of an intellectual exercise. It's academic why the price is going up. It's just some degree. And I understand that.

12:40I got to pay this. It doesn't really matter. I got to figure out how to make ins me in my home and adjust for these sorts of crazy price spikes. And by the way, you talk about especially diesel, which I know most people aren't using diesel for their personal vehicle. But I'm telling you, you talk about everything. Everything that we buy virtually is contingent upon fuel prices. If we travel by aircraft. If we shop at a grocery store, these things end up at places by being hauled on, well, by big rigs. We call them semi-s here at my part of the state. Some people might call them tractor trailers. Whatever, but the 16 wheelers. They are 18 wheelers. So 18 wheelers us? I think it is.

13:40Anyway, the price of fuel is a big factor in the cost of all these things. Because you got to get a shift and that's, you know, they're going to start passing that cost of fuel. And just eat that. At least not indefinitely. Maybe for a little bit, I don't know. It depends on a lot of things. But this is going to be felt in the Americans wallet. It already is at the gas pump. But inflation, inflation and prices going up are not synonymous. All inflation relates, or I should say, turns into prices going up at, well, prices going up. All inflation results in price increases. But not all price increases are due to inflation. And this is a perfect example. We don't have high, truly inflationary percentages right now. And if you just measure it and say how much things are getting more expensive, certainly things are getting more expensive.

14:40Because of what's happening in the straighter for moves, which is, again, where the Iranians are interrupting the flow of oil through there. Now they've come out and said, I read this last week, that they were only trying to prevent US and Israeli shipments from going through there. Everyone else could ship through there. I don't think that that's practically the case. That's the messaging that they want to use. They've effectively shut this down. People are afraid to ship oil through there. I saw a report on television last week where people were holding their ships because they didn't want to get through there and, you know, get struck. Have a, get struck by a missile or who knows? Have it be boarded by the crazy and Iranian regime or whatever else? And so this is obviously created problems. The markets are reacting to this pressure, this tension. And this is what we've, we've got. But that's not true inflation.

15:40What true inflation is. And hear me as I tap the mic here to make sure you're paying attention. Hear me say this. I tap the mic here to make sure you're paying attention. Hear me say this. Inflation. And go back, don't take my word for it. Go back and study the late great Milton Friedman. Milton Friedman was a phenomenal world class economist. Just absolutely brilliant. He used to do a lot. He used to go to on Phil Donahue. He used to try to take economics to the masses and explain these very important concepts to the, to the average person. And you know, had some success. And obviously a lot of people didn't care because that's just the way that it is, especially when, you know, there's not much direct threat to their particular lifestyle or no perceived threat.

16:40And so people, people oftentimes ignore these things. But he used to do a great job explaining these things, answering questions in that pop culture about economics. Go back and look at some of these tapes from the 80s. Again, he was on with Phil Donahue who was anything but a friend of conservatism. But regardless, he says inflation is caused by one group and one group only. And that's the federal government. And it's specifically a phenomenon that is created when the government prints too much money. I've explained this, you know this. The money, by the way, money that's created in the economy. The actual, well, it used to be off the printing presses. Now it's pressing a button to send deposits to banks. But that money reflects real economic output in the economy. And so the money is a representation of the value. And so if there's more dollars that have been created

17:44than the actual value, real value of economic output, then that's an indication of inflation. And the larger that gap is between the money created and the actual actual economic output, the real value delivered to the economy, the larger the inflation rate is. That's how that this works. But that's not what's happening here. This is a supply problem or a perceived supply problem because Iran is threatening to, well, it's taking aggressive posture and the straight-off hormones, it's a narrow waterway. So it's not like you can just go cruising through there with that detection. You're asking for trouble potentially. If you try to take your ship through there, then you get, you know, you start thinking of things like Captain Phillips, if you ever saw that movie or know that story, read the book, whatever, where they were boarded by Somali pirates.

18:44What was it? The Mersk? What was the name of that ship? Anyway, it doesn't matter. They, similar sort of thing, right? Where except for, instead of, instead of pirates, you have, well, what's left of the Iranian Navy interfering with things. And so it's a supply issue. It's not inflation. And this just, that's just a, listen, a teachable moment to explain the difference. And this is important to understand because as soon as this problem is fixed, and I want to talk here in a moment about how Trump is, Trump is basically giving Iran an ultimatum to fix this problem or else, so we'll talk about that in a moment. But as soon as this particular problem is fixed and the flow of oil can continue, or resume going through the strait of Hormuz between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman,

19:45this problem will begin to be alleviated. It will begin to fix itself. So that's where we're headed. Got other stops I want to make along the way, my friends, but before we do that, I want to remind you that if you're dealing with discomfort or just tired of living off prescriptions and managing those side effects, you are not alone. A lot of folks looking for something natural that they can trust, they're out there, and you may be in that group as well. Check out Christopher's organic botanicals, a family run natural-cratum company, rooted in true tradition and transparency. They partnered directly with farmers in Indonesia, they lab test everything before it ever, reaches your hands, no hype, no synthetics, no funny business, just the real thing done right.

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21:47in Iran, some developments, the ballistic missiles we talked about, the straight of Hormuz being shut down and threatening, Iran is threatening folks who have... Well, who ship oil through there. This has caused global prices to increase. That's obviously a big problem. You're filling it in your pocketbook. This is not good. There's economic pressures already on the American people. There have been... We're still digging out of the absolute chaos that was unleashed on the American economy by dynamics. And so we're trying to navigate this. This is not a larger economic sign of weakness. This is a consequence for trying to deal with a radically insane and dangerous regime in Iran. That by the way, we have effectively decapitated. And so now we're just trying to, again, well, trying to keep this problem

22:47from starting right back up where it was after we stopped this war. So, timeout's in order. I gotta get my friends quick. Timeout, you're listening to conservative, not better talk. I'm your host Todd Huff back in just a minute. Welcome back, my friends. Let's be honest, when your financial world starts getting a little more complicated, you need more than one size fits all advice. That's where full, sweet wealth shines. The brightest, their team specializes in working with families and individuals at your level, offering personalized guidance that goes far beyond the basics from private equity and private credit to options, strategies, and coordinated legal, planning, full, sweet wealth helps. You see the big picture and make confident decisions about your legacy. It's all about having a dedicated team to guide you each and every step of the way,

23:47so you can focus on what matters most, your family, your goals, your future. What real financial confidence in your financial life? Well, visit fullsweetwealth.com. That's fullsweetwealth.com. Build your legacy, secure your future. We talked a little bit about the straighter from moves here, as we've talked about what's happened in this Iranian war. Again, we're taking a little bit of a pause from our series, which by the way, if you want to get access to all the things we've talked about in that series to help give a financial framework, not financial framework, a political framework through which you can view politics. And talk about it intelligently and help people see these very important things that we've talked about. All you got to do is sign up. Sign up to get the inner circle.

24:48It's totally free. We email links with background and all the stuff we've discussed and we get into it more in the inner circle. I don't have time to get to everything here, but we do there. At the inner circle each weekday, all you have to do is text truth to become a member, to join, to sign up. Again, it's totally free. Text truth to 317-785-1030-317-7851030. Okay, so we've got this problem in Iran that the war, we've got the straightover moves being shut down effectively by the Iranian military, the Iranian Navy. And of course, we talked about their ballistic missiles earlier in the program. And so Trump has had it. Look, Trump is basically telling the Iranians we're not playing these games with you any longer. In fact, Trump has given them an ultimatum.

25:51Trump went to treat social and gave, well, I think the treats may have been a press release, but he's made an announcement here. And he basically said, look, if you don't open up the straight of hormones in 48 hours, we're going to obliterate. We're going to obliterate your power plants in your country. Now, it's interesting or important to note that some of these, some of these at least are nuclear power plants. So Trump says, listen, if you're going to play games with our energy, if you're going to threaten people who are trying to simply engage in commerce, these are not people who are involved in the war. That by the way, your lunatics, I felt, create, have actually set up these circumstances that we are dealing with today, the ones who are chanting death to America,

26:51death to Israel, all that kind of stuff. Because of these circumstances and situations that you've created, we started this war. You got to threaten Israel. You've been dangerous for a long time. We talked about the start of this war. Now we're talking about finishing this war, hopefully, finishing this war, not just stopping the war, but actually winning it. Actually getting to a position where we can say that we have won the war by achieving our objectives. And the part of the price, and of course this did not come as a surprise or a shocker to the White House. They knew that this would be an Iranian response to try to cause global financial problems, especially when it comes to the global economy, when it comes to oil. They have, they've wreaked havoc

27:53on the global economy when it comes to that. And this was not surprising. This was not something that was unexpected. But now we're here, right? And now you begin to look at your contingency plans. Trump, of course, is dealing with, having to create support or try to create support for this war by explaining what was at stake, what was, what the risk was, what's been allowed, candidly, to fester in Iran and elsewhere over the course of the past several decades. We've had many administrations who have been asleep at the wheel. Many Americans have been asleep at the wheel, but apathetic as to what's been happening. Global threats were on the rise, even when we pretended like they weren't, dating back even to the 90s. I mean, it's amazing to me when things are good financially.

28:57We had the economic boom in the 90s, or you could say the economic boom in the 80s. Things were good economically. Iran is half a world away. It's inconvenient to have oil prices be what they are, but it's not devastating. But it can be devastating to an economy, to global prices. It could impact people in a pretty traumatic way. And so the president knew this going in. None of this is shocking that this was going to happen here, but he's given Iran an ultimatum. You either do something about this or we're going to take out your energy, your power plants, pretty much at the next 48 hours. Now, that was given. I think that threat, that ultimatum was given. I'm looking it up right now to pull up the article here. And I think I've hit the wrong one.

29:57Did I? Let's see. Nothing is working smoothly on the device here. It is slower than you could possibly imagine. It's slower than a seven-year itches, my family would say. This thing is not cooperating. So we're going to refresh this. But I think it was given over the weekend. So we're nearing the point, right? We're nearing the point where we're going to have 48 hours. And then what happens? Then what happens? Are we going to, is Trump going to launch missiles immediately here? This is at redstate.com breaking. Donald Trump issues 48-hour ultimatum on a run, opened the Strait of Hormuz or face disaster, written by Bob Hodge. I said, H-O-G-E, I'm thinking of Merrill Hodge. She used to play running back for the Pittsburgh Steelers. H-O-G-E is the last name at redstate.com. Here's what he says in his article,

30:58President Trump fired off a social media post Saturday evening, warning the Islamic Republic of Iran that if it doesn't ensure the crucial waterway of the Strait of Hormuz, is fully opened within 48 hours. He will order the destruction of their power plants. The message said the clock starts as of the moment he posted, which was 7.44 p.m. Eastern time. That would have been on Saturday over the weekend. So here we are, depending upon when you're listening to this, where, what are we? And the final 12 hours. I mean, we may be past the deadline by the time you listen to this, depending upon when you hear it. But we're looking 48 hours later, is Monday, Monday evening. So here's what the post said on, it was Truth Social, I believe, right? Yes, I believe so. Here's what it says. If Iran, it might have been a tweet.

32:01Nevertheless, if Iran doesn't fully open, without threat, that part was in all caps. The Strait of Hormuz within 48 hours, hours in all caps. From this exact point in time, the United States of America will hit and obliterate their various, this all to follow is in caps. Power plants starting with the biggest one first. Exclamation point. Going back to regular font. Thank you for your attention to this matter. I thoroughly enjoy when he, when he inses posts like this. Presidents, and then of course, all caps again, Donald J. Trump. So what does that mean? What's going to happen? Is it Trump? Is it positioning? Is it rhetoric? Is it literal? Are we about to see another barrage of missile strikes this time targeting

33:04these power plants, including nuclear facilities, which by the way, I mean, listen, these may be, who knows what's going on in these places, right? So these could be targets for any number of reasons, but Trump has made it clear. They know what they're doing. They can stop this at any moment that they wish to do it. If they don't, we're going to go after their energy since they've tried to create chaos in the energy of the entire world. So I should say with the energy of the entire world. So that's where we are, lots of other things, of course, happening there. But that's all the Iran talk I can get into today. That being said, I want to talk after the break about Robert Mueller, who passed away. I want to talk about Trump's words and comments, and another post on social media. We'll get to that, my friends. After the breaks, it's tight back in a minute.

34:04Welcome back, my friends. You know, I mentioned on this program that we have re-launched our, well, the vision of this, of the Todd Huff Show called Red, White, and Brand. It is focused on helping you put your logo on almost anything. I mean, this can be my goodness. We've done some, we're doing some awards. We're doing some, done plenty of t-shirts. Got an order of, you know, some things like post notes. And just, whatever you can imagine, my friends, your logo on almost anything, redwhiteandbrand.com is the website. promo code Todd is going to save you 10% on your 10% off your first order. Again, redwhiteandbrand.com. Your logo on almost anything. promo code Todd saves you 10% on that first order. Okay. So I mentioned before the break

35:07that I wanted to talk a little bit about the passing of Robert Mueller. Epic Times says this former FBI director, Robert Mueller died on March 20th, according to a statement by his family. That, by the way, was Friday. He was 81. Mueller served as the FBI director between September 2001 and September 2013. Most recently, Mueller served as special counsel in charge of investigating alleged ties between President Trump's 2016 presidential campaign. And yes, of course, you remember Russia, Russia, Russia. Mueller in 2019 reached the conclusion and his final report on his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. So long way of saying that. That neither Trump nor any member of his campaign colluded.

36:10You remember that word, my goodness. That word was used as often during that period of time as the word gravitas was used in 2000 to describe the Bush-Chainy ticket. Anyway, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government, Mueller's final report states. And this goes on. Listen, you can get more information on the stack of stuff on the website. The easiest way to do it is just to sign up for the inner circle. Text truth to 317-785-103317-785-1030. Just text a word true to you can get this. But that's, that's, Robert Mueller passed. But Trump had something to say. As you can imagine, Trump did.

37:11And so I'm going to read you his social post. I don't know if you've seen this shit or not. I'll tell you to brace yourself for this. Where's the full quote? Hold on here. Let me pull. That just has an excerpt. I want to read it in his totality. And I know I've got it in here. I know I've got it in here because I just read it. Here it is. Robert Mueller. This is Trump's quote or post. I believe again on truth social. Robert Mueller was a bad guy. He went after me with the fake investigation, hurt a lot of innocent people, and tried to take down a president who did nothing wrong. Here's the part I would say to brace yourself for. And gag. Listen, this is some people won't be bothered by this. Others will. He says, I'm glad he's gone. He couldn't hurt people anymore. He leads behind a very troubled legacy. Now, these sorts of things.

38:12I've seen, of course, already people responding to this, whether it just be locally, or just whoever, people responding to this. And people are bothered by this, right? And I understand. I understand. I wish Trump wouldn't do this, to be honest. I listen. I know that the investigation, Mueller's investigation was, while I think it concluded the right thing, it certainly did not do the president any favors for a long time as it was in the news cycle. And I don't know. It just, the whole thing was crazy. As I went through from the very beginning with this, I was always just blown away. That people would be so enamored with this. I mean, we have to believe, again, I don't want to go too much into this. I said there's so many times before,

39:13but Trump, you had to believe that, first of all, the last step in a conspiracy to steal an election was an advertising campaign, which is preposterous as someone who's been an advertising to think that that's how that works. Number one. Secondly, we had to believe a whole series of things about Trump that he had, first of all, no, not a bad enough cast of characters here that would have done the job for him. He had to go to Russia, somehow Russia had social media marketing experts that were better at understanding how to manipulate Americans than were the American corporations, the American social media people. And so he went to Russia, you know, went and had probably drank with Putin, right in the Kremlin. Even though Trump says he didn't drink, we know he drinks, right? The media can't believe that. Trump's a terrible guy. Of course, he's probably drunk constantly. If you listen to the media and what they want you to believe about this guy

40:13and he colluded and he basically stole the election by tricking Hillary voters and devoting for him by using Pokemon Go X ads at the time, Twitter, Facebook, everything else. It never made any sense the last stage of a conspiracy to be an ad campaign. And of course, it was just a preposterous mess and Mueller did a lot of bad things. But I just, I listen, I think that this is, this doesn't need to be said, especially in the wake of his death. Trump shouldn't have done that. I gotta go. Have a great day, SDG.