This is an I Heart podcast. Guaranteed human. Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George Washington Broadcast Center. Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty. I'm strong and Getty. And now, he is, I'm strong and Getty. President Trump forged this moment. Iran begged for this ceasefire, and we all know it. As a President, truth this morning, a big day for world peace. Iran wants it to happen. They've had enough. Boy, I hope all that's true. Um, doesn't seem that it's obviously true. So we'll talk more about that later this hour. We'll talk about that later this hour. What happened last night? Uh, what has been agreed to or not agreed to so far? It's quite a mystery to practically everybody. Stay tuned. We'll hit it hard. Maybe the bottom of this hour. Yesterday, at its height, oil was $112 a barrel. Right now it's 91. So you got that. Stay with us. Disruption has its own costs. Um, if you can tweak something as opposed to blowing up your head, often that's a good deal, whether a relationship or a job or just other 1000 examples. Sometimes something needs to be completely disrupted in the downside of the disruption just has to be dealt with. And I would argue that's where we are with America's government schools at this point. Uh, and on that topic, a handful of, uh, in pieces of information I've come across, uh, San Francisco school officials voted last week to restore and restore the government schools. To restore eighth grade algebra more than a decade after the district eliminated the course in the name of equity, which attracted intense criticism as math scores, scores declined across the district. So it's good that they backtracked from a horrifically stupid policy, but the school board approved that measure by a four to three vote. Wow. And it lasted 10 years. The district policy implemented in 2014 as San Francisco led the charge toward absolutely insane abusive education policies. Uh, removed algebra from middle schools and attempt to give minority students more time to learn basic math skills. Instead, math proficiency declined across the district among all cohorts, including among black students. Eighth grade math proficiency in San Francisco public schools fell from 51% to 40% in the space of, uh, six years. Well, 51% is a horror. Right. That starting number is a horror. And how'd this program work equity wise, Jack? Proficiency among black students fell from 11% to 4%. Wow. Parents who could afford tutors or enrolling their kids in summer school often did, paying out a pocket under the old policy San Francisco. This is a quote from a Stanford economist. They try to achieve equity not by raising the floor, but by lowering the ceiling. It's a problem we see nationally. Uh, just horrible. That's enough of that though. God dang it. Even in general, it's really hard to know how much your kids are learning at school unless you're like questioning them themselves because they will give your kids good grades and just pass them along and you have no idea. Yes, absolutely. Now, from the right and leaning New York Post, this is an article or an editorial by Dr. Carrie Ingram, who's an education specialist. Uh, schools should educate children, not train activists. America's public education system is drifted dangerously from its core mission. Schools exist to educate people, uh, children, obviously, teach them how to read, write, think critically and understand the world around them. But across the country, many classrooms are increasingly focused on something else entirely. They are bent on turning students into political activists. And man, she runs through a nationwide checklist of school children, little children, participating in anti-ice drills and protests. It's the latest example of political propaganda forced on kids during the school day. Uh, in New York, footage shows a preschool teacher encouraging children to talk about how they feel about ICE and President Trump. Obviously, based on the so-called education they've received from their teacher. In Boston, here's a video of an elementary school teacher, uh, showing her little kids marching around the classroom holding signs chanting, No Donald Trump, No Donald Trump. It's full-on activist training with taxpayer dollars during the school day. And she writes- Which would be horrible on its own if you- if reading and math were at 95% proficiency. It would be awful and a danger to society. But you got- both ends are bad. Agreed. Students are taught to organize demonstrations, participate in protests and adopt ideological positions on complex public issues. Things they don't have the facts or context for. And often before they've even mastered basic academic skills to Jack's point, then she restates your argument more or less. Um, alternately it's increasingly replaced with lessons instead of reading math, science and history. Lessons centered on activism, grievance and personal political identity. This isn't preparing students for success, it's distracting them from the very education they desperately need. And she goes into some of the miserable results, um, and more examples of the activism. Uh, the largest teachers union, the National Education Association, is training teachers right now. They're growing these programs in advancing LGBTQ plus justice and transgender advocacy. Rather than how to teach reading, writing and math. Not- not like transgender awareness, but advocacy. And obviously as she makes the point, kids are not learning to think critically and how to think they're learning what they must think. There's only one belief that's allowed and it is drilled into them. I wish we had time for this whole article because it is very, very good. But I was struck by this. The left-leaning id- leaning, please, it leans so far, it's gonna fall over and crack its head. The left-leaning Atlantic, with their big feature article, America is sliding toward illiteracy. Declining standards and low expectations are destroying American education. I would go with have destroyed, but- Oh, I would say have perverted and- and- and- and screwed a couple of generations of children already. Folks, I mean, we're all familiar with the- the oft-stated truism that we didn't know what was happening in the classrooms till COVID. And parents looked over the kids' shoulders and were like, what the hell? Here's the bad news, that had been going on for some time and it's still going on now. They just know they have to keep it a little more covert. And I beg you, I beg you to believe me, I'm not a paranoiac with some sort of agenda just trying to keep you listening. This is true. Let me quote a little from the Atlantic. The past decade may rank as one of the worst in the history of American education. So they- That doesn't surprise me in the least. It marks a stark reversal from what was once a hopeful story. At the start of the century, this century, American students registered steady improvements in math and reading. Around 2013, this progress began to stall out and then to backslide dramatically. What exactly went wrong? The decline began well before the pandemic, so COVID-era disruptions alone cannot explain it. Smartphones and social media probably account for some of the drop, but there's another explanation, albeit one that progressives in particular seem reluctant to countenance, a pervasive refusal to hold children to high standards. And I would argue, and progressives are absolutely, as unwilling to consider this, substituting indoctrination for learning. Oh my God. This is a tough subject for me to engage in and not lose my mind because I've lived it. I know. Because my kids- I know. We've fallen off a cliff. My kids are 16 and 14. So I've lived this. I've had teachers tell me, your kid is grade level. And then quizzed him and found out, no, he's freaking not. Not even close. Not even close. What are you doing? We are now seeing what the lost decade in American education has wrought. They write in the Atlantic, by some measures American students have regressed to a level not seen in 25 years or more. Test scores from the National Association of Educational Process, progress rather, released this year show that 33% of eighth graders are at reading at a level that is below basic. A third of them, meaning that they struggle to follow the order of events in a passage or even to summarize its main idea. Boy, but they can tell you that about all the different genders. That is the highest share of students unable to meaningfully read since 1992 among fourth graders. 40% are below basic in reading. The highest share since 2000. In 2024, the average score on the ACT, the popular college admissions standardized test, was 19.4, the worst average performance since the test was redesigned in 1990. American school children have given up almost all of the gains they achieved at the start of the century. They mentioned that parents with more money have put their kids in private schools, hired tutors, etc. But the masses of people in say the bottom 80% of income who might not have had those opportunities, are not been aware of how critical it was to exercise them, have seen miserable, miserable results. And this is the progressive agenda and teachers unions at work. Well, for many years, we need a major disruption of our government schools now. If you grew up the way I grew up, most of us did, where your parents could assume that you're learning to read and write, and that if you're getting A's and B's or C's or whatever, you're roughly doing okay and everything. But those years are, I don't know when it ended, but those days are over. You cannot at all assume your kid is learning basic reading, writing, and arithmetic, or that their grade means anything. I will restate what I've said many times. You may be in the ruby, reddest town in America. There is an island of deep blue in your town. It is your government schools. Trust me on this. Here's another great point, rather, from the far left, Atlantic. A seemingly plausible culprit and a familiar boogeyman for progressives is insufficient spending. The problem with this tidy explanation is that it's not tethered to reality. School spending did not decline from 2012 to 2022. In fact, it increased significantly, even after adjusting for inflation from $14,000 a student to more than $16,000, and a great, great deal more and more expensive places. Oh, boy. And they go into the financing and more or less just... We're spending more than we've ever spent per student adjusted for inflation and getting less. That's the only thing you need to know. Besides, America recently ran a very large natural experiment in dropping money on schools that, in a word, failed. He goes into the details. Michael Petrelli, the president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute in Education Policy, think tanks said, and I quote, and I'm going to use the term spit for obvious reasons here. The scientific term for this is that we didn't get Jack's spit out of that money. There are some studies that can detect small impacts, but they're small. I think it's also fair to say that a lot of the money was wasted. I mean, obviously we could go on all day. I will not step... even a tiny baby step back from my statement that I've made more than once. The biggest crisis, the biggest problem the United States of America faces right now, is the indoctrination and lack of education of our children. China as a threat pales next to it, as does Iran. End of screed for now. Well, and they'll all fit together eventually. Well, and the fact that all of this, all of this, the progressivism is being pushed hard by China, through TikTok, among other things, and Russia, and all of our adversaries. They are bankrolling the crap out of it. Who do you think George Soros is? What do you think he believes? Why do you think he's financing what he is? To bring down the great evil United States. Alright, that's the end of my screed. Day one of my son's public school history class, they had to write the land acknowledgement. That's what they did in history class on day one. He's no longer in that class, but... Tear it all down. It's unreal. Any comments? Text line 415295 KFTC. Armed strong and Getty. So we're going to talk about the ceasefire and what we know and what we don't know coming up in just a little bit. But we didn't, because Trump threatened to end the civilization yesterday, we didn't get around to this story. Oh my God, yeah. Maybe you just heard the broad outlines of it two days ago when it first emerged of, Dude goes out in a boat with his wife, he comes back, swims back saying, wife fell overboard. He paddled back saying his wife fell overboard with the boat key in her hand. So he couldn't start the engine. So it took him a very long time to get back to report her missing. So that was all I heard, maybe all you... Was there anybody, unless you haven't watched enough 2020 or Dateline in your life, who didn't immediately jump to the, he killed her. Yeah. Immediately? Anyway, so here's the latest development in the story. The desperate search into Bahamas for Michigan mother Lynette Hooker, who went missing during a nighttime boat ride with her husband, Brian Hooker, has entered day three. Speaking to CBS News, Carly Ailesworth, Lynette's daughter, says the two had a rocky relationship. Their relationship has been a lot of fighting and drinking lately. So I'm just kind of questioning what actually went on in that dinghy. Royal Bahamian police say Brian told investigators Lynette fell over from an eight foot hard bottom dinghy with the keys to the boat and was carried away by strong rip currents. Ailesworth says her mother is an experienced swimmer and boater and doesn't believe his story adds up. Okay, that doesn't include the daughter also saying yesterday he had once threatened to drown her. And I just, obviously this is not funny. It's just, it's incredible to me that these idiot murderers, like the guy on the cliff in Hawaii, took out the insurance policy on his wife. Then a week later, you know, beats, tries to beat her to death with a rock and throw off a cliff and thinks he's going to get away with it. This guy had been getting into fight, say, I'm going to kill you. I'm going to drown you. And then takes her out in a boat and she disappears and he thinks that that's going to work. And he makes up this elaborate story that conveniently explains like every aspect of it and makes it look like he's not a murder. What is it with the murderous idiots? Well, in the guy in Hawaii was a doctor. I mean, he's very bright. But some people must have a blind spot imagining how their story is going to sound to another person. I mean, because that boat story, like you said, everybody reacted the same way. Wait a minute. We all reacted that way before we heard from the daughter who said, yeah, he'd been threatening the killer for a while. Oh, yeah, that's pleased. It's over. What? Yeah. It's just so unfortunate that so many bad things happen at the hands of complete idiots. Yeah, I hope this is nobody in our audience. But if there's somebody vexing you in your life and you're thinking about killing them. Number one, you will get caught and you will be in a cage for the rest of your life. Number two, just go through the other choice and no matter how painful it might be of divorce or lawsuit or whatever. Yeah, she fell overboard with the key and you see and yeah, you're right. And you know what's going to happen? We're just going to say, damn, that's a shame. You know, my prayers are with you. Go and live your life now without your wife burdening your soul. Because it's never your angry drunk spouse who commits that sort of crime. So I guess you're free to go. You moron. Oh, unbelievable. Um, did Iran get everything it wanted or close to it? Or did Trump get everything he wanted? We can get into some of the details on that coming up. The details that are known, which aren't many. Armstrong and Getty. The president declaring victory. So is the Iranian regime as it announces that the country is going to temporarily halt retaliatory attacks in the region to allow these negotiations to take place. It also says it's going to reopen the critical Strait of Hormuz for the next two weeks. But honestly, there are many unanswered questions about what's actually been agreed and achieved, although the Strait of Hormuz will reopen for now. The Iranians are controlled by the Iranian military, whereas before the war there was a free passage for all vessels. I'm trying to come up with the most charitable view of this, I possibly can. Maybe the problem that some of us are making is not recognizing that this is just a pause for negotiations. This is not anything having been accomplished. Just both sides have proposals. Let's stop the fighting and then sit down and talk about these proposals. And as I suggested earlier, also get a grip on who are the new guys? Who's in charge and what are their attitudes? With the idea that we could restart the ass kicking if they don't agree. Got this note, just real briefly. Dave from South Carolina. Can you act a little bit happier that we're not at war today and hell didn't break loose the way you thought it was going to yesterday? That's why I haven't watched the mainstream media since 2020. I swear a lot of people seem bummed out today that the war didn't happen like they thought it would. Market's way up disaster averted beautiful spring weather. Life's good. Go buy some stocks, boys. Which is funny. I think I would describe it, Dave, is there was a giant hornet's nest in the attic and today was the day that the battle was going to begin. Then the exterminator said, nah, it's going to be fine. And I'm like, ooh, there's still a hornet's nest in the attic. That's where we are. Yeah, so the problem with my rosy scenario is that's not what the Trump administration is saying. They're saying that Iran has agreed to all this stuff and there's no indication that they actually have. Right. Now maybe that's just Trump being the salesman with the presumptive close or whatever. Here's a rosy view before we get to some of the less rosy views. Former ambassador to Oman, his name is Mike Smartsevers. He tweeted this out. My take on the ceasefire. Iran blinked. Just yesterday, the regime rejected a temporary ceasefire and refused to meet in Islamabad. Overnight, they took President Trump's threats seriously. There is no way to bridge Iran's 10 points with America's 15. So the outcome of negotiations depends on whether Iran accepts the fundamental U.S. demands. Removal of highly enriched uranium, no further enrichment, dismantlement of the ballistic missile and drone capacity, an end to funding and directing regional proxies, and a full reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. We'll see soon enough. There's no indication that they're going to agree to any of those things. They have never hinted that they're going to do any of those things. And they're claiming to their own people and to anybody who asks. They haven't agreed to those things and they won't. Yeah, if there is an explanation to square that circle, whatever that expression means, I don't know what it is and I'm working as hard as I can to imagine it. Now, the OK, here's one possibility. The shaky, newish leaders of Iran trying to coalesce their control over the military in the country are anxious not to signal any sort of weakness but to make less to more militant factions push them aside. So they're talking to Washington while claiming to be hard as is at home. That's a good angle. And that could be one of those things that, you know, with 2020 hindsight, 20 years from now, when the details come out, it'll all make sense. This does happen a lot. Read some history of some major ending of conflicts or peace deals or whatever. There's so many things going on behind the scenes that you don't know about that you can't know about. Maybe that's it. Maybe maybe the people kind of in charge in Iran have told Trump and and and and with cough that the only way we're holding on is by pretending to be a hard ass. Otherwise, we're dead and then you'll be negotiating with the real crazies. And so we've got to at least pretend that's possible. That is absolutely 100 percent possible. The businessmen are trying to rest control away from the religious fanatics. Yeah, it's it's possible. For what we know, though, Trump said quote from his own post complete immediate and safe opening of the Strait of Hormuz. The Financial Times and others are reporting that as of this morning, Iran is demanding that shipping companies pay tolls in cryptocurrency for oil tankers to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. The Strait was free to pass through before the war started. And as of today, it looks like you got to pay Iran a toll. Now, Jonathan Karl just tweeted out that he had a conversation on the phone with President Trump and Trump said he's OK with the Iranians charging a toll for all the ships that go through the Strait of Hormuz. He said, we're thinking of doing this as a joint venture. A U.S. Iran venture to charge tolls quote. We're thinking of doing this as a joint venture. It's a way of securing it also securing it from lots of other people. It's a beautiful thing. If that is the result, Trump will be impeached and he should be. So we bomb the Bejesus out of Iran. They become more militant and seize control of the Strait of Hormuz, but they promise to share some of the booty with us. And we say, OK, it's a deal. Because in Trump's mind, we weren't getting any money for ships going through previously and now we are. So that's good. Yes. The people of Iran still live under a horrifying regime that is going to seek out anybody who said an even slightly kind word about the United States over the last month and they're going to torture them to death and hang them in the streets. With all due respect to the horrors that the people of Iran suffer, I'm more concerned about the U.S. and our allies. Will Iran continue to export Islamic fundamentalist terror? How about that, but I don't care how big a slice we're getting of the action in the Strait of Hormuz if they keep doing that. How about the main reason for the war? Do they hang on to the uranium and keep working on trying to get a bomb? Questions piled on questions. Now, Trump said this morning that Iran is going to help us dig up the uranium and get it out of the country. That's hard to imagine. I suppose it's possible, but it seems unlikely. But the world, the only thing we have to go on right now is Trump's own quotes today. We're thinking of charging a toll as a joint venture and it's a way of securing it from lots of other people. It's a beautiful thing. That's where we're going to end up. Yeah, I'm digging. I'm trying to come up with any clues. International relief was tempered by uncertainty over what comes next. There also is this. This has been reported. I saw it on MSNBC and Fox. Our version of the agreement of the ceasefire is they give up their nuclear program and we get the uranium back. The Farsi version that Iran put out doesn't include that. That's a pretty major point. It's the reason the war happened. Hey, somebody hit copy. They forgot to hit paste. It happens. Oh boy. I'm reading some of the statements of the people involved and I just, I don't know. There's no knowing at this point. Shipping companies signaled that they were cautious about resuming transit through the waterway and full of ships have been observed moving through each day since the war began. Israel said the ceasefire did not extend to Lebanon on Wednesday carried out its largest strike against Hezbollah since that front opened up. Yes, so the agreement out of Islamabad said that Israel did need to stop attacking Lebanon and Hezbollah. Israel said we don't agree with that and they've hit a more today than they have at any point over the last month. Further highlighting the fragility of the truth, the truth such as it is, Iran's state media reported that an oil refinery on Levan and an Iranian island in the Persian Gulf was struck by unspecified enemies. Fresh Iranian attacks were also reported in some Persian Gulf countries. Kuwait's defense ministry said that its air defenses had engaged with at least 28 drones from Iran despite the ceasefire. Investors welcome this ceasefire after weeks of war. They haven't ceased firing, is my objection to that. I give more leeway to that just because the ends of lots of wars have included continuing to fire stuff off for a while. It's hard to get everybody on board, I guess. And here's the key sentence, worldwide relief at the pause in fighting was tempered by confusion over what would come next. Yeah, so this is Financial Times. Trump says U.S. and Iran will dig up and remove nuclear material. You know, big if true as they say. Mark Halpern from his newsletter today said, if there is a Trump masterstroke coming, it will emanate from a place that is currently hidden from analysts about what happened and what happens next. Yeah, what did happen last night? What is actually being ag... was anything agreed to? Critics of Mr. Netanyahu's call these ceasefire a diplomatic disaster and accused him of failing to achieve his stated war goal of destroying Iran's theocratic government. Let's see what else. Let's go with, let's hear from Pete Hegzeff presenting the other side of this, starting with 60 and run through a couple of these, Michael. Iran has been a threat to the United States and the free world for 47 years. Chance of death to America, targeting our people, killing Americans, lying and blackmailing their way toward a nuclear weapon. So they thought. No longer. Not on our watch. Is that... Never mind everything we just said. Sorry to have wasted your time. Well, is that true? I mean, it could surely Pete Hegzeff wouldn't go out and say that if there wasn't some chance that it's true. But I can't imagine how it is. Did the agreement include, because the weird beard junior is in charge. He's the Ayatollah. He's in a coma. He isn't in charge of squat. That's my opinion. Okay, so you think there's a new regime in charge that's not going to chant death to America and is going to tell the, you know, the however many million people in Iran that believe that sort of thing. Hey, no more death to America. We're kind of friends with them now. Do I think that we're charging? No, no, but Pete Hegzeff seems to. Does he believe that though? I don't have the slightest more from Pete. This is just a couple of hours ago. President Trump forged this moment. Iran begged for this ceasefire and we all know it. As a president truth this morning, a big day for world peace. Iran wants it to happen. They've had enough. I'm not trying to just be Captain Negative, but they probably did beg for a ceasefire. The ceasefire includes we now control the Strait of Hormuz and get to charge a toll. And according to our version in Farsi of the ceasefire, we get to keep our uranium. So yeah, I'm all for the ceasefire, they might say. Yeah, I would beg for that ceasefire too. Pete goes on. Operation Epic Fury was a historic and overwhelming victory on the battlefield. A capital V military victory. By any measure, Epic Fury decimated Iran's military and rendered it combat ineffective for years to come. Okay, fair enough. I think this room next clip is the key clip. If there is a key clip. This new regime just happened to look at what happened to their predecessors. Their top leadership was systematically eliminated. The previous Iranian Supreme Leader, dead. The Supreme National Security Council Secretary, dead. The Supreme Leader Office Advisor, dead. The Supreme Leader Military Office Chief, dead. The Defense Minister, no longer with us. The IRGC Commander, dead. The Armed Forces General Staff Commander, dead. The Intelligence Minister, dead. The IRGC Navy Commander, no longer here. The IRGC Intel Chief, dead. So the most charitable view is what you were saying. They are dealing with somebody that's nominally in charge right now. They can't say it out loud because they're trying to figure out how to consolidate power and deal with the people that want them dead. They have agreed and said, yeah, we're fine with not having a nuclear weapon. Fine with us. We'll give you the uranium. Thanks for killing the lunatics, by the way. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're going to try to run the country. I hope we can all be friends. Maybe we're dealing with a group of people that are saying that and they're trying to consolidate. I heard this phrase one time, maybe from Henry Kissinger, somebody like that. The only way a state and nation can survive is if it has a monopoly on violence. You have to have a monopoly on violence. They're trying to come up with a monopoly on violence so there are not other groups out there that can challenge them. And the keys to the Treasury. Yeah, exactly. I mean, if that is true, that's an incredibly, incredibly encouraging development. Big If will wait and say, God, I would say, holy crap. Any thoughts? You can text us or email us. Armstrong and Getty. I'm going to insert you today. I need an egg McMuffin and I need 11 big breakfasts with the hotcakes. You said 11 big breakfasts with the hotcakes? 11, yes. Alright, just warning that will take probably a while. Well, I got 800 kids at the house, so yeah, that's cool, bro. Here's a second, I need manager approval. I need manager approval. Anything else you do today? No, that'll be it. You're looking at 83.34 for the next one. 83. Okay, thanks, guy. First of all, Chuckles McGruff there was taking it all in a good spirit. Apparently that's a quote unquote viral video. He's got a big family, blah, blah, blah. There's actually a follow-up story that's pretty interesting. You need manager approval if you order more than what, four biscuits or something? Because the other customers will have to wait for longer than they want. Actually, that might relate to the follow-up story that I've got, which we barely have time for, but interestingly, and we can come back to this later, there's just absolutely no question that Americans have been getting richer over the last 30, 40 years. The middle class is smaller because the upper middle class is much bigger. Every quintile is improving in virtually every single way, and the populists on the left and right are all wrong. We can get back to that next hour. But interestingly, this, you remember the kind of woosy McDonald's CEO who was nibbling at the New Burger? There's a great article in the journal about how McDonald's is dealing with a K-shaped economy in a K-shaped menu. They have one cohort of their audience who wants better food and are willing to pay $8-9 for a burger. That's fine. Absolutely fine. There's a huge chunk of their business that needs the low-priced, extra-special cheapo stuff, and they're trying to figure out how to cater to both audiences. Give me the stuff you dropped on the floor. Ha, for my kids. Ha, ha, ha, ha, that's okay, bro. Yeah, so they're experimenting with plump, juicy, McSpicy wings. $6 for four pieces. They're more than twice as expensive as the equivalent number of McNuggets, but they're much higher quality than McNugget. Let's see. The review says, they felt bigger than what I got at my last visit to Buffalo Wild Wings. The hand-bredded crispiness rivaled Raisin Canes. Oh, wow. My son wanted to try those when they were there at the McDonald's a couple weeks ago, but they were out for some reason. So they must be popular. Must be. And then I got that new sandwich that the CEO tried and hated it. But personally, I didn't like that one. The big arch. The big arch I did not like. And I love McDonald's. That's true. Maybe you're cut out for the dollar menu. We're dollar menu people, kids. It's all right. That probably fits. Okay, we got more on the way in hour three. Armstrong and Getty.
