GEOFF BENNETT: Another political fight in Congress, a mixed martial arts fight at the White House, and a potential deal to end the fighting with Iran.

Time now for the analysis of Brooks and Capehart.

That's "The Atlantic"'s David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart of MS NOW.

It's always good to see you both.

GEOFF BENNETT: So, the White House says it's increasingly confident that a deal with Iran is within reach.

David, what should Americans make of the administration's stated confidence?

DAVID BROOKS: This is -- somebody counted.

This is the 40th time Donald Trump has said... DAVID BROOKS: ... we're very confident.

So 40 is a good biblical number, so maybe it's true.

It's too soon to really know how this all turns out, but I think you can say some things.

One, the Iranian military is degraded, so that's a plus.

Two, the Straits of Hormuz will be in worse shape before -- after this action than before.

Before, it was an open waterway.

Now it's an Iranian and Omanian lake.

Three, it seems extremely unlikely to me, despite what the administration is saying, that Iran is going to want to give up or is going to be willing to give up their nuclear power.

This has been a core of their whole regime for decades, or that they will give up supporting Hamas and Hezbollah.

This has been a core.

And so unless they're really in economic struggle, worse than we think, and they're going to be moved by that trouble, then I'm a little dubious.

I think we will end up significantly worse off than before the war.

One other final point.

All these bombs got dropped.

What actually pressures each side?

In each case, it was an economic sanction.

It was Iranians closing the strait and us imposing a blockade and sanctions before that.

So it was actually economic pressure that moved people, not all these bombs that got dropped, and that should be a lesson for leaders going forward.

GEOFF BENNETT: And, Jonathan, I mean, is there a broader lesson here about American foreign policy that, no matter who occupies the White House, presidents discover that the bargain with Iran is ultimately always the same?

It's constraints on its nuclear program in exchange for economic relief.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: And that's what we had as the United States with the JCPOA, which President Trump ripped up and is now trying to get a JCPOA-like agreement, February, March, April, May, June, four months into a war he started with Benjamin Netanyahu.

They got to the JCPOA not through two people zooming into a capital and then leaving and saying we have got a deal.

They got the JCPOA by hunkering down in Switzerland every day for years, Switzerland and other places, for years, across from their counterparts and interlocutors with other nations involved to hammer out that deal.

We have seen nothing like that whatsoever when it comes to bringing about a resolution to this current war with Iran.

GEOFF BENNETT: David, what's the bigger risk for President Trump, arriving in a deal that basically mirrors the Obama era Iran deal or failing to negotiate a deal after promising that he could do something better, find something better?

DAVID BROOKS: Well, I wasn't a fan of the Obama deal.

By the way, I think it's sunsetted too soon, so making it a little unreliable.

But the danger for President Trump is that we walk away with face covering, so we don't admit that we lost the war, but we lost the war, and everybody's in the region knows we lost the war, and everybody in America knows we lost the war, and everybody around the world knows we lost the war.

And that hurts American prestige and will hurt American interests long term.

GEOFF BENNETT: We have seen examples recently of Republicans breaking with President Trump, whether the anti-weaponization fund, to the fight over the FISA Section 702 - - this is a warrantless surveillance tool -- over his election of Bill Pulte as the acting director of national intelligence.

Are these isolated disputes, Jonathan, or are we starting to see a Republican Party that feels more comfortable challenging the president?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I mean, yes and no.

I'm loath to say we have reached a pivot point, like this is the moment.

We don't know.

I think we will know as time goes on.

But as we get more of these things like this, like the rising up against Pulte, like bringing down the FISA law, that Republicans are finding their courage.

We should also keep in mind that a lot of them are finding their courage because they have been primaried and lost, they're retiring or their primaries have not happened yet.

And so they're keeping their powder dry.

But each time they take a stand against the president, I think, for once, claws back some congressional authority as a co-equal branch of government.

GEOFF BENNETT: One of the Republicans who was primaried and lost is John Cornyn.

And in an interview with The New York Times, he predicted that the two years after the November midterms will be the most miserable two years of President Trump's life.

He says: "He's going to have the most miserable two years of his life in the last two years of his term, I think, because I think November is going to be a disaster."

Historically, dissent inside the MAGAverse has been short-lived.

Do you see that changing?

DAVID BROOKS: A little.

I was thinking when I read that quote that it'll be miserable for him, but it won't be as miserable as for us.

DAVID BROOKS: I do think there is some sort of leakage here.

I wouldn't say it's a turnaround, but there's been some sort of leakage.

The Trump thing is just weird.

He's just -- he appoints Bill Pulte, who's clearly not even close, within a Pacific Ocean, of being qualified for this job.

And then he turns around, and to make the permanent acting, not acting, but the permanent director of DNI, Jay Clayton, who's totally like superstar level by Trump's standards.

So how does the same guy pick two people, one with such radically different qualifications?

The one thing I should add is that I don't like what the Democrats are doing here.

I understand you don't like Bill Pulte.

I understand you think he should not have been appointed.

And that, you're absolutely 100 percent correct.

But the FISA program works well.

We are now -- as Speaker Johnson made the point, we're now -- we got the World Cup here.

We got the Iranian thing going on.

We need all the intelligence I can get.

And that FISA program supplies, I'm told, half the president's daily intelligence brief.

That's a lot of information and valuable information.

It's a very well-working program.

And the Democrats are not repeal -- or not renewing it sort of in my view out of spite, but they're making us less safe.

GEOFF BENNETT: Jonathan?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: How this became the Democrats' fault is curious to me.

One -- a couple of things to keep in mind.

One, even though the law has expired, it was reauthorized by a FISA court in March of 26', this past March, which goes through March of 27.

So Congress has time to come back and reauthorize it, do whatever they need to do, because it's not just Democrats who have concerns about the law.

It's Republicans as well.

So I just don't think it's right to say it's all the Democrats' fault, especially when they're not even in the majority in either house.

GEOFF BENNETT: In the time that remains, David, do your Sunday night plans involved being at the White House for a UFC match, by chance?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I asked him the same thing.

DAVID BROOKS: Well, I'm actually active participant.

DAVID BROOKS: I'm going to be fighting with Jonathan.

It'll be fun.

It will be like... GEOFF BENNETT: That, I would like to see.

Could you imagine?

DAVID BROOKS: Yes.

Yes.

GEOFF BENNETT: But what do you make of this?

DAVID BROOKS: Well, I first thought of, like, who are the artists John F. Kennedy brought to the White House?

It was like W.H.

Auden, Robert Frost, Jerome Robbins, Leonard Bernstein.

And now we have got cage fighting.

Don't anybody say America's in cultural decline.

So I just... DAVID BROOKS: Go ahead.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, look, yes, to your point, presidents have traditionally sought validation from established cultural institutions and artists.

As I'm saying this, I'm looking at the what people have called the claw on the South Lawn.

President Trump has created this alternative cultural establishment around combat sports and podcasts and influencers and social media stars.

How significant is that shift?

And what does it suggest?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Well, it's a significant shift because it's the president of the United States who's anointing it.

Whenever a president invites someone from the culture into the White House, it's giving the imprimatur of the president.

Excuse me.

President Obama brought in Lin-Manuel to do what then became "Hamilton."

So there -- you're talking about Auden.

And now you got Lin -- I cannot remember his name.

DAVID BROOKS: Lin-Manuel Miranda, yes.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Miranda, because I'm so close to calling him Noriega.

And that is -- I know that is not right.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: But this, a cage fight on the South Lawn of the White House, the people's house, that also has corporate sponsorship that you can see inside the ring, this - - talk about degrading the culture.

This is degrading the White House, degrading the people's house.

And it's just unconscionable that this has happened.

GEOFF BENNETT: Part of me thinks, though, that there were people who said that about Obama when he had rappers in the East Room, right?

I mean, it's just -- are we just in a different time, a different... DAVID BROOKS: He wants us to be talking this way, because he's saying, look, you get looked down upon by people.

I believe in cage fighting just like you.

GEOFF BENNETT: Right.

Yes.

Final word.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: No, we are out of time.

And I'm -- we don't have enough time for me to thunder righteous indignation about all this.

GEOFF BENNETT: We will pick it up on your Substack.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Yes.

GEOFF BENNETT: Jonathan Capehart, David Brooks.

Thank you both.

Thank you.

DAVID BROOKS: Thank you.