Erick Erickson HR 1 10-09-25

Hello, America. It is Eric Erickson here, broadcasting coast to coast from beautiful Vermont. It actually snowed in the mountains last night. There was a weather advisory. First time this fall season, they've got snow up in the mountains. It's cool. I woke, it got here last night, about 11.30, it was 39 degrees. Woke up in the 40s as high as going to be like 60 degrees. It's gorgeous outside. The leaves are changing color. Very, very beautiful city, Burlington, Vermont. I'm here to give a speech, not on the radio up here, hoping to be on the radio up here, but giving a speech to a group tied to Americans for Prosperity. They ask me to come up. I will be back in the studio tomorrow. So all of this is to say, I can't take your phone calls today because the internet's set up in this hotel room where I'm doing my show is not good enough for me to also connect to the studio to do the show and take your phone calls. But we have a lot to talk about. Nonetheless, I will fill the void. We do have this situation developing in the Middle East where even Democrats are coming. forward. MSNBC daring to say nice things about the president of the United States. John Meacham, who uses Donald Trump as a as a cudgel to show just how awful he is compared to others. I guess he used George H.W. Bush actually is the cudgel. He uses George H.W. Bush, who he wrote a biography of, was friends with the family, say how awful Donald Trump is. He's a would-be dictator, a despot. He's on MSNBC this morning. One of the things about... honesty and citizenship and a sense of, I would say maturity about what people in a democracy should do is even if someone with whom you disagree about 99 things does the 100 really well, you should say so because that's what intellectual honesty is. And so all credit to President Trump and his, as you say, unconventional team. But if he makes an unconventional team, that's fine, right? I remember once asking the senior President Bush after something terrible, what happened. It's a sign of something that I can't remember what it was after he'd been president. Something had happened in the police. And I said, you know, this is a man who spent a decade dealing with this. I said, Mr. President, do you? You think this ever gets resolved? And he said, God, I don't know. That's what one of the most experienced diplomatic presidents in American history. I bet it was an unknowable thing. An unknowable thing, and it is knowable today that the Israeli hostages will come home. The bodies of the dead will come home. Unfortunately, the trade-off may be too much for some in Israel to bear in that they will be trading a couple thousand Hamasniks who have been imprisoned in Israel during the last two years. Those people will head back to Gaza. More of an army for Hamas. Israel, however, will not let its guard now. The Israeli soldiers will withdraw from the territory in Gaza. The Israeli hostages will be released to Israel. The Hamas supporters in prison will go home. This is the beginning of a major movement to wind down operations in the Middle East.

Donald Trump any credit for it. And even he was having to acknowledge Trump changed the dynamic. They're based on Abby Phillips's question. What changed? Because Joe Biden couldn't get Turkey to bend. Joe Biden couldn't get Qatar to bend. Notice though, going back to Martha Radditz, one of the things that she said was that Hamas and everybody else saw Donald Trump bomb Iran. Remember, it was condemned at the time. even by people like Martha Raditz, who said it could have been too much of a provocation in the Middle East. Bombing Iran proved to be a decisive moment. It took their nuclear play off the table. It required them to divert resources they otherwise would have sent to Hamas to rebuilding their nuclear program. The Israeli three-staged attack on Iran-Hasbalan Hamas, decapitated Iranian third-party access. The attacks on the Houthi, that, by the way, Donald Trump wasn't able to pull off successfully, but Israel did mattered. But through it all, the major dynamic that changed the situation was Donald Trump. Joe Biden couldn't get this done. For a year, Joe Biden attempted to get something done. A year and a half, Joe Biden couldn't get peace of the Middle East. Why? Because Joe Biden decided to coddle Iran. Joe Biden and the Democrats decided that Iran was a rational player that they could work with. And they were not. And everyone who knew anything about the Iranian situation knew they weren't. And it didn't matter to Joe Biden. Joe Biden, like Barack Obama. was going to side with Iran, was going to treat Saudi Arabia and Israel as the bad guys. And what Donald Trump did is he showed Israel, you absolutely have my loyalty, you absolutely have, I've got your back, you absolutely will have me in your corner, but these are the things you need to do for me. He's been attacked by the anti-Semites. The anti-Semites led by even members of Congress like Marjorie Taylor Greene and former members of Congress like Matt Bill Gates, suggesting that people in Washington were in Israel's pocket. Those people who were supposedly corrupted and bought off just got a peace deal. Marjorie Taylor Greene didn't get a peace deal. Joe Biden didn't get a peace deal. Ben Rhodes didn't get a peace deal. Donald Trump got that peace deal. Through all the slurs and accusations, Donald Trump kept his head down and did this. And Democrats today are now dealing with a man who they have shut down the government. And even with the government shut down, Donald Trump has been able to get something done. This is John Fetterman. Do you think the president deserves the Nobel Peace Prize? Well, I mean, if this sticks, I think the whole point of having a Nobel peace prize is for ending wars and promoting peace. And I'm going to make a direct appeal to the president. You know, I hope he chooses to provide the tomahawks to the Ukrainians to and give them the tools that they need to push back against the Russia. And if he brings the Ukrainian war to its end, I'll be the Democrat leading the committee.

for his Nobel Prize peace for ending both of these terrible wars. John Fetterman there on Fox News also wants to do it. And by the way, there is word coming out of the White House as I'm talking right now that it does look like the president emboldened from this as emboldened to re-engage with the Ukrainians to try to bring that war to peace, to an end. This is a very big deal today. Very big deal. There are American citizens who have been held hostage by Hamas for two years, and Joe Biden did nothing to get them home. I wonder how many of those who were killed in captivity would be alive had Donald Trump been elected sooner. I think it is a totally reasonable question to ask. How many would still be alive if Donald Trump had been president sooner? But those who are alive are coming home and those who are dead, their bodies will be returned to their families for burial in Israel. Yes, 2,000 or so Hamas supporters, the Hamasniks will be sent back into Gaza. Hamas now must decide if it's going to disarm. That is part of the second phase of the plan is the disarmament of Hamas and the amnesty for Hamas. If they refuse, the war could come back again. But at least the hostages will be home. And I have to tell you, I have this fear in the back of my head. I really do. that none of them will actually come out alive. I hate to say that I hate to be the pessimist, but I just don't trust Tamas. I don't trust Tamas to not do something horrible and violent here at the end before they lay down their arms. But at least after two years in captivity, everyone will get back to Israel living or dead, and we can move on. And the people of Gaza, who the left have insisted are in a genocide, and they're not. They'll be able to begin rebuilding with Donald Trump, who actually is good at building stuff in charge of the building campaign. So you know it's going to be nice. This is a new day, a new piece. And it was brought to you by the Trump administration. Have something to say? Hello. Hello. 1-877-9-7 airing. That's 1-877-97-9-73-7-425.

Missed part of today's show, catch it again in full with the Eric Erickson Show 24-7 live stream, available at Ericerickson.com. Stream enabled for Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. Welcome back from nice and cold Vermont at Eric Erickson here across the United States. Don't worry about the full number, but do worry about this. Text the word Eric, E-R-I-C-K to 33-777. You can get the show notes, the live stream, the podcast, everything else you need. This ongoing story, this development we've got now, of the president of the United States being able to structure this deal. You've even got the Democrats in the United States willing to acknowledge. that the president did some good here. This is Ambassador Mike Huckabee, now the Israeli ambassador, on Fox News last night talking about this. But the real key is President Trump. He's the one that made this happen. Certainly, envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were a very big part of sealing the deal, bringing it together. But this would never have happened without the leadership of President Trump. He brought people together that no one thought would ever sit together, talk, and come to an agreement. And it's really a remarkable day. And I'll tell you, there is a great sigh of relief being heaved throughout Israel today because this is a day that everyone here has been praying to happen for two solid years. Ro Kahana, the very progressive Democrat from California, just listen to this, struggling to a degree to want to give Trump any credit. Join me now is California Congressman Ro Khanna. He is a member of the House Armed Services Committee. Congressman, thanks so much for joining us this morning. Give us your reaction to this historic agreement. Well, it's obviously very welcome news. Finally, the hostages are going to come home. The bombing hopefully is going to stop. Israel is going to withdraw. Everything I have read seems that this is a welcome development. And I'm really glad that after two years of a war, this seems to be finally coming to a resolution. Yeah, I bet he is. But at the same time, it doesn't really want to give Donald Trump any credit for it. Notice how the squad is very quiet today. You haven't heard from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. You haven't heard from Elon Musk Omar, Alana Presley. And you're probably not going to. They were screaming there was a genocide in Gaza. And when peace was proposed... They said nothing about supporting the peace because they don't really believe there's a genocide. And they're really, I mean, we all know which side they're supporting here.

Well, it doesn't matter. Donald Trump has gotten peace. The hostages are going to come home and then we'll deal with the next phase. So what will the next phase be? Well, part of it will be whether or not Hamas disarms. How does Hamas choose to reintegrate into society and do they give up their power in Gaza so that others can come in and rebuild Gaza? You know, just the other day, Iran attempted to deliver a weapons cash to Hamas via the West Bank. And that was disrupted by our allies, including the nation of Jim Jordan, which was able to intervene and stop the weapons from getting into the West Bank. But clearly Iran is not ready for peace, whether anyone else is ready for peace. Hamas is going to have to be purged from power in some capacity to get real and meaningful peace. And we're going to see how Donald Trump's force of personality is able to make that play out because it's going to be, that's going to be the most difficult task for the president of the United States at this point is how do you bring about peace now that you got the hostages? How do you bring about a peace where Hamas disarms and goes away? But he's gotten us as far. Let's see what else he can do with some out-of-the-box thinking. Now, speed of little boxes. I got my Eden Pure Thunderstorm here with me. I don't have to have it, thankfully, but I always travel with it. It's an air purifier. So it gets rid of dust and pollen. It gets rid of pet dander. It eliminates 99.9% of bacteria and viruses that flow through it. And also, it wipes out any odor. My hotel room? Smells fine. I don't need it. But it packs a wallop. And if I needed it, I would have it because it's small. It's portable. I can hold it in my hand. You can get three of them and save $200 bucks. Get them for less than $200 at Edenpuredeals.com. Edenpuredeals.com. The discount code is Eric 3, E-R-I-C-K-3. at Eden Puredeals.com. Check them out today. Get three of them. Eliminate odors. Get one for upstairs, downstairs, your basement, your travel bag, wherever you need it. You go to Edenpuredeals.com. Eden Light the Guard of Eden. Pure is the driven snow. Edenpuredeals.com. The discount code, Eric 3. E-R-I-C-K-3. No space at Edenpuredeals.com.

Hello, America. Welcome back. It's Eric Erickson broadcasting to you from nice and cool Vermont. The fall leaves really do change up here. It's gorgeous. Never been to Burlington before. Got a chance to get up this morning, get some coffee, walk around. Very, very nice. I'm here giving a speech from Americans for Prosperity to their local team up here, not on the radio up here yet, although there are rumors. We'll see. We're talking about the president's deal. He went on with Sean Hannity last night about the peace deal in the Middle East. This is the president talking to Sean Hannity. See all of that disappear. I think you're going to see people getting along and you'll see Gaza being rebuilt. We're forming a council that the Council of Peace, we think it's going to be called and it's going to be very powerful. And it's going to really, I think to a large extent, it's going to have a lot to do with the whole Gaza situation. People are going to be taken care of. It's going to be a different world. I think really the Middle East came together. Amazingly, they came together. You know, they have some countries with extraordinary wealth, and just spending a small portion of that wealth can do so much for that area. So we'll be involved in it. Good for the president. Now, I also, I want to go back to a clip. You know, I pulled this the other day. I told Charlie to pull this clip. But I didn't get an opportunity to play it. But it's actually, it's a kind of funny clip from Caitlin Susan Collins talking about the president's work ethic and the dread that everybody has on being on Air Force One with the president. What traveling with him is like in the first term? Because I had this source who said, you never want to be on Air Force One on a trip. And I said, why? Like, you'd think you want to be in the axis of power close to Trump. He doesn't sleep on these trips. And, like, you know, you're going to Asia or something. And that's kind of the only time you're going to sleep before you go on this trip. Yeah. But Trump is just always up and talking. And he'll, like, have them go wake staff up if they're asleep because he wants to talk to them. And so they, we have this big trip to Asia coming up. And, you know, you're just, you're not going to sleep on that flight. You're not. And in fact, I and myself have gotten a late-night phone call from the president who never seems to sleep. He's always working, and he was up last night with this. And from what I'm told, he wrote his statement. He had Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner on the phone. He had Marco Rubio standing next to him in the Oval Office as he got on to write the tweet. And this was it. I am very proud to announce that Israel and Hamas have both signed off on the first phase. of our peace plan. This means that all of the hostages will be released very soon. Israel will withdraw their troops to an agreed upon line as the first steps towards a strong, durable, and everlasting peace. All parties will be treated fairly. This is a great day for the Arab and Muslim world, Israel, all surrounding nations, and the United States of America, and we thank the mediators from Qatar, Egypt, and Turkey, who worked with us to make this historic and unprecedented event happen. Blessed are the peacemakers Donald J. Trump.

President of the United States. Everyone obviously commenting their disappointed he didn't end with thank you for your attention to this matter. Now, what is interesting to me are the number of people who have just consistently decided that he is Hitler and yet he has brought peace for Jews and gotten them out of captivity. And those people are completely signing. This is a very big deal. And I don't care who you are. You should recognize that Donald Trump has done something good. I just one more time. I want to play this clip one more time. This is John Meacham from this morning, who is a massive Donald Trump critic, has complained about everything Donald Trump has ever done, has suggested Donald Trump's an authoritarian figure and a threat to democracy. This is John Meacham. This is what people on MSNBC woke up to. They were probably throwing things at their TV. One of the things about... honesty and citizenship and a sense of, I would say maturity about what people in a democracy should do is even if someone with whom you disagree about 99 things does the 100 really well, you should say so. Because that's what intellectual honesty is. And so all credit to President Trump and his, as you say, unconventional team. But if he takes an unconventional team, that's fine, right? I remember once asking the senior President Bush after something terrible, what happened. It's a sign of something that I can't remember what it was after he'd been president. Something had happened with police. And I said, the man who spent a decade dealing with this, I said, Mr. President, do you think this ever gets resolved? And he said, God, I don't know. That's what one of the most experienced diplomatic presidents in American history thought. I bet it was an unknowable thing. An unknowable thing. Well, today we know at least that these hostages are coming home. Will we continue to peace of the minutes? No, I don't think we're going to. I think the situation flares up again. We've had 4,000 years of tribal warfare in the Middle East in this region. We're not going to get rid of it tomorrow. But for a time, just a small moment in history, we can breathe some sigh of relief. Yeah, I think that's a good thing. I think it's a very good thing. So what do the next phases look like? This is going to be the important one because Donald Trump insisted this is phase one. That was in his statement, phase one. Phase two is we now have to say once the 2,000 members of Hamas are released from Israel and integrated back into Gaza, what happens to Hamas? Do they continue to assert political authority in Gaza or do they go away?

What the president has proposed is to give them amnesty and allow them to leave Gaza and go wherever they want to go in peace. He's hoping that other Arab neighbors will absorb them. The odds are they won't. So where do they go? Maybe they stay in Gaza and they reintegrate back in society. You know, part of the problem is this may be hard for y'all to comprehend. But if you go to Gaza, Leland Vittert was talking about this with Bari Weiss a couple weeks ago, that they're taught to hate the Jews. In Gaza, the children are taught to hate the Jews. It's an indoctrination that happens even on their version of Sesame Street. The Jews are evil. The Jews need to be killed. This is woven into the fabric of that society, which is a reason that Israel is concerned. At the same time, Israel has in the past been willing for there to be a two-state solution provided, however, that they were disarmed, that Hamas was disarmed, that Gaza was disarmed. Perhaps we could get there. What the president would like to see is a two-state solution without Hamas involved, and then the president and this council of peace will oversee the rebuilding of Gaza. And they will deploy resources from some Middle Eastern allies to build up Gaza and make it a nice city. You know, it was this weird thing that they claimed that Israel had invaded Gaza and taken it over before October 7th. And then once the war actually began, they claimed that Gaza was some peaceful metropolis, beautiful metropolis, and Israel had destroyed it. And then it's like they claimed that the power grid in Gaza was going to go out forever and a day ago. It was kind of funny. Somebody was streaming on the internet from Gaza last night, how people were going door to door to tell people that there was peace because there was no internet. And people were like, why are you able to stream this if there is no internet? The propaganda campaign. This gets back to the Dan Goldman comment from earlier that Israel had a black eye. Israel needed to settle in some capacity. Things were going against Israel. Not really. Things have been going against Tamas and with the president of the United States willing to think differently. I think it worked. Remember, when he killed Qasem Soleimani, they said there would be war. There was no war. When the president withdrew from the Paris Climate Accord, they said the whole world would burn up. It did not burn up. When he moved the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, they said there would be war. There wasn't.

This president has continued to defy conventional wisdom that has built up over time in large part from a group of diplomats in Washington, D.C., who tend to be very sympathetic in their thinking to the Palestinians, not Israel. The level of anti-Israeli hatred in the Washington diplomatic establishment is well documented, well known, and overwhelming. Many of the voices you get on television, many of the voices you get in the diplomatic corps, they are people who do not like Israel. They are latent anti-Semites, but in particular they really do hate the Israelis. And they particularly despise Benjamin Netanyahu. Remember, the conspiracy theories have been that Benjamin Netanyahu wanted to keep the war going because he was otherwise going to be indicted. If he left the premiership, he would be indicted and go to prison. And so he had to keep the war going. This has been the spin for some time. It's like the Epstein spin with Trump, which we'll get into here a little bit. You had a ton of people come up with a ton of excuses to avoid dealing with the reality of peace in the Middle East. And Donald Trump thought around and through all of that to get to the point today where two years and two days after the hostages were taken by Hamas, they will be coming home. The Israeli military, once the Knesset approves this deal, which is going to happen, that's the Israeli parliament. Once they approve the deal, People will start moving. Troops will move. Hostages will move. And then we'll see. Where do we go with phase two? Just the fact that the president was able to get the hostages home is a big deal in and of itself. What happens with phase two? What happens with phase three? What happens with phase four? I have no idea. I don't think anybody knows. I don't think you can predict these things in the Middle East. But what I do know for certain is that what is happening today is monumental. And yeah. I actually think the president deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. The Armenia-Azerbaijan situation, the Indian, the Pakistani situation, this situation with Hamas and Israel, the president keeps brokering peace deals. I don't think you have to go all the way to the Ukraine-Russia war like John Fetterman wants to do. But if he gets that done too, so much the better, there are rumors in Washington today. The president has actually approved long-range missile usage for... Ukraine to be able to target defensively the drone-making capabilities of the Russians. We'll see if that pans out. One way or the other, we're headed towards a peace today in the Middle East. We're headed towards hostages coming home. And it's going to be real funny to watch Democrats over the next few days as they struggle to try to avoid giving Donald Trump credit. I think the magnanimous ones are going to have to do it. They're going to have to come out and say, look, I disagree with the president, a lot of stuff, but he did good here.

But they're not going to want to do it because if they do, it's going to up his polling. And if it ups his polling, it puts them in a worse position on the shutdown fight. They got Marjorie Taylor Greene coming out for them on CNN. Marjorie Taylor Greene sounding more and more like a Democrat on CNN, siding with the Democrats on these issues. Nonetheless, where we are today. The president has, I mean, look, he gets the credit. Whether you want to believe it or not, whether you want to give him the credit or not, you can't deny. This is a monumental deal in the Middle East today. It is a monumental shift in where we were. And the president got a lot of groups that particularly don't like each other. Like, for example, the Turks and the Qataris and the Saudis and the Egyptians to all get in a room and agree, it was time to get Hamas to release the hostages and time to go back to peace. Honest. Putting your trust in me to tell you what's going on. Transparent. I need you to know this from the bottom of my heart. Giving you the information without the noise. My job isn't to tell you what you want to hear. It's to tell you the truth. It's the Eric Erickson Show.

The Four Things You Need to Know podcast, giving you the four things to pay attention to after the show, available on YouTube and your favorite podcast app, or by texting Eric to 3377777. Talks are resuming on Broadway. Actors are considering a strike on Broadway. Welcome back. It's Eric Erickson here. So this is from National Public Radio. The union representing Broadway actors and stage managers is resuming negotiations Wednesday. In order to try to head off a strike, the main sticking point between the actors equity association, the union representing performers and stage managers, and the Broadway League, which represents theater producers and owners, is healthcare. About 900 Broadway equity performers and stage managers have been working without a contract since it expired, September 28th. A strike would shutter 26 Broadway productions. Five shows, Punch, Ragtime, Mamma Mia, Little Bear Ridge Road, and Beetlejuice would stay open because they operate under different contracts. The stage adaption of Prince's film that's about to open in Minneapolis and headed for Broadway would also shut down. Would it not be funny if the president of the United States took his diplomatic negotiation skills bringing peace to the Middle East and broad peace to Broadway? Can you imagine if he sided with the actors and were able to get them a health care deal? They wouldn't know what to do. They put on a MAGA hat. Do they jump off a building? What do they do? So I was sitting in the hotel restaurant this morning having breakfast, and there was a woman in there, and she was talking kind of loud, but then I could hear her say. She said, but, you know, they came over to the house, and we were having such a good conversation, and they brought this one friend with him, and I don't really interact with him too much. I don't really know him that well, and he was a Trump supporter. That literally happened, and she whispered it. And then she says, very defiantly, I did not talk to him. And she was upset with her friends for bringing him. Of course, this happens in Vermont. But she couldn't say it out loud. It was like a curse upon her home. She had someone who voted for Donald Trump of the House. Now, you take that level of disdain and you apply it here. You've got the actors on Broadway. They want health care. Donald Trump somehow does a negotiation. He's able to get them that which they want. I bet the meltdown would be historic over the president interfering, over the president doing something, which now reminds me. This gets to the story where we've got to go next. The president very much wants to bring about a health care deal with the Democrats. You have Marjorie Taylor Greene now siding with the Democrats. She's gone on CNN. Notice how CNN is willing to platform Marjorie because she's on the side of the Democrats all of a sudden. Demanding that Obamacare be expanded.

that Obamacare subsidies be extended. Keep in mind, it was the Democrats themselves voted to end the subsidies because they were just COVID extensions. That's what's going away. The additional health care payments related to the COVID shutdowns and lockdowns are finally supposed to go away. And the Democrats, having voted to get rid of them, are now insisting that they stay. because they're using it as a political weapon against Donald Trump. And Marjorie Taylor Greene is on their side. The president, of course, is saying he wants a health care deal with the Democrats. The Democrats are trying to pivot and claim he's just trying to protect Jeffrey Epstein. The whole thing is honestly a little bit silly. But this is where we are in the United States of America today. Where we've come from is a great class from Hillsdale College. You can go to Eric for Hillsdale.com and take a class on the founding of the American Republic, the Constitutional Convention, and how we derive our laws in this country. It's actually a really good class you can take at Eric for Hillsdale.com. E.R.C. Eric for Hillsdale.com. You sign up with Hillsdale College today. You take one of their classes completely free. You get a certificate of completion when you're done. You learn something about a subject you're interested in because you get to pick. They have 40 subjects to choose from. History, political science, philosophy, literature, religion, chemistry, economics, mathematics. It's all there. You pick the class. Every class in... It's divided into 30-minute episodes, depending on the class, depends on the number of episodes. So with Hillsdale's faculty, they're engaging, they're smart, they make you smarter. They're actually really, really good. I mean, it's just, it's a very well-done thing. I've taken the Federalist Papers class. I've taken the one on capitalism. I've done the CS-Lewis one. They've got one of the founding of the Roman Republican. I'm a middle-aged man, so of course I took that one. And they've got one of the constitutional convention that I've taken with Larry R and himself, the president of Hillsdale, very good, highly recommend them, can't recommend them enough. Eric, E.R, I-C-K, Eric for Hillsdale.com, you go sign up today. There's no charge to you, and they're all really good. Now, when we come back, we do have to move to the government shutdown. Just as there's movement in the Middle East, there's movement on Capitol Hill, and I need you to know something. If you were a listener to this program, you learned a key fact earlier than anyone else in America. And that's no exaggeration. If you listen to this program, you knew something was going to happen sooner than anyone else in the United States. And I'll tell you what that was when we come back.