Aaron Chadbourne- Segment 1

And what we need today is little Aaron Chadbourne on Inside Maine. It's Chadbourne Day. Thanks to the Rolling Stones and Janet Mills for that great introduction. I'm very excited to dig into the governor's weekly radio address. I was trying to do the math, Jeremy, in the car about how many Janet Mills radio addresses are left. And so like there's going to be like what, four in September, four in October. That's eight. Four in November. That's 12. Four in, so 16. And we have two more left this month. So we have less than 20 more times that there will be a Janet Mills radio address. And I only host this show like once a month, sometimes twice a month. Usually. Yeah. Yeah. I only got like four or five left. I am so excited. I'm so sure you are. And I want to get into it. But I can't. There was something as I was driving in here, squealing into the parking lot to get here on time. I did hear Tony Randazzo your reference. I don't want you to think it went unnoticed. Your reference to meta fauna. Megafauna. Oh, megafauna. Megafana. Yes. And I mean, you know, I took Latin, so I just quickly broke down the roots. I knew it meant big. Big animals. Yeah. Yeah. So was that in the story or did you add that? Nate Hanscom wrote that story. So that was all him from this morning. That checks out. He loves animals. He loves animals and he has away with words. Well, that was a good story. Yeah. Yeah, I like that story. I think it's better than the alligators on the golf course. I'd rather see a moose. I mean, both can be dangerous, but observe from a distance. Both can be fun to see. And you're not going to, like, moose are mostly dangerous when you, like, hit them with your car. You're not going to accidentally, like, run into a moose on the golf course with your golf cart. that'd be a very slow speed you might cause a bruise on the moose they might kind of like be annoyed that they got hit by a golf course golf cart well welcome to inside maim i am your host aaron seven nine nine four two six is the number i did say i had to start with Janet Mills radio address and Janet Mills The audacity of this woman. So she does this radio address on opioid treatment and reducing overdoses. Great. Love it. Good idea. The reason she's doing it is because right now she's trying to write her legacy. And I think we all know that Janet Mills has a pretty abysmal legacy. One that is marred so much that her own party. Couldn't stand the idea of her being a candidate for U.S. Senate. They were willing to choose the guy with the Nazi tattoo and the rape allegations and the online posts that were basically problematic for everyone. Did you see, by the way, Graham Platner's coming back. He's going to do a rally on Labor Day. Is he really? Yeah, I saw that. Okay. They invited him to Ellsworth. Oh. I guess, like, a little rape is okay. Oh, man. For organized labor? Like, I'm just shocked that the organizers would want to associate themselves given, I mean, he has denied the allegations. So I guess they're just allegations at this point. But I mean, with everything in his problematic past, like he's trying to make his comeback toward this quickly. I mean, to what end? I mean, what's he, does he think he's going to be forgiven and be elected into some office someday in the distant future? I don't know. Man, I don't see it. I will say people have short memories. But for rape.

I believe it. I believe it. Who doesn't enjoy what I'm hosting? Come on, Steve. No, we have some spirited, you know, conversations. You know, Aaron, it's Austin said of immigrants that they're trying, they're, quote, trying to force their way of life onto us, unquote. Who says that? Who says that? All over talk radio, you know, that they're here to force their Sharia law or their way of life. So I have to ask this audience, you know, candidly, how many personal experiences they've had here in Maine where immigrants in Maine tried to push them around? I mean, the immigrants I know here, Aaron, are some of the nicest, most respectful people I've ever met in my life. You know, they tend to be a bit more traditional about proper manners and family values than most Americans. And they certainly haven't installed hundreds of military bases here to violently overturn our elections, like the U.S. did in Guatemala, like we did in El Salvador, like we did in Chile, Argentina, and the Middle East. And we weren't just pushing people around there, Aaron. The CIA funded and trained death squads who murdered hundreds of thousands of civilians, union workers. etc., and literally wrecked those nations whose immigrants then fled to America for asylum. Here's my final point. We need to seriously reconsider just who's pushing whom around in this world today. And I'll be damned if it isn't the good old USA. Have a nice day. Okay. Thanks for the call, Steve. I'm not sure I followed the whole why that was all relevant and related. I think you can object to the role of the U.S. is playing in the world. I mean, the fact that other countries try to manipulate our elections or try to influence them, you know, through hacking and disinformation and misinformation. I'm sure we do it in other countries. And so I get that part of it. But I don't see the connection between the CIA and unchecked immigration into this country. And the straw man... that you wanted to put up as it's often said this and that about Sharia law. Like that is unrelated. So I mean, I don't get it. I think there are people who are in this country illegally and some of them are doing it because they want a better life for themselves. And others of them are doing it for other reasons. But I don't think any of it has anything to do with the thing that you said about the CIA in our role around the world. Now, I do want to use that as a pivot point, though, to talk about the role of the U.S. and the world, particularly... the war in Iran and how that's affecting the markets, how that's affecting the American people, how it's affecting morale of our troops, how it's affecting our preparedness if we have to go to some sort of conflict with China or Russia in the future. I think that the timing of this war in the midterm election is, you know, unfortunate.

I don't think you should necessarily make political decisions about when to defend the world and when to stand up to a nuclear threat based on when the election is coming. But I do think that President Trump's decisions with respect to the Iran war are going to reverberate in this election. It's likely going to cost the Republicans their majority in the House, maybe in the Senate. I don't know. The map in the Senate, I think, looks a little bit better than what's happening in the House. Maybe the House they can hold on. I don't know. It's going to be a nail biter. But it could be a blue wave. And it could be a blue wave because people are feeling the pain at home and they haven't been given a story from the Trump administration about why it was necessary to do it, why it was necessary for us to like absorb the extra cost. and why we need to make the sacrifices to our economy, to our friends and family, to our way of life in order to do this thing in Iran. And it doesn't seem like he has much of a plan. Now, I am not in the negotiations. I don't know what else he's saying. I don't know what else he's negotiating. But Trump keeps coming out every five seconds and saying that the Strait of Hormuz is open. And Iran keeps saying that it's closed. Ships are getting attacked. They're not going through freely. And so there is certainly. There's more to the story here, but it's not good. It was supposed to be, remember at the beginning four weeks? It was going to be four weeks and then we'd be done. I think they got a little bit bold because here at home what they were able to do when they captured Maduro. and Venezuela came to heal, I think they thought that they'd be able to do the same thing in Iran. And Iran is vastly different. The Middle East is vastly different than Venezuela. And I just think this is a misadventure in Iran. Again, I'm not part of the decision-making process. I don't know if it needed to happen now. I don't know if the things that the Trump administration are saying are true. We certainly know that this president has a loose relationship with... the literal truth. And I'm not saying that Trump is a liar to inflame everybody. I'm saying that he often says things that aren't exactly true. And so when we listen to him talk about the war in Iran and he doesn't tell the American people the whole story about why we're there and what the goals are, and if the goal's now, and we're going to declare success just by having the straight of her moves open and we're not going to actually achieve anything and we're going to have thugs in charge of Iran and we're not liberating the people. We're not leaving ourselves with a better partner for peace, for stability. for economic partnership, then what are we doing? If we're not destroying their nuclear capability, if they still have big military capabilities, and how many times has Trump said that they have no, it was destroyed, it was decimated? That's good branding, that's good marketing. Trump has always been a guy that does that in his business life, in his public life, as a candidate, and as a president. But we're owed some modicum of truth of like, all right, what is the actual situation? And it can't both be true that... they are decimated and they have no capabilities, and yet we still can't open the straight of our moves. It can't be true that the straight is open, but also we need to negotiate until the straight is open. The double speak from the Trump administration is troubling, and I think it's important for all of us to acknowledge it.

I think that when the Biden administration engaged in these half-truths and the distruths and untruths, I think it was very important for us to call it out, and I was very, very critical of the other side for not acknowledging when you're being lied to. And I think on this side, with respect to the Iran War, there is much, much more transparency, much more reasoning and arguing, and we need a lot more from this president and from this administration. Now, I have been saying for a long time, I've got my list of the cabinet officials that I want replaced. High on my list were Pam Bondi and Kristi Noem. They were high on my list. I thought Pam Bondi was a better choice than Matt Bill Gates, but how she handled Epstein and how she was behaving didn't seem like she kind of had command of the job. I thought after being Attorney General of Florida, she would have been better prepared to be Attorney General of the United States. I thought she had to go. I thought that Kristi Noem was a terrible choice to lead the Department of Homeland Security. She was more interested in playing dress-up and getting photo ops and attention for herself than she was in carrying out the mission. And I really fundamentally believe that whoever leads the Department of Homeland Security should have some background in law enforcement that includes being, you know, an attorney general or a district attorney or U.S. attorney. So they were on my list and they're gone. Also on my list are people that I don't think had enough skills or managerial experience that were put into place. That chief among that list is Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense. I think he has been an incredible symbol for recruitment. I think he's good for morale when before we started going to war. I think changing the name from the Department of Defense to Department of War was the first indication we all should have had that Trump was going to go to war. He was going to start wars. And that's the opposite of what he said he was going to do. So I wouldn't be surprised after the midterms, if it goes as badly as I think it might go. that Trump fires Pete Hegseth because of the disaster in Iran and he tries to find a way out. I also think, by the way, that Markwayne Mullin, Department of Homeland Security, I wouldn't have picked him either. He doesn't have the background that I need. He was a U.S. Senator. He was a good ally of the president on cable news, but I don't think that qualified for him for the job, and I don't know that he's long for this world either. And for those of you who keep track at home, the last person on my list is Kash Patel. I think Kash Patel, again, likes the photo ops. I'm sure he's better than the deep state that was running it before. And I guess if that's your goal, then... Okay, but I think we need to get back to having people in charge who know what they're doing, who are honest with this country, and are setting up a sub for success. You're listening to Inside Maine. I'm Aaron Chadbourne. Thanks for being with us. When we come back, we'll be joined in studio by Ron Russell. He's the Republican candidate for U.S. Congress in Maine's first congressional district running against Shelley Pingree. Ron Russell, when we come back on Inside Maine, I'm Aaron Chadbourne.