The MeidasTouch Podcast - MeidasTouch Full Podcast - 7/7/26

Episode Date: July 7, 2026

On this episode of the MeidasTouch Podcast, Ben, Brett, and Jordy break down the latest news, from Trump’s bizarre White House luncheon to his Trump Accounts event and more. The brothers also cover alarming developments overseas as China and North Korea test a nuclear-capable missile, Russia escalates its attacks on Kyiv, and Ukraine strikes back with major attacks targeting Omsk and one of Russia's largest fuel refineries. They examine the massive funeral processions for Iran's Supreme Leader, Trump's increasingly uncomfortable behavior toward Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, and his rambling July 4 speech delivered before sparse crowds. All that, plus more, on this episode! Subscribe to Meidas+ at https://meidasplus.com Get Meidas Merch: https://store.meidastouch.com Deals from our sponsors!  HexClad: Find your forever cookware @hexclad and get 10% off at https://hexclad.com/MEIDAS! #hexcladpartner Smalls: For a limited time, get 60% off your first order, plus free shipping and free treats for life, when you head to https://Smalls.com/MEIDAS. Miracle Made: Upgrade your sleep with Miracle Made! Go to https://TryMiracle.com/meidas and use the code: MEIDAS to claim your FREE 3 PIECE TOWEL SET and SAVE over 40% OFF. IQBAR: Get 20% off all IQBAR products. Text TRUTH to 64000. (Message and data rates may apply) Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Ken Harbaugh Show: https://meidasnews.com/tag/the-ken-harbaugh-show The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Your sales order says one thing. Your inventory says another. Your spreadsheet says good luck. O-Doo brings your business together on a single platform. From sales and accounting to inventory and marketing, visit Odu.com to book a demo. It's O'DOO.com. We've got a lot to discuss on today's episode of the Midas Touch podcast. Donald Trump held a lunch with banks and billionaires and other oligarchs. He proclaimed that Nikki Minaj ran the small business. and he said, everybody in America is experiencing a golden age and people are as rich as they've ever wanted to be. Their dreams have all come true, except that's not true at all. Meanwhile, not only are people suffering here on the domestic front internationally. The world has never been more dangerous and more chaotic, at least in recent history.

China and North Korea testing nuclear-capable missiles. no comment at all from the Trump regime, no comment at all from Hegzith or Marco Rubio. You have Russia escalating in Kiev, striking Kiev with ballistic missiles as Zelensky and Ukraine no longer have the necessary Patriot interceptors to stop the ballistic missiles, both because the Trump regime is withholding it and as a result of the Trump regime in Netanyahu's catastrophic war in Iran, which depleted those Patriot interceptors. You do have Zelensky striking back with a drone swarm at Omsk, which is Russia's largest fuel refinery over there. That's about 2,500 to 3,000 kilometers away. So that's a significant development. Meanwhile, in Iran,

in Tehran, as well as come, you have massive, massive, massive. attendance of Ayatollah Komenay's funeral. This may be the biggest gathering of human beings, like in history together in one place. It's the biggest funeral in world history, and you have somewhere between 10 and 15 million people who are attending this funeral procession there. Financial Times has also confirmed those numbers, and we've been sharing this footage just because it is a historic event in human history to see this many people. And I think it also makes us all reflect on what Trump and Netanyahu said was going to happen on the ground. When you see all those people here, I think to myself, that's the place you wanted to launch a ground invasion against.

That's the place where you said that Trump and Netanyahu would show up and be greeted as heroes and that they would be welcomed there with open arms. I mean, you see all of those signs going after Trump and Netanyahu and also America, although you hear people on the ground there saying it's the American government that we're talking about here, not necessarily the American people, but their signs are there will be blood and go after Trump and kill Trump and things like that. Meanwhile, Donald Trump was out there making deranged social media posts. And just to show you how in a media cycle, the press just lets Donald Trump get away with basically anything, he posted that he wanted to get a restraining order against Georgia Maloney, the Prime Minister of Italy.

And it doesn't even register as like a story anywhere, right? The president of the United States harassing a female prime minister, a female leader of Italy, a NATO country, basically saying she's stalking me, right, which is why I need to. restraining order against, you know, that was the implication of that. It won't even be a story that's covered. And I can say, well, can you imagine if former president, and you can't, you can't, and it should not be normalized. And I think I could show you him posting about McCauley Culkin or him posting weird photos of himself and Mike Tyson or post with former President Obama and Michelle Obama on an AI Air Force one where it, you know, says, you know, Black Lives Matter in graffiti and it has, you know, Islamic scripture and all of these things, you know, obviously

horrifying. It's just the very idea of saying that you want to get a restraining order because a female prime minister in another country that's integral to our national security here is like stalking you from somebody who's been found civilly liable of sexual assault here in the United States. It's, it's horrific. And we shouldn't forget also, and I'll bring it up here at the outset Donald Trump's financial disclosures or the portion that he revealed, which showed that there were billions of dollars that he made in 21,000 stock trades and crypto schemes, which over the weekend and throughout the day, the Trump regime's propagandists, it may be unseemly, but it's just like what Hunter Biden did or, you know, the way it's true, they try to frame it

and the Wall Street Journal in New York Post in order of both sides it is, we weren't good when Hunter did it, so we shouldn't be good about it when Donald Trump and his kids do it. It's like not even in the close universe of similarities like at all. And I've been covering that here as well.

And then Donald Trump is railing on communists. We're going to go after the communists at that bizarre July 4th. That's their theme heading into the midterms. We're going after the communists. We're going after the communists. And that July 4th event was the disaster we all thought it was going to be. The fireworks show became like a smoke show, like literally smoke.

Like you couldn't even see the fireworks because they just blew up all the fireworks, all that one so they can say they set the Guinness Book of Records of the most fireworks, polluted the air. You couldn't even see the fireworks. I mean, just objectively. And then the event was had a very weak attendance when Donald Trump spoke and they tried it. Oh, 415,000 people attended everybody. It was $415,000, but actually then $150,000.

It's enough is enough is enough. And let me bring in Brett and Jordi. We got a lot to discuss. And I think I start with this disclaimer because it's true. The next 100 days are among the most important 100 days as everybody gets closer to the midterm elections. And to me, this is the peak moment we've been warning about where exhaustion really starts to say. it's like running a marathon, right? You're really good, maybe early on. You're like, should I run this marathon? What am I doing? What am I doing? I trained for it. But what do I do? Then mile five to

10, you're like, I'm good, I'm good. Then you get into mile 15. I'm pretty good. Then 20 and it's hot. And you're like, what am I doing here? Am I going to be, you know, and that's when lots of people break. And that's kind of where we're at right now. And I know there's exhaustion that really sets in this stuff starts to overwhelm you and feel like this is never going to end and we're never going to get out of this period. But that's when in the marathon you've got to trust your training. And here you've got to trust your values and principles and you got to move forward and you got to rally each other and you got to stay united during very difficult times.

Brett and Jordy, how are you? Got to stay focused. Got to keep putting in the reps, right? Every single day, got to keep putting in the reps. It's good to be here, Ben. Good to be here. Jordie. Good to be here.

might as mighty. I hope everybody had a happy Fourth of July. Hope you're able to get a little bit of relaxation, spend a little bit of time with friends and family. I know it always feels, you know, a little weird when it's Fourth of July as we are witnessing these incredible attacks on our democracy. And as we see the most corrupt individual we have ever seen in the presidency right now, but, you know, I think that's really what America is all about. I think America is about criticizing those in power who are acting corrupt. I think it is about constantly fighting for a more perfect union. And I think that's what we all are collectively trying to do here every single day. Jordy, I gotta say, man, looking a lot better this episode. Last episode,

I saw there were a lot of people worried about you because Jordy was a victim of this heat wave on the East Coast. And Jordy was sweating. He was drenched. Your face was red, only because it was incredibly hot in your house over there. And folks were concerned, even though you told them, The only reason I look like this right now is because it's incredibly hot in my house that I don't have AC on right now. So, Joanie, how are you feeling? You're looking fresh. You're looking good.

It's mighty. I'm feeling great. If you are an audio listener, I know we've been pushing people to download the audio version of the show. And please still do that wherever you get your podcast. It is helping. If you're only an audio listener, you should go back to last Thursday's episode just to get it.

I mean, it's incredible that the brothers even let me on air looking the way I looked. It was ghastly. That's all I could say. I am looking and feeling great this episode. I'm excited to get in. I did just want to take a moment and sincerely thank everyone for the birthday wishes last week. I know I was talking to a lot of folks in the chat, but I didn't say so on the stream. So I just wanted to say thank you guys.

It meant so much. The mightest mighty community is truly just like the greatest community that's quite frankly ever existed. I know I might be biased, but I'm being sincere. Benji, where are we going? I think the most important tool that a reporter has is where you focus your lens on. And it is always very notable to me where that lens is being pointed and where it's not being pointed as I reflect on the downfall of corporate news, which frankly traces the downfall of our democracy, which I believe is worth saving and can be saved. And one of the ways we have to

do that is by building independent news. And so that's why at the outset, I say we should never normalize the fact that the president of the United States is saying he wants a restraining order against the prime minister of Italy by making up that she like is so obsessed with him and wants photos with him so badly that, you know, he needs a restraining order. And just to post that mockery of her, she's a far right-wing politician in Italy. There should actually be a natural alignment between her and Donald Trump. And in fact, she was allied with him in pushing when lots of other European countries were saying you shouldn't be supporting him anymore.

She was one of the voices in the room saying, let's, you know, let's be patient and things like that. And that's who Donald Trump goes, Donald Trump goes after her. And you don't hear a peep about that. And this is heading into the Ankara-NATO conference that's taking place in Turkey. And it is notable as well and not surprising to me, although perhaps surprising to my dogs that you hear in the background, but that's not surprising to me that as we approach this Ankara event, you have Putin out there. You have certain things that are happening around this NATO trip that are very predictable. And we've been talking about for a very long time, right? You have Russia escalating in Ukraine. And if you notice what's happening there, Russia is using a lot more ballistic. missiles and a lot less drones. Why? Because Ukraine is capable of knocking out 90 to 100% of the Russian drones at this point, which by the way, the U.S. could have studied how you did that in the security

umbrella in the Middle East, considering that the Russian drones are Iranian drones are the Shaheed drones, but Ukraine's able to strike those. But Ukraine doesn't have the ballistic interceptors right now. So what's Russia doing? Obviously, they're using. ballistic missile strikes over and over and over again. And Ukraine just doesn't have the interceptor. So just think about it. Like if you're Ukraine, you know if you had the weapon, you could stop the ballistic missile, but you don't have it. So you literally just have to watch as the ballistic missiles strike your cities, whether it's Saprisha or Kiev or Kashan or, you know, any of these areas, while Donald Trump remains entirely silent about it. Now, I'm

mention that the outset that Zelensky has been able to strike back at Omsk, Russia's largest fuel refinery over there, with drones. And if you follow the route that it seems these Ukrainian drones took, they actually reached about 3,500 kilometers. Now, the Omsk fuel refinery was about 2,500, but they took the drones through a very circuitous route to evade the Russian drone interceptors. And so you have that development. And I reflect on Donald Trump promising on day one, he was going to bring peace after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. I know them so well. It would be very easy to do peace. That's why you have, and we should have zero faith. I wouldn't even want to use their word faith when it comes Donald Trump in the same sentence, that this memorandum of

understanding with Iran is actually going to result in anything durable. cost, look what he promised on day one or before day one with Ukraine. It'd be easy. I'm going to get a deal. And instead, he started wars all across the world and he hasn't been able to resolve wars. And he just makes up that he's solved this war and that war and this war and that war, you know, which, which he hasn't. It also doesn't shock me as we get closer to this NATO summit where in Ankara in Turkey, you have Israel under Netanyahu. and the Netanyahu regime escalating its attacks on Turkey, saying they shouldn't get any F-35s. The security umbrella should be Israel controlling

all of the major military weaponry in the Middle East. And regardless of what your perspective is on whether Turkey should or should not get F-35s, what you can deny is that Netanyahu is escalating this rhetoric to affirmatively cause problems at the NATO summit that's going to take place on Tuesday. That's one of the goals of what Netanyahu is doing and trying to derail that. We shouldn't ignore the fact that you have in southern Lebanon and in Gaza Netanyahu continuing to attack over and over and over again in violation of the Memorandum of Understanding and in Gaza.

standing as it relates to southern Lebanon and the purported ceasefire as a result as it results in Gaza, as it relates to Gaza rather. So you have that going on. And we still have thousands of innocent people getting killed mothers, children, elderly people. That's not Hamas. That's not his bold. I mean, those are elderly mother, women, children over there. And then again, what's not being covered, that's how I want to start at the outset. What's not being like what's not be covered. You know, I actually did see for the first time today coverage of what's going on in Tehran at Ayatollah Komenay's funeral. I saw CNN at a crew. BBC was kind of early on having a crew. We focused on it on day one, and I'm not suggesting we're the only people who focused on it.

But now I am seeing some coverage of this. And, you know, it's interesting as I see some of the a criticism of covering it. Oh, you're propagandists for having a team embedded there to show what's happening. I mean, I don't think that's being a propagandist for the Iranian regime. The picture that you all, that was painted by Trump and Netanyahu and Neocon, Warhawks, and others, was that this would be the scene right here after Trump and Netanyahu invented. They promised that after the invasion. And clearly that did not happen.

We shouldn't forget Netanyahu and Trump being hacked on, hacked into Iranian TV. They beam themselves as though the Iranian people would be greeting them as, oh, we saw what you did in Gaza. We saw the genocide there. We saw the genocide that you do in a Lebanon. Yes, come on in. We want that here in Iran. But that's what was sold, right? That's what Trump and Netanyahu said was going to happen.

That did not happen. And now what's undeniable is these images and what we're seeing. And we can discern for ourselves what's happening. That doesn't mean that we are supportive of the Iranian regime by showing you the footage. I think that it's hard to watch that and not accurate. reflect on the size, scale, and scope, and the meaning of that that there are so many people out there who are mourning and showing solidarity and support for this regime. And then people go, I'll Ben, there's just a small, first of all, that's not a small group of people. They're being

paid. Clearly, this is a propaganda operation, okay? But didn't you all say that Iran doesn't have money and they're bankrupt and they're on their knees and you've destroyed their Navy and they're begging for a deal and they don't have any money at all and they're basically bankrupt. So they're bankrupt, but then they've also paid tens of millions of people to show up and coordinate the largest public gathering in history. So I start with that, the things that we'll get to all the other stuff, what's happening in the Ovaloff. If I think we start the show with here's what's not being covered, those are your stories that should lead the news. Here's the thing. You shouldn't be mad at the people who are reporting on this. I mean, it's

ridiculous. You should be mad at the people who've been lying to you about the realities of this war and about the Iranian regime and about the people in Iran. You should be furious at that, quite frankly. And, you know, as we look at all these problems, all those stories to me that Ben was just discussing have a pretty consistent through line that we have a narcissistic, psychopathic, a lying commander-in-chief, and that really permeates through everything, whether it's Ukraine, Russia, whether it's the war in Iran, anything, every domestic issue. It's all lies and fraud all the way through. And we're seeing the consequences of this breakout worldwide and here at home.

I've been watching this commentary, and Ben was touching on a little bit, but from these MAGA commentators and these Netanyahu align commentators. And the things that they are saying just sound way too familiar to me. And I bet they sound very familiar to you as well, right? One of the things that we've been hearing, those crowds, they're using AI, they're fake crowds. They're just there to make sure that he's really dead because they actually hate him. They're crying.

Those are fake tears. They're busing people in. They're busing him in, actually. And they're paying the protesters. They're actually there. I'm not protesters. They're paying the people to be there. They're paying them.

They're paying them. Doesn't this all sound like the exact same stuff that Donald Trump says about the no kings rallies? Doesn't it sound like the exact same things that Donald Trump said about Kamala Harris's rally when she had massive crowds there? Isn't it kind of similar to what Donald Trump's been saying about vandals and the reflecting pool and all this crap? So the problem is he lies about all of the stuff. Far too often there is a complacent, compliant media who is willing to parrot those things because it fits with a certain dynamic, but that's not the facts. And the issue at hand is people need to understand the facts and understand the war that we're getting into, especially if somebody like Donald Trump is going

to send our troops, the brave men and women in our armed forces into harm's way on false pretenses. That's the thing that should piss you off, not people showing you what's actually going on. And so I think this is incredibly revealing when you see this. And yes, there are a lot of people, of course, in Iran who are very against this regime, and we've covered that. We've covered the pro-democracy protests across Iran. And Donald Trump gave those people a lot of false hope. Remember back in the day in February, when he said, take to the streets, I will have your back. And then he did not have their back. But just like in all countries, right, there are people who don't like the, I mean, think about our country, right? Think about the United States. There are people who

don't like their government, and there are people who do like the government. And there's versions of that dynamic that exists throughout everywhere. And so if you are just getting one side of the story here, if you are just being fed of one narrative, you are not being told the truth. And so I think this really breaks through that BS and breaks through. And I even saw a lot of MAGA people today saying, wow, I feel lied to. I feel lied to. I'm looking at these crowds in Tehran. And this is not what I was told about the Iranian regime. I was told we were going to be able to overthrow this regime in a night. I was told we were going to be able to walk in and it was going to be done. But no, it's a country of what, the 90 million people, I believe. And they had something like

15 million people out there, not protesting, but out there. I guess they were protesting Donald Trump with those signs, very graphic signs about Donald Trump and J.D. Vance and they had signs about Laura Lumer. Like, when you see the signs about Laura Lumer, I'm like, oh, they're very red up. They're paying attention. That's not someone I would say would be a household. name if he asked people even in our country. But you're like, oh, they're deep in it. They're educated on on what's going on in the United States here. It's just eye-opening. And as you see also, the stuff that Donald Trump was posting about Maloney in Italy, the Italian prime minister, like Ben said, that's somebody who Donald Trump should be best friends with, right?

So they share a lot of ideology. You know, a lot of people don't like Maloney because she has a lot of these kind of maga-esque beliefs. But Donald Trump is attacking. her and he's attacking her on a personal basis because she didn't want to, I guess, get involved in Donald Trump's war and she had a stern talking to him. We all saw that footage at the G7 a couple weeks back. And so Donald Trump wants to act like, she's obsessed with me. She's obsessed. She can't get enough of me. It's sick and it's very predatory by the way from somebody who is an adjudicated sexual predator. And you could see the way that he acts as a predator, even on female leaders across the country. But I think that.

I think it gives you some more insight into Donald Trump, insight, which you probably know. And that's that Donald Trump, even though he does have this, you know, very horrific ideology and that is toxic and fills the political landscape both here and abroad. At the end of the day, Donald Trump is a selfish human being, and everything to him is personal. It doesn't even matter if you align with him on nine out of ten things. If you make him look bad or you go against him on one thing, he will go after you, the same way He has gotten rid of all these other people in Congress who decided to vote to release the Epstein files, even though they voted with him 99.9% of the time.

They became his public enemy number one because to Donald Trump, it's all about, you must respect me or you must flatter me. You have to constantly stroke my ego 100% of the time. And you fall out of line, I am coming for you. And that's the message that he's sending to Maloney and, frankly, other words. world leaders while he's doing this. But that's really where it comes from, this very selfish, narcissistic, sociopathic and psychopathic mindset of Donald Trump, where he just has to attack, attack, attack, attack when he feels threatened, even if it's something incredibly reasonable or just

a disagreement. Absolutely. Look, the biggest reckoning in our lifetime, Midas Mighty brothers is going to be this idea of championing truth as a society again and not allowing yourselves to get played, not allowing yourselves to be lied to, and then not being willing participants to make the lies even louder. What's so frustrating, I think, for so many, is Donald Trump has lied to his base so often and so many times and so loudly now that they're finally starting to wake up. It's just this whole idea that the Trump regime is it doesn't deal in reality, right? Why for the Trump regime would you acknowledge that there are that many people, you know, attending the funeral for the IATOL? Don't acknowledge it. Then it won't

exist. Why for the Trump regime should he acknowledge that China and North Korea have been testing nuclear weapons? Don't acknowledge it. It doesn't make it real. Just don't acknowledge it. It's the same reason why Trump wouldn't sign the Housing Act, in my opinion. That would make the affordability crisis, very much real. But if he doesn't sign it, doesn't acknowledge it, not real. He lives in his own MAGA reality that he's crafted by putting all these yes people around him, right? Why not test for COVID in 2020? That would make it real. Donald Trump is all about just keeping his whole MAGA universe so pristine and pure, his MAGA universe, the golden age for Donald Trump and his regime and the people at Marilago. It might be the golden age for them, but not for the American people.

It is so obvious to me that his refusal to acknowledge that these things are existing is so intentional because then he has to try and address it. Then he has to answer for it. Then it becomes his problem. And he's the laziest person in the world. He doesn't want to do the work. He doesn't care about the American people. That's not why he's president.

He became president to stay out of jail. And now he's using the office of the presidency to continue to grift and line his pockets with money. That is what he's doing. That is what he cares about. That's why last year he walked away with 1.4. billion in crypto earnings. Why? Because he doesn't care about you. This isn't the point. Is you the MAGA base, you the American person? He could care less. It's all about how can I use this office

and this power to benefit himself, his family, and those around him. If he doesn't acknowledge these things are happening, it doesn't exist in the MAGA reality, Ben and Brett. Yeah, and he uses the same tricks. And so we'll talk about this when we come back from our first break. But his post, He goes back to the Walmart trick, right? Remember during Thanksgiving when prices were significantly higher and he says, Walmart, 25% down under Donald Trump versus Joe Biden. Then he calls him sleepy crooked Joe Biden. We all know that for Thanksgiving.

That was not the case. But he just goes back to it right now. Walmart bringing down the price of beef at least 15%. Other prices going down 25%. Everybody else. Time to join. What did he say two weeks ago? Freedom gas centers.

I never heard of these. In eastern Philadelphia, freedom gas centers, everybody. They brought down their prices 25%. It's going to be great for you. We all know inflation is rising, and it's rising at an alarming rate. Not only is inflation rising at an alarming rate, you have jobs being lost at an alarming rate. So you have both aspects of what's called the dual mandate of the Fed under attack.

You're losing jobs. right now while you're having inflation rise. And that's a very, very serious issue that's taken place right now. That's the reality of what's happening out there. While Donald Trump says we're in a golden age, right? Let's take our first quick break of the show. A reminder, as Jordy said at the outset, we'll keep on reiterating. Subscribe to the Midas Touch audio. It really is an important initiative that we're pushing right now. We're trying to rise up those audio charts again, and we need your help. So just wherever you get your audio podcast from, or if you don't, just go find out where you have audio podcasts available and then just find Midas Touch, subscribe, and we appreciate that and leave a five-star

review. All right. Let's take our first quick break of the show. We'll be right back after this quick break. As you know, I've been using Hexclad for a while now and I've been obsessed with it. I love grilling in the summer, but once you move beyond burgers and steaks, that's when things usually get frustrating. Vegetables fall through the grates, fish sticks, or falls apart.

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Use the codes. If there's an exit survey, let them know. We sent you real quick. Benji, those sponsors, Hexlad and Smalls have been big friends of the network for quite some time now. If you are in the market for those products, definitely show them some love. There's some great discounts and some great offerings. Benji, where to you next? You know, I often tease what I'm going to show in the next segment like Walmart's, the post about Walmart. Then I just end up saying it. And I'm like, man, that's not a good tease if you

just give the answer right away. But I'll just bring it up one more time that, you know, Donald Trump posting, great news, everybody. I've just been informed that one of the biggest, best, smartest retailers at America, Walmart, will be lowering its prices to celebrate America's 250th. They're going to reduce the price of a pound of ground beef by almost 15% amongst many other products. This is a huge deal for the many millions of Americans who smartly shop at Walmart, which is a truly patriotic company. What do you do? You're trying to pump up their stock like you did with Dell today? You had Michael Dell standing behind him today. Del stock rose, you know, how to check what it is. And I wasn't following it all day. But while Trump was there, the stock rose

where the guy probably made quite literally billions and billions of dollars to then say, how many times has he announced that he's doing this now? It ended around like 4.43% up and hit like 8% up right after Trump said that. And it should be, you know, in Trump's financial disclosures that he himself released by law, he has, what, over a million dollars in Dell stock. And this is not the first time that Trump has done this before we even knew that the financial, that was. on the financial disclosure. Remember a few months back when Donald Trump was giving, I think he made it in the Rose Garden or the whatever it is now, the concrete slab in the where the Rose Garden used to be. He was outside somewhere. And he made a comment, you know, buy Dell. Now is a good time.

Buy Dell. And then it was revealed that he had all this Dell stock. I mean, the corruption that's happening is just mind-blowing. By the way, I'll go back. I think it was over the same announcement. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was about the account. It was about the Trump investment funds that he's called like it's literally the same he and it goes back to my Walmart point right which is he did the Walmart announcement Thanksgiving he just brings back the Walmart announcement I don't even know how many times Dell has been in the Oval Office where they've talked about a philanthropic investment by Dell where he's putting in X amount of dollars into the Trump investment account so it's going to be a tax write off at a corporate level and maybe even individually for it for

for Dell, depending on how it's structured, the so-called Trump investment accounts by S&P and NASDAQ ETFs, exchange traded funds. So companies like SpaceX when they're applied to the exchange traded fund because they got them to like waive the 100-day requirement, you know, so the companies are putting money into accounts that invest in exchange traded funds, automatically for kids that then pump up the market for the companies. You see what they're doing there because when they invest in these exchange traded funds, those funds that have to buy the companies that are at the top of the exchanges, and then that pumps up the company.

So it's like, Micron gave 250. So they get a deduction and they're putting it in something that should boost their own stock price down the line. That's part of the situation that's going on. You know, it's a thousand bucks. I don't think, like, I want to be clear, I would like to see and make sure, first of it shouldn't be called Trump accounts. I'd be interested to actually see how young people and babies can make more money or get money and be able to thrive and live.

But if you talk about some of the major issues right now facing the American people, I don't think it's babies investing in the stock market right now. I mean, I think it's homes and afford. and dealing with the crises that most Americans are confronted with. That isn't for me to say I can hold a complex thought and think to myself, how, you know, are there smart investments that you can be doing for children that grow over time? So when they're adults, that they can, you know, also participate in the market. Potentially, I want to know more about it.

But I think about what's needed right now. And I also think about the market manipulation taking place before our eyes. But then you have the Walmart announcement. here's what's going to have. You know, Walmart, bringing down its prices. And then, you know, it's like what he says with drug prices, right? You know, that they're down 800%. It's the same, it's the same schick.

They're down 800%. Okay, so the drug companies are paying you $800 if the products won. Most favored nations. That's not happening. You're telling me that the drug companies are now reducing their prices. So it's as cheap as the cheapest price of that same drug. foreign country. It's just not happening. Like, he could keep on saying, we're doing most favor nations, because most people don't know what that even means. Most favor nations means the

same price as the lowest price. That drug gets charged in another country. It's not, objectively, that's just not happening here. And over and over again, I can go and talk about, you know, each one of these schemes that he runs. And it just, it just lies. So you see that, you get your hopes up. And they're like, the manufacturing boom is taking place here. It's manufacturing boom. taking place? Quite the contrary. We've had some of the biggest job losses late. I remember, you know, we were reporting on the manufacturing boom that it was actually

happening under the Biden administration and all the investments. And if you remember those charts, I don't have one on me right now, but like it was like a steep increase in manufacturing investment under Biden. And Donald Trump just reversed all of it, like just, like shut it all down. And now he tries to claim some sort of victory over that and tries to claim manufacturing gains when there really aren't. Right now, the entire economy, like all the economic growth is basically what in like hospitality and or medical, I think. It's a medical, right?

It's straight. Hospitality is losing. It's basically just medical, medical health care, which is probably a result of, you know, having a lot of older people, you know, in the country right now. And so that's true. It's a lot of private equity investing in health care companies that actually then charge the government for Medicaid. and Medicaid-related services. And interestingly, you want to know where the waste, sorry, Brett, to interrupt you, but where the waste, fraud, and abuse in these systems come from is not at the individual

level of people getting the treatment. It's oftentimes the private equity firms and people like a Rick Scott's company, who's now, he's now the Senator of Florida, that would send and submit incorrect statements to the government for reimbursements in order. to make all this money is where actually a lot of it's and that's one of the areas where you know where anyway yeah Rick Scott's Medicare fraud was something like 1.7 billion dollars in fraud just a just a massive massive number and so you should remember that as people like Trump and and these Republicans work to remove a coverage of Medicare and Medicaid and and all social security and

all these services from people and they try to claim oh we just got rid of it for those all legal immigrants, it's not you, it's not you, we're just taking care of the fraud. Like, even if that were true, and let me reiterate, that is not true. That's a lie to cover from stealing health care from human beings. But even if that were, it pales in comparison to what the Rick Scots of the world are doing, the people who actually own these conglomerates who are quite literally stealing from you, but that's the oligar class, right? That's the class of people who they are working to protect. And I think that's a big issue that I have with so many of the things Trump does, because I truthfully personally, of an issue with the Trump account stuff, honestly, like really at all. It kind of stems from an idea

that was actually put forward by, if you go back, like Cory Booker and then Senator Bob Casey had a similar idea. Like, it's not a bad idea in and of itself. What I issue is, is that what Trump ends up doing is he always picks winners and losers. And so on the one hand, you have these Republicans who are trying to, you know, put forward and, you know, just capitalism is amazing. And we need unfettered capitalism because that, that's what makes prosperity. On the other hand, they're not actually, they actually don't want that at all.

They actually want crony capitalism. They want a capitalism that is just, they essentially want socialism, but socialism for their rich buddies. And so you have Donald Trump constantly picking and choosing winners, trying to hurt and come after companies that he doesn't want it to succeed. And then striking all these deals and corrupt deals

and doing all these, making all these efforts to pump up companies that he does like, like in that Walmart post, this great, incredible company, you've got to go to Walmart, this is how business is done. Same way he treats everybody, right? Because going back to the Maloney example, what does Donald Trump want? He just wants people constantly to be praising him, like a dictator, like people do in these regimes across the world. That's what Trump wants. That's the energy he wants, and he doesn't want anybody to do anything else. So Del, go buy Adel, go to Walmart, go get your, I don't know, whatever these other MAGA companies are. I'm not going to give him free

advertising. Can I just say this though, Brett? Because I think you're on to something. I think at the baseline, like the Trump accounts thing, it could be a good thing. But I just think anything that Donald Trump touches and brands himself, you just have to be highly skeptical of it. Also, you know, what does every good Ponzi scheme need to keep going? It needs more suckers. And unfortunately, these suckers are sucking on their pacifiers and thumbs and aren't really willing participants in this as their parents opt them in. So again, I am high. skeptical of anything Trump does, even if it seems like it's a good thing. And all of a sudden, now he's starting to prop up all these other companies around.

Why is he doing that? You just have to investigate. I don't mean to drop. But let me give you the answer. It's what I said before. So what he's now encouraging these companies that many are worried are in a bubble, right? The semiconductor AI, you know, lots of these companies that are propping up the market, take some of your money and do a philanthropic investment.

into the so-called Trump accounts, right? So it will be a tax write-off for you or a deduction for you, depending on how it is classified. You put them into these accounts. The accounts then are forced to invest in the S&P 500 to which you're listed on. So then those accounts then put those $1,000 or whatever into the market. And then these exchange traded funds, these ETFs that buy the market, then buy your company.

And when you do it at scale, it props up the market. So that, to me, is one of the schemes behind it. And one of your kind of late stage capitalism red flags, if you will, is that a lot of these companies got a lot of American investment in it from the Chips Act, which was a Biden initiative, seeing that our semiconductor industry was good, was basically non-existent compared to what was taking place in Taiwan and other places. So what was it? $40 to $50 billion were invested in these companies, if they hit certain metrics, they would

get lots of money. Like look at a company like Micron, which just gave $250 million as a philanthropic investment to a so-called Trump account. It's gotten subsidized to the tune of three to file. I have to go back and look at what the numbers. But like $3 billion of taxpayer money went. to them, which helped the company go from 60 billion market cap to like over a trillion market. Go look at market.

It's like, whoop? You know, and where do you think that those years came from? In my opinion, it was Chips Act investment, which, by the way, could be good if you have the semiconductor industry, you know, actually being sustainable and doing the right thing. But then I think they do these Trump account things to focus on pumping up the stock versus pumping up the company itself to begin with. So that's what I think is also behind a journey, in my opinion. I think that aligns exactly with kind of what I'm saying here, right?

Like it just feels like there are more shady pretences around this. And again, something that could be good. Anytime Trump touches something, it turns to shit. So I think just anybody has to be highly skeptical of what this looks like. Well, I'll, this is a segue. Then we'll go to the break because I don't want to, I don't want to belabor this, you know, this point. Because look, obviously, as an American, I still root for Team USA. Okay, my wife's family is from Mexico, so I would root for Mexico as well.

And they live here, obviously, now. They're citizens here in the United States, but they're born in Mexico. And so it was a disappointing loss, obviously, to England, although England played great. And I'm enjoying the World Cup. I enjoy watching it. I hate when the politics are infused into it. I don't like the, I want to just watch sports, you know, and not make it. weird. And, you know, when Donald Trump did the, all of the bad comes from like the Peace Prize

and the weirdness and the personal aggrandic. But if you just let sports pans be sports fans, people want to form bonds and be together. Like, I hated when you had Mark Wayne Mullen, Homeland Security Secretary said I was dancing around when Iran lost in the world. Like, why are you dancing around? And why did you treat the team that way? Or why did you treat all of those teams that way when they when they arrived here but you know when donald trump has so overly politicized this and then he calls up giani infantino and you know and then tries to put his finger on the scale you see the outrage internationally with flow balligan um being um you know you know being allowed to play after the red card it was the first time by the way i don't think it was a good call to begin

with but it was reviewed on instant replay but you now but because everything trump touches, he infects with that. And then they were bragging about it today and like laughing about it. And Ted Cruz like, thank you for doing that, Donald. Thank you for doing that. And you see why the rest of the world is absolutely limited. And I'll just say, obviously, if it happened in another country against us and we saw it be dead. I got to say, the only thing I'm going to say is I think it's very interesting that Donald Trump has spent his entire term railing against birthright citizenship, only to call up the head of FIFA in order to help out the guy who is only on the USA team right now and only a citizen due to birthright citizenship.

So thank you, Donald Trump, for your endorsement of birthright citizenship. Glad that we could clear that. And by the way, for the record, too, I am stoke flow is playing in the game. I think it gives us a huge advantage to win. That's not the point of this, though, is just Donald Trump's, his own corruption. It just knows no bounds. And it just gives up. As you said, he gets a stank all over.

It gives us this kind of stank like internationally. I do want to say, though, anyway. Can I say something positive, though, just to go off the, I do think, I think the World Cup has been incredible, though. And I love these international events where everybody is tuned in because I think, you know, sports and whatever, even take away like all that stuff. Just the idea of people from all over the world all kind of focused on one thing. And I think it's, I think it's very special. actually. And it's one of the reasons I love the Olympics, no matter where the Olympics is. And I think you really actually see the best of humanity. That's why I hate all the stuff that Ben was

saying with Ted Cruz and all these obnoxious people and crumb getting all their stank all over this. But I think it's really cool. And I think it's also cool that, you know, there are all these people from all these countries all over the world right now who are in the United States, who are in Mexico, who are in Canada and are getting to experience, you know, things that they never had before. And there, you see these videos online of them, you know, being amazed by things that we take for granted, right? And things that are kind of quintessentially American, even though if we joke about them and write them off, like fast food places or Costco or things like that. And so I think it actually is like incredibly, you know, special and a unifying experience.

And to me, it's been one of the kind of bright spots in a very dark time, quite frankly. We know, which is why when we come back from your last time. I want to add this one thing. Sports are the ultimate unifier. There's nothing like sport in this country. There's nothing like sport in the world. The fact that these things exist are incredible. Also, Flo should never have had the red card to begin with.

I'm stoked he's playing. Let's go, USA. And it reminds me, though, of how perverted Donald, that's the thing that's the right word, the perversion of the July 4th celebration, which, you know, he ruined. I mean, he ruined America's two. I mean, every aspect of it was odd and weird in the rallying against communism.

I mean, you had the so-called great American state fair, which wasn't great, and it wasn't even a state fair. And then the heat exhaustion, the bizarre fireworks, just to set a Guinness book of records and to blow them all up at once without any rhythm or patterns or colors, right? It was just all white and just blowing stuff up, you know, which is probably a parable for the Trump regime itself. you know, while talking about vandals and reflecting pool and tearing things. And it just, you know, it turned something that could have been actually very unifying

into something that was, you know, ugh, ugh, you know. And so there you have it. All right. Let's take our last quick break of the show, a reminder. Subscribe to Midas Touch on audio, wherever you get audio podcast. Make sure you subscribe on audio. All right. Let's take our last quick break of the show.

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So definitely check them out, especially if you're in the market for those types of products. Benji, where to next? Something I probably should have mentioned at the outset about these stories that are not getting the coverage they deserve. We should also be focusing on what's happening in Venezuela. Obviously, a few weeks back now, two weeks back or so, the back-to-back earthquakes there, the forquake and then the main quake, you know, it's so rare to have those happen, you know, right after each other that way. And then I think a very slow search and rescue operation that was held back

by the authoritarian regime there of Delci Rodriguez and Diastado Cabello, and lots of people on the ground were trying to, you know, get their loved ones or be able to actually, you know, do work. The United States said it brought in $100 million or $150 million, and they made that the big announcement, $150 million for search and rescue. But again, it's like when we talk about Micron giving $250 million to these so-called Trump investment accounts after getting billions of dollars in subsidies from the taxpayers, you know, it's also like, like how much money did Venezuela give to these opaque accounts that Donald Trump has opened up regarding Venezuelan oil, billions of dollars, right, that we've taken, or Donald Trump's

has taken, I'm not really sure where the money is, right? But we know they've taken billions of dollars in Venezuela and oil. And then it's like, we'll give you $150 million, but we took billions of dollars. Why wouldn't we rush billions of dollars of resources there and marshal everybody. And it seemed that what was most focused on by Delci Rodriguez and Diastado Cabello was the show. And I think the people in Venezuela know this, that a lot of the attention was like giving, and this was the other day, they gave medals to the American search and rescue team, you know, because they know that Donald Trump likes medals. And so you literally had Delci Rodriguez and diastado Cabo, who are in the Maduro regime. And the Trump regime lay

the Maduro regime, narco-terrorists, and that the leaders of the narco-terrorist ring, this is what they said about them, were Delci and Diazado Cabello-Cabello. I mean, we have a most wanted sign, Diazado-Cabedo-Cabedo, $25 million. He was labeled this by the Trump regime. This is how they labeled him.

And the Biden administration. And this guy and her were given medals. While there are still tens of value, what are you celebrating? Even if you think that the search and rescue team did a valiant job, or a valiant effort, there are tens of thousands of people who are unaccounted for, over 3,000 dead, tens of thousand injured. And when the death toll is counted, I mean, it could be in the tens of

thousands, potentially. I also think an investigation is needed into some of the underlying causes of the earthquake. And again, I don't want to veer into a conspiratorial area. So I'm very careful with, you know, it's a natural disaster. I do want to say that drilling activity, fracking activity, increasing that has been known to increase or enhance seismic activity. That link has been proven before. I don't have the data to suggest, and I'll be very clear, a cause and effect here, although I will say it is very rare to have a forquake and then an earthquake back to back like that. But regardless, why are you doing, you know, there are tens of thousands of people likely dead. We know 3,000 are dead. This is a time of mourning and you're out

there giving medals like it's the FIFA or like it's, you know, like the Olympics. Like what, what, and in diastado is, and obviously, why is Delci having Deistado do it? Because it legitimizes the leadership in Venezuela, when you have the, basically, the U.S. ambassador now to Venezuela there, and Diastado is doing it. So think about how difficult it would be now, what you're going to bring a criminal case against Deiastado in the future, when your own ambassadors right there as part of the award ceremony with Deistado. So do you see how that was a move by Delci and Deistado to also insulate themselves from prosecution in the future or from any accountability there. And meanwhile, you have the Trump regime saying Maria Machado is doing some grotesque PR stunt

and that she's trying just to show up there and they're basically prevented her from getting a visa. They stopped her. I think she traveled somewhere to then stop there and then fly into Venezuela and she was stopped from doing that. So I think that that's, again, that story's not getting enough attention, which is why I'm covering it. Also, no. I was going to say, you know, add Maria Machado to the list of people who put their trust in Donald Trump and ended up getting screwed over by it.

And Maria Machado, you know, you remember she won the Nobel Peace Prize. Donald Trump was bitter about it. And remember, I mean, she's a very impressive individual who, yeah, and unfortunately, she really sold out all. of her credibility. She took a big gamble, which I think clearly has not paid off on kind of just going to suck up with Trump and then let's, I'll give you my Nobel Peace Prize and all these things. At the end of the day, she ended up just humiliating herself. And now as she tries to see if she could even go back to Venezuela and have some sort of impact or do anything, now she's just getting iced out by the Trump regime who's just like, nah, we're cool with the Maduro regime now.

Like, we're tight. We're in business together. We're hanging out. We're having fun. We're friends. I mean, that just shows you, you know, again, what Donald Trump values more, you know, than anything. Donald Trump will screw you the second he gets the chance to as long as he thinks that it's going to be better for him personally, not better for the Venezuelan people, not better for the American people. And it's why we were sounding the alarms when, you know, the people were pushing those images of Venezuela and celebrating in the street after Chavez's ouster. And they were like, look, they're so happy. How could you be upset? Look how happy they are. And I said, because I know how this ends. I know how this ends with people. I know what Donald Trump is going to do here. And now if you look at all those polls, the people who are dancing in the streets, they're not so happy anymore. They feel oppressed. They are very disgruntled with their government right now, the Maduro regime, the same oppressive regime.

Trump regime, right? It's a puppet. Trump runs it now, basically. Yeah, they're Trump puppets. And so they're now furious. A lot of them are furious at Donald Trump. This is building resentment. And in my opinion.

and this is a powder keg that will explode in the future, you know? There's always a reaction to an action, right? There's always something that is going to happen. There's a butterfly effect, so to speak. And when Donald Trump does these things, you may not see it right away, but down the road, you are going to see a lot of unrest, and you're going to see a lot stemming from this. I mean, because what more of a humiliation is there for a country

than for you to let your country become a total puppet of the United States? States of America. You don't think that's going to build some opposition. You don't think that's going to enrage people against the United States, against leadership. And we're already seeing more than the seeds now. We're seeing that already starting to grow. Bray, you just said something right there. I don't know how you didn't just belt out laughing. Well, I guess I do know because of how serious the topic, but you go, she as a Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize and Trump was bitter about it. Like, that was verbatim what you just said. I mean, what an insane friggin timeline that we're living in that that could be a true statement. She won a Nobel Peace Prize.

So Donald Trump got super, super mad at her because he thought that Nobel Priest Prize should have went to him. I mean, just out of this world bonkers that we've just- At least Trump got the FIFA Peace Prize. We know that organization's on the up and up. I think, look, Donald Trump is a dystopian reality TV president or dictator. And what happens in reality TV shows? Outcomes happen fast. There's like a challenge.

There's an outcome. it appears to be real, but it's fake, right? It's usually scripted by the producers in advance, but it has the trappings of reality and something happens. And so when we talk about the cause and effect, Brett, where you actually play something out to its logical conclusion, maybe it doesn't happen that day, but in Trump's reality show, that episode is over.

We move on to the next episode, but the world hasn't moved on to the next episode, right? Like, we're now a year and maybe more out from Trump's so-called Liberation Day. And yes, the inflation didn't surge on day one, right, after the disastrous announcement. But now we're experiencing it because things in real world, not reality TV, in real world, they take time to develop. And that lag is often what MAGA has kind of used to attack the other. I mean, if you think about the most significant example, is that a lot of the impact of COVID financially, economically, hit when Donald Trump left, right?

He destroyed the economy. The PPP program where they printed all of this money and they gave it out to mostly rich people, the way supply chains were destroyed, and of course the deaths taking place when you had to reopen the economy with all of that and you had to take the bandage off, it turned out it was gross. It was ugly. And there was a lot of inflation. And that's why lots of people

predicted great recession. And it was tough for Biden. And Biden was old school and he really couldn't message it. You know, he was about uniting and let's get past it. And da-da-da-da-da-da. And while he was taking the steps to fix, then he was being blamed as the firefighter for what the arsonists were actually doing. The same thing here, Brett, you look at Venezuela. Okay, on day one, yes, Trump did the invasion. He put Delsey in. But now we're feeling the systemic impacts and the consequences of what's actually happening. And that's going to be felt long term. And outside of Venezuela, what it has enabled, going back to what we talked about is the law of the jungle, the law of the strong, where China feels a certain way about Taiwan now in a different posture.

And China's doing nuclear capable ballistic missile test. where Russia feels completely free to say, okay, we'll do whatever. I mean, you're just invading Venezuela. We got this. North Korea feels a certain way. Other countries, you know, feel a certain way. We're not even talking about, I mean, look at what they're now rebranding as the African Corps that's in Mali right now.

I know people don't give a lot of attention to the developments in Africa, but Russia has a lot of troops in Africa right now where it's out there, you know, working with God. I mean, you have to think more globally in geo-streaty. strategically about these things that, you know, about these things that are happening. A few other points I'll mention, though, you know, it's interesting as you also see these Maga Republican Congress members from Southern Florida, many of them come from families that are Cuban and they're there. And they've been basically saying, we need Machado, why, you know, Delsey Rodriguez needs to go. And it's like, you're out there pumping up Trump. Like, where do you think this is

coming from right now. I mean, obviously that's where it's coming from. It's your guy in Donald Trump. And then to make the episode go full circle, because I know my dogs want the episode to go full circle as well, you think about Machado. And Machado thought, okay, the way to endear myself is I'll give him the Nobel Prize. I'll suck up to him. My path is through obsequiousness to Trump. And what she saw is, nope, he'll just take and take and take more from you when you, when you do that. Like, that's not the way to whatever. The same thing we saw with NATO. NATO appeased Donald Trump for the first year. And what did he do? Betrayed NATO every step of the way. And you look at someone like Georgia Maloney also as well. And you can make these parallels everywhere. So, if you're

Iran, which model do you follow? North Korea? Do you follow China? Do you follow those models if you're Iran or do you look and you're like, oh, yeah, I'll make a deal with him. It'll be great. It's interesting because you have Whitkoff and Kushner who are saying to Iran, look, look, look. You're going to be super rich. You just can't do tolls in the strait of Hormuz. Just trust me. You don't want to just give up control over the straight and things will be great. And Iran's like, you killed our leader, the Ayatollah. You every time we've been in negotiations, you've literally started. You've literally started invasions during negotiations, not only do we not trust you, we were not even in the same universe of even thinking about trust. What are you talking about? You know, and then you start to read

and research your history about Iran. I've done videos on this over the weekend. And you start to also look at incidents that probably don't get enough attention anymore like Iran Air Flight 655 in 1988 when a United States tanker that was in the Strait of Hormuz during the Iran and Iraq war, this tanker, the Vincenzi, shot Iran flight 655, killed 290 passengers, innocent Iranians aboard, and then just did not blame the pilots when we just blew up an Iranian flight in the Strait of Hormuz. And I bring that up because I'm sure a lot of us don't even know. But of course, they know.

What do you think? They know that in Iran that happened on July 3rd, 1988 as well. And so they don't trust. And when it's like, just trust us, man, we'll be good, we'll be good. I just want us all, and I'll throw it to you, Brett, just to have a realistic understanding of the world and here to be better informed about everything. That's the goal that I want to empower everybody to do here with this network is to be informed about everything. You need a, you need nuanced perspectives on things, on everything, even things that may seem simple. oftentimes when you look below the surface, they're a lot more complicated.

And what Trump tries to do is he tries to simplify everything into these catchphrases and to Ben's point, these reality TV kind of moments that he thinks sounds good and he knows are easy to propagandize the people but aren't actually good and they don't actually work. And that's why things keep falling apart. You think it's by accident that the out, that the pool turned green? No, we told you that it was going to turn green weeks before the thing turned green. It's not because we're psychic. It's because when we analyze the situation, when we spoke to scientists, they told us, the pool is going to turn green due to the conditions that Trump is creating.

It doesn't make us brilliant or clairvoyant, but Donald Trump tries to package these things in these statements. And then he just knows that he could just lie about it after the fact and go, oh, it was vandals who did it. It was vandals. He does this about everything, the fireworks show. When we heard about this fireworks show for July 4th, which are actually like July 5th fireworks, because Trump rambled on for so long. ended up speaking to a nearly empty a crowd, despite Trump claiming that there were over 150,000 people there. We did reports. We showed you the footage. We showed you the receipts of all the empty seats there because people had to return back through security after they evacuated the premises.

But during that fireworks show, the July 5th, the fireworks show, it was a disaster. And we knew it was going to be a disaster because we knew Trump's plan was just to blow a bunch of stuff up all at once and that it would look ridiculous. It would look ridiculous. It would look ridiculous. You wouldn't be able to see anything. I'll play you this short clip of the fireworks first, which also, by the way, resulted in the air in Washington, D.C. being more toxic the next day than like anywhere in the entire world. But watch how just stupid this looks. This is idiocacy in real life. It's ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. And I've already given you a few examples, but here's another example of Donald Trump trying to say things in platitudes and not taking a nuanced approach

anything or trusting experts. I mean, this was like day, back to back days, okay, where Donald Trump one day, his energy secretary was bragging about getting rid of renewable energy. I don't know how this is a brag. How is it a brag that you are making things more expensive for people? But he proudly posted, Energy Secretary Chris Wright wrote, as we approach peak electricity demand in the 13 state mid-Atlantic region at 7 a.m. this morning, less than 6% of electricity generation was coming from renewables. Over 91% of generation is coming from gas, nuclear and coal, keeping our air conditioning's blasting. Our air conditioners blasts. Keep them blasting, folks. Keep them blasting. We don't have any of that silly renewable energy. We took that

away. You got gas and oil. Keep those ACs blasting. This is the worst messaging. It obviously flies in the face of science. So they post that one day. And literally the next day, oh, by the way, and then he was specifically, he showed a chart of the PJM energy grid, which powers these 13 states energy. And the following day, literally the next day, the Trump administration had to alert PJM to cut their electricity use because outages, overloaded transmission lines, and extreme heat were pushing the system towards blanchem. blackouts. And so as a result, Reuters reported that PJM escalated their emergency actions as a result. I mean, that's a direct cause and effect right there of the Trump regime saying, we don't need that stinking renewable energy. We're getting rid of it. Proudly, essentially saying that they're raising your bills and relying on non-renewable energy.

And then the next day, the next day, a federal alert we need to conserve. And by the way, remember they were saying every day, they were going on about Mamdani's repeating the same request that is made in every single state and city virtually across the country to keep your ACs at 78 degrees to conserve energy. And then when the Trump administration does it, well, suddenly it's not socialism, but it was socialism and communism when Mamdani was urging people to conserve. I don't understand. And meanwhile, you know who gets screwed? The American people, because they're paying higher bills. and also the United States of America as a country, as a global power, because Trump continues to lie to people also about what other countries are doing in this space.

Trump tries to pretend, he goes, oh, China learned long ago that they shouldn't do anything with wind. They don't do anything with wind. It's not even remotely true. China is the world's largest wind power producer. Over 220,000 wind turbines in operation. Yet Donald Trump says, this is an exact quote, China makes almost all the windmills, and yet I haven't been able to find any wind farms in China. Do you ever think of that? No, they actually do use them.

They use them much more than the United States. They also use solar. China has installed thousands and thousands and thousands of heliostat mirrors across an 8.61 million square foot field at the world's highest solar thermal plant and duo Tusho scheduled to commence operating in October. That's just one solar project out of many solar projects that they've been doing because China understands even from a selfish level that this is going to make our energy grid stronger. This is going to make us less reliant on non-renewable energy. It's actually a tool to have in our arsenal.

It's going to allow us to provide a better quality of life for our people, make us less reliant on the Middle East with all these disruptions, with wars in the Middle East and everything that's going on. takes that off the table when you have this there. So Donald Trump's attack on this and the fact that they are like brag about it, they brag about the idiocracy of it all as they're hurting people and they get the mag of people to cheer them on. Yes, my bills are going to be more expensive. Thank you, Energy Secretary Wright.

Thank you for taking away renewable energy. It's just you got to point it out and you got to really just explain to people what's actually going on here. And when you look, the thread between so many of these things is that it's all to enrich the oligar class. It's all to enrich this Epstein class. And you see this coordinated effort across all of Donald Trump's schemes to get people distracted on lies and kind of branding and his cons, his cons, while he pickpockets

them and gives the money to the wealthiest Americans. You're seeing wealth distribution quite directly. from the people who need it the most to the people who need it the least. I mean, even when you look at Donald Trump's stock and crypto earnings, right, it was literally like almost a direct one-to-one line between the amount Donald Trump made off his meme coin and the billions of dollars that people lost investing in Donald Trump's meme coin. I don't think I've ever quite seen it.

Wealth transfers appear that direct to the American people. But yeah, that's crazy, crazy stuff. Absolutely. Look, and I'll just end with this. We just celebrated our 250th anniversary as this country. If we want 250 more, heck, if we want 50 more, we have to do exactly what Brett just said there. And again, that's this reckoning within our lifetime about propping up people who tell truth, who use facts and data to assert their arguments and get these lies and these liars and these grifters.

just out of here, man. It just cannot be the way of the future if we ever expect to continue this great experiment that we're all living through right now. I know there's a trillion-dollar propaganda operation out there that is infecting our loved ones and our neighbors and the people of our communities. And it's very hard to get them out of this zomification that they're all kind of going through. But I just think it is so necessary that we as a community, we as the might as mighty and just people who love this country, these pro-democracy folks out there, champion and truly, truly champion, truth, honesty, integrity. These should always be the qualities that we look to instill in the next generation within ourselves as we go forward here. Because again, we just

celebrate the 250. If we want 50, if we want 20, if we want 15, five more, those are the qualities that we're going to need together as a country in order to make sure that that happens. everybody it's been an honor to be here with you today whether you're watching on video or listening on audio thank you for all of your support we're grateful for you and we'll keep on fighting for you every day for those who watch on youtube can you try to subscribe on audio as well it helps even if you don't plan on listening on audio you never know so go to whatever audio app you have subscribe to Midas Touch and leave a five-star review and audio. It'll take you 30 seconds.

It's free. It's free. And we'd be really grateful for it. Thanks, everybody, for watching. We'll see you next time on the Midas Touch podcast. Jordy take it away. Shout out to the Midas Mighty! Want to stay plugged in?

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