The MeidasTouch Podcast - Philippines Prez STICKS IT to Trump WHERE IT HURTS

Episode Date: February 3, 2025

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on how the Philippines is already cutting America out of key deals as America is weaker than ever. Wildgrain: Wildgrain is offering our listeners $30 off their first box - PLUS free Croissants in every box - when you go to https://Wildgrain.com/MEIDAS to start your subscription. Visit https://meidasplus.com for more! 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 Influence Continuum: 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 Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Square. You're not just running a restaurant. You're building something big. And Square's there for all of it. Giving your customers more ways to order. Whether that's in person with Square Kiosk or online. Instant access to your sales. Plus the funding you need to go even bigger.

And real-time insights so you know what's working, what's not, and what's next. Because when you're doing big things, your tools should too. Visit square.ca to get started. From commutes that become learning sessions to dishwashing filled with laughs, podcasts can help you make the most out of your everyday. And when it comes to everyday spending, you can count on the PC Insider's World Elite MasterCard to help you earn the most PC optimum points everywhere you shop. The PC Insider's World Elite MasterCard, the card for living unlimited. Conditions apply to all benefits. Visit pcfinancial.ca for details. When does fast grocery delivery through Instacart matter most? When your famous grainy mustard potato salad isn't so famous without the grainy

mustard. When the barbecue's lit, but there's nothing to grill. When the in-laws decide that, actually, they will stay for dinner. Instacart has all your groceries covered this summer. So download the app and get delivery in as fast as 60 minutes. Plus, enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions, and terms apply. Instacart. Groceries that over-deliver. Discover the magic of BetMGM Casino, where the excitement is always on deck. that over-deliver. Doesn't stop there. With over 3,000 games to choose from, including fan favorites like Cash Eruption, UFC Gold Blitz, and more,

make deposits instantly to jump in on the fun and make same-day withdrawals if you win. Download the BetMGM Ontario app today. You don't want to miss out. Visit BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. 19 plus to wager. Ontario only. Please gamble responsibly.

If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. There's very little consistency with anything Donald Trump is. But if you take a close look, the one thing that seems clear is he is attacking and weakening our alliances and strengthening our adversaries. Let me give you another case in point with these tariffs. You notice that the 25% tariffs, well, that's what our allies get hit with. But the 10% tariffs, those are for our adversaries, right? So less tariffs on our adversaries. As some have said, the administration is demented, but I think there's something deeper going on here. You take a look at the ripple effects. For example, the president of the Philippines has now offered a deal with China.

You want to talk about deal-making. It's deal-making that weakens the United States' geopolitical interests. And I'm going to show you this first, and then I want to show you what Marco Rubio was saying about the Philippines. And you can see how China is outmaneuvering Donald Trump quite easily. But either Donald Trump is the biggest idiot ever, which may be the case, or he's playing right into the hands intentionally and maliciously in terms of our geopolitical interests, right into the hands of China. So take a look at this. The Philippines president offers a deal to China, stop sea aggression, and I'll return the missiles to the United States, the Typhoon U.S. missile system. So the Philippines president, Ferdinand Marcos Jr.,

offered at the end of last week on Friday to remove U.S. missile systems from Philippines if China halts what it called aggressive and coercive action. The U.S. Army installed these Typhoon mid-range missile systems in the northern Philippines in April last year in the Biden administration to support what the longtime treaty allies described as a training for joint combat readiness. Now, however you feel about it, this was part of a geopolitical arrangement of the United States and frankly of NATO in Asia as also part of America's support of Taiwan and in an effort to try to check the growth of China, which was also building a lot of bases in the nearby areas. This is what the U.S. geopolitical policy was or geostrategic policy was. But now one of the things that we're learning is that Trump's new Pentagon appointee on Southeast Asia has argued for negotiating a, quote, cooperation spiral

with China, whereby the United States will unilaterally, quote, remove U.S. military forces or weapons systems from the Philippines in exchange for CCG executing fewer patrols. One of the things that's being asked, can the U.S. and China forge a cold peace right here? Well, the interesting thing about this is that it undermines everything Secretary of State Marco Rubio said at his confirmation hearing. What's interesting, if you listen to Rubio in the clip I'm about to show you, it actually kind of echoes what the Biden policy was and a prevailing view amongst international strategists, those in the State Department, those in the Defense Department. Now, what you have to do is to kind of check China's expansion, you have to make your own

kind of maneuvers, military bases, military maneuvers, and diplomatic maneuvers, U.S. aid to various countries, and then, you know, enhanced kind of military support. But already America's so weak, Philippines is going to China. Hey, can we do a deal? Let's make a deal, Xi Jinping. As America's Pentagon official who has to report to Hegseth, Pete Hegseth, who's never led any military thing before, really, other than a nonprofit, which pushed him out, but never led a large organization. This is what's going on.'s what marco rubio said secretary of state rubio let's play this clip let's let's leave taiwan out of it for a moment and say it's the philippines okay in the last 48 hours there's this massive i don't even know how to describe it but this

massive ship that the chinese have built that's like headed towards the philippines and the philippines feels threatened by it rightfully so We've seen this on a daily basis with the harassment and so forth, but on a daily basis. If, God forbid, there is some miscommunication or some inadvertent conflict emerges there and we have obligations to them, the impact that will have on the entire globe, the impact that it will have on the entire globe is enormous, and that includes Europe. So they have a selfish vested interest in seeking for the Chinese to curb their behaviors. I would also point to the Europeans that what the Russians have done with Ukraine would not have been possible without the assistance of China, whether it's the sharing of technology or aid in evading sanctions or selling their oil in secondary markets.

The Chinese have been hidden, but clear to everyone watching, partners in the Russian endeavor. So when you see that, you can see how Trump's actual policies undermine what Rubio's saying. But that's what Trump wants, right? Like Trump will have his attorney general, Pam Bondi, at the confirmation hearing say, we're going to respect the rank and file FBI directors and FBI staff. Everybody's going to get due process. And then Donald Trump fires any FBI agent who had anything to do with investigating January 6th insurrectionists and terroristic acts on January 6th and Oath Keepers and Proud Boys. So Trump pardons all of the January 6th insurrectionists. They get treated like heroes, but then law and order, the FBI, they get fired. My point though here is that Pam Bondi said the opposite. So my point about Marco Rubio is that Marco Rubio said one thing and then the policy was undermined. This episode of the Midas Touch podcast is brought to you by Wild Grain. Wild Grain is the first bake-from-frozen subscription box for artisanal breads, pastries, and pastas.

Wild Grain's boxes are fully customizable to your taste and dietary restrictions. In addition to their classic variety box, they recently launched a new gluten-free box and a plant-based box that is 100% vegan. Best of all, they take the hassle out of baking since all items bake from frozen in 25 minutes or less with no mess or cleanup. Now, my personal experience with Wild Grain has been incredible. I wouldn't steer you wrong. It's super convenient and all the products are high quality and super fresh.

I cannot say enough good things about Wild Grain and I know that you're gonna love them as much as I do. Are you ready to bring all your favorite carbs right to your doorstep? Be sure to check out Wild Grain so you can begin building your own box for artisanal breads, pastas, and pastries. For a limited time, Wildgrain is offering our listeners $30 off the first box,

plus free croissants in every box when you go to wildgrain.com slash Midas to start your subscription. Now, how else was the policy undermined as well? Let me give you other data points. So Donald Trump's recent press conference, he says that he's going to put tariffs on Taiwan. Taiwan's our ally. So Trump's talking about putting worse tariffs, more damaging tariffs on our ally Taiwan while then having this cooperation with China against the Philippines and against Taiwan. Here, listen to what Trump says here. Play this clip. Plans put together. In particular, in the very near future, we're going to be placing tariffs on foreign production of computer chips, semiconductors, and pharmaceuticals to return production of these

essential goods to the United States of America. They left us and they went to Taiwan, where, which is about 98 percent of the chip business, by the way. And we want them to come back. And we don't want to give them billions of dollars like this ridiculous program that Biden has. Give everybody billions of dollars. They already have billions of dollars. They've got nothing but money, Joe. They didn't need money. They needed an incentive. And the incentive is going to be they're not going to want to pay a 25, 50,

or even 100% tax. They're going to build their factory with their own money. We don't have to give them money. They're going to come in because it's good for them to come in. They're giving them money. They don't even know what they're going to do with it. I had people tell me, we have no idea.

We didn't need money. And then when Donald Trump was asked about DeepSeek, which is China's AI that really destroyed America's AI industry, was so far more advanced. It one would look at China's foray into AI as a direct economic attack and assault on U.S. industry. One would think, did China steal? Did China take the billions and billions of dollars in development from U.S. AI companies and basically appropriate it for their own use, undercutting the U.S. interest? But Donald Trump's like, actually, you know, maybe a good thing. Here, play this clip. This is very unusual when you hear a deep seek,

when you hear somebody come up with something. We always have the ideas. We're always first. So I would say that's a positive. That could be very much a positive development. So instead of spending billions and billions, you'll spend less and you'll come up with hopefully the same solution under the trumpet and remember how i said before that you know the u.s power internationally as kind of the quote-unquote leader of the free world it was post-world war ii exercised in a lot of ways so one of the ways it was exercised was through aid supporting supporting other countries, building bridges, alliances, and the other way was military. Now, the United States is pulling out all of its aid. We're attacking everybody, threatening countries. Donald Trump's arbitrary, capricious, malicious mind. You don't know what's

going to happen one day or the next. Th, threatening everybody, saying America doesn't need anything. We don't need allies. We don't need anybody. I mean, you couldn't be weakening us more if you tried. That's why it feels intentional. And also from a military perspective, we are enhancing the power of China. We are enhancing the power of China. We are enhancing the power of Russia. We are weakening Taiwan. China may not have to fire a single shot with all of the kind of former American allies. They just start making deals with Xi Jinping because they can't rely on America. And America is so weak, they see the writing on the walls. Look, even the president of Mexico, the very popular and powerful Claudia Scheinbaum at the G20 summit a few months back, she was not supposed to meet with Xi Jinping. She met with Xi Jinping, took photos with Xi Jinping.

Why to send a message? We could try to find other power structures outside of the United States if you force us to. But even without Claudia Scheinbaum, I mean, the head of the president of Panama, Peru, Honduras, Colombia, all had state visits with Xi Jinping over the past five, seven, eight years. Panama established strong relations with China during Trump's first term. China is giving billions of dollars in aid. Panama established strong relations with China during Trump's first term. China's giving billions of dollars in aid. They're giving statements about respecting sovereignty of nations, the types of statements that used to emanate from the United States. And what's Trump doing? Just acting like a blabbering fool.

That's my point. My thesis here is that either he's the biggest idiot and moron ever, which could be true. The most incompetent, dumbest, you know, I'm not trying to name call, just trying to be objective. Or this is intentional to help China, to boost China, to help Russia. China and Russia are talking. They're making deals with each other. Russia and Iran are talking. They're entering into alliances and America's breaking all of its alliances. So if you wanted to execute a plan, how do you weaken America? It's this. And this example in the Philippines is a perfect exemplar of it. Hit subscribe. Let's get to 4 million. Thanks for watching. Can't get enough Midas? Check out the Midas Plus sub stack for ad-free articles, reports, podcasts, daily recaps from Ron Filipkowski and more. Sign up for free now at MidasPlus.com.