The Daily Show: Ears Edition - TDS Time Machine | Josh at the Desk 2025

Episode Date: January 18, 2026

Josh Johnson's freshman year at The Daily Show desk was filled with deep dives into the unraveling of the Epstein files, Trump's grudge against "treasonous" Obama, an accidental venture into socialism, a strange debate about pedophilia, and the president's ever-shrinking chances of getting into heaven. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Check out Odu at O'Don. O-O-O-com. That's O-D-O-O-O-D-O-com. You're listening to Comedy Central. Problem with this distraction is that it's so old, Jeffrey Epstein wouldn't date it, all right? Trump has been going after Obama for decades. He's not, he's going to need something else, something juicy.

The White House offering an unexpected health update on President Trump, revealing that he recently underwent a battery of test and has now been diagnosed with chronic venous insufficiency. Doctors tell us it means there isn't adequate blood flow to the veins and the legs which can cause swelling. Oh no. Look at that ankle. When I said something juicy, I didn't mean a shoe should not give you a muffin top. And I cannot stress how big of a deal this is, because they never admit that Trump has anything but impeccable health. Usually they bring out a doctor to be like Donald Trump has big muscles and a girthy-ass dick.

Medically speaking, he makes Hercules look like a pig with cancer. Like, I'm not exaggerating. His doctors once said that his blood pressure was astonishingly excellent. That's not even how blood pressure works. Blood pressure is numbers. If you want to impress us, say 120 over 80. They made it sound like Trump could control his blood pressure. like the settings on a fancy hose.

His blood pressure is on miss, but he can turn it up to cone or jet if he so chooses. I get why they put this out. One, it's a good distraction, and two, people have been starting to notice that Trump looks medically speaking like shit. After these images of President Trump started to draw attention, apparent bruises on his hands covered with makeup

seen in February, and this week, the White House physician says it's consistent with minor soft tissue irritation. tissue irritation from frequent handshaking and the use of aspirin. Well, problem solved. No one's going to shake hands that look like that. Even that hand right there, you could tell that the thumb is like, ew, ew, ew, ew, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, go, go, go, go.

But, okay, Trump violating his own hippor rights didn't get people to move on from Epstein. So now he's getting snacks involved. President Trump says he's convinced Coca-Cola to change. its recipe. The president claims that the company has agreed to start using real cane sugar in Coke products. This is so insulting. Trump's treating Americans like a kid you can bribe with a treat. Allow me to demonstrate what Donald Trump is going for here. I don't care about pedophilia anymore. Delicious. And if all that doesn't work for you, if you don't care about Coke or Trump's health, don't worry, he's got some true crime for you. This morning, the Trump administration

releasing more than 230,000 pages of records related to the assassination of civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. That's how bad things are for Trump. His back is against the wall so hard. He's releasing more black history. But this might be the worst distraction because all he did was remind us

that he can declassify thousands of secret files and people noticed. Bernice King, the daughter of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., posted this picture on social media with the caption that simply reads, Now do the Epstein files. Damn, that is cold. Do you know how much you have to screw up for Dr. King's family to go, no, no, we choose violence?

If Trump wants to distract us, all he has to do is keep his promises. If you ended the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, that would be extremely distracting. If you put up affordable housing, Americans would be like, what Epstein fires? What Epstein files? I'm too distracted memorizing my new home address. If you want to think of it in terms you can understand, think of it like a bribe, Mr. President. You're the deal guy. Make us a deal. We want to know what's in the Epstein files, but if you put some universal health care in your palm and hand it over, Epstein, who?

I ain't seen nothing. Let's kick things off with drug prices. They're too damn high. They're so expensive that rappers are bawling out on a full prescription, okay? Singles are dropping like, I got a drop top bins and a multiply Alexa Pro? Now, President Trump made big promises about lowering drug prices once he got into office, but all the haters said he was never actually going to get it done. Well, guess what, haters?

His promises just got even bigger. We're going to get the drug prices down, not 30 or 40 percent, which would be great, not 50 or 60. No, we're going to get him down 1,000, 600 percent, 500 percent, 500 percent, 500 percent, numbers that are not even thought to be achievable. Yeah, I also thought it would not be achievable to lower drug prices 1,000% because that's not how percentages work. Just so you understand,

lowering drug prices 100% means it's free. Lowering it past that means they're going to give you money. Next year's first. Forbes billionaires list is just going to be a bunch of dudes with leukemia. On the bright side, on the bright side, we're actually going to be bankrupting insurance companies instead of the other way around. You know? If Trump had enacted this sooner, that CEO would have shot Luigi.

But look, but look, Trump actually does have a plan here. It's not to put a cap on the drug prices. That'd be too easy and simple. We're working very hard right now to get the other countries to lift up their prices. a little bit and to get the drug companies to put it to them. And if they don't, the drug companies will have a lot of problems, and they are mostly agreed to it. And if the countries don't, then as an example of it's Europe, I'll say, that's okay.

You're no longer allowed to sell cars in America. You're no longer allowed to have Mercedes, BMW, Volkswagen, or any of the other many cars, and they will say, oh, I love the idea of lower drug prices for America. So the plan, just so I have it right, is to lower drug prices here by forcing Europe to raise drug prices over there, or they can't sell us their cars reducing our choices as consumers and making cars in general more expensive for everybody. And I know it's very confusing, but I've seen this before. This is crackhead logic, all right? A crackhead can never go from A to B, all right? When I was a kid, I'd see a dude who needed $15, but instead of asking for money, he would try to sell you a tire.

Which, of course, he didn't have, but he did have a bike chain. And if you would buy that bike chain from him for $12, he would put that towards the tire, and then one day eventually buy crack. And my point is, that's a better drug plan than what Donald Trump is doing. Once again, Donald Trump can't shake the Jeffrey Epstein news. He's going to lower drug prices 2 billion percent, and the media still won't let it go. But old buddy Donnie's got another car to play. President Trump again tried to divert attention from the Epstein files, this time by accusing former President Barack Obama of treason.

Obama cheated on the election, and we have it cold, hard, blue, and it's getting even more so. I'm sorry. cold, hard, and blue. Like, that's a normal phrase about an investigation. There's been 400 seasons of law and order, and no

detective has ever said, we got you cold, hard, and blue. Dun, done. But yeah, Trump is now going after Obama again, and this time he's got to Colsey Gabbard saying she's got documents that prove Obama tampered with the 2016 election, which is treason.

But if you see what Obama was doing over the weekend, he doesn't seem to stressed. In my opinion, and this is controversial in my family, you should not eat ketchup after the age of eight. Does this man seem worried? You know, he's doing a podcast about ketchup. How is it that Barack Obama, the man Trump hates the most, is the most unbothered during two Trump presidencies? Like, I don't know what is pissing Trump off more. The fact that no one is letting go of the Epstein files are that Obama refuses to be. the adversary Trump wants him to be.

This would be like if you took the movie Lion King, and right after Scar took over Pride Rock, Simba sang Hakuna Matata for the last 43 minutes of the film. Also, what an insane take. You're not allowed to have ketchup after the age of eight? Eight years old is too young for rules like that. Like, at eight, I'm still wetting the bed, but now I have to be an AOLI man.

Trump has lost total control of the situation. Even his allies in Congress are turning on him. In an effort to gain clarity, three Republicans joined Democrats on the House Oversight Committee to subpoena the Justice Department to give Congress all of the Epstein files. This fight's coming no matter, I mean, this is here. And I'm ready to take this vote. I think we should take this vote and move forward. Move this country forward and people deserve transparency. Nancy Mace, damn.

Trump is even losing the white women. which is great because it means we're getting the white women and we're getting those files. All right? This feels like when you're at the airport and Southwest has delayed you for 23 hours. You're standing in line at customer service and there's a white woman in line in front of you

bubbling harder than Prosecco. She's even doing the like, and then she turns to you and says, I'm going to say something. And you're like, yes, yes, yes, white lady. Go up there and get that manager. And it's not just Nancy Mace. This is an issue across the entire Karen American community. Marjorie Taylor Green wants the files.

Lauren Beaupert wants a special counsel. She's like, I came to Washington to expose pedophiles and jack people off. And I'm fresh out of people to jack off. Now, it may be surprising that some of the most diehard congressmen are going against Trump on this. but you have to remember that they ultimately just want to be reelected. And right now, their voters are absolutely losing it over this Epstein thing. How much are your constituents clamoring for more information about Epstein right now?

It's the number one phone call that we get by far. It's probably 500 to 1. 500 to 1? Yeah. It's number one phone calls that we get. I'm sorry, 500 to 1? I want to know about the Epstein files, but that is wild. That means people are calling in 500 times. about Jeffrey Epstein for every one caller who's just like,

hey, uh, my tap water poison. I could understand it if everything else in your state is going fine, but this congressman's from Missouri, okay? They have real problems, but they're using all their boost mobile minutes on this thing. I'll talk to my kids next month. This Epstein thing is too important. And worst of all, for Trump,

it's not just his allies in Congress or conservative Americans. He's pissed off his most. important base of support. Crazy-ass lunatics. Jacob Chansley, the Q-Anon Shaman, who became famous for his horned outfit. During the January 6th, Capitol Riot is lashing out at the man who gave him a pardon. Chansley called the president a fraud. Wow. Do you know how down bad you are when the guys who went to prison for you were turning on you? Like, I need to stress this real quick. He went to jail for Trump. This would be like if Nelson Mandela

came out of prison like, you know what? I'm done with black people. These guys believe in everything but you. Take a look. He also suggested that the president had defiled a corpse. Billionaire Elon Musk wasn't spared either, with Chansley describing the world's richest man as a baby eater. This is so, so bad.

That's the thing about QAnon. Like, if Kendrick Lamar wanted to ruin your life, at least he'd do a bunch of research on you and your life. family. Kewanod just comes out and says you're eating spines. And there's no way for you to prove you don't eat spines. In fact, every time you've got something between your teeth, they're like, see, see, he flossin babies. Yesterday, Trump was in the Oval Office to announce the construction of a big road in Alaska. Congrats Alaska. You finally got a road.

And we know one thing about Trump is that he likes to keep his press conferences focus and and on topic. So let's hear what he has to say about this cool road. I want to be good because you want to prove to God that you're good so you go to that next step, right? So that's very important to me. Trump, are you sick? I mean, aside from all the visible signs that your body is falling apart, are you sick

or something? Like, we should take a second here, because this is the first time I've seen Trump be humble about anything. Like, normally he'd be like, heaven's begging me to come. I'm only staying alive to play hard to get. Jesus came up to me with tears in his eyes, and he said, please, sir, come fix heaven.

It's a total dump. It's like he just realized he only has immunity here on earth. And this isn't a one-off. Trump's been talking about this heaven thing a lot lately. If you're not a believer and you believe you go nowhere,

what's the reason to be good, really? There has to be some kind of a a report card up there someplace. You know, like, let's go to heaven. Let's get into heaven. I want to try and get to heaven if possible. I'm hearing I'm not doing well. I really get the bottom of the totem pole.

Oh, man. This is such a bleak and completely accurate view of his chances in heaven. I will say, though, you never want to see the guy who's supposed to keep you healthy and safe talk about dying. Like, he's supposed to be leading you. You never want to hear a pilot over the guy. the system be like, oh, I just can't wait to get into heaven. Like, uh, can we get to Pittsburgh first? And look, I don't know, man.

Heaven is tough to get into. Like, I don't want to throw cold water on your hopes and dreams, but you might want to think about trying to get into like a safety heaven. Like, whatever SUNY Albany of heaven is up there, you know what I mean? Like, apply there, you know? Because the truth is, there's probably a good reason for Trump to worry about getting into heaven, you know? Is it? Yep, yep, yep.

That, too. I mean, that wasn't even the first thing I thought of. Crazy how many things there are. President Trump now says he wants to send out $2,000 rebate checks paid for by his tariffs. One of the things we're going to do, we're going to issue a

dividend to our middle income people and lower income people about $2,000. Wait a second. Okay. Trump's making everybody pay tariffs, but only poor people are getting the $2,000 checks. So he's just redistributing taxes from rich people to poor people. Did Donald Trump just stupid himself into socialism? I mean, I mean, you're doing a great job, Mr. President.

We always believed. Everybody shut up, all right? Don't say a word. Let this play out, and we'll have free health care by Christmas, all right? Nobody, nobody, nobody, nobody call him Mango Mamdani, all right? Great idea, Mr. President. Very capitalism. But hey, you know what? $2,000 would help a lot of people.

If the money's there, the money's there. If the president sent $2,000 checks to the $150 million people who make less than up $100,000, it would cost $300 billion, even though the tariffs are only projected to raise about $217 annually. the money's not there. And now I'm starting to get worried because that's $83 billion short. And I'm not saying Trump is the worst president

of all the time. I'm just saying I've never met anyone who was $83 billion short. And by the way, he's only $83 billion short if he hasn't promised the tariff money to anybody else. We're going to take some of that tariff money that we made.

We're going to give it to our farmers. The big thing we want to do is pay down debt. The president tapped into tax. tariff revenue to keep WIC money for women and infants and children going out the door. Tariffs is one of the reasons why we have the money in the Treasury to actually be able to pay our troops. I think the tariffs will be enough to cut all of the income tax. Donald Trump's suggesting that tariffs could fund the country's child care needs. That'll easily pay for the Golden Dome.

And we'll have a lot of money left over. Money left over. The money that never existed is already spent. And you're running around the country promising money you do not have to multiple people many times over. Every week I'm at this desk, I say this, and I guess I'll have to say this for three more years. But this is crackhead behavior. Yesterday, the Epstein story exploded back into the national conversation when House Democrats released three emails that Jeffrey Epstein wrote about as BFF Donald Trump. But Donald Trump has the entirety of the GOP behind them.

And you know these world-class strategies have a plan for getting this story off the front page. As part of the Republican response to the selective and limited release of emails by the Democrats, Republicans stepped up and put out 20,000 pages of Jeffrey Epstein-related documents. Oh, no! This is the downside of your people really having your back because they were basically like, he got nothing to hide. Here's 20,000 more emails. Don't you people know anything about a cover-up? This is like trying to hide pissing yourself by shitting yourself. Trump's people spent a year saying there are no Epstein files. Now there's 20,000 pages and those still aren't the files. What happened? There's now more pages of Trump-Ebstein lore than Batman and Superman crossover.

And look, these 20,000 pages weren't all about crimes. A lot of it was just weird broshit about women that they dated. Epstein says in these emails that he could produce photos of Donald and girls in bikinis in my kitchen. Epstein claims that he and Trump had dated the same woman back in the 1990s, saying, my 20-year-old girlfriend in 1993 that after two years I gave to Donald. Man, I'm glad Hillary killed that guy. Because I can't imagine a worse way to break up with someone than setting them up with Donald Trump.

If someone broke up with me and they were like, I don't deserve you, but you know who does? And then Donald Trump walked in, I'd be like, damn, I didn't know you hated me. And by the way, just as a side note, the woman people say Epstein might be referring to is a Norwegian cosmetics heiress, whose name, and I am not making this up, is Selena Middelfart. And if you're watching this from Norway and you're like, it's Miedelfart. That is basically what I just said. Now, she is denied that she ever dated either of them, which I get. But more importantly, how is Selena Middlefart a real name?

It sounds like a bad spy name. Like if you broke, if you were a spy, you broke into a super secret security office. And right after you grab the disc or whatever, you turn the corner, and then there's someone looking at you and they say, who are you? And you haven't thought that far. You almost say Selena Gomez, but you know that's not going to work. So you're like, Selena, Selena, and you get nervous when you're, you know, trying to come up with a name and makes you fart in the middle of your sentence.

you're like, Selena Middlefire. And then that guy is just like, oh, okay, do you know where the bathroom is? So the GOP didn't do Trump any favors by releasing these emails. They basically saw his grease fire and said, let us add some water. And his supporters on TV aren't doing that much better. This is obviously an attempt to smear the president by cherry picking. This is just all for show. A distraction.

Just ridiculous. The carnival show. It's journalistically malpractice. Why weren't they as concerned about Bill Clinton? They love to create drama. This whole Epstein-Files thing, a little bit played out. Played out? You know shit's bad when the sensationalist media is like,

you guys don't want to hear about the international island sex scandal. Let's talk about budgetary cuts. Let's get nasty. Come on, guys, that's not going to work. If you want to downplay this story, you need a master, all right? Megan Kelly, you're a master of spin. show us what you got. As for Epstein, he wasn't into like eight-year-olds,

but he liked the very young teen types. There's a difference between a 15-year-old and a 5-year-old. You know, it's just whatever. It's sick. What the hell was Megan Kelly ever an attorney? Your Honor, my client only engaged in diet pedophilia. Ma'am, everyone knows there's a big difference between a 15-year-old and a 5-year-old, but everyone also knows there is never good reason to be talking about that difference. Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by searching The Daily Show,

wherever you get your podcasts. Watch the Daily Show weeknights at 11, 10 Central on Comedy Central, and stream full episodes anytime on Paramount Plus. This has been a Comedy Central podcast. This show is supported by Odu. When you buy business software from lots of vendors, the costs add up, and it gets complicated and confusing. O-DU solves this. It's a single company that sells a suite of enterprise apps that handles everything from accounting to inventory to

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