The Lonely Liberal Podcast

Nick breaks down a chaotic week in American politics. Opening on Iran: three US Navy destroyers came under missile, drone, and small-boat attack in the Strait of Hormuz, the US struck Iranian soil for the first time since the ceasefire, the UAE was hit by Iranian missiles, and Saudi Arabia pulled US airspace and airbase access — forcing Trump to abruptly pause "Project Freedom." Meanwhile, an Atlantic report this week revealed Trump is "bored" with the war, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio met Pope Leo at the Vatican, where the pope handed him a literal olive branch. Then to the Great Redistricting War: just eight days after SCOTUS gutted Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, Tennessee Republicans carved up Memphis to eliminate Steve Cohen's seat, and the Virginia Supreme Court threw out the voter-approved Democratic redistricting map on procedural grounds — handing Republicans a major net gain heading into the midterms. Plus: Senate Republicans tucked $1 billion in taxpayer funding for Trump's ballroom into the ICE funding bill after Trump promised the ballroom would be privately funded; the Court of International Trade struck down Trump's Section 122 tariffs in his second major tariff loss this year; ABC accused the FCC of violating its First Amendment rights over an investigation into "The View"; Kamala Harris privately told donors the DNC should release its buried 2024 autopsy as she eyes a 2028 run; and the Pentagon released its first tranche of UFO files. We close with the 22-foot gold statue of Trump unveiled at his Doral golf course this week, blessed by an evangelical pastor who insisted "this is not a golden calf."

The 2026 midterms are supposed to be a referendum on Trump. But while everyone's watching that fight, corporations and billionaires are quietly buying the outcome. Nick counts down the Top 5 PACs already flooding Congress with cash — from the GOP's traditional money machine all the way up to Trump's $304 million protection racket. Crypto has $300 million in the game. AI companies are targeting state legislatures. And the biggest player of all is a sitting president's personal war chest, funded by people who need something from the White House. This is what Citizens United was always going to produce.

Nick is back from Spain and joined by Rick to catch up on two weeks of political chaos. They open on the White House Correspondents' Dinner shooting: Pirro's confirmation that Cole Allen's bullet hit a Secret Service agent, and Trump's bizarre pivot to pushing his $400 million ballroom within hours of the attack. Then to Iran: the 60-day War Powers deadline arrives, Hegseth invents a "ceasefire pauses the clock" rule from the witness chair, Trump launches "Project Freedom" in the Strait of Hormuz, an Iranian missile strikes a US Navy vessel, and gas hits $4.45 a gallon. Plus the bombshell SCOTUS ruling in Louisiana v. Callais that effectively guts Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, and the gerrymandering arms race it's already touched off across the South. Also covered: Janet Mills drops out of the Maine Senate race, clearing the path for Graham Platner vs. Susan Collins; Trump's approval crashes to 37%; the record 75-day DHS shutdown ends with Speaker Johnson folding; the 5th Circuit blocks mifepristone by mail nationwide; and the Senate bans itself from trading prediction markets. We close with Trump's plan to bulldoze a public minigolf course for a marble statue garden of himself, and the Daily Beast investigation into his all-night Truth Social habit (including a midnight AI-generated bikini image at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool).

A lot of people on the left are quietly asking the same question right now: if the Democrats keep letting us down, why bother? Nick brings his sibling Li on to work through it honestly — the Stein votes, the Gaza frustration, the feeling that even a Democratic win wouldn't have fixed anything. 

Over the last two years, at least 10 people with access to America's nuclear and aerospace secrets have died or disappeared. The FBI is now investigating. Congress has opened a formal inquiry. Trump was briefed and called it "pretty serious stuff." So what do we actually know? Nick walks through the cases, the official responses, and what remains unanswered — because this story is just getting started.

Week 8 of the Iran war, and the wheels are coming off. Iran re-closes the Strait of Hormuz just 24 hours after reopening it, gunboats fire on Indian tankers, and gas hits $4.12/gallon — while Russ Vought tells Congress he has no idea what any of this is costing taxpayers. The House war powers resolution fails by a single vote. Trump picks a fight with the Pope, posts an AI-generated image of himself as Jesus healing the sick, and cancels $11 million to Catholic Charities in the middle of it. Pete Hegseth quotes a Pulp Fiction monologue as real scripture at a Pentagon sermon. The Atlantic drops a bombshell alleging FBI Director Kash Patel is drunk on the job and unreachable behind locked doors. RFK Jr. launches a taxpayer-funded podcast the same week a new book reveals he once pulled over on I-684 to cut the penis off a dead raccoon while his kids waited in the car. Plus: Analilia Mejia blows out NJ-11 by 20 points in yet another Dem special election overperformance, Swalwell and Tony Gonzales both resign over sexual misconduct on the same day, 10 House Republicans defy Trump to extend Haitian TPS, and Kamala Harris says she's "thinking about" running again in 2028. A week where institutional pushback finally showed up — from the Pope, the courts, the voters, and the Republicans Trump can't count on anymore.

Rick's out sick, so Nick is flying solo with a quick-hit roundup of the biggest stories of the week. Six weeks into the Iran war, Trump threatened to bomb power plants on Easter Sunday, Vance flew to Islamabad for peace talks and came home empty-handed, Israel killed 300+ in Lebanon in a single day, and the Pope told everyone to knock it off. Then Vance hopped over to Hungary to campaign for Trump's favorite authoritarian — and voters threw Orbán out anyway. Plus: Melania held a press conference nobody asked for, Swalwell's gubernatorial campaign is in freefall after sexual assault allegations, Trump wants a triumphal arch next to Arlington (for himself), ICE arrested a soldier's spouse on an Army base, and inflation is back up. A lot happened. Let's get into it.

Trump threatened to destroy an entire civilization. Iran held firm. Two hours before his own deadline, Trump blinked — and called it a victory. This week, Nick breaks down what actually happened with the Iran ceasefire: what's in the deal, how it compares to what Iran was offering the day before the war started, and why the country that pushed America into this war just bombed Beirut hours after the ceasefire was announced. Plus: why the only people who stopped a potential genocide weren't in Congress.

Trump had one of the most chaotic weeks of his presidency — and that's saying something. He gave his first primetime address on the Iran war 33 days in, claiming total air dominance over a country that then shot down two of our jets within 48 hours. He fired his Attorney General for not being ruthless enough. He told a room full of Saudi investors that MBS better "be nice to him." And he dropped an f-bomb on Easter Sunday while threatening to bomb a country back to the stone ages. Oh, and NASA launched the first humans to the Moon in 53 years — which somehow got lost in the chaos.

Nick and Rick break down Trump's contradictory Iran war speech and what the downed F-15 means for the conflict, the firing of Pam Bondi and what it tells us about the DOJ under Trump, the bizarre FII summit speech, the Supreme Court's skeptical reception of Trump's birthright citizenship case, Hegseth firing the Army Chief of Staff mid-war, the $1.5 trillion defense budget, 100% pharma tariffs, and a new executive order on elections that experts are already calling unconstitutional.

Cuba's power grid has collapsed. Hospitals are postponing surgeries. The government is telling people to cook with wood. And the United States is the reason.

In this episode, Nick breaks down how Trump's "maximum pressure" campaign has effectively blockaded Cuba — cutting off its oil supply, intercepting tankers, and threatening any country that tries to help. It's the same playbook used on Venezuela, now applied 90 miles from Florida. And it's working, in the worst possible way.

Plus: why Trump's Iran timeline probably isn't what he says it is — and why Cuba's crisis doesn't need Iran to end before it gets worse.