It is election day 2026, and Paul Rieckhoff is wide awake before sunrise in New York with one message: expect the unexpected. The Wall Street Journal is reporting the US has been quietly striking Iran for weeks. The Pentagon hasn’t held a routine press briefing since May 5th. Tucker Carlson is warning that Netanyahu is pressuring Trump toward a tactical nuke strike on Pickaxe Mountain. And a cornered Trump — if the walls close in tonight — is the most dangerous Trump we have ever seen. This is no-BS analysis from a combat veteran and institutional watchdog who refuses to let the election news cycle bury the war machine cranking up behind it.
Episode 666
Election Day Breakdown
Election day in America, and the biggest story on the planet is still that Donald Trump can do anything he wants with the most powerful military ever assembled — and nothing is stopping him. Paul Rieckhoff opens episode 666 with a warning not to have a failure of imagination: secret US strikes on Iran, a Pentagon that hasn’t briefed the press in six months, and Tucker Carlson warning of a tactical nuke scenario at Pickaxe Mountain. Then he turns to the 35 independent veterans on ballots coast to coast who are quietly rewriting what American politics looks like.
The Brief
→ Four things from today’s episode
01
Why Paul says the biggest story in the world is still that n. Why Paul says the biggest story in the world is still that nothing is stopping Trump from using the most powerful military ever assembled
02
The Wall Street Journal reporting on secret US strikes again. The Wall Street Journal reporting on secret US strikes against Iran’s Qeshm Island — and a Pentagon that has not briefed the press since May 5th
03
Tucker Carlson’s warning about Netanyahu pressuring Trump to. Tucker Carlson’s warning about Netanyahu pressuring Trump toward a tactical nuke strike on Pickaxe Mountain, and why Paul says don’t dismiss it
04
The cornered-animal theory. what a losing Trump might do with the Insurrection Act between now and January
