The MeidasTouch Podcast - Journalist Brian Karem and the Alternate Reality of the Radical Right

Episode Date: March 19, 2021

The MeidasTouch brothers kick off the show with a brand new segment called “Please excuse my racism, I have ______,” where they recount the latest and craziest excuses people have made for their hateful remarks and actions. The brothers then talk about the horrific mass shooting that took place in Atlanta and the rise of anti-Asian hate in American. The brothers then shift to the current topics in Congress, discussing the passing of the Violence Against Women Act and the bill to honor the Capitol Police, both of which faced opposition from the GQP. Next, the brothers welcome Playboy White House Reporter, CNN Political Analyst, and host of the Just Ask the Question Podcast Brian Karem to the show to discuss his riveting tales of being arrested for protecting sources, driving around minefields in Kuwait, being the first to go to Pablo Escobar’s palatial prison and his contentious relationship with the Trump White House. Later, the brothers discuss Mitch McConnell’s threat of a “scorched earth” Senate. Thanks for making The MeidasTouch Podcast a top podcast in North America! Please help us continue to climb the charts by subscribing, leaving us a 5-star review, and sharing this show with your friends! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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And make same-day withdrawals if you win. Download the BetMGM Ontario app today. You don't want to miss out. Visit BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. 19 plus to wager Ontario only. Please gamble responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, Welcome to the Midas Touch Podcast. Ben Micellis, joined by my younger brothers, Brett Mycelis and Jordy Mycelis.

Midas Touch, the founders and creators, not just of a major political movement, but of the phrase hashtag Saki bomb was confirmed today in an earlier interview that me and the brothers did with the stephanie miller and stephanie miller show i as a lawyer used my deposition skills and concretely uncovered without any dispute that midas touch originated the term sake bomb and while we did create a truce between the midas touch podcast and the Stephanie Miller podcast. Let it be known, Saki Bob. Definitely a big time truce though, between Midas and Stephanie. Big time truce. So we love Stephanie Miller. We love going on her podcast. This morning that we're recording this, we were actually on her happy hour show, which is her super fun. She's normally on the radio. You got to watch what you say, but we had a really great time on her show because you're just able to let loose on our happy

hour show. Listen to her podcast after you listen to our podcast. And then she had, yeah, please. Now her show is fantastic. And then she said that once we all get vaccinated and that we're all good to go, we're going to go get some celebratory sake bombs with Jen sake and with Stephanie. And I just can't wait for that. I mean, that sounds like the greatest thing of all time. Are you kidding? I am ready, except for the fact that I don't drink. I will do non-alcoholic sake bombs. How about that? Yeah. I don't know if many people know that you don't drink. You mentioned it's sort of pretty low key, but for those listening, Ben does not drink. It was about two and a half years ago, three years ago, Brett got married. So Ben kind of got hit with a back to back where there's some wedding photos that had

come out. Ben was also doing a lot of publicity for some fire festival documentaries. And I don't think my man, my older brother really liked the way he was looking in those photos and videos. So he said to himself, Hey, I'm done drinking. I'm going to get my weight right. And then he just started running like Forrest Gump. If you know anything about Ben, he can't do anything half-assed like anything he does. It needs to be to the total extreme. So when Ben started running and he used to run back in the day in high school, Ben used to run track and be on the soccer team and things like that. But when Ben started running to work out, he wouldn't be like, oh, yeah, let me do like a two or three miles on the treadmill.

Ben was like, no, I'm going to run 15 miles today. I'm going to run from downtown Los Angeles to Malibu. I'm going to run a marathon tomorrow. Like he just goes all in. And with the drinking, he goes, you know, I'm not going to drink. I'm not going to drink anymore. Only black tea, only black tea. And literally every single restaurant we've ever we ever go to with ben the first thing he does is make sure they

have black tea on the menu and if they don't like he's like it was their way anyway you could get black tea like i'll do any kind of black tea and people who don't watch you know some of the clips that we post you can see it in my hand but at all times i will always have a coffee cup in my hand, but at all times I will always have a coffee cup in my hand, but there will always be English breakfast tea or chai tea. In fact, I get so much chai tea that I often buy out the entire store after like three weeks. If I'm in a new area, I'll go through the entire chai tea and English breakfast tea selection at like a Starbucks where they'll be completely out. And they'll be like, we've just never seen anybody drink tea like that. Are you living in this alternative tea universe? I said, no, I like tea, but let's talk about today's theme.

And today's theme, fellas, the alternative universe of the GQP and the world that they are living in. This is not the old days where we were talking about nuanced debates over tax policy and spending priorities. We're talking about a GQP who can support an anti-women's violence bill. We're talking about the GQP who can support a bill honoring the Capitol Hill police officers who defended a Capitol building. We are talking about a GQP who blames their racism and their hatred on low blood sugar,

who claims that an individual who went out and engaged in the mass murder and hate crimes of the Asian community was having, quote, unquote, a bad day and was simply trying to end his temptation. We are living, folks, in an alternative universe that Midas Touch is calling out. And we need to be clear. The Democratic Party is the pro-democracy party living in reality. And this crazy GQP party, they are living in their own fucked up virtual reality of chaos and conspiracy. Ben is fired up today. And rightfully so.

It's going to be a good episode. Ben is fired up. I think he's drinking the extra caffeinated tea today, I think. I got two tea bags today. Oh, yeah. That's exactly. That's what's happening here. People are going to think we're sponsored by tea. Next time you're ordering tea, make sure you enter promo code Ben at checkout. Yeah, like tea is just the brand. Yeah. No, the truth is I'm overcompensating because normally the brothers and I will talk slightly before the show about what we're going to talk about. But today, I think if I just give some extra energy, I'm just going to overcompensate for the lack of the pre-meeting before the pod.

Great work out there, B. Let's pull it back a little bit and dig into some of these stories. Jordy, I know you've been hyper-focused on a story about an announcer. This was earlier in the week. Could you tell us what happened with the racist remarks of the announcer? Give us some context for what happened there just to set the stage. Yeah, it's a segment called, Please Excuse My Racism, I Have Blank. And what I mean by that is we've seen the most ridiculous excuses come out of why people exhibited just blatantly racist behavior. So one, a former youth pastor, Matt Rowan,

called the Norman High School girls basketball team fucking N-words on a hot mic while announcing the girls basketball game as the team knelt in unity during the national anthem. Now, Matt Rowan would then quickly go on to blame the incident on his diabetes, saying, I will state that I suffered type 1 diabetes, and during the game, my sugar was spiking while not excusing my remarks. It is not unusual when my sugar spikes that I become disoriented and often say things that are not appropriate as well as hurtful. Some people get insulin. Some people say the N word. Let's be clear. We talk about some people. Okay. We are talking about white people and

white supremacists engaging in conduct consistent with their racism and white supremacy. And when they are exposed, they blame it on a health-related issue. They blame it on their temptation that they're having a bad day. sick freaking people, in many cases, like the ones that Jordi will talk about, the massacre at the Asian massage locations, that people deserve to be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. And they need to be called murderers. They need to be called terrorists. They need to be called what they are. I got to commend Jordi, you, because you and another account that we follow and admire all the work they're doing, Resist Programming, put a lot of pressure on the sponsors of OPSN Live's broadcast. OPSN Live is Matt Rowan's streaming service where he said these statements over. And since then, they've lost five out of six of their sponsors by you just using your platform, Jordy, and Resist Programming.

Great job, Jordy. Using their platform. I want to be clear. This is why I do the shout out to the Mightiest Mighty, because it's not just me. I could say these things into a void. And if people don't take action on their own and to help the cause, you know, nothing's going to get done. So it definitely just was not just me, although I appreciate the accolades, Bert.

On behalf, oh, Bert, we got a Bert drop. We got a Bert drop. But on behalf of the Mightiest Mighty and yeah, no, we appreciate it. Yeah, we pressured five of the six sponsored. One was just completely complicit in the whole thing. So we knew that one wasn't going to happen. The page, I won't say it again. He doesn't deserve the free advertising, but he then removed his official website.

It's totally taken down. His YouTube channel no longer has any content published on it. And same with his Facebook. So we completely, you know, together dismantled that company. And I, you know, I'm just so thankful to the Midas Mighty for putting the pressure on the sponsors. If there's enough pressure on a company, if there's enough outrage, companies will change. If they see things as a threat to their bottom line, they will change what they're doing. And that's why it is so important that you use your voice. You could think, oh, you know what?

I have a small account. You know, what's my voice going to do? Well, your voice is going to add up with someone else's voice. And those are going to exponentially grow and increase. And it all works to put pressure on companies. And we need to do that across the board, whether it's companies supporting racism, companies supporting attacks on voting rights, and so on. Turning to a sobering and incredibly tragic story this week, the mass shooting at several

Asian massage locations in the Atlanta, Georgia region, the Cherokee County specifically. Let's be clear on the background here. This outcome is a direct result of Donald Trump calling the coronavirus, the Kung flu, the China virus. And instead of having a plan to combat the global pandemic by blaming the pandemic on the Asian community, on the Chinese community for his own failed leadership and constantly mocking the Asian community. This is a natural result and consequence of that. Jordi spoke on the last podcast before this shooting of the incredibly tragic but incredibly significant and substantial spike in anti-Asian hate-related crimes. You hear about it in the news, but you hear about it through our friends, through people who we know,

who are from the Asian community, who have experienced these hate crimes. And so, Greta, Jordi, tell us about what tragically happened this week and what the sheriff said. Yes, a white 21-year-old male terrorist was charged. Wednesday, he killed eight people between three Atlanta area massage parlors. Now, six of the eight were of Asian descent. The white male, he told police that Tuesday's attack was not racially motivated and blamed it on his sex addiction. Excuse my racism, I have blank. Yeah, which is fucking crazy.

Authority said he lashed out at what he saw as sources of temptation. And people immediately, and rightfully so, were incredibly skeptical of these comments. And Ted Lieu, I think, summed it up best. I'm gonna paraphrase here, but Representative Lieu said something to the effect of, if sex addiction is your issue and your sexual predilection is towards Asian woman, if that's your thing.

And because of that, you take out your frustration by killing Asian woman. That is a racially motivated incident. That is race and sex. These are not mutually exclusive things. And then we found out that a Korean paper was reporting that the shooter told one of the massage parlor employees, I'm going to kill all Asians. It just seems like in all these scenarios, we are seeing in some cases, the media and oftentimes the sheriffs, the police departments going to bat, not for the victim's rights, but for the rights of these murderers, for the rights of these terrorists.

Let's listen to Cherokee County Sheriff Captain Jay Baker, why he said that this shooter went on this killing rampage. The investigators, they interviewed him this morning and they got that impression that yes, he understood the gravity of it and he was pretty much fed up and then kind of at the end of his rope and um and yesterday was a really bad day for him and this is what he did he said that the killer was fed up and this was a really bad day for him for the killer it's like no this wasn't a bad day for him the killer when you have a bad day you might actually go and have a spa day you might have a drink not ben if you're ben you might have some

tea you might take a nap you might play video games that's what you do when you have a bad day you don't go and murder eight people in cold blood that is not a bad day. And let's talk about the where this is rooted. This is rooted in the alternative reality of Trumpism, where they everything rather than just dealing with the truth is blamed on conspiracies or blamed on people, not on the quality of character, but on race. And this particular sheriff has a racist history. He is a racist. He is a white supremacist. And when we look back at old social media posts of this Cherokee County Sheriff Jay Baker. It says, love my shirt. This was a post he put on Facebook. Love my shirt. Get yours while they last. And the shirt is mocking COVID-19. And it says imported virus from China and spelled C-H-Y-N-A-I. I'm not going to do the pronunciation

of the way Trump did it, but that's what the way Trump would call the China virus, mocking Chinese people. And so this sheriff was incapable to meet the moment. And the views of the sheriff, frankly, instead of upholding the law, allow sick fucks like this terrorist who killed people to kill people and kill the Asian community, people in the Asian community like they did. And this is rooted, let's be clear, in white supremacy as embodied in Trumpism, period. Now, Republicans are just constantly saying the quiet part out loud. It seems like racism is just out in the open. These people may as well be wearing their hoods into the halls of Congress. That's how bad it is getting.

That's why they like Trump. They were like, oh, shit, we don't have to wear the hoods anymore. We can just be fucking racist and walk around and just fucking and just do this without the outfits. And 25 percent of the population, 33, is going to support us. We don't even have to hide. Fuck it. Let's do it.

Let's support Donald Trump. That's their whole support base at this point. They are a sick fucking group of people who are white supremacist racists. That's all they are. Just call them out. It's true. I wish we were arguing, you know, what do you think the tax policy is better for this? What do you think the fair minimum wage? I wish we were arguing normal issues with people. But unfortunately, we're not there and we're not going to be there until we eradicate this threat of Trumpism and fascism and racism from our society. And we actually made a video over the weekend about Ron Johnson called hashtag resign Ron. And it showed Johnson's words that said, I'm not afraid of these January 6 attackers. Those were patriots who love

this country. They would never hurt cops. They would never do anything to break the law. However, if there were Black Lives Matter protesters, then I would be afraid of them. I mean, that's the most obvious example of racism that you could possibly say. And if you thought that was bad, flash cut to Thursday morning when Representative Chip Roy of Texas in opening remarks about these rising hate crimes against the Asian community said this out loud. He actually said this. There's old sayings in Texas about, you know, find all the rope in Texas and get a tall oak tree. You know, we take justice very seriously and we ought to do that. Round up the bad guys. That's what we believe. Literally talking about a lynching when doing his opening remarks to speak out against hatred against Asians. Yeah, there was a time when it was what you would do in a bipartisan fashion,

because speaking out against hate crimes, speaking out against terrorism is bipartisan. That should transcend political parties. But here we have the GQP when confronted with a tragedy where we should all rally around the country and rally around, in this case, the Asian community, the country when it comes to the attack on the Capitol, the Asian community when it comes to this terrorist attack. They are incapable of even saying and relating to the victims. All they want to do is speak in racist tropes about lynchings and blame Black Lives Matter. You can't say there's no racism in America and then say, now here's an old timey saying that my family passed down for generations about lynching. I mean, those two sentences are not compatible. I am sorry. Actually, I am not sorry.

Now, the problem is at the end of the day, we're living in different realities as you were touching on, Ben. I mean, when 9-11 happened, everybody rallied and knew the terrorists were the bad guys and wanted to do everything that we could to get rid of terrorism in America. When the Oklahoma City bombing happened, everybody got together and knew this is a bad thing. No one said, you know, Timothy McVeigh was having a bad day. You know what? Yeah, let me tell you on that real quick. Or, you know, Daniel, myself, you real quick on that one.

Maybe Josh Hawley, who wrote a whole paper defending the actions of the Oklahoma City Bomb. What the fuck? I fucking hate Josh Hawley. And by the way, if you're ever gonna start a sentence, there's an old saying in Texas, just fucking stop. You should not complete that sentence. Odds are it's ridiculously racist. Yeah.

Now the problem is, is that when you have somebody like the Kenosha killer, the person who drove across state lines to Kenosha, Wisconsin, to kill protesters, not only does the right not condemn it. What they're saying is this guy is a hero. This guy is a model citizen. This is who your kids should aspire to be. Tucker Carlson hails this person as a hero. Conservatives all want him to like run for Congress and shit. It's really demented, demented stuff. And now when this young man drives to multiple Asian massage parlors to murder people, the right and the police are rushing to defend not the victims, but the killer themselves. I mean, we're in a twisted world right now, if that's the reality with the people with whom we're dealing. And that's one of the issues with trying to get into policy and things. It's

that if we don't agree on the fundamental idea that murder is bad, how do we move forward from there? And speaking about alternative realities, Brett, as you mentioned, you know, here, the House Democrats proposed a bill honoring the Capitol Police who defended the Capitol from the January 6th insurrection. Just think about that. It should be the most uncontroversial bill. If you say you support the blue, as the GQP used to say, they don't support the police, let's be clear. The GQP hates the police and they're anti-military at this point. I just want to be very clear on that. But if you support the police and you support democracy, you would support the police officers who were at the Capitol building that day, who were holding back the GQP-inspired insurgents and terrorists who tried to attack the Capitol building. So the Democrats

continued to try to introduce this bill honoring the Capitol police officers, and the GQP tried to prolong it and basically to all these procedural maneuvers so that the bill can never even be voted on. Finally, the bill was voted on after the GQP tried to delay and forestall this bill. And 12 Republicans voted against it. 12 GQP members voted against it. John Ross, Greg Stoop, Bob Good, Andrew Clyde, Michael Cloud, Matt Gaetz, Lance Gooden, Andy Harris, Thomas Massey, Andy Biggs, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Louie Gohmert. And we've heard these names before. It's the same names. Same names.

Same names every time. It's like the same names every time. And just sick individuals. And just going on my journey, taking you one step further on the Josh Hawley or Holly, should be Josh Hawley. I got an email that said from a Holly who's probably listening to this, who said us, it's spelled H-A-W-L-E. It's pronounced Holly's love the show, but it's pronounced Holly. And I actually hear a lot of people, even in the media, refer to it as Holly. So anybody out there, it is Josh Holly. When Holly was 15 years old, his response to the Oklahoma City bombing was, quote, many

of the people populating these movements are not radical right wing pro assault weapons freaks, as they were originally stereotyped, dismissed by the media and treated with disdain by their elected leaders. These citizens come together and form groups that often draw more medium fire as anti-government hate gatherings. OK, you're right, Jordi. I just want to take that back. At that time, Josh Hawley, who's a senator now, is a sick fucking terrorist man his entire fucking life.

He's acting just consistent with the way he's always been. This is a sick fuck. It's really disturbing and it's really disturbing that these people are in Congress and in the Senate. And there's no coincidence here that the names you listed off, Ben, of the people who voted against the bill are people who seem to be very connected to the insurrection itself. They have a lot of ties to the insurrection. A lot of them were calling for violence. I mean, five days before, Louie Gohmert was literally calling for violence. And we have a clip of that. We'll play it. Bottom line is the court is saying we're not going to touch this. You have no remedy. Basically, in effect, the ruling would be that you've got to go to the streets and be as violent as Antifa and BLM.

So five days before the insurrection, Representative Louie Gohmert saying that basically with the way the court cases are going, not in Trump's favor. The only option is to, quote, be as violent as Antifa or BLM. And by the way, when when that fucker Donald Trump went on Fox News the other day, he basically called the Supreme Court cowardly for not overturning the elections. He's still perpetuating the big lie. He's still out there saying these things post insurrection that led to the ins lie. He's still out there saying these things post-insurrection that led to the insurrection. And finally, Brett, another way that we know they're living, the GQP is living in the alternative reality is the resolution to renew the Violence Against Women Act.

Okay, the Violence Against Women Act is what famously was one of Joe Biden's, President Biden's biggest accomplishments as a senator. Biden wrote the legislation, which was first signed into law by Clinton in 1994. The bill provides money towards investigating and prosecuting violent crimes against women and imposing automatic and mandatory restitution on those convictions and providing for civil redress in cases where prosecutors choose not to prosecute cases. And so this bill had always been professing with bipartisan support until 2012, when Republicans objected to adding protections to same-sex couples. But this is a bill that is a bipartisan bill in nature. Now, 172 Republicans voted against the Violence Against Women Act. The GQP is pro-violence against women. Does that shock you? It doesn't shock me at this point, but there's no other way to read it. I mean, this bill is extremely bipartisan in its nature

and very obvious. I mean, in addition to the things you described, it institutes the federal rape shield law that limits the ability to introduce evidence of a rape victim's past sexual history to try to denigrate them in front of a court. It provides funding for victim assistance centers like crisis centers and hotlines, creates community violence prevention programs. I mean, these are the things that are extremely basic and important, yet the GQP votes against it. It's baffling. It's really, really baffling. I mean, I'll tell you how bipartisan this was. Not only did it pass by a bipartisan nature until really 2012 when the same-sex couples were looped in and how horrible to give protections to same-sex couples. But in 1993, when this passed the House, it literally

passed via a voice vote. They didn't even have to tally the floor because everyone agreed with it. They just said aye and moved on and passed it. That's how radical this Republican Party has become. I just don't know how you can vote no to this and then sleep and look at yourself in the mirror and be able to sleep at night. The only rationalization I could come up with is they just don't care. They're genuinely bad, awful people who don't give a shit. And that's the night. The only rationalization I could come up with is like, they just don't care. They're genuinely bad, awful people who don't give a shit. And that's the thesis. We are living in a reality where we want to help people, where we want to promote humanity, bring people together, support democracy. Okay. That is where I thought our country always was. We may have our disagreements of how

best to perfect our democracy, but we essentially agree on the premise of democracy. OK, but when we have, you know, even even questions like from our next guest, Brian Karam, when he asked Trump about the peaceful transition of power and Trump couldn't answer that question directly. It was the first time since like 1792, you know, from the very foundation of our country where we where we ever dealt with this issue of a peaceful transition of power. We now know, simply put, that there is no intent to have a peaceful transfer of power and that the GQP wants to see a North Korea style version of a dictatorship in America that upholds white supremacy. That is where the GQP sides when they vote against the Anti-Violence Against Women Act, when they don't want to support the police officers who bravely defended the Capitol building, where they try to blame their racism on not feeling well in a specific day,

where they support and promote, though, this horrible anti-Asian, anti-black and brown rhetoric. These are a disgusting group of people. But someone who's been on the forefront and on the front lines of exposing them is Playboy reporter Brian Karam. When we come back after these messages. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast. The one and only Brian Karam joining us. Brian, how are you? Good to be here. Thanks for having me.

Thanks for being had. So we were on Brian's podcast the other day with, according to reviews, Brian, that I've heard, you know, I don't know if you've heard the same. We were your favorite guests of all time. Did you did you hear that? It got out. Somehow that escaped. Yes, we even issued a press release. I hear that I was doing my digging like a journalist. Of course, we all know you for your incredible work, just asking truthful and what perceived as very tough questions. They were tough because you asked the truth and you stood up to power, specifically asking Trump whether he was committed to a peaceful transfer of power. But Brian, I want to go back, though, because I think a lot of the public knows the work you did there. But you've always been, as a journalist, asking very tough questions. You received, obviously, the National Press Club Freedom

of Press Award in 1991 for keeping a source confidential in a shooting case involving a police officer. Tell us a little bit just about what that case was, because before framing what you were doing in the White House press, you know, press secretary's office that day when you were a member of the press club, I want to go back to your background. Well, I was covering a I was a crime reporter at the time in San Antonio for Channel 4 KML TV, which is now W., which is now WOAI and owned by Sinclair. It was owned by, at the time, by United Television. And there had been a couple of cop shootings, and our overnight photographer has to keep me on standby

if there's another cop-involved shooting. I'll come out no matter what time and get here. And I did, and it was midway through this guy's Gary Williams overnight shift when he pulled over two Hispanic brothers, a fight ensued and the cop got killed. And everybody said that they were going to find these two kids and kill them. And nobody really gave them much credit. They were young, poor Hispanic kids on the wrong side of town. And so they caved themselves in. I got a jailhouse interview with one of them who said that they didn't start the fight that the cop did.

Nobody believed him, you know, until six weeks later when the autopsy report came back and the cop had been speedballing. He had cocaine and heroin in his system at the time. And so when the two brothers said, hey, the guy pulled this over and started hazing us for no reason, it started to make some sense. I had three sources I protected. I went to jail four times. It went to the Supreme Court the last time. And the Supreme Court kind of thumbed its nose or gave its middle finger to me. They wouldn't even let me out of jail long enough to pursue it. It was in federal court at the

federal appeals court headed towards the Supreme Court, and they wouldn't even let me out of jail to pursue the appeal. So at that point in time, my source, who by now, one that I was really hopeful in protecting, who was afraid for her life, she had fled to California and she came forward voluntarily and they let me out of jail. So there's a long story short. Yeah. And no, I appreciate the brevity, but also the complexity of the story. And you had district court judges, law enforcement, everybody telling you, you have to reveal this source, but yet your journalistic integrity, you know, you, you stood up to that. You were willing to even go to jail for it. I mean, I mean, walk me through four times, what's going through your mind because

that level of courage, obviously you received appropriately. So the award for it, but I don't think lots of people in this day and age, you know, would be willing to, would be willing to do that. Well, the first thing that went through my mind is I'm glad I had training in boxing. I wasn't, I was going to sleep with my head against, you know, my back against the wall, not picking up the soap in the shower. But most of the, most of the guys in jail, the two weeks I was there the last time, were very cool because they liked the idea that I was in jail because I wouldn't snitch. Snitches get snitches. So they were very happy that I wasn't. That's some street cred. I like it. Yeah. So they kind of gave me, you know, say, ah, that guy's all right. So I only got one fight it was a guy named baby he was about six eight and

he looked like Shrek and he got he thought I was getting it kind of easy in prison so he was going to try and start a fight with me and he probably would have kicked my butt out in the real world but I had a I was scrubbing nicotine stains off the ceilings that day and there was a mop next to me that someone had got done, just got done mopping the floor. And I picked up the mop handle and hit him across the head in the toilet. And after that, they left me alone. You see, so I'll tell you this. So when Brett and Jordy didn't know that I was going to start going there with the interview, they thought I was going to start going right with the Trump stuff. But now you see, it was definitely worth pursuing it. And get this, before Brian dealt with the

American dictator, he was dealing with other dictators and drug lords previously to our dictator and drug lord that we had for four years. So Brian was in Kuwait City and was one of the first in Colombia with Pablo Escobar during the drug war. So you're always finding yourselves in these positions. Just walk us through briefly the Kuwait situation and what you took out of that, and then the Pablo Escobar situation. Well, yeah, the first one was the Gulf War. And I went over there the first time to cover the deployment of a hospital, the 41st Combat Support Hospital. And then when the bombing started, I went back. I had to fight with the military because they kept telling me that they weren't going to let

me to the front at all. So I had to drive, you know, by myself, run some checkpoints, got in the middle of one tank battle to get through to the, it was 73 Easting was the name of that battle, I think. And outside of Khafji, we got into some other stuff. And then up near Rafah, we finally found the hospital I was at, and then they were put on hold. So we left that hospital with the news that the ground war was going to break out. And we rode through north through Kuwait, through northern Saudi Arabia, after having been in Iraq and coming back to Dharan, drove up and got into Kuwait City while the battle was pretty much finishing up. We got, you know, it was kind of hot.

There was one point where one of the, there was a guy by the side of the road with an AK-47, and the producer that was with me said, hey, this is a guy from Iraq. They're turning themselves into American soldiers. Let's get him in here, and we'll take him with us. I'm going, dude, he's got an AK-47, and I got an Icky 79. I ain't going anywhere with him. So we avoided him. And then there were a couple of, we had to drive through a minefield or around a minefield, not through it. Thankfully not through it. Part of it had already been removed.

So we just were very careful driving through it and then got to Kuwait city, put the flyaway up and then did standups with Tom Brokaw and some of the other members of the NBC team for, you know, three or four days after the end of that war and then came back. You were one of the first reporters, if not the first reporter in Kuwait City. We were, yeah, we were definitely among the first. I mean, I don't know technically who got there first, but I mean, we were doing stand-ups and live shots and sending stuff back to New York and to San Antonio the day that it was liberated. And there was still gunfire.

We could still hear. We interviewed people that were – first time I'd ever seen pro-American graffiti. It was like, welcome, Americans. People are offering to make us dinner. Hey, you're here. You're the good guys. And so that was really nice. Good food.

And then we interviewed people that had been tortured by the Iraqi Republican Guard. And then we went to a, it was an internment, the 41st Combat Support Hospital. It also ended up taking some POWs in a fenced in area. And that was really weird. That was some of the elite Republican guard from Saddam Hussein, and they didn't look elite and there wasn't a Republican in the bunch, but they were all in this kind of fenced in area. And then I saw this one guy and he had on a Chicago Bears jersey. And I went over to him and I started talking to him in English.

I knew Arabic enough to get shot. But, you know, there was this guy with a Walter Payton jersey on. And I go, hey, dude, why are you wearing a Walter Payton jersey? He goes, I'm from Chicago, damn it. And I go, well, what are you doing here? And he goes, I came home to visit my grandparents and they put me in the damn army. And he was in the Iraqi army and i've been said he was in the iraqi army against his will holy all he had on all he had on was what he came there with a walter payton jersey and of course we have the

hydroxychloroquine drug lord of our president but briefly you can go into the pablo escobar the pablo escobar were you the first reporter to enter into Pablo Escobar's home after he escaped Colombian prison after he escaped the prison it was crazy these are the craziest stories in the world have you uh considered uh contacting Ghost Equis and seeing if you could take over as the most interesting man so we were we were doing that for America's Most Wanted we were doing a story on the hunt for Pablo Escobar. So we went down to Colombia and we flew in a Huey helicopter to Invergado, the prison. It was in the countryside.

And it was the only prison I've ever seen where the gun turrets pointed out. It was not a prison. It was his fort. And there were these bungalows. They had a porno bungalow, and they had a playing field for soccer. And then they had a pool and a jacuzzi. And he had this wonderful, there was like four or five different buildings where him and his buddies lived, and they had motorcycles and dirt bikes. And he even had a bomb-proof bunker because he thought the American government was going to bomb him. And so he was going to protect himself. And we went there and

his place looked like Jurassic Park. He had a beautiful estate and they had like these dinosaur, big dinosaur things and a zoo and all these monuments and so you go up there and he had escaped like a week before because the Colombian government had enough of them we're going to move him to a more secure facility so he escaped out the back paid somebody off ran into the jungle and off into the hinterlands and so we were there first and Sam Donaldson got there I think the week after we did so it was that was yeah we were very happy to get in there and do that story and then of course he got caught on a rooftop and got shot and killed not too long after all right i'll let brett talk about

that we had to dodge a little bit of gunfire there that was fun i'm over here like yeah well i went i went to japan one time and brian's like i got chased by helicopters and gunfire there. That was fun. I'm over here like, yeah, well, I went to Japan one time and Brian's like, I got chased by helicopters and gunfire and ran through a minefield. I'm like, geez, what a life. That prepared you, though, for the Trump administration. Oh, yeah. Nothing was like Trump. I'll tell you the God's honest truth about that. I've covered wars. I covered the drug wars. I've covered riots. January 6th at the insurrection in the Capitol was the most unsafe I ever felt covering a story. Out of all the stuff I've ever covered, that was one time I had my head on a swivel all day long. And I've never felt that unsafe anywhere.

Tell us about that. It was Capitol. Well, I'd gone down there, you know, it was a normal day at the White House, as if any day was normal. And, you know, so I had a couple of death threats just walking across the street that morning. There was a guy, big fat guy with a Confederate fly. He said he was going to kill me. I recognize you. I said, OK. And the Secret Service guy was standing there. He goes, don't worry, I got this. So I walked into the campus, went through the metal detector, you know, set up. And then Trump had a speech that I went and covered out the south, you know, between the Capitol and and the White House. The one where he had Giuliani, you know, trial by gunfire.

And one of his interchangeable kids was there screaming and ranting, raving. And then I talked to the, yeah, it just reminded me of these kids. It just, you know, always got picked last for kickball. So then we're, we're talking to, I'm listening to the, the, the speech and then all the guys walk off and they're going, we're going to the Capitol because the president said to do it. We're taking it back. And, you know, it was like something out of South Park. It was, you know, it was just really, you know, weird. They took our jobs.

So they all marched up there ready for a fight. And they were screaming at, you know, reporters. And there was the one guys that were crawling up the walls. I remember going, guys, you know, there's steps on either side. You don't were crawling up the walls. I remember going, guys, there, you know, there's steps on either side. You don't have to crawl the walls. You're not Spider-Man. You can go up the steps. And one fell off and broke his neck. And so then, you know, they were dumb. And then they came over screaming, you know, they were going to kill reporters. And I said, wait, I'm with Playboy. And then they go, really?

Can you get us to a party? Can we get in a party? So my life was saved by the fact that I had a Playboy press pass with, you know, the little bunny ears. Well, good thing you didn't give them like your CNN affiliation or. Oh no, if I'd given them a CNN badge, I'd have been skewered. I'd have been right there standing next to Mike Pence as they put him up, you know, on a rope. Did it seem like they had a plan when they were headed towards the Capitol?

Like, did you sense of like, oh, like shit's about to go down? Yeah, the plan was, you know, any I've covered so many mobs. The plan is just rabble, rabble, rabble, mad, mad, mad storm, the Bastille type of stuff, you know, pitchforks and, you know, that's what it is. And that's why it's really unsafe. That's what makes it the most unsafe is because there's no, you know, in a war or even in a riot, you know, there's the police, there's the rioters, and you kind of know what's going on. In a war, you know, there's, okay, these guys are in tanks, these guys are not, here's, you know, you kind of know what's going on in a war. You know, there's OK, these guys are in tanks. These guys are not. Here's you know, you kind of get denied. But that was so confusing because you didn't know you couldn't cover it because they wanted to put you in the story. And so, you know, they were coming after reporters as well as going after the Capitol.

It was just a bloodlust. I mean, it was like somebody got up in the morning, drank the wrong alcohol and decided to go on a killing spree. And Brian, you famously had a contentious, to say the least, relationship with the Trump administration in the press briefing room. Was the first kind of major public incident with Sarah Huckabee Sanders when you confronted her about immigration. Come on, Sarah, you're a parent. Don't you have any empathy for what these people are going through? They have less. Brian, guys, settle down. I'm trying to be serious, but I'm not going to have you yell out a term. And was that kind of the first?

Yeah, it was. It was six months in and I had taken, you know, I don't like listening to them try to bully us. And I got real sick of them calling this fake news an enemy of the people. And I had had a couple of moments of pushback on that. We're not fake media. Watch it. Don't say that. And off camera, when I would go in there and talk to them, I'd say, look, just don't do that. As you know, you're doing your job. We're doing hours. And it got nowhere. And so that one day she came out and I said, you know, that's it. You know, she wanted us. It was before the immigration. It was like six months before that.

The first one was over the fake media. And she wanted Sarah Sanders wanted us to look at a piece of video that she admitted she hadn't seen but thought it was really good. And it was an invented piece of it was actual fake media. And I just said, you know, stop it. Just stop it. You know, we're here doing our job. Anybody can turn a channel if they don't like what they see. They don't have to read us. But we're stuck with you for four years.

So just stop it. And I just basically confronted her on that. We're here to ask you questions. We're here to provide the answers. And what you just did is inflammatory to people all over the country who look at it and say, see, once again, the president is right and everybody else out here is fake media. And everybody in this room is only trying to do their job. I disagree completely. First of all, I think if anything has been inflamed, it's the dishonesty that often takes place by the news media. What was funny is I didn't think anything about it.

I was just pissed at the time and got tired of their bullshit. And I started treating her like she was one of my football players. I almost said like, drop and give me 20. Jumping jacks. take a couple of laps. And so then my phone, well, actually my watch started vibrating because it's tied in with my phone. And there are all these people on Twitter who apparently were going, you know, following me all of a sudden and it would notify me. And it was so it's like vibrating and and i was like holy shit what did i do i just told you to shut the hell up you know so that yeah that was the first

time were you there for the very first one when sean spicer talks about the big crowd side was that just the weirdest fucking thing you ever experienced and you're like were you was that like your moment like this is fucked up well that's i remember turning to someone and going well we know where this is going. There's not going to be any truth in this administration at all. You got to push back. I mean, that's what set the tone. And if you weren't a reporter listening, if everyone got upset with me the first time I got there were a lot of people in the White House press corps. You got upset with me the first time I got into the administration.

You made us part of the story and you should just take notes and you shouldn't say anything. And I'm going, bullshit. They made me part of the story when they call me fake news. I'm not standing there taking that shit from anybody. Fuck that. And so, you know, I don't give a shit what they thought of me. I'm not there for them. And, you know, that's what I go back to old school, Helen Thomas and Sam Donaldson. You're not there for yourself. You're not that you're there for the audience that reads you or watches you. And you're there to ask questions. So ask the question and, you know, push back.

You know, somebody said you're you're very antagonistic towards politicians. Damn right I am. That's my job. I look at politicians like a dog looks at a fire hydrant. That's the only way to look at them. And so I'm not going to take that kind of crap from I don't care who you are. He was President Donald Trump, not King Donald Trump. He deserves the respect of the office, but he doesn't deserve. I'm not going to sit down just because he tells me to sit down or shut up. So, you know, in the beginning, there was some pushback. And I just said, look, man, I don't give a shit what you, you know, you think what you want. You do you and I'll do me. And the White House tried to have your press credentials removed. Oh, yeah. And they took it away. And you had to go to court and battle for that. Tell us about that. Yeah, three times. I beat him in court three times. I love that. He's a three time loser. I would tell you, honestly, I may have thought that was a great accomplishment back then but

given all of the losses I think that he loses just perennially in court but yeah but your battle was a was a significant battle for the first amendment for the freedom of the press just tell us about them taking away your press pass and what you had to do to get it back oh well that was uh I keep forgetting the guy's name yeah that uh yeah that guy so he came out screaming and ranting and raving and saying kind of a shitty stuff and i said look we can talk here we go outside and talk all day he took it as a direct threat you're a poker i was like yeah whatever so um yeah i didn't really give a shit what they had

to say and i was there to ask questions what you know one woman said uh i said mr president could you stay in and take a few questions from the press where they're around this is the social media people that trump liked that he brought there and where are the real media you all are and i was like oh whatever so you know some of them had attacked jim acosta that day about his book there were others that were going after somebody else and so go gorka thought that he could yell and nobody would say anything about him and that wasn't me and i you know i told him i said i'll talk to anybody you can come on the podcast if you want but you know i think he uh um blocked me i told him to go get a job that's

like a week later i saw him on a fish commercial or fish oil commercial and somebody said well what do you think of that and i said well i told him to get a job and he did i guess he takes advice he listened to you he took it i just can't imagine after all you've been through that sebastian gorka going to make you feel threatened. Brian, I think one of the words you used, too, is that I think you call them also a group of people eager for demonic possession. Yeah, that's what got them all. I go, oh, here's a group of people eager for demonic possession. And that drove them nuts.

They went crazy over that. And so I guess a week or so passed. And then one day I was going to leave in the White House. In fact, the president had come out on the South Lawn to leave and had taken two questions from me. And I think one of them may have been about Russia. And then he left. We left. And on my way home, I got a notice on my phone that I was being banned from the White House. So the first thing I did was pick up the phone and call Ted Boutros, excellent First Amendment attorney who also handled the case for Acosta. He jumped on board. We filed an injunction. I got to keep my press pass. They sued or they they appealed and took it to the full district court. And so all five or six, you know, guys on the court looked at it and said, how about this? You're nuts. Karam can go

back in. And then he filed another appeal and lost that. And what it actually did, the joy behind that piece of judiciary give and take was the fact that it strengthened the existing ruling, Sherrill, so that in the future, it's going to be harder to remove reporters. They tried to make the argument that I was combative and they can't control me. And one of the judges on the panel said, look, you still have the ability if there's a wild mooning reporter to have them removed from the grounds. But you just can't remove someone because you don't like what they have to say. Yeah, not in the United States of America. And we're so grateful that you were in there in the press briefing room all the time that you did get reinstated.

Because you asked what, in my opinion, is one of the most important questions, one of the most important moments, really, in American history that I think will be studied and looked at for a while, is when you asked in September to Trump, do you commit to making sure there is a peaceful transfer of power? And let me just play that clip so that our listeners could hear, and then we'll get into that. Win, lose, or draw in this election. Will you commit here today for a peaceful transfer of power after the election? There has been rioting in Louisville. There's been rioting in many cities across this country. Red and your so-called red and blue states.

Will you commit to making sure that there is a peaceful transfer of power after the election? Well, we're going to have to see what happens. You know that I've been complaining very strongly about the ballots and the ballots are a disaster. I understand that, but people are rioting. Do you commit to making sure that there's a peaceful transfer of power? We want to get rid of the ballots and you'll have a very peaceful, there won't be a transfer, frankly, there'll be a continuation. The ballots are out of control. You know it. And you know who knows it better than anybody else? The Democrats knows it better than anybody else? The Democrats know it better than anybody else. Go ahead.

Even just listening to that now sends chills down my spine, especially now with the context of January 6th. I mean, just can you take us to that moment, like you asking that question, you being in that briefing room, getting that response? What was going through your head? Well, by that time, we were under COVID restrictions, and you weren't allowed to be in that room unless you were part of the pool. And OANN had been there and the, standing in the background, and the White House would let them do it. So, I figured if you're going to break your own damn rules, screw you. I'm going to show up too. So I would show up whenever I damn well wanted, which was, you know, not whenever I damn well wanted, but once a week. I was limiting myself to once a week being there instead of every day

because of COVID. And I've been under lockdown like everybody else and been tested and vaccinated and inspected and ejected, rejected, and, you know, deselected. So that day when I got there, there was an empty seat. And so I took it. The pool did not fill all the seats. I had been told I could fill a seat if it was empty. So I sat in it, the very last chair in the very back row. And Trump started on and on. I go, he's not even going to call on me.

So I raised my hand and son of a bitch, if you didn't call on me first. And I remember going to myself, okay, rock and roll, let's go. So the only question that mattered to me was we had been hearing about his reticence. So I said, win, lose, or draw. Win, lose, or draw. Are you going to commit to the peaceful transfer of power? And his answer was frightening to me that he, you know, he said, well, don't stop counting the ballots. Frankly, there won't be a transfer of power. He was,

he was screaming that he was going to be a dictator. And I, you know, what was frustrating to me, I'm going, I can't, and, you know, I kept trying to follow up because there had been riots. There had been concern in the country. And one of the questions right after me, they didn't follow up on that. They were asking about Meghan Markle and Harry. That's what stresses me out so much about the press rooms, because I feel like they often take advantage of those situations and they call on somebody else. I won't like the press to form an alliance and say, oh, you didn't answer that question. Like, well, I'm going to ask the same question until we get that answer. Why can't that happen? That following up on each other, we should do better and it should be, and that is part and parcel of the lack of experience in that briefing room. You know, like the other day I was on one of the COVID tests or the COVID briefings,

and those are done by Zoom. There's 150 people in there, you know, and so they call on a few of us to ask questions. April Ryan, a friend of mine from Baltimore, she asked a question, then they called on me and I said, I want to follow on April because they hadn't answered the question that she asked. But here's the deal. I've been doing this for a while. A lot of people, the problem with that briefing is, and this is the accusation that was leveled against me, you just want to get on TV. Some people do just want to ask a question and they don't think too much about the question, nor do they really listen to the give and take and the flow in the room.

Some of the best questions I've ever gotten in that briefing room over the years or in a press conference over the years is by listening to what other people are asking. And that's another thing that I learned from Sam Donald. I said, Sam would follow Helen all the time. I go, why do you do that? And he goes, I like to follow the best. I mean, you listen to what's being asked. And I always try to ask a question that I think you sitting at home would want to have asked. I don't really care about the, you know, right now we seem to stumble over each other asking about earmarks and, you know, technical things and housekeeping questions. I mean, why are we asking Jen Psaki housekeeping questions?

I can go up there anytime during the day and ask him one of those. I think you should listen and ask policy questions in those briefings. Those are the things that are most important. Or in a case of Donald Trump, just his crazy ass bullshit that he would do all the time. You have to call him on it. Your job is to push back. You need to listen to other reporters. And like you do, I get frustrated with that. And what do you make of the job? Jen Psaki has been, and what do you make of the job? Jen Psaki? Brian, this is what I have to deal with. This is what I have to deal with. This is why I sit quietly in the corner until it's my time. I find my window and Ben still messes with me. Well, I think she is high handed and more polite, but very adept at avoiding questions and very adept at working a small room of 14 reporters. I don't like the snark that she brings

sometimes. And I think we deserve better answers, but she deserves better questions. And I think the current briefing, I'm glad they're doing them because it brings back a semblance of normalcy. But we need to have that room filled with, you know, 70 reporters. You talk to anybody who had her job before, like Joe Lockhart or any of the others. I mean, everybody gives her props for being nicer, more polite. And, you know, it's a low bar to crawl over from Trump. I mean, you know, some of you are not threatening to kill us. I get to go home today without a death threat. And they've done some good things. But ultimately, like Joe Lockhart said, what he worried about was when you got in a press

room and someone would ask a question and then, Brett, like you said, somebody would follow and then somebody else, he goes, I would feel like they were triangulating and I was in the crosshairs. And that's really what we need more of. There's a couple of issues that I think show where the, first of all, I don't know that Jen sees the president every day. She has in fact told me that perhaps she doesn't. So the question is how much does what she say really reflect what the president is thinking? That's why you actually need a press conference with the president, which we are going to get next week. And hopefully it won't just be the pool and extras. It'll be in a larger venue and more people. And then secondly, what you need out of in a press briefing, those

two issues that I talked about that highlighted is we were talking about Jamal Khashoggi and we've asked a couple of questions about it, but we really haven't followed up. And when we do try to follow up, it falls by the wayside. But the question that remains about Jamal Khashoggi is on the campaign trail. Now, President Biden swore that he would treat Saudi Arabia as a pariah state. We knew Trump wasn't going to do anything about the death of an American reporter out of a reporter living in Virginia and working for The Washington Post. We knew that wasn't going to happen. He went on TV and said, it's all about the money. But we wanted and expected more out of Biden. And so we haven't really gotten an answer yet. And we need Biden himself to answer that. They have, in effect, not done any sanctions against Saudi Arabia and given him a free, you know, it's like you get one free pass for killing one reporter. Well, what happens next? I mean, there's a whole big issue about if you're going to kill, it's like killing a cop. If you're going to kill a reporter and all that takes on, how are you going to treat normal people who don't have the public eye? And why is it okay to kill one reporter who worked for the Washington Post? Why is there

not sanctions? Why? This is an issue that really needs to be gone over thoroughly and then the other one and i give the biden administration its props on this issue it's the the jorder that i'm sorry i looked at your name jordy it's the border that's a good nickname for jordy though he's rather than jordy he's the jordy the jorder down on the border trump has basically screwed up border policy and there is no crisis except the one that trump created this is a 40 year long problem that they've played political football with since the uh economy oil economy crashed in mexico in the 70, and they devalued the peso. It's been a huge ongoing problem. Both sides have made political hay out of it, and these people continue to suffer. So it's a huge issue to take on. And the people that I've talked to down on the border that I have known for years

think that Biden is making good initial first steps in dealing with it. But you need to let us in, right, to see it. And you need to quit letting Donald Trump frame the issue. And Psaki has allowed that to happen in her press briefing on a couple of occasions, you know, dealing with a crisis. She should come right out and say, look, it's a 40 year long problem. This is going on. That is going on. And call the press out for that stupidity that we repeat because there are Republicans out there going, it's a crisis. No, it's not. It's an issue that they think they can make hay off of because they're getting killed on the coronavirus. And everybody knows that the Republicans are full of shit. So now they're just going to try and make you afraid of something again so they can get

your vote in the midterms. Brian Karam, thank you for joining the Midas Touch podcast with Brett, Jorder, and myself. Jorder. Jorder. We appreciate it, Brian. Look forward to chatting with you soon, and thank you for your time today. We will be right back after these messages.

No, that's not America. That's not America. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast. Great interview with Brian Karam, huh? Amazing. Also a great interview with Brian Karam. Yeah, but Ben said it fast, so, you know, he said it right. That's his thing, remember?

Dude, I am the worst on fucking names, huh? Yeah, apparently. Even when I know the name, fucking names, huh? Yeah, apparently. Even when I know the name, I just can't. I joke with clients too that I'll always be, and it's not an offense to the individual, I'll always just be slightly off on somebody's name. It's like my Achilles heel. I think you just overthink it.

But no, Brian Karam is really one of the best journalists out there. Objectively, I think he is so fantastic and he's really a hero of mine. Like he's everything that you want in a journalist who's out there speaking dealing with like real issues to then have like Sebastian Gorka call you a punk or to like confront Trump and stuff. It's like the guy is like battle trained. He's like ready to go. He's like the right man for this. Literally battle trained. The guy's been in jail multiple times for protecting a source. He's been in the Gulf War. He's been at Pablo Escobar's house after Pablo Escobar escaped. It's all so crazy. But that's what we want. That's what we want out of journalists.

We want people who are going to ask important questions that people care about. And I think that's why I get so frustrated when I hear some of the questions that Saki gets asked, because she gets asked just bullshit questions that no one cares about. It's a lot more about the palace intrigue or the dog, or is he getting a cat and things like that? I'm like, let's ask questions that the people need to actually, there are important issues that people need to know about. We need experienced journalists who could do their jobs here. And Brian is that guy. And I hope he actually gets back in the press briefing room soon. I would love to hear his questions to President Biden and Jen Psaki and all that.

I think it'd be fascinating. Totally. And one of the things that we've talked about, just switching gears for the moment as we conclude the show, is the importance of aligning the bipartisan support of the people, the bipartisan support on issues like raising the minimum wage, of making education affordable, of giving people health care, of coming up with common sense gun reform, while also respecting the right to bear arms. the complexities of the system, but that all Americans should have healthcare, recognizing the complexities that are involved in operating a small business, but that Americans should have a living wage. All of these things can, in fact, be reconciled with common sense legislation. And the American people are so largely behind that. But we have the filibuster. And the filibuster, as often said, well, the filibuster exists to protect the minority political party that's in power. But that's not how the filibuster is truly being used and abused by the GQP. The filibuster is being used to help the billionaires and deca-millionaires in their quest to gain more wealth.

By and large, all of these measures that the Democrats are proposing are pieces of legislation for the people so that Americans who are not millionaires or billionaires can truly live the American dream to rebuild the middle class in America. And the GQP doesn't want that. And so McConnell has warned of a scorched earth Senate if Democrats change the filibuster. And McConnell says nobody serving in this chamber can ever begin to imagine what that completely scorched earth Senate would be like. Let me tell you what a scorched earth Senate is. It's a blocking the release of the Mueller report, blocking Supreme Court nominees, blocking voting rights bills, blocking gun safety legislation, blocking the minimum wage, blocking laws targeting corruption, these anti-corruption laws. And then it's McConnell championing all of these, basically destroying the filibuster

and championing these policies that have totally changed the makeup of our judicial system. And we know that Amy Coney Barrett was basically put in six days after the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Yeah, you can't threaten somebody with something you already do. It kind of takes the oomph out of your threat when you're threatening them with what you've been doing the past eight years or so. You, Mitch McConnell, are the scorched earth senator. You created the scorched earth Senate.

You are responsible for this. So the concept that now, Ooh, all of a sudden, watch out. If the Democrats get rid of the filibuster, here comes scorched earth. It's just bullshit. And I think the Democrats don't want to remove the filibuster to get, to put in place legislation. That's like unpopular. The Democrats want to pass the legislation that's wildly, overwhelmingly supported by the American people, whereas the Republicans, they wanted to eliminate the filibuster

and push through legislation that helps the 1%. We want to expand voting rights to all the people with the For the People Act. That's what we want to do. We want to be implementing background checks for guns so that people like the shooter in Atlanta aren't able to get a gun easier than they are able to register to vote. I mean, we want to do common sense things that people agree with. The Equality Act provide protections to the LGBTQ plus community. These are all just like no brainers to me. Like, yes, of course, we want expanded voting rights. Of course,

we want equality. Of course, we want sensible gun control and a raised minimum wage. We want all of these things and everybody should want all of these things. And the fact that Mitch McConnell felt the need to come out and make that not so veiled threat shows me that I think we're on the right track and we should call his bluff. We should do it. Call his bluff. Stand up. Let's work to change the filibuster. And the good news is we're starting to see an opening here because both President Biden and Senator Joe Manchin, who Senator Manchin has been very averse to any sorts of changes to the filibuster previously. He recently expressed interest in possibly

a revised filibuster process by which people actually have to do a talking filibuster rather than just say, oh, filibuster. And it's like their get out of jail free card to having to pass any sort of legislation. So, you know, I think we got to take what we could get here. And I think we should fight for this talking filibuster. And we should be pushing for all these policies that, like you say, Ben, are policies that 90, 80 percent of the people want. These are policies for the people. And if the Democrats can deliver on these wins, we'll never have to worry about Republicans using the filibuster for their own ends because the Democrats will win elections because people will like the policies that they're delivering. They will like their higher wages. They will like their expanded voting rights. They will like all these things. And Democrats will naturally win elections. And we don't even have to we could just make them the far right fringe party that they are just make them small and make them go away right now the fall love it the file the final segment

of the show is a segment that we call jorder patrol jordy tell us a funny story about the mycelis brothers that first comes to your mind go so here's the thing jorder can't be my nickname because jordy is actually shorter than jorder So that's not how nicknames work. Jorder Patrol. I remember right off the top of my head, Ben, you were 16. Means I was 8. Brett, 11. That's how math works.

We were filming. We were making like a video. You know, this story's not even that funny. You guys were just mean to me in the end. Jorder Patrol. Thank you for listening to this week's edition of the Midas Touch Podcast. This has been my cellist, Brett Mycellus,

and Jorder, the Border Patrol, Jordy Mycellus. Thank you so much for listening. Hold on, hold on. That's not... Shout out to the Midas Mighty! See you later! Shout out to the Midas Mighty. No, that's not my nickname. See you later. Shout out to the Midas Mighty.