Pod Insights The Team House WAR: U.S. & Israel Strike Iran, Khamenei Killed | EYES ON GEOPOLITICS About this episode In this episode, we discuss the recent military strikes by the US and Israel on Iran, the implications of Iran's retaliation, and the complexities of Iranian politics. They explore the potential outcomes of US-Iran relations, the succession of Iran's leadership following the death of Khomeini, and the strategic goals of the US in the region. The conversation highlights the challenges of regime change and the need for a coherent plan moving forward.
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00:00 Start
05:14 The Aftermath: Retaliation and Regional Dynamics
09:24 Power Vacuums and Succession: The Future of Iran
16:49 The Complexity of Regime Change: Lessons from History
23:37 Economic Resilience: The Iranian Regime's Survival Tactics
36:32 Confusion in U. S. Foreign Policy
39:03 The Nuclear Enrichment Dilemma
42:58 The Role of Congress in Foreign Policy
47:51 The Succession Plan in Iran
51:48 Potential Outcomes of Regime Change
56:18 The Threat of Terrorism from Iran
01:01:38 The Need for a Coherent Strategy
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Transcript 17,630 words · 15 speakers
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1:39 Speaker 02 Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Eyes on Geopolitics. I'm here with Mick Mulroy, Jonathan Hack and Andy Milburn should be joining us soon. A lot going on. I mean, you guys have been glued to your phones and your TVs just as much as we are, I'm sure. If you're watching a podcast about geopolitics. The huge news story was the US and Israel launched a strike on Iran, killing the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini. Iran came back, retaliated and shot ballistic missiles and drones at basically everybody in the region.
2:16 Speaker 02 Israel and like there's like nine countries, I think at this point that they've tried, they've hit and try to hit UAE's been getting smoked too, which is interesting. I'd love to know why that's like UAE has gotten just almost as much as what Israel's gotten in terms of like firepower retaliation back towards them. Um, yeah, fluid situation. Obviously Israel just launched another, uh, bunch of airstrikes again in Tehran right now, like as we're recording this at like 11 a.m. Eastern. Um, so yeah, well, I don't know, guys. I mean, that's like the Cliff Notes real quick version. What do we got, Mick?
2:55 Speaker 03 Uh, so to start with, I'd say I do support the strikes. Uh, I do support the strikes. I am very happy to see that the Supreme Leader is no longer with us. Um, I'm sure people have seen it on social media if they didn't know it already, but the, the laundry list of things that the Iranian regime has been responsible for is extensive and each one of them, I think, um, needed to be addressed, whether it's the Beirut bombings, the, the amount of soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines killed in Iraq. Um, thanks to, uh, Qassem Soleimani, who is obviously being directed from above.
3:33 Speaker 03 Um, I think it was a long time coming. There are issues around it. Uh, I would say, uh, we all thought that they, we were going to see a meeting on Monday, so tomorrow, which would have been, uh, I think in Vienna and there was going to be getting down into the technical experts, which meant to most people that the negotiations was going at least in a positive direction. Uh, you generally don't get to the technical experts unless you've agreed on the principles or framework of the agreement, right? So, um, I think there'll be a question about the U.S. and negotiations, uh, and whether you can essentially trust that the negotiations are in good faith. Don't know if that was not the case,
4:14 Speaker 03 but I think it'd be fair to say that some people would say, kind of looks like you were negotiating just to prepare for, uh, the inevitable in your mind. Uh, again, I supported the strikes, but I think that's going to be a question. The, uh, the other issue that we saw all of a sudden start being said is this idea that there was an imminent threat to the United States.
4:35 Speaker 03 I don't have access to the intelligence now, but it was kind of like, wait, where did this happen? Um, they have an ICBM that can reach the United States. Never heard that before. Uh, I think that had more to do, if you look at the War Powers Act, it talks about the president's ability to use military force. An imminent threat is part of that ability, right? So they basically, some lawyer said, just say imminent threat continuously, right? Um, and again, I, I, I do think, I did support strikes. I do think they were going toward a nuclear weapon. There's no reason to enrich uranium to the level they did, you know, a thousand pounds, about 60%. We didn't even know where it was. So I do think there was real issues being addressed, but I think that part is going to be questioned.
5:20 Speaker 03 It's going to be an investigation, not investigation, but they're certainly going to look at, well, where's the intel saying that this was an imminent threat? Where's the intel saying that they were getting close to being able to deliver, uh, you know, weapons to hit the United States? Uh, cause we just never had heard that before. Uh, other things to, to talk about, obviously, you know, the tactical level. Uh, you know, I was reading this morning, I had several friends telling me that it was a real combination of intelligence fusion that led to this massive success of taking out Khomeini, the Minister of Defense, IRGC Commander, their equivalent of the National Security Advisor. I mean, go down the list as I think there was up to 40 senior people that were
6:05 Speaker 03 uh, eliminated and it apparently was a great combination of the Mossad, obviously, which focuses almost exclusively on Iran and the CIA. And, uh, and the original strikes were substantial. Um, and of course, we're trying to diminish the, the nuclear program. And one thing about, you know, I'd say a cautionary tale for future politicians who were undoubtedly not heed my advice is don't exaggerate things, right? Cause you end up, your exaggerations then hurt you in the future, right? So if you obliterate something, then you can't say there's an imminent threat that it's about to be reconstituted. Cause it's at the terms don't actually match.
6:44 Speaker 03 Right? So I know people, the media is making a lot of hay out of that, probably rightly so, but it's it's a cautionary thing. Just say what actually happened. Don't lie. Yeah, yeah, don't exaggerate, right?
6:58 Speaker 03 So what are we doing now? And that, okay, so we saw the attacks. They were, it is a war of choice. So there he's gonna have, the president's got to explain that to his side of the the party that is uh more isolationist and under the idea that we should stay out of wars. Uh but that's that's his burden to bear. The retaliation, I I'll I'll say one more thing about that and then throw it over to you guys. And before we started, I think it'd be great to have Jonathan explain the succession that comes with the Supreme Leader. But the the last thing I'll say before pausing is the Iranian response. There's a couple of things. One, it looks like they were going on orders. And then once the decapitation happened, they just did it, right?
7:42 Speaker 03 And they made a very big strategic blunder. They attacked the civilian populations and almost every country in the region. So these countries who either were promote pushing diplomacy were were trying to avoid the actual conflict itself are now firmly on the side of the US industrial in fighting. Uh because I mean, we saw the the Shahid drones and slamming into hotels in Dubai and Skyrise civilian apartment complexes in Bahrain. That was a huge strategic mistake. Uh and so I think that that is something that we're gonna have to see. And now we're seeing
8:24 Speaker 03 this nonstop rhetoric about some supersonic weapon system that's gonna be used uh probably today to or tomorrow by the Iranians that is gonna cause all sorts of death and destruction. Uh so we'll have to see where this goes. I would hope that the US takes the opportunity to say, okay, we took out the Supreme Leader. Let's stop and uh let's go to the negotiation.
8:48 Speaker 03 Of course, Iranians have to agree to this, but look for an opportunity to off-ramp this. Because if it continues too long, it's going to have major impacts around the world. About sixty percent, I think of the traffic's already down going through the Straits of Hormuz. It is, oil's going to skyrocket, a lot of bad things are going to happen. And of course, if the Iranians really view this as an existential threat to their regime's existence, they're going to use every possible means available. So clandestine attacks, terrorist attacks against not only military and diplomatic facilities and personnel, but civilians. And they do have the ability and they have penetrated inside the United States. So there's a lot of reasons why the US and Israel should take the win, if you want to call it that,
9:34 Speaker 03 and see if there's a way out of it. Again, the enemy gets a vote and Iran has promised specifically Leterjani to retaliate pretty strongly. So we're gonna, we're gonna see where this goes.
9:45 Speaker 02 Can you blame them?
9:47 Speaker 03 I would, I would.
9:49 Speaker 02 Going scorched earth? They just, like their eighty-seven-year-old supreme leader just got smoked, including like another dozen or so top guys.
10:00 Speaker 02 What are they supposed to do? Right? Because their goal is regime security, obviously.
10:06 Speaker 03 Yeah, and any other part to that, Dee, is I mean, it's a five-thousand-year-old civilization. It's almost important in human history, yet forty-seven years, they freaking destroyed it. And thirty-seven of those forty-seven years, Khomeini was in charge of it. So they've brutal, the only thing they're good at is brutalizing the Iranian people to stay in power. That's it, right?
10:24 Speaker 02 Yeah.
10:25 Speaker 03 They can't run a country, they run out of water, they have one of the biggest oil and gas supplies in the world. They can't, their economy is, is.
10:33 Speaker 02 Well, that's because they were sanctioned, right? I mean, I, I'm not saying.
10:36 Speaker 03 And they were sanctioned because of their actions.
10:38 Speaker 02 The regimes, I'm not like crying over fucking Khomeini being smoked, I could care less. What I care about is like the blowback and we, and us seeing what's happening now across the region.
10:53 Speaker 02 We have no plan. It's almost like, it looks like two thousand and three was like a master stroke in Iraq compared to what's going on right now, frankly.
11:02 Speaker 02 You know, there's gonna leave an obvious power vacuum and we're gonna talk about the succession succession and what that's gonna look like.
11:10 Speaker 02 I don't really know what the point of this was, to be frank. Uh, I don't really, I mean, I understand Kamala being a bad guy and the regime as a whole being horrific. But if we really cared about the protesters of some, whatever it is, 30,000 people that have been killed. Why didn't we start doing this a month and a half ago when the protesters were at the protests were at their height? And the regime actually looked like it was really on its back foot.
11:38 Speaker 02 Frankly, like as the layman here, and I told this to John before we started. Uh, you ask people, like I've asked friends of mine who are like, you know, they just read headlines really. And, uh, they don't really understand or care about the nuances of foreign policy and geopolitics. They honestly just blame Israel and frankly, to quote them, it's like the Jews run us. That's what they said to me, like layman people, right?
12:06 Speaker 02 Obviously I don't agree with that. I think Israel is a belligerent actor in all this, but I, I can obviously, you know, you could differentiate Israel IDF Bibi Netanyahu, the right wing of them, that party. And like regular Jewish people, like most people don't want war. But frankly, like in terms of like the person on the ground. Who pays the taxes that does this, they don't understand what the fuck's going on. And they think that Israel is our daddy here, for lack of a better term.
12:40 Speaker 03 I mean, I'm gonna start saying people are anti-Irish if they disagree with me. Cause it really, it doesn't, I mean, that's a, that's a weak argument, man. Like you could disagree with people and not be, you know, anti-Semitic or racist or whatever, whatever moniker you want to use. And obviously, I mean, most American Jewish folks disagree with the policy of Netanyahu.
12:59 Speaker 02 Sure, sure. And frankly, there is a, there is an argument there to say that Netanyahu is also a war criminal, so.
13:07 Speaker 03 But from the Israeli perspective, I mean, let's face it, they have dealt with proxies that have attacked them almost nonstop, including on October 7th, then joined in by the Houthis and Hezbollah. And yeah, they're going to want to get the United States to help them degrade, if not destroy their enemy. I would. So I see it from their perspective. I mean, we can go into how they conducted the war in Gaza. God knows, we have the expert right there, Andy. Seriously, and I mean that very sincerely. But the idea that Iran is a threat to the Israelis is clear. So if I was in their shoes, I would have loved to try to get my big brother to roll
13:50 Speaker 03 in there and help me take out and do what they did. And I do think the United States had the justification. I mean, nobody ever, nobody ever gives like any blame to the Iranians here. They could have actually negotiated and agreed not to have a nuclear weapon, and they wouldn't have the sanctions against them that they do. And they wouldn't have to brutalize their own people. You just said they killed 30,000 of their own people, right? So what about the, what about the actual culpability of the Iranian regime?
14:20 Speaker 03 It's almost like, it's like Al Qaeda where they get a complete pass. It's just all, all the criticism is, is to the countries reacting to their actions. And I think, I think they need to be held accountable, and they were held accountable.
14:33 Speaker 02 Well, Al Qaeda is a terrorist organization, and like it or not, the regime is the leadership of a sovereign country, right? So I think there's a little bit of difference there, as well as like-
14:45 Speaker 03 They're both capable, culpable for their own actions.
14:48 Speaker 02 I completely agree with you, as are, as are we.
14:50 Speaker 03 You're a terrorist organization, so my, my standard of, of actions is somehow different than every other human on earth.
14:57 Speaker 02 Right.
14:57 Speaker 03 If you, if you're going to commit murder and you're going to attack another country, stand by for being attacked back.
15:02 Speaker 02 Right.
15:04 Speaker 03 And you can't use proxies to try to avoid responsibility. That, that day should be over, and as soon as that happens, then proxies will be less effective.
15:12 Speaker 02 Sure. I mean, well, like, I think it's arguable that after October 7th, and the, the, what Israel's done, not just in Gaza, but in Lebanon and in Syria and Iran, back in the 12-day war, that, and us in the Red Sea, like that, the proxies in Iran are the weakest they've ever been in terms of like being a threat. Definitely to our homeland like um but you know even in the region I would say that like Hezbollah got smoked essentially Ashara hates fucking Iran and we and Israel still bombs them um so I would I would argue that the Iranian proxies are the weakest they've ever been in the last
15:56 Speaker 03 Why is that the case because Israel did it right you they attacked Israel Israel attacked back
16:04 Speaker 02 Yeah, but I don't think this is like it's not I mean
16:08 Speaker 03 It's not because they ideologically shifted space and decided not to be an enemy of Israel and the United States it's because they got their ass kicked that's what happened
16:18 Speaker 02 Right yeah I just don't know you know decapitating strike on a on a sovereign leaders thing I you know international law I mean that's been a myth in the last year anyway it's just things we uh we've never really done before and like now like we're going to a place where like we you know we're acting more like Israel where it's just like you know they can they assassinate whoever they want whenever they want um but yeah I don't know I just don't and plus again like I'm gonna come back to the planning
16:49 Speaker 02 like in terms of the fallout and what comes back and the blowback right because Hezbollah supposedly has agents everywhere that you know there's a huge diaspora of Lebanese people in America so I would argue that the homeland is more at risk now with uh like a rudderless ship and some lunatic let's say IRGC guy taking over in terms of like attacks on the United States of America actual like United I live in New York you know what I mean so it's like that's an you know compared to what it was with like this you know he was a jerk off and I'm not sad he's dead I don't care one way or the other um but like this sickly eighty seven year old who like kinda was you know
17:29 Speaker 02 with our best case scenario in terms of that regime and you know that's crazy this and you know it's a little wild to say but some like fifty year old crazy IRGC commander coming to power I don't know if he's gonna be like the the kinda guy we wanna negotiate with like a real sage person that's like thoughtful and considerate in terms of like global you know global order and the rest of it but I don't know I think it just can be messy and I don't think we've really learned our lessons from Iraq or Afghanistan frankly And we're in a worse position in Iran, right? Because we don't even have a ground force there. And there's 90 million people there. So even if, even if, you know, the Kurds
18:09 Speaker 02 and other groups come up and like, be back like the, like the hardcore regime people, how do we, you know, this is gonna probably devolve into civil war, right? Most maybe, I mean, most likely, I can't see this being hap- having a happy ending. Anyway.
18:27 Speaker 02 John, what do you got?
18:30 Speaker 04 Oh, it's interesting to listen to. Um, yeah, I'm thinking about you mentioning the geriatric 80 year old ruling the country. Thing is, uh, that guy's been ruthless since day one. And it's easy to look from the outside in and, and kind of think about how it affects the, the world, and ignore how it affects the inside of the country. And since he became uh, first president and then Ayatollah, he was right there directing every death, every killing. He signed the death warrants of 3,000 people in 1988 when they executed Mujahidine Chalq. You know, frankly, that's a wild cult, the Mujahidine Chalq, but they're still people. There was zero trial, no due process. They're basically these little slips of paper that had a person's name on it and a single box where you just check yes, and they get executed.
19:14 Speaker 04 And actually, uh, Raisi, who, who died tragically for himself in a helicopter crash a few years ago, was the, one of the judges that was signing those slips of paper. And the reason I mentioned the Ayatollah and Raisi, who were later on politicians, all of them started out as these bloodthirsty revolutionaries who wouldn't take no for an answer, no matter what. And when the revolution happened in 1979, there were actually eight different groups that were part of the revolution. One of those groups is what the Islamic Republic of Iran came from. The other seven were violently suppressed to become extinguished. The only ones that survived were the Mujahidine Chalq, in, in any big number that actually matters. And they were actually pushed out of the country and they went to go to Iraq. And when Saddam
19:58 Speaker 04 invaded Iraq, the Mujahidine Chalq that remained in Iran helped Saddam come into Iran. And there's that, that long history is very important for thinking about today. We think about the Ayatollah today, that he's this old man, you know, can barely walk. There's a reason his left arm doesn't work. And it's because he was almost assassinated in 1981 for the things that he did to other Iranians. So since day one, he has been a target of Iranians because Iranians have been a target of him.
20:22 Speaker 02 Andy?
20:24 Speaker 04 He's ready to go. I can tell.
20:27 Speaker 05 No, I I I've been I've been following and and learning with great interest. Yeah, I I mean, I I believe I
20:35 Speaker 05 we we need to get occasionally people on who um who don't know what they're talking about so that we can have vociferous arguments, right? Maybe, I don't know, Andrew Fox or someone like that, but because I'm I'm absolutely on board with everything that Mick and John have said, but I'm I'm not going to simply rest at that. I'm going to say what's kind of interesting, uh, you know, to to kind of sum up what everyone has said so far. Look, the the death of Khomeini uh from a legal and ethical standpoint, um justified. I mean, that's the general argument here within the group, I think, uh, you know, based on all the things that have been said, plus from a a kind of a
21:14 Speaker 05 a perspective of national interest, and um it's a it's a debt some consider long overdue for Iran's support of uh pro Iranian militias within Iraq, right?
21:32 Speaker 05 Which resulted in substantive US casualties. We all know that from the development of EFPs back in, what, uh, two thousand and five, two thousand and six, um, all the way up to the the fight against ISIS, right? And and beyond. When we've been continuously having problems and incurring casualties from Iranian backed militias. And so so this didn't come out of the blue. I mean, we, there is a ledger um that Khomeini has established, not not just vis a vis his own people in terms of brutality, but in terms of uh of his um proven uh antipathy to the United States and that which has resulted in in US casualties in in the past. So
22:15 Speaker 05 I could just say, setting that right. But one thing, I I would say, a question going ahead, and I'll be interested here both John and Mick on this is, you know, how does this fit into, we we understand what You know, Israeli views are Israeli, Israel is always very on point when it comes to pursuing their strategic objectives and they have always portrayed Iran as as an existential threat to Israel. Whether you believe in that hundred percent or not, um, doesn't matter. It's the fact that is that's Israel's standpoint on this. Israel views Iran's regime, particularly its nuclear missile capabilities as an existential threat.
22:57 Speaker 05 Of course, uh, you'd have to have a convoluted kind of chain of thought to regard, think of both of the, either of those as existential threat to the United States, but certainly a threat to US interests. Um, Israel justifies targeting, you know, the leadership and I G R C infrastructure uh, as as a continuation of the war that they've been involved in for several years and is framed as degrading Iran's capacity to protect power in the region. All right, all of that we understand as Israel's strategic interest very clear, but what are ours at this point, you know, so, um, I, aside from the president reaching out directly to the Iranian people and trying to encourage an uprising, um, coming out of the Pentagon,
23:42 Speaker 05 though, is very clear that the framing emphasizes preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, um, defending American forces and allies from Iranian missiles and proxies in the region. That is how we frame this. Um, but what do we expect to see next? So, so I would, you know, what we've seen is, is Iran's I A Ds, the Integrated Air Defense System, totally stripped, right? And that was the goal, presumably, apparently by today. Um, we've gone after command and control nodes, we've gone after leadership, and I believe we've also gone after nuclear facilities. But what, uh, what do you guys think is, is the end state? Number one.
24:23 Speaker 05 Number two, are we only seeing part of this? Do you think? Do you think there is, there is stuff going on on the ground with a covert nature to encourage a regime change, a takeover? Because we've all talked about on this show, the fact that bombing alone, no matter how effective, is not going to guarantee shift of balance of power, domestic balance of power within Iran. So how, how does this all fit, do you think, into the end game, the end game? The last piece I mentioned, you know, D brought up, is there an element of this that is purely, purely punitive going after Iranian officials?
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27:00 Speaker 05 For what they have done to their own people? Or again, is this part of a concerted effort for regime change? What are your guys' thoughts? Based on what you know, what you've seen on the ground?
27:12 Speaker 03 So I think, one, I would join the chorus that the president could do himself and the nation a favor by really sitting down and explaining what the plan is here. Generally speaking, that's done well in advance. Perhaps there was a little bit of deception, and that's why he hasn't. So, okay. Now, there's no deception needed. We're obviously engaged in full-on conflict. So I think that would be helpful. There might be, what he might say is that the US is prepared to do militarily what we can't do diplomatically. We are prepared to degrade any time they try to build up their nuclear facilities.
27:55 Speaker 03 We're ready to hit them. Every time we think their ballistic missiles reaches a critical mass, because obviously quantity is also an issue when it comes to dealing with the threat. They can mass them, in other words. And that is what causes all the death and destruction in Israel and on now, we can see in other countries. And of course, if the regime is going to continue its nonstop, not only threats against Israel, the United States, and the West, but actions, right? By supporting proxies that will attack all the above. Let's remember Hezbollah was responsible for more American deaths than any other group until 9/11, right? So that might be what they say.
28:38 Speaker 03 With the end goal hopefully being to get back into the diplomatic sphere and end up with an agreement that we can all live with. And that allows the Iranian people to essentially kind of escape the yoke of these maximum pressure campaign and sanctions, but also gives the world assurances that Iran will never get a nuclear weapon and will stop using proxy forces to attack its enemies in the region. So I think there, I think there, it can be explained. But of course, the enemy gets a vote. So what is Iran gonna do? Are they gonna, are they gonna accept this? Is President Trump gonna look at the Venezuela model as, okay, so I'm not really gonna support the opposition. I'm just gonna deal with somebody for practical reasons that are
29:22 Speaker 03 gonna be, you know, like your Delsie Rodriguez's of the world? Is there somebody like that? Is there, is there any possible way that the, what's left of the regime would be amenable to that? I think Jonathan should answer that. But there's a lot of questions out there, but I think the first thing we could do, the president could do, the White House could do, is to sit down and explain why we are where we are and where we hope to be headed with this.
29:53 Speaker 04 Yeah, I'll, I'll piggyback right on there. Yeah. So I'm thinking about, there's two possible outcomes to this. One is a change in the system, which is a new government. And then the second is status quo, which is remnants of the current government remaining, like you were mentioning, Mick, with the Venezuela model. The problem here is that Venezuela model can't work in Iran, because the regime is so entrenched and it's so monolithic and as far as, as it's, you know, the shields are stuck together, just like a phalanx, as far as this regime is concerned. And they're all in survival mode. Every single one of them shares very similar views. And those views aren't, perhaps to other people's surprise, they aren't necessarily religious. They're survival minded. There are certainly clerics who are, you know, fanatic religious folks,
30:34 Speaker 04 but there are very wealthy, you know, very powerful individuals in Iran that benefit only from the existence of the regime in any form. And as long as that system stays there, those people will remain corrupt and in power. The, the central bank will continue printing currency left and right, continue destroying everyday Iranians' lives. If you go right now into a grocery store, and I saw this last weekend in Iran, you have to use a payment plan to pay for yogurt. It's become so expensive and currency is so devalued, you cannot purchase it with money, but because they're not part of the SWIFT banking system, you can't use a credit card either. So you have to do a payment plan where you promise to pay for your yogurt over the next month, which is insane. I mean, that's just a tiny little speck of like how how this regime
31:18 Speaker 04 has treated its own people. Because like you said, they have had plenty of opportunities to come to the negotiating table over the last forty seven years and say, all right, we're going to change how we're behaving. And they've never done it, except once, which was during the JCPOA, where they changed one element, just one element of how they conduct foreign policy, but still continued instigating and antagonizing people in the region and the world. Now, let's go back to the two options. So if we have the IRGC remain, like you mentioned, the Venezuela model, what you're going to have is people like Ali Lari Joni, Abbas Aragchi, Mohammed Bagram Gali Baf, Yahya Sabawi, name some of the listeners I might've never heard before. But if you watch the regime for a long time, these are people that you don't, every time you hear these people's names, you shudder, because these are the
32:01 Speaker 04 people that have been holding power the entire time. When you see the Ayatollah up there in his elderly state, talking on a Friday to the people, that's not who's in power and has not been in power. The people in power are those names I just mentioned. Those would be the people. And by the way, those are the people that are still alive. They were not killed yet, yet. Those are the ones that if we hand over power and say, oh, they're these pragmatic people, Ali Lari Joni, he's the Speaker of the House, or Gali Baf is the Speaker of Parliament, Lari Joni's Supreme National Security. Oh, these are pragmatist politicians. Absolutely not. These guys have had the levers of power. We've talked about this in the past about the Sepahis or the Guardians. These are the Guardians. These are the ones that have been ruling the country. It would be an absolute mistake to hand over the keys in a legitimate fashion, like, oh, now we actually recognize that you are the
32:46 Speaker 04 power brokers. The the country won't just status quo. It'll get worse. Because now they've been exposed, and that there's nothing to hide behind anymore. They'll say, well, now, we're in power, and you have to do exactly what we say. There's no more secrets. There's no more hidden black market where the IRGC controls eighty percent of the black market. Now it will be a hundred percent of the black market, because they will be the government, legitimately, the government in their eyes. And in our eyes, if we legitimize them, that would be a huge mistake.
33:16 Speaker 05 Yeah, I think it's fair. Right, John, the, since 1979,
33:25 Speaker 05 the regime has focused on developing built-in redundancies, right? I mean, through parallel institutions. So you mentioned the IRGC and the real power brokers behind there.
33:40 Speaker 05 You know, they act as a, they act as a check, of course, on the, on the regular conventional armed forces. And then you've got the besiege and the specialized units who back the regime. And then the whole, you know, the layer of civil security and intelligence bodies.
33:57 Speaker 05 You brought up a really interesting point about the economy. So although the civilian population is clearly suffering heavily from the state of the economy, isn't it true to say that the regime itself has kind of economic networks built in as buffers, right? I mean, the IRGC has its own linked enterprises, smuggling networks. And then there are kind of quasi-government bodies, right? That, that manage social services, economic projects, outside state channels and continue to function.
34:35 Speaker 04 Yeah, these are called banyads and they're kind of like private equity firms in equivalent to the United States. They're worth over 150 billion, 200 billion, 300 billion. There's one called Khatam Al Ambiya, which is the construction jihad headquarters. That's what it is in English. That's this giant multinational conglomerate that has offices all over the world. They have these shell companies, holding companies in places like Hamburg, London. They even have bank accounts in the United States. They're, they're completely evaded the sanctions regime that is designed to stop them. And in fact, they've enriched themselves because they're the only actors that have access to the money, which means like they control that scarce resource. And inside Iran, there's these groups that are supposed to support poor people or poverty. All that money gets funneled into regime pockets, all of it.
35:21 Speaker 04 And even the Central Bank of Iran, back in the early 2000s, there was a big scandal because the director of the Central Bank fled to Canada with 3.6 billion. How do you flee with 3.6 billion dollars? That's not really a thing you can bring with you in your pocket. That means a bank transfer was facilitated and approved by a Canadian bank. Right? How is that possible if they're not part of the SWIFT system? Right? And it's because they're able to get around all these sanctions with what they're doing. And we can have a whole episode on how they do that because I've studied that in great detail. But they are able to do it and the mechanisms exist and states allow it. For example, Germany is a big facilitator of this regime money that flows in and out of Iran. You've got the children of all these regime leaders, the ones I just mentioned, like Lari Joni, Kalibov, even Khamenei.
36:05 Speaker 04 Their kids live in Canada, London, Paris, and they have Instagram accounts. You can see them, they're all wearing Louis Vuitton bikinis, zero hijab at all. I mean, they don't look Muslim, right? But you have these guys talking on the TV as if like Islam is the end and that's it. And their kids are in Paris at a pool party posting on Instagram. Right? So what it really comes down to in reality is corruption. You have this small group of highly corrupt individuals who will never change. I mean, you can't come up to a corrupt billionaire and tell them, hey, can I just get your money back, please? They're not going to do that. Right? There's only one way to go. Right? And I think these people see it like, for example, if you see Lari Joni currently speaking to the public. He's right now like the number one guy that's kind of leading the the existence of the regime in the media.
36:50 Speaker 04 And he's talking about like, we'll do everything we can to survive. I mean, he's telling the truth. They will do everything they can to survive. The question is, how much longer can they survive? What's that target list look like that we have? What's that spreadsheet look like? Like, remember back during the war, we had the Joint Prioritize Effects List. I'm sure his name's on there with an objective name. And I'm curious, how long is he going to survive on that spreadsheet?
37:12 Speaker 03 So these bonyards, I mean, you obviously just described it. Is it a lack of will for countries, whether it's Germany or Canada? Or is it they're just, they just are being deceived?
37:26 Speaker 03 It's deceptive and they just don't know what the account, I mean, can you explain that? Maybe we should send this to the Treasury Department, this section, right?
37:33 Speaker 04 Yeah, actually, we just in class at Yale Law School had the sanctions and money laundering experts speak to us. It's very interesting to listen to. They were talking about cartel money, but it's a very similar situation where Wachovia Bank, for example. There was a big scandal because Wachovia Bank got fined several billion dollars for facilitating almost much of the cartel money between the US and Mexico. And the problem, there were two problems. One problem is the self-interest of the bank because they collect fees from all this money. So they don't want to scrutinize that. I mean, they're making a lot of money. That's one issue. The other issue is on banks like this, like Wachovia or Bank of America, for example, they have trillions of dollars of assets moving through daily. Daily. I mean, how can you track every one of those dollars on that spreadsheet every day? You can't.
38:16 Speaker 04 So it's a very tough kind of cat and mouse game. If you, if you care about it, if you want to stop it, it's very hard to do it. Especially when there's one degree of separation between the sender and receiver. Let's say you've got a, a small subsidiary bank in Hamburg that's sending money to Paris. Well, if you're the Paris Bank, it looks like it's coming from Hamburg. It's hard for you to know who sent that to Hamburg. Now add a second layer in there and you're, and the, the amount of complexity you can introduce by adding two or three layers between sender and receiver. It's, it's hard to even fathom. I'm not making an excuse for the bank because on the other side, it's that really that first reason in the beginning, why they didn't scrutinize it to start. And that's because they're making money off of it. Right? I mean, they're, they're corporations. It's, it's normal for a corporation to maximize the value of shareholders and that's what a holding company for a bank does.
39:00 Speaker 05 Yeah. All I wish is to say that, you know, the Iranian, the whole regime system is, is just built to withstand shocks, right? It's built for redundancy and resilience. And, and that is, that's a significant problem when you're talking about regime change as potentially being a strategic objective of the United States. But as Mick points out, we don't know if it is yet. That was just something that, that we're talking, pondering because of what the president has addressed to the Iranian people. He hasn't addressed the American people yet, but he's addressed the Iranian people.
39:36 Speaker 04 Well, we did the same thing with authorization of use of military force to kill Qassem Soleimani. If you read that document, it's about Saddam Hussein and Iraq and Iraqi forces in Iraq. And that was the document that was used as legal justification for that assassination. Like, right or wrong about the assassination, the document they used does not connect to the action, right?
39:56 Speaker 02 So how is that legal?
39:58 Speaker 04 Well, that's the thing. I mean, if you're the one writing the rules and nobody stops you, everything's legal, right?
40:03 Speaker 02 Yeah, and like you, we've seen like the messaging from the administration even before the uh, uh, strikes happen. Um, it's yo-yoing all over the place. It's the protesters and it's nuclear weapons, then it's, you know, proxies. There's no real, you could put them all together, sure. Um, but there's no real like actual plan in terms of like why we're doing this and to what end is there? Um, because it does sound like they're extremely entrenched and we don't have half a million troops. You know, driving down Main Street in Tehran to like start to unravel this. So, um. Andy, I remember you a couple of weeks ago, maybe a week ago, you'd mentioned about like mowing the grass. It was like every time another guy pops up, like, oh, he's the new IRGC guy. He's the new Ayatollah.
40:46 Speaker 02 We'll smoke him too and like, we'll just do this game forever. Um, and another bit about their nuclear program. Sure, no one believed it was obliterated or whatever they said back, uh, last year. Um, but a bunch of nuclear experts had mentioned that like their nuclear program had basically stopped, had basically like paused indefinitely after that. So to bring up, we had Whitkoff last week as well, talking about there's a week away, some bullshit Israeli talking point. Um, they're a week away from having deliverable shit like. There's no clear messaging here and frankly, like when you send Steve Whitkoff and Jared Kushner to be the negotiators.
41:26 Speaker 02 I don't, I don't have a ton of confidence in that group. Gonna be honest. I'm sure they'd be great at negotiating a lease for a hotel person or some bullshit like that. That's good. Great. Uh, this is like real deal foreign policy that's extremely, um. Nuanced, extremely complicated. Um. So yeah, I'm not exactly confident in this administration and their plan or lack thereof. Uh, on what happens next. And frankly, I think we're more in danger in the homeland right now than we ever will, than we ever were three days ago. Gotta be honest, but I'm an idiot. I don't know.
42:04 Speaker 02 Who wants to take that up?
42:05 Speaker 04 I'll jump in here. So we were talking about the nuclear enrichment stuff. You were talking about that Mick about how you don't need 90% enriched uranium for anything except a weapon. Between 60% to 90% is a small technical step. This was the issue all the way back to 2015. Well, Laurie Johnny, that guy that I mentioned, that's like the behind the scenes puppet master that's still alive. He's the one that said, giving up nuclear fuel abandonment or abandoning it. It's like giving up Pearl for a candy bar. That's what he said. And he still has said that. So if this is the guy that we want to remain. The nuclear issue is going to continue. It's going to exist. And we killed something like 40 people in the past three days, some of whom were scientists. But it's not like you can extinguish science.
42:48 Speaker 04 You know, there will be more people that learn how to do these things. And once you've you've produced a method to do it. New people can come in with less knowledge and reproduce the thing that that original smarter person created. So earlier in the 2000s, when they set up those centrifuges and set up the way to do the cascading enrichment and all this, this kind of little more complex way of enriching uranium to to mask the way that it's enriched, to hide it from the IAEA. That's been done. It's been it's been created. So that way, when someone comes in with less technical knowledge, they can take that plan off the shelf and reproduce it. And that's even what Iran did in the first place when the AQ Khan network gave Iran nuclear material back in the late 80s, early 90s.
43:28 Speaker 04 You know, that Pakistani weapons broker came in and sold the uranium plans to Iran. Iran didn't have to invent it. And this is the problem that still exists because that is that knowledge is there. It's kind of like killing an ideology. You can't do it. You also can't kill nuclear knowledge. So a less experienced technician might come in and restart the program because Laurie Johnny wants them to. Now we have a problem where we're going to have nuclear weapons that might be improperly manufactured, which could be even more devastating because of unforeseen effects of these weapons. So the threat of the weapons exists. I just don't know if in the past two months it got worse than it was because the rhetoric they were, you know, the West was saying it sounded like it was a lot worse and worse. And, you know, we're 10 days away, we're a week away, which you remember Netanyahu standing in the UN a few years ago, holding up the picture of the bomb, saying we're we're five days away.
44:14 Speaker 04 And we've been five days away for 20 years. So I don't know how real that threat has been, actually.
44:21 Speaker 02 Also, the nuclear threat we they had known rich uranium during the JCPOA.
44:25 Speaker 04 Right, they had it down to under 5%, which was incredible commitment to actually follow the deal. The problem is, though, it didn't include proxies, so it was never an acceptable deal to Israel.
44:36 Speaker 02 Yeah, but we're America. Like, we don't give a shit what Israel wants. That's how it should be. I mean, Israel should be safe and secure, absolutely. But they cannot dictate our foreign policy. No other country should be able to dictate our foreign policy.
44:51 Speaker 02 That's my position as an American citizen, anyway. And I'm Greek, too, right? My family's from Greece. Greece shouldn't be able to dictate our fucking foreign policy. So, sorry, guys. I mean, we call the shots. There's a reason why we're the big stick.
45:06 Speaker 02 Or there should be, anyway.
45:09 Speaker 03 And the issue when we got out of the JCPOA.
45:12 Speaker 05 Because for a long time, it's been troubled me that the Greek government may be dictating US foreign policy.
45:18 Speaker 02 I'm just saying, even if they had sway like that, I wouldn't be like, oh, yeah, let's go for it.
45:25 Speaker 05 Yeah, I mean, I think that's why it's important, like, both Nick and John have said, that the president addresses the American people to explain what the what the objectives are. You know, we we can go back and forth, we can, as we have, and we've talked about the probable possible consequences, what what our objectives are. But at the end of the day, only one man can really address that conclusively, right? And it's probably time to do that, to explain why that is. And there's, you know, there's good legal and ethical reasons for doing that, of course. I mean, we haven't discussed in depth the legal basis for what has happened.
46:09 Speaker 05 So far, though, I mean, I would venture, we're probably on legal solid ground. We can justify what has happened under the president's, you know, the. The president's powers under the War Powers Act, although that's tied to a limited timeline, right? You can talk about self-defense, you can talk in terms of both past actions by the Iranians and potential imminent action, although of course that's kind of thinner ice. But all of these things probably need to be explained to the American people, to Congress, so that everyone understands and what the goals are of these strikes going ahead.
46:54 Speaker 05 And if it is simply to keep Iran within limits when it comes to support for proxies and nuclear, its nuclear capabilities, in other words, if it is a mowing the grass effect, then let's, you know, let's announce it. But I think all of us are concerned about kind of an open-ended, unstated goal of regime change without that being fit into any kind of strategic plan, without anything else happening beyond the bombing.
47:24 Speaker 03 Yeah, you mentioned earlier, Andy, about the idea of whether the US is really promoting the opposition to take control of a country. And as Jonathan said, the change in the actual governing structure. I would be hesitant, if I was advising the president, to have him ask the protesters to get out in the streets. I mean, obviously, we'd like to see a regime change. I get that. I would like to see a regime change. But if we're not willing to do much to a system, we could be sending them to their death, right? So you already mentioned the 30,000 dead. Well, can you imagine how less of the restrictions the regime would have on protesters now? Right?
48:08 Speaker 03 So it could be just an abject slaughter. So again, it's not because I don't want to see a regime change, but when we ask people to do that, and we've done this before, we collectively, the US, you know, in Iraq after Desert Storm, it can go really poorly for them. And if they felt like we were promoting them getting out there to do something because we were going to step in and assist them. That could be a problem. I'm I would imagine, I don't know, but the that the agency's been tasked to help foment it. But that those never work unless it's organic, right? It's you can't like create it out of whole cloth. But you can enhance something that's actually genuine. And I think the I think the opposition is obviously genuine. But the question is going to be.
48:54 Speaker 03 It's easy for us to send them out on the streets. But is it gonna is it there's a real chance for it to be successful? Or is it a real chance that we instead of thirty thousand dead, we're looking at three hundred thousand dead? And I think we have to consider that before just telling them to get out there and protest.
49:11 Speaker 05 So, you know, and that gets to to John.
49:16 Speaker 05 And and actually Mick too, I mean, this is both you, both you, Bailey Wicks, but. Presumably, one hopes that there are a list of kind of. C C I Rs, right? That would indicate. What's that mean? Um, Commander's Critical Informational Requirements, right? So, in other words. That presumably the intelligence community has been primed to pick up on certain indications that regime change. Uh, maybe a prospect, right? In which case there may that might be a trigger to follow on actions.
49:52 Speaker 05 So you simply, as Mick said, simply where I'm heading on this is simply calling people out on the streets. As as Mick's pointed out, it's been disastrous in the past for us. Think back to nineteen ninety one with the Shia uprising in Iraq, in Iraq, right? So may so maybe before we do that. What the I C has been primed to look for certain things. I don't know, you know, visible splits among power centers. Um, the clerical establishment being kind of being pitched against the I R G C, there being a rift between them. Or or perhaps I R G C factions going against each other. Uh, provinces ignoring Tehran's directives, uh, behave, you know, differences.
50:35 Speaker 05 Uh, significant changes in security force behavior, right? Units refusing orders, standing down. Um, openly switching sides.
50:45 Speaker 05 Or a challenged succession process, right? Or maybe sustained protest capacity, that you know, the protests just continue to get bigger and bigger. Any one of those or all of those things might be indications that regime change is even a prospect. But you'd have to key the intelligence community to look for those things and report them. You'd have to have a plan to follow up and reinforce success in those areas, which is what I mean about having part of a bigger strategy. Part of a bigger strategy isn't simply bombing and then saying, hey, guys, I think it's time to overthrow these shitheads.
51:22 Speaker 04 And also for there to be a threat that's credible to the regime, you need the intent which the people have. But you also need the capability for them to materialize that threat. That means weapons, lethal force, control over communication, control over media outlets, ways to communicate to disparate, widespread groups to actually come together, join together, use that lethal force to then become a threat to the existing system. And the problem is the regime has done a very good job of having no second amendment in Iran. So the regular people cannot own weapons and have not owned weapons since 1979. This is a huge gap between the haves and the have nots. The regime people have weapons and the 90% of the country that opposes it do not. They even went through and took away hunting rifles up in the mountains and things like that.
52:07 Speaker 04 So there are no weapons except a very small amount in the country. If the US was going to help, this is a great way to covertly supply them with weapons, providing, you know, we did the same thing in Albania, actually, in World War Two, when we were supporting the partisans. We dropped huge amounts of weapons and crates, ammunition, medical supplies, all kinds of things to sustain the Albanians, and they succeeded. That was a huge success in Albania, and I think that's actually a very good resistance model for a situation similar to this, where you had a very repressive regime coming in with zero qualms without harming anyone in their path. And the US and Britain both came in and supplied those resistance forces, and those resistance forces were able to become a credible threat.
52:48 Speaker 03 Jonathan, would you mind explaining the succession plan and how that works for the Supreme Leader that we were talking about before?
52:55 Speaker 04 Yeah, sure. So the Constitution they have actually talks about it pretty in depth. The Constitution is very lengthy. It's not like ours, which is succinct and easy to understand. I'm just kidding. It's sometimes simpler is not better. But yeah, they have right now three people that have come together by the Constitution to actually sit in a council similar to how the Pope is selected. Where they they come down secretly and deliberate and talk about the different candidates. The reality is though that the candidates have already been selected by the Ayatollah far in advance. So they're basically deliberating over a list that's already predetermined.
53:28 Speaker 04 There's a little bit of tension between the people on that list. Two of them that stand out. One is the first Ayatollah's son Hassan. And the recently deceased Ayatollah's son, Mojtaba. Now, the the recently deceased Ayatollah said, I don't want my son to take over. I don't want it to be a hereditary regime, etc., etc. I don't know how true that is because he was president and then became Ayatollah and then never let go. So, you know, actions speak louder than words. I'm not sure how that works. The thing with Mojtaba is he's been kind of out of the spotlight. Perhaps on purpose to allow him to look like an aloof cleric because that was a big piece of insecurity that the Ayatollah had. Was he wasn't actually a grand Ayatollah when he became the leader of the country. Somehow that title materialized in 1989 that he was suddenly a grand Ayatollah, but he wasn't.
54:13 Speaker 04 And he was very insecure. There's actually interviews of him speaking about that in 1988 before he ascended to what is ostensibly a throne. So what's going to happen now is the three people that are supposed to meet, one of them's dead because he was killed during the initial bombing against Khamenei.
54:30 Speaker 04 That was Hijazi, his chief of staff. So now there's only two. That's Pazeshkian, the president. And then the chief of the judiciary, Golem Hussein Ajayi.
54:40 Speaker 04 Now Gollum Hussein Ajai's name is on that document. So you have two people deciding who the Ayatollah will be and one of their names is on the list. It is not unlikely that his name ends up being the one brought to the Assembly of Experts, which is this group of eighty-eight clerics who then take that list and ratify it. And it's very similar again to the Pope, they release the information to the public and suddenly everyone accepts it. And I mean, if that's as far from democracy as you can get, that's, that's the way it is. But that's, that's how their constitution is designed. The thing is, these individuals I just named are all top targets for the West. It's not clear if they're going to be alive next week. So, and we saw this with Hezbollah actually in June where Nasrallah was killed.
55:24 Speaker 04 A successor was named, two days later, the successor's dead. Now we have the third, third string quarterback in charge of the organization who hasn't done anything since then. Because he's probably scared for his life, if he's even alive. Right? So this is what they're facing right now. This is what they're deciding. While they're deciding that, there is the group that I mentioned earlier, the real power brokers, Ali Larijani, Gali Baf, the Speaker of Parliament, these like hardcore IRGC individuals. They're making their own decisions now about what's going on, separate from that quote unquote constitutional clerical secession system. And we might see a thing where these two groups, that religious group and the pragmatic group are coming to head.
56:04 Speaker 04 Because perhaps Larijani wants to rule the country as the IRGC person that he is without a clerical backing. It's possible that the clerical component is removed because of an emergency situation that they create or has been created. That would mean that that religious component is sidelined. This is actually what the CIA complained about in the last year as a warning about regime change in Iran is if this is a runaway regime change without actual outside support to stop it from running off on its own, the IRGC will take over the country. This was in the New York Times last week, I believe, that it was, that this was part of the CIA's assessment. I think that's, that's a realistic assessment because the clerics don't have guns either. The people with the guns are the IRGC. So if the IRGC in this moment of danger decides, you know what, guys, we're going to change things a little bit.
56:50 Speaker 04 Larijani's in charge now. That, who's going to stop them? That is to say, you know, that's, that's, that's a possible outcome. It's a likely outcome unless the US does something. And what that something is, is that, that other option I mentioned earlier in the show, which is a new system. The, the most likely new system is Reza Pahlavi, the Crown Prince, comes into Iran, perhaps on a white horse. We don't know how, uh, he'll come into the country. And he actually has something called the Iran Prosperity Project, which is a 10-point plan. You know, this, this has been ongoing for a very long time, talking about, you know, if there is regime change and if outsiders are allowed to come back into the country, this is how it's going to go. Very in-depth. It's like a 200-page document that talks about how they're going to reform the economy
57:34 Speaker 04 and governance, et cetera. The bottom line is their plan is a secular government that is.
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58:16 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart Radio app today.
58:36 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down. Rather than giving teens the answer, study mode helps teens work through problems and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
59:04 Speaker 11 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.
59:34 Speaker 04 Either monarchist or not, and they're going to have a referendum, which is like in the very beginning of this plan. There'll be a referendum where the people choose, do you want a monarchy similar to the UK, where it's kind of in the background, but you have a parliament that's making the decisions? Or do you want a straight democratic system like the United States, where we have separation powers and all that without any monarchy? Whether that also comes to fruition or not, I don't know, because there's always a change between what someone says before they have power and then what they say when they do have power, as we saw even during the revolution. So that even is not a certainty of what it will actually look like if that other option comes in.
1:00:10 Speaker 02 How does the Crown Prince come back to Iran without his own guns, like the IRGC has?
1:00:18 Speaker 04 So you saw in Trump's eight-minute statement, he said, "If you defect now, you will have immunity." That was very clear in there. He said it a second time in a speech he gave. So clearly, this is part of the narrative that, hey, if you're in the Artesh, which is the regular conventional forces, or if you're in the IRGC even, if you put your weapons down now, somehow the US promises that you will not be touched. Now, if I was an Iranian who just lost 11 family members to these people killing everybody, I don't know if I would listen to that instruction from this guy in another country telling me that these people are suddenly immune from me. Right? So I don't know how enforceable that is, but that is part of the US plan at least, that if these forces, especially the Artesh, the army, the regular conventional army who's not involved the way the IRGC is,
1:01:03 Speaker 04 if they put their weapons down, perhaps that will be the new military. Perhaps they'll be the new security forces, which is exactly what happened in 79. It's not like the military left the country in 79. The Shah's military put their weapons down, took off their Shah fatigues and put on revolutionary fatigues. Same thing with Sabak, which was the original intelligence organization that the CIA helped create. Sabak took off their Sabak badges and put on Islamic Republic intelligence badges.
1:01:29 Speaker 04 It was same guys. I mean, Lari Jonny's father was in Saba. And a lot of these guys that are currently in the IRGC, their parents were all in Saba. So there's even a precedent for that in the country in recent memory of some people. So it is possible that that could happen. And we just wonder, you know, which of the people hang on to the beliefs that they had before and which surrender them?
1:01:53 Speaker 05 Yeah, so I think um.
1:01:56 Speaker 05 To your, to your point, the, the, the way that John has just laid it out, that, that gap. That gap between identifying a successor.
1:02:09 Speaker 05 And him actually taking power. Being able to come in and, and flipping a, a transition of power, all those things that need to happen. That is, that, that's the gap that, that right now, unless we, we're getting additional information, just seems so improbable, right? Because, John, the way you painted this, the most likely outcome is going to be short-term consolidation, uh, harsher repression, you know, a tightened role by, by the IRGC. Uh, even, even to the point of them taking over from um.
1:02:45 Speaker 05 You know, from the theocrats, if that's the right word.
1:02:50 Speaker 04 Yeah, and Iran, you have three types of politicians. You've got hardliners, pragmatists, and reformists. And we haven't talked about the reformists at all in this episode. Those are the people that have been sidelined. There actually have been some presidential candidates. You remember back in 2009, there was the Green Revolution. That was because Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected a second time in a dramatically fraudulent election. Because the person running against him was a reformist. And the government didn't want that reformist because that would loosen their grip on power. So the, the contest right now is between the hardliners, which are those theocrats, and the pragmatists, which are the Lari Jonnies of the world. Those are the two groups that are currently duking it out, but there still exists a reformist camp in Iran. There it's small, but it exists.
1:03:34 Speaker 04 The question is, is the West willing to accept them as part of a new government? Or are they too tainted with the memories of the past? Because they were, they are part of the regime, right? But there are these reformists who are trying to remove the hijab law. For example, they're trying to allow women to travel alone because there's actually a rule in Iran. And if people know this, women are not allowed to travel outside the country by themselves. They have to have a guardian, a male guardian with them. This is in their legal system. So these reformists are saying, we need to stop all that stuff. This is not making sense. It's, you know, ruining our view of others' view of us in the world. And it's not letting us progress and so on. Even, even those small changes were not, you know, they're, they're too unpalatable for the regime to accept.
1:04:15 Speaker 04 So we don't know if those reformists will also come up in this transition period and help to bridge that gap between the old regime and the new regime. Because their voices have been suppressed since 2009.
1:04:24 Speaker 02 Wow. Well.
1:04:28 Speaker 02 The, so the gap is pretty, uh, pretty wide, I'd say, uh, Andy. And, uh, I feel like it would be good for whoever the powers that be, whether it's US CIA to involve the reformists into this, right? I mean, you're probably going to have to involve IRGC people as well. Right? Do you want to make the same mistakes you did in Iraq by like de, debaffification and that stuff? I mean, uh, the similarities are there, I would say. I mean, you have to, these people are the people that live in this country. So you have to have them involved in terms of how the next steps and what it's going to look like.
1:05:08 Speaker 02 Yeah, it seems like a tall task, to be honest, in terms of regime change, gonna be honest. But I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm just reading the tea leaves.
1:05:18 Speaker 05 We talked about.
1:05:22 Speaker 02 All right, Mick, get out of here. I'll see you later. Thanks, man.
1:05:26 Speaker 05 Yeah, probably a good time to to wrap with, you know, we've wrestled with the topic well. You know, it's just, the only thing I was going to say to your point, Dee, is that, you know, we talked about, yes, low prospects for regime change. And in order for it to happen, I think we're probably all agreeing that there needs to be substantive action, right? Not just provide weapons or create the conditions by taking out the leadership of the current administration. I mean, there needs to be more to enable a viable opposition
1:06:09 Speaker 05 to gain power because of the fact that the IRGC in particular is so embedded into the fabric of Iranian society. And so that's again gets back to is this part of a coherent strategy that is focused on regime change? Or is that not one of our goals? And the regime change option is simply a, it's not a red herring, but it's something that would benefit us. And if we can bridge that gap by providing encouragement, then we will certainly do so. But we're not prepared to do more than that. That's the real question,
1:06:51 Speaker 05 right? Whether that's kind of our stance cheering from the sidelines, or whether we have a plan in place, a COVID plan, to enable a viable opposition to actually seize power.
1:07:03 Speaker 04 I think that goes to what we've all said about uncertainty. The leader of the country, our country, needs to say what our objectives are. Because that will help people understand why step one, two, and three are happening in that order and for what end, you know, purpose, method, end state. Why are we doing this? It's a military operation. We need to know what the end state is as the people. And Congress needs to know that too, so that they can understand what are we approving and disapproving? What are we actually debating about? And perhaps there's a good reason for whatever has happened, or there's not. We don't know because we're not receiving the information to make that informed decision.
1:07:36 Speaker 02 Yeah, I would say there's no coherent plan. At all and Congress is completely fucking useless. Uh, they, yeah, I don't have any confidence in Congress, just the way they've been acting the last year plus when it comes to Venezuela and to this now. I mean, you see Congress, you see senators cheering the sun. Um, like, like it's a great thing with no actual plan as to what happens next. Um, and it's kind of scary, frankly.
1:08:10 Speaker 04 But you got Lindsey Graham, he's pretty level headed.
1:08:13 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah, no. Yeah. If you're, he's the best. He's the best. So level headed, super pragmatic.
1:08:20 Speaker 02 I have some fucked up jokes to say, but I'm not, he's, he's a demon. Let's be honest. You guys don't have to say, I'll say it. He's a demon.
1:08:28 Speaker 04 Maybe he and AOC can have coffee together.
1:08:31 Speaker 02 Yeah, yeah. That'd be a great little coffee date. Um, a couple of things, um, from Zach and we'll wrap up soon. I'm sorry, guys, if you guys have to run. Um, there's one thing I wanted to talk about in terms of what the blowback could look like in, in the United States. Zach Dorfman, uh, national security journalist, really respected, great, he does great work. He said, I spoke with a former CIA official with extensive Iran Hezbollah experience about this. He argued that once sleeper cuts force or Hezbollah operatives in the US saw the writing on the wall, they'd opt to lay low instead of committing terror acts likened it to the Soviet era deep cover spies at the end of Cold War. What do you guys?
1:09:11 Speaker 04 I push back on that. There's been a long narrative from certain analysts that there's this huge sleeper population of Hezbollah in the United States. I've seen estimates, the FBI put an estimate out in the late nineties saying there were like 1,200 Hezbollah sleeper agents in the United States. I think this is a similar approach to the approach we have with North Korea where we give them so much credit that part of their threat is derived from the credit that we give them. And what is a sleeper agent from Hezbollah? What does that look like? You know, is that someone with a gun under their bed that's waiting for the signal to get out? Like the Minutemen that we had in the revolution? Or is that a Lebanese guy who's Shia that maybe you have his phone number?
1:09:50 Speaker 04 There is zero definition of what this means, and I'm sure there are certainly threats in this country. Whether that threat is so large that we could call it this like sleeper agent network that just sounds so sophisticated. I mean, look at how the attacks have been in the past 20 years from Hezbollah. Are those sophisticated or are those typical guerrilla actions? I mean, if their best forces, which are now destroyed, can't even cross the border into Israel to do a raid anymore. How are you going to have a sleeper agent who got trained 15 years ago? Get activated in 10 years and remember all of this training. I mean, in the Marine Corps, I was trained to use a rifle pretty well. I haven't used my rifle that way in a long time. If you give me that rifle today and say, go do X, Y, and Z in this very sophisticated manner, I'll probably make some mistakes.
1:10:33 Speaker 04 Because I haven't practiced or trained or kept up that capability. So I just have to kind of push back on this thought that there are, there's this huge sleeper network in the country that might lay low and do the sophisticated, long-term maskarovka and, you know, illegals operation that the Russians did during the Soviet Union. I just don't think that that's likely.
1:10:49 Speaker 05 Melbourne? Yeah, I mean, I would agree. I think, I mean, what we're looking at now is probably, if I was, if I was going to hesitate, guess which I will, right? It's a, that the US will look soon to de-escalate, right? That's been a pattern in the past, rapid escalation, rapid de-escalation, signaling Iran that further retaliation will be bad for them, right?
1:11:20 Speaker 05 The risk of, the risk is still there of a widening regional war, you know, with shipping lanes disrupted. I mean, it really depends on how Iran, how far Iran's prepared to take this, right? I mean, oil markets convulsing, US bases under sustained attack.
1:11:37 Speaker 05 Israel potentially fighting on multiple fronts. I mean, some of that's unlikely because we've seen the state of Iran's proxy forces. But there's certainly an opening for escalation, kind of accumulative escalation, right? And that, that may have been Iran's purpose in targeting Gulf countries, even though it seemed like a strategic loss to lose their support.
1:12:02 Speaker 05 But yeah, I mean, I, I think the next, the thing we're all really looking for is signaling by the United States on what the end game is. Because airstrikes are easy, right? And they garner great publicity and soundbites. But, but the end game itself, the strategic goals for the United States, that's, that's the tough part. How do we define them? And how do we explain what we're doing right now leads to, leads us to those goals?
1:12:33 Speaker 02 I have one more question because there's a bunch of, some people talking about, you know, let's say Iran, you know, fractures and there's a civil war and, you know, not unlike what happened in Libya. Does Iran have a potential of becoming a terrorist like Haven? More than it already is.
1:12:53 Speaker 04 I would say no. And that's the reason is a lot of the terror you see from Libya, Syria, Afghanistan. These are by Sunni Salafi jihadist groups that existed before those conflicts existed. They were empowered by those conflicts because of the chaos and power vacuum and weapons, especially in Libya, just freely floating out into the desert. Iran is not like that. And it's so multicultural. It's such a cosmopolitan state. That you don't have the same conditions of this kind of homogenous Salafi jihadist, you know, receptive population that you had in northern Libya or in Tunisia, for example. It's just, it's not a parallel. And it's not just because of the religion. It's because of culture. You know, if you're in Western Iran, you're in a Kurdish area. And within the Kurdish area, there's different types of Kurds.
1:13:36 Speaker 04 You know, there, there are even, there's Christian areas, there's Jewish areas, there's Bahays. Totally separate from Islam. And not only that, you have Lures and you have Balochis and you have Achwazis, which are like historic thousands of years of history amongst themselves. That are attached to Persian history, but also with their own separate history. And it's not, it's not a similar place like northern Libya that was colonized by European powers for a very long time. And then suddenly the colonization was ripped out. And now you've got this strong man rising up and then he's dead. And now the weapons flow out. It's not really a similar situation, I don't think.
1:14:11 Speaker 02 Cool.
1:14:13 Speaker 02 All right, guys. I mean, that's all I got pretty much. There was one bit of news that we didn't talk about. It came out like probably a few hours before we started. That the CIA and you know essentially like gave Israel intel about when this meeting would happen with the Ayatollah and their senior guys and that supposedly they delayed the attack to wait for this meeting to go down to happen. So they were all congregating in the same place like delayed it. They were supposed to go overnight and then they did it early in the morning in Iran. Um, I don't know if that's a CIA doing like a curtain call, kind of like, you know, yeah, see, we, you know, we're doing and stuff like that. But, uh, that went into like the timing of this attack. I just want to put that out there for the audience.
1:14:58 Speaker 04 I think it makes sense, especially because it's Ramadan and the timing of the attack was right after uh, Suhur, which is the last meal during the evening. So usually that's when people gather together. We did the same thing in 2016 in Mosul when we were retaking Mosul from ISIS. A lot of our very heavy strikes were during Ramadan because the high level leaders were all meeting with each other without any civilians because they're, you know, they're at war, right? So they go meet with each other at night and then sleep in the same building. We'd have sometimes buildings with 80 guys, high level commanders in the same building. They just had breakfast and now they're going to bed and now we're striking. And we actually did this very similar things back then. We would track their movements. We'd have a funeral that would go on. We track where everyone went from the funeral over a few weeks and once they all gathered together for that breakfast two weeks later, you got 20 more funerals.
1:15:44 Speaker 02 Yeah.
1:15:46 Speaker 02 Yeah. Andy, you have anything left in the tank? No. Um, all right, guys. Listen, as always, a pleasure. I want you guys to do us a favor listening. Check out Andy Milburn's book, When the Tempest Gathers, incredible memoir. Check out uh, Jonathan's book, Iran's Shadow Weapons. Jonathan knows what the fuck's up with Iran. He, he gets it. He's screwed in. Um, if you want to learn something, get that book. That link is in the description as well. The Whitefish Security Conference, uh, Security Summit is happening early April, April 2nd to the 4th. That link is in the description as well. And any and all links, you want to find us, the links are down in the description, patreon.com slash the team house.
1:16:27 Speaker 02 Help support the show. You get both Eyes On Geopolitics and the Team House ad free and early. And you help support the show and keep the lights on. So thank you very much, guys. A pleasure as
1:16:39 Speaker 02 Yeah, thank you. Hey, all the best, guys.
1:16:41 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:16:56 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:17:07 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
1:17:12 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:17:18 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast, on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart Radio app today.
1:17:38 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down rather than giving teens the answer. Study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options, like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
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1:18:35 Jack Murphy? I want to tell all of you today about a new newsletter that we're launching that encompasses both the Team House Podcast, the Eyes On Podcast, and the High Side News Outlet, which I run with Shawn Naylor. The newsletter is going to be once a week. It's going to come into your inbox, and you're going to get the most current podcasts on Eyes On and the Team House, and whatever's topical or current on the High Side. So it's another way for us to get the information out to you, as social media algorithms are pretty iffy, and you never really know what you're going to get. So this is a once-a-week email. It'll slide into your inbox, and it will have, you know, the greatest hits of that week.
1:19:15 Speaker 02 It's really good. I'm checking it out.
1:19:19 Jack Murphy? The website for it is teamhousepodcast.kit.com/join. Teamhousepodcast.kit.com/join. Go there, and you enter into your email list, or you enter your email into the little thing on the website, and you're good to go. And that'll be it. So we really appreciate your support, and hope you'll consider signing up.
1:19:43 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:19:57 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic. In a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:20:08 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you, you're not alone.
1:20:13 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:20:19 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast, on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart Radio app today.
1:20:39 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down rather than giving teens the answer. Study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
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1:21:37 Jack Murphy? The link will also be down in the description if you're looking for it there. And that's teamhousepodcast.kit.
1:21:44 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:21:59 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic, in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:22:10 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
1:22:15 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:22:21 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeartRadio app today.
1:22:41 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down rather than giving teens the answer. Study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
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1:23:39 Jack Murphy? K I T.
1:23:46 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:24:01 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic, in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:24:12 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
1:24:17 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:24:23 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast, on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeartRadio app today.
1:24:43 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down rather than giving teens the answer. Study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
1:25:10 Speaker 01 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.
1:25:45 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:26:00 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic, in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:26:11 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
1:26:16 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:26:22 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeartRadio app today.
1:26:42 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down. Rather than giving teens the answer, study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options, like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
1:27:09 Speaker 10 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.
1:27:43 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:27:58 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic, in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:28:09 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you, you're not alone.
1:28:14 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:28:20 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast, on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart Radio app today.
1:28:40 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down. Rather than giving teens the answer, study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options, like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
1:29:07 Speaker 01 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.
1:29:44 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:29:58 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:30:09 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
1:30:14 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:30:20 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more. Because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat, it's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeartRadio app today.
1:30:40 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down rather than giving teens the answer. Study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
1:31:08 Speaker 10 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.
1:31:41 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:31:56 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic, in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:32:07 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
1:32:12 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:32:18 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart Radio app today.
1:32:38 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down. Rather than giving teens the answer, study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options, like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
1:33:05 Speaker 01 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.
1:33:43 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
1:33:58 Speaker 07 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to "I'm deathly allergic", in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
1:34:09 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
1:34:14 Speaker 08 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
1:34:20 Speaker 06 So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat, it's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart Radio app today.
1:34:40 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down. Rather than giving teens the answer, study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options, like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.com/parents to learn more.
1:35:07 Speaker 01 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 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.
1:35:39 Speaker 13 She's been thinking about this sleepover all week, but I think about her food allergies all the time. Fortunately, her doctor prescribed Zolair, omalizumab. It's proven to significantly reduce allergic reactions if a food allergy accident happens.
1:35:52 Speaker 14 Zolair 150mg is a prescription medication used to treat food allergy in people one year of age and older to reduce allergic reactions due to accidental exposure to one or more foods. While taking Zolair, you should continue to avoid all foods to which you are allergic. Don't use if you are allergic to Zolair. Zolair may cause a severe, life-threatening allergic reaction called anaphylaxis. Tell your doctor if you ever had anaphylaxis. Get help right away if you have trouble breathing or if you have swelling of your throat or tongue. Zolair should not be used for the emergency treatment of allergic reactions, including anaphylaxis. Zolair is for maintenance use to reduce allergic reactions, including anaphylaxis, while avoiding food allergens. Serious side effects such as cancer, fever, muscle aches and rash, parasitic infection, or heart and circulation problems have been reported. Please see zolair.com for full prescribing information. Ask an allergist about Zolair.
1:36:35 Speaker 14 This is an advertisement for Zolair, paid for by Genentech and Novartis.
1:36:39 Speaker 09 ChatGPT for Teens is designed to help teens learn, think critically, and grow their skills. ChatGPT for Teens supports active learning by breaking concepts down. Rather than giving teens the answer, study mode helps teens work through problems, and interactive quizzes test their knowledge and provide immediate feedback. Safety protections are on by default, and parental controls offer families additional options, like setting study hours and quiet hours. Visit chatgpt.comPARENTS to learn more.
1:37:06 Speaker 01 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.
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