The MeidasTouch Podcast - MeidasTouch Full Podcast - 9/23/25

Episode Date: September 23, 2025

On this episode of the MeidasTouch Podcast, we break down Trump’s latest meltdown of a press conference alongside RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz, where he spewed lies about autism and promoted fringe conspiracy theories. We dig into the bribery scandal engulfing Trump’s hand-picked “border czar” Tom Homan, Trump press secretary Karoline Leavitt’s desperate spin, and Trump’s disgraceful rant at the Charlie Kirk memorial. Plus, Jimmy Kimmel Live! returns to ABC after a Trump FCC–fueled suspension, the looming threat of a government shutdown, and much more as we expose the chaos, corruption, and authoritarianism of the Trump regime. Ben, Brett and Jordy break it all down. Deals from our sponsors!  IQ Bar: Text TRUTH to 64000 to get twenty percent off all IQBAR products, plus FREE shipping. Message and data rates may apply. Sundays for Dogs: Get 40% off your first order of Sundays. Go to https://sundaysfordogs.com/MEIDAS or use code MEIDAS at checkout. Timeline: Go to https://timeline.com/meidastouch for 20% OFF to get started today! Home Title Lock: Go to https://hometitlelock.com/meidas and use promo code MEIDAS to get a FREE title history report so you can find out if you’re already a victim AND 14 days of protection for FREE! And make sure to check out the Million Dollar TripleLock protection details when you get there! Exclusions apply. For details, visit: https://hometitlelock.com/warranty 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 Cult Conversations: The Influence Continuum with Dr. Steve Hassan: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen 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 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown 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

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or go to explorevolvo.com. So first I thought that Donald Trump's event in Mount Vernon, Virginia on Saturday was the most deranged event he's held to date where he started calling former President Biden an SOB but was cursing and then he confused the names of countries. I'll go over that. But then on Sunday, I thought, wow, Donald Trump turning a Charlie Kirk memorial into a hate rally is probably the most deranged event. I don't use the term hate rally lightly. I mean, Donald Trump, unprovoked, says, I hate my political opponents. I hate you. And then Donald Trump started talking about tariffs and sending the military to invade American cities and said, Charlie would have wanted it. Charlie would have wanted it.

So I thought that event was the most deranged yet. But then, before we went live today in the Oval Office, Donald Trump held a press conference on a set of metafin, which he said, Akamata, Matafin. He doesn't know how to say it, Tylenol. He wanted to let you know that he made that connection. And then just started spreading these medical conspiracies that are even more deranged than RFK, if you could imagine that all equally. It was Donald Trump telling you how he felt about this.

I feel when it comes to Hep B, you know, STD, Hep B, you do it at this age. You know about MMR? I think you take it this. I'm just telling you how I feel about it. And then he goes, don't take Tylenol if you're a pregnant. Do not take it. And they're spreading like debunked quackery, far right wing podcast insanity stuff. That's not reflective of peer review medical information.

They've fired the vaccine advisory board. They fired all of the people in the CDC. And honestly, just as an American, what just transpired, it's one of the most, maybe the most embarrassing thing ever. You know, when Donald Trump said, the world is laughing out of us and now no more. No, they are horrified. They are laughing.

I'm, if you're an American and you're not humiliated, then you have no shame or you're so brain rot that you have no clue what the hell is even going on. That's not even to mention Donald Trump's attack on free speech and what transpired last week when Trump got Jimmy Kimmel fired. And now Disney ABC says they're bringing Jimmy Kimmel back set to start tomorrow because people got absolutely livid and actors and writers that we ain't working for you, ABC Disney, unless you bring Jimmy Kimmel back. And then over the weekend, we learn about Tom Holman, Donald Trump's so-called borders are taking $50,000 in cash in a Kava bag. That's like a Mediterranean kind of restaurant. And the cash was in the bag and it's on videotape. And then today you have Donald Trump's chief propagandist, press secretary Caroline Levitt, said he never took the money.

Well, according to the FBI reports, it's on a tape. And this is like all things Trump, right? they make a statement and it's like, okay, release the tape, then they hide the tapes or destroy the tapes, just like the Epstein files. And folks, I haven't even touched upon the fact that we're heading for a government shutdown in, I don't know, a week and a half at this point, October 1st, and Maga Mike Johnson canceled work for Congress. He canceled work for October 29th and 30. He told Republicans, don't show up. Why would you tell him not to show up on the two days before the shutdown unless you actually want a shutdown to take place, which is what Donald Trump wants.

I don't know how one can look at the totality of circumstances and not conclude that what Donald Trump is doing is either a based on literally a dementia-ridden sickle mind or more likely an intentional malicious effort to rip to shreds the United States of America. This is step by step what you would do to put America through the biggest humiliation ritual ever and perhaps even most humiliatingly at all that there's still 35% of the country that loves this stuff, which is just wild to me because if you just look at the objective data, what the hell is going on here? Like, I'm not trying to say this from, oh, you are leftist, you a Democrat, you're from

Blue State. No, what the hell is going on? I mean, seriously, what in the world is going on? If you're a farmer, he's crushing you. If you buy groceries, he's crushing you. Gas ain't $2 a gallon right now. That ain't helping you. Your health care is about to be taken away, regardless of you have Medicaid or Medicare because the Affordable Care Act tax credits are about to expire. Democrats are trying to save those, oh, you damn leftists, you're trying to save my health care. Why are you trying to save my health care for? I don't want my affordable. I don't want my Obamacare.

It has the name Obama in it. Seriously, what is going on with this country right now? Let me bring in Brett and Jordy. Long intro, but what the hell is going on? Long intro, but we got a whole lot to talk about. I mean, there's a lot going on. I feel like every day we wake up and it's like a new version of hell. It's like, okay, what is today going to bring us?

It doesn't even feel real at a certain point when you're watching Donald Trump on TV and he's screaming, don't take Tylenol. You're like, what are you doing? Why are you spreading these lies? And I think one of the things that is going to kind of thematically link so many of the things we speak about in this episode is a theme that we've talked about so much here on the Midas Touch podcast. And that's how Trump always tries to exploit tragedy, or just people's pain, you know?

You could always be sure that when tragedy strikes, when people are fearful, Donald Trump will be there exploiting it to his political advantage. And we've seen that time and time again. And we saw that during the various storms throughout the country when Donald Trump spread lies about FEMA. We're seeing that with this whole autism thing that Donald Trump is doing by trying to blame it all on Tylenol, despite the fact that there are no studies that say that is true whatsoever. We see it with what's going on with the Charlie Kirk incident. We're seeing it all over the map. Trump has one mode.

It's here's people, here's some people in pain. Let me figure out how I can manipulate them and exploit them and hurt them further. that they have to rely on me so that they beg me for scraps. It's just what we constantly see. I think it's absolutely disgraceful. And I agree with you, Ben. There's just such a propaganda arm out there right now, amplifying this stuff, getting people to be so divided that they don't care about basic facts or the truth. They just care about owning the other side. And I think what we all have to do here is that the Midas Touch podcast, we don't think empathy is a dirty word. I think that's a big difference with us and so many people out there. I think empathy is a good

thing. In my opinion, I think empathy is one of the most important qualities that a leader could have, that honestly any human being could have. We all need empathy. We all need to care for one another. We all need to be figuring out how we could help one another. And you should not let your own political beliefs get in the way of the truth when the truth is staring you in the face. You don't go, oh, that's just the leftist thing or that's just what the medical community says. Yes, because they studied all of this, okay? Because they have the actual data. Maybe it's time to actually bring back trust, bring back some faith to these people who actually know what they're talking about rather than these inexperienced losers that Donald Trump is putting in these positions

of power as he enriches his buddies and everybody around him. Like I said, we got a whole lot to talk about, as you heard from Ben's intro, I'm going to toss it over to Jordy because I know I got a lot to say later on. But Jordy, what's the latest? Exactly. Very similar sentiments, Brothers, Midas Mighty. I just feel like we're all collectively living through like one of the most traumatic timelines in modern day American history. And we're all doing it together. And it is quite frankly, exhausting. So I just want to thank everyone for tuning in today, especially just because there's been a lot going on. And they're trying to keep you down. And it's just, it's really just bizarre. That's the only thing that I could say after watching these press conferences, especially today's

Ben and Brett. It's just like, oh, my God. But, you know, look, we're all in this together. And thankfully, we have wonderful partners here at the Myoste Channel, such as Dr. Vin Gupta. And I think Ben and Dr. Van Gupta are going to be doing an emergency press conference later responding to everything. And so it's just now more than ever, we need real, reliable facts, data, scientists, and doctors because experts be like e-empathy should not be a dirty word. experts should not be a dirty word either, and we need those now more than ever. And I want to give a quick shout out to our Midas Health series. Dr. Van Gupta is doing such an incredible job.

A lot of people have been asking, so where can we hear? Where can we watch Midas Health? Well, we're putting these emergency episodes here on YouTube, so you can watch right here on YouTube. And they're also on the Midas Touch podcast feed. So if you're listening to this on Apple Podcasts on Spotify, you just go there, you'll listen to it. We usually do at least one episode a week.

It'll come on the feed. It's also on our substack at Midasplus.com so you can check it out on our substack. All right, Ben, where shall we begin? I want to start just by saying this as well. A phrase you'll hear me use a lot on my daily videos and on this show and in our substack is the phrase moral clarity because there ain't a whole lot of it in 2025 and frankly leading up to 2025. And we need to speak with moral clarity.

And that means it has to be rooted in values, more than just short-term transactional gain. And I think what Trumpism represents is short-term transactional gain, whether that's market manipulation, getting rich quick schemes, and nobody wants to call out the facts, the science, the values, things that are deeply rooted. in what it means to be a democracy. And sometimes calling it out is going to result in some short-term pain. Yes, Disney ABC, you may face retaliation by the Trump regime or Apple. You may face higher tariffs if you don't show up at the White House delivering gold bars to Donald Trump. But in the long term, you are going to be better off because, If you capitulate in the short term, Trump's going to keep going after you.

And when the entire ship that is the United States sinks, guess what? You're on that ship as well. You ain't getting off. And it's going to eventually impact and hurt you as well versus if you acted with moral clarity. Another word that's so needed right now is leadership. We need people to act as leaders. And that means making tough decisions. That means speaking out about moral clarity, even if you take incoming threats or harassment or criticism, that's what leaders do.

Leaders don't send their communities into get butchered, basically, and walk them into it. leaders have to explain to people, if people are getting disinformation, what's the disinformation? Why are they getting hurt? And you have to take a stand and say, I understand you may have heard this on the internet, or you may have heard this from a friend or whoever, but they are wrong. Okay. And you need to understand that. So I am going to make a leadership recommendation. Like, and I'm specifically, I could give a lot of examples, but when we talk about labor unions, all those unions who did not want to endorse Kamala Harris and stayed on the sidelines, it was like, it's obvious that Trump hates unions, it's very clear. If your union members feel

he likes unions, they're being misled and defrauded. So you as the union leader need to stand up and say, I know you're hearing that, but that is wrong. Otherwise, the loudest, dumbest, stupidest, most dangerous voices control the conversation while you bend to their whims. I just wanted to say that from the outset. Now, before showing you some of these clips that Donald Trump spreads disinformation, I want to read a statement from the OBGYN lead group, the American College of obstetricians and gynecologists. They called Donald Trump, statements about do not take Tylenol totally irresponsible. And they said that the suggestion that Tylenol use in pregnancy causes autism, which is

what Trump directly said from the Oval Office, those statements are irresponsible when considering the harmful and confusing message they send to pregnant patients. Today's announcement by HHS is not backed by the full body of scientific evidence. and dangerously simplifies the many and complex causes of neurologic challenges in children. Dr. Stephen Fleischman said in a statement, it is highly unsettling that our federal health agencies are willing to make an announcement that will affect the health and well-being of millions of people without the backing of reliable data. Now, I'm glad that they put out a statement like that, but notice who they do not mention in the statement.

It's not just HHS as this amorphous entity. It's Donald Trump. And people need to start labeling where the problem is coming from, that we have in a demented authoritarian, vile piece of trash in the Oval Office who is spewing it. And he's a liar. He's a dangerous maniac. And he is sending the United States into the dustbin, a trash can, a dumpster in the world. in the world. We need to call out what this. Oh, it's not HHS. It's Donald Trump and who he appoints.

But the buck stops with him. I've never seen this lack of accountability structure when we have someone who doesn't even know how to pronounce a set of metafin telling people, do not take Tylen. I mean, here literally. I think you actually pronounce it. Epstein amethin. I think that's what you pronounce. Listen to what he says here. He says, do not take Tylenol. This is a crazy man. This is not normal behavior. And it's annoying when you're going to turn, no one watches corporate news. We're like, Donald Trump made a controversial statement today

that the medical community has some concerns about. You see, Donald Trump gave a position at this, but critics of Donald Trump say that, no, this is a crazy, insane, dangerous human being behaving worse than a toddler would act. Watch what he does as he says, don't take Tylenol. Let's play it. Don't take Tylenol.

Tylenol. There's no downside. Don't take it. You'll be uncomfortable. It won't be as easy, maybe, but don't take it. If you're pregnant, don't take Tylenol. And don't give it to the baby after the baby is born. Then he goes on to say that there are certain groups that don't take vaccines and don't take pills so they don't have autism. And Donald Trump from the Oval Office says, the Amish, they don't get autism because they don't take vaccines, which is not a true statement. Let's be very clear. It's a deranged conspiracy theory. But also his attack on vaccines from the Oval Office, and he does go on to attack the

vaccines for polio, measles, mumps, rubella, that's what's going to get people killed in mass. Here, play this clip. Because when you go from 20,000 to 10,000, and then you go to 12,000. you know there's something artificial they're taking something and by the way I think I can say that there are certain groups of people that don't take vaccines

and don't take any pills that have no autism that have no autism does that tell you something that's currently is that a correct statement by the way there are some studies that suggest that yeah

with the Amish for example the Amish yeah virtually I heard none And you see, Bobby wants to be very careful with what he says, and he should, but I'm not so careful with what I say. But you have certain groups. The Amish, as an example, they have essentially no autism. Then Donald Trump does not know how to pronounce the word acetaminophen. Let's play it.

First, effective immediately, the FDA will be notifying physicians at the use of acedum. Well, let's see how we say that. Asadaminephine. Acetaminophen, is that okay, which is basically commonly known as Tylenol during pregnancy can be associated with a very increased risk of autism. Then he says that there's a rumor that because people in Cuba can't afford Tylenol, that they don't get autism in Cuba. Again, this is just made up, deranged, ignorant stuff.

here, play this clip. This country is going through what parts of the world are going through. And I will say there are parts of the world that don't take Tylenol. I mean, there's a rumor, and I don't know if it's so or not, that Cuba, they don't have Tylenol because they don't have the money for Tylenol. And they have virtually no autism, okay? Tell me about that one. Tell me about that one.

You shouldn't be starting a statement in the Oval Office that I just heard a rumor about X, Y, and Z when you're supposed to be. surrounded with the top experts. But Donald Trump has fired the top experts. The vaccine board has been gutted. The CDC's been gutted. And look, I could show you a lot more clips. Donald Trump attacks vaccines for Hep B and then says his own guidance of when he believes people should take Hep B vaccines and how they should treat it. He then talks about MMR and says, this is when I think that you should take it, that again, cuts against what the medical community says. And there's a, you know, a real significant risk now that polio, measles, mumps, rebella,

happy, horrible and horrific things are going to surge, which we're already seeing happen in a lot of red states. And this stuff is going to kill people. What Trump did in the Oval Office will result in many thousands of people, tens of thousands, and perhaps more dying, in my opinion, Brett Jorny. I agree. And it's just, it's so dangerous. Honestly, that may have been one of the single most, if not the single most dangerous press conferences Trump ever did. I immediately got flashbacks to Donald Trump's press conferences during COVID, where he sidelined the experts and started spouting his own theories. We need to inject the disinfected. It's like that, but now he's actually putting that into policies and the people around them are going, yes, it's, it's, I shouldn't

do the impression. They're doing, you know, they're saying that, you know, that, you know, you're right, Mr. President. Yes, you're a genius. This is great. They're, they're pushing his worst possible kind of, you know, the parts of him. And this is what people are getting now. And the thing is, like, yes, you could say like, okay, 30 to 35 percent of the American people, you know, are people who probably believe Donald Trump when he says these things, which is like way too much. But there are going to be people beyond that who think there's no way a president of the United States could be so irresponsible that he would say something that defiantly, that he would say something with that sort of passion without any evidence whatsoever. I mean, this is like the

most important thing ever, my child, my baby. There's no way the president of the United States would lie about that. No, yes. Yes, he would. He did. And this is what he does about everything. And I think it's just so incredibly manipulative to see how Donald Trump takes a situation like this, where you have parents who are very concerned about their children, right? Like, you have a lot of probably parents of autistic kids who are trying to figure out why, how do I fix this? How do I do? What do I do here? It was it me? Is it external factors? What happened? What went wrong? Like, they're thinking all of these things about their kids who are probably doing great, by the way.

Like, I know so many autistic kids were doing, like, incredible. stuff. And they're thinking that. And then Donald Trump goes, oh, you know that thing on Facebook that you read about Tylenol? True. True. And it reminds me when we go back to the past, right? And just how far, how extreme this Republican Party has become under Donald Trump. You think back to that moment with John McCain at that town hall when John McCain was confronted by a voter who was clearly reading those same sort of Facebook-y message boards where they said, Mr. McCain, Senator McCain, I heard there was rumor. Obama, he's an Arab. He's an Arab. And John McCain said, no, this is a lie. By the way, obviously there would be nothing wrong if he was indeed. But

John McCain actually said, no, that's a conspiracy theory. That's not true. That's a lie. What we have now in this Trump era is the top of the party and everyone else to the party going, yes, your conspiracy theory is correct. Let me play to your worst instincts. Let me actually embrace that. Let me embrace whatever you're thinking that could possibly be making you scared and nervous. Let me exploit that so I could take advantage of you. And that to me is just so horrific to watch happen on this and on literally like every single issue that we're seeing with this administration. You're spot on, Brett. And let me just paint a quick, picture for our audio listeners. So you have a makeup wearing orange face clown looking good guy like

Donald Trump. I mean, that's just what he looks like, speaking, cognitively addled. You could call it speaking. I don't know what he's doing up there. Just kind of mumbling through, stumbling through words. You got RFK Jr. over his right shoulder. You got Dr. Oz over his left shoulder. Just like nodding along, nodding along. Like what he's saying is making sense. And it's just, you know, it's, it's scary. that's all I have to say when I watch it. Like that is deeply disturbing shit that we're all watching right there because he's doing this based on vibes. He even says it during this presser.

He says, in my opinion, this is X, Y, and Z reason why it's bad for you. And it's like, again, it all stems from the MAGA attack on experts. And we've seen it at the start of COVID and we see it to this day. There is something against them with people who actually study. and know the facts based on data for for for for maga and especially for donald trump that's such a bizarre concept for him that what do you mean you're not no no look trust me i'm donnie i know everything and it's tylonol that's causing it so i'm just going to warn everyone and i'm going to say hey don't take the Tylenol everyone especially if you're pregnant and like the way he's such a

predator man the way he's even talking during this you know addressing pregnant women he's like telling them like essentially if you're in pain suck it up you know don't don't take to suck it up you could you could fight through it and it's like dude back off man you're such an abuser you're a predator and most of all you're truly just an insane person at the helm right now and for me and I know brothers too we all have young kids on this podcast and seeing this and I'm just trying to think two three five 10 years down the line here, the domino effects that something like Donald Trump press conference of the one that we just witnessed is going to have a society at large. It's just, it's scary stuff, man. By the way, I cannot wait until I'm able to get my son vaccinated. I'm like counting down the days.

And I just want to leave everybody with this message before I turn it over to Ben, which is please, I know a lot of you believe this, but some of you might be, there might be something to what Donald Trump is saying. Please do not take medical advice from Donald Trump or RFK Jr. please consult medical professionals. Please consult your own doctor, okay? So state regime media known as Fox. Their whole kairon and announcement throughout the day was autism announcement. Autism breakthrough was the kairon.

And this is how they launder this as news. Autism breakthrough. So the maga mush brain viewers who are watching this believe that there was some major breakthrough that Donald Trump and RFK uncovered, that's how it's being delivered to them, and that is so deeply irresponsible. That's the nicest thing I can say about it, is that it's deeply irresponsible. More likely, it is deeply malicious at its core. All right, I want to take our first quick break of the show.

When we come back, I want to talk about the fact that we are now in a manufacturing and construction recession, the Financial Times reports, although, Donald Trump lies and claims that we brought in somewhere between $9 trillion and $17 trillion dollars from foreign countries, which is just utterly false. Donald Trump does not know the names of the countries that visit the White House. He keeps either referring to Armenia as Albania or the deal between Armenia. And he says Azerbaijan as Abba-Jabajan. He doesn't know how to say it.

But then said- Can he think he could get acetaminophen in Azerbaijan? John. Then he said Armenia did a deal with Cambodia. I mean, in every level of this, we have the most unqualified, deranged individual there. We'll talk about that and more. Just a programming note. We're going to be doing our Patreon chat next Monday, not today Monday. So we are just rescheduling that. So please be there next Monday. I know that there were a lot of people who who reached out about holidays and travel and all these things. So we're going to move it to the following Monday for all of the people who have reached out.

Shana Tovatt, all those who celebrate. Let's become a member of our YouTube channel if you can as well. That's been hugely helpful to our growth. First quick break. Let's come back. Let's chat more after this quick break. This episode is brought to you by IQ Bar, our exclusive snack and hydration sponsor. IQ Bar is the Better for You plant protein-based snack made with brain-boosting nutrients to refuel,

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Use the links. Use the codes. If there's an exit survey, let them know we sent you, Benji. Before I toss it over to you, I've come to the realization, you know how Marvel, the Marvel movies have, like, different timelines for characters and arcs and stories plots. We're not living in the main timeline. And that upsets me because what we're witnessing right now, there's just no way this is the main. There's no way we're on Earth 737. Jared, you ever go like, you ever think?

like it is possible like we all died during COVID and like it was just some like hellscape we're now living like I sometimes have these these thoughts where I'm just like is this real life man like maybe we all just died we're all in hell or something I don't know maybe I'm maybe I'm really too much about my own psychology oh man well if we are I'm glad I'm in here with you guys yeah well Jordan you mentioned Marvel which uh filmed a lot in Georgia right and there's been reporting that Marvel is moving a lot of those jobs overseas. Some say it has to do with the health care costs that are there. But, you know, I thought that Donald Trump was going to fix it and it was going to be the

cheapest thing ever. So you just mentioned Marvel. You could probably give me any reference, Jordy, and I can do that with as well. But, you know, today we saw the Financial Times report that U.S. manufacturing and construction are experiencing recession-like conditions. You know how when it was with Biden, they would just, like, predict recession that never happened. So when there actually is one with Trump,

they're like, it's recession-like. It's kind of like a recession. I mean, look, it's obvious to anybody who knows the job market right now, that the job market is horrible. If you live in a community that's around factories and manufacturing, you know that factories are shutting down and laying off workers right now. The only thing that's really being built are these massive data centers for AI, which is consuming a shit ton of energy and jacking up everybody's energy costs at their home, taking over massive swaths of farmland that Trump is just giving to his oligarch friends.

We see that across the country to fuel AI, which is ultimately eliminating jobs of Americans and further fueling. By the way, if you're wondering, like, why are all these tech people, why are they sucking up to Donald Trump so much? Like, why are they doing it? It's exactly because of that, because they want just complete unfettered ability, unrestricted, no regulations at all for them to build all these AI data centers and use up energy while it drives up your costs so long as they could fire employees with their new AI technology and continue to build, build, build. That's like what so much of this is about. And that's why you see Zuckerberg doing the act, the stupid act that he's doing. That's why you see Tim Cook sucking up. It's why you see Sam Altman there. Like it's all the same shit.

Right. In the movie Don't Look Up, which is a reference that I gave that was on Netflix where the comet or asteroids about to hit the earth and there's a whole like maga like movement about don't look up, the billionaires create a plan to mine the asteroid for its natural resources versus actually destroy it. So it doesn't, I hope I'm not ruining it. the movie for people. I haven't seen it. I should give an alert there. Spoiler alert so that the asteroid doesn't destroy Earth, but they focused on mining the resources and then it's

ultimately too late. That's what these billionaire oligarchs are doing here in the United States across the board. And these data centers and AI, both in terms of energy consumption, job killing, the environment, climate change, like they are literally, and now Trump's vaccine quackery, which always existed, but to see it unfold like that in the Oval Office, I mean, that literally is a don't look up kind of moment right there. If you look at how Americans feel about Donald Trump's handling of the economy, 63% disapprove, 34% approve, whereas at the same time, same poll from American Research Group, which is a good job. on these things. Biden's handling the economy in September 2024, 51% disapprove,

44% approve, which is one of the reasons that Democrats ultimately lost that election. Trump promised, I alone can fix it. I'm going to make everything more affordable on day one. And of course, he's actually made things significantly worse, where Biden had things on a track of inflation cooling, the economy rising, had done. Donald Trump just put the economy on autopilot, literally did nothing, we'd be in a pretty good place that he could take credit for it, but he's actually the worst human being for the job right now based on his malignant narcissism. He will make every move that is the worst possible move in the situation. And then based on his pathology, his malignant narcissism, he'll then do

everything to then make it worse versus actually solve the issue. It's one of the deeply concerning things is as bad as George W. Bush was, in my opinion, in handling the economy, which led to the Great Recession. At the very least, when there was the crisis, he delegated and let the best people kind of figure it out and kind of help deal with the situation. Trump would replace his own defective pathology with the experts, and there's no longer any experts working anywhere near government that are competent. So, as I said in the intro, though, I said, first, I thought that Trump's Mount Vernon, Virginia thing that he did on Saturday was the worst. Then I thought Charlie Kirk's memorial, which Trump turned into a hate rally. And then ultimately,

I saw that Oval Office, then today where Trump started spewing vaccine quackery, that's going to kill people. But here's what Donald Trump said in Glendale, Arizona. He turned Charlie Kirk's Memorial into a hate rally. I do want to say this because I thought that Erica Kirk's speech was, I can say objectively, I thought that her speech met the moment. I was very impressed by her speech. I'm not critical of the speech that she gave. I thought it was heartfelt. I felt sympathy.

I've condemned violence in all of its forms before. But I thought that she was there. And speaking from her heart, she like forgave the shooter. And it was a very, her speech was, you know, I thought met the moment. I really did. Let's give you my honest opinion. But then the contrast that showed between what she was saying versus what Trump and Don Jr. Like Don Jr. was trying to do like weird stand up.

And then Stephen Miller was just yelling. But Donald Trump literally said, I hate my opponents. I hate them. That's where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponents. I don't want the best for them. Here's what Trump says. In that private moment on his dying day, we find everything we need to know about who,

Charlie Kirk truly was. He was a missionary with a noble spirit and a great, great purpose. He did not hate his opponents. He wanted the best for them. That's where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponent. And I don't want the best for them. I'm sorry. I am sorry, Erica. But now Erica can talk to me and the whole group, and maybe they can convince me that that's not right, but I can't stand my Just not what you should be saying as the president of the United States, not what you should be saying in any capacity at all or in any leadership position. But that is what fuels division and that's what fuels problems. I'll just also fact check it. I think that Charlie Kirk hated his enemies. He said lots of hateful things about black people, gay people, trans people, women. I should be executed, kind of mocked, mocked Palestinians who were being killed in mass. So I have. I, should be executed. I don't know. Mocked Palestinians who were being killed in mass. So I think that Charlie Kirk said very hateful things. That's just my opinion on it. But Donald Trump to say, I hate, I hate these people. I mean, you're the, this is the thing, you're the

president of the United States. You're supposed to be uniting, but you are further dividing. And then he used and would invoke Charlie's name to like talk about tariff, like, and Charlie loves my tariffs against the world. We're bringing in trillions of dollars, again, which we're not. But he just gives away the game plan. Okay, you're just going to invoke Charlie's name for everything that you're doing. That's sending the country in the wrong direction to say, Charlie, Charlie told me to do it. And then he says that as well about sending the Marines into American cities. But I don't need to show you that.

I'll show you this one, though, where he talks about tariffs are making us rich again. And the way he says it too, he's like, turning point is hot. Erica and Charlie, they're hot. America is hot. Our tariffs are like Charlie. Here, play this clip. Just like Charlie and Erica made turning point hot, we are looking at a country that has the chance to attain a level like never before. Tariffs are making us rich again, richer than anybody ever thought was possible.

And the only one challenging them are people that hate our country or foreign countries that are paying a price because they did the same thing to us for years. Brett, Jordy, again, like utterly deranged. And I just, when people say, like, when I give the lead up to the clip, yeah, I make sure my lead up, like, I'm not being hyperbolic. That's what pisses me off about corporate news and their coverage of it. Like, I'm literally just telling you what they said. Then I played the clip and I show you that, that they said that I don't know else how to characterize what we saw other than by just saying, here's what he said.

I saw a, I think it was like a study recently, uh, where they were saying that one of the issues that people have, there's a psychological thing, and it goes to what you're saying, and why it's so important that we play the clips, is that when people hear about what are these policies, what is Donald Trump saying, oh man, Republicans really plan on taking away health care

for millions and millions of Americans in order to give tax cuts to the richest Americans. When they hear that, some people, and this is like there have been studies about this, their brains go, you're making it up, you know? They're inclined to believe that nobody could have that much of a lack of humanity that they could possibly actually do something that heinous and evil. So these must be lies coming from the other side. This must be, these must be political talking points. But the truth is, no,

like this, we're just in an error right now where there are just the most heinous things being said, the most actions, you know, heinous actions being done upon our fellow Americans. And it's disgusting. And That's why we do have to continue to show the clips. And Ben, I cannot agree with you more what you said in the lead-up to those clips. I thought Erica Kirk was extremely gracious in her speech. I felt for her. I really deeply, deeply feel for her. I cannot imagine the strength that it requires to get up on that stage in front of that many people

just days after your husband was shot in such an atrocious manner killed in cold blood. I cannot imagine having the strength to go up and deliver the speech that she, gave. But to see the way these political actors hijack this event for their political ends, it goes to what I was saying earlier in this episode, that they never waste the tragedy, these people. They always try to exploit it. So you have a bunch of people who are very upset, right? Obviously, we have our opinions of Charlie Kirk, right? And we feel strongly about that based on our values and our principles. There are a lot of people who felt much differently about him, and they're there, they're sad. They lost somebody who was a part of their life.

And instead of trying to console them, instead of trying to unite the country, this is one of those moments where you could unite the country, try to pull out the best in everybody, tell that crowd, we are all Americans. Instead of doing that in this moment, you use this moment to further inflame tensions to stoke more hatred, to stoke more violence. And to me, that is completely disgraceful. If you listen, and I don't want to play the clips, but you listen to Stephen Miller's speech, it was like a rip-off of the Nazi propaganda minister Goebbels. if you listen to his speech, like literally like nearly word for word. Tucker Carlson was up there implying that Jews were response, happy Russian on everybody, implying that the Jews were responsible for the killing of Charlie Kirk. That was the context of Tucker Carlson's remarks, if you heard him. It was a very thinly, thinly veiled anti-Semitic speech that he gave. And then

Trump's speech where he's ranting about tariffs and sending the U.S. military into cities, just further increasing the temperature, further trying to use this moment to one. once again, try to radicalize people instead of trying to actually ground people and make this a moment where we could unite as Americans around common values. To me, that is just the most disgraceful thing. And that is the most dangerous aspect to me about Donald Trump as a so-called leader. It's that he does not have the ability to actually lead our country in moments of crisis. And when crisis strikes, he always inevitably makes it way, way, way worse. And for our audio listeners, we were playing clips from the C-SPAN footage.

And so under the clips from the C-SPAN footage, you know, it says Charlie's name, birthday, death date. And then it says memorial service. And so I just can't help. But when we're playing those clips of Donald Trump, it did not turn. It turned from a memorial service literally into a hate rally like that, the snap of a finger. And I guess that's what you get with Donald Trump in this regime, unfortunately. But it's on full display for.

everybody to see. You know, again, this was supposed to be a memorial. It felt like it was more of a CPAC-type R&C convention than anything else. And just the things that they were spewing, we played the clip of Donald Trump. You all heard that absolutely bonkers. I want you guys to share that with people in your circles because, again, absolutely bonkers stuff. The Stephen Miller clip, that's on our Instagram account. Go at Midas Touch. Check that out. Because honest, all of this stuff right now. It's just so reprehensible. And it's just like, ah, like it just makes you want to scream. But again, I'm happy the collective we here, the mightest, mighty, the brother, all of us here, that we're all in this together, seeing this for what it is. And that's just the most anti-democratic

attack on the institutions that we live for. It's really, really such scary times. But again, I'm glad we're in this together. And one of the things I just want to say quickly is we're also seeing just the complete fall from grace of the corporate media every single day. And it's something that really bothers me. You know, Ben was kind of, you know, giving his impression of the corporate media about how they're likely going to cover this insane press conference today that Donald Trump did about Tylenol, where they just kind of, they normalize it, they sanitize it. They make it sound like it's normal.

I think Ben accidentally said something about it being controversial, like, as if he was playing the corporate media role. I think they'll say something more along the lines of, and Donald Trump raised red flag today on Thailand like something with the new announcement on autism yeah i mean they make it sound like it's a legitimate thing which is the issue and even yesterday you know i was watching i was watching football and after football on cbs they went right into a story about the uh the charlie kirk event and they made it i i can't i can't even explain it i was horrified they first off they made it sound like they were honoring like the pope or something like the you know this incredible

conservative activist who inspired millions and did wonderful things and touched the youth. And I was like, I was like, what are we doing here? Like what just what are we doing here? And the president of the United States, President Donald Trump gave an incredible speech where he brought, where he fired the crowd up. I'm like, am I living in an alternate reality right now? Like, did you not hear him say that he hates half of the country? Did you not hear him say he's sending the military into American cities that he's

ranting about tariffs during what is supposed to be a eulogy. Like, this is the coverage on CBS news. And it just really, really, really drives me up the wall and makes me feel like I'm nuts. But I know that I'm not. I know that it's their issue that you have all of these companies continue to fold to this administration who continue to just buckle and do whatever they want, who are scared of saying a bit of truth if it's negative about the Trump administration. And that's kind of the whole point, Ben. It goes back to what I said at the outset, too, though. Moral clarity, values, leadership.

When you have a foundation of values and you don't deviate from it, you can see these things. And if they deviate from that, you have to just use this objective lens to call it out. If every speech was like Erica's, like Erica Kirk, there wouldn't be a I wouldn't criticize it. I wouldn't say awful speed. No, I mean, I would tell you, I thought that Erica's speech met the moment. I thought it was touching.

And despite the fact that I think that Charlie Kirk was a bad guy who said hateful things, I thought her speech was really met the moment. By the way, Ben, even if it weren't, I would give her enough grace in this moment to be like this. And this is a person who is suffering. This is a person who just witnessed the most horrific thing imaginable that you could witness happened to somebody she loves. But she didn't.

She actually did, I think, a very gracious, a very passionate emotional speech. These other people, however. Yeah. And hence, I call it out because objectively, that's just the reality. And we shouldn't be okay with that. If your boss or coworker or family member behaved in that way or neighbor or whoever, like you would call it out or you wouldn't be okay with it. And so why are we okay with it and normalizing it at the highest level of leadership?

That's what it always comes down to me, not Democrat, Republican, Independent, Red, but to me, it just is moral clarity, values, leadership, democracy, and normalcy versus chaos. Like, does this make sense? And I think we, again, as leaders, we have to speak with moral clarity. So we're going to take our last quick break of the show when we come back. I do want to talk about Trump's Bordersar, Tom Homan. and allegedly taking $50,000 of cash in a bag from a restaurant called Kava in Texas. It's apparently on tape.

But don't, don't, don't disrespect Kava now. Kava's good stuff. I like Kava. I love it. I love it. But now the regime is saying that that never happened. Okay, well, then release the tape. Okay, release the files, release the tape.

Like, we get into these endless cycles of the lies and the coverups every day. with like a new thing. And then you have, of course, Donald Trump's posts that we'll talk about where he says, Pam, you need to go after my political opponents, Schiff and Letitia James and Comey. You need to go after them. Bring them to justice now, exclamation point. And then Trump fired the Eastern District, top federal prosecutor, this Eric Siebert guy. He appoints his own personal attorney, Lindsey Halligan in that position and directs Lindsay to prosecute them. And she's probably going to prosecute them. This is going to happen. You know, and we've just this is unprecedented that, you know, if this was found in some file and this would, you'd ever be,

oh my God, but the fact that Trump is saying it out loud doesn't make it better. It's just outright fascism. That's what it is. We'll talk about that and more. Last break of the show, reminder, go to patreon.com slash minus touch. Next Monday, we've got a lot of requests. Please move it to next week because of the holidays you're right we're moving into next week so we'll do it next monday patreon dot com slash might as such become a member of our youtube channel it helps grow this platform last break home stretch we'll see you back shortly as someone in my thirties i'm taking steps to ensure i keep living my best life that's why i'm so happy i found timelines's first ever longevity gummies Timeline's first ever longevity gummies, powered by mitopure, is a delicious easy way to put more energy

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HomeTidalock.com, promo code Midas. Let's go. Shout out to our sponsors. Links in description of both the YouTube and the audio. Use the links. Use the codes. If there's an exit survey, let them know he sent you, Benji. Before I toss it over you, I just got to correct one thing for the record. The main timeline on the MCU, because I saw folks commenting and I don't want to get called out. It's

actually 616. Earth 616 is the main MCU timeline. Again, which we're not. Marvel Cinematic Universe. Correct. Correct. Correct. Again, which we're all clearly actually not living in together. Ben, where to next? Let's go to that Mount Vernon event that Trump did on Saturday, where he called former President Biden, who is trying to survive stage four cancer right now.

You know, it's obviously difficult times for former President Biden, but Donald Trump gives a speech and says, Biden's a son of a bitch, and he curses, he uses the words, son of a bitch. And then he says, don't feel bad for him. don't feel bad for him ever. That's how Donald Trump is spending his time. Again, this is all just hate divisive stuff.

That's not what a leader should be saying. Here, play this clip. The very angry, mean Biden, you know, Biden was always a mean guy, but never a smart guy. You know, even you go back 30 years ago, 40 years ago, he was a stupid guy, but he was always a mean son of a bitch, you know? Has it working? Not working too well for him right now, as that says. So when you start feeling sorry for him, remember, who's a bad guy? Yeah, horrible, horrible stuff right there.

Then Donald Trump's comment about his meeting with King Charles, where he got the Disney king queen princess experience at Windsor Castle. Donald Trump said that this is what he was talking to King Charles about. Here, let's play this clip. It's old, right? But 990. And the name of the king at the time, at the time was William the Conqueror.

I said, that's the coolest name I've ever heard. William the Conqueror. And he built this massive, massive castle. And he was known for winning wars. It's very interesting. In fact, I asked King Charles, what do we call you, Charles the Conqueror? He said, no, I don't think so. I don't think so.

But he's a great guy, and he's doing a great job, an unbelievable job. But the 250th anniversary. Then Donald Trump started making up wars that he claims that he's resolved when he promised he would end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours after the election, which he now says was just a joke and he was being sarcastic. He also has not ended the atrocities being committed in Gaza. America's refused to even recognize the existence of a Palestinian state at the request of Netanyahu. Meanwhile, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, and many other nations. are formally recognizing the existence of the Palestinian state, as they should, this week in the United Nations, in my opinion, of course. But here Donald Trump starts talking about wars, and he says, I resolve the war between Armenia and Cambodia.

Here, play this clip. They had one over here, one over there, and slowly over the course of about an hour, they came close, and at the end of an hour we were hugging each other and holding hands. It was an amazing thing, and we settled at war. That was not settleable, as the expression does. Cambodia and Armenia, it was just starting, and it was a bad one. Okay. Cambodia and Armenia, not in a war.

He means Azerbaijan. If you go and ask the Armenian community what they think about the resolution, what was the resolution? It would just codify that Azerbaijan took over certain disputed territory, and then Donald Trump brought the leaders, who he doesn't even know who they are of Azerbaijan and Armenia into an area in the White House where he has Trump 2028 gear and was just kind of pointing it out to them. Just very, very weird stuff right there.

He's previously called Armenia, Albania. I played those videos before. I'm not going to show it here. But going to the press conference in the White House today, Caroline Levitt was asked about the report from MSNBC and Washington Post, they got a great exclusive, that the FBI has Tom Homan, the borders are on tape accepting $50,000 in cash back in 2024, saying that if he were to, if Trump were to win, that Homan would direct government contracts to these undercover FBI agents who were acting as business individuals. And according to the FBI

reports, this was caught on videotape. That's what's being reported by Washington Post. It was on a video recording. Yeah, video recording on tape. So that's pretty definitive if it's on a video tape, video recording. But here's what Caroline Levitt said. Let's play it. Sure. Thanks, Caroline. So, too, on the Holman investigation, I mean, can you just speak to, did the president ask the Justice Department to close the case? And does Holman have to return the $50,000? Well, Mr. Holman, Roman never took the $50,000 that you're referring to. So you should get your fax straight, number one, number two. This was another example of the weaponization of the Biden Department of Justice against

one of President Trump's. Okay. So then she goes on and blames Biden, Biden, Biden. Well, you know, here's the thing, too, right? Where it's like the Epstein files, right? Like, okay, well, they're the files. So if you would like to produce the files and show us, then show us. And then we get into these cycles of the cover-up, then the MAGA Republicans block the subpoenas,

then Democrats fight for it. And then a new one emerges like this, right? And this is like every- But Ben, think about this brilliant scheme, okay? Just think about this brilliant scheme. The Biden-D-O-J, they discover that somebody, one of the closest people to Donald Trump, who's going to be likely running his whole border operation. They catch him in a bribery scheme.

And in order to assist their election efforts, they keep that information completely private from the public and don't tell a single person. Wow. Brilliant. Brilliant. Caroline Levitt, you have nailed it once again. Brett, not just any DOJ, though, Biden's weaponized DOJ.

They decided to keep that a secret. We're not hush, hush on this one, Ben. It's like, the thing is this, There are so many criminals in this White House, and there's so many people who have done bad things. And this is also one of the issues that we've been seeing over the past few years. It's that when somebody commits crimes or allegedly commits crimes, oftentimes in an ideal world, in a just world, they get prosecuted for those crimes. And the fact that just a matter of fact here, you know, that a lot of the people in this administration are tied to this administration have committed. a multitude of crimes over the past three years, and especially as we saw, going back to January

6th and all this stuff. And a lot of people got started, at least began to get prosecuted for those crimes. Now, what the Republicans did is they said that that was weaponization because they were being held responsible for those acts. So now they are going after Democrats trying to play both sides here and say, make a false equivalence saying, you went after us. Now we're going after you, Letitia James. Now, we're going after you, Adam Schiff. Now, we're going after you, James Cohn, you know, whoever it is, because they are actually weaponizing the DOJ when the DOJ before was actually following the law and was trying to prosecute criminals. And by the way, I think a lot of people, I think maybe most people listening to this podcast, would say they weren't doing a quick enough job at it. And I would

have to agree with you on that one, Ben. Not to make light of Watergate, but, to make light of Watergate, I don't know how they teach it in school anymore. I just, I really don't because of all the craziness that we've seen unfold over these last handful of years. That was a very serious subject matter. We all went to the same high school, you know, public school. Shout out Long Island. Shout out, Plainbee JFK. And it was a very serious subject matter. And they taught it with the severity and the sternness that that needed to be taught with over there. They did a fantastic job. Great history department over there. But I just think to myself, how are kids learning about this now? Because every day is another Watergate. It's

unbelievable. Well, it goes back to the term that I used at the beginning, moral clarity. During Watergate, the Republican Party had the moral clarity when Nixon was uncovered to have engaged, Nixon tried to hide it. But when it was uncovered, what he was doing, which is, like, frankly, compared to what Trump does, like, what Nixon did in Watergate wouldn't even be a story in the Trump era. That's how massive the Trump criminal cartel, as I think it is, you know, exists. But the Republicans were going to hold Nixon accountable. So Nixon left. He resigned, right? After all of the pressure that was put on him. But again, that's moral clarity. And speaking about moral clarity, an example too is, look what happened in Brazil, where their

Supreme Court did something very different than our Supreme Court, right? Their Supreme Court heard the case of their former insurrectionist president who's very close friends with Donald Trump, Jaire Bolsonaro, who tried to topple the Lula administration after Jaire lost the election. He inspired very similar to the United States. Their Supreme Court found Jair Bolsonaro guilty and he's going to be sentenced and he has been sentenced to 25 plus years, probably going to serve the rest of his life in prison. But what does the Trump regime do today? They hit the wife of the Brazil Supreme Court judge with Magninsky Act sanctions as though she was like a terrorist, as though she was like a Russian oligarch.

The Trump regime goes after the wife. They've already gone after the Brazilian Supreme Court judge, to be very clear. But they now go after the wife and hit her with these what's called. Minitsky Act sanctions to basically prevent her and freeze her bank accounts and to torture and harass the wife. Because America identifies now with the insurrectionist, with Jair Bolsonaro. And despite the fact that America has a trade surplus with Brazil, America's hit Brazil with 50% tariffs because they prosecuted their insurrectionist former president. And now China is getting their soybeans and lots of their produce, as is the rest of the world, from Brazil and not the

United States, and the United States farmers are suffering right now. And when we talk about moral clarity as well, while the U.S. takes that action against Brazil, the Treasury Department is now saying that it will be, that it is America first to bail out Argentina, which is on the throws a bankruptcy because Javier Malae, the leader of Argentina, is part of this right extremist network of the Javier Malaes, the Buckelis, the Orban's, the Putin's part of that crew. So now our Treasury Department says, our taxpayer dollars will be spent bailing out Argentina. Why would they need bailing out? Didn't Trump and everybody say that Argentina is a model of good governance?

And when you look at the people who the Trump regime admires, it is people like Javier Malay or Buckeli, which has the highest incarceration rate, you know, in the world and a pretty small economy, Orban with surging inflation. Trump views Putin as having like the greatest economy when Russia's economy is in the toilet bowl right now. And then Trump looks at thriving economies across the world. And even in the United States, like California, as who should be under attack. I mean, if California was a country, it would have the fourth largest GDP in the world. California is a donor state, meaning California gives $85 billion more to the federal government than it takes, whereas a red state like Texas takes $72.5 billion more than it gives to the federal government. California quite literally subsidizes most red states' existence in the United States of America, and red states function the way Javier Malays, Argentina, or Victor Orban's Hungary, or Putin's Russia functions,

and the diverse pluralistic state like California is the one that's out there subsidizing all of this, only for these states to then attack California as part of its kind of fascist overall plan. So I think it's important to lay out that whole context right there. And, you know, I thought that California Governor Gavin Newsom did a powerful press conference over the weekend where he announced that he was signing into law a no mask policy as it relates to ICE agents that goes into effect pretty soon, requiring schools to come up with plans to protect students from the harassment by ICE agents. And I think Governor Newsom spoke with moral clarity at that press conference where he says

Trump's America is a nightmare. Here's what Governor Newsom has to say, let's play. Unmarked cars. People in mass, people quite literally disappearing, no due process, no rights, no rights in a democracy where we have rights, immigrants have rights, and we have the right to stand up and push back. And that's what we're doing here today. This is a disgrace. This is an outrage what we have allowed to happen in this country.

And I could not be more proud of this legislature, the legislative authors to the community demanding more from all of us at this moment. let's talk about Jimmy Kimmel returning to the air. You know, I have mixed feelings about this, and I understand that, you know, Jimmy Kimmel has a lot of staff who depend on this show. It's unclear to me how you exist now in that orbit, knowing that they're going to do to you what they already did. I'm glad he's back on air, but, you know, I know a lot of people are celebrating this as a big First Amendment win or whatever. I, you know, I may be a little bit more cynical on this one. And I wonder how you can exist when you know that if you don't do anything wrong at all, you can be canceled immediately because of the pressure from the Trump

regime. You know that pressure will continue to bear down on Disney and ABC. And by the way, Ben, Like, we're still, we haven't, like, heard totally what Sinclair and Next Star and these affiliates are going to do also. I mean, there was a rep from Sinclair said something that, here's a quote that Brian Stelter posted. Beginning Tuesday night, Sinclair will be preempting Jimmy Kim alive across our ABC affiliate stations and replacing it with news programming. Discussions with ABC are ongoing as we evaluate the show's potential return. If you remember from our last episode of the Midas Touch podcast, we showed you that horrific. letter from Sinclair, which is a pro-Maga, pro-Trump, right-wing conglomerate that owns the most ABC stations in the country. There's a high possibility that Sinclair or Next Star, one of those two,

own the ABC channel that you watch. And they decide, you know, what they could have a say over what this programming is. They were going to put a Charlie Kirk special on that channel. And then they ended up caving and just throwing it up on their YouTube channel instead of airing it. But now they are still saying at the as of this moment of us being live right now they are still saying that they are going to refuse to air jimmy kim alive um during his time slot and so i think you know we still have to be aware also of all these other uh you know forces that are at play and again the theme of the show if you act with moral clarity and your values these decisions are easy because now what abc disney has to confront is now brett to your point okay well now now

Sinclair and Nextstar are probably using this to extract leverage on ultimately what they're going to be paying to ABC Disney and they're going to want to get the most out of that. They're going to use it as a wedge in contractual negotiations and they see that Disney ABC is morally pliable to transactional force. So they know we can get you to, you're weak. like we're going to get you to submit, right? And Trump and the FCC know that they can exert pressure. So now maybe, okay, you want to keep Kimmel, we want to make sure that you get rid of the

view or now we want you to get rid of, you know, we want your news programming to look like this, right? So now ABC Disney has to now approach this from a position of weakness because at the end of the day, what Trump says anyway is you already paid us $16 million to settle the Stephanopoulos lawsuit. So you're already in my orbit. Like, you already kissed the ring and you've admitted by settling for that amount of money that you were wrong and that you, you know, and that you did something incorrect when, in my opinion, they didn't do anything, you know, incorrect. So to me, that's why you have to act with moral clarity. You have no choice. Like,

Even if you wanted for short-term transactional gain, it's going to screw you in the long run. So even if you actually don't have a moral compass, you have a few choices when the mob tries to shake you down, right? You can literally give the mob your store. You can run away. But if you give them a little bit on Tuesday, they're not going to come away. They're going to come back the next Tuesday. And they're going to come back the next Tuesday after that. And maybe they go away for a year, but then they come back again and knock, knock, knock,

okay, well, we're looking for our payment. What do you mean? I already paid you. Well, now you've already paid us. So do you want the world to know that you've already paid us? That's a microcosm of what we're seeing here. And then at a systemic level, the issue is macro economics and micro, but macro, how is this impacting confidence in the American?

markets. Well, it starts to look a lot like Argentina, doesn't it? And that's why on the metrics that I think are really dispositive in my view, seeing the crashing dollar, seeing manufacturing and construction recession, seeing a terrible job market, noting that the Trump regime is preventing annual inflation data and annual reports on hunger in America now from being released. What else are they preventing from being released? That really matters to me. And then I look at this market, the Magnificent Seven, as they call it, with these big AI kind of tech companies, you know, and these companies that are leading the markets, you see that our entire stock market is being hoisted up, in my view, by what appears to be an AI bubble and other kind of tech-related

bubble. And again, I worry that as we examine it as a student of history on past great recessions and depressions, you see similar patterns. Now, I don't know. I'm not prescient. Otherwise, if I was, I would tell you precisely what to do. But I can recognize the similar pattern that we're seeing right now. And it's a Ponzi scheme like, uh economy where he keeps moving the the metrics and the measures further and further down the road the way bernie made off would say hey i need two weeks i need two weeks i'll show you the returns you want to pull your money out give me a year give me a year and a half right that's similar to what we see here and finally i'll leave everybody with this let's not forget about the government shutdown which

is going to take place on october first now all democrats have come in and said is look we'll agree to your continuing resolution, but you got to preserve the Affordable Care Act tax credits. Because if you don't, they're said to expire and people's premiums are going to go up 2x, 3x, maybe even more. People can't afford to pay $1,500 a month for their health care premiums. Just do the math times 12, what that is. People can't afford $300 more a month on anything in this economy, yet alone that. So Democrats are like, okay, you've gutted Medicaid, you harm Medicare, we're in difficult economic times.

We just want you. And by the way, you may disagree. You may just say, hey, Democrats, just force this thing. Don't fund this thing at all because it's an authoritarian regime. And I think you can make a persuasive argument there. But Democrats have said, look, save people's health care. Then if you want to do a continuing resolution, even though you previously said you don't support continuing resolutions, MAGA, will allow this thing to keep on. getting funded, and Donald Trump ordered Republicans, don't talk to Democrats, yet alone

negotiate, don't talk. And if you want to know again using data, why I can, I think, convincingly show you that this is a Trump MAGA thing is, why would MAGA might cancel the day of work for the 29th and 30th? Like the two days before you're telling people don't show up to work and Republicans don't be here, that's how they're trying to force a shutdown to a shutdown to occur. Democrats in the Senate, to their credit, did not vote for cloture this time, meaning they did not give Republicans the 60 votes to then allow a vote where you would just need a simple majority. You need cloture 60 votes, and then you need a majority on the underlying CR continuing resolution. Democrats did not give Republicans that. So we're headed towards a shutdown. And Trump

said, don't speak to Democrats. So Democrats said, if you're not going to speak to us, why would we support something that we're supposed to speak to each other that's literally how this is supposed to work it's not like your majorities are massive let's speak to each other so i want to flag that for everybody and i think that trump wants to shut congress down because he knows they're getting closer towards getting the epstein files and so he wants them shut down to stop work on the epstein files and i think trump knows that we're heading into difficult and perilous economic times and he wants to blame Democrats for that and say Democrats shut it down. I was bringing us to a golden age and Democrats shut it down.

You know, and I just think about these symbols, Brett and Jordy, I'll leave everybody with this. As Americans are struggling to pay their groceries, as Americans can't afford homes, can't afford mortgage payments, if they're lucky enough to have mortgage payments, can't afford rent, living paycheck to paycheck, health care is being ripped away, Donald Trump building a 90,000 square foot golden ballroom. Donald Trump ripping to shreds the Rose Garden and replacing it with something called Club Rose Garden, a club for rich people to party at the White House. The image of Donald Trump in the UK and golden carriage and castles while Americans are here suffering,

you know, all of that to me, that imagery in Donald Trump's businesses, making billions of dollars. It seems every day another Trump kid is in Wall Street, ringing the bell for another company that they're making money off of. It's just, that contrast to me is deeply, deeply un-American and deeply problematic. So I'll leave everybody with that, Brett.

I don't know if you have anything else to say before you go, but I know we covered a lot of ground today. If you're on mute. I'll leave you with this. If there's one thing, and we did cover, oh, my gosh, we've covered so many topics this episode. But I'll just say if there's one other thing that we could take away from this whole kind of Jimmy Kimmel Theasco and what we've seen in the last few days, it's that your voice still matters. And I think you all were loud enough, the threats of boycott, the Disney Plus cancellations,

all of the various celebrities banding together and saying, I think there were like 400 celebrities who signed a petition with the ACLU. There were tons of other celebrities who were saying, I'm not going to participate in any Disney ABC projects until this suspension is lifted. And I think all of that collective pressure from everybody shows that we still do have agency and we still do have power,

and especially when you hit people in the pocketbook. And ABC's market cap or something, it was like down nearly $4 billion since they suspended Kimmel last week. And so it just shows you that, You still have this power. So take the small winds and use it and understand that you still have to stay loud, that they want you to be silence. They want you to be quiet.

But I assure you they are not as strong as they are pretending to be. They are not as powerful as they are pretending to be. The people have the power. We just have to use it. Jordi, take it away. And shout out to the Midas Mighty. Want to stay it right Want to stay plugged in?

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