Did you at any point offer to give him the Nobel Peace Prize? That that actually happened? I had read that somewhere. I wasn't sure if it was true. Well, it hasn't happened yet, but I certainly would love to to be able to personally tell him that we believe that Venezuelan people, [00:00:18] because this is a prize of the Venezuelan people certainly want to to give it to him and share it with him. I remember and honestly miss the days when the right wing was against participation trophies, but unfortunately, we have an embarrassing president who is obsessed with getting the Nobel [00:00:36] Peace Prize, even though he has effectively been bombing seven separate countries in his second term. But who you just heard from is Maria Corina machado, who is the Venezuelan opposition leader and the winner of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, which has completely discredited the prize in my eyes. [00:00:54] They offered her. She's offering her award to President Donald Trump, who has now thrown her under the bus following the ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. The kidnaping of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Jake, your $0.02. Yeah, she looks like the Joker in that clip. [00:01:11] Yeah. And so you're going to give your peace prize to Trump. If he'll commit to a bigger war in Venezuela. And essentially install her. Yeah, I mean, that's what she wants. Yeah. This makes a mockery of any peace prize. And the Nobel is now an utter joke. [00:01:27] It was a joke when Obama got it, but yes. Yeah I agree. Now it's like it's done. Nobel peace prize, you don't exist anymore. You're a total freaking joke. I don't know who the who's picking it, but obviously they wanted war in Venezuela. All right. But more importantly, why did they not choose her? [00:01:45] That's really important. And that's what we found out now. Now, look, there there was some reporting in the Washington Post that alleged that the reason why Trump threw her under the bus was because of the fact that she didn't, offer her prize to Trump. Although Machado ultimately said she was dedicating the award to Trump, [00:02:04] her acceptance of the prize was an ultimate sin, said one of the people. If she had turned it down and said, I can't accept it because it's Donald Trump's, she'd be the president of Venezuela today, this person said. Now, according to The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, they've kind of poured cold water on that. [00:02:21] It was actually the CIA which determined that installing Machado would create too many issues and instability because she's not popular. The opposition leader is not popular in Venezuela. There have been multiple polls showing that to be the case. The Wall Street Journal reports that the intelligence report cited [00:02:39] Rodriguez and two other top Venezuelan regime figures as possible interim rulers who could keep order. And that's, of course, Delcy Rodriguez, who is now the sworn in president of Venezuela. She was the vice president when Maduro was in charge. [00:02:55] Now, the report concluded that Edmundo Gonzalez, widely seen as the actual winner of the 2024 election against Maduro and Machado, would struggle to gain legitimacy as leaders while facing resistance from pro-regime security services, drug trafficking networks, [00:03:12] and potential opponents. More from The New York Times On this. Even though Machado has gone out of her way to please Trump, in reality, her relationship with the white House has been fraying for months. Jerome. So senior U.S. Officials had grown frustrated with her assessments of Maduro strength, feeling [00:03:31] that she provided inaccurate reports that he was weak and on the verge of collapse. They also grew skeptical of her ability to seize power in Venezuela. So the Trump administration is now facing the wrath of war hawks and, to Jencks point neocons who want all of Maduro's government gone. [00:03:50] There hasn't been regime change in Venezuela. That is what the neocons want, and they're demanding it. So we've got Democratic Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Yeah, you heard that right. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat, demanding that Machado be installed. [00:04:07] Take a look. It's more clear by the hour that Trump is backing Maduro's corrupt regime, swapping Maduro out and keeping his regime cronies in power. He's choking off any real prospects for democracy. I just met with Venezuelan leaders in my community, and they told me. [00:04:24] While Trump sidelines and dismisses Maria Corina machado and Edmundo Gonzalez, political prisoners in Venezuela remain in jail, and the remnants of Maduro's regime have made repression even worse by ratcheting up searches of cars, property and cell phones, and arrests for anyone who promoted [00:04:41] or expresses support for Maduro's removal. There's no plan for a transition to democracy. And this heightened persecution is what Trump would send Venezuelans with TPS in America Right back into this crucial moment cannot be missed. That much is clear. [00:04:56] Nothing short of the future of liberty, prosperity and freedom for Venezuela is at stake. Now, when we talk about how the two parties are really the uniparty, meaning they agree on the big issues like foreign policy and the economy. [00:05:13] This is what I'm talking about because that was a Democrat you just heard from. Now let's hear from John Bolton, who served in Trump's first administration and is, of course, a right winger. Here's what he has to say about Trump shunning Machado. [00:05:28] I think the administration is making a big mistake by throwing Machado under the bus, as they did on Saturday, and thinking that they can negotiate with Delcy Rodriguez, somehow to have a stable transition. The Rodriguez and the other Maduro loyalists are not going to negotiate [00:05:48] their own exit from power, at least not for the foreseeable future. It's the opposition in Venezuela that voted overwhelmingly against Maduro that clearly supports Machado and Gonzalez. Those are the people who can help provide stability, not the Maduro regime. [00:06:07] So that's who the neocons want. It doesn't look like they're going to get what they want for now, but things could change. What say you, Jake? Okay, so I think that both the reports, although they appear to be conflicting, are probably true. I think that Trump is a child. And so the fact that she didn't give the prize to him [00:06:25] is could that have aggrieved him? I mean, if you before Trump was president the first time around, I would have said no, that's outlandish. Nobody's that childish, right? But he is. And so I know how mainstream media makes things up. They they do it. [00:06:41] It's all sleight of hand. Like a magician. It's all how they frame issues. They get you to look at it from a certain perspective, but rarely do they just make up quotes out of whole cloth. So that probably was very likely an actual Trump insider who told you how Trump feels about it. [00:06:58] And you could tell in Trump's public statements he seems outwardly bitter at her. She's not qualified. She has no respect inside of Venezuela, etc. But now I think the other side is more important and also true, which is they did a calculation inside the government, CIA, whoever it might be. [00:07:18] Right. And they thought, okay, if we try to do regime change, well then we're going to trigger the military, the Pro-maduro militia, and we're going to trigger all sorts of opposition. And it's going to be super hard to do it because we're going to need ground troops. [00:07:35] Now, Trump doesn't want ground troops back. He doesn't want ground troops. So how's the only way we can get rid of Maduro? Oh, if we keep his infrastructure in place. So then we're not fighting them. They're still happy because they still have their jobs. In fact, they all have one job higher, right? [00:07:52] They all move up a little bit. So that calculation is not the worst. It's just like I don't want to invade or attack Venezuela, etc.. But as a matter of strategy, if you're going in that direction, I at least understand the logic of that, right? [00:08:07] Now, why are the neocons upset about it? Because there is some logic to keeping them in place if you're sure that they're really in our back pocket. Right. Because there's always a couple of different factors. Debbie Wasserman Schultz is from Florida, so she's concerned. [00:08:24] There's a lot of Venezuelans in Florida now and a lot of Cubans in Florida. And they all want regime change, and they want regime change in Venezuela and in Cuba. So they're not satisfied with this. And plus she's Israel first. And Israel always wants regime change. Why. [00:08:39] And John Bolton is also Israel first. So the reason is if it's the same regime but just a new leader, are they going to stop working with Iran and Hezbollah or are they not? That's the only thing Israel cares about. And so if they're still working with Iran and Hezbollah, they're like, [00:08:54] well, this didn't do the job at all. And the current Venezuelan regime is very critical of Israel, very critical. And they don't like that. Israel doesn't like that. So and that's why I'm really thank you for bringing that up. Yesterday we showed you the video of the new interim president of Venezuela. [00:09:10] And she one of the people she blamed, in fact, the only person she blamed at that in that part of the speech for the invasion was the Zionists. So when the Debbie Wasserman Schultz and John Bolton see that, they're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's it. Regime change her not satisfied. We want more war. [00:09:29] Right. So they're going to push and push and push. And I don't know what's going to happen because you look last thing on it is so yes it would be harder to fight the entire regime, so makes sense [00:09:44] to not topple the whole thing, right? But how much are they going to listen to us? I mean, are they really going to say, yeah. Yes, sir. We now serve you loyally and we're your servants and dogs. Or are they going to say, yeah, I'll give you a little bit of this, but I won't give [00:10:00] you the whole thing and I'll follow you on this, but I won't follow you on that. And then at what point does Trump go? That's it. We're going in anyway. Yeah. We don't know. Okay. So it's hard to predict. But I do know this. Maduro was willing to give Trump everything he wanted and Trump decided [00:10:18] to do what he did anyway. Right. So I think it's because of the fact that Trump failed in overthrowing Maduro in his first term. He tried multiple times and did fail, and Maduro was mocking Trump in the last few weeks. And Trump is very sensitive, and I'm sure that hurt his feelings. [00:10:35] So if Maduro was willing to play ball with the Trump administration, there's some indication that maybe the rest of the regime would be willing to play ball in order to avoid all out war with the United States. But again, we don't know. We just have to wait and see. And we are in some ways at their mercy, because if they decide that [00:10:53] they're not going to follow our orders, then we have no choice to either go, oh, well, it didn't work. We're losers and go home, which Trump is very unlikely to do, or go on the ground and try to take them out, in which case we're in a quagmire [00:11:09] and an occupation and an epic disaster. And in recent weeks, Trump has downplayed the severity of having boots on the ground. He's like, it's not a big deal if you have boots on the ground. Whereas previously he had a very different take on that. So again, we're just going to have to wait and see. [00:11:24] I don't want to make strong predictions and have egg on my face, because really we don't have any evidence that things are going to go one way or the other. Yet. We have to wait. Every time you ring the bell below, an angel gets his wings. Totally not true, but it does keep you updated on our live shows.