audio1681949878

00:00:00 Speaker: Well, it's great to have Patrick Henningsen here because we were just in Mexico for an Acapulco and things kicked off. And of course, I want to speak about Iran because it's the most pressing topic. But let's start if we can. Where we started in Puerto Vallarta with Acapulco started off innocently enough. It ended with, uh, with cars on fire. What was your take on this? Was it was it theater? Was it a real situation? Was it a combination of a little bit? Was it made for TV action? What was your take on it all? Yeah. Anarcho poco twenty twenty six became narco. Narco Poco. Uh, twenty twenty six. Um. Disaster seems to follow this event. Uh, yeah, it does, uh, it precedes and follows this event. But yet the event still, uh, carries on, which shows the level of resilience there. Um, and so, look, it was a great week. It was a great conference. Um, you know, everybody was buzzing by the end of the week and then everyone at the end of the week, you know, departs to their different, uh, locations. Um, some people were staying for the, uh, crypto vigilante and Dollar vigilante seminars that came after the main conference, but. So I was, uh, scheduled to fly out, uh, very, you know, not long after that. So I think it was Saturday or Sunday, I can't remember, but, um, but. Yeah. So I like myself like others. Uh, well, we heard the news. Yeah, I think I was going out Sunday, actually, and, uh, I heard the news. Pat, Pat, get outside, get outside. I was having breakfast, and someone said in my hotel. Get outside, get outside. Look, look, there's cars are on fire. There's nobody in. The streets are blocked. And so I went out. Sure enough, uh, that's exactly what it was. It was kind of surreal, uh, like, you know, a little bit cinematic in that respect. And I was like, I'm looking around and I'm like, where is everybody? It's like lockdown. Nobody on the streets is a ghost town on usually on Sunday on the weekends in a city like that, which is a major international tourist hub. There's tons of cars and it's just busy as anything on the weekend. And, uh. So. So anyway, I wasn't planning on, you know, doing any journalism while I was there, but, uh, I sort of got the camera out. Got the phone out. We managed to hook up a live feed, uh, to the Sunday Wire, which was broadcasting live at that point. So we got in for a few minutes. And just to show people like what? What was around us and, uh, you know, a little bit of reporting, and then everyone kind of went away and it was a little bit unnerving because, you know, Charlie, I've been in war zones in different countries. I've been in situations where, you know, it's like not my normal environment, places like Iraq or Syria or, you know, places like that, even Iran. Recently I was in Tehran, which wasn't a war zone yet, but it is now, which we'll talk about later. But but with with the the Cartel Wars. I have no real point of reference as to like how things work in that situation. So there's a level of unpredictability, and there's a lot of foreigners in that city, a lot of expats, a lot of Canadians, a lot of Americans especially, and a lot of people visiting for the event and just tourists in general in our hotel. Uh, there are people down there like part of Christian missions and churches. And I ran into these people and nobody knew what was going to happen. You started seeing things on social media saying that if the cartels demands, uh, the cartel, Jalisco New Generation, if their demands are not met, this, this, this, this retaliation, this unrest was in in response to the killing of a major narcotics boss. At least that's the main story. Uh, and, uh, he, uh, el mencho el mencho. Sorry. El mencho. He's a mensch. El mencho tied to the Israelis. I don't I don't know. Well, yes, actually. Actually, yes. I'll mention that. Um, and so he it was a Mexican, uh, federal, uh, operation with the with assisted by US intelligence. So and and maybe more than assisted by US intelligence, I think I think the, the America is very much involved in this whole story and driving the story, in fact. Um, but but so that's the retaliation. So everybody's like, they're seeing reports on social media that there's going to be invasions in hotels and homes. If the demands aren't met by five p m. And that was on Sunday. So airports closed. We see a video on social media. People like fleeing the airport like screaming, running out of the terminals. I mean, it's real dramatic, made for TV stuff. I mean, it's not the type of thing that, uh, I would have ever expected to experience, um, especially in a place like that, which is very chilled. Mexico, just in general is very, very chilled. I know there's things rumbling under the surface in a lot of a lot of places, but overall it's very laid back compared to the US. So anyway, and so there was the unpredictability and the people didn't know what was going on anyway, after seventy two hours and you know, after buses, cars, buildings, the smoke all over the city and then people are afraid to go out and there's reports that taxis were being shot at, um, there's even reports of and I can actually verify one of these reports that attendees at our event, their taxi was attacked, uh, near the conference center. That actually happened. I actually later saw the photographs and heard from those people, but, um, but so it's kind of chaotic. And then it died down after seventy two hours, then, you know, manana, everything as normal. Um, and life back to normal in, in Puerto Vallarta. Maybe not in some of the other cities like Guadalajara, more inland or, um, where the where this kind of raid took place was Tapalpa, which is about four hundred meters southeast of Puerto Vallarta, and that's known as a cartel stronghold in the Jalisco state. So anyway, I did I did more analysis of this and looking at the political data points, and I tried to kind of synthesize that to figure out what what what what's pushing what, you know, are you looking for? Where's the leverage? What's pushing in on what. And what I, what I found was, I mean, it's obvious that the biggest drug traffickers in the Western hemisphere have always been and always will be, the CIA and the DEA, uh, two major us and and the FBI is complicit to to a large degree, but mainly, let's say the CIA and the Drug Enforcement Agency, they are the biggest drug traffickers, uh, in the Western Hemisphere. They work with the cartels. But in terms of actually enabling the trafficking into America. It's a US government agencies and military, uh, that that do the bulk of the heavy lifting, uh, for those operations. And there's a lot of money to be made. So knowing that if you think about this as a mafia hierarchy, who's the biggest mafia on the planet, who's got the most guns, who's willing to use them? It's it's the America that's the biggest mafia on the planet. And then Israel, uh, is the little sort of capo, uh, they're next to maybe maybe that's the that's the capo. Maybe it's the the partner. Who knows? Maybe it's the the son, Michael Corleone, but, uh, but but the Mexican cartels are nested underneath that. They're nested underneath. They themselves have their own power base in Mexico politically. And we're talking generations, generations of political cultivating influence and control. And there's all sorts of networks between, uh, corporations, government and the cartels and politicians that are appointed to be regulators. These are key positions. And this was the same in it's the same in America, maybe more so in the past when corruption was, uh, not so white collar in America, but in Mexico. Those are key positions. So Claudia Sheinbaum is the new president. She happens to be Jewish, which is to me, is neither here nor there at this point, because she's seems to be very pro-Palestinian. And the Mexican government's official position is recognizing a Palestinian state at the United Nations. And you guess who is very, very unhappy about this and offended by it is the Trump administration and Israel. And Israel is on a mission to flip all of the Latin American governments away from recognizing a Palestinian state. And they've they've succeeded in Argentina and the US. A lot of people aren't aware. Charlie, uh, have, uh, executed a coup in Honduras before Christmas. So two, two months before Christmas. So in October, November. That was a successful soft coup. It's very well documented what happened. We've reported on a lot of it. Other people, other journalists have done, too. So the what the Trump administration, what Marco Rubio's task is from Paul Singer and the Israeli lobby is to put far right governments in place throughout. They will not tolerate one dissenting country. So they've marked Colombia for regime change. They've marked Nicaragua for regime change. Uh, they have marked Mexico. That would be very difficult. Uh, Cuba, as you can see. And, uh, and probably Brazil, it will be towards the end of the line on that. We'll see Venezuela as well. So look at, look at the results. This is a real thing. And Israel have the Isaac Accords. That's the. You've heard of the Abraham Accords, right, Charlie? Yeah. The Isaac Accords is the same for Latin America. That is Israel's political project to flip Latin America, to norm, to normalize relations and be pro-Israel. Why? I looked at the weapons, uh, traffic in Mexico. Largest weapons trafficker in New Mexico is the United States, bar none. And Sheinbaum complained about this. She's saying we've done our part by stopping fentanyl coming through, but you're not stopping the guns coming through. And she's vocally, uh, you know, challenged Trump in the US on this. This has been a problem going back decades through multiple administrations. But guess who the second biggest weapons trafficker into Mexico is, I guess Israel? Yep, you guessed right. So, uh, so between Israel and the USA, why would Israel want to be trafficking weapons into Mexico, specifically into the hands of the cartels and organized crime. That's so interesting, isn't it? And you have to ask this. The other question is, why was Israel in Colombia for the better part of twenty years, uh, arming and training the death squads of the right wing government at the time in Colombia? Uh, the paras, they called them the paramilitaries to fight the FARC. Okay. And so and at the same time, Colombia was buying over the table, uh, billions of dollars of weapons from Israel and technology, surveillance technology, guns, all sorts of things, and the training as well, all that. So Israel wants to have all of those countries as clients. This is a huge market collectively for weapons, arms, military training, AI surveillance software, uh, tracking, kill tracking, kill software, all this stuff that Israel has road tested in the West Bank and Gaza. They're marketing it to the US, and they're. And they want they want to open that up as their main market. And, uh, and so they and they also have business interests in there. They want to increase their ownership. Uh, and this is the billionaire class, the Ron Lauders of the world while he is American. Uh, or I don't even know if he's American. I think he's American by nationality, but, uh, he's the one that told Trump to to take Greenland. And he is also one of the big mega-donors next to Les Wexner, Jeffrey Epstein's main financier. Uh, and many others. They're part of the mega group. So Ron Lauder and these others are also pushing for Javier Milei to open up, uh, parts of Argentina for Israeli interests and not just business, military interests is what what what would Israel's military interests be for? controlling Tierra de Fuego and the Southern Straits access into the Pacific. I mean, what does this tell you? What's coming? Well, it makes me ask, how do you say Operation Condor in Yiddish. Yeah, yeah. Well, yeah, it's a condor. A big, very big bird. Um, so. Yeah, I mean, so so this isn't a conspiracy. Everything I've said is absolutely one hundred percent factual. And and look at what they're doing to Cuba. Who wants Cuba at the end of the day? Before. Before the Castro's revolution, whether you are, you know, communist or capitalist or whatever. Before Cuban, the Cuban revolution, fifty three Havana was an offshore site for the Jewish and Italian mafias and and the and the Mafia. Congressmen and senators would go down there to do their dirty deals, have their parties do whatever they do, and money's exchanged offshore ninety miles and the. You can imagine the level of corruption in the US system at that point. And and so Castro reversed all that. And they've never forgiven the Castro revolution for this because he pissed off pretty much everybody. And I think John F Kennedy probably got the brunt of that, uh, in nineteen sixty three. And, uh, and so there's that, that that's now there's suffocating and destroying, trying to strangle with a military blockade. Cuba not allowing fuel in. I mean, it's, it's it's horrendous. And no one's going to be able to stand up to the US. How does that play out? Does that play out with the US just taking Cuba at some point? Yes. Yes. That's that's they they feel it's a softer target than Venezuela because of its location. Uh, it's got a smaller population and it doesn't have nearly the sort of power powerful, um, uh, kind of mass political base, uh, that Venezuela has in terms of the mass. It's a it's, you know, population eleven million. And, uh, and they're just banking on the fact if they can ruin it economically and destroy it socially and then start possibly bombing hospitals. And, you know, your these are this is Israeli siege tactics. Yes. The Trump administration has merged with Israel in in the methods, in the mentality, in the tactics, in the language and totally, uh, disregarding international law, human rights, any, uh, you know, war crimes, like what are what are war crimes? They're they're just arrogantly just dismissing any criticisms, like, what are you talking about? We have the power. We're going to do it. So that I mean, that's kind of where we're at right now. It's not pleasant if you're on the receiving end of that. Uh, and unfortunately, we're so corrupt. The political system in America is so corrupt that Democrats and Republicans, for the most part, are on board with all of this. They really are. And they couldn't care less about the Cuban people, but they will wax morally about, oh, we need to free the Cubans and bring democracy to the Venezuelans, and we need to liberate the Mexicans and, uh, etc. and it's just endless, the same hollow rhetoric and all thereafter is they want every single acre of agricultural arable land in Cuba, under the nested under Cargill and Koch Industries and Monsanto and all these other bill gates. That's, that's that's their interest in Cuba, nothing else. That and probably growing drugs there. Yeah. You know, because the I'll say something controversial. This Trump administration is absolutely aligned with international drug cartels. One hundred and ten percent. They pardoned one of the biggest drug traffickers, Donald Trump. Juan Orlando Hernandez, former disgraced president of Honduras. Trump pardoned him and no one asked why Trump? Trump's reason. Someone said, why did you pardon this? The biggest federal indictment, one of the biggest in history for trafficking cocaine into the United States. ex-President of Honduras in the federal pen. And Trump says, well, my people said he was treated very badly, very badly. He was treated very, very. Biden. Biden treated him very bad. I mean, so there's no, like, real justification for it, no reason for it. And then you have to ask the question, who told Trump to do that? Who told Trump to do that? Well, Israel, uh, was also he was a big backer of Israel Hernandez. He was very pro-zionist. But worse. Worse. Marco Rubio is best friends with the President of Ecuador, Daniel Noboa, and the Noboa family have been implicated in guess what? Smuggling coke in their in their banana shipments to Europe. The Noboa Fruit Company. Massive scandal in Ecuador. And then that's been tamped down. You don't see the DOJ sending any indictments or anything to that. So. So that's Rubio's best pal. So this is the this is the Latin America they want to see, which is run by cartels, pro-Israel and far right, basically. And I'm, you know, I'm I vote people know me. I voted conservative, I voted for Trump. I admit, uh, on multiple occasions because I believed the campaign promises. But, uh, you know, when it comes to regime change, overthrowing governments, um, I'm pro national sovereignty. I believe it's the business of the people in that country to determine what type of government they have, not Washington's business. So I believe in in sovereignty. I believe in people's right to free speech and and so forth within, within the context of whatever state they're living in. But, you know, I don't believe it's our business to determine the government. What I think is the more pressure we put on some of these countries, um, the more hardcore the hardliners get in whatever form of government it is. Sure. And, uh, and they get more defensive and we get more war as a result. And, um, so, yeah, I don't think there's anything conservative at all at about this Trump administration. I think this is a radical Trotskyite neocon, uh, regime that that, unfortunately, is in Washington, and they're completely out of control at the moment, as we can all see. Uh, I've been watching them try and fit a square peg into a round hole for a while with bricks. With Brazil in particular. It always felt like a piece that didn't fit geographically, didn't fit ideologically, I don't know. It never seemed like it fit with what they were doing with the Belt and Road Initiative. And that whole thing is the goal for the American empire and the Israeli empire as well, to get Brazil out of that arrangement, to isolate it from the rest of the BRICs nations. Is that doable? Is that something they're looking to do? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And I think they they they did this successfully. Argentina was going into BRICs, right. And then Millie was installed into power, which was under this guise that he was a libertarian and all this other stuff. And he is uh, it's it's kind of a train wreck. All he did was just basically saddle the country with more international debt and managed to get a bailout from Trump. Uh, the biggest, one of the biggest financial bailouts in global history. More money than the United States for for backstopping their currency, basically. I mean, they've given money and stuff to Ukraine, but in terms of cash payments, uh, what they've given to Argentina, it's uh, more, in fact, in any one tranche. So why is that? They're really desperate to hold. They need to hold that up as a pro US pro pro pro Israel uh, government. And so for for Brazil, uh, it doesn't surprise me that Brazil was one of the sort of founding BRICs countries, because if you look at BRICs, it overlays with the Non-Aligned movement. The Non-Aligned movement was a precursor to BRICs. This would have been during the Cold War in the sixties. And these were countries like Libya, like, um, uh, Syria, the old Syria, like like Iran, like Cuba, you know, the ones without central banks, basically. Yeah. And and they tend to be leaning left, uh, or or maybe even if they're not leaning left in the sense of, you know, an official socialist or communist country. They're into nationalizing key industries and state directed economy like China, basically state directed economy. So the non-aligned movements would be definitely not NATO members. That would you wouldn't be in there in the Nam if you were a NATO member. Uh, not members of the EU, obviously. So you wouldn't belong to any of those clubs, uh, or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization or whatever. Um, the, the NAFTA and NAFTA, the Free Trade organization wouldn't be in any of those, uh, wouldn't be a trilateral Commission, um, sort of country like Japan. So what's left? And you wouldn't be part of the British Commonwealth either. So what's left are a lot of those Nam countries. And, uh, and so Brazil's unique in South America because it's Portuguese. There everything else. It's a Spanish speaking world, but it's an outlier and that's Portuguese, but it has the most powerful economy it has. It's the most rich in terms of resource endowment. And it also has very, very strong institutions, uh, in Brazil, um, as well. So, uh, they would definitely like to take it out of, of bricks and also because they would a great client for China. So a great supplier to China and also a great buyer of Chinese product as well. And the US want to streamline the Western Hemisphere and create a Fortress America. Write down the Western Hemisphere, including Latin America. But the problem is, during the nineties and two thousand, China made massive inroads into all of these Latin American countries and Africa. And, you know, and then Washington's they're all having fits and tantrums because they're like, look at how far China has penetrated into Africa and into South America. And this is just and right in our backyard. And they're stomping their feet. And I'm thinking to myself, but the US used to have complete dominion over Latin America. So what was the US doing during the nineties and two thousand around the world that drew them away from their own hemisphere? And hmm, let me think about that. Who drew America away from their own hemisphere to fight foreign wars in Central Asia and the Middle East? Is it that little tiny strip of land the size of new Jersey? 


Yes. It's Israel. And who determines foreign policy in Washington? The Israel lobby. So the Israel lobby pulled America, put America into debt, pulled all of its resources and focus into the Middle East and Central Asia to to to keep Israel secure and safe and and neglected pretty much everywhere else in the world. If we're thinking from an imperial perspective here, uh, and, and now they're they're kicking and screaming and they're trying to make up for lost time. And by rushing it and doing these desperate operations like kidnapping the president of Venezuela with a fake indictment about drug trafficking and shooting up fishing boats in the Caribbean, and then flexing and doing a victory lap like this is some great achievement for Delta Force. Um, that that that's where the US is, has found itself in twenty twenty six. So it only has itself to blame. And the fact that America has lost at least Washington anyway, has lost a tremendous amount of its national sovereignty to a foreign entity. And I don't think we can argue with that. Looking at the events of the last week, uh, I mean, it's now everyone should see it by now. If you if you cannot see this at this point, you will never see it. Yeah. It's true. I was talking to John Perkins about that. He's refreshed. Confessions of an economic Hit man recently with the Latin American flavour to it, talking about the Chinese economic hit man, how they come in and do this. And it occurred to me that, you know, the policy of America versus the policy of China in, let's say, in relation to Africa was that the Chinese were building hospitals for sick Africans, whereas the Americans were building graveyards for dead ones. Right. We were just in there murdering their people. Meanwhile, China's building infrastructure, of course, they've got their own frustrations with it. You can watch the documentary about the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Chinese trying to build infrastructure in there. And it's it's a frustrating situation, but it it, um, it occurred to me that at some point, the American empire was going to realize that they'd left the back door open in Latin America and that the Chinese had moved in and it started. I don't know whether it's Ecuador importing in facial recognition technologies and starting. That's that's a that's a slippery slope. So so does the did did this pivot to Trump's Monroe Doctrine? Was that just predicated by somebody taking a big picture look and saying, hey guys, if we don't if we don't pay attention to this two decades from now, the Chinese are going to have all of South America colonized and they're going to be coming north. It's just some calculation going on as a defensive play. Or is the American empire just only thinking offensively these days? No, I mean, it shouldn't be. It shouldn't be any kind of an epiphany in twenty twenty five or twenty twenty six, in this first year of this Trump administration, particularly that, you know, China has increased their influence, uh, economically, uh, politically, even globally, but especially economically, uh, by orders of magnitude, uh, from where it was thirty years ago. Um, just look at the trade deficit between the United States and China. Uh, as an example, the US. What happened is this is what you're seeing now is it's not it's not something that happened overnight. But they're they're they're trying to roll up the American public to make to make them think this is a new phenomenon and you need to get really outraged about it. You need to give us all of your money, and we're going to tax you into oblivion to pay for this new military. Trump says. I'm going to rebuild the military again. Like he said, I rebuilt it before. He didn't rebuild anything in his first term. He's not rebuilding it now. We have aircraft carriers from nineteen sixty running around. Uh, you know, I'm surprised they don't use coal, uh, furnaces. But anyway, um, so what what the novelty here is that the establishment has, has realized that they, they have they have gotten rich off the financialization of the American and the European and the British economies by outsourcing all the jobs starting in the nineteen eighties and and chopping up companies and breaking up companies and taking the what they called the underperforming assets, selling them off. And then then all of a sudden the share price goes up on the stock market because, oh, that company is turning a profit. But at the expense of all of those domestic jobs in the United States and England, in the UK and in Europe. And that's the that was the big revolution of the nineteen eighties. And then all the, all the momentum is going to, to Wall Street, uh, to the, to the financial class. And what do they do? They, they lobby with their, with their increased power and clout, lobbying for more deregulation of financial instruments and derivatives and all of these creative, uh, repackaging of debts and Re Securitizing mortgages and the subprime mortgage crisis and the repeal of the Glass-Steagall act. Again at the end of the Bill Clinton, Bill Clinton second term. And all of a sudden, you know, so the economy is humming, but it's humming for them, and it's not necessarily humming for everybody else. You know, we're not seeing concomitant, uh, wage growth. And certainly the cost of living keeps going higher and higher and higher. And so not so they can never make America great again. Trump's run on this trope. But America will never be competitive in the manufacturing sector until they they realize Elon Musk's vision of robots, uh, making everything. And then we're at that point, we're all on UBI, getting paid a stipend to stay at home and do watercolor painting, uh, and other navel gazing activities that will make us live our best life. Right. Um, so, but but like. Exactly. But, um, but so they can never reverse that. And China will never lose that competitive advantage. Not for a very, very long time because China's um, on the ascendancy. 

And and so the foreign policy component is that software from the nineteenth century. And that's that's political operating system OS that is a political OS. I'll use this as a metaphor so people understand with it. It's a political OS that's very outdated. In fact, it's the equivalent of windows ninety seven, uh, today. So imagine running windows ninety seven today trying to get your AI bots to work. It's not going to work so that all the foreign policy vision, the vision of global management is outdated. And what's and and if if you go a hundred years back, where was China a hundred years ago? It was more or less, uh, backwater in terms of the Industrial revolution, where was Africa one hundred years ago, you know, and basket weaving? Not so anymore. Where was the Middle East one hundred years ago? Camels. Tents. And that's not the case now. Uh, India. Where was India one hundred years ago? They were under the thumb of the British Empire and being, uh, you know, extracting all of their wealth and, uh, running massive slave labor structures to benefit the City of London. That's not what's happening in the world today. So all of that geopolitics was configured for another world, a world that no longer exists. So when you hear Marco Rubio and Donald Trump or echoing the, uh, the the sentiments and the frustrations of the central bankers, that's what you're that's what you're hearing, that the elites, management class, the hereditary rightful rulers of this planetary fiefdom, they're they're still thinking in old imperial terms. And meanwhile, the US is not even probably the number one superpower on the planet. Not economically anyway. Maybe militarily, but not economically. China is the workhorse of the planet, there's no doubt about that. And India is not far behind them. And America is getting worse and worse in that position. And with a declining population, which is a byproduct of all of that great social engineering of post World War two, and Europe is also cratering, declining population again, because of all that great liberal policies and inventions and social engineering and post-modernism. So we all bought into that in the West for the last seventy years, and now we're getting upset and. And then people like Elon Musk are funding the far right to get angry at the immigrants and angry at the black people and angry at the Muslims, when in fact, Elon Musk is the product of that post-modern liberal corporate order that is eating itself as consumed in the United States to literally consumed the United States, to the point where Gen Z are now looking into the future and wondering what is their compelling future. Yeah. What what's the promise for these young kids? What? What are we promising them? Uh, in the next generation, it's not the same sort of American dream or promise that were given to our generation or our parents generation. And at that point, you have a major contradiction, uh, in the political economy. And if that can't be reconciled, uh, through politics or other means, then you will eventually have a fraying at the seams of the fabric of, of of the Republic in this in sense of America. But I think Western civilization, as we know, as we've come to know it, the first world, uh, is is coming under pressure now. Structural. Structural pressure and and this everything we're seeing with the Trump administration and the Trump phenomenon is a is an expression of that, as are all the supine European, uh, governments that are completely feckless and immoral and corrupt and, and van der Leyen in Brussels, this is an expression of this process and they just don't want to face the fact. Yeah, the people themselves are like a physical manifestation of the, of the, the state, you know, the, the, the weaklings in Europe who are just they're the next one is weaker than the one before and they're nobody has any respect for them. Donald Trump in this cartoonish vaudeville sort of impression like a like he's running a he's pretending to be a president. I think this might be the most dangerous time in the world, because you have a delusional American empire that's losing power, but thinks it's gaining power. Walking into the Thucydides Trap with China, Where twelve out of the last sixteen times this has happened, it's led to war. Right. A rising power challenging the existing superpower never ends well. You got a seventy five percent chance of that ending poorly. And you've got the worst people in the world in charge. I'm having a hard time if I'm this generation looking at what is. What's the twenty years look like for me? Boy, I don't know that I can help them. I don't know that I have anything good to say to, uh, you know, uh, you know, just work harder. I don't know that that's the answer. What? What do you tell these people that are looking into the future? Well, you know, it's it's it's way, it's way more dangerous than eighty years ago because we don't just have one nuclear armed state superpower. We have, you know, uh, eight or ten, um, and in the top tier, maybe for four or five in the top tier, that's way, way more dangerous. So, uh, you know, for the, for, for this next generation, they have to. They have to look at. I sort of tried to address this a little bit, but I didn't go have enough time to go deep into it. In my, my talk at, uh, anarcho poco. But this, this construction of this digital, uh, control grid and the that has got people so pinned down, uh, in their day to day movements and ability to express themselves, uh, on the public square forums that we have, uh, social media and YouTube, etc.. Um, and then the, the, the system's ability to switch people off if they're seen to be an unfavorable person, either switch them off at the port of entry in a country or switch them off, like in terms of debunking. And this is something that happened to a lot of our colleagues during the Covid fiasco, with the vaccine scandal and all of this stuff. All of us who were, uh, protesting against it, speaking out against were getting canceled on different levels. And also this. This can extend with people who are anti-war activists. Now um, as well. And so that that why that's different. Is this the first time in history where there's no expectation of any privacy? Just imagine that no private life, um, no private movements, no private movements, like no private activity, period. And so going into that, it's very difficult to then rise up to overthrow the system in a physical way that maybe previous generations were able to do when things just got so corrupt, when things just got so out of order that it was suffocating and people had no choice. As Gerald Celente famous says, when people have nothing left to lose, they lose it. And but now when you lose it, what do you where do you lose it? You're going to end up losing it in your bedroom, uh, and going into a manic depression. And then you're how are you going to cope with it is not to rise up against the man, but go down to the farm to Walgreens and get a prescription for Xanax. 

You know that that's how a lot of people are coping, or turning to drugs or just basically withdrawing into their virtual worlds. So that that's, to me, the big human challenge, at least in the West. Now I'm talking about people in other places in the world, including places I've just visited recently. Even in Iran, they're not as tied into that digital world. They they're still connected with the real world, traditional family, the land, you know. You know, food from from the point of the the getting it from the tree to the plate. I mean, that's that's not a foreign concept for people in those countries or in other countries in Southeast Asia or in Africa or or in large parts of South America, even in Mexico, for instance. But in the US and Europe and Canada and in advanced countries like Japan, more and more people, especially the young generation, are more and more siloed into this kind of centralized system of providing everything that they need or seemingly they need, uh, at a whim so that that that's going to be a big challenge. So you got two choices at that point. And again, this is a conversation that we had a lot of during the week with people. Um, you can opt out, you can look for an escape hatch that you can start an intentional community. And there's a lot of people that are going to do that. And, uh, you know, I would never get in their way, and I would never tell them that's a bad idea because it's not a bad idea. It's a great idea. However, there's still a large percentage of people that still live within the confines of this, this ruling system. And so then the question is, you know, a lot of us in the freedom community or in the truth community or however you want to characterize it, so many of us are withdrawn from politics. We don't vote, we don't get. We don't interface with the system because it's so corrupt and our vote doesn't matter anyway. And we're not going to get involved in any local meetings and we're just going to withdraw. Now that's an option. That's withdraw my my participation, withdraw my consent. But there's a price to that. And that's the people who are going to engage. Are those people you just said, Charlie, that being worse, one's being replaced by even worse ones and the level of mediocrity just keeps going higher and higher. And then we're controlled by absolute ghouls and demons and fiends and corrupt people that are total corporate careerists who don't have any, have a shred of any interest in anything ethical or moral, and are only caring about themselves, their and their gold plated pension and their and their clout and their status. And that's it. And job for life. And ideally, a job where they don't have to actually do anything so that that's who's ruling us more and more. That's the case. So what about what would happen if all of us in our community, even the people that we spent a week with recently in Mexico, what happened if those were the dominant faces in in our in our system, in our government? Those were our congressmen, our senators, those were the heads of all the committees. I think we'd have a very, very different situation on our hands personally. Um, so that's just I'm just putting that out there, Charlie, as an idea. Well, there's and and I'll tell you this, there's, I suppose, a bright side to the younger generation being digital and being aware. I've never seen so many people question the official narratives that they're seeing on TV in a way that they didn't do in the past. And one of them that came up here in the States that was everywhere, was there are massive protests happening in Tehran. They've the the regime has murdered tens of thousands of protesters out there. Now, of course, I hear that I immediately my bullshit detector goes off like crazy. Uh, but for the average person in America or in the UK who's just got a couple minutes to consume information on the news to the best that they can, they see that, they hear it. It's, uh, maybe they see it on one channel and they think maybe then they read it in the newspaper. Oh, I see it again. Or maybe they hear it online. Next thing you know, it's real to them. You were there. What was the reality of the situation that you saw on the ground in Tehran? Well, that's one of the reasons I decided to go. And believe me, there was a lot of things keeping me from going. A lot of a lot of hurdles, a lot of obstacles, political obstacles. Um, and I, I will I will be, you know, I've already been, you know, targeted for, for going over there and, and in very malicious ways. Um, and I expect to see more of that and, uh, but but but quite frankly, I had no choice because as a as a journalist, I can't keep opining and analysing and covering this this region, this area. There comes a limit where you're talking about a place or a country that if you don't have personal experience and you, there are limitations to what you can, how you can express yourself in terms of understanding what's actually happening on the ground. So I wanted to go to see what the real situation was politically. And I, I got fairly conclusive answers on this. One of them is that there is a massive sense of solidarity within the country of Iran. And and because it's being targeted and threatened and that that comports and, and is consistent with everything I studied in my, uh, you know, as a masters of postgraduate student in international relations. So all that theory and it is good, even though you know the theory, even though it makes sense to you to see it verified strengthens it to another level. So I saw that with my own eyes, I experienced it. I got attacked for sharing those insights. Uh, internationally. One video, which I had no idea it was going to end up on their national broadcaster. Someone just came up to me with a phone, uh, and, you know, I was out there with two million people all supporting the Supreme leader and the government and saying, you know, you screw America, basically, you know, bring it on. Um, and then someone shot a mobile phone video of ask me a question or two and said it was for their blog and it was on their national news. And then it went it went international after that. And, uh, boy did I did. I reap the whirlwind, uh, for, for that one minute or one minute and 30s. But, um, but I'm glad I did it. And also just to also, I feel like when as a journalist, I don't go just to go look for a story, I go to learn what life is like, and I want to know what the people are like. And I want to know if I can sit down and and you know, and I want to understand what their customs are and have have a meal, have a conversation, have a political debate. And then they're asking me a lot of questions about my side as well. That's also part of the journey is you're, you're you're I'm, I'm the evidence for them of what some people in my part of the world think and and not like what Fox News is putting out on the airwaves. So that for me, being there, that's also valuable to have an alternative American or Western perspective for Iranians. And, uh, and so they probably think that we're all cheerleading this insanity that, that I mean, my guess is that their media is skewed in a way that well, not that it really has to be, but to show how many Americans are supportive of this. And I want to stand up and scream like, hey, not all of us. Not all of us are thinking that this is this is, uh, the right thing to do. I think before social media, that was a big, big problem. Now they see how many of us reasonable, insightful, uh, people, uh, are on social media? They see the the numbers and they know that we're here now, and they really do. And so they're very canny, uh, in, in that sort of thing politically, I would say Iranians are very canny and very smart, and they are they are the best trolls in terms of memeing and trolling. They're incredible. Um, and it makes, um, they regard America, even conservatives in America, as being kind of woke. You know, they so because they're actually conservative, they're socially, they're pro-family. They're, you know, they're pro-family. They're they're religious, they're not, you know, they're against abortion. They're against all those things that conservatives claim to be against in America but aren't really, um, and they're pro-sovereignty and they're also they're pro their own interests in there, you know, which is, again, what a lot of Americans claim on the right, especially in MAGA claim to be. But they aren't actually, because when it comes to the crunch, they will kneel to Israel not ninety nine times out of one hundred, if not one hundred times out of one hundred. Um, and that's not just on the right. This is this is across our political, uh, spectrum in Washington. I wish, I wish there were more Americans that would, I think, uh, pull up our politicians on this. And I think there are. And you mentioned some bright spots, Charlie. And I think I think we are seeing a big opening of people are having this wide eyes, wide open moment now, and you can see it. It's very visible. People are questioning totems that were sacred up until recently. And not just young people, even normies, you know, even normie boomers are coming around slowly. But, uh, but but the youth, I think, are realizing that no, this, this, this thing that you guys have been doing now for all these decades, it's not going to work for us. We're not really on board with that. So that's why it pushed the elite class and the the Zionist elite class, led by Larry Ellison, second richest man in the world, to basically go on a rampage of buying up every US media outlet to try to control the narrative. They're panicking. They can't control. They think that if they buy TikTok that they're going to control, uh, the what people think about Israel and the world on TikTok or if they're not. And to prevent them from being sympathetic to the, you know, native Palestinian population. It's not going to work. The kids are just going to leave TikTok and say it's a sellout and they'll they'll migrate to some other platform or they'll find another because that, you know, in a capitalist world, that's your market. You're not you're not going to be able to suppress that whole youth opinion market. It's just not going to happen. They will pop up wherever they wherever they're going to pop up and they're going to dominate. Uh, and and so, so yeah, there's something definitely to be, to be hopeful for there. And unfortunately, we have these decrepit dinosaurs that are in power right now. I mean, literally ghouls in their eighties like Biden and, uh, and Trump that are driving the world off the cliff and they won't even be around to see the impact. Sadly ironic that the Jews, who are such big fans of Barbra Streisand don't understand the Streisand effect. Streisand effect? Well, yeah, I mean, it's it's it's so funny. You want to see something funny? This is I, I yeah, that that would be a good app. The Streisand app. Yeah. We should, we should, we should work on that one. It's a problem but so so okay let's go to Speculation Island I guess. Because because as of the recording of this, the, the the US has started bombing Iran three days ago. So we're talking less than one hundred hours, you know, so things are going to be progressing by the time this episode is available. And, you know, we just understand how things progress. What's the what's the best case scenario for this for for all all parties involved? Did we get into some sort of theatrics and and we leave it at that, kind of like what happened on the twelve Day War, if that's what they're actually calling it. Uh, or does this spiral drag in, uh, neighboring countries that have security agreements and does this break out like World War One, where everybody gets dragged in simply because they're they're legally tied to one another. And once a bomb goes off in this country, then that country is in. And that's my fear. How do you are you can we brightside this or is this going to get ugly? I think it's already ugly. I think it's already ugly. And um, you know, Iran warned that any, any, uh, An unprovoked attack on them would result in retaliation against US bases all over the Middle East and against Israel. And that's exactly what they did. They've done it. Uh, so, you know, America, no one should be shocked about what happened. Uh, what's happening now? The question is, what will the US and Israel do to save face? That's the question. Because America has already got a bloody nose. I mean, think about that. I mean, who who would have the temerity to hit US bases in ten different countries simultaneously in twenty four hours and then pummel Tel Aviv? Tel Aviv is getting pummeled, uh, in Israel, and they even hit Cyprus. This a major NATO base, uh, British RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus and, uh, and NATO can't do anything because the US started the war and they're the leading NATO country. So there's NATO's out of the picture there. But, uh, and no one thought that they would hit EU. That's EU territory. So Iran is is already officially attacked and hit EU territory? Not by much, but they could, if they want, send a very, very massive barrage of missiles or very big barrage of missiles to, to Cyprus. And then what the Europeans are going to say, how did this begin? That's the question they should be asking themselves. But instead they'll say, we support our ally, the United States. And the Iranian regime is abhorrent and whatever. But, uh, so what will they do to save face? And the sad thing is, I think even at their own detriment, the US and Israel have the potential to go and hit, you know, nuclear power stations in Iran create huge havoc. Environmentally hit population centers kill lots of civilians in Iran. Um, and they will try to assassinate every they have a list of all of their leaders in their planning, um, uh, strategy Center, and they're working twenty four seven to try to assassinate and kill everybody in line politically. I mean, that's that is a Israeli tactic. And the US is is the US is merged with Israel now in its methods and its language and its approach to, uh, international power. And I think this is it's going to be very bad. It's yes, it will be chaotic. But the US and Israel are going to pay a dear price and are paying a dear price for this in terms of their international legitimacy. And Iran has shown the world that one country, one country, the first country to ever stand up to the United States head to head first in the modern era, uh, in a meaningful way and inflicting damage and not afraid and not surrendering, being threatened with annihilation and saying we're not surrendering. And they've already what they've achieved already is unprecedented. And Israel, I think, just continues to dig a ditch for itself. But look, Israel had total dominion over Gaza. And carpet bombed it for two straight years, and they still have not subdued Hamas. Do you think they can do that over a country like Iran that has a square meter territory? That's the equivalent of continental Europe? And you think they're going to subdue them in a week? And to make them capitulate? No. And the people are going to get more. What they've done is well, is whatever the results of this, they're going to be horrific for Iran. I can tell you right now it's going to be bad. Iran's going to lose a lot of people and a lot of their leadership class. And but what what they've done is they've motivated the young generation in Iran that weren't even born during the revolution to have no recollection of what their elders tell them, the stories of why America is bad. Now they're seeing it for their own eyes. So they, America and Israel, have just reinvigorated a new generation of resistance in Iran. And this if you look at what Iran has achieved in terms of technological developments over the last, you know, twenty or thirty years in terms of missile tech, their space program, their nuclear physics, their their drone tech, their satellites, the avionics. Um, if this country was not under sanctions, this would be a bona fide superpower of Asia. Bona fide superpower. It would be the equivalent of, you know, maybe like a United Kingdom, uh, or a smaller sort of superpower, uh, within Central Asia and, and the Middle East. And but even under sanctions, they're still demonstrating that they are a superpower. They've achieved some level of deterrence against an overwhelmingly superior, uh, to superior adversaries with no assistance from anybody. Pretty much. So that's, uh, that's that's something that's historically that is something. So is it. But does that mean there's not going to be pain and suffering for them in the short term? And and does that mean the US and Israel are not going to stop hitting them with every last bomb they have? Uh, no. They're going to be the US and Israel are going to unload their arsenals on Iran in the hopes that that they will surrender or that they'll be destroyed, or the regime will be defeated. And guess what? If if it's not us, then Iran will emerge as the de facto winner of this. Even taking all of the losses, Iran will emerge as the winner because the winner will be judged by what the pecking order was before the war. In other words, if the US is up here and Iran is down here and say Israel is up here. If after the war it becomes this, then you can judge relatively who won by the change in the global pecking order in terms of reverence, respect, uh, and potential. You know which country has the best prospects for future coalitions with other countries mid-tier powers? China, Russia and then Iran will be considered the winner because they'll have they'll have a net gain in in America will be a net loss. Israel will be a net loss. So they might be able to kill one hundred thousand Iranians and drop a couple tactical nuclear weapons and obliterate a few cities. And trust me, I would not rule that out. When you're talking about these demons in Washington and Tel Aviv, however, that that does not guarantee them victory, unfortunately for them. So that's something to think about. Let's wrap up with this. Uh, you were talking about the technology of of the Iranian regime. We've seen some of the hypersonic missiles that are very impressive and unusual, but we've got a different technological group in Silicon Valley who have entered the fray here. And now we're into the new era of warfare, which involves Palantir. And so we saw what happened with the targeting of Gaza. The Social Credit scores essentially put on buildings in terms of ranking them with lavender. And and these programs that they have. What's the what's the future of what what is World War three against Iran look like in a palantir world? Yeah. And and that would be the second or third wave of this war, uh, later, because I don't think it will end with this particular conflict that we're witnessing now. This phase is not going to be the end. Um, the through the what the world is Alex Karp's version of the world. Elon Musk. Lucky. Uh, Palmer lucky and all these, uh, you know, self-appointed, uh, guardians of humanity or inhumanity. Um, their view of the world is an autonomous AI swarming, uh, a constellation of, you know, autonomous AI, uh, drones, um, missiles, um, all sorts of cyber attacks, subterfuge, relentless, automated until. So the problem with this is any government can can be capitated. Um, you could render any government. You can immobilize any government, no matter how how how big the nuclear arsenal is. If you overwhelm them with swarming you, then can it be very difficult to to to withstand whoever would have the advantage in the short term? I mean, eventually, if they weren't successful, the other side could come up with countermeasures with electronic warfare and other sort of countermeasures. But invariably, if this happens between nuclear powers, in other words, if, if, if, let's say the US is getting so bolshie with their AI, autonomous tech or Israel that they are deploying it to try to decapitate the Kremlin in Russia or the Chinese government or another nuclear power. If you're doing that with conventional AI tech, and I wouldn't say it's conventional at this point, because autonomous AI, which can't be jammed by GPS. In other words, it's sent on its own mission. Mhm. Okay. And you're using that in in thousands and swarming. Um, the the nuclear power sensing an existential threat has only one choice at that point. And that's to launch, uh, intercontinental, uh, strategic nuclear weapons. So the irony is, Charlie, that AI, even though it's, quote, a conventional tech, if it's pushed to its maximum in terms of autonomous AI and swarming and Palantir powered decision making, um, it is going to end in a thermonuclear war. It's very the likelihood is, is more than high because you're leaving countries with no other choice, which is to existential survival. Um, or uh, just basically surrender at that point and, uh, you know, who's willing to roll those dice? You know, some people are. Alex Karp's happy to roll that dice because he's a psychopath. He's he's given up on humanity. His him. Elon Musk their future is is robots synthetic? Uh, you know, girlfriends and, uh, virtual worlds and, you know, living on Mars under tunnels like, that's their compelling future for humanity and and just them and people like them and people who look like them and think like them and everyone else is. If they're not willing to work as slaves in the cobalt mines, then they really have no point on the planet. you know, that's that's their compelling future. Uh, for for for for humanity. And, um, and I just see that as the logical conclusion to this, this where this AI madness is taking it will upend civilization for Western civilization, and it will ultimately upend humanity. I firmly believe it. I don't see any other positive outcome unless it somehow, collectively, humanity can pull pull this back into some place where it can be regulated or controlled. But what's the benefit of it? Is it making our lives, you know, having one million AI drone swarms with, you know, super explosive tipped spears and, uh, running kill kill apps, uh, and all that, is that how's that making our lives better? Is it protecting us from terrorism, or is it what? Delivering our packages, uh, ten minutes faster than normal? Or, like, what is the actual benefit of any of this stuff, other than the people that are producing it and are strong arming our governments to pay for it and using our money? At the end of the day, to pay for it, where's the benefit for humanity? I personally don't see any benefit at all. At all. Call me a Luddite, I don't care. Where's the benefit? I know the Amish had it right. We owe the Amish a big apology. Not that they'd be watching this episode, of course, but Amish. The Amish are the most based people on the planet right now, and I think. I think there's going to be a lot of appeal to go that route. You know, the Mennonites and the Amish, I mean, they they definitely got it right. What's on the agenda for twenty first Century Wire moving forward this year? What do you guys have planned besides doing outstanding reporting on the Epstein situation? By the way, I must say, uh, that you and Freddie Ponton have been putting out its. I just keep thinking that's the last one. And then there's another one. Then there's another one. So what do you guys have planned for this year? We our our mission is and I'm thank you for asking that question, Charlie. And we I've been working really hard. It's been a very difficult to come back from all the the censorship and the cancellation over the, the Covid era. It made us invisible, um, for the most part. And I've had to we had to fight back physically by literally having mailing lists to contact people to share and like and subscribe our YouTube channel. We're physically doing that. We're not getting anything from YouTube. Um, we're doing it all by hand. And, uh, but it's starting to pay off. And, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm great. Great that I'm able to work with, uh, such great talent. Um, and Freddy being a tremendous, uh, journalistic, uh, talent. Uh, literally. You can't teach. I've worked with many journalists before, and there's some things you just can't teach, you know? So you have to have an instinct. Uh, you have to have a nose, like, to know where to look to, to put the story. And Freddy has that, like natural talent. And, uh, I'm, I'm, uh, very, uh, a great experience to be able to teamwork stories with him as well. That's another rare talent. So we're we're just going to keep following what we think are the emerging important stories that and we're going to produce reports that have the most impact that we think is going to intervene in the narrative. So I, I look at my philosophy as Charlie, I look at the narrative like this kind of blob, and I see it coming and my job, our job as the, you know, a battleship in The Rebel, the ragtag fleet of the Rebel Alliance, is to look for that six foot by six foot opening, identify it, and then we just unload and we keep going, and we'll unload for weeks on the same target until it breaks. And when we see it breaking on, on social media and online and people talking about it on big shows and we're like, okay, damage is done, we'll move on. We're going to look for the next one, and that's what we're able to do as a small media outlet that maybe a big institution, um, can't do because they're having to deal with the weather. The court reporting the local, uh, child abduction story and the local water controversy and the local corruption and this and that, that we don't have to cover. We don't we're not obligated to cover all of those things that a mainstream media outlet has to cover, because that's part of their charter. Um, we can focus on what we think are the important, uh, political and geopolitical points. And literally I just follow my personal interest. And that's always been my rule. And, uh, and Freddy is, uh, and Freddy and the other writers that we have, they're pretty much the same. And I encourage them just to follow their interest. So I only select people that I work with that I know have an interesting worldview, and they see the world in an interesting way. And I know if that's the case, then they're always going to come up with very interesting things to share and talk about, and then we're able to feed those stories into our podcast or The Sunday Wire, and into our other, um, endeavors and on on to interviews like this with great shows like, like yours, Charlie. And, um, and that's, that's how we see our role in, in the alternative media at the moment. And we're just going to expand on, on, on and do do more of it and try to, um, double up, um, our input by the end of the year. So what we have now, we would like to double by the end of the year and, uh, and then launch a couple of new shows, uh, as well before, uh, before the end of the year. It should it would have been done already, but I'm too busy actually, you know, reporting and then doing a lot of interviews and, and also running the website, um, and, and stuff like that. So but little by little, we're, we're I always want to keep it, um, sustainable and growing at a pace that we can manage and that financially we can afford to maintain, um, even in lean times. And that's the important part. And that's why we've been able to sustain our. Our output since two thousand and nine. Late two thousand and nine, when we started, I started the first blog, uh, twenty first Century Wire and. So and but I think now this is it's going to be a big springboard year. We had a really good winter fundraising drive, and we managed to secure a lot of our budget for the coming year. So that's I mean, I've never been so confident uh, than this year in terms of like being able to actually do certain things in the coming year that that that are going to make a difference. And so that's, that's what we're going to do this year. Well, I'll wrap up this episode the way I started my introduction of you to the stage in Mexico. You guys want to see what a real journalist looks like. That's Patrick Henningsen. Everybody go check out twenty first Century Wire. Go set that as a bookmark. And if you want to connect with me, you can go to macroaggressions. Or hopefully you're checking out activist Post.com. Thanks, everybody. We'll talk to you again soon.