The MeidasTouch Podcast - Sexy Pragmatic Progressive Politics with Congressman Ro Khanna

Episode Date: April 30, 2021

On today's episode, we start the show by discussing the all new sexy Meidas Merch (which you can buy here) before recapping President Biden's incredible speech to the nation, and the embarrassing and predictable GQP response. Next, we speak with Congressman Ro Khanna about what it means to be a progressive capitalist and get his thoughts on the first 100 days of President Biden's administration. Then, we finish the show with a recap of the doody that Rudy colludy has found himself in, and the growing number of GQP failsons with daddy issues galore. Ben also breaks down the 3 requirements of being in the GQP cult. Special thanks to our sponsor Grove Collective for making this episode possible. Making the switch to natural products has never been easier. For a limited time, when our listeners go to grove.co/meidastouch you will get to choose a FREE gift with your first order of $30 or more. Support this show and take advantage of this offer today! Click here and get started! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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That's datemyage.com to connect with thousands of singles worldwide. datemyage.com. Welcome to the Midas Touch Podcast. Ben,icellis joined by my younger brothers Brett and Jordy Micellis. We have a great show for you today with Congressman Ro Khanna from California's 17th congressional district will be joining. What I love about Ro Khanna and what I'm excited to interview him about is his view of progressive capitalism, how progressives can work with free markets, how capitalism can work for the people, and how we need to change our system from corporate raiders, from the GQP pillaging the people. And we need to focus on what free markets should be about. Free, freedom for the middle class, for real Americans, for all Americans. Bring back manufacturing jobs. Bring back green jobs. Make green jobs. Make America truly the place that it should always have been.

So we can make great products just like the new Midas Touch merch. That's a plug in the beginning this time. I am loving the feedback we're getting, but I got to bring up one comment that I received last night, which really I'm still thinking about it. I'm still thinking about this. That's what you get, Brett, when you start posting porno. Yeah, what are you doing from the porno? What are you doing? So to clarify, yesterday we posted a photo of one of our new lines, Club Democracy. It's a Midas Touch shirt, Club Democracy.

Club Democracy. I feel like that's what Midas Touch is all about now. We're a pro-democracy movement. We want all those who believe in democracy to come and join us. So we had this product. I posted a photo of a woman wearing the product, a long sleeve shirt inside a coffee shop, staring down at her coffee. And somebody goes, I love the work you guys do, but this photo is so overtly sexual. How dare you guys sexualize women like that? The photo is literally a woman just existing. Fully clothed. Fully clothed, long sleeves. There's zero sexual about it. And I probably shouldn't comment to every ridiculous comment we get, but I did from the Midas account say, I'm sorry, but that's not what this picture is at all.

And then they doubled down and they said, how dare you? This is so overtly sexual. The sexualization is ruining your message. Do you guys see the photo? Is there even like an ounce of sexuality in that picture? Absolutely not. But I didn't realize they responded to you i didn't know i didn't know this was an exchange that went back and forth

round two round two it's uh wow it's like this you know this the internet is a crazy crazy crazy but truth be told the midas merch since we've revamped the store. We've made it available to all of our international listeners and supporters out there as well. The Midas merch has just been crushing it like we are running out of Midas merch. And so if you want to get your vaxxed and relaxed mask, if you want to get your club democracy t-shirt or sweatshirt or all the other Midas touch gear. Here's one thing that, uh, that, that, that our dad told, this is what dad told me yesterday. He goes, you got to make a Midas touch shirt that basically has the brothers on it. And basically says like the Midas brothers, Ben, Brent, and Jordy with our faces on it. I just genuinely don't know if people would

ever wear shirts with our faces on it, but dad's like, you got to do it. So I don't know if people would ever wear shirts with our faces on it, but dad's like, you got to do it. So I don't know if I'm being pranked or punked by my dad, and I'm going to make shirts with our faces. Our self-esteem is not high enough to proceed with that shirt, unless you tell us you want that shirt. So you can let us know if you want that shirt. But I'll let the listeners in on a secret. The brothers refuse because of their big egos, refuse to let us make team brother name shirts. So for example, hashtag team Jordy, hashtag team Ben, hashtag team Brett. They refuse to let us do it because they know their certain little brother, their younger brother shirt might outsell theirs. Well, the good news is, is that even if Jordy's shirt outsells, Brett and I will

still win in grammar and in stringing together sentences, because Jordy, you would be one of the brothers if you use brothers as plural. So you have a big ego and you're against the idea of the joy. You just you just decided to exclude two out of your three brothers in this concept. We're like, let's do a shirt with the three of us. And Jordy goes, nope, we need Team Jordy to sell out. I'm just letting you guys know what I'm hearing. Here's the thing, though. I think I understand a little bit why that commenter was calling the club democracy shirt sexy. You know why? Because democracy is sexy. Democracy is sexy, you're right. Joe Biden is bringing sexy back. What did you guys think of the speech, the joint address last night?

Well, at least sexy, you know, Brett, I'll leave you in your view of democracy and your sexualized relationship with democracy. That's you and democracy. It's called a transition, Ben. It's called the transition. What you do between yourself and democracy. I leave to you. But I want to talk about the joint session of Congress, the joint session. It's called a joint session. It's called by the president of the United States. The president asks the speaker of the House to be invited to give a speech. It's basically the same thing as a state of the House to be invited to give a speech. It's basically the same thing as

a State of the Union, although the tradition is that because a new president just oversees, has been the president for a short period of time, they really can't opine on the State of the Union. That said, last night, even though it was called a joint session, which was two days before his 100th day in the White House. Might as well been a state of the union. And my friends, the state of the union under President Biden is strong because in these 100 days, I'm just going to say it flat out. President Biden has done more than any president in the history of the United States. Period. Full stop. We went from four years of fear of destruction and death to 100 and a fucking idiot.

I mean, just I don't know if it's the juxtaposition, if it's like one may say when you have like the worst fucking food in the world and then someone gives you something decent, it tastes like a five star meal. But I genuinely think that Biden's accomplished a ton. But also, I mean, Trump's a fucking idiot. I don't care like what. Yeah, he's all those things you said, Brett. But let's just be honest. These guys are these guys.

And GQP gals are morons. Absolute morons. And the speech started off historic. You know, no matter what Joe Biden said, if Joe Biden got out there and just like said, oh, yep, America's great. And then walked off stage, it still would have been an historic speech because sitting behind him for the first time ever in America's history were two women, Vice President Kamala Harris and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, which was an incredible sight to see. I mean, this is progress, folks, right before

our eyes. But then Joe Biden, I got to say, delivered a speech which blew me away. You know, I think this is one of the problems with the Republican messaging on calling him Sleepy Joe all the time. It's that when he actually gets up there, this is a guy who's bold, who's dynamic, who's delivering policies that people want, who's inspiring and who speaks directly to the American people in a relatable and empathetic way. His messaging is clear and precise. And I was personally I was blown away by the speech last night. Dude, Joe came to play last night. He was on fire. It was a phenomenal speech. And anyone who says otherwise, I mean, you're just lying to yourself. It was a very, very good speech. He had one moment that was really interesting. I didn't realize. I don't think any other president in that state, you know, in that forum has ever spoken out against trickle

down economics the way Biden had last night when he said we need middle out economics. Oh, middle out. He called it right out. The most common refrain from President Biden was jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, which I think was an incredibly important point to be hitting that all of these policies, whether it's putting paychecks, putting money in people's pockets, getting people vaccines so they could get back to work, dealing with infrastructure, all these are plans that help bring back jobs and revive the economy. Yeah, I like a president who actually helps the people and doesn't try to divide with, you know, with just dumb theatrics and just stupidity and vaccines,

jobs, infrastructure, racial justice, voting rights, $15 minimum wage, strong unions, common sense gun control, standing up to autocrats, standing with our allies, bringing our troops home. At the end of the day, tough platform to beat. And you see why in the face of that, Republicans have to go, but our hamburgers, but Dr. Seuss, but Mr. Potato Head. Because these are extremely popular proposals that every American should be behind. And most Americans are behind. What was their new one, Brett,

that Joe Biden wants to cancel July 4th. Isn't that what, what's a Bobert said? Yeah. Yeah. Bobert canceling July 4th, hamburgers, all those things.

It's just the Kamala's book. Like the literally just fake news. Just make up makeup. And then last night, this is how desperate they are. Marjorie Taylor Greene posts while Joe Biden is pitching a plan, which once again is a hugely popular plan that will help families across this country to expand universal pre-K and free community college for all Americans. Marjorie Taylor Greene decides to tweet, federally funded school from age three to 20 doesn't sound like education. It sounds like

indoctrination, all at your expense, by force, in the form of taxes. Yeah, I don't think they know how the public education system works and the things that they would roll their eyes at. So the fact that the GQP is against the funding of schools, against funding schools from age three to 20. Did you see there was a close up? I loved when they would when the TV cameras would show the GQP. The camera guys were on it. Like when they talked about gun control, boom, boom. When they talked about tax raises on the rich, Mitt Romney, boom. When they talked about clean water, boom, Mitch McConnell, who's angry at clean water. I've never seen a guy angrier at clean water than McConnell. I understand that these things, that these state of the union addresses and joint addresses,

typically you see one party standing up and applauding the president and the other party staying down. But usually there are across the aisle issues like everybody should have clean water. We should get rid of child poverty that brings both sides up. But this GQP kept their asses in their seats with sourpusses on their face every time. We need clean water for all Americans. Nope. We need to protect the right to vote. Nope. The GOP just sits there. We need to eradicate child poverty from America. Nope. We need to raise taxes on those making $400,000 a year so that we could pay for health care for Americans and get our infrastructure back. Nope. That was the theme of the night. How about Americans need to get vaccinated? They don't stand up and clap for Americans need to get vaccinated. But look, the people who watch this, according to the CBS News poll, YouGov poll, 85% approved, 15% disapproved. But you know what's so

wild is that in terms of the disapproval, all of the GQP members who spoke after obviously disapproved and vocalized their hatred of the speech in the most bizarre terms. So first we have Lindsey Graham. Let's play that clip. Yeah, really. I saw a socialist tonight. I saw a man who embraced socialism. Okay, so that's Lindsey Graham.

For Lindsey Graham now, you just need to play two seconds before it just brings you, gives you a headache. I saw a socialist tonight. That means legitimately nothing. That's socialist. Then we have Ted Cruz, AKA Ted snooze, AKA you snooze, you cruise Ted Cruz. We did a video that we put together in a web,

right. And you put that together in like a, like 10 minutes after super rapid response video, just because this guy is the worst. Nobody likes Ted Cruz. Ted Cruz sucks. Everybody hates Ted Cruz. And here's a little taste why. The speech by design was calm and dulcet tones. I challenge you to remember a single line from the speech. A few minutes later. the most radical line tonight you remember was when joe biden said we the people is the government i challenge you to remember a single line from the

speech and then for really for no reason we showed ted cruz sleeping at the end of the video during the speech he had his eyes shut lion sleepy ted this is really ted cruz whole idea this is ted cruz's whole concept with joe biden it's yes he's sleepy yes he's boring but he's radical and that messaging just is is i want to break down what he even said. I mean, so first, apparently, Cruz was upset that Biden spoke in a calm tone. Like, like, I heard someone up there speaking calmly. Yeah. OK, yeah. Like, you want a motherfucker up there saying you need it to hydroxychloroquine.

You need like like like like that's what y'all actually want. A fucking psycho. Like, I mean, when you actually think of the criticism of Biden is that he's calm and speaks like an adult. I mean, just think about that. I forgot who else it was, though, and somebody else was like, you don't see Biden out there tweeting passionately. It's like we just had four years of you denying you even saw Trump's tweets. And now you're pretending, oh, I don't like that Biden isn't tweeting erratically and he's too calm and too chill.

You got nothing. And then Cruz's evidence, apparently, for why the speech was radical. And just to explain this to me, he goes, we the people is the government. I don't even explain to me why that's radical. I don't know. I thought we were government by the people for the people. I thought it wasn't that isn't that America? I mean, I just I don't think that part of the video is being covered enough. Like I get that it shows that he listened. And so it proves that he didn't like not listen to the speech. But then we the people is the government. I don't even know if that's what's controversial about that. We are people, you know, for the people, by the people. That's the whole purpose of the democracy.

Would he prefer that Trump is the government? Would he prefer that Cruz is the government? I mean, these people are the worst. And then you had afterwards the rebuttal speech. And we just prepared a video of Senator Tim Scott. Hot off the presses. Hot off the presses. We haven't even released this video yet. So by the time you are listening, you will have seen this Midas Touch clip of Tim Scott. I don't want to ruin it. So you'll hear for yourself. I have experienced the pain of discrimination. I know what it feels like to be pulled over for no reason, to be followed around a store while I'm shopping. Every morning

at the kitchen table, my grandfather would open the newspaper and read it, I thought. But later, I realized he had never learned to read it. I get called Uncle Tom and the N-word after the shooting of Walter Scott, after the deaths of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd. A hundred years ago, kids in classrooms were taught the color of their skin was their most important characteristic. And if they looked a certain way, they were inferior. Today, kids are being taught that the color of their skin defines them again. America is not a racist country. The immediate thought is everything he said at the beginning demonstrates the significant racism that exists in this country. And then to conclude with there is no racism in this country and America does not have racism after

explaining these true experiences of racism that exists is just the ultimate form of just being disingenuous. And that's at the end of the day, there's so many issues with the GQP from the fact that they're crazy, from the fact that they're psycho to that they're hateful, the fact that they're despicable and disgusting and smelly humans. Like there's a lot to hate about the GQP, but also there's no level of consistency. They just say words. It's just a bunch of words. It's just a bunch of word salad and getting people angry at the end of the day. You know what I found weird was the rebuttal speech itself. It got like primetime play. Like

I was watching it on CBS. You know, maybe it just costs, you know, I haven't been in the space that long. I know they do rebuttal speeches, but are they always nationally televised like that? Like you would think that at least nationally, the president of the United States would get the last word. Yeah, they always play the rebuttal speeches.

Always though, they always play the rebuttal speeches. Always, they always play. On national television. Yeah, I don't think I've ever seen a time where they haven't played a rebuttal speech, but rebuttal speeches really are where political dreams go to die. And if you're making that speech, I think you're kind of like a kamikaze taking one for the team when you're making that speech because no one wants to make that speech And no one has come out of that rebuttal speech on the other side doing better in their quest to rise the political ranks. I mean, who could remember President Bobby Jindal, President Marco Rubio? which could never hold weight next to the gravity and boldness and impact as basically like this is how fucked up it was then like the young cool

republican to counter obama when obama was when obama was on fire but they always show let me rephrase that but do they show democrats for rebuttals i can't think of one. Yes. Yeah, I always do. Okay. Well, 100%, 100%. Whenever they show, whenever there's a state of the union though, Jordy, which only happens once a year and a joint session like this, which will only happen usually once a year, unless there's some extraordinary other reason to be invited to have a conversation, which happens on rare occasion that requires a rebuttal. They do air the short rebuttal. Yeah, I think Governor Whitmer did it last year. But I have something I want to talk about, guys. And I want to talk about shifting gears here for

a second to Grove Collaborative. Now, I want to put this out here to our listeners from the very outset, because one of the things that I'm excited about at Midas Touch is to work with advertising partners now who I actually will use the product. And then I feel that our Midas Touch supporters would like and would use. That's like a major threshold for me. So Grove Collaborative is a way to basically keep a clean and healthy home, which is more important than ever these days. But the issue that I think we all face is that there's a lot of household products out there, but we want products that are natural and that are effective. And wouldn't it be nice if there was somebody you could just trust, put in the work for you, save you the time and

money. And that's where Grove Collaborative comes in. And here's an interesting fact too, Brett, I don't know if you knew this, but 70% of people say they want to use natural products. I would even argue the number may be more than that, but 70% of people say they want to use it, but only 2% do. And the reason why is because they get this at stores where the biggest companies get on the shelves, but aren't the most healthy. And so I actually used Grove Collaborative. I went to grove.co. That's how you get there. You go to grove.co and I placed an order. I checked out this online marketplace that delivers these healthy home beauty and personal care products directly to you.

And I got these products and, you know, my girlfriend, very excited about them. My girlfriend liked them. Your wife got them. I know Jordy's fiance liked them. I loved them. I mean, everybody here who's used them, liked them. I mean, one of the reasons that we liked them is because when you put them on the floors, because they're natural products, she liked that they're natural and she felt that she didn't have to worry about the dogs getting sick or the fumes and dangerous stuff. That's the great thing too. It's like a bit of everything, right? It's like you're able to get dog products. I got hand sanitizer. I got body wash. I got glass straws. You could kind of get a bit of everything that you need around the house, whether it's dog products or home products or beauty products, you name it. I got Mello. I got Midas Mello,

the blueberry dog treats. He won't go to sleep now until he has his blueberry dog treats. Plus it's the natural good stuff. And when you go to like a store and you just see like a billion things and you see all these chemicals listed on the products, it gets very confusing. But at Grove Collaborative, it's just everything you're getting, you know that it's going to be good stuff and you know it's going to be good for the environment. So we're really excited to partner with Grove. Making the switch to natural products has never been easier. And for a limited time, when Midas Touch listeners, this is an incredible freaking deal right here. When you go to grove.co slash Midas Touch, you can get a free gift with your first order of

$30 or more, but you have to use that special code. So it's grove.co slash Midas touch. That's M E I D A S T O U C H to get your exclusive offer. Once again, grove.co slash Midas touch, get your free gift. I mean, it's free. It's free. You're going to get good products. You need the products anyway. You might as well get products that are going to be good for the environment, good for this planet. Brett, you are so right. And now switching gears, I am thrilled to bring on Congressman Ro Khanna, a congressman from the Bay Area representing California's 17th, who's championed pragmatic capitalism. Congressman, welcome to the Midas Touch podcast.

Ben, thank you. Congratulations on all your success. You've really got rookie of the year. I mean, you've hit the ground running and a lot of folks on the Hill are talking about you. I appreciate that. and you've hit the ground running, and a lot of folks on the Hill are talking about you. I appreciate that. You know, back when I played basketball, it was always Mr. Hustle.

That was the – it was never like the all-star. It was never the best on the team. It was always six men off the bench, Mr. Hustle, and I will take Rookie of the Year, especially – That reminds me of my coaches used to say, Ro, you can hustle. You could be the hustle of it. It took me a long time to realize they were saying that because I was terrible at everything else. And they thought hustling would be the one way I could add any value. I was like, Mr. Hustle, teacher's pet. You know, they're all kind of the good things that you want

as a high school student in college. The other thing they used to say, not that you have more serious things to talk about, but anytime I used to get up to the plate, they used to say, watch the bunt because they had figured out. Anyway, we share a lot of similarities, including being from the beautiful state of California and including being progressive capitalists. You know, it's funny because we when we started, you know, we always said, look, we are pragmatic progressives, you know, and that's what to me the progressive movement really is. It's about creating economic wealth for all Americans. It's about these common sense approaches. So and you even

you haven't been afraid to go on Fox News to even talk about what it means to be a progressive capitalist. And I think this is an important message to get out. So when you say progressive capitalism, sometimes people think those terms don't go together. What does that mean? Well, to me, it means that I believe in markets as something that enhances freedom, right? I mean, why do we have markets? If you didn't have a market, then basically you would have collective decision making and you would have Congress making decisions or city councils making decisions about everything that's produced. Well, are you really thinking that you're going to have innovation and entrepreneurship if everything is based on the collective? Of course not. You need

entrepreneurs. You need the lone artist, the lone visionary to go out and be able to invent things. So that's the reason we need markets. It's freedom, it's creativity, it's innovation. But what we need at the same time is to have equal access to those markets. We need to make sure everyone has health care, has education, has basic nutrition, has a safe community to live in, has opportunity to get funding. Otherwise, you are not really having a true market. So that to me is progressive capitalism. One other point about it is you can define markets in different ways. And I would define markets to achieve the common good and tackle climate change, tackle disease. One of the policies you championed recently, you've been vocal about it on Twitter, is we need to fund the IRS. You applauded President

Biden for increasing funding of the IRS by $80 million to hashtag audit the rich, audit the rich. Why is it important that we audit the rich? Well, it makes more sense of what we do right now, which is audit the poor. I mean, literally, I'm not kidding about this. This is like every speech of the Budget Committee that the Republicans make. Your income tax credit is abuse and fraud. And so finally, I asked myself, what is the abuse and fraud they're talking about? And they're literally talking about like the grandmother who claims their grandkid as a dependent.

That's what's currently getting audited. Or a couple that split up where both the husband and wife, mom and dad are claiming a dependent. So that's what the IRS is auditing more than they're auditing people on Park Avenue. This is actually the truth. And what I'm saying is most of the income that isn't being paid is by the top 1% there because they're the ones who owe the most. This doesn't have to be an economics PhD to know that you're going to get more revenue if you go after the top 1% for unpaid taxes than going after people who are taking one too many deductions on the EITC. So we're saying focus on where the

actual money is going to be collected and focus on how they're hiding that money because a lot of them are doing businesses and they're not disclosing the business income. You could raise $1.2 trillion. That would be a third of paying for everything that the president proposed in his brilliant speech last night just by collecting taxes that people owe. What do you think about his speech last night? I thought it was a home run. I didn't know Joe Biden had that in him. Maybe I was for Bernie. We spent so much time saying Joe Biden, he's going to be cautious and incrementalist. And, you know, I don't think Bernie will mind my my saying this. And I was having a conversation. He said, well, he's he's doing better than we thought he would.

Isn't he, Rowan? And, you know, the truth is he he really rejected he rejected the framework of Reaganism. And he's making a bold, affirmative case for government as necessary. So I love the speech. And he's got his own way of relating and earning trust of people. I think he's off to a fabulous start. And for our listeners who don't know, and correct me if I'm wrong, you were the co-chair of the Bernie Sanders campaign. I was very proud of it. I mean, look, I think Bernie Sanders, to his credit, has been a huge team player. I mean, one of the very unfair criticisms of Bernie Sanders was, oh, he's not a good Democrat. He doesn't isn't a team player. And he's put all that aside. He was out there campaigning for Joe Biden.

And now he's on the lead on getting Biden's agenda through as his budget chair. And what do you think when you look at this other party, whatever, you can't call them conservatives anymore in my view. Do you think you could? Let me ask you the question, because and I don't want to give you the lawyer leading question that I get. This isn't a loaded question. I can't call anytime someone says conservatives. I go, there's nothing conservative about these people. Like they support insurrections. They want government takeovers of businesses that they don't agree with their politics. They believe in bizarre conspiracy, dangerous conspiracy theories and Jewish space lasers.

They go after students who are survivors of school shootings. Like, do you look at these people and go, how dare you call yourself a conservative? No, you're absolutely right. I mean, and obviously Trump's presidency was anything but conservative. The whole conservative idea is that we respect tradition and institutions. And Trump was the most cavalier about running roughshod over the rule of law and institutions. I think the Republican Party right now is in search of an identity. I don't think anyone can really define who they are.

Let me say, I mean, if I was being trying to make coherence out of it, I think it is a party of fear. And I mean, to be genuine about it, I think they're fearful of the change in America, the change of demographics, the change of new voices, the change of immigrants, the change with technology. And a lot of what they are talking about is appealing to people's fear of change. Let's talk about the Democratic Party for a second. How do we bring together these two factions of the Democratic Party, which seems to be the more progressive wing and then a more moderate and conservative wing with like a Joe Manchin or a Kyrsten Sinema on some of these policies? And should we? And should we? And should we? Should we?

Well, of course, by all signing up for my vision of progressive capitalism, right? That's the synthesis. Look, I think I think the president and Schumer and Pelosi deserve some credit. I mean, they've been pretty remarkable in getting everyone from Jamal Bowman and Pramila Jappal and AOC to Manchin and Sinema behind some critical legislation. Obviously, with the American Recovery Plan, that was a huge achievement. Now, let's see what we're going to go forward in doing in getting these wings together on infrastructure, on a family care plan and on taxes. I do think we're going to be able to do it. And the message I think that Biden has to send, which he's sending, is I am doing what the country

wants, what I was elected to do. These are very popular policies. And you know what? The wings will have the chance to fight it out after I'm done my eight years or whatever he wants to do. But I'm going to position us for what we need to do right now. And I think a way of getting people together is support the president's agenda. Right. So that means, well, don't push all the time for everything you want or Bernie campaigned on, but push for the stuff that's in the Biden agenda. And it means probably for the moderate. Don't question the stuff that Biden's putting in. That's the compromise. What you said there resonated with me so much. It's that these policies are just hugely popular and bipartisan with the American people. The Republican Party might make fun of them and might knock them, but the people are behind it. I think I saw last night, 85% of speech watchers

approved of Joe Biden's speech. And most of them said that it made them feel optimistic about America. But then you turn on Fox News and they're talking about hamburgers and they're talking about Dr. Seuss. I mean, what do you think of this line of attack from the right? Are they just totally out of ideas? What is happening there? Well, they're out of ideas. I don't understand who they're caricaturing. I mean, I read Dr. Seuss books to my kids, and so no one's boycotting. They make up a fake bookie man, right? You know, progressive Ro Khanna from the Bay Area still reads Dr. Seuss. So like they set up these total straw men. And I think they've met their match with Biden because Biden has this amazing skill, right?

If I say something or if Bernie says something, they'll say, oh, that's just Ro Khanna, California. But when Biden says it, it's like that's the voice of reason or something. So he's taken all of these policies and he's making them, selling them to Scranton, Pennsylvania. And there he's totally befuddled the Republican Party where they're they've just not been able to define him. And and look, there's we've got to be candid that there are issues of race and gender and age mixed into that. One of the things that shocked me in the campaign during the primary when we would do polling over and over again is that the voters that had the biggest intersection were between Bernie and Biden. And I said, they're on two different wings. But so much of it is cultural. They both were able to culturally connect. And I think a lot of the Republican opposition is cultural. They're trying to look for those

cultural points to divide us. And that's where I think Biden's doing his greatest service is he's helping us transition to a multiracial democracy and saying, look, everyone's going to have a part of it. Switching gears now slightly. And I know it's an issue that you've done an excellent job speaking to, but I feel like has sort of gone, you know, underspoken about in the media at large is what's going down in India. We've done a great job here in the U.S. now, 200 million vaccinations plus. We're doing that well. And, you know, we're helping the American people. But how much and what obligation actually, is it for the United States to now help other countries like India during their crisis?

I appreciate your story with what's our obligation, because I do think we have a moral responsibility to help when there are humanitarian crisis around the world. Everyone says it's in our self interest. Yes, it's in our self interest, but it's something deeper. Our founding principles is about recognizing the dignity of all human beings, regardless of race, religion, borders. And when we can help after we've prioritized Americans, obviously you prioritize Americans just like you prioritize your family. But we can help. We should. And I'm so glad that the administration now is helping. We're sending oxygen. We're sending PPE. We're coordinating with tech companies to get philanthropy to the right hospitals. But the one thing we really need to do is to license the vaccine formulas to over 100 other countries. And it's

important to understand what this means, the TRIPS waiver at the World Trade Organization. It sounds jargon filled, but it's actually really simple. Right now, if you're a manufacturer sitting in India or in Africa and you want to make a vaccine for COVID, you can't pay Moderna or Pfizer and license the vaccine formula to manufacture it. No one's asking for it for free. They're not even contracting it. They're not allowing contract manufacturing. If we continue this way, we're simply not going to be able to have vaccination for the world. That's wrong morally. And also, ultimately, it puts us at risk with new variants emerging. Listeners are going to ask why, though. I mean, I hear you. Why does that even exist? It seems so common sense that if there's a pandemic, that's a global pandemic.

So what happens in India could affect here, especially if there are other variants. Why does there exist this thing that blocks that licensing from taking place? Does Big Pharma want to block it because they're trying to protect their IP? Like what's the underlying tension here? Yeah, no, it's a fair question because obviously everyone is saying, in my view, that Americans should be vaccinated first. So let's make sure that's happened. But now that we've gotten there and now that it's not going to affect Americans, what is the harm in licensing it? Because Pfizer will still be paid, Moderna would still be paid. Their fear is that they would be licensing a technology in the mRNA vaccine that would allow other countries to,

one, manufacture things so their profits, they won't be as dependent on Pfizer, Moderna, so it may hurt their short-term profits. And they may be able to use that technology to make advances in other areas, on cancer, on other diseases. I guess my view is good. Like, I want to compete with China, but if China develops the cure for cancer, that's great. I mean, what should we not all – should we all not use paper? Should we not use the compass because that was invented in China? Like I'm all for competition, but not when it comes to advancing human civilization against disease and climate change. So if Pfizer and Moderna are going to be fine, they're going to make tons of money licensing it. They don't need to have exclusivity on mRNA technology. AKA progressive capitalism.

Now, I would be remiss as a Bay Area congressman if I didn't ask you about a Bay Area hero who I happen to represent, Colin Kaepernick, who's been deprived employment in the NFL now going on his fifth season, who's clearly qualified to pay, who has stood up to racial injustice, who stood up for the people and who is being denied employment. And he's a hometown hero in the Bay Area. I mean, you have all these corporations that talk a big game. You know, hey, we want to help the people. We're against racism. But in theory, the people who these corporations often exile are people like Colin Kaepernick, another Bay Area person, Eric Reid, who doesn't have a job right now. What kind of message is that sending? And you want to see Kaep play, huh? I do. I mean, he was he had a lot of support and Eric Reid had a lot of support,

obviously, in the Bay Area before he even became a national hero. He didn't set out to be a national hero. He was doing something on principle, which is protesting in a very peaceful way and in the most peaceful way issues of police brutality. And I and he's obviously been ahead of his time because when he was talking about it, this was before Jacob Blake. And he pointed out something that now the country realizes is wrong. So he should play. I don't know what the holdup is there. Everyone acknowledges that on the merits, he would play. And yet no team is willing to really take the risk, as I understand it, and offer him a job. So, I mean, it shows he's a person of courage. He's an extraordinary athlete

and he's really been treated unfairly. Congressman, thank you so much for joining the Midas Touch podcast. Appreciate you. And we'll be right back after these messages. Thank you. Keep at it. Love the program. Thank you. Keep at it. Love the program. Thank you so much. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast. Great interview with Congressman Ro Khanna. I think I'm just going to go out and say it like Congressman Ro Khanna is the kind of person who I think could be like president of the United States one day. Absolutely. Absolutely. I genuinely, when speaking to him,

you know, thought like, you know, he's going to be, you know, he worked in the Commerce Department under the Obama administration. He went to Yale Law School. Sometimes you just speak to people and you're like, you know, like that person is going to be.

You know how when we started Midas, though, like we were trying to figure out like what's the best kind of, you know, mess, like what do we call ourselves? You know, like that person is going to be, you know, how, when we started Midas though, like we were trying to figure out like, what's the best kind of, you know, mess, like, what do we call ourselves? You know, cause we were never political per se, and we were never into like certain political labels. And we decided we landed on the phrase pragmatic progressives. And I feel like Congressman Ro Khanna's message of being progressive capitalists is in essence, that pragmatic progressive nature, which is there are ways to actually achieve change and get things done. And this is how you do it.

I love it. Let's transition from that and let's talk about some duty, right? And when I say duty, I'm actually talking about Rudy duty, Giuliani. And no, we're not talking about the duty leaking out of his face when he's trying to contest the free and fair election. Nope. We're talking about Rudy duty, Giuliani. And no, we're not talking about the duty leaking out of his face when he's trying to contest the free and fair election. Nope. We're talking about the deep duty that Rudy is finding himself in. I'm just losing track completely of what you're saying. But federal agents executed a search warrant this week at the Manhattan apartment and office of Rudy Giuliani, according to his attorneys, and not just according to his attorneys, but the fucking most embarrassing thing of all. His son, Andrew Giuliani, did this like bizarro Trump impression talking about the raid on his father. I mean, it's obvious that

Rudy Giuliani has been conspiring with foreign countries to try to literally interfere with the American election. That's one of the issues I believe that's being investigated. Again, everything that the Republicans argue, the Democrats do like the Republicans really do. I saw a funny poll that what's his name took of the most embarrassing moments of Rudy Giuliani in the past year. And it was like, what's the most embarrassing moments? Was it the four seasons? Was it the duty dripping out of his head? You know, the poll I'm talking about?

Yeah, I know. I think it might have been a George Conway poll. Yes, it was. Was it Rudy farting on Jenna Ellis? No, that so that wasn't in there. That wasn't in there. I'm naming the other stuff i can only fit four things on a twitter poll i was shocked at sasha baron cohen's with a 15 year old girl

sticking his hand down his pants this guy has had quite the run in a short period of time it's weird like it's crazy for we're new yorkers we grew up on long island you guys know this and what rudy was when we were younger growing up in new york you were yeah you know he was new york's mayor he was america's mayor that was all bullshit jordan but it's crazy it's crazy looking back on that and just knowing the sentiment that people had around him in the community and just thought he was america's mayor he was the new york he was the face of new york it was wild it turned out that he actually did a horrific job and was the face of New York. It was wild. It turned out that he actually did a horrific job and caused a lot of the issues that we saw

on 9-11 and then used that tragedy for his own political benefit and then completely threw away the reputation that he built by doing that because people did, in fact, as you're saying, bought into that messaging by just becoming or just showing himself to be a complete lunatic. But now, I think Rudy's fucked. I think. Yeah, I mean, this is a serious investigation. It's concerning his activities in Ukraine, including whether he conducted illegally lobbying for Ukrainian officials while he claimed to basically go after Biden. And this would also seem to implicate Donald Trump as well as because Rudy was doing this as an agent of Donald Trump. A lot of people say, you know, when are we going to start seeing things happen?

When are we going to start seeing the Justice Department move? And this is a big taste of that. This could be one of the first big dominoes to fall. Ben, you mentioned Andrew Giuliani. I think we got to watch at least one of these clips. Oh, yeah, play the clip. Oh, my gosh. Mind you, I'm speaking as a son and a concerned American.

Anybody, any American, whether you're red or blue, should be extremely disturbed by what happened here today, by the continued politicization of the Justice Department. This is disgusting. This is absolutely absurd. And it's the continued politicization of the Justice Department that we have seen. It's absolutely absurd. Before we get into that one, go play the next video too that we have. They play off each other. We have to talk about both at the same time.

The only piece of evidence that they did not take up there today was the only piece of incriminating evidence that is in there. And it does not belong to my father. It belongs to the current president's son. What? Hunter, you're bringing back Hunter? So what I see in Andrew Giuliani here is the perfect cocktail of rage meets fear meets panic in human form. And Andrew, what is with also these kids with extraordinary daddy issues who have to mention my daddy, my father, if this could happen to my dad, then it could happen to

you. Isn't that the point of the law that everybody, whether you're the lawyer for the president or whether you're a cashier at a grocery store, every single person in this country should be equal under the eye of the law. And if anything, this shows that our Justice Department is working and the hypocrisy to try to act like this is a politically motivated hit on his father when President Biden has made it a point to distance himself from any knowledge of Justice Department investigations. It's just the height of Republican hypocrisy and projection. If you merge Don Jr. with Eric and you fuse them with Gary Busey into one person, you get Andrew Giuliani. No, I love that. And but this is I was going to say something similar.

This is like a new video idea. If you were to show the Eric Trump, Don Jr., Governor Death Santas, Andrew Giuliani, and you put them like kind of side by side, you know, and you start with former guy and then you kind of clip different like screenshots of each of them. Yeah, you could almost play like the same sentence. You could form the sentence.

They do the same things with their hands and they talk like fucking idiots and they all have the same cadence and go, this is disgusting. And literally it's the same rage that spews out of them. Hashtag hashtag GQP daddy issues. And it's why we say that it's a cult and it's a weird fucking cult. And I think we conclude with the segment again that the GQ it's a weird fucking cult. And I think we conclude with the segment again, that the GQP is a weird fucking cult. And let's talk about cult rules, cult rule number one. Okay. You have to suck up and be a total cuck to your cult leader. In this case, Donald cucking

Trump. And, and, and it's the weirdest things in the world because no one gives a fuck about former guy anymore. He's the biggest fucking loser. He's going to be known as the biggest piece of shit ever to stay in history. Yet his fucking acolytes, the Lindsey Grahams of the world, have to keep going on shows that are also by suck ups like Hannity and just praise Trump in unusual ways. And let's just play this specific clip. But let's just talk about when you listen to this clip, look at the odd transition comes out of nowhere to speak about Trump's golf game having nothing to do with the underlying subject that's being talked about. Foreign policy declaring war on the cops we're set to come back let's get

good candidates lindseygram.com put your name in the hat raise money and beat these people so we can take our country back why do i think donald trump crushes you on the golf course i'm just guessing i don't know who's gonna win that match because he's better than i am he's gonna kick me around well you're both better than me like that's not even funny that's just ridiculous and it has nothing to do with it and and brett the awkward transition of like they were talking about some other issue and then all of a sudden they go how much better is donald trump at golf than you donald trump would kick my ass at golf if you want to see him whoop me.

I mean, the whole thing is just extremely bizarre. So rule number one, you got to suck up. You got to suck up. They're like a half a step away, though, from Kim Jong Un style, like saying, no, Mr. Trump does not pee or poop. He runs out. Number two, number two, to be a part of the weird GQP cult, you just have to be a weirdo. You almost speak in a different language. I described it on Twitter the other day as when you hear these GQP speak to each other. I mean, it's so incoherent and bizarre. It's almost like Martians speaking to each other. I said on Twitter, remember when the Furbies would communicate with Furbies?

And it was like, that's what they speak about. Except here, like they accuse each other of heinous crimes to each other. And so play this clip of Lin Wood telling, GQP Lin Wood telling this other GQP, Dren McKissick, at a recent town hall style meeting. I know about you and Lindsay. You need to get out of the race now. Nothing can stop what's going to come. He said, I know about you and Lindsay. Nothing can stop what's about to come.

You are supporting Chinese pornography. I know, I know. The other guy responds, I know about you and the Chinese. You are supporting Chinese pornography. I know. I know. The other guy responds, I know about you and the Chinese pornography. You support Chinese pornography. I know about you and Lindsay. You don't know anything. You don't know what you're talking about. I know about you and Lindsay.

You don't know anything. Nothing's going to stop it. Nothing's going to happen with you. It's going to come out. You need to accept that. Hey, bring it on out, buddy. Come on. I don't think you want to bring it out, but it's going to come out. Come on. You and Lindsay, it's going to come out. You need to accept that. Hey, bring it on out, buddy. Come on. I don't think you want to bring it out, but it's going to come out. Come on. You and Lindsey, it's going to come out, Drew. I'm trying to tell you.

Bring it on, man. I'm trying to tell you. I heard you. Soon you'll hear from other people. You know what I just realized? No denial? What? It's bad WWE promo parody.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. what it's bad wwe promo parody yeah that's what it is so just absurdly pathetic and over the top what the fuck are they even talking about they're speaking in code like what ben's saying go back to the where we started though this podcast with with his ted cruz basically criticizing biden for saying he spoke calmly he spoke calmly as though that's although that's the criticism you want people talking about. You're a Chinese porno and you and what you did with Lindsey Graham and you like this porno like these are weird fucking GQP people now. Rule three. OK, one, you got to be an absolute cut to you have to be absolutely, absolutely weird. And number three, you have to have absolute purity.

Even when going away, you're doing yourself a service. You have to then go back to the cult every single time, no matter what, you know, to seek reapproval. And this is Kelly Loeffler. Kelly Loeffler was gone. I mean, honestly, the greatest thing that she was probably doing for herself was just disappear at this point and just go and do it right. I mean, it was frankly, frankly, she's lucky that she's not hasn't been indicted yet for her insider trading. She's lucky she's not in prison. She should just hide out and be quiet. If I were Kelly Loeffler, I would hide. Instead, she tweets this week, I sent a letter to Georgia's attorney general calling for an

investigation into the secretary of state's handling of the 2020 elections. We will keep fighting for more transparency, accountability and integrity in our elections. She's talking about the Republican Raffensperger as the secretary of State and his handling of the 2020 elections. And it's just like, Leffler, go away. Nobody cares about you anymore. You and she was the poster person of like just being totally warped into GQP. You literally could see it in her eyes. She was a robot. One of my favorite things that I saw from this though, is this came out yesterday and was just a blip in the news and in the Twitter feed.

Everyone was like, okay, Kelly, like shut the fuck up. Like, what do you, like, what do you do?

Who cares? No one cares. Go live in your, go live in your mansion, go insider trade, whatever you're doing. Just don't talk to us. You never even won a single election.

You didn't even win to get you in. You were appointed. Not even Fox News liked you. Not even any of these people who you're now trying to appease, like these Lin Wood, Batcha crazy people, liked you. And now you're trying to suck up months later because you're trying, I don't know, maybe she's trying to run for Senate now because we found out that Doug Collins isn't going to be running for Senate and there's a gap there. Maybe that's her decision run for Senate now because we found out that Doug Collins isn't going to be running for Senate. And there's a gap there. Maybe that's her decision. Maybe this is her planting the seeds.

But Kelly is like the most unpopular human being on the planet. She's never won. We start from the fact that she has the single worst communications director of all time in little Stevie Lawson who blocked all of us. Stevie Lawson who's dedicated I'm like so curious what he's up to he might still follow me that was such a flex you have the communications

director this guy Stevie Lawson who came after Midas Touch during the campaign and so we just made it our whole goal to destroy Stevie Lawson. And we made it personal. And boy, with the help of all of you,

Midas Mighty, we crushed Stevie Lawson. He had to block everybody. Stevie Lawson is not so cocky after January 5th, after that election. Stevie Lawson is now known. Stevie Lawson is now known as the most or one of the most pathetic political operatives ever to live. It is the most embarrassing record of any human being ever. Like Stevie Lawson, if you look it up, check Urban Dictionary. I think Stevie Lawson, you look up, it's failure.

It's like, oh, shit, I didn't do good on my test. Like, did you do really bad or you do Stevie Lawson? A huge fuck up from here forward. Stevie Lawson. Yo, I Stevie Lawson'd it. Look, you know, like in anything really bad, like, yo, yo, you're looking, you're looking. What's the matter? You go, yeah, you know, I got my second shot.

You know, I'm having some side effects. I'm not feeling good. Are you feeling like sick or like Stevie Lawson sick? That's Stevie Lawson. But look, here's the thing. And this is how I want to conclude this podcast. The GQP just digs deeper and deeper and deeper into their Q roots. And that's why they become a marginalized small party of disgusting, stinky, putrid human beings. The U.S. economy grew at 6.4% pace in quarter one of 2021 with huge jumps in consumption, in business investment, in government spending, in housing.

And U.S. growth is likely to be fully recovered from the pandemic by quarter two of 2021. Those are stats. 6.4% economic growth. Those numbers are unheard of numbers, and those numbers are uniquely tied to Biden policies. This is because Biden put in the stimulus plan. This is because Biden is helping businesses. This is because Biden is a normal president who doesn't tell you to drink bleach all day. This is because Biden has set up a pathway for vaccines. This is why America is leading the world in vaccines. That is what America first really looks like. This is what caring about our country is. And this is why elections have consequences. We talked about this with Congressman Ro Khanna.

We've talked about this on the podcast. The GQP has nothing to talk about. That's why they talk about burgers and the 4th of July and Dr. Seuss because they have no ideas except the one idea of pillaging the United States of America for billionaires. Other than that, it's creating a white supremacist vision of America to the exclusion of everybody else and destroying the fabric of our nation. That's why they talk about all these other issues. But that is why me, Brett, and Jordan want to remind you each time that you have the power, that you hold the key to save our democracy, to wear our Club Democracy shirts,

however you please. Wear it looking sexy. Wear it looking not sexy. You are part of Club Democracy, and not sexy you are part of club democracy and we thank you for joining our club shout out to the Midas Mighty