Iran War Update

Tonight’s show is about the Iran war getting messier by the hour, and Trump looking less like he has a plan than like he has a problem. Israel reportedly killed Ali Larijani, a major Iranian security figure who, not long ago, was on the short list of people the US supposedly thought could help lead Iran one day. At the same time, Trump is again begging Europe to join his war, even after spending the past year insulting Europe, threatening allies, freezing them out of decision-making, and even rejecting British help when it was offered. Now Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis says Europe will not enter the war. So after boasting that Iran was already beaten, Trump is suddenly desperate for backup.

We’re also learning more about how shaky and dishonest this whole thing looks behind the scenes. Reuters says Trump was briefed before the US strikes that Iran could retaliate against America’s Gulf allies, even though Trump later claimed nobody warned him. NBC reports the Pentagon has already prepared options for Trump to end the war if he chooses, but so far he has not. Trump’s National Counterterrorism Center director has now resigned in protest, blaming Israel for pressuring the US into the conflict, while NOTUS reports that the State Department had already fired its oil and gas experts months before the bombing started. Meanwhile, Trump keeps making things up, from threatening “treason” charges over media reports that did not even come from American outlets, to claiming some former president secretly backed his Iran bombing, which his own team is now scrambling to explain.

And the costs are starting to show. Oil is up again, gas prices in the US keep climbing, and one of Trump’s top economic advisers basically admitted that consumer pain is not the administration’s priority. That matters because this war could hit everything from shipping to medicine, especially since India supplies nearly half of America’s generic drugs and depends on the Strait of Hormuz for critical materials. Iran is already allowing safe passage only for countries it considers friendly, and Iranian-backed militias are getting bolder, with a drone reportedly flying unchallenged through the US Embassy compound in Baghdad. Add in Trump postponing his China trip, Mike Johnson offering yet another incoherent excuse for the war, and Zelensky revealing that hundreds of Ukrainian air defense specialists are now in the Middle East helping counter Iranian drones, and the picture is clear: this is spreading, it is getting more dangerous, and the White House still does not seem willing to level with the public about any of it.