They've especially got to make a change to appease the Republicans who are really concerned about how Iran's going to impact them and how inflation and these prices are going to impact them if we do have free and fair elections in the fall. But I feel like Hague said this kind of jumped the shark here. And it's easier for Trump to make a move on him, try to stop the bleeding, maybe change the narrative, than to continue to try to ride this out and take accountability himself, which he's clearly not going to do.

Paul Rikoff, the host of the Independent Americans podcast.

And, you know, Hannah went through some of the numbers there on the war and the firings,

which you and I have talked about when you've been on with Pete Hagseth.

But the other thing, this was much earlier in a very long hearing.

I don't know if you heard the back and forth with Adam Smith, ranking Democrat, on the committee, and talking to Heggseth, essentially about nuclear ambitions in Iran and

whatnot, but it was interesting part of this. Here's Adam Smith and Pete Heggzeth from earlier.

We had to start this war, you just said, 60 days ago, because the nuclear weapon was an imminent threat.

Now you're saying that it was completely obliterated.

They had not given up their nuclear ambitions. Their ambitions continued.

All right. So basically, hey, what about this whole obliterated stuff? What do you make of Higgs-Seth today? Not a good day. Not a good day. I mean, this is like watching a fighter in the corner just getting pummeled. I mean, he's had a good run at times where he can control the message and he takes friendly questions from the new Pentagon propaganda press corps, which has like the My Pillow guy in and now he's in a real hearing and the war is not going well and is an incomplete at best. And I think the question is going to be for most Americans, what have we gotten for $25 billion? $25 billion is an insane amount of money. And what you've gotten is the Strait of Hermuz is still not clear. Your gas prices are up, fertilizers up, diesel's up. They haven't gotten the enriched uranium, the military is not obliterated, and the regime is still in place. So it doesn't look like a very good return on investment. And the bigger issue, they want more. They want $1.5 trillion. And I think most Americans, all political backgrounds, say, hey, that could go toward schools, that could go toward fixing roads, that could go maybe toward lowering prices here at home. It just doesn't look like a good investment. And I think, Hegstead is really struggling because he doesn't look truthful. He's not answering questions directly. He's playing a lot of politics. And if you're explaining, you're losing. Well, timeline-wise, too, people are started to think, boy, we could be in this for a while because, you know, President Trump now seems to have rejected what Iran's offer was, which was basically open up the straight and, you know, get rid of this blockade, but we're not talking about nuclear right now. So he wants a nuclear deal. But that means the blockade stays, he says. So yeah, that means extended war, right?

And more money. Right. Extended war. 41% of our Navy is now in the Gulf region. Yeah. And I've said

before this can become a sucking chest wound for our military. That's true. Now it's pulling in more

resources, pulling in more dollars, pulling in more attention. And yesterday, Margo Rupio is talking about hitting Cuba. So this is bigger than Iran. This is about forever war. It's about continuing to go forward without congressional approval, without authorization. And they've blown past Congress. Now they want to go back to Congress and ask for the money. It should go the other way. They should ask for congressional approval, get bipartisan support, get money.

And here's the other side of the ledger, too. They haven't even talked about the Department of Veterans Affairs. You're creating a whole new generation of veterans, and nobody's even asking for a plus up at the Department of Veterans Affairs to care for them. I think it's another sign of how this plan is half cooked and in many ways starting to en route. Well, we'll go back to what you just said, going to Congress. I mean, we're at the 60 days now. This is right around now, pretty much. We've been in it for a period of time where they, you know, whatever you think of the war effort, whether you support it or not, you probably should support the fact that they should at least have Congress weigh in on it, or Congress should push to weigh in on it a little bit more, maybe than they are.

Yeah, I mean, they haven't even really had hearings. This is the first time that they're kind of having an open hearing about all the issues surrounding Iran. And I think here's what's really important. The president's watching. We all know the president watches television. He watches his cabinet secretaries, and he's watching Hegset struggle. Hegg said there's been the TV guy for for a long time but now he's really struggling and republicans are calling for him to be removed and republicans see him dragging them down around the midterms and that could force trump to finally pull the trigger on removing hegseth and putting out the fire and putting someone else in there who's less radioactive and gives him time and space to do the other things you want. Well, if he was watching, he took a break to have this chat with Vladimir Putin

today. The Kremlin came out, as you heard, and they said that Putin put forth these ideas

about Iran's nuclear program and this temporary ceasefires of possibility in Ukraine.

Here's more from Trump and the Oval on Putin just a short time ago.

I talked about Ukraine, and I talked a little bit about Iran. I talked about a few different

separate things, mostly about Ukraine, and we had a very good conversation. I think we're going to

come up with a solution relatively quickly, I hope.

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