959: Why America Might Stop Helping Ukraine

Brian Nichols  0:00  
Instead of focusing on winning arguments, we're teaching the basic fundamentals of sales and marketing and how we can use them to win in the world of politics, teaching you how to meet people where they're at on the issues they care about. Welcome to The Brian Nichols Show. Wow. Hey there, folks. Brian Nichols here on another fun filled episode of The Brian Nichols Show, I am Yes, as always, your humble host joining you from all lovely cardio miracle Studios here in sunny Eastern Indiana. The Brian Nichols Show is powered by our awesome sponsors, amp America. Get the news you need to know without the corporate media bias or fluff over at amp america.com also The Brian Nichols Show, powered by cardio miracle, the best heart health supplement in the world. So if you want to learn more about how to help lower your resting heart rate, improve that, improve that high blood pressure, while also improving your pump at the gym, stick around. We'll talk about that more later in today's episode. But first we're gonna head jump into the topic of conversation today, all things foreign policy, specifically, what's happening over in Eastern Europe, we saw Lord Mayor Zelensky, who was over here in the USA back a few weeks ago, having a nice little heart to heart with with Donald Trump and JD Vance at the White House. Didn't go as expected, and maybe was actually a master class and how to lose a negotiation to discuss all that and more. Joining me from young voice is Kyle Moran, welcome to The Brian Nichols

Speaker 1  1:25  
Show. How you doing? I'm good. Thank you for having me. Excited to be here, excited to have

Brian Nichols  1:29  
you in the show, Kyle, I know we have a lot of fun stuff, fun stuff, kind of scary stuff to dig into here, all things foreign policy, specifically what's happening over in Eastern Europe. But before we get there, Kyle, do us a favor. Introduce yourself here to The Brian Nichols Show audience and your focus that you have here today you're bringing to the platform about what's happening over in the foreign conflicts, over in the Middle East, in Europe and all that and more. Sure

Speaker 1  1:53  
so I, as you said, recently published in Real Clear Politics. Recent graduate from University of Rhode Island, international relations and history. I've also been working with the critical threats project at the American Enterprise Institute, specifically on the Iran project. Awesome.

Brian Nichols  2:09  
Kyle, so let's, let's go ahead and set the stage here for your article. Over at Real Clear Politics, Zelinsky just gave a master class and how to lose a negotiation here. I'll, I'll do this for the the video watcher, which, by the way, yes, we are over on YouTube, on rumble, on Twitter. So go ahead, check us out over there when you do, of course, hit that subscribe button. But and yes, we are an audio show. So if you didn't know that, you can take us on the road, but Kyle, give us a low down here. We see here in this this picture of Vladimir Zelinsky and Vladimir, sorry, Zelensky and Donald Trump sitting at the Oval Office, and this conversation that was 45 minutes in length really has been snapshotted for what the seven to nine minutes, I think it is of some of the fireworks right where, you know, there's the one meme I saw where it's Trump and Zelensky playing a game of Risk, and Trump saying, Listen, you don't have the cards right now. You're putting millions of people's lives in danger, which, if it was a game of Risk, is funny, but this is actually not funny, because it's real people, it's real lives, and it's real danger. So let's talk about this. Just set the stage here. What was the, I guess, goal of this initial conversation between Zelensky and Trump, and what did we see unfold for the folks maybe, who didn't hear about all this? You know, whether it's on the evening news of the social media or likewise?

Speaker 1  3:26  
Yeah, so Zelensky really wanted to get Trump persuaded to participate in what's being called a backstop, where, if any security guarantees that Europe provides through any future negotiations and ceasefires are violated by Russia, then the United States will send in our soldiers, which is a large ask. It is essentially asking the president to commit that US soldiers will die for Ukraine. So if you are coming to the White House to request something like this, it is staggering to engage in such a heated debate on not just national but international television. Leaders around the world were all watching this, I can guarantee you, and this is something that's going to be studied for years to come. Well,

Brian Nichols  4:12  
as someone who I've been in the world of politics now for well over 20 years, I've, you know, I've studied a lot of this stuff, from a historical standpoint to just a a what a tactic standpoint, right? Like there, there is a lot of yin to the Yang here. And when you look at the present, the presentation that Trump and JD Vance gave it during this, this, this talk, the the vibe that was really presented by the and I'm just gonna say the corporate traditional media was that Trump and JD Vance were being bullies, right and and yet Kyle, there's a lot more to that story and a lot more to the actual video, the 45 minute video that was on purpose or just for the sake of time, either not given as context or just outright omitted by these these entities. So you. There's a lot of kind of yin and yang. Again, back to what we're seeing here happen to this oval office. It's a very delicate dance between Zelensky and Trump, and then the fireworks happened, right? And we end up with Zelensky leaving the White House with No deal. And of course, you know, he's getting roasted on social media for still wearing his his his little military suit that he's been wearing. Where's your suit? Zielinski, that was the claim there afterwards. But I guess the main question is, where does this set things now? Is the rush or the Ukrainian United States relationship fractured? Did this end up getting resolved at all? Talk to us more about that. Kyle, well,

Speaker 1  5:39  
he didn't just leave the White House, by the way, he got kicked out. That's how badly that's one way to get Yeah, that's one way to leave. So yeah, but the situation right now has recovered somewhat. We have resumed the intelligence sharing with Ukrainian military officials that we suspended after that disastrous meeting. But I think to your point about how the traditional media has presented this as Trump and Vance being bullies. Uh, you're quite right about that being misleading. This was not a confrontation that simply that Zelensky simply got dragged into, or that that Vance or Trump were bullying him numerous times throughout the interview, you could see Zelensky drifting off course, trying to go talk about specifically praising European efforts, and Trump was trying to rein him back in saying, no, no, no, if you're a diplomat in that situation, you have to be able to read the room. You have to be able to recognize that most people have the skills to do this, that Donald Trump is not somebody who's going to take kindly to this. And again, this is not to moralize one way or another whether that's a good trait of his, but it is to recognize that it is a trait of his, and so he has to work around that if he wants to be an effective negotiator. Well, it

Brian Nichols  6:55  
almost feels like Kyle that a lot of folks have been demanding this, right? It feels like we've seen over the past. And I'm just gonna you know, for the past 30 years, especially, America has, while presented itself as this, like, global leader, you know, the world's policeman, however you want to classify it, we've started to see that. Yes, we're leading with that mentality. But in terms of like leading with integrity with morality, that's taken a real big back seat. And I'm not looking to Trump and saying He is the embodiment of morality and integrity, but in terms of American interests first, right? It seems like a lot of Americans, they've been wanting that American first perspective represented on our standing from a foreign policy perspective and and it seems like America is always leading the charge to then say, here's how we can screw ourselves. So I think that a lot of folks who very much looked at this interaction and said, finally, finally, a US president, not just, you know, bending over backwards to appease, you know, these, these foreign leaders, is that a fair take? It

Speaker 1  8:03  
definitely is. It definitely represents how a significant segment of the population feels, whether you are listening and believe that is a right opinion to have or not. There are. There has been a long history of us almost ignoring domestic issues at the expense of foreign ones. So when this is to my point of when Zelensky comes to the White House and is essentially asking for a US backstop, which would risk American soldiers dying for Ukraine sovereignty, if you are going to do that, you have to first recognize that that is an enormous ask. And second of all, it is not exactly the smartest approach to be sitting there praising leaders of nations that Donald Trump is at that moment feuding with. And an example, I'll give you one. Somebody who has handled this much better is the leader of the United Kingdom, Keir Starmer, who is not exactly that gifted of a politician, but he has enough of a brain to recognize Donald Trump is somebody who, if you go over and you flatter him and give him another elaborate state visit by the king that he is going to eat that up. Keir Starmer did that when he visited the same day as Zelinsky. And you can just see the difference in the in the outcome of those negotiations?

Brian Nichols  9:23  
Well, it's because, at the end of the day, too, people are people, right? I know we always, you know, we, we kind of have this, like, there's the Normie world, and then there's like, this, how to phrase it, like, there's this perception that there's like, there's real life, and then there's this fake world of politicians and royalty and foreign conflicts and like it feels almost borderline Hollywood, right? Because you don't, I mean, we're in America, and we're very fortunate to Trump's point, right? We have, or maybe it's Zelinsky point. We have two oceans on either side, so a lot of. These, these big foreign conflicts really are outside of our purview, for better, for worse, like we, I don't look outside and see tanks rolling down the street or see, you know, smoke in the distance from a missile blast, right? But when you look at the the debate in, I guess, in the confines of when it's presented by the corporate media, right? It almost does turn into theater, but at the end of the day, that theater, they are real people, and that's something I think a lot of folks do, they forget, they don't want to acknowledge, is that, like you're members of Congress, you're members of the the executive branch, the judiciary, and in this case, you know, Zelensky, Starmer, all of these other entities out there, these world leaders. They're just people. And you look at Trump, one of the things that made Trump popular, and, dare I say, successful, before his venture into the world of politics, is that Trump was a businessman. And when you go into the world of business, I mean, this is, this is where you get to see human behavior, incentive structures, like the basics of economics, 101, really start to play out in terms of both how to make deals, but also how to negotiate and how to deal with other folks who have competing interests. And that's what we all do every single day. But there's some there's just something where people kind of turn their brains off to embrace the theater, the theatrics of the moment. And, you know, you mentioned Starmer, you know, and Trump in their interaction, it was absolutely different. And I think a lot is just the manner in which they were approaching each other, right? It was not so much a confrontation or a debate or a negotiation on on the live TV air, but it was more of a more of that, that Pomp and Circumstance kind of vibe, right? So I guess, what can we learn from this Kyle when we're looking at the differences between, you know, Keir Starmer and Zelinsky, or name other world leader here, I know we had Abdullah Hayek on the show the other day. We're talking about the King of Jordan and how he had a negotiation with Trump, when you're talking about what was happening in the Palestinian region there at Gaza, the Gaza Strip, and talking about taking potential Palestinians to Jordan, and how the King of Jordan had to kind of walk this fine line. So what is something that we can take away and learn from, if not us as the public, but just big picture looking at the interactions between these world leaders. Like, is there a style that you've seen work more effectively? And if so, what can we learn from that? Yeah,

Speaker 1  12:29  
so to your point, there are a lot of people lives, who are impacted, who are displaced, and who are killed through this conflict. It is easy to tune out just how many people are dying. Yeah. But in the in the Iraq War, the United States lost something like 4000 maybe 4500 soldiers throughout the entirety of the War, Russia and Ukraine together lost 2000 are losing 2000 a week. So I mean, the scale of this is like nothing we've seen in so so long. Russia's total soldier loss, I believe, has now surpassed that of World War Two. So the amount of death that is happening is impossible to overstate here. So regardless of where you come down on this issue, we just need to keep in mind that this is a serious issue that people are dying every day for, and we we do need to be serious about getting at least a ceasefire and then eventually a meaningful, just peace for both sides. Let's

Brian Nichols  13:34  
talk more about the human impact here, Kyle, because this is something I think a lot of folks are very isolated to the reality of, if you're not on Twitter or X, I guess it's as it's called now, you maybe aren't seeing the horrific videos coming out of the the Eastern conflict, where you'll have, I mean, for the lack of a better term, Brother versus brother, because Ukrainian soldiers and a lot of Russian soldiers, they have a Very common shared history, in some cases, shared lineages. But when you look at this conflict at the micro level, right? That the human impact. I mean, I've seen the videos of Ukrainian soldier with a broken leg, you know, sitting there praying to a drone, or no, he's a Russian guy, sorry. He's a Russian soldier who had broken leg, and he's praying to a Ukrainian drone, please don't drop the bomb on me. And then you see the bomb dropping his body blown to smithereens. And just It's horrific to see this happen. And yet we are so removed from the reality of this. There is very real human struggles and torment that is taking place over in Eastern Europe right now, the likes that we really haven't seen in in modern I say modern history, I mean at least American history, like we were so isolated, I guess again, going back to the idea of like we're not, we're not seeing all the blood jet around us, but this is the norm over in Eastern Europe right now.

Speaker 1  14:53  
It is, and that is absolutely why. And to be honest, Donald Trump made a big deal in. His campaign about getting this ended before he took office. Now, I always took that with a grain of salt. I did not. I would have been shocked if this, if this was that easy, I do think that the Biden administration got to the point where they were, they were completely beyond even attempting to bring this to a close they weren't even talking with the Russians anymore. So I do welcome further negotiations, but we do need to be more serious about this, both on the US side and on the Ukrainian side, and now, especially with the Russians. I don't know if Russia really wants a ceasefire, as strange as that may sound, because they have been making serious tactical advances in the last few weeks. So we have to be as hard on Russia as they were on Zelensky, if not harder, and in my opinion, harder, because it's well and good to to criticize Zelensky because of his ridiculous antics in the Oval Office. But I mean, you have to look at the aggressor here. Russia was the one who started this. We have to be clear mind, clear eyed, with the facts on the ground there. And right now, Ukraine has agreed to the terms that Donald Trump laid out in the ceasefire, and Russia has not

Brian Nichols  16:19  
so and let's, let's look at that, because I think there is a big debate right now that I want, I want to maybe get your perspective on, because, to be fair, right? Let's, let's look at this situation. You go back to, you know, even as far as 2014 right? You've had these, these eastern conflicts happening over in Ukraine, more or less like a mini Civil War. Call it an unrest, call it a civil war. But that was very real back in Ukraine. Prior to 2014 you had two sides. You had the more pro, we'll call EU, type of mentality. And then you had some more Russian nationalist sentiment on folks, more on the eastern side of Ukraine. And I believe it was before Volodymyr Zelensky took took charge. But there was quite a large military campaign on these territories. And this is what originally kind of set up the conversation, conversation that's not the right term, but more of the contention between Zelensky and and Putin or not. Zelensky, I'm sorry, Ukraine and Russia. And then you fast forward to the US involvement in the Ukrainian what would they call it, the Ukrainian uprising, where, I think was Boris and CO was he the the Prime Minister? Yeah, yeah. So he was, he was more or less removed. And call it, call it removed, call it voted out, but it was obviously due to American influence, right? And then you look at the the appeal to get Ukraine as a part of the United Nations, or not united, I'm sorry, part of NATO and all this right factors into very real like, reasons for, I would dare say, anybody would say it makes sense for Russia to be like, hold up time out. Because if the if it was us right, if you know, let's say Hamas or No, how about this Iran? Right? That's everybody's favorite bully in the Middle East, and pick on right now. So if Iran was working with Mexico, and they made a pact with Mexico, and Mexico became part of the the NATO 2.0 I don't know. Like, if that was the case, then all of a sudden we have a NATO, NATO 2.0 country at our southern border, who is more or less like partnering with one of our enemies. I could absolutely see us saying, Ah, no, no way, Jose, this is a no go. So let's kind of like help walk through that Kyle. Because I think there is both an understanding that Putin isn't the good guy here, but is he? Is he as bad of a bad guy? I guess, as it's been promoted,

Speaker 1  18:50  
he is portrayed as the all intense bad bad guy. I will agree with that some historical context is always helpful, though. So after the fall of the USSR, a significant portion of Soviet nukes were stationed throughout Ukraine, which made the international community, both Russia and the United States, quite nervous. The Ukrainian government at the time was extremely weak. We were legitimately these concerns were legitimate about these nukes falling into some hands that you do not want to have nukes, is how I'll put it. So we did come to the negotiating table with Russia and Ukraine. Russia specifically guaranteed that in exchange for handing over its nukes, it would never invade Ukraine, and the US actually committed to security guarantees on that as well. So it is a difficult position for the United States. But when Russia comes to the table and guarantees if you surrender your nukes, we will never invade you, and then invades anyway, we have to be clear eyed about this and then on the NATO issue, I don't think that this has persuaded. Created the international community to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO in any way, because Russia is not going to take Kyiv. Just as I was saying that we have to be clear eyed that Ukraine is not going to retake the Donbas and Crimea, Russia has failed for three years to take the western parts of Ukraine, so places like Kyiv are simply not going to fall so where does this leave us? This leaves us in a position where there's going to be a Ukraine, a Ukrainian state that's deeply concerned about another Russian invasion, that has already been lied to in the past, with an agreement with Russia that they won't do this, so that incentivizes them to join NATO significantly more than they were than they ever had prior to the invasion. So I think that that is a bad miscalculation, on Putin's part.

Brian Nichols  20:53  
At what point this kind of goes back to my conversation with Abdullah Hayek. At what point, though, Kyle, would you say there is a very real argument for Americans to say, Listen, there's tragedy, there's there's suffering, but I feel the tragedy and suffering here at home, the the domestic issues that are being ignored in pursuit of the making things better over in countries 1000s of miles away. At what point is there an argument for Americans to say, Listen, I get it, but you got to fight your own battles. We can't. We can't keep being the policeman of the world. I mean, go if you want to do your NATO thing, do your NATO thing. But understand that we as Americans, we're we're out right, like, at what point is there an argument that that that makes sense in your world to

Speaker 1  21:45  
much of that? I would say decades ago, without saying that we're out, I would have, I will. I am a huge fan of Poland really stepping up their game. They are going to be the military superpower in Europe pretty soon, because they're one of the only states that have taken defense seriously, if you look at defense spending in even the UK, and then once you get into Germany, they this country, Germany was sending its soldiers to military practices. They could not find weapons for these people to hold. So they went in. They went in holding broomsticks. This is something we can't even make up. It's it's like you, it blows the mind. So these people have not taken their own security seriously at all. Much of this has because been, because presidents have largely allowed them to get away with it. So certain people will be certain presidents have complained about European spending. But we really do need to get them to step up. Trump has gotten them to step up one way or another. I wish it had been under slightly less hostile circumstances, but it I guess that may be what it took, but we do have to look at the positives as well. Poland in particular, has been outstanding at its own military defense, and especially in recent weeks, their Prime Minister has really upped their game in terms of military commitments. Well,

Brian Nichols  23:13  
and you mentioned, maybe this is what it took, right, that the hostile situation, I mean, folks listening to the show that they're well aware I used to weigh 385, pounds, and it wasn't up until I went to the doctor's office that one time, and she's like, Hey, Brian, you're 18, and you're like, at high risk for, like, morbid obesity, heart attacks, that kind of stuff. And like, that moment when I'm hit with the slap in the face of reality, that's when the behavioral change happened for me, right? And, I mean, I think it makes sense for folks to say, Well, yeah, sometimes you need that slap in the face of reality before you start to understand that, okay, I have to do things differently. And you know, there is a lot of folks who will just, they'll, they'll freak out about Trump for right or for wrong, but Trump was voted in to do a job, and I think he's doing it well, that is to be the the bull in the china shop, right? Like this, this system we've had in place for the past 70 years in a post world war two era, it's not working the way it was supposed to work. Yes, we became a dominant superpower, but with that, we became the world's policeman. We became more or less like the world's piggy bank, and then with that, we allowed all these other countries to neglect their their defense spending, to neglect their own, their own different responsibilities, because we were taking charge and we were the ones leading, but at the same point in time, enabling this behavior, and it's cost us, quite literally, blood and treasure over the years, and More and more Americans, especially today, are saying, You know what, no, I'm done. I'm good. I don't I it's not that I don't care about people overseas. Is that I care more about what's happening in my backyard. And this is where I, you know, said to Abdullah Hayek when we had on our show, because we did get into a kind of a fun little back and forth. But it really comes down to, I think, that. Your average person is, is at the point where they're like, Yep, I'm done. I get it, but I'm done supporting all the extra stuff outside of the purview of our 48 states, or the two, you know, up in Alaska and down Hawaii, like the American 50, is what we need to be concerned about first and foremost. So my my concern, but also kind of my prediction is, Kyle, you're gonna see more and more of an electorate start to say, No, America, reign it back in. Not isolationist, but non interventionist. Okay, we've, we've made promises in the past. Sorry, there are promises we can't keep, and frankly, they are made by people who couldn't keep them either, and now it's being pushed on to us generations later to maintain the promises from the past generations like folks are just rejecting that and mass so my guts telling me that we're gonna see over the next 1020, years, 30 years, very much a pulling back of America from a global stage in terms of not not interacting, but Being that, bully pulpit right to kind of, you know, push the rest of the countries into a direction we want them to go. And I think there's, there are gonna be very real consequences to that, namely, when America pulls back, there will be other countries who will fill that vacuum. But, I mean, that's what I'm diagnosing, Kyle, am I on track? Do you see a different course of action, and if so, what does that look like? I

Speaker 1  26:22  
definitely think you you're on the right track, because a lot of that is true. So much of this has become such so much government spending as Doge has been uncovering, has been on such ridiculous things we so we have to take a clear look on what is in the American National Interest funding transgender operas in Latin America is simply not one of them. I'm sorry to whoever is running that, but it's not so when you look at on the international stage, Donald Trump is neither, in my opinion, isolationist nor hawkish. He ranges between a extreme variety of both at sometimes simultaneously. So for example, we are now bombing the Houthis in Yemen, which some people may support, some people may not support. But we have to look at what is in the national interest of America. Here, the Houthis are blocking international shipping through one of the most important canals in the world. So if you take a purely isolationist or non interventionist approach and say, well, that's a long ways away, it doesn't really impact us. I disagree that it doesn't impact us, because I think it does. I think that that will have big ramifications, not for some other country, way that across the world before everyday Americans who are trying to get regular goods and services. And I think that that if we don't act on that, that really opens trump up to dangers of inflation, potentially worse than we saw under the Biden administration. If we're if people are just running rampant throughout the world doing whatever they want with terrorism and piracy and all this stuff. So Donald Trump has taken a really strong stand on the Houthis. By the way, Joe Biden removed this group from the terrorist from the terrorist list, which is insane. Their slogan is, forgive me, if I don't quote this correctly, but their slogan is, Death to America, Death to the Jews. Victory to Islam. Nice guys. These are not these are not our friends. These are terrorists. And so Donald Trump recognizes that and sees it for what it is, as a threat. So in terms of moving forward, we just have to be more focused on what is actually in America's interest. And so I definitely hear you on some of this internationalism stuff, especially liberal Institute liberal international institutionalism, but on on some of the more interventionist policies, I still believe there's a lot of them that are in our interest. I don't, I don't believe that just to simply withdrawal from the international stage is going to be in pretty much anyone's interest. I

Brian Nichols  29:06  
was listening to a podcast other day, Kyle and I want to position this, this scenario that they were outlining, where the question was raised, are we going to a moment in history where we're going to see a realignment from a foreign policy perspective of America, more and more or less, I'll say partnering with, but aligning more with a country like Russia versus more of the the European nations. And here was the argument is that you see that a lot of the more we'll say that the social Marxism, the the more progressive mentality that has really built up in in Europe, and they seem much more focused on creating this type of like this, this type of society moving forward, whereas the argument was positioned that America and Russia are more so sociologically, societally. Be, I guess, compare and contrast more on the same page, and they were arguing that Russia is more of like a 1950s America right now. Is that a fair assessment? And do you see that being a real outcome down the road? Or do you think that that one's off base?

Speaker 1  30:16  
I don't think so at all. Because if you look at I mean, I am all for mocking. And the French, for example, it's America's long time past time, there's always room for that. But when you look at, I mean, the divorce rate in Russia is 70% really. That is, yes, it is such a lie that is put out that they are some they. They may portray themselves as being the super Trad country, but they're simply not this. This country is the ex Soviet Union, where there was brutal repression of the Orthodox Church, the largest church there for almost a century. They executed priests. They sent them to labor camps in Siberia, these people are not if you are looking for a traditional country, you should keep looking, in my opinion.

Brian Nichols  31:11  
Alright, Kyle, I got me mid mid drink there, and I just realized we're at 30 minutes for here for the show. So we're going towards the tail end of the episode. So how about this? I will joking my own spit here I will go through and I'll quickly do my final thoughts. I'm gonna turn things over to you to bring us home sure this, this has been a recurring conversation we've had here in the show, and candidly, I really haven't had the right answers. And it's not because I'm not educated in the area. It's just there are so many different competing narratives, competing interests that is just is a big, messy ball of muck at this point. And for me, I always teach my sales teams, and when I'm doing coaching and stuff, I always teach the idea of controls. You can control, right? And this stuff, all the foreign interventions, the wars overseas, the stuff beyond our global borders, they're just stuff that we can't really control that well, right? Like we can try to pull levers and change behaviors, but we can't control it. And this has been something I think we've really brought into our American foreign policy for the past 70 years, is we're going to try to control everything, right? We're going to go over the Middle East. We're gonna control Iraq and control Afghanistan, and we're gonna control Vietnam and control Korea, and, you know, go through all of our, our non war, wars that we've had, that has been the overarching mindset, and I'm seeing, especially with more of like the Gen Z and goodness Gen Alpha taking over now, over the next, you know, 20 years or so, I know, get ready.

Speaker 1  32:40  
No, that's scary. I'm starting to feel, feel my I'm a, I'm technically Gen Z, by the way, but I mean, Gen alpha, this is getting crazy skinny, yeah,

Brian Nichols  32:48  
exactly, or so the kids say. But like, I think we're going to see more and more of that generation. Just be like, yeah, no, I really, I don't say, I don't know. I bet they will say I don't care, right? And I'm concerned that we're going to see more and more folks just say, You know what? And I'm not even so much saying concerned. I guess it's just, I think this is the inevitable outcome of, you know, I want to control. I can control, and I can control what I see in my own community, right? I can control, you know, my impact and getting involved or volunteering or going to local school board meetings or going to, you know, city council meetings. I can control getting involved in my neighborhood. Heck, I can run for local office, and I can make impact here in in my community. And I just, I'm feeling that as that generation starts to take over more, we're gonna see more and more of that mentality, which I actually, I am, I appreciate. I think it's a good approach. But is that going to be in in the, I guess, moving forward mentality, something that is taking away from our ability not to control foreign policy but to lead? You know, Teddy Roosevelt, Love him or hate him, that speak softly and carry a big stick, right? Exactly like that mentality. I think that makes sense from a foreign policy standpoint. I don't want to go and use force to change the behavior of every single country that's out there, but at the same point in time, if I'm ever in a situation where I need to, you know, I need to flex some muscle, I have the ability to do so. So I think there is very much a what I call it, a pivot point, a fork in the road. Use your favorite analogy here, but I really do see that we're kind of coming to a fork in the road moving forward. And I'm not really sure which direction we're going to go. If they go the route I think we're going to go. It is going to go back towards this more. Hey, I'm an American first, and I'm going to focus on America and my local communities first, and listen, there's pain and suffering overseas, and I am empathetic towards that, but I can't control that, right? I can't go out and be, you know, volunteer and help after a military occupation came through and wiped out a community. I can't do that. I can maybe feel I'm doing something and send my money overseas. But is it going to the areas it needs to go to help make things better? Probably not. So I just feel I'm going to focus more on the things I can see, see, touch, smell, hear, taste like it's it's the stuff in my local community, in my my my state, in my country, in America. That's my final thoughts, I guess, Kyle, I know it's kind of rambling there, but uh, that's where I see things. What do you have for us and what are your final thoughts today? Yeah, so I definitely hear you on a lot of that, and I think that that very well summarizes how a lot of Americans are feeling. What I'll say in response to that is there are in politics, there are frequently pendulum swings from absolutely almost one, one too far over an extreme to the other so granted, is nation building in Iraq necessarily in America's best interest? That's a perfectly legitimate question that many Americans are going to say no to. I would caution all of our listeners here, all of your listeners here, to avoid simply, if you're saying that we should not have been nation building in Iraq, and I hear you on that. Do not let the pendulum swing to the other side where, oh, my god, the world is now on fire. The Houthis have taken over the the shipping throughout half the half of the world's international shipping lane. I can assure you that that is as equally undesirable as the other alternative. So I definitely hear you on the isolationism part from a lot of Americans, but I also just caution about overreacting into the other direction of extreme isolationism. And so I will close with this that Donald Trump, in his first administration was was very spot on about this, and so far, he's been pretty good about this as well in the second administration, but he really did embody, speak softly and carry a big stick. He did not start any foreign wars, but when Iran was messing around, he just simply bombed and took out one of their top generals, and everybody just froze and said, What is going on? And Iran did not try stuff under Trump's first administration. I'll tell you that, because they knew that there would be consequences. So there is a lot of benefit that comes to

Speaker 1  37:15  
that comes through the speaks often carry a big stick, but if we embody, if we're telling the world we want nothing to do with any of this stuff, they're going to take that as a green light. They're going to say, hell yeah, baby, America's gone, and I don't think that's in anyone's interest either. So there can be a very strategic pullback from from several of these places, for sure, but, and I definitely think Europe needs to step up their game on this. But I also think waving the white flag and pulling out is sending a massive green light to a lot of people who are not our friends, who will never be our friends, to simply go crazy.

Brian Nichols  37:58  
All right, Kyle, we're going to go ahead and put a pin in today's conversation, do us a favor, uh, let folks know where they can go ahead, reach out to you if they want to continue the conversation. And also check out more bangers that you have here. Zelinski is a master class and how to lose a negotiation that was over at Real Clear Politics. Kyle, bring us home,

Speaker 1  38:13  
sure. So you can find me on X I'm at Kyle. P Moran, perfect.

Brian Nichols  38:17  
All right, easy enough. Kyle, we appreciate you joining the show today. And folks, if you got some value from today's episode, today's episode, do me a favor. Go ahead and give it a share, and you do tag yours truly at B Nichols liberty. You can find me on X, on Facebook, on Instagram, wherever it is you have your social medias. And also, for the The Brian Nichols Show itself, you can find us both as a video show or as a podcast. So for the video content, you can go over to x, to Facebook, to rumble and to YouTube. Check us out. We're going live over there every Monday and Friday nights. We get the stream going around 8:30pm Eastern, with the show hopefully taken off there around nine o'clock. So hit the Subscribe buttons over there, and of course, make sure you set your calendar you should be checking those episodes out while they go live. Or if you want to go ahead and just check us out at your own pace. Yes, you can watch us over on YouTube or take us on the go. Your favorite podcasting apps, Apple podcast, Spotify, YouTube, music podcast, attic, wherever it is, just find The Brian Nichols Show. Hit, subscribe, download all unplayed episodes. We have over 950 episodes here of the show, going back to January of 2018 and each episode, I guarantee, will leave you feeling educated, enlightened and informed. So with that being said, we're gonna go ahead and sign things off today. Thank you, Kyle, for joining us with that being said, Brian Nichols signing off here on The Brian Nichols Show for Kyle Moran, we'll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai