Poverty and Inflation Crush Americans as Trump Sends Billions to War and Israel

Stephen Sour, thank you very much for coming on. So, the reason I'm so excited to talk to you is because it's hard to find anyone who pays attention to the numbers. It's easy to find people with opinions and sweeping theories about this that or the other, the rise and fall of nations. But to find someone who actually keeps track of what we're spending on this or that or what people think about this or that as recorded in public opinion polling, pretty hard actually. And you are probably the most famous person who keeps track. So, thank you very much for doing this. So, let me just ask you, let's start with the Iran war and it's popularity. So, like democracy kind of demands if you're going to do big things that you've got public buy in because you're doing it on the behalf of the public reportedly. How is this war viewed by the public in the United States? >> It's the most unpopular war since polling began. >> Really? >> Yeah. Yeah. first poll according to this joint poll that was that's been conducted on a near weekly basis since the start of the war through the present by the economist in Yuggov they've pulled Americans on whether the Iran war has been the right decision or the wrong decision. It started at negative net 13% net support which means that 13% more uh people 13 percentage points more people opposed the war than supported it. So most Americans oppose the war the day it started >> from the jump 13 percentage point. ask you to stop there is that's I mean that itself is unusual right cuz if memory serves when wars start with fireworks and flags and all that most people are kind of all in >> right it's sort of cathartic at the beginning >> exactly >> but then it wears off over time and all wars Tucker get more unpopular over time even World War II uh which started off with something crazy like 95% you know 95% support something like that >> but over >> but even the Iraq war in 2003 >> yeah that started off at I believe plus 40% or something. >> Is that true? Wow. I forgot that. Okay. >> Um and the Afghanistan war even higher. And of course those have tumbled down over time. >> Oh yeah. >> Um but the point is that all US wars, major wars since World War II have started with positive net support. The Iran war is the only one that has started at a negative number in terms of net support. And over time it's only gotten more unpopular. So, at the time of we're having this conversation, according to the latest data, it's at -35 net support. >> -35. >> Yeah. And for context, that makes it the most unpopular war ever. >> I bet I'm not an epidemiologist, but I bet there are diseases with higher ratings than that. >> Yeah, I I would assume so. I mean, it's it's a near universally unpopular policy. And even if you look at there's always uh you know additional related Iran war questions on this poll that you know you don't get from the summary sheet. You have to actually dig through the the data looking at the individual questions and the responses is that even if you um even among the people who still support the war it was the right decision about half of them want it to end as quickly as possible. So they won't really admit that it was the wrong decision but that say like should we end it as quickly as possible? Yes, absolutely. I love this. I hope it's over soon. >> Yes. Yes. Yes. >> I really think it was a great decision. Can it end? We needed it to end yesterday. >> Yeah, exactly. >> Okay. Well, that's really interesting. Um I sense that. I mean, I you know, I I strongly uh felt that myself, but I was also surprised by how little effort the administration meant went to to sell it ahead of time. Like usually these things are the product of a long runup, a roll out. >> Yeah, there was a steady buildup of military assets, but they didn't they didn't prime the Trump administration didn't prime the press. They didn't square the UN in the same way that the Bush administration did in the runup to Iraq. to my knowledge it seemed even though there was this you know one or two monthl long buildup and then there was you know the last June there was the attack um by the US on Iranian nuclear facilities I believe on uh June 21st 2025 >> that's correct >> and then there's of course that that history that had built up and then of uh Benjamin Netanyahu the Israeli PM lobbyed the White House famously in I believe January uh actually in February They met in uh early January, I believe, Trump and Netanyahu. And then in February after a briefing with Netanyahu, Trump decided to go to war and the US was at war a couple weeks later. >> But during this during this whole time, there was no real concerted effort to get people on board. And because over time the US presidents have an enormous amount of latitude to just basically go to war outside of congressional opinion, outside of a congressional approval rather as required by law and they find legal justifications to kind of work their way around it. And the worst part is Congress really for the most part isn't interested in holding isn't interested in constraining presidential decisions. So why the US went to war with Iran? Multiple reasons we can discuss, but I think one of the main reasons was there's nothing stopping it, right? >> There's no institutional push back from Congress, which is even from the opposition party, there was >> So Chuck Schumer hasn't demanded a congressional resolution declaring war on Iran, even though we've been in war with Iran since February 28th. >> They've they've they've introduced a lot of war powers resolutions. What the problem I have with Democrats among them among many is they refuse to take on the budgets that enable wars in the first place. >> Exactly. >> So we have all these symbolic votes of non-binding resolutions that would ostensively order Trump to withdraw all troops from the Middle East who are engaged in hostilities with Iran. But Democrats are very excited for a very select number of of of Democrats. And then on the opposite side, a very small an even smaller number of Republicans who are actually willing to take on the military budget. So I think Democrats realize there's a lot of currency um and there's a lot of um political capital to be gained by coming across as anti-war. So they'll speak out about it >> and they'll say they're anti-war, but they'll vote for the budgets that enable war in the first place. >> So let's talk about that budget. um the the defense budget or I guess now it's called the war budget cuz it's the war department um has grown, you know, at higher than the rate of inflation, which is saying a lot. So where are we now on the on the defense budget? >> We're at 1.1 trillion. That's the enacted budget for fiscal year 2026, which which actually ended on September 30th. So we're still at that level through this. It's called a continuing resolution. Just continues the levels. um >> 1.1 trillion. >> Yes, that that's that includes the that's the base budget that's enacted every year plus it's the amount of money that came from the big beautiful bill. There's about 150 billion in military funding in the big beautiful bill, the the first reconciliation bill passed in believe July 2025 under the Trump the second Trump administration. >> So I too little attention is paid to this. So 1.1 trillion. So that's by far the largest piece of the discretionary budget. I mean nothing even comes close. That's the majority of the discretionary budget as far as I know. >> Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's I mean every year the budget that Congress votes on military spending occupies more than half of it. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Right. So the rest being the what we call entitlements or things that just keep going until the government goes back. >> The discretionary budget is the the one that u the Congress votes on every year and then entitlement spending the mandatory spending as it were. >> Automatic. Yeah. >> Yeah. Yep. the um stuff that operates basically as trust funds that keeps going regardless of you know whether the government is operating or whether we're experiencing a shutdown is a is a separate amount that's um that goes on automatically as you said but then there's 12 funding bills that Congress approves every year to fund >> the federal agencies that basically keep the government going and of that amount military spending is is over half of it and if you look at all US government spending in a given year military spending if you include the mandatory resources included, you're getting to about a third. And if you include um uh like militarized uh domestic security like domestic security apparatuses it's and the proportionate uh responsibility each of those has to the national debt then you're talking about like um um the largest component of of US spending every year is on war and policing effectively. >> Yeah. How's that going? Well, so actually how is it going? So 1.1 trillion. And as far as I know, we can't get our fabled aircraft carriers anywhere near the Iranian coast. We can't secure passage of shipping through the straight. We can't keep the Red Sea open. We can't subdue the Houthis, who are we told this like primitive got chewing tribe in the mountains of Yemen. So like what exactly is this money going to? If you can't beat the Houthis with $1.1 trillion, try not to use profanity here. What what is this for? Uh well, one one way to answer that question is that more than half of the annual military budget goes to for-profit contractors. Most of us have been raised to believe that the only path to success in this country is to go to some college and then spend your life behind a desk. But of course, that's a lie. America needs people who know how to do things, how to build and sustain things, the infrastructure of our country, for example. And that's why our partners at Defend CellCam are launching a new program to award $150,000 to American workers across the country. The money will help hardworking people pursue careers in the trades that this nation needs to thrive and survive. Defense business success makes the blue collar scholar program possible. When you buy a Defend Camera, you're helping support the next generation of tradesmen. Plus, you get a Defend camera, which is the best. There are a few better ways to keep your family and your property safe. Visit defendscellam.com/workforce to learn more about this. Apply or nominate a bluecollar scholar yourself. And if you're picking a camera, use the code Tucker to save 20%. But for 1.1 trillion, you could just buy Yemen. >> You No, I'm serious. You could buy the country, which apparently I've never been. >> Yeah, the military budget is large. I mean, it's larger than the economies of a lot of countries >> of most countries. $1.1 trillion. Yeah, it's there's no African country with a $1.1 trillion >> GDP. So like why wouldn't you just why wouldn't you buy Yemen? Like what is the point here? Is it to enrich Boeing? Is that to me it's it's if you want to look at it through a lens of okay how the military industrial complex operates. It gets an enormous amount of money through the annual military budget. That money flows into obviously profits and shareholders and executive pay. the executives at the top weapons manufacturers who get the majority of their revenue from the US government make 20 million $30 million a year. Um and these are basically public firms statistically speaking and most of their money comes from taxpayers. Um but they're allowed to profit like like >> they're making $30 million a year. >> Yeah. Top executives are Yeah. Boeing, Loheed, General Dynamics, North of Grumman, Loheed Martin. >> Wow. might have said that already, but then a portion of that revenue is recycled back into the political system through lobbying, through campaign contributions, and through an underrated method of influence is the funding of think tanks in Washington DC. Oh, >> I've noticed. >> Which gives them who produce reports that are not, you know, objectively PR material, but they they fall within a certain spectrum that is allowable for the arms industry. So it gives arms industry interests a sort a sort of academic or technocratic gloss that it wouldn't otherwise have through lobbying or campaign contributions. Makes it easier to justify. >> So you send money to AEI or Heritage or Brookings. >> I'll give you an example. So CSIS, Center for Strategic International Studies, is a very establishmenty think tank. I think like Henry Kissinger was on the board there at some point or whatever. and it's bipartisan of course um and it develops Iran war cost estimates in an intelligent way. Their re their research is actually well grounded but they will sound the alarm when it comes to war costs related to US munitions expenditures. So raising that alarm and again it's just justifiably so. The US has burned an enormous amount of munitions in Iran. That helps create a demand to buy more weapons as the war itself has. >> But they will also It's like you need new toner cartridges. >> Yes. Yes. >> You've bought the hardware, but the actual profit is on the toner cartridges, the oil changes, the munitions, the stuff that you have to keep buying. And they really uh and my main pet peeve in this sort of national security intellectualism that happens in the in the in DC is they turn political problems into technocratic or technical problems waiting to be solved. So the US is experiencing a shortfall in missile interceptors. Interceptors are missiles that shoot down other missiles. Yes, everyone I think is aware of at this at this point. But the US has burned such burned such vast quantities of these interceptors during the Iran war that has created a shortfall and subsequently a PR nightmare for the for the Trump administration and and and the people in Congress who support the war. Now um the obvious solution to the interceptor problem is to look at the main cause of why we've run low in the first place which is the war. Instead, we're getting these very >> Wait, so pointless wars are tough on your munition stockpiles. Is that what you're saying, >> Tucker? It turns out that that to be the case. I know this is shocking to some people, but we're getting these 12 You have a PhD. How'd you know that? >> Oh, yeah. Yeah. I I just Yeah. It was just years of intensive study, but the important is like people who do have PhDs are are developing these, you know, 20page reports on how to replenish the stock piles, but not really calling for an explicit end to the Iran war. So they're just saying really tinkering around with like oh m uh production schedules and yeah like can how how can we increase the year yearly production capacity from the projected 650 Patriot interceptors in fiscal year 2027 to get it to 750 and how do we invest in the solid rocket uh supplier base and how do we get the critical minerals we need to accelerate production like what are you talking about? we have a problem that is caused by war. And if your first recommendation isn't to stop that war, I just I just can't take that seriously. So that's the kind of that's the kind of analysis you get when even when it comes to like a very narrow subject like missile like like rebuilding the inventory. >> So this is part of their lobbying budget. Lock like Lockheed for example, it's just to pick one would spend you know it's the money it gets from the government building the weapons that it has sold to the government of course and employing its workforce and all that but then part of the money would go to lobbying either directly or influence campaigns laundered through so-called think tanks. >> Yep. Spend money on advertising too. One thing that I've tracked over the years and this is like I run this newsletter called Polygraph on on Substack and I one of the main things that uh I do is I state the obvious but in a very very specific way. So, for example, for every military budget that Congress votes on every year, I compare um the yes and no votes, and I compare how much each respective vote category took from arms industry donors before voting. And lo and behold, as you're totally unsurprised to hear, is that the members of Congress who receive more money from arms companies, military contractors, are more likely to vote for the military budget and military budget increases. >> Oh, wow. Really? >> Yeah. So, >> so there's cause and effect. >> There's at least a correlation. And I I >> Oh, but correlation is not cause >> when people say duh, I said yeah, I'm not surprised either. But you know when we talk about money in politics the first like people say oh like like everyone knows that it's a problem but you know you approach a certain politician about it and they say oh it's it doesn't affect my vote you have no proof about it. It's like here if every year I'm noticing that members of Congress who vote for a military spending increase take three to five times more arms industry cash than members opposed to military spending increases. Then we've moved the conversation away. We're suddenly for people who care about the the effect of money and politics. We're suddenly now on the offensive because now members of Congress have to say, "Okay, this correlation exists now." So, and you're part of this group who on average takes three to five times more money from the companies that profit from war and you've just voted for a record amount of military spending. >> Well, yeah, especially considering the use of these weapons. I mean, it's one thing if we're defending the homeland against a ground invasion from Paraguay or something or any, you know, defend the homeland. Got it. Fine. But these are like totally pointless wars disconnected from America's national interest in which unarmed civilians, kids get killed cuz why it there's like no justification for any of it. It's like repulsive. Yeah. Morally, I I mean, I'm not going to I don't come to be a moral authority. I can tell you how much it costs though. I can tell you as someone who's followed these costs, it's incredibly taxing on the conscience. >> Well, can I just ask too, unless I'm misunderstanding, you're saying that some of these maybe all these weapons manufacturers derive most of their income and profits from the taxpayer. >> The major ones. Yes. So for example, Loheed Martin last year or a couple years ago received I think uh 73% of its income from DoD contracts and then even more from US government brokered sales to foreign countries. So all in all, when you combine the amount of um revenue that Loheed Martin received from government contracts plus the arms deals that were executed through the arranged and executed through the US government, you're talking about a company through which you know 97% of their revenue is tied to policy. They're just working for US taxpayers who are their customer, their only real customer, right? >> Yeah. Yeah. >> What you're saying is they're taking taxpayer money and using it to lobby taxpayers for more taxpayer money. >> This is how military be. >> How is that allowed? >> So they take if I don't pay my taxes, I go to jail. >> So they're taking money from me at gunpoint, the majority of my income because I'm not in private equity and I pay labor tax just like everyone else does >> on wages. And so the majority of my money goes to the government by force and then the government sends that to people who lecture and lobby me and my elected representatives to take more of the money. Like how is that a fair system? >> That's a question you can ask, you know, in a lot of sectors as well. The difference is >> in a lot that's right. Thank you that because that is true what you're saying. It's not just sector. But the one thing that's that's special to this sector is that we're not talking this is a state-run economy, right? Because I mean it's when we talk about the US arm industry, it's it's primarily it's a socialized system. It's top down. It's it's about state planning. It's about delegation. It's about contracts. And members of Congress really like it because they can they have with their districts they have their own little FFT where they can direct you know government contracts uh how they like depending on you have to usually hire lobbyists for this and they they write legislation a certain way. So that narrows down the the list of eligible companies that can bid on a contract and then you kind of you you work you work your legislative magic to alter the text in the bills so that you're given a very high chance that one company is be able is going to be able to carry out a certain project and you know that company has links to your district as a member of Congress. So ship building in Maine and Mississippi, munitions in Tennessee, aerospace in California. It's like every state, every congressional district has a piece of this, correct? >> Yeah. Yeah. And through this process called, it's either called like political engineering or geographic engineering that these arms companies deliberately spread out their assets to touch quote unquote all as many congressional districts as possible. So when lobbyists say get together to um uh keep afloat a dying and deeply fraudulent project like um the latoral combat ship which was uh eventually just killed off in in the last couple years. in the early teens is had a huge problematic history and there was this huge lobbying effort in the early in the mid20s to you know keep funding going to this very problematic ship even though it had tons of technical flaws. There was literally a crack developing in the halls of the ship cuz they were made of aluminum and not steel. Um and this massive amount of technical problems that this ship was just never going to deliver and is obvious. But there's this huge lobbying effort where uh a group of lobbyists organized this lobbying effort where um I'm going to slip into the first person here cuz I was a part of this lobbying effort where we organized all of the suppliers, the contractors, and the subcontractors involved in the production of this um what John McCain called the little crappy ship, the LCS. and we just developed a map and this huge spreadsheet of all the different areas that um projects were related to and how many people employed. So when we went to congressional offices to lobby for this project, there was eventually like in the white paper that we provided like a a you know a uh some sort of national security justification usually that we just grabbed from an arms industry funded think tank and then but the real line was like okay and at the bottom was just like and by the way it this this uh this company employs 550 people in your district. >> Well anyone who uses Cozy Earth will tell you the exact same thing. It's been a gamecher. It's wild. The night's getting cooler. Creating an extremely comfortable space on your bed and couch is a very good thing. Cozy Earth is here to make it happen. Their bubble cuddle blanket. Precisely what it sounds like. How could you not sleep well in one of those? It's really hard not to sleep well. In fact, your kids might wind up physically fighting over gets to use it. You should know that. 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I did get the feeling that they were that some people I asked about especially towards the end because I I mean uh towards towards the end obviously I devel I figured out who I was and was basically just morally opposed to this through and through but when the subject came up when I tried to bring it up indirectly there I got the sense that a lot of people were talking themselves into a moral high ground that didn't exactly exist and the stuff that they were saying was less at me and more like re like reaffirmations for them. Yeah. >> I'm good enough. I'm smart enough and dog on people like me. >> Yeah. Yeah. There was that there's a sense of uh entitlement. There's a sense of um but also a moral component too. That was just it was odd to see and to >> you know Stephen the world needs 2,000 lb bombs. >> Yes. Yes. Has to. And we're we're helping, you know, we're helping delivering savings to the taxpayer by, you know, helping the F-35 stay funded even though it has tons of problems. But yeah, there's there's a lot of >> How interesting. Well, I think it makes you much more credible that you have experience from the inside watching all this. >> Yeah. Trained by the best. >> Um, so this defense budget 1.1 trillion, that seems way higher than I remember it. >> Yeah. Yeah. So in 2021 the military budget was 741 billion. This is in I'm just going to say in nominal terms because this is how you know Congress remembers these things but a little bit higher if you adjust for inflation. Much higher but over time I mean by the time well that was when when Biden entered office and then when he left it was I think it was close it was like 850 or something. So it increased over during the course of the Biden administration before him it increased under Trump. Um, it increased under the first term of Obama, then went down. But pretty much since 2015 or 2016, the military budget has gone upward pretty much every year, even after accounting for inflation. >> So basically everything Eisenhower warned about has come true. The defense industrial >> Yeah. Eisenhower >> establishment has just eaten the country. >> Yeah. Eisenhower was worried about basically the war machine becoming sentient. like this collection of this collection of interest would sort of not necessarily like >> execute corruption in kind of like the you know backfield you know smoke filled rooms and cash table although that that happens but it's it's more about like creating the conditions where >> Capitol Hill is just operating in its own world it's insulated from the interests of everyone else and when you know >> we ideologies are here to we we've all got ideologies you and I have them of of course, but when you start mixing in profit interests to decisions about especially war and peace and people's security, I have a bit of a problem with that. I have a massive problem with that, of course, especially when it's not even working. It's not even achieving your stated aims, >> right? >> Whether I mean whether or not I agree with those aims, which I don't, but even if I did, I would say, okay, it's fair to measure your performance by the standards that you articulated. we have the greatest military in the world. It can do this, but you haven't done it. So, like, what's your explanation? >> Right? It's one of these cases that we're going to hear this more and more from Trump administration officials like like Pete Pete Hagath, for example, that oh, it's Congress that's not letting us win the war. It's like, no, no, no, no. We haven't even accomplished the military objectives that that were laid out. Like, Iran is still able to project power across its borders. Like, congrats. You've beat up on a country that has the GDP of, you know, Kentucky or Illinois or something like that