Trump’s deeply strange night, plus the $5,000 he never delivered

David Pakman (0:00)

Coming up today, Donald Trump has a bizarre night, strange physical behavior, wandering around the stage. But most importantly, Trump welcomes Iran taking out Los Angeles and San Diego. That's 16 million people. Americans says it would be a small price to pay. And then things get really weird when he brings out Natalie Harp, calls her the perfect person and then watch what he does when she walks away. We'll get to it. The suggestion that newspapers should be arrested. What does it mean to arrest the newspaper over reporting about empty seats at Trump rallies? And remember the five thousand dollar Doge checks that were promised, which, of course, never showed up? Well, now they're promising another five grand, but only if Republicans win the midterms and they're trying to do revisionist history on that five thousand that never happened from Doge. Later, Ben Rhodes will join me. It's a packed show today. Let's get right into it. And remember, if you have not yet reviewed my book, pay attention on Amazon, please do.

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We have to start today with the possible plague situation in Russia. I know it's 2026, but we are talking about plague. We are indeed. And Donald Trump has now been asked about it. And somehow I have to say Trump's answer is simultaneously reassuring, but also completely bizarre. But rest assured, Trump is looking into plague very strongly.

SPEAKER_2 (1:55)

Oh boy.

David Pakman (2:18)

Trump, of course, totally miss. He's already misunderstanding what we're talking about. He goes, you know, it's pneumonia. Well, it's mnemonic plague. It's plague in the lungs.

And the microbes getting stronger is not exactly the issue. We're talking about plague. Now, if Trump had knowledge that this was some kind of souped up for lack of a better term plague that Russia was researching as a bio weapon, that would really be something. We don't have evidence of that at this point in time. Now, you could kind of look at this two ways. You could go, well, Trump actually seems to be taking it seriously as stupid as Trump sounds when he goes, we're looking at it very strongly. He is saying I'm taking it seriously. I'm worried about it.

The problem is, you know, after everything we experienced during COVID, there is this universe where Trump hears about a possible infectious disease situation and just goes, hey, we got it under control. It's an exaggeration, et cetera. He's not doing that. And so he's using his weird language of looking at it very strongly and monitoring and this and that. And frankly, the fact that Trump isn't dismissing this out of hand tells you this is worth watching. The government is worried for Trump to even acknowledge that. But then Trump tries to explain the science. It's pneumonia. The microbes and germs are stronger disproportionately. What does it mean? Now, Trump is vaguely. You never know whether he's doing it on purpose because he's so clueless. But he's alluding to some kind of anti microbial resistance, which is a real phenomenon. But plague is not pneumonia.

We are talking about the bacterium Yersinia pestis. It is pneumonic plague caused by that in the lungs. And Trump's suggestion that things that used to work don't. The reality is, assuming this is not an atypical novel plague, pneumonic plague is pretty treatable with antibiotics if you identify it. And if you start the antibiotics quickly, this is what we talked about yesterday. Now, we have this 28 year old lab worker, anti plague researcher, supposedly, in Siberia who has died after developing severe pneumonia. And the reports are raising the possibility that this is pneumonic plague. About 200 people were reportedly placed under medical observation. There was one report that a second person has died. It is not confirmed. And hopefully that is not true because that would start to suggest spread. The important thing is plague hasn't been confirmed definitively. Russia has said there are no plague cases in Irkutsk. And you always wonder with Russia, are they being highly technical to make a statement that is narrowly true but misrepresent represents the broader situation? But there is a reason that governments pay attention to this untreated pneumonic plague is almost always fatal. Historical estimates put untreated plague of pneumonic plague at the mortality is that basically 100 percent. So the problem with all of this bigger picture is we've seen this movie before with Donald Trump and Trump involved in any kind of public health response is pretty terrifying. I mean, remember this.