The Big Ben Show: A Risky Ceasefire That May Not Last

Plus, Russini-Vrabel reconsidered

Apr 09, 2026

New Big Ben Show dropped last night, and we’ve got a jam-packed episode, including interviews with Lucas Tomlinson and Rebeccah Heinrichs on the Iran ceasefire deal and the risks involved for the United States. Watch and listen here:

Washington Shouldn’t Compromise on Iran

Mark Dubowitz and Ben Cohen in the Daily Wire:

A ceasefire is not peace. It is not the formal end of hostilities. It is a pause.
General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made that unmistakably clear at a Pentagon press conference on April 8, his first since President Donald Trump announced a ceasefire with Iran the previous evening: “A ceasefire is a pause, and the joint force remains ready, if ordered or called upon, to resume combat operations with the same speed and precision as we’ve demonstrated over the last 38 days.”
Iran’s rulers should now understand that this president does not bluff. The United States and Israel remain, in Trump’s words during January’s anti-regime uprising, “locked and loaded and ready to go.”
Since that warning, the landscape has changed dramatically.
Domestically, more than 40,000 Iranians have died after the regime unleashed extraordinary violence against demonstrators. Militarily, Iran has been badly weakened by combined U.S.-Israeli operations: its navy crippled, air defenses penetrated, missile stockpiles and launchers significantly reduced, and key elements of its defense-industrial and economic-industrial base severely damaged. The supreme leader and 51 of his top commanders and advisors have been eliminated along with thousands of members of the IRGC, Basij, law enforcement, and intelligence apparatus.
Diplomatically, nearly six weeks of attacks on Arab capitals have shattered what little trust remained between Tehran and its Gulf neighbors, and Iran is increasingly isolated even from American allies who have their fair share of differences with President Trump. Psychologically, Iran’s leadership has learned that beneath Trump’s social media theatrics — offensive to many — lies a president willing to act.
As in many wars, both sides now claim victory. But Iran’s claim is far less persuasive. For now, the regime has achieved the minimum objective of survival. Yet survival under sustained military, economic, and political pressure is not strategic success. The possibility of an Iran freed from Islamic Republic rule remains very much alive.
As talks begin this weekend in Pakistan to solidify the ceasefire, Washington should negotiate from a position of maximum leverage, not compromise. None of the 10 points reportedly included in Tehran’s public proposal deserves serious consideration: lifting all sanctions, preserving Iranian control of the Strait of Hormuz, demanding war reparations, permitting continued uranium enrichment, and insisting on an indefinite halt to hostilities would amount to strategic surrender by the United States. Tehran’s original 10-point proposal was fundamentally unserious, unacceptable, and, as the White House put it, “completely discarded.”
That should remain the administration’s posture. The central reality has not changed during these volatile weeks: The Islamic Republic remains the most dangerous force destabilizing the Middle East and a direct threat to American security. Replacing it with a government that allows Iranians to reclaim their country should remain the central objective of U.S. policy.
That requires abandoning illusions about trade-offs. Unlike the Obama administration’s pursuit of the 2015 nuclear deal, the Trump administration should not seek to persuade, incentivize, or rehabilitate Iran’s rulers. It should present terms and insist on compliance.
That means no enrichment. It means surrendering Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile. It means intrusive, unannounced inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency as a prelude to dismantling Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and ballistic missile program. It means freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz. It means maintaining all sanctions until Tehran proves over time that it has ended support for regional terror proxies and complied fully with American demands.

More here:

U.S. Fertility Hits Record Low

The Wall Street Journal:

The nation’s fertility rates hit record lows in 2025 as childbearing continued to shift toward older women, according to new federal data released Thursday. For the sixth straight year, the number of children born in the U.S. remained at roughly 3.6 million.
The number of births per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44—the general fertility rate—reached a record low of 53.1 in 2025, according to provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The rate has mostly headed down since 2007, a prerecession peak when millennial women started to enter their prime childbearing years.
One long-term trend driving the slide: a sharp decrease in birthrates for teens and women in their 20s. In 2025, birthrates for women in their late 30s exceeded those for women in their early 20s for the first time.
The lack of growth in births continues to be driven by uncertainty about the future, including concern over finances, relationship stability and the political climate, according to Wendy Manning, a demographer at Bowling Green State University. But research shows many women still desire to have children…
The teen birthrate fell 7% last year, extending a yearslong decline related to public-health campaigns and growing use of longer-acting contraceptives. Since 2007, the birthrate for 15- to 19-year-olds has fallen 72% in the U.S.
“We spent decades and lots of money trying to discourage early childbearing, saying, ‘This will ruin your life. This will ruin your kid’s life. Don’t do it,’ ” said Karen Benjamin Guzzo, director of the Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

GOP Campaigns Embrace AI, While Democrats Bet Against It

Semafor:

In Democratic shops, the conversation about whether to use AI tools internally is quiet and cautious. One example: I’m told the Democratic National Committee has approved the use of only Google’s Gemini LLM, and not its competitors, for official work like data analysis and coding. Other Democratic groups have used AI tools to build campaign sites more quickly, replacing some hours of busywork.
But there is Democratic dread about the consequences of widespread AI use, like employment loss for visual artists and camera crews, that the GOP doesn’t share. While data center construction and favorable tax subsidies for the AI industry are politically unpopular, only Democrats have a faction that wants to stop the bulldozers. Democrats have introduced the sole successful proposals to restrict AI in political messaging.
Rep. Julie Johnson, D-Texas, author of a bill that would let candidates sue for damages if their opponents ran “materially deceptive” AI ads, told me that such deception was already a problem in her primary.
“It depends on if it’s based in fact, or if it’s just made up bullsh*t,” she said, a few days before being forced into a runoff with former Rep. Colin Allred. “Colin has done some AI-generated ads with my face in them; I don’t like it, but I don’t have a huge problem with it. That is, in fact, me. What I don’t like is using AI to create an image of me with Trump and Kristi Noem, because that’s just never happened.”
(Allred’s campaign distanced itself from the images Johnson was talking about; they came from The New Leadership PAC, which supports him in the May runoff.)
That defense of observed reality doesn’t have much power on the right, which has fully embraced AI image generation. The tears of liberal-leaning artists who won’t get paid to make those images are a bonus.
And it’s not just the Trump operation diving in. The president’s amplification of AI images has often happened in a political vacuum — replies on X, re-Truths on the president’s social media account. By contrast, the National Republican Senatorial Committee has used AI in ways that deeply anger Democrats. Not that they can do anything about it.

Yes, There’s a Problem With the Vrabel-Russini Stuff

Ethan Strauss:

Some of you were far more skeptical of the photographed duo and let’s just say…I now see your side. I received a lot of pushback from readers and people within the industry. The most common reply was something like this, via an anonymous tipster:
I looked at those pictures again today and they were taken from really far. No way paparazzi would give a fuck about those two. So where did these pictures come from. Was one of them being followed by a PI? Because their spouse did not trust them?
That’s not really what shook my belief in the defense, though, nor was it the avalanche of unearthed critical comments Russini made about her husband and marriage. It was top NFL reporter Adam Schefter on Philadelphia radio nimbly evading questions from the hosts. Schefty, who knows both people involved and likely has a lot more contextual information, did not laugh off this matter. Instead he grimly said:
I feel bad for the families involved. It’s unfortunate.
Well then. That doesn’t exactly sound like a response to some wacky innocent misunderstanding.
When the photos were published, I figured this situation would soon blow over because almost any Internet story does. Perhaps it will, but there’s a level of publicized unseemliness where, even with time, a topic never truly goes away for a public figure. Vrabel and Russini can return to their jobs that revolve around America’s favorite distraction, but people don’t forget. Russini’s latest output is reporting on the NFL referee labor situation and I suppose information based productivity is about the best move a reporter in this scenario can make.
Some additional thoughts…
This story is a good example of Aaron Sorkin’s take on bad publicity:
It’s like seasickness. You think you’re gonna die, and everyone else just thinks it’s funny.
Many are having fun with a salacious scandal, but, to Schefter’s point, there are families involved. If this is what it looks like, it’s also tragic for those involved.
I know it’s sports and not matters of extreme importance, but there is indeed a journalistic ethics component to all this. Out in aforementioned Philly, where Dianna Russini won “Eagles Insider of the Year” for Spike Eskin’s WIP, some fans are up in arms over this seemingly unconnected story. Why? Because Russini reported interest from the New England Patriots in chronically unhappy Eagles star wide receiver AJ Brown.
Russini isn’t the only person to have reported this. When New England Patriot legends Julian Edelman and Rob Gronkowski interviewed AJ Brown, the Eagles wideout winked when Edelman said, “We’re all Patriots.” Mike Vrabel was Brown’s head coach back in Tennessee, as discussed on the pod, so there’s a history there.
Still, you can’t fault an Eagles fan for wondering if there’s an aspect of the tail wagging the dog here. A reporter who broadcasts a star Eagle’s desire to leave just happens to have a close “relationship” with the coach of a team she names as potential suitor. I personally think AJ Brown would be doing all he could to leave Philadelphia for New England even if Russini had retired two years ago, but the optics aren’t wonderful.

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