Leland Vittert’s War Notes: Hostage to Gas Prices 🚨

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NewsNation Chief Washington Anchor and On Balance host Leland Vittert was a foreign correspondent for four years in Jerusalem. He gives you an early look at tonight's 9 p.m. ET show, delivered straight to your inbox.

The 60s are calling📱: Back then, President John F. Kennedy challenged us to go to the moon and return within the decade — we did it using slide rules.

🚀And now we are going back — oh, the excitement!
🤦In fact, it's super exciting because we have a "diverse" crew, as if that is the point of exploration — the sex or skin color of the person exploring.
- 🚀Wednesday is the first launch window for Artemis II, which, like Apollo 8 in 1968, will fly around the moon and come back.
🤩NASA and others think we are going to be "inspired."
- A retired NASA astronaut said this is the trial mission to land on the moon, which is really hard.
  - 🤦Wait, what? Fifty-plus years ago, Americans landed on the moon. Now, we have iPhones that are millions of times more powerful than Apollo 11's computers, and it's "really hard"?!?!
- 😂Why are we going to be inspired to discover that 57 years later, we are able to replicate it? Why is it even a surprise? It would be a bigger surprise if we couldn't do it.
- Reality check☑️: I find it a little disappointing — hundreds of billions (maybe trillions of dollars) to NASA and the best we can do is go back to the moon behind schedule and over budget?
- 📲Call me when you are going to Mars.

Don't Take the Exit 🚨

‼️One does not have to support the war with Iran or think it's a good idea, but now that it's started, America must win it — it's unclear if President Trump will.

‼️The real risk in Iran isn't America losing militarily, it's the American president showing the world he's hostage to gas prices and public opinion.

- 📰Mike Allen's PM note says the coming oil crisis is akin to COVID — slowly spreading around the world
  - ✏️Allen headlines: "The oil market's COVID moment"
- 🚨If Iran can do that with no nuclear weapons and limited conventional weapons, imagine what they could have done if allowed to grow for another few years.
👀Trump is looking for an exit — in the words of Bill O'Reilly, he is desperate for a deal
- 🗣️Meantime, his secretary of war, Pete Hegseth, is declaring regime change has already happened — reportedly, the U.S. is negotiating with Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.
  - 🎤Hegseth: "This new regime, because regime change has occurred, should be wiser than the last. President Trump will make a deal. He is willing."
- Reality🤦: Trading one crew who shouts "death to America" for the guy who led the "Death to America" chants isn't regime change
🤷Why the freak out? Democrats thought $5 a gallon was just fine to confront President Putin, but $4 a gallon is too much to confront Iran?
- Must read 📰: The Wall Street Journal headlines: "Gas Just Hit $4 a Gallon. Is That Really as Bad as it Sounds?"

Look back🔙: Before the war, everybody quoted Colin Powell's "If you break it, you own it."

This isn't you break it, you own it.
It is: You start it, you have to finish it.
‼️If we leave because oil prices are up for four weeks, it doesn't strengthen deterrence. It teaches the bad guys that if they raise oil prices, we will leave.

Today📅: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Dan Caine kept talking about the time and place of our choosing — a military way of saying we have the ability to do what we want, when we want.

‼️The Wall Street Journal reports Trump might try to end the war with the strait still closed or without a commitment from Iran to open it.
What I am thinking🧠: If Iran can close the Strait of Hormuz at the time of their choosing, then they have the upper hand.

Local knowledge‼️: The Arab world knows better than anyone the dangers of an emboldened Iran — they don't want the war to end, but we do?!?!?!

Trump has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to restore American deterrence — it only happens if we bring Iran to its knees.

Watch tonight📺: Trump is remaking the world. Ambassador John Bolton always advocated a war with Iran — why isn't it working out as he described?

Plus➕: Ernest Hemingway wrote "The Sun Also Rises" about how a character went bankrupt
- "Two ways: Gradually and then suddenly."
- 🌎The world is shifting; it was gradual, and now, it's quickly
- France, Italy and Spain are all siding with Iran over the U.S. and Israel.
- 🤷Even Secretary Marco Rubio is questioning what the point is of 'good friends' if they won't come and help you.

The Cost of Doing Nothing 💸

‼️For as much as Congress complains that Trump acts like a unitary executive, he is the only one solving the problems while Congress is out on recess — aka vacation at Disney World.

🛑The Department of Homeland Security has been shut down for 46 days now, and tens of thousands are going without paychecks
🖊️Trump signed an executive order to get TSA agents their paychecks after airport security lines hit over 4 hours — yet others are still waiting for their checks.
- Federal Emergency Management Agency workers
- U.S. Coast Guard
- Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency employees
Kudos 👏: TSA lines have gone down from four-hour wait times to a few minutes since TSA workers got their first paycheck in more than a month

To be fair⚖️: Democrats started this and have gained nothing

ICE agents still wear masks
Agents aren't wearing name tags
- Democrats are gambling with lines in the sand that only end up hurting people.

Watch tonight📺: Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., on what Democrats have gained here.

Snatching Defeat from the Jaws of Victory‼️

👀Democrats think they can't lose in the midterms. But reality is, it's really easy to lose — just keep dancing around in frog outfits and waving communist flags.

💥Democrats can blow the midterms by focusing on Trump rather than helping the American people.
🤷But they might just win by default because they are "different" than Trump
- 📈Polymarket poll says Democrats have a 51% chance to win the Senate in November
- 📈And 85% chance to win the House.
Be fair ⚖️: The polling for the Republican Party and Trump is also ridiculously bad.
- 🎤CNN Harry Enten: "You know, you go back to last year when he was sworn in for a second term. He was at plus six points, then minus three points a year ago, minus seven points nine months ago, minus ten points on October 2025. January 2026, minus-13 points. And now all the way down to minus-18 points. A term two low."
- 📉Trump's approval rating is at 33%, according to a new University of Massachusetts Amherst poll.
Look back🔙: Trump's polling was even worse after January 6, but he came back largely because of Democrats' unrelenting hatred of him — they should learn.

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