The MeidasTouch Podcast - Ben Meiselas DELIVERS POWERFUL Response to CRITIC Letter

Episode Date: July 27, 2023

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas responds to a “request for a comment” by a media critic who claims the MeidasTouch focus on Donald Trump’s crimes and the GOP behavior reflects an undisclosed “progressive bias.” Thanks to our sponsor Manukora honey! Head to manukora.com/meidas or use code MEIDAS to automatically get a free pack of honey sticks with your order – a $15 value! Schedule a free case evaluation with a personal injury lawyer at MorelliLaw.com/Meidas or call 516-447-8233 Remember to subscribe to ALL the Meidas Media Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://pod.link/1510240831 Legal AF: https://pod.link/1580828595 The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://pod.link/1595408601 The Influence Continuum: https://pod.link/1603773245 Kremlin File: https://pod.link/1575837599 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://pod.link/1530639447 The Weekend Show: https://pod.link/1612691018 The Tony Michaels Podcast: https://pod.link/1561049560 American Psyop: https://pod.link/1652143101 Burn the Boats: https://pod.link/1485464343 Majority 54: https://pod.link/1309354521 Political Beatdown: https://pod.link/1669634407 Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://pod.link/1676844320 MAGA Uncovered: https://pod.link/1690214260 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. I'm Ben Mycelis from the Midas Touch Network. You know now by watching this network, one of the things I say over and over again is how the media is really not equipped for this current moment where you have Democrats on the one hand who are pro-democracy comprised of Democrats, independents, progressives, liberals, real conservatives, not this MAGA Republican mess. And on the other hand, you've got these MAGA Republicans. There's nothing about their policies that's actually conservative, yet the media presents this division of liberal versus conservative and goes, oh, Marjorie Taylor Greene, a conservative, Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, a conservative, Lauren Boebert, a conservative, Matt Gaetz, a conservative. And I've always said, no,

when you try to overthrow our democracy, when you sing songs with the January 6th insurrectionists, there's nothing conservative about you. When you support Vladimir Putin, nothing conservative about you. So here's an inquiry that I received, and it's from, I guess, a fact-checking organization. And it looks like they want to do a piece that basically says that the Midas Touch podcast is progressive and has this progressive bias against conservatives. And it really misses the point, but I just want to share with you this letter. I haven't formally responded yet, so I guess this video can be my response. I get a ton of inquiries like this all the time, and I usually just ignore them. But I want to share with you just so you see the types of inquiries and how people just

simply don't get it. I will assume for the sake of argument that the person who works for this organization called New Guard Tech, Valerie Pavilonis, I'll assume that this is well-intentioned, although I may be assuming a lot. And here's the email that I received. Hello, my name is Valerie Pavilonis and I am a staff analyst for NewsGuard, which reviews and rates online sources of news and information. I hope this email finds you well. I previously emailed a personal email of one of the hosts, but this address seems more appropriate. I'm writing because I'm currently working on a report on the Midas Touch podcast. I have some questions about the podcast, which are included below.

So let's go through those questions and we can answer them together, Midas Mighty. How about that? Number one, who technically owns the podcast? Well, on every podcast, it says the Midas Touch Network. The Midas Touch Network technically owns the podcast too. When we rate podcasts, we check whether podcasts are dominated by one-sided opinion. From what I've listened to, the Midas Touch podcast is dominated by one-sided opinion. From what I've listened to, the Midas Touch podcast is dominated by one-sided liberal opinion without an alternative view. Well, you misunderstand the Midas Touch podcast and the Midas Touch network.

The Midas Touch network and the Midas Touch podcast is dominated by a pro-democracy point of view. We don't call ourselves liberal. We don't call ourselves progressive. Do I have a lot of liberal and progressive views? Absolutely. But I think I have some views that could be considered conservative. But in a traditional sense, I mean, I don't believe in overthrowing our democracy. I believe in a peaceful transition of power. I believe in free and fair elections. I'm against election denialism.

I support NATO and so on and so forth. Let's go take a look at the examples that Valerie is going to give me in this email to try to say that the Midas Touch Network has a liberal bias without alternative views. And I assume she's going to write a report saying that the network is very biased. But let's take a look at the examples that she gives. She goes, for example, during the July 21, 2023 episode, the host discussed social media content posted by Trump during special counsel Jack Smith's criminal investigations into Trump's alleged election interference. Quote, she's quoting from the podcast, quote, it's like they're the Republicans playing this game of fascist poker where they don't actually have a hand to play, one of the co-hosts

said, quote, so they continue to bluff with all this bravado and this culture war because they don't have anything. And all of a sudden they found themselves committed to Trump with no real tangible impacts on how they could actually help provide or help this country. And now they're stuck. And it goes on to say, this episode did not provide any alternative viewpoints. What alternative viewpoint do you want? You want the fascist viewpoint? You want the viewpoint of the MAGA Republicans? If you go up in the paragraph, though, what you say is you say, the host discussed the social media content posted by Trump. So wouldn't the alternative viewpoint be there?

The fact that I posted the alternative viewpoint? I post what Donald Trump is writing. I post the videos of what the MAGA Republicans are saying. The alternative viewpoint is literally posted. It is literally played on the podcast. And then I respond to it and then I fact check it. So the Midas Mighty, all of the people who watch our videos can say, okay, here's what the MAGA Republicans are saying. Here is what the facts are. And I show the evidence and then I show their statements. That seems to be showing an alternative viewpoint. The letter to me goes on to say, during the July 18th, 2023 episode, the host discussed the 2023 Turning Point Action Annual Summit. Quote, so what went down at this conference, said co-host

Ben Micellis. Quote, well, you had Donald Trump Jr. saying he doesn't do cocaine because that's somehow important to the American people. Lauren Boebert saying that she is a rhino hunter because what are you even talking about? Marjorie Taylor Greene saying it's a bad thing that President Biden is like President Lyndon B. Johnson. Ted Cruz saying that the Barbie movie is a communist Chinese plot. And Trump making up fake conversations that never happened between himself and Vladimir Putin. I mean, such a sad state of affairs for the Republican Party on full display at that conference in Congress and just throughout the country. By the way, I'm going to read more later in a moment, I'm showing what they are saying at

the convention. Their viewpoint is getting time. Some of the criticism that I get on the Midas Touch Network is, why are you showing these videos of Trump? Why are you showing what these MAGA Republicans are saying at the conference? Because I'm showing their alternative viewpoint. I'm showing what they're saying, and then I'm giving you my perspective. But my perspective isn't just opinion. I then show you the court documents. I show you the filings. I show you the facts. We go through, well, what's the prosecutor actually saying? Oh, Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans are saying that Bill Barr is a rhino. That is ridiculous. Let me explain why. You have retired federal judges like Judge Luddig, who's an actual

conservative, who's out there saying that the MAGA Republicans are complicit in the insurrection and complicit in Donald Trump's crimes. I'm showing you what these viewpoints are and what these perspectives are. Anyway, the letter goes on to say, later in the segment, Ben Micella said of the Republican Party, quote, the whole party is completely destroyed. The whole party is completely deranged. What we are seeing are the last gasps of a dying political movement, and it is our job to usher in an era of normalcy. The episode did not provide any alternative viewpoints. Again, do you see how wrong that is, Valerie? When you look at the paragraph before, I'm showing the viewpoints

of what the MAGA Republicans are saying. And notice that what I say here is I don't say that it is our job to usher in an era of Democrats controlling government. That's not what I say. What my appeal is, and I make it very clear, is normalcy. What my appeal is to the American people is compassion, is intelligence, is true law and order, is a fact-based approach. That is what I repeat over and over again. And when I say that the whole party, the modern day Republican party, is completely deranged and look at what we're seeing, I'm not just saying that randomly. I am showing you the examples of what they're saying. I mean, are you saying that I need to have QAnon

people on the podcasts? Are you saying that I need to have Don Jr. on the podcast? Do I need, in order for me to satisfy you that the show's not biased in a way that you think is improper, do I need to have people who spread disinformation about the 2020 election, who spread disinformation about COVID, people who say hateful things about Americans, who want to take away people's freedoms and who hate on marginalized communities. I have to give them a platform. Look, I'm showing what they're saying. I'm showing their words. That's what we do here on the Midas Touch Network. This episode of the Midas Touch Podcast is brought to you by Manicora Honey. Now, when I say the word honey, you might be thinking of that stuff that comes in a plastic bear-shaped

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And then Donald Trump is going to be charged with serious state crimes. And he can't gaslight his way out of that. The public relations strategy ultimately is not going to work. He's just going to be like a madman ranting and raving. He's going to be like at the end of one of those movies when you see someone being whisked away into an insane asylum. And it goes on to say, the episode did not provide any alternative viewpoints. Again, it did. It shows the viewpoint of Donald Trump. I show the clips of what Trump says, what Trump posts, what Trump's lawyers say. I show all of those every single day. And then I give you the alternative viewpoint is my viewpoint, which

I consider to be a viewpoint of normalcy, compassion, intelligence, and fact-based. We devote whole shows, and this is why the Midas Mighty community is growing, where we go through the court documents. We go through what the evidence shows. We go through point by point by point in a very diligent professorial type way to make sure we're arriving at the evidence. And if you watch my videos, you know that I am critical where criticism is appropriate when it comes to people who may be affiliated with the Democratic Party. I'll give you just one example that comes to mind right away.

I was critical of the Fulton County District Attorney, Fawnie Willis, for retweeting fundraiser posts because I believe that a district attorney doesn't need to be retweeting that. They could engage in campaign activities, but I just don't think when you're prosecuting someone like Donald Trump, you need to be retweeting and you need to have a Twitter game. That's just an example of where I've said, hey, I don't like that. And I've been critical where I thought a Department of Justice filing has not been done the right way, the speed at which certain investigations move. If you go watch, we post, in addition to our podcasts, nine to 10 videos every day that give an array of viewpoints. And we speak with former people

who work in the Trump administration. We speak with people who once were in Trump's inner circle. We have a lot of views here. People who, we just interviewed recently a former January 6th grandma who served time for being an insurrectionist. I mean, we are giving alternative viewpoints. And I show, most importantly, the alternative viewpoint over and over and over again. Just watch what our videos are every single morning. Three, if podcasts have a point of view, we typically look for that point of view to be disclosed either in the podcast description or in the beginning of episodes. However, I didn't see a disclosure of the show's progressive stance anywhere. If I missed such a disclosure, can you point me to it? If not, why does the podcast not disclose

its stance? We do. It says we are a pro-democracy media network. I constantly talk about how the Midas Touch Network is 100% pro-democracy. We have t-shirts that say unapologetically pro-democracy. Our slogan is unapologetically pro-democracy. Our slogan is unapologetically pro-democracy. And you are the one, Valerie, who wants to put a label on me to say these sets of views are progressive and what? Don Jr., Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, you're gonna say is conservative.

Again, I don't believe those people are conservative. I don't believe the MAGA movement is a conservative movement. You believe they're small government? They want to have the government control women's bodies. That is what they are doing every single day. They want the government to tell the LGBTQ plus community who they can marry, who they can love. These MAGA Republicans want to shut down corporations for having diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. The MAGA Republicans spend committee hearings actually showing dick pics, non-consensual dick pics of Hunter Biden. They are obsessed over and over

again, Hunter Biden this, Hunter Biden this. They spread lies about COVID. They want America to withdraw from NATO. They spread lies about elections. Okay, they're not conservative people. And that's why I say, if you look at a lot of my views, I'm sure people could say, well, that's a liberal viewpoint. That's a progressive viewpoint. But I think, again, there are conservative viewpoints. And I believe right now there is a pro-democracy community,

and the pro-democracy community is made up of Democrats, progressives, liberals, former Republicans, actual conservatives, independents, people who are not affiliated with political parties, people who support democracy. On the other hand, you've got Donald Trump, MAGA Republicans, people who want to suspend the Constitution, people who support the fake elector scheme, people who support Donald Trump's ambitions to become a dictator, people who support Donald Trump stealing and showing classified documents to people who shouldn't be seeing it, causing grievous injury to our national security. That is the perspective that we bring.

And the type of fact check or report that you are doing really does a big disservice to our democracy, Valerie, and it truly ignores what is going on on the ground. So I hope you found this to be a very thoughtful response to your request. At the end of the day. So I hope you found this to be a very thoughtful response to your request. At the end of the day, I'm sure you're going to write what you are going to write, but I do want to let you know that at least the types of questions that you have, it looks like you have the bias. And it looks like the bias that you have is in favor of people who gaslight and who spread disinformation and who want to topple our democracy and frankly take away the freedoms from people like you and others in the press to do their jobs unless they're spewing

propaganda for donald trump and the MAGA Republicans. That's where I think your bias is, unfortunately, here with these questions. Or perhaps you're just using an outdated or old paradigm of politics, but we have to adapt and see the world for what it is today. And Valerie, here's what I would ask you to do as well. Go take a look at the videos that we've done on the mass exodus of Republicans from the MAGA Republican Party, where we highlight the stories of Republicans, independents, people who are not affiliated with political parties, who used to vote for the Republican Party, who no longer can because the Republican Party left them and became

the MAGA Republican Party. We've done like 20 videos on the mass exodus series. So go and watch them, read the comments, and you can see what's really going on right now throughout this country. But I wish you well, Valerie. I hope you take this thoughtful response for what it's worth. And again, I think that your questions are misguided, but hopefully I've set the record straight. Until next time, I'm Ben Mycelis from the Midas Touch Network. Hit subscribe. We're on our way to 1.5 million subscribers thanks to your support. Check us out at patreon.com slash Midas Touch. Wherever you get audio podcasts, subscribe to the Midas Touch Podcast and have an excellent day.

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