Putin Gets Exactly What He Wants w/ Jack Murphy & Marc Polymeropoulos | EYES ON

Today we're joined by Marc Polymeropoulos & Jack Murphy to talk fall out of the Trump administrations new stance on the war in Ukraine with Russia. Marc Polymer ⬇️ https://x.com/mpolymer?lang=en https://web-cdn.bsky.app/profile/did:plc:4hfd6gooiddj6aelubt7jlrz All things Jack Murphy:⬇️ https://x.com/JackMurphyRGR?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor We Defy https://www.amazon.com/We-Defy-Chapters-Special-History-ebook/dp/B0DCGC1N1N The High Side https://thehighside.substack.com/ New merch, patches, and stickers! ⬇️ https://theteamhouse-shop.fourthwall.com Support the show on Patreon:⬇️ https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouse Find Andy Milburn here: ⬇️ https://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8 https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023 https://amilburn.substack.com/ https://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-Operations https://bsky.app/profile/andy-milburn.bsky.social https://open.substack.com/pub/amilburn/p/journal-of-a-plague-year?utm_source=app-post-stats-page&r=emo6q&utm_medium=ios Find Mick Mulroy here: ⬇️ https://fogbow.com/ https://www.loboinstitute.org/ https://x.com/MickMulroy?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-patrick-mulroy-31198b52/ https://bsky.app/profile/mickmulroy.bsky.social Find Jason Lyons here: ⬇️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-lyons-666873316?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app https://bsky.app/profile/bgsilverback73.bsky.soci Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 help make it happen fast. Rated A+ by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star TrustPilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 0:29Speaker 01

  And then comes Ukraine. And it's a classic David versus Goliath story. And, and I think for a lot of us, it was appealing because this was right versus wrong. There's no gray, there's no murk. Yeah, yeah. And, and then, then what I think about is the same thing I thought about, about Afghans, who we betrayed and Kurds we betrayed. But the betrayal of the Ukrainians, imagine if you're one of the, one of the members of SOF right now in Europe, I don't think they're in Ukraine, but in Europe, you know, training in Ukraine, or you're a CIA officer in, at Kiev Station. How do you look at your partners in the eye this morning?

• 1:13Speaker 02

  All right. Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Eyes On. Very special one today. We have Jack Murphy and Mark Polymeropoulos, the No Marines. Thank God.

• 1:26Speaker 02

  Lot cooking. Want to thank Mark, of course, Mark, former senior CIA officer, current national security analyst and expert. Jack Murphy, of course, our dear leader, host of the Team House and writer of The High Side. Guys, how's it going? What's happening in the world? Mark, how are you? You start, because I know you're red hot.

• 1:49Speaker 01

  No, so it's good. So I, you know, I just got back, you know, I have a little home gym that we built during COVID, so I was just lifted and I was listening to French Heavy Metal, Go Gyra. So I'm all fucking jazzed up now, but, but I wanted to say something because I, every time I come on, um, I love coming on the show. I've done this for years, but I was just out at the University of Colorado at their ROTC uh, program, talking to the cadets about leadership. They, they're, they're the couple of the army guys invited me out just because they had, they had heard me where on the fucking team house. Literally I get a phone call and said, hey, I heard you on the team house. I loved your leadership stuff. Um, would you come out and talk to the cadets? So I went out there and you all have a huge following, um, uh, even amongst the, the kind of youngsters coming up. And so,

• 2:31Speaker 01

  uh, and I want to tell you one thing, if you ever go to Colorado, University of Colorado in Boulder, oh my God, what a place.

• 2:38Jack Murphy?

  That's cool. That's exactly the type of audience, you know, that I hope we reach out to young people who are interested in, you know, serving their country in some shape or form and not, not to, not to really persuade them one way or the other, but to, you know, if you're interested in this, here's a lot of more information. You can listen to someone like Mark talk about, you know, in depth about the agency for, uh, in his career there. And that can help them make their decision. So yeah, those are exactly the type of people you hope you reach to.

• 3:05Speaker 01

  And one of those things is that they also, what, what the cadets, uh, uh, told me, and also there was a couple of, uh, Jack, a couple of army rangers who run the program there. But they said they, they loved how, you know, you bring on folks, uh, uh, and this probably won't apply today, but who are apolitical. So, you know, but because you have in kind of the vet pro world, kind of, you know,

• 3:25Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 3:26Speaker 01

  People who kind of go crazy on the right. Um, but you all don't do that. And you bring on people who serve their country and tell some unique stories. And you try to keep it apolitical. My, one of my favorite things is, is whenever I listen to the team house and you see one of your guests go down a certain road and how you and Dave kind of madly scramble to try to get them back on track.

• 3:44Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, yeah. We're not necessarily trying to go down that road. Um, but yeah, I, I mean, I, I think had a conversation with Doug Wise a while back where he said something like that. He's like, this is one of the few nonpartisan spaces where people from this profession can talk. Um, and he's like, there's not very many of them.

• 4:04Speaker 01

  So amen, amen to you guys. So happy to be on as always.

• 4:08Speaker 02

  And just an editor's note by design, that's by design. We do that on purpose and I'll be me and Jack talk about this offline all the time that it hinders and has hindered our growth.

• 4:21Jack Murphy?

  Oh, for sure.

• 4:22Speaker 02

  We're gonna keep it like that, even if it means less money in our pockets clear. You know what I mean? Like, we're never gonna just kowtow. So.

• 4:30Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, I mean, i- this is like a little aside, a little like anecdote that maybe means nothing to anyone at this point, but you know, many years ago, I fell into the circle of Ginny Thomas, the Supreme Court Justice's wife, who was quite a sort of an activist. Not that I ever met her or anything like that, but she was emailing me and trying to get me to testify in front of Congress, trying to get me to talk to 60 Minutes and all these other people. Not that I'm have a problem talking to Congress or journalists, but I realized at that point, I was like, if I do this, I'm allowing myself to become a political tool and the entire rest of my life is going to be different.

• 5:09Jack Murphy?

  And I was, I was probably like, I was still young. I mean, I was like 30 or something like that. And I was just like, this isn't the road I want to go down.

• 5:18Speaker 01

  You know, one of the, one of the interesting things is I obviously has, has denoted, I, you know, I do some media commentary and I have a contract with MSNBC. So, you know, take it, whatever you want to take it in terms of political ideology, but if people actually watched my, my hits during the, the Afghan withdrawal, I was savage against the Biden administration for how they hosed this up. And so I think, you know, the, one of the things that I try to do is, is, you know, call it like I see it. And that's what I think you all do as well. And so that's just, that's just kind of a smart place to be. That if, if you find yourselves being hated by everybody, it can be loved by everybody too. But if, if you, if you annoyed both the right and the left, Jack, I think you've probably done your job. That's the place to be.

• 6:01Jack Murphy?

  But I, I will say though, you know, all of that said, I also have felt in the, you know, over the last month or so, that maybe it's more important, not necessarily to get partisan, but like.

• 6:16Jack Murphy?

  I'm seeing things that I think are pretty messed up and I think it's important that we say they're messed up. Like this isn't cool. This isn't okay. And I don't think it's necessarily a left or a right issue. Like we'll talk about Ukraine in a little bit. Like it's not necessarily a left or right issue. It's just like, this is stupid.

• 6:34Speaker 01

  Well, right. I mean, I have to, you know, half of my friends are Republicans. Um, and I spend half of my day on Signal chats saying, really? This is really what you signed up for? You know, with Trump siding with Putin? Or, you know, uh, you know, uh, threatening to fire the probationary officers at the CIA or, um, or the special agents at the FBI. I mean, these are actually not conservative principles, uh, and what's happening right now. So I'm very comfortable.

• 7:02Jack Murphy?

  The question is, what are, what are you trying to conserve? Um, because it doesn't seem like they're trying to conserve the United States government or constitution at this moment.

• 7:12Speaker 01

  Look, government, you know, government sucks until, you know, planes start falling out of the sky and terrorist attacks happen in the United States and your VA checks don't get to you. And then there's a fricking measles or bird flu epidemic. Um, and, and you know, your kids are sick. And so, you know, this kind of, you know, war on government, I find ludicrous. We want, we want to reform government. Everybody does. If you actually work, you know, you're in the military. I was in the CIA. I could spend five hours telling you all the reforms that are needed. You probably could do the same thing. Um, we could have a whole podcast on the Pentagon procurement process, which is, you know, do we need giant aircraft carriers? I mean, look in, look at Ukraine and, and, you know, the explosion in indigenously produced drones that are having effects on the battlefield.

• 7:50Speaker 01

  So, you know, reform is, is really good, but this is, this is kind of the, and I, you know, I call it the wet dream of the Chinese or Russian intelligence services. It's, it looks like a covert action plan to like destroy the US government.

• 8:03Jack Murphy?

  Yeah. I mean, that's the thing. If you had infiltrated your people into the United States government, you know, like J. Edgar Hoover suspected. This is exactly what they would be doing. They'd be flipping all the switches off, unplugging things, firing people, just like jamming up the works so that nothing can happen.

• 8:20Speaker 01

  Look, let me say that the, you know, I have lots of friends in the FBI, um, who all believe in the need for reform. But the idea that you're going to take, it's, it's 6,000 FBI personnel who worked on personnel that worked on January six cases, 900 special agents. Um, the lists of them went down to this kind of weird O M B Elon Musk thing, which we don't really know is secure or not. And then, and to DOJ, but. One thing that I don't know if the American people realize is that the agents involved in the January 6 cases were taken from the joint terrorism task forces because they considered it domestic terrorism.

• 8:51Jack Murphy?

  They were taken from all over, Mark. I mean, like, that sucked up like a third of the of the Bureau.

• 8:57Speaker 01

  But if you end up getting rid of these people, you know, that's gutting the JTFs around the country. It's also doing two other things. One is their existing caseload, what happens to it. But number two, and I don't think this has been talked enough about.

• 9:11Speaker 00

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 help make it happen fast. Rated A+ by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star TrustPilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 9:41Speaker 01

  Do you really want, and you know, think about things we did overseas when we're trying to advise reformer security services. Here's what you don't do. You don't throw, you know, 6,000 FBI personnel or 2,000 CIA officers out in the streets overnight who are angry. That's a counterintelligence disaster. I'm not talking about civil, you know, civil unrest. I'm talking about people without with mortgages to pay, with top-secret clearances, who need healthcare, and who, when they get when they get hit up on LinkedIn by a consulting firm located in Dubai that wants their, you know, their services, it's the Chinese intelligence organizations who are going to hit them up. So there's so many second-order effects of just a lot of these really ill-thought-out moves. And but again,

• 10:25Speaker 01

  I don't see a whole lot of pushback from from the Republicans. And I guess the American people think it's okay. The CBS News poll from last week said Trump had a 53% approval rating, which means this shit's going to keep going until something bad happens.

• 10:39Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, I mean, maybe maybe I'm the one that's out of touch, right? You like, you start to wonder this at, you know, you'd mentioned earlier, like, maybe America isn't the country that we thought it was. It's actually something different. It seems like we're in this point, this era right now where.

• 10:58Jack Murphy?

  People who are intimidated by complexity where I think the information environment has become so overwhelming that everyone wants to distill it down and you know quote unquote common sense. And you know, you can not that complexity in that information environment makes people feel uncomfortable. But when you start trying to eliminate it, I mean, the way the globalized world works today, I mean, we can't go back to the Stone Age. Like, it's not possible at this point. I mean, not without, you know, catastrophe and apocalypse happening.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  Right, right. And so, you know, so we're left with a time in which we are kind of battling for the truth. I mean, you know, I mean, you know, I think Dee follows me on Twitter probably more than you do. But I threw a fit and kind of said I wouldn't go on Twitter anymore a couple of months ago. Now I'm back on.

• 11:48Speaker 02

  Jack's been good. He's out. He's not on.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  And look, trust me, I get more hate mail and death threats on Twitter. Some of them are funny. I think I might have told you guys, someone called me an Islamist communist one time and that I should have. But I don't really know what an Islamist communist actually is because it kind of doesn't exist.

• 12:06Jack Murphy?

  I mean, people, people are so brainwashed. I mean, we, we will do an interview with, you know, a woman who served in the army and you get a bunch of comments like, oh, this is the DEI podcast. I was like, you're just a water buffalo. Like, you can't think for yourself at all. You're just regurgitating propaganda like, like a communist.

• 12:26Speaker 01

  One of the things that I've done is I talked to, I do a lot of talks to, to college students who are interested in national security careers. And, and I had a line in this and I kept it. I was brave. I was, you know, I was just at the University of Colorado recently. And I say, you know, I actually say diversity, you know, is our superpower. That, of course, is exactly what Pete Hexeth, new Secretary of Defense, said in his hearing. He said we should never say that again. But I disagree. And I just, I tell the students why is because on the streets of places like Moscow and Damascus, the most sensitive assets are often handled by female case officers. If you serve and, you know, work and serve in the Middle East and you're a CIA officer, and you guys know this, but you know, for the audience, if you go out in what's called a surveillance detection route, it's the idea of, you know, making

• 13:11Speaker 01

  sure you don't take surveillance of the bad guys to your agent meeting. If you have a female officer in a full Abaya, guess what they're not gonna do? They're not gonna get caught. We need to have female officers. We need to have people who don't look like the three of us on this program. I remember, you know, so many instances in which we had this ethnically diverse station. Um, in which they spoke different languages and we, the reason, one of the reasons why we didn't get caught was good tradecraft, but also is because we could look differently on the street. That's the best athlete approach and that's where diversity is great. But when you hear things like the Pentagon is not going to these, there was just a, a, a news article that they're not going to. Um, this, uh, I guess it was a, it was engineering conference or event at a historically black.

• 13:55Speaker 01

  College or something in which, uh, used to be a very good kind of recruiting tool for the military. Well, they can't go anymore because of the anti woke, you know, anti DEI stuff. That's insane. Uh, you know, we're gonna end up and your, some of your listeners are gonna go crazy when I say this, we're gonna end up with an all white. Intelligence and military. Um, if we kind of go down these paths of, you know what? We can't celebrate, you know, Black History Month. You know, you can't have a women's council and, and even, you know, when at the agency, uh, when I go into these colleges and I talk to folks and it, a female officer, I mean, a female candidate would come up and say, is, is. CIA a comfortable place for women? And I said, you know, it's gotten better. We've had sexual harassment scandals. But here's why, because we really cannot, you, you know, female officers, uh, uh, have kind of a tremendous advantage in some places, but also, you know what?

• 14:40Speaker 01

  There's a women's council at the CIA. You will have a group outside of work where you can talk to people. That doesn't exist anymore. That's crazy. So, you know, is the DEI stuff annoying sometimes? Sure it is. I went through all this stuff. I was told in a three day seminar that I was a racist. It was annoying. Did it stop me from spying? No. And so the pendulum is swung so wildly, uh, you know, uh, in which we blame plane crashes. On DEI stuff. This is crazy. Uh, was it annoying? Should it be reformed? Yes. Uh, you know, now it's like the, the, it explains all of our ills of society.

• 15:13Jack Murphy?

  Yeah. Blaming, blaming women and black people like punching down like that is about the most pathetic thing that I can possibly imagine. And it's, it's kind of sad that there are these dudes that are just so intimidated by, you know, a country that is changing that, you know, we're seeing like a backlash.

• 15:29Speaker 01

  The snowflake, are you, I mean, are you such a, I'm sorry. You want to be this badass motherfucker in, in special forces or in the CIA? Um, and you can't take a two day class on DEI and that's gonna cause you to quit? I mean, this is crazy. It's annoying. Reform it.

• 15:44Jack Murphy?

  Well, I mean, a couple, I talked to one person who worked for, let's just say protective detail at the State Department.

• 15:53Speaker 01

  Right.

• 15:53Jack Murphy?

  And he's in, he, he thought DEI was stupid, but it was also just a block on his evaluation.

• 15:59Speaker 01

  Yes, that's it.

• 16:00Jack Murphy?

  Like, and it said something about like, are you inclusive with your team members and bringing them into the fold or something like that? He's like, it's dumb, but it didn't affect his job in any way.

• 16:10Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 16:10Jack Murphy?

  Um, or, uh, up at, uh, at, at Special Operations Command, they had a, uh, office with a DEI office with nine employees working in it, run by a PhD. Um, they all got fired and I, I mean, I don't really have a problem with that either because no one I've spoken to knows what the hell these nine people did up there. Um, so I mean, I don't think DEI is something that's going to be missed as it goes away. There's going to be some other things, you know, like I should point out, the equal opportunity rep is still up there at SOCOM. So I mean, that's, and that was always separate from DEI. Um, so I mean, yeah, absolutely.

• 16:51Jack Murphy?

  I think it's important that we recruit, uh, you know, from a diverse, uh, population. But yeah, DEI, I, I mean, it's like you, you said, I, I don't think it was like destroying or helping America. It was more like something that was like, kind of annoying.

• 17:07Speaker 01

  So, so fix it, you know, but, but the idea is, you know, you know, Musk's kind of preoccupation with this anti-woke stuff and uh, that, or that Pete Hegseth thinks that this is actually what, you know, um, uh, has affected military readiness is insane. Uh, let me just, you know, my friends who have served at, you know, in, in the US Navy who just got back, these are some young folks, um, who were, you know, you know, driving a ship in the, uh, uh, in the, you know, in the Pacific somewhere says, you know what? Our fucking ships are falling apart. I'm sorry. That's not because of DEI. You know, there's, there's something fundamentally, uh, uh, the fundamental reform that, that certainly, uh, needs, um, to take place in the, uh, within, within.

• 17:44Jack Murphy?

  But it goes back to what I said about people being intimidated by complexity, like.

• 17:48Speaker 01

  Right. It's hard. Yes.

• 17:49Jack Murphy?

  Training the Navy is a big, complicated, expensive endeavor. Um, it's a lot easier to just blame transsexuals and be like, hey, the transsexuals, they, they destroyed the Navy.

• 18:01Speaker 01

  I you know, the one of I was out west a while ago and someone was railing to me about, you know, trans athletes in high school sports. And I said, I said, you realize in Utah, there's four of them. Like literally this, this might have decided the presidential election.

• 18:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 18:14Speaker 01

  You remember the the Super Bowl ad that everyone went.

• 18:16Speaker 02

  That ad was incredible.

• 18:18Speaker 01

  Uh, and so the Republicans ran this ad, but I mean, this is like 5,000 on the list of important things in America.

• 18:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's not a national issue.

• 18:27Speaker 01

  Voting. Oh, come on. Yeah, let's let's let's get us back on track. Let's talk.

• 18:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. So yesterday, um, the US delegation included Marco Rubio, um, and Lavrov met in Saudi Arabia with, uh, was MBS at the meeting?

• 18:46Jack Murphy?

  I don't think so.

• 18:47Speaker 01

  Oh, no, no, no, no, they met before with him.

• 18:50Speaker 02

  Okay, so and they had a four and a half hour meeting and they came out, uh. I mean, if you're a supporter of Ukraine, I wouldn't say it was a pro Ukrainian meeting. Uh, I think that's fair to say. Um, you know, they came out saying that Ukraine needs to have made concessions and stuff like that. It looked like a hostage video with Marco Rubio with the Russian delegates. Um, yeah, so that's where we're at there. There's some word that Putin and Trump are going to meet within the month again. I don't know where, um, it came out very pro Russia. I mean, and I told Jack this before the meeting, like they're going to go into that meeting and come out with a different set of a new set of talking points and it's going to get

• 19:34Speaker 02

  disseminated out and these are going to be the new talking points of what Zelensky is going to have to do without Ukraine and without European, uh, representation at these meetings. So that's where we're at. Mark?

• 19:47Speaker 01

  So let me just start off this off again, because I think Jack made a good point, um, that we have to criticize things that that we see are wrong, but you almost make this on a nonpartisan basis. So I'll say that, you know, if you were Ronald Reagan or John McCain, you'd be horrified, um, at what was the betrayal of Ukraine and the resuscitation, the rehabilitation of a war criminal. It's Vladimir Putin. Um, yesterday was kind of the culmination of of a shocking week in which the US policy, foreign policy changed dramatically. You know, we were the ally of Ukrainians. We spent $60 billion to attrit the Ukrainian military 50%. Not a single US soldier was killed. Russia is our enemy. Um, uh, everything from, of course, their invasion of Ukraine to, you know, sabotage and assassination or operations a- a- across Europe too, by the way.

• 20:33Speaker 01

  Um, and you all, I think, have talked about it, you know, paying bounties to the Taliban to kill US soldiers. Um, yet now we are at best a neutral party and perhaps now we're actually siding. Um, with, with Putin because it wasn't only the results of the Riyadh meeting, it was then President Trump's comments in a press conference in which he essentially blamed Ukraine. Um, for being invaded and so. You know, there was a, a, a former British intelligence officer made a comment yesterday that I'd certainly heard and picked up on, he said, US flushed 80 years of leadership down the toilet and so. Um, I think this is a, a, really a profound moment for the United States. Um, friends of mine, probably for you all as well, who have worked on and in Ukraine are horrified. Uh, but ultimately the, you know, well, there's two things, do, do the American people care?

• 21:17Speaker 01

  I don't know, but where are the republic, where are the GOP national security? Uh, uh, set, who actually many have been, uh, i- in favor of helping Ukrainians? Because yesterday, um, and really the week was, uh, was not a proud one for the United States, you do wonder, and I, I know the way my friends in Europe are saying now, you know, are we the good guys anymore?

• 21:37Jack Murphy?

  Yeah. No, that, that is the question, isn't it?

• 21:42Speaker 01

  What do you think, Jack?

• 21:46Jack Murphy?

  I mean, I don't think that a country changes overnight, but I mean, from like a political policy point of view, I mean. We're, you know, siding with the evil empire here, um, you know, Russia was up against, they're, they're on the ropes, their economy is shit, they lost like 800,000 soldiers during the conflict. Why in the world are we appeasing this dictator? Um, it doesn't make any sense to me other than to be, you know, i- it's, it really is like these people cooked their minds on Twitter and they want to be like edgy contrarians, like, oh, let's go side with this, you know, dictator, this strong man. Um, it's kind of bizarre to me.

• 22:26Speaker 01

  Jack, let me give you a kind of my thoughts on this, and I think you'll identify with it because both of us were practitioners. So I look at everything differently. I know you guys were very kind to say I'm a national security analyst, blah, blah, blah. But actually, I always look at it from the guy or the gal on the ground. And so, you know, we went through the 20 years of the GWAT, and I spent time in Iraq and Afghanistan and Syria. And so we trained indigenous forces, and sometimes we obviously stayed in places too far. And you leave with the whole kind of, I think, maybe I don't want to speak for you, but you know, you're like, hey, I'm proud of my service. But yeah, it's things are a little murky. Like, some of my friends really fucked up. Like, ah, I'm not so sure how great, you know, God bless me. We had to respond after 9/11, but Iraq, WMD, like, you know, proud of the service there. Anyway, so you'll leave with like, and then comes

• 23:11Speaker 01

  Ukraine. And it's a classic David versus Goliath story. And and I think for a lot of us, it was appealing because this was right versus wrong. There's no gray, there's no murky. And and then then what I think about is the same thing I thought about about Afghans who we betrayed and Kurds we betrayed. But the betrayal of the Ukrainians, imagine if you're one of the one of the members of SOF right now in Europe, I don't think they're in Ukraine, but in Europe, you know, training Ukrainians, or your CIA officer in at Kiev Station. How do you look at your partners in the eye this morning? After what Trump said, not only after what happened in Riyadh, but after what Trump said. I mean, these are people you broke bread with. You spent a year plus with them. You know their families. Maybe people in their units have been killed.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  We were committed to to assisting them. You know, so I think of the guy or the or the gal on the ground, and what it's like to to look at your Ukrainian partner in the eye and see their as they're looking at you. And hey, Jack, man, I love you. But holy shit, you guys are betraying us now, aren't you? What do you say back?

• 24:15Jack Murphy?

  Hey, guys, it's Jack. I just want to talk to you for a moment about how you can support the show. If you've been watching it, enjoying it, but you'd like to get a little bit more involved and help us continue to do this, you can check out our Patreon. It is patreon.com/the Team House. And for $5 a month, you can get access to all of these episodes of The Team House ad free. The same goes with our affiliated podcast Eyes On with Andy Milburn, Jason Lyons, McMulroy. That one, you will also get all of those episodes ad free. And you support the channel and the show and we really appreciate it. The Patreon members are literally what has helped this company, this small business survive, especially during our early years.

• 25:01Jack Murphy?

  And you are what continues to help this thing going even as we navigate the turbulent world of YouTube advertising. So we really appreciate all of you guys. There's going to be a link down in the description to that Patreon page. And there is also going to be a link to our new merch shop. So if you guys want to go and get some Team House merchandise, we got stickers and we also have patches. And I should mention, if you sign up for Patreon at $10 a month, we will mail you this patch as well. So we really appreciate that. But they're also for sale on the merch shop. And additionally, they got t-shirts up there, water bottles, a tote bag, coffee mugs, all that good stuff.

• 25:45Jack Murphy?

  So please go and check them out and support the show. We really appreciate it, guys. Thank you.

• 25:52Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, no, exactly.

• 25:55Speaker 01

  What would you say?

• 25:57Jack Murphy?

  I mean, it's one of those things where like, yeah, as the person on the ground, you have to be like diplomatic about it and like, yeah, support the policies of the United States government, but you know, we're still committed to this relationship. You know, I've spoken a little bit about it before and I- Really? You would say that? I mean, what else are you gonna say? Man, this is fucked up. I know. I'm sorry. Well, maybe like at a bar over a beer, you might- Oh, okay. I'm not talking about officially at like a conference room.

• 26:23Speaker 01

  But here's where you gotta be careful on this because if I was sitting across my Ukrainian partner and I said, hey, man, like, this is totally fucked up. This is wrong and our president is, this is crazy what we're doing. What if this guy goes back, tells his, you know, his, his unit commanders and say, hey, you know, the, the agency guys here think this is really screwed up and that gets back, back to the White House and back to Washington? You are in an impossible situation. Um, uh, you know, does that mean you, you, well, if you're in the military, you can't, but the agency, do you resign? I mean, if you're in the State Department, you write a dissent channel. I mean, I, I don't know what the answer is because I've not, I, I, I can't imagine a time

• 27:03Speaker 01

  in which we have switched policies almost overnight. Now, we saw this coming. This all kind of emanates from Helsinki, you know, years ago and Trump won. When he, he sided with Putin in the, in, in, when Putin said, you know, I didn't interfere in your elections. Um, Jonathan Lemire of MSNBC asked him a question, you know, who do you believe? And he basically said, I believe Putin over the intelligence services. So you can, you can think of it starting from then, but this right now, this policy flip. I mean, it's, it's pretty wild. And so again, for practitioners on the ground, I mean, I don't know how you serve in a US embassy in Kiev now. What do you say?

• 27:35Jack Murphy?

  Mark, Mark, what do you make of it for as a, from a policy standpoint? I mean, I think none of us can or should um, at all assume that there is some sort of grand strategy behind this because I don't think there is. Um, but still, I mean, why, why do you think that we did this abrupt, is it just a case of like, well, Biden did this, so it's bad? You know, just like during the first Trump administration, anything that Obama did was bad. So we got to reverse that and turn it around. I mean, is it just contrarianism? Or is there something else going on here?

• 28:09Speaker 01

  Jack, that's a, that's a great question. So, so a couple of things, just to kind of, but to, to, to prep for the answer to that, let me say there is no function in this government now. So ordinarily, policy changes, policy discussions take place, the National Security Council, where you have, and no, this is this, I'm going to get a migraine thinking about this because I participated that and then, you know, you have low level policy meetings at the NSC amongst the interagency and then it eventually goes up to what's called the deputies committee, the, the DC. That's the deputies of cabinet agencies. Then it goes to the principals committee, chaired by the national security advisor, then the president will come in. So there's a policy process and saying, hey, we're going to do something different. I don't think this shit's going on right now. Because if you look what happened in Munich.

• 28:50Speaker 01

  Pete Hegseth stepped on his crank. I'm sorry. You know, this is someone who is wildly unqualified for the job. And he goes out there and he gives this speech, which, which all of my information is, was not coordinated with anybody. And basically says, Ukraine will never be in NATO. Just giving away one of our, you know, negotiating positions.

• 29:08Jack Murphy?

  Yes, wild.

• 29:09Speaker 01

  Everyone goes crazy. Then JD Vance comes and gives this lecture about, to Europe, saying, actually, Russia's not your biggest enemy. Actually, the European war, free speeches.

• 29:18Speaker 04

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 make it happen fast. Rated A+ by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star TrustPilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 29:46Speaker 01

  And people's minds are blown. And then Trump says something else. We have, and by the way, General Kellogg, former Green Beret, where the fuck is he? He's, and so he was supposed to be the envoy. So we have no voice in any of this. And the only thing that matters, and one of the things I've been saying, you know, on my TV hits, is that Trump is the only one who matters in this. And again, you look at, you know, you know,

• 30:06Jack Murphy?

  Well, Trump and Elon.

• 30:08Speaker 01

  And Elon, right. Don't you think Mike Waltz, a former Green Beret, or Marco Rubio, a longtime member of the Senate, now Secretary of State, don't you think they know better?

• 30:16Jack Murphy?

  What did you, what did you make of that press conference they gave yesterday where Mike Waltz and Rubio, they looked like they just had their lunch eaten by the Russians?

• 30:24Speaker 01

  Because they did. They have no experience in negotiations. They have no experience in dealing with people like Sergey Lavrov, the foreign minister, who's been there for two decades. You know, God bless Mike Waltz and what he did for our country. And Marco Rubio has actually been a voice against autocracy and for human rights. And they're sitting there like, you know, like, you know, Saddam-esque parroting the great leader of Trump. But let me go back to, why does this all occur? And, you know, one of the things that CIA did really well, we fucked a lot of things up, but we, we would do these leadership profiles of, of foreign, of foreign heads of state. So can you imagine the leadership profile that the British, or the French, or the Germans, or anyone else has done of Trump? When it

• 31:05Speaker 01

  comes to Ukraine, because I think he actually detests Ukraine. He thinks this was one of the reasons why he was originally impeached. And he particularly hates Zelensky. And so for him, it's all personal. So there's in it. What I'm trying to say is there's no way we are ever going to support Ukraine or Zelensky. It's just not going to happen because that's just baked into Trump's DNA and it doesn't matter. If everybody around Trump, not everybody, but people like Waltz and Rubio want to support the Ukrainians. It's not going to happen.

• 31:34Speaker 02

  Yeah. So there's a from the New York Times. Trump sees Putin as a compatriot and a strong player who was a genius for bullying Ukraine. And that's from the New York Times.

• 31:45Speaker 01

  Zelensky said sometime in the last 24 hours that Trump is living in a Russian manufactured disinformation environment.

• 31:53Speaker 02

  I mean, it is good that like, you know, because Zelensky was saying all the right things the last couple of months, you know, the election happened as a transitions going on. Saying what he needs to say to try and keep Trump on side. And now you do see him kind of bucking a little bit.

• 32:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, they, they, the, the, the lead up to that is that agreement they tried to hand him at Munich.

• 32:14Speaker 02

  Right.

• 32:15Speaker 01

  Uh, where, you know, apparently the Trump administration wanted him to turn over like 50% of the natural resources of Ukraine over. In exchange for what? I'm, I'm not even.

• 32:24Speaker 02

  In exchange for previous support, not even new support.

• 32:29Speaker 01

  So, so do you know how gross this is? I mean, think about the United States and, you know, don't laugh at me when I say this because I believed it. And I, and I still, you know, and I still want to, but you know, we're supposed to be the good guys, you know, America stands for economic and political freedom, and we don't always live up to this. But there is the notion of the bright shining city on the hill. And I'll tell you, if you go to any US embassy consulate section overseas, anywhere, there's a line around the, around the corner because people want to come to America for a reason. Uh, uh, and, and we, you know, values do matter. Again, Pete Hegseth in his speech in Europe said, actually, values don't matter. Only military might matters. And, you know, my head blew off again because uh, uh, that's just not who, what, what America is about.

• 33:08Speaker 02

  It doesn't even make sense.

• 33:10Speaker 01

  It, right. It doesn't make any sense, but now we are a transactional government. You know, this is, this is the age of kings and queens again.

• 33:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 33:18Speaker 01

  We're going to do, we're only going to do anything that is, you know, has direct financial interest for the United States. Like this idea of trading minerals. I mean, I think it's, I understand why the Ukrainians would go along with it because they're like, we'll do anything at this point. But it's gross. Again, the American ideal means something. Let me, what I was thinking about the other day, and I've talked about this, you know, we've had great conversations on the team house about, you know, how do we recruit agents? And you know, there's that old acronym MICE. And so we, we, we end up gaining someone else's trust, you know, an Iranian government official, it's Russian, Chinese, based on, on their vulnerabilities, but it's based on this, this acronym MICE, which is money, ideology, coercion, which we really don't do, and ego. And that's, you know,

• 34:02Speaker 01

  that's what you're trying to plug into. Some people are financially vulnerable. Some people have, you know, have been screwed at work. So you can go for your ego, but a huge amount of people we recruit is based on ideology because we're the good guys. I mean, and that's the idea of political and economic freedom. And are we actually going to take that off the table? And so I was, that's what I was thinking about the other day, just because to me, it was just this, this transactional foreign policy is just gross.

• 34:26Jack Murphy?

  Well, it's interesting. You mentioned that, you know, we're go, you feel like we're going back to the age of kings and queens. And that's exactly what I've been reading about in Nick Land's writings, which apparently Nick Land was and is influential on the thinking of Elon Musk and the people around him. And Nick Land specifically talks about how liberalism has failed, democracy has failed, America is a failed experiment. He uses this term, the cathedral, to describe like our institutions. That it is just this sort of self-replicating zombie. And that what we need instead is a monarch,

• 35:10Jack Murphy?

  a monarch CEO. And he goes into like, it, it really is going to be like a government of high status males, basically all just corn cobbing each other, I guess. And you have this monarch CEO at the top that just says like, this is how it's going to be.

• 35:27Speaker 01

  You know, there's, there's, so that seems like exactly what's happening. So good on you to, to be reading that. I gotta pick that book up.

• 35:34Jack Murphy?

  Yeah. And I should, I should point out too, that like behind like all the like, kind of like cool branding, that this looks like it's something new or kind of hip. It's really just boilerplate fascism. There's nothing really new about it. It's just fascism with some clever branding around it.

• 35:50Speaker 01

  And I think that, that, that should go to kind of this existential question on, you know, who are we right now? And one of the things that I think that is going to be very telling. You know, will the American people then at some point say, hey, this is really not what we signed up for, you know? We elected Donald Trump because there was inflation, the price of eggs were high. Now let alone, you can't find any goddamn eggs anywhere. I want some eggs. There's no eggs in Whole Foods. This is driving me crazy in Vienna, Virginia. But, but you know, but who, you know, are we okay with this? And, and so, you know, we're going to see over the next several months and years, and maybe the next, the midterm elections, but are the American people? Okay. Which, you know, Anne Applebaum is a, is a writer who I love, you know, all of her kind of analysis. And there's a piece she wrote for the Atlantic.

• 36:34Speaker 01

  This last week or two, where she actually called what's happening is regime change in America.

• 36:39Jack Murphy?

  Yeah.

• 36:39Speaker 01

  Because it's not only foreign policy that's changing, but just fundamentally inside the United States, this theory of the unitary executive. This all powerful presidency, no set, you know, there's no.

• 36:50Jack Murphy?

  Maybe even a little bit worse than that though, Mark. Cause I, I mean, when I listen to President Trump, I mean, it just sounds like old man babble to me. It doesn't even make sense what he's saying. It seems like Elon is actually running the show.

• 37:02Speaker 01

  And JD Vance as well. And JD Vance has some very extreme views on this. So I actually, I, I agree with you. And so, you know, are we okay with, you know, dismantling the entire, you know, you know, firing 30 or 40% of, of the US government? You know, if, if the American people are okay with that, and there's a bird flu epidemic, or there's a measles epidemic in Texas. And people are going to die. Okay. Well, you know, maybe we, we deserve what we're going to get, but I'm not so sure that's, that's the case. And you know, I mean, I, I, there's just the stories of the last couple of days, you know, you know, the, the Republican party is supposed to be the party of national security, you know, to support the military or back the blue. Is that what firing FBI agents is all about? Is that what?

• 37:43Speaker 01

  You know, there's been, you know, with, with all these, with these cuts or these, you know, terminations, reductions in force of these probationary employees. That's military spouses. We're getting fired. Um, you know, none of this makes sense. The VA, I mean, does the VA need reform? Oh, my God, of course it does. Um, uh, but it just, the, the, my, I guess my question is, is, is the American people, uh, are the American people going to be okay with this? When the real effects of some of these changes.

• 38:09Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 38:10Speaker 01

  Coming about, because it is radical and I don't think any, I mean, they said they were going to do it sort of. I don't think they realized that Elon Musk would be the co-president. Um, but, but ultimately it's, it's pretty dramatic what's happening and, and for people, you know, I think it's so lazy intellectually when people see, yeah, fuck the government. You see a lot of conservatives say that, that's okay, good. The federal government's too big. Okay. So, you know, when the FAA doesn't have controllers in the control tower, is that what government too big means? Um, this is just not being done smartly or with any kind of, uh, uh, you know, uh, direction. It's, it's like how Elon Musk, you know, uh, when he took over Twitter, he fired everybody and then kind of rebuilt it. You don't do that with government.

• 38:47Jack Murphy?

  One of the interpretations of like, you know, that people have advanced of like, what is Donald Trump? What does that represent? What, you know, this sort of like end of an era in the beginning of a next. And I mean, one of the probably like easiest to understand takes on it is that Trump is a wrecking ball that the voters, that the constituents sent to Washington to destroy the place. Because they're so fucking angry.

• 39:12Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:12Jack Murphy?

  So fed up and some of those, some of those issues, those anger issues with like, we've talked about DEI. They're hyped up, you know, it's grievance politics, but there are real issues that Americans are sick and tired and they're fed up and they're tired of being fed bullshit all the time. And I think many people, rightly or wrongly, they see Donald Trump as like the guy that's going to cut through that.

• 39:36Speaker 01

  So, you know, you're a hundred percent right. And I think we also don't have a, a party in opposition, you know, the Democratic Party.

• 39:41Jack Murphy?

  Yeah.

• 39:42Speaker 02

  Absolute pussies, excuse me for being so brass.

• 39:45Speaker 01

  And so, you know, there's, there's, there certainly is a whole kind of, you know, AAR going on, uh, you know, forensic analysis of how in the world, uh, did this happen? Did Donald Trump get elected? Um, uh, uh, because of this, of this disruption, you know, were the Democrats that dysfunctional? And I think, you know, you make a, you can make a very strong case that the answer is yes. Um, you know, there's, you know, so what do we need? I mean, now we're getting into some weirder territory. One of the things I talked to a friend of mine the other day said, you know, we need it. We need a, an oligarch in the center, like a Mark Cuban to come in and, you know, and be the cat. I don't know. It kind of makes some sense. I sort of, I guess. Um, but you know, because one of the things that you have, going back to something Jack, you said earlier is that, you know, the, I love your podcast.

• 40:28Speaker 01

  I'm on your podcast, but some podcasts in the United States have done tremendous harm in spreading, uh, uh, you know, misinformation and disinformation. And so when you look at the, and I'm sure Dee, you know, scours the, the, the lists of, of, you know, podcasts, what do well and what don't? You know, Tucker Carlson or Joe Rogan, there's a lot of nonsense that's spewed on there. Um, and that's how Americans are getting their, their information right now. So, you know, so how do you counter that? How do you, how do you counter? I mean, you just have to tell the truth. Um, because so there's so much crap on, on these kind of, uh, uh, podcasts that have gazillions of viewers.

• 41:05Jack Murphy?

  I don't know that the truth can necessarily compete though, with people's emotions and that they, they get emotionally triggered by certain outrageous things. Um, and I, and I feel like that the, the algorithms that these companies are using, that they're actually encouraging. And I, I know for a fact that they encourage you to put out outrageous content all the time. Dee and I have had many conversations about this and it's interesting to see how the algorithm itself is sort of like barfing up this new ideology. Um, in the last few years that combines right wing politics, the military, Christianity, but also you like UFOs.

• 41:45Speaker 02

  Yeah. Conspiracy theories.

• 41:46Jack Murphy?

  Earthquake weapons. You know what? What, what, what's going on here? And I think it really is an algorithm that all ideologies are filled with inconsistent dumb ideas. But I think you're seeing a new one start to coalesce because of this arbitrary algorithm.

• 42:03Speaker 01

  And then, and then people have this incredible distrust, uh, uh, you know, particularly of government. I mean, uh, one of my buddies, he's actually a cop. He was down at, he's, you know, the, the FBI Quantico runs these, uh, annual conferences for, for, you know, kind of, uh, uh, local police officers. Um, I actually went and I did a leadership talk a couple of years at it, but he was wearing an FBI polo shirt around Quantico. Just going to the local seven 11 or whatever, getting his gas at cheats or I don't know, whatever it was. And someone came up and said something like derogatory against the bureau. Like, I don't trust you guys. And you're like, you live in Quantico. Like, the whole, this town is fundamentally based on FBI, DI, and the Marine Corps, you know, base being here.

• 42:45Speaker 01

  And it's just, to me, that was, and he was shocked. He's a big city, he's a big city, East Coast, you know, cop. So he doesn't see this kind of, that kind of, I mean, he's, he's an anti-police bias, probably from other people on the streets, but. But he was shocked at this. This is regular old kind of person, a pickup truck, saying something nasty to him because he's wearing an FBI shirt. I mean, that, that, so again, there's something wrong with that.

• 43:07Jack Murphy?

  Yeah.

• 43:08Speaker 01

  And so, and so, but one thing I kind of, I wanted to, to kind of throw out there, just in terms, as, as, you know, of course, this is a national security podcast, it has to do with. Kind of the, the pending reductions, both that the State Department, CIA, and FBI, and maybe even lead off with kind of USAID. But. You know, my view of, of working alongside AID, uh, uh, foreign service officers over the years is that's a tremendous, you know, uh, kind of value added for us in terms of. Of soft power. I mean, there's, there's multiple military officials, US military folks I've met over the years who actually said AID was indispensable. Um, to, to the United States national security. What's your, what's your thought on that? And essentially gutting foreign aid entirely?

• 43:49Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, I mean, it, it's again, it's one of those things where some voters think that half of our GDP goes to foreign aid.

• 43:57Speaker 01

  Right.

• 43:57Jack Murphy?

  I mean, they, they seriously believe that.

• 43:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:00Jack Murphy?

  Um, when it's, I, I don't know what the actual percent is. It's for sure less than 1%. It's probably closer to like 0.01%.

• 44:07Speaker 01

  That's correct.

• 44:09Jack Murphy?

  Um, and, um. You know, that foreign aid, it, it develops our soft power. And, you know, what people don't really understand about that is it's not like just to be nice. It's like, we're also looking for something in return. There's some leverage we're hoping to develop through foreign aid. Um, you know, sometimes it's in goodwill, like, hey, you're an ally, you just got pounded by an earthquake. We want to help you guys out. And there's not like strings attached to it or anything, but like. Foreign military sales and USAID and all that kind of stuff. There, there is a sort of like give and take to all of that. Um, that I don't think a lot of people acknowledge or want to acknowledge.

• 44:50Speaker 01

  And, and Jack, who do you think when we stop doing that, who do you think takes our place?

• 44:54Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, Russia, China, Iran.

• 44:57Speaker 01

  China. I mean, it's unbelievable. I mean, we're, we're feeding soft power to China for a tiny kind of fraction of investment, you know, on top of the notion that I think what there's, there's some figure that was thrown around 20, we've saved 20 million people with kind of the HIV prevention program.

• 45:13Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, which is, which is objectively a good thing.

• 45:17Speaker 01

  It's a conservative program too. I mean, you know, conservatives love this program. So it's just, this is to me is, is insanity. And then you go to the notion of the probationary officer issue. And that's where the US government is firing the probationary staff of the, I mean, the, sorry, the administration.

• 45:33Jack Murphy?

  Again, it started to interrupt Mark, but just to point out, there are a lot of people out there who think probationary officers are people who are on probation because they're in trouble because they did something wrong. You want to tell them, tell them what it really means?

• 45:47Speaker 01

  It's officers within one to four years of experience. Um, I think that intelligence community has a, has a higher number. It's several, it's several years, maybe three years into your, four years into your career, but for others, a year. And so what we're doing, you know, so all federal agencies had to give lists to, to OMB about their probationary staff because it's easier to fire them. If you're on your probationary period, you don't have the same amount of rights. This is insane. You know, again, I said, as I said, I'm going to talk in the colleges all the time. Um, I got a text message from a, a kid I, I mentored at the Citadel, who is a Republican, um, who then joined the national security state and was just fired. And he is despondent. Um, uh, and because this is, this is Gen Z,

• 46:29Speaker 01

  this is the next generation of security practices. It's who you and I and Dee in this podcast are trying to pass the torch to, to get them excited about this. We've just fired these people. That's insane. Um, there's, you know, uh, uh, it also makes no sense. So for example, if. If you say, um, uh, you know, uh, these, the new directors, the CIA, uh, John Ratcliffe wants to beef up our spying capability. Um, he said that, you know, because the agency is too woke. So we got to get better against China. You just fired your staff who's going to go serve in in Beijing. It's nuts. And, and I think the, the, you know, uh, it, it also seems misguided.

• 47:12Speaker 01

  If you want to, as you know, as, as, you know, I don't know if they have the right legally, but if you want to say, look, I want to replace this, the C suites of the FBI and CIA, fine, do it. What are you doing going after the junior staff? Um, this is not the woke ideologues of the Biden administration. These are kids right out of college who wanted to serve their country and the rest of their fucking classmates are making a shitload more money. I just don't get it.

• 47:38Speaker 02

  I mean, it's just like a real business. It's a businessman thinking, right? Like what's your first move when you don't have a good quarter?

• 47:45Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, it's Jack Welch, just like trim the fat.

• 47:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's just lay people off.

• 47:49Jack Murphy?

  A bunch of people.

• 47:50Speaker 02

  And like, I'll, I'll, uh, make a guess that like when they go to DOD, they're going to cut people too. And we'll see how that's weak. Yeah. Like what people were saying, like, oh, they're going to look at the procurement process. Like, no, they're not. They're not going to look at the primes and the money that the, like, the defense contractors are making. Let's be honest here. Uh, the first move is to scalp. They want scalps.

• 48:13Speaker 01

  So the Economist just had a great article this week, um, uh, talking about the need for reform at DOD and exactly that, you know, how, um, how everything is jacked up. Uh, uh, but that has nothing to do with the idea of going in and firing your probationary staff. Um, uh, one of the, one of the interesting things now is because, you know, there's so much pork barrel

• 48:34Speaker 00

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 help make it happen fast. Rated A plus by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star TrustPilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 49:03Speaker 01

  There's so much congressional interest. Individual congressmen and women have their pet projects and they have people at military bases. So these DOD cuts, I don't know if you're a Republican congressman, you're going to hear it this week. When, when people start getting fired.

• 49:17Speaker 02

  Well, what they're worried about is if a Republican congressman comes out and says something against Trump, that Elon's going to primary him.

• 49:22Speaker 01

  I know. So this is.

• 49:24Speaker 02

  Thirty million dollars on a primary.

• 49:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, the, the lack of courage amongst the, the, the Republican kind of national security set is incredible to me. And I've, again, half my friends.

• 49:33Jack Murphy?

  And, and all, all of these corporations too, isn't it interesting that they went from unwavering support for DEI to totally bowing down like immediately.

• 49:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:43Jack Murphy?

  And I, I've, I've railed against this for years, you know, that these companies use this crass advertising, you know, that we have like BLM ice cream and gay pride Oreos. And it's, it's just the way corporations try to sell us shit that we don't need. And it, but it's still, you know, disconcerting to see like, yeah, if we did have like a fascist or a communist government, these same corporations would be selling us products, you know, covered with a hammer and sickle or a swastika.

• 50:11Speaker 01

  But they are, they're, everyone's bowing to the knee. I mean, you, the people can't rush to the White House, these CEOs can't rush fast enough.

• 50:16Jack Murphy?

  Yeah.

• 50:18Speaker 01

  One of the things also that I wanted to raise, again, for folks who are interested in the intelligence community, you know, when, when you're, I mean, this literally, I'm going to tell you something that a hundred percent happens. So as you get promoted up through the, the agency or the IC or the State Department, I'm sure FBI, you know, there's always going to be the flavor of the day. So at one point it was, okay, you need a little more kind of DEI experience. And so you, Mark, case officer Mark, after serving overseas and getting shot at at war zones and all this stuff, we need you to go do a rotation in some kind of, you know, you know, recruitment office where there's some little DEI flavor in order to get promoted. Okay. And, and you know what you say, you say, all right, I gotta check the box. I mean, Jack, you're in the military, this shit happens all the time.

• 51:00Jack Murphy?

  You gotta go check the box. Yes.

• 51:02Speaker 01

  You gotta check the box. So I'm going to go check the box. And all of a sudden Trump's elected and what they did is they then fired anybody in a DEI position. These are rotational positions. It's a regular case officer, a senior manager who was told to get promoted. He or she had to go to this position, they're there and they are now out of a job. And one of the things I saw in an article yesterday, I was actually happy with this, is that there was 11 such officers at the agency and, and they've, they, a judge has kind of frozen their dismissal because they're, this is like, the lawyer, Kevin Carroll, former agency officer was like, um, these are people who were told to take this job. They're off, they're case officers or analysts, like, what are you doing firing them? But that was that that was this blanket thing like anyone who ever touched DEI is going to get fired again.

• 51:46Speaker 01

  Uh, that just again, I mean, these are common sense stuff that I think the American people should agree was nuts, but we'll see if it kind of sticks or not.

• 51:55Jack Murphy?

  The one other thing I wanted to, you know, ask you about or to put our finger on a little bit here regarding USAID, but also all the other stuff going on with like the IRS and the Treasury Department and so on. And I think it's important to point out that Elon Musk is lying about what's going on in these organizations, describing congressionally approved expenditures as being quote unquote fraud. That these are lies. This is a liar who is telling bold faced lies to the American public about their government.

• 52:30Speaker 01

  He admitted it, Jack, in that bizarre press conference where at in the Oval Office where his kid was picking his nose.

• 52:37Jack Murphy?

  Yeah.

• 52:38Speaker 01

  Um, which was, I actually thought that was incredibly funny. Uh,

• 52:42Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, but that was on purpose, Mark.

• 52:45Speaker 01

  The nose picking?

• 52:46Jack Murphy?

  No, the kid being in the shop.

• 52:47Speaker 01

  Oh, no, I like the nose picking part of it.

• 52:49Jack Murphy?

  I know. It's hilarious and cute, but that's like to distract.

• 52:52Speaker 01

  And and Trump, Trump looked like a hostage there too. He was miserable.

• 52:55Jack Murphy?

  Yeah.

• 52:56Speaker 01

  But but Elon Musk said something really interesting because someone said, hey, by the way, this charge that we spent $50 million for for condoms at Hamas actually is not true. Um, and and Elon Musk said, yes, sometimes we're going to get things wrong. Um, yet yet Fox News blurts out this $50 million condoms in Gaza bullshit nonstop. And gets everybody kind of all hyped up that the idea is this, you know, uh, you know, is now a terrorist supporting entity. I mean, I don't know. It's it's it's what is it? It's pro. Choice, pro birth control terrorist sympathizers. I mean, it's it's freaking madness, but Elon Musk lied and he said, yeah, sometimes we're going to get it wrong and we'll get corrected.

• 53:35Speaker 01

  And then, you know, the damage is done already. And so, you know, the, I think the thing that's, there's a couple of things that to me are really chilling about this, these Doge folks access into kind of the, the, the kind of the secret world. I don't know who these individuals are. I don't know if they have security clearances. The idea that they have access to the treasury system is, or the IRS is terrifying as an American citizen. Because that's your personal data.

• 53:59Jack Murphy?

  And the question is, why, why the fuck do they need access to our personal data? For government efficiency, like why?

• 54:06Speaker 01

  And for an administration that looks like there is going to be a campaign of retribution against Trump's political enemies. I mean, this should scare the crap out of every conservative. Like this is why my head is going to explode. This is, conservatives should be outraged. This is massive government overreach into privacy. And then the other part is, you know, when you talk about these people poking around in, in the treasury or the national security institutions is there's a huge counterintelligence issue. And you know, there was a story, and I don't know if it's true or not, it's been reported quite often. I imagine it's true that, that, that somehow the agency sent down the first name and last initial of the entire probationary cadre. Two thousand five hundred officers down to OMB in an unsecured manner.

• 54:50Speaker 01

  We just then, in essence, compromised the entire covert status of our next generation.

• 54:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, we spoke about that in a previous episode. Yeah.

• 54:56Speaker 01

  Again, insane. And, and an own goal by the agency, but I think they're probably just obviously trying to comply. I, there should be an investigation on how.

• 55:05Jack Murphy?

  I, I mean, that's, that's gets into the other interesting thing about like compliance. Like if you're working at the CIA and they tell you to send an email with all these names over an unsecured net. I mean, isn't your answer going to be, no, I'm not doing that because it's illegal?

• 55:21Speaker 01

  And which is what, you know, that's why the, the acting director of the, of the FBI, you know, former HRT guy, you know, was, was considered a hero down at the bureau because he's actually resisting some of this stuff. He's probably, I would imagine, not going to be there.

• 55:34Jack Murphy?

  It baffles me a little bit because like if some 19 year old pimple faced kid shows up in my office at VA, IRS, Treasury, FBI, and starts telling me he needs to look at the computers and this is how it's gonna be. I get old school on that ass and show him right out the door. I'd turn that dude right around. But it seems like nobody's willing to do that.

• 55:59Speaker 01

  The two AID security chiefs were fired after they they said no.

• 56:04Speaker 02

  I mean, how many inspector generals were fired?

• 56:06Speaker 01

  They're all gone. Right. Yeah. So again, this is, and but who is the architect of the IG? And of whistleblower stuff? These are people like Chuck Grassley, a very conservative Republican. And so the Republican Party is dead on these issues. They've been good on this stuff. They believe, you know, whistleblowers are critical. The inspector general staff, absolutely critical because what does it do? It uncovers government malfeasance. This is, that's a, that's a conservative principle that so many in Congress seem to have.

• 56:34Speaker 02

  That's what I don't understand. Like, why fire inspector generals? If you're trying to trim the fat and make these agencies more efficient.

• 56:41Jack Murphy?

  Cult. Because it's a cult.

• 56:44Speaker 01

  Right. It's the power of the unitary.

• 56:46Jack Murphy?

  All that matters is one person. One person.

• 56:50Speaker 01

  You're a true conservative. I don't see how you're supportive of this stuff. And, you know, so, you know, we'll see if anyone has kind of power or strength. I think you're gonna see this week, the probable, you know, nomination going through of Cash Patel.

• 57:04Speaker 02

  Crazy.

• 57:05Speaker 01

  Same thing what happened.

• 57:05Speaker 02

  That's like me going to the FBI and being the director.

• 57:08Speaker 01

  But I mean, you know, so whether it's Patel or Tulsi Gabbard was confirmed or RFK Junior was confirmed. I mean, these are, Hegseth was confirmed. When you talk to Republicans, you know, I live in DC on the side, none of these people are qualified. And so, but, but they see it in a much different fashion. This is based on political survival, survival. If they voted against these individuals, they would get primaried. And again, that's to me, that goes against, you know, your, your principles. When you take an oath to the Constitution to do the right thing. They did not. I would much rather, you know, be out of a job than to have on my record that I voted for some of these people.

• 57:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 57:45Speaker 01

  That's me.

• 57:46Speaker 02

  Oh, God. I don't feel well good about this conversation at all.

• 57:52Speaker 01

  I mean, I don't know what's what's something good to look forward to. I'm trying to think baseball season's coming up.

• 57:57Speaker 02

  Bears.

• 57:58Speaker 01

  We got the great. I got some great concert tickets. I'm gonna go, Jack, you're gonna love this. Come on. Next Thursday, I'm gonna go see Dropkick Murphy's in DC, the tiny little place of 5,000 people in the stands.

• 58:10Speaker 02

  That's cool.

• 58:11Speaker 01

  That's some old school punk. Come on.

• 58:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 58:15Speaker 02

  Oh, and another bit of news. Kellogg arrives arrived in Kiev today. I saw a video of him. He did. He took some questions. He looked. I mean, what does a guy like that do when he shows up in Kiev after the day before? What like what happened yesterday during that meeting and the aftermath with Trump? Basically, just siding with Russia, more or less like what does a guy like Kellogg go through? He's going to meet everybody, right? In Kiev? Like, what does he tell these people?

• 58:44Speaker 01

  I mean, I would imagine there's gonna be some damage control. I mean, you know, which is often the case. I mean, Rubio has come out and said, no, the Ukrainians are gonna be at the table. Again, it's a dysfunctional government. Nobody knows what we're talking about. I mean, you know, my friends who were at the Munich Security Conference came back and said it was just it was incredible to see the whiplash. And our European partners are horrified. And again, what you know, for those who think that Europe doesn't matter, and I think there's probably a lot of people on the right who are very dismissive of of Europe, they shouldn't be because 1,000 NATO members were killed in Afghanistan defending the United States.

• 59:28Speaker 01

  Even the Ukrainians, think about the scenes at HKIA at Hamid Karzai Airport with the chaotic withdrawal. You saw some people outside. Of course, the US military was there very bravely. You saw a lot of people in tiger stripes, which is kind of maybe some intelligence community, paramilitary forces, Afghans, and you saw the Ukrainian special forces who were there after the US left.

• 59:50Speaker 01

  We are not going to have any friends or allies if we treat people like shit. If we turn into this kind of imperialism bully. Uh, you know, another nine eleven, no one's coming to our aid. Uh, one hundred and fifty eight Canadians were killed in Afghanistan. And and yet we're, we're, you know, we're beating the shit out of Canada every day. I mean, you know, for for those of us who kind of work with partner forces, worked on liaison relationships, you know, this stuff matters. Um, and and and I think we're kind of going going south. I don't know. So, you know, Kellogg will do some damage control. I mean, they're going to try to, I mean, right now, the personal relationship between Trump and Zelensky is now gone right into the toilet. So how you repair that, I'm not sure.

• 1:00:27Speaker 02

  Um, so, yeah, uh, Zelensky, like probably an hour ago, I began discussions with European leaders, and I believe they would step up and fund the Ukrainian armed forces if the US does not. EU has agreed on new sanctions on package on Russia, Financial Times. Um, and I was, I read some article that there was talks of like the EU package for Ukraine being like upwards of like eight hundred, nine hundred billion euros.

• 1:00:54Speaker 01

  Good, I hope so. I mean, they have it. I mean, Europe's got to get a chip together. They need leadership. Um, Europeans certainly have the capacity to do this. Uh, the the question is, you know, any kind, so there's one is is kind of, you know, sustainability. If you talk to people, I'm going to box this, of course, I'm not a military analyst. But, you know, you know, certainly Europe needs stuff. Uh, I mean, sorry, Ukraine needs stuff, but this is actually turned into this kind of drone war. And so and and you're and Ukraine is producing, uh, there's a lot of indigenous productions. Um, so I I think Europe certainly can can step up and lead. There can be some kind of Europe, Europe security force there. But again, this is going away from US leadership. Uh, certainly any kind of a US role.

• 1:01:35Speaker 01

  And, you know, perhaps that's ultimately what what, uh, what, what, you know, what Trump wants to kind of walk away from all this. Um, the other, the other point on this too is that, you know, under NATO, there's that, there's an issue of what's called Article Five, which is attack on one NATO member, other people will come to aid. That's what, that's how, that's why a thousand NATO members were killed in Afghanistan. Um, I, I think that, that whole notion of Article Five is dead.

• 1:01:57Speaker 02

  I mean, the only time it was ever invoked was nine 11.

• 1:02:00Speaker 01

  Yep, yep. And a thousand NATO members were killed.

• 1:02:03Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:02:03Speaker 01

  Which is why I think so much of this kind of Europe bashing is so insulting. Just why, you know, same thing, again, 159 Canadian troops.

• 1:02:10Jack Murphy?

  There were, you know, there were 49 Danish troops who died.

• 1:02:13Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:02:14Jack Murphy?

  In Afghanistan, which is a hell of a lot of people for a small country like that.

• 1:02:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, we want to invade Greenland.

• 1:02:21Jack Murphy?

  It's, like I said, it's not a left or right issue. It's just dumb. Like, it just doesn't make sense.

• 1:02:26Speaker 01

  Yeah. What are we doing? We're gonna have no friends. Um, you know, and, and, you know, from your former unit and, and certainly stuff that I did, you know, a lot of the time was done training with other countries militaries or intelligence services. That's gonna go away. We're gonna have no friends. And so we're gonna have a short-term win. You know, so the, the president of Panama says something about this whole mess with the Panama Canal, which makes my head hurt. Um, uh, but ultimately, you know, are we gonna have anyone come to our, uh, come to, to our assistance in our time of need? And I don't know the answer to that.

• 1:02:59Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, it seems like, yeah, they want short-term wins, so that it's a little feather in the hat of the administration, but like, with destroying everything around it, you know?

• 1:03:09Speaker 01

  I mean, you know, again, are we the good guys? You look like an asshole. You know, I mean, I, I, you know, my, my time goes back to, so what would it like, what would it be like? Let's, let's play a game here at, at a diplomatic reception. In the past, you go, you hang out with the Brits because they're fun and they like to drink. You go over to the French because they probably have some good wine going on. And, you know, maybe there's, they, they, you know, they're talking about a new restaurant they went to. And so you're checking out around town. I mean, who do we hang out with now? You know, it's not Europe anymore. It's, it's gonna be like, you know, like the, the Pakistani dad. I don't know, like, who are our friends? You know, is it gonna be the author, the authoritarians who come by and kind of give a little, you know, wink? Hey, like, you're one of us now. Like, I, I don't know what it's like to be an American diplomat with this kind of stuff.

• 1:03:51Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, I mean, I guess just to like close off some of my thoughts on it, you know, I have been kind of like dismayed. I mean, we've talked a little bit about like the failure of like the media, the Democrats, the Republicans to confront some of these issues.

• 1:04:05Speaker 00

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 help make it happen fast. Rated A+ by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star TrustPilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 1:04:34Jack Murphy?

  Jeez, talk about academia for a moment. Like, I was reading the last issue of Foreign Affairs, which was written between the time that Trump was elected and inauguration. So he wasn't yet in office when that issue was published. But all of these scholars, political scholars, and damn near every single one of them was like, "Well, you know, the Trump administration may prove to be surprisingly nuanced in some ways that you didn't quite expect. And, you know, it's not going to be as bad as you think it's going to be because the resiliency of the global system is like completely out to lunch, like completely detached from reality."

• 1:05:12Speaker 01

  I call it wishful thinking. And I was, and I quit, I was a member of a Signal chat where there was some really esteemed kind of historians involved. And that's what I heard from them. It was this wishful thinking. It's not going to be so bad. And of course, I go through my daily catastrophizing. So maybe it's a ding on me, you know. You know, I get criticized on social media on Twitter.

• 1:05:33Jack Murphy?

  Doom scrolling.

• 1:05:34Speaker 02

  Well, part of the whole Peter Thiel stuff, part of the whole Peter Thiel like thought process about that guy Nick Lani's, like, they attack academics, too. Like, academics are in the crosshairs. So I think they're doing the same thing as like the Republicans.

• 1:05:50Speaker 01

  Bending to the knee.

• 1:05:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, Republican congresspeople are the big corporate CEOs. It's like they're trying to hedge their bets. And do the right thing so they don't get fucking targeted.

• 1:05:59Speaker 01

  But I I rejoined this chat. I was invited back in because I was I was being an asshole and I railing against everybody and bait and some of the some of the historians, these are like former deans of major universities. Said to me, you were right. It's actually wor- it's actually worse than what you predicted. Um, so I think that in academia, it's changing a little bit too, because again, it's now my argument would be, well, he said he was going to do all this, read project 2025.

• 1:06:22Jack Murphy?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:23Speaker 01

  He's he's coming through on all of his promises. There there ain't nothing new in this stuff. Um, I mean, there's a playbook. They are following it to the T. Uh, uh, but but Jack, I think you're a thousand percent right. There's so much wishful thinking. There's the it's quote, it's not this bad. Or, you know, you know, you know, and and uh, I think that there's people are going to regret. Some of these articles. It reminds me, I mean, just this just came like it's like when. You know, Jake Sullivan wrote and was it Foreign Affairs or Foreign Policy just before Gaza?

• 1:06:52Jack Murphy?

  Affairs, yeah.

• 1:06:52Speaker 01

  October 7th, they the Middle East is peaceful. This is great.

• 1:06:55Jack Murphy?

  Yeah, he was like, we fixed Palestine, Israel. Yeah.

• 1:06:58Speaker 01

  Uh, that's not so much. We didn't. We didn't even talk about the Middle East. About you now advocating, you know, ethnic cleansing in Gaza, which as a as a Middle East hand, that is my expertise. My head blew off with that. I mean, again, are we the good guys? Are we actually advocating the ethnic cleansing of Gaza?

• 1:07:15Jack Murphy?

  Well, I mean, that that one's on Biden and Trump just solidified it and put it on paper, kind of.

• 1:07:20Speaker 01

  I mean, come on, what are we doing? So anyhow, I could talk to you guys all day. It's fun. And I can't wait to see some of the you'll get some positive responses. You'll get some hate mail.

• 1:07:30Speaker 02

  No, people are gonna freak the fuck out.

• 1:07:32Jack Murphy?

  Let them.

• 1:07:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:35Speaker 01

  Jack, one last question. How's your book doing?

• 1:07:37Jack Murphy?

  Uh, good, really good. Um, yeah, We Defy is done really well, and uh, I'm working on a novel right now that I have been hired to write.

• 1:07:48Speaker 01

  Oh, very good. Hey, see, see, DC, I'm playing producer now. I'm playing like, like, emcee here. I'm asking Jack, but plugging his book.

• 1:07:55Speaker 02

  Thank you. So Jack Murphy, of course, we defy. Great job, Mark, on that. You can check it out. The link will be in the description. All the other guy's stuff, the links will be in the description. Mick Mulroy doing incredible work with Fogbo and Longbow. Mark P, MSNBC analyst, national security analyst. Where else can people find Twitter? The deep state. Core deep, yeah, hardcore. When is the new podcast? Are you gonna come out a new podcast?

• 1:08:18Speaker 01

  What's? Yes, I bet there's some exciting news, but not to be announced yet.

• 1:08:22Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:08:23Speaker 01

  Podcast from across the pond.

• 1:08:25Speaker 02

  Cool.

• 1:08:26Speaker 01

  The, uh, a member of and then, and so, yeah.

• 1:08:29Speaker 02

  So something's cooking, so stay tuned for that. Yeah.

• 1:08:31Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:08:32Speaker 02

  Um, and Patreon dot com slash a team house. Please don't leave it if you got upset. Join it, please. Also, our merch store, all the links will be in the description. Patreon dot com slash team house. Thanks, guys.

• 1:08:45Speaker 01

  All right.

• 1:08:46Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:08:48Speaker 00

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 help make it happen fast. Rated A plus by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star TrustPilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 1:09:23Speaker 00

  Cash flow crunch? OnDeck's small business line of credit gives your business immediate access to funds up to $200,000 right when you need it. Cover seasonal dips, manage payroll, restock inventory, or tackle unexpected expenses without missing a beat. With flexible draws, transparent pricing, and control over repayment, get funded quickly and confidently. Apply today at ondeck.com. Funds could be available as soon as tomorrow. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 1:10:00Speaker 05

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 make it happen fast. Rated A+ by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of 5-star TrustPilot reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at ondeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 1:10:34Speaker 05

  Cash flow crunch? OnDeck's small business line of credit gives your business immediate access to funds, up to $200,000, right when you need it. Cover seasonal dips, manage payroll, restock inventory, or tackle unexpected expenses without missing a beat. With flexible draws, transparent pricing, and control over repayment, get funded quickly and confidently. Apply today at ondeck.com. Funds could be available as soon as tomorrow. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.

• 1:11:04Speaker 06

  Sponsored by GSK, the makers of Extenture, Depamocumab ULAA. If your asthma keeps interrupting, it may be time to try something else. Extenture is an ultra-long-acting prescription maintenance treatment for severe asthma, eosinophilic type, ages 12 and older. It isn't for sudden breathing problems. Extenture is the first and only add-on treatment that can help deliver protection from asthma attacks with two doses a year. Just one dose every six months. That's a lot of time for everything in between. Serious allergic reactions can occur. Get help right away for swelling of face, mouth, tongue, or trouble breathing. Don't change or stop medicines, including steroids, unless told by your doctor. Report if you have a parasitic infection,

• 1:11:47Speaker 06

  common cold, sinus infection, inflammation in the nose, flu or flulike symptoms, joint pain, or sore throat may occur. Carry on with fewer attacks and ask your doctor about Extensure. Learn more at Extensure.com or call 1-833-393-3678.

• 1:12:04Speaker 04

  OnDeck is built to back small businesses like yours. Whether you're buying equipment, expanding your team, or bridging cash flow gaps, OnDeck's loans up to $400,000 make it happen fast. Rated A+ by the Better Business Bureau and earning thousands of five-star Trust Pilot Reviews, OnDeck delivers funding you can count on. Apply in minutes at OnDeck.com. Depending on certain loan attributes, your business loan may be issued by OnDeck or Celtic Bank. OnDeck does not lend in North Dakota. All loans and amounts subject to lender approval.