Trump jokes, rants, talks price of pens as Iran war enters fifth week

President Trump spoke about Iran for 10 minutes in his first Cabinet meeting since the United States launched its war against Iran. price of ceremonial White House pens – he claimed to have reduced that figure from $1,000 to $5 by switching to his preferred brand of Sharpie.

Trump was trying to emphasize at Thursday’s meeting that he is a big money saver. Masada looked cheerful as he joked with other leaders of his administration.

When asked late Thursday on “The Five” on Fox News whether the Iranian people have access to basic needs such as drinking water and food, he said: Trump complimented Dana Perino’s appearancethe Fox host who asked the question, compared to when he met her years ago.

“I’m not allowed to say this anymore, this is the end of my political career, but you can look even better, okay?” Trump said. “You’re not allowed to tell a woman she’s beautiful anymore.”

He later talked about Iranian authorities killing protesters, but said he was more pleased with them recently because they had given him a “gift” by allowing oil ships to pass through the Strait of Hormuz.

In both debates, Trump used a brash, laid-back tone; the same one he had maintained since the war began a month ago, and was very different from that of past wartime presidents.

For weeks, Trump has deflected criticism of his war campaign and questions about why it is justified and how long it will last. He mocked reporters who asked about tactics and whether he would deploy boats on the ground, saying it was inappropriate and stupid, and repeatedly dismissed concerns about the human cost of war by shrugging his shoulders or changing the subject.

Meanwhile, his war has cost the United States billions of dollars and depleted global reserves of critical weapons systems, such as Tomahawk missiles, which cost millions of dollars each and are essential to maintaining U.S. security around the world. According to Washington Post.

The war, which entered its fifth week, had a negative impact on the markets. US stocks fall on Friday Wall Street is nearing the end of its fifth straight week of losses (the longest streak in almost four years) and oil prices are on the rise again.

Markets have fluctuated as Trump’s changing messages about ending the war, planned and then postponed attacks on Iranian power plants, attacks on oil and gas infrastructure in the Middle East and Iran’s chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, through which a quarter of global oil passes.

Trump has talked in recent days about a deal to end the war, but so far that deal has not materialized because Iran has underestimated the seriousness of the negotiations. Instead, Iran appeared to be formalizing its dominance over the strait, including inflicting major damage on ships attempting to pass through the canal from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

The number of American deaths in the conflict has remained steady for days — at 13 — but the war continues to take a devastating toll on the Middle East every day. While thousands of targets continue to be hit in Iran, the death toll has approached 2,000.

Speaking by video at the Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva on Friday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi accused the United States and Israel of having “a clear intention to commit genocide” in Iran, claiming that more than 600 schools were damaged or destroyed and more than 1,000 students and teachers were “martyred or injured.”

The controversy was partly about the February 28 attack on a primary school in Minab, which killed more than 165 people, mostly children. It is stated that the evidence suggests that it was the work of the United States and that the United States is under investigation.

Casualties also continued in US-allied Gulf states, where Iran continues to attack US military installations and other infrastructure, and in Lebanon, which Israel has brutally occupied and bombed in its own war with the Iran-backed Hezbollah force.

But Trump still moved between speeches and more formal meetings with apparent levity; He seems unbothered by the gravity of the conflict and acts as if US victory was already at hand.

“We have already won the war. We have completely won the war militarily,” he told “The Five” on Thursday.

After Trump’s meeting with Perino, fellow host Greg Gutfeld began changing the subject, saying, “I’m debating whether to be serious.”

“Do you think Biden would do this interview? Can you imagine? Would Biden – Sleepy Joe – do this?” Trump said.

He called the war “a bit of a detour” from his otherwise winning economic policies, and once again suggested – without offering evidence – that Iran was on the verge of having a nuclear weapon and would have used it to cause devastation in the Middle East and the United States if the United States had not attacked first, including bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities last summer.

“You can’t let a crazy man or a crazy ideology have nuclear weapons,” Trump said.

He repeated his long-held lie that he won the 2020 election and claimed his support among the MAGA base remains at 100%.

An AP-NORC poll this week found that most Americans believe that. US military campaign in Iran has gone too far That includes about a quarter of Republicans, and many others are also worried about gas prices.

during his cabinet meeting On Thursday, Trump appeared supremely confident but also aware that the dispute was far from resolved.

He said the United States was “deeply — truly — ahead of schedule” in its war effort and that “the Iranian regime has now admitted to itself that it has been decisively defeated.” However, despite the US eliminating Iran’s “mine dumpers”, he said “even now we don’t know if there are mines” in the Strait of Hormuz, and added: “If you think there might be mines, that’s a bad thought and it will stop things.”

He said the US had destroyed about 99 percent of Iran’s capabilities, but that “the problem with the strait” and the threat to the remaining 1 percent was unacceptable because that 1 percent was a missile penetrating the hull of a ship costing $1 billion.

“If we make a 99% reduction, that wouldn’t be good,” he said.

During the “Fives” interview, Trump was also asked whether the CIA said that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, who took on a leadership role in Iran after his father, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed in the first attacks, was gay and that this would be a crime under Iranian law.

“Yes, they said that, but I don’t know if they were the only ones who said that. I think a lot of people say that. And that gets him off to a bad start in that country, you know?” Trump said in a surprising acceptance of a previously rumored intelligence briefing.