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- [00:00]
Benji
Limu Imu and Doug.
- [00:03]
Brett
Here we have the Limu emu in its natural habitat, helping people customize their car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual.
- [00:13]
Interviewer/Reporter
Fascinating.
- [00:14]
Brett
It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug.
- [00:18]
Jordi
Uh, Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us.
- [00:21]
Brett
Cut the camera. They see us.
- [00:22]
Jordi
Only pay for what you need@libertymutual.com Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Savings vary unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance company and affiliates.
- [00:29]
Guest/Reporter
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- [00:56]
Jordi
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- [01:19]
Guest/Reporter
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- [01:30]
Brett
Zoe, this thing weighs a ton. Drewski, lift with your legs, man.
- [01:33]
Guest/Reporter
Santa.
- [01:34]
Brett
Santa, did you get my letter? He's talking to you britches.
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Jordi
I'm not.
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Guest/Reporter
Of course he did.
- [01:39]
Jordi
Right, Santa, you know my elf, Drew Ski here.
- [01:41]
Brett
He handles the nice list. And elf, I'm six' three. What everyone wants is iPhone 17 and at T Mobile, you can get it on them. That center stage front camera is amazing for group selfies. Right, Mrs. Claus?
- [01:53]
Guest/Reporter
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Jordi
Give it as a gift.
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Guest/Reporter
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- [02:04]
Brett
Nice. My side of the tree is slipping.
- [02:06]
Jordy
Timber.
- [02:07]
Jordi
The holidays are better.
- [02:08]
Brett
AT T Mobile switch in just 15 minutes and get iPhone 17 on us with no trade in needed. And now T Mobile is available in US cellular stores with 24 monthly bill.
- [02:18]
Benji
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Jordi
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- [02:21]
Benji
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- [02:26]
Jordi
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- [02:27]
Benji
Visit t mobile.com the world is on fire as a result of Donald Trump's weakness. We've never been this close to a world war since, frankly, the beginning of World War I and World War II as Donald Trump has destroyed an established world order. Let's just talk about what's happened just over the past 24 to 48 hours. You had President Zelinsky of Ukraine visit Mar A Lago, where Donald Trump has been holding court at the Mar a Lago dining room. Donald Trump was parroting Putin talking points and saying to Zelensky that Putin just wants to help Ukraine and make things better for Zelensky. And you saw President Zelensky look at Donald Trump like he's absolutely crazy and a total and utter madman, because that's what Donald Trump is. You have China launching its most aggressive military operations or tests right around Taiwan. Taiwan has had to respond with putting its military on the highest level of military preparedness that there is. Donald Trump was asked about what he's doing to help Taiwan, and Trump said, I don't even know what's happening. What do you mean? China's running military tests. You have Iran saying that it is officially at war with the United States, with Europe and with Israel, and says that it has more capabilities now than it ever did before. You have Kim Jong Un in North Korea testing cruise missiles.
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Brett
Remember when that would just take place.
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Benji
Like under former President Obama, and people.
- [04:10]
Brett
Would be like, my God, that's so weak. You're letting Kim Jong Un test cruise missiles. Well, yeah, he's doing it right now.
- [04:16]
Benji
And it's maybe a footnote on what's taking place in the world right now. And that is related to, by the way, what's happening with China and Taiwan. And all of this is also an effort to intimidate Japan, and Japan and South Korea kind of feel abandoned by the United States. But we'll get into how Trump has also given up America's role in Asia, given up American's role in Europe, given up America's role in Africa, Central America, South America, really throughout the entire world. And also Donald Trump mentioned on a right wing radio program that we actually attacked inside Venezuela as like a throwaway line. And then Donald Trump was asked about it earlier in the day and he's like, I don't, I don't know who.
- [05:00]
Brett
Who cares Whether we did that or.
- [05:02]
Benji
Not, that's what's going on in the world. Then here in the United States, the Trump regime continues to cover up the Epstein files. As Donald Trump said during Christmas and the day after, a million documents were uncovered, by the way, was uncovered by the Midas Touch network when we uncovered the 1.2 million documents with the Southern District of New York. But in the small amount of documents that have been turned over, we identify, not we. Julie K. Brown identified. The public was able to identify and see that back in 2019, Trump's DOJ was spying on Julie K. Brown. She's the top reporter who was exposing Epstein and his inner circle. And there are documents in connection with subpoenas and other things that it were in the current files showing Julie K.
- [05:51]
Brett
Brown's flight itinerary was being looked at.
- [05:55]
Benji
By the Department of Justice at that time. So we'll cover that. And also, Donald Trump's health continues to deteriorate. While he was with Zelensky, it looked like both of his hands were now discolored. And on his left hand it looked like now there was a. It looked like a hole.
- [06:11]
Brett
And again, we're just all somewhat speculating because this is yet another cover up.
- [06:15]
Benji
As Trump refuses to turn over his actual medical records. It looks like an IV that's been going into both of these hands. And that would explain a lot. But because Trump's covering it up, we're just left to speculate and give our informed opinions.
- [06:29]
Brett
And then I want to cover this as well. Another case got dismissed where ICE shot somebody.
- [06:36]
Benji
And this happened in Los Angeles. And I'm very familiar with this federal judge, and I'm very familiar with this.
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Brett
Central District of Los Angeles or Central.
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Benji
District of California prosecutorial office.
- [06:46]
Brett
And this federal judge dismissed this case where ICE shot a guy because ICE was refusing to turn over body cam footage.
- [06:54]
Benji
They were refusing to or the prosecutors.
- [06:57]
Brett
Were refusing to turn over the basic discovery documents.
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Benji
And the judge is like, you're utterly incompetent.
- [07:03]
Brett
I'm dismissing this case with prejudice. And so yet another case where ICE shot somebody and then blame the person they shot getting dismissed. And I think that shows you just how utterly incompetent this DOJ is on cases that are high profile, medium profile.
- [07:21]
Benji
And not so high profile.
- [07:22]
Brett
If you're a criminal defense lawyer right now, this is like your dream come true because this DOJ doesn't know how to function because. But if you care about law and order right now as well, you're very worried because they can't accomplish basic tasks. That and more here on the Midas Touch podcast.
- [07:39]
Benji
Brett and Jordi, we've got a lot to discuss.
- [07:42]
Brett
Obviously, it's wild when I turn on the. When I turn on the news just to see. And I hate corporate news. Like, are others covering this? Like, none of this is being.
- [07:51]
Benji
Like, none of this is being covered at all.
- [07:54]
Jordi
And it's certainly not being put in the appropriate context, I would say. I mean, you know what you described. When you're looking at what's going on. North Korea with Iran with Venezuela with Russia and Ukraine. I mean, I think it's fair to call it, like, at minimum, like some sort of cold world war that is happening right now. And it's happening as a result of Donald Trump's complete and utter weakness, and it's happening to his complete nutter, capitulation to these other powers. And it's also the philosophy of the Trump administration, as we've heard them say, as Marco Rubio has talked about, this multipolar world where you have basically three countries running the world. You have the United States, you have Russia, and you have China, and that's the way they want to carve up the entire world. And when you look at it through that lens, everything kind of begins to make a little bit of sense. And one of the issues with covering this administration, and I think the way that kind of corporate media has been trained to cover just the world in general, the kind of way their templates are set up for them to cover stories, is they typically give the person providing them with the information the benefit of the doubt that the truth is coming their way. And I think the Trump administration has taken advantage of that fact, and they quite literally lie about everything. And then they end up getting the headlines that they want. Um, and then the research is done after the fact to go, oh, maybe they lied about this fact or that fact. Meanwhile, Donald Trump has gotten all the headlines he wanted about X, Y and Z. And when you look at all the various things coming out of this regime, when you look at. And then like you were saying earlier, if you look at what's happening with ice, if you look at what's happening with this Department of Justice and all the Epstein stuff, if you look at their horrific. You know, you're supposed to. The Department of Justice usually has, like, a 99% conviction rating that has absolutely plummeted because they are so bad at these cases, and they're lying about just about everything out there. If you look at what's going on in Venezuela and these boat Strikes. If you look at the stuff Donald Trump is saying about Russia and Ukraine, it's just lie, lie, lie, lie, lie, disinformation, disinformation, Propaganda, propaganda, propaganda. We essentially live in a Russian state right now with Donald Trump being the Vladimir Putin who's spreading the propaganda to us. So we cannot trust anything coming out of this regime right now. Nothing at all. We have to honestly speculate about everything, and we have to do our own research about everything. And that's why independent media is so valuable at this critical moment in our nation's history. We're going to dive into everything. You know, I got to check in with Jordy first. Jordyn, what's the latest?
- [10:29]
Jordy
What's up, brothers? What's up, Midas? Mighty Brett, well said. Look, I'm really excited for today's show because we have a lot of ground to cover. And you put it perfectly there. B. Corporate media is just failing, just failing left and right here to deliver people the accurate news. And so everyone knows that watches the show. We come with fax data and receipts, literally. And I'm excited to just jump on in. So, Benji, with that, where do you want to start off today?
- [10:51]
Benji
Right? And you know, you have the free world, which is not represented by the United States anymore. I mean, you have Ukraine, you have Europe, you have Canada, you have Australia, and you have some other areas, right? And they are referred to by Russia as the old world, and they're viewed as this outdated democracy. And that. That's not the way of the future. Right? Then you have this authoritarianism kind of creeping back where you had these centuries of democracies and the idea of democracy spreading. Now you have authoritarianism back, asserting itself with these strongmen leaders, which is what.
- [11:34]
Brett
Existed throughout most of history.
- [11:37]
Benji
And they're utilizing the disinformation that's out there and AI and all of these tools in order to effectuate what they're doing.
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Brett
I mean, just. And they speak to it. The authoritarians speak to each other through their authoritarian kind of language and lies and fake world that they create in order to justify the atrocities they're inflicting.
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Benji
I mean, you wake up this morning.
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Brett
And you have Russia announcing right after Zelensky shows up. Magnanimous. Zelensky shows up with a productive idea at Mar A Lago.
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Benji
Zelensky shows up and says, okay, Ukraine.
- [12:15]
Brett
And Europe is going to call the bluff of Donald Trump and Putin. Here's what we're going to do. Why don't we allow there to be.
- [12:21]
Benji
A referendum, a vote to take Place that.
- [12:24]
Brett
If you want territorial concessions, if you want Ukraine to give up eastern Ukraine, Donbas, other areas like that, let's just take a vote. Let's do a 60 to 90 day ceasefire so that we can stop the war. Then let's do a vote. And if ultimately. And we'll do a vote for the President. Also, if people want to vote out Zelensky and if they want to vote to be Russia, let's just make sure it has all of the aspects of a free and fair election. Let's protect a free and fair election, and let's put it to a vote. And if people want to go with Russia, we'll allow that. But it has to be decided by people, because this is an issue of sovereignty. It has to be decided by the.
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Benji
People in a vote.
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Brett
Right. A good way to really call the.
- [13:09]
Benji
Bluff of Trump and Russia.
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Brett
So what does Russia do right away? Well, they first put out a statement that says a ceasefire is just a prolongation of the war.
- [13:21]
Benji
It's an exact statement that came from.
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Brett
Lavrov and Ushakov and Dmitriev and Putin. A ceasefire prolongs the war. Stopping the war makes the war last longer. So that's what they went with originally. And then they realized, okay, well, what do we do? Just, just lie, just make something up. And let's use the word terrorists, because that's a way to, to rally support. So what are we going to do? So if you woke up this morning, you may have heard the news on.
- [13:54]
Benji
The Midas Touch network that Russia's Foreign.
- [13:56]
Brett
Minister, Sergei Lavrov, said on Monday, Ukraine attempted a terrorist attack using 91 drones against the residents of Vladimir Putin, right around Putin's house, right around the area, but that Russia was able to stop it. Now, a drone swarm with 91 drones that would have to evade all of the other areas of detection and nobody would hear the drones being shot at by any of the defenses anywhere, including by where Putin actually lives in kind of northwest Russia. I mean, the story made absolutely no sense. But then Russia put out a statement and said this Ukrainian attack will not go unanswered and that we need to adjust our negotiating tactics now to deal with the terroristic actions of Ukraine. And then Putin calls Donald Trump up right away and says, look what they did. They tried to kill Putin. Putin calls up Trump, they tried to kill me. They tried to kill me. And then all of the Russian propaganda that then goes out, which, by the way, Trump doesn't rebut. What we'll show you in a little bit Trump. Trump agrees with it. Trump's like, well, thank God I didn't give Ukraine the Tomahawk missiles because they may have used the Tomahawk missiles to go after you, Putin. So I guess you're going to have to respond however you're going to respond. Like, don't you think that this was set up when Donald Trump was speaking with Putin both before and after Zelensky left? I mean, think about it. Trump said he spoke to Putin for hours and hours and hours. And when Trump was asked, well, what did you talk about?
- [15:36]
Benji
He goes, what do you think we talked about?
- [15:37]
Brett
It's not like we talked about, like, dinner or food or like what movies we like. You don't think that they were coordinating this strategy and that when he met with Zelensky privately, that he was going to say, hey, you know, if you don't agree to the deal that we're doing, you know, they may be able to find some sort of pretext to start launching attacks on Ukrainian government buildings. Right? And that's what was executed the day after Zelensky left. Like, duh, that was the plan. Duh. That's what Putin told Trump. Duh. That's the message that Trump delivered to Zelensky when they were there in private and Trump kicked out the reporters. And what, what Putin said he's going to do and what Trump threatens Zelensky with is he said, let's be. Let me tell you what's like with Omazes. He's going to kill you, Zelensky. They're going to try to assassinate you. They're going, I could help, I can try to help you, but they're going to go after the government buildings in Kiev if you don't agree to surrender. That's what went down privately, in my opinion. And how do you know? Just make common sense out of it. Putin, then Putin and Lavrov execute that plan today. Zelensky comes out with a statement right away and says, this is all false. It's just yet another pretext to go after our government buildings and try to kill me. But that's what this is about. They're going to, they're going to try to kill Zelensky right now. I mean, let's be very clear, right? That's what they're going to try to do. And I think Trump gave him a green light to it. And I think that's what Trump was threatening Zelinsky with. And that's what this meeting was all about in the frickin dining room of.
- [17:04]
Benji
Mar A Lago, Brett and Jordi.
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Jordi
Yeah, we've talked about these pretexts before and how these authoritarian leaders feel the need to create pretexts in order to justify their autocratic actions. It's been the big theme of this podcast. We brought it up numerous times. Because it's Donald Trump's go to move, and it's Trump's go to move because it's also Vladimir Putin's goto move. And this scheme that they've devised that was announced earlier today could not be more transparent. If these were two kids, if this was a bully on a playground running to the teacher and telling the teacher that this kid threw rocks at me or something, and then he was trying. They were trying to get the other. The kid that they were actually bullying in trouble, the teacher wouldn't believe it. So spare me the BS that this is the thing that Donald Trump is now believing and that this is what they actually believe may have happened. He obviously didn't look into the intelligence. He doesn't care to look into the intelligence. He wants to accept Putin's framing of this because he views Putin as the good guy in this invasion and he views Zelensky as the bad guy. And you could just look at the way they greeted the two leaders as well. Volodymyr Zelensky comes to the United States. Not a single single US Official is there to greet him. Now, I want you to think about the red carpet treatment, and I mean literally the red carpet treatment that they gave Putin when he arrived in Alaska for that summit with Donald Trump, that disastrous, horrific summit with Donald Trump where he made a complete fool out of Donald Trump, where Donald Trump had our United States military quite literally get on their knees and roll out the red carpet for Vladimir Putin. And we see Trump do this all the time, whether it's with his 2020 election lies or whether he's speaking Portland. There's an invasion in Portland. Portland's in chaos. We need to send in the military. He did it here in my city of Los Angeles. Same thing. It's the same way that Putin operates. It's the same concept. When Putin goes, oh, Nazification, we need to de Nazify Ukraine. And that's why we're going in there. They're constantly trying to find their next lie that they could tell their supporters that they could amplify on their propaganda networks in order to justify their horrific actions. Because what these autocrats don't like doing is they don't go out there and go, okay, I'm going to be evil now. I'm going to go kill some people. That's my move. They try to wrap it in this other framing, whether it's framing of patriotism, whether it's a religious framing, whether it's a framing of revenge or retribution for wrongs that happened to them. And so you see right now what is happening. And I think there's such a stark difference as well. First off, I feel horrible for somebody like Zelensky who has to be put in the middle of this and has to play this ridiculous game where he needs to go to Mar A Lago first. Why these leaders going to frickin Mar A Lago, What a disgrace in general there. But has to go to Mar A Lago just so that Donald Trump doesn't get him killed, essentially. But thankfully, when he was here, he also met up with Prime Minister Carney in Canada. They had a good meeting. And I think that contrast that we saw within a 24 hour period of Zelinsky's meeting with Mark Carney and then meeting with Donald Trump, you see actually who is taking the mantle as leader of the free world, who is, is actually out there protecting democracy and protecting Ukraine's sovereignty. And then you see evil, you see Donald Trump, you see the people sitting at this very table that I'm showing right now to our viewers of the video podcast sitting around. I mean, look at all of these people. You see people like Stephen Miller and Witkoff and all these people around Donald Trump who are just the epitome of evil right here. Um, it's, it's all very transparent. But you know, that's how these autocrats work and they rely on their propaganda networks, they rely on their mouthpieces in order to kind of spin these stories and get it out there. But I think our audience is a lot smarter than this and I think the American people as a whole are a lot smarter than this.
- [20:46]
Jordy
Absolutely. And you hit the nail on the head right there too, Brett, because that's exactly Donald Trump's plan, Right? He is counting on the fact that Donald Trump thinks you, the American person, are too dumb to see through all of this bullshit. That's it. Period. Dot for me, it comes down to this. I don't, in my heart of heart, I genuinely don't understand this need from Donald Trump to just bend over backwards to appease Putin. Right. It's this love of this strongman mentality that has now put the United States in a very, very, just awful predicament. Because coming out of this, in a post Trump era, Ben, as I like to ask you about. It's scary to think where our allies are gonna stand with us, just seeing how our president right now at this. So buddy. Buddy with Vladimir Putin, Ben.
- [21:37]
Jordi
Yeah.
- [21:38]
Benji
Our former allies are in a containment mode. Right. They have to do this dance and pretend that the United States is still an ally, just to keep as much of the intelligence apparatus that still wants to be supportive. Close enough. But then they have to develop their own plans and they have to assess the world, recognizing that Trump sees the world as the United States, as spheres of influence. The United States controls the Western Hemisphere, Russia controls Europe and Russia and China controls all of Asia. That's how Donald Trump sees everything.
- [22:20]
Brett
But just take a look right here about just even like, the statements that.
- [22:24]
Benji
Were put out by Putin and Trump.
- [22:25]
Brett
This morning, like, as they signal to.
- [22:27]
Benji
Each other in their authoritarian language, Putin tells Trump that Kiev's terrorist actions will not go unanswered and that there's going.
- [22:36]
Brett
To have to be, like, negotiations, negotiations recognizing their terroristic goals. And then Trump's response is how shocked and outraged he is. Just think about what Donald Trump's doing.
- [22:46]
Benji
To justify the war crimes taking place off the coast of Venezuela.
- [22:50]
Brett
Narco terrorism. These are terrorists. They are bringing in fentanyl in order to kill millions of Americans. Every one of these boats that we blow up, we've saved 25, 50,000 lives. By the way, fentanyl is a scourge. But fentanyl is not coming from these fishing boats off the coast of Venezuela. Venezuela brings zero fentanyl. And just. If you want to remove Venezuela from the equation, think about how Trump weaponized the language of fentanyl and terrorist attacks, accusing Canada of bringing in fentanyl and killing America. That was Trump's pretext for tariffs. We have to. They're killing Americans. They're behaving in a terroristic way. It's the same deranged authoritarian language that is used. And watch. I mean, when Donald Trump held this press conference with Zelensky and he was asked some pretty basic questions by the press, just listen to how he answers the question. So the reporter asks Trump, did Putin agree to a ceasefire to allow a referendum? Right? A pretty basic question, right? Donald Trump says that he was going to end the war in 24 hours. And remember a few months back where Donald Trump said that if Russia did not agree to the cease fire, what was Donald Trump going to do? Impose secondary sanctions. You know what Trump did instead? He removed the sanctions. Didn't impose secondary. He removed the sanctions. And you know who he.
- [24:22]
Jordi
No, Ben that's not, that's not, that's not fair. I'm reading right here that he put sanctions. Oh, on, on the eu. He put sanctions on Europe. Sorry, I got my.
- [24:32]
Brett
So he put the sanctions on Europe because Europe wanted to have moderation on bots and consumer fraud on social media apps that have more than 45 million users. So the Trump regime says, ah, Europe is running an anti free speech regime. But then all of these social media platforms are banned in Russia and Saudi Arabia. But they're rewarded, right? Russia's diplomats were jet skiing off the coast of Miami. I mean, did you see these videos of Dmitriev, who runs their sovereign wealth fund, like, mocking the US dude was jet skiing in Miami. While these top European diplomats are now banned from coming into the United States. And Saudi Arabia gets America's most highly classified and valuable semiconductor chips while Donald Trump does business deals with Saudi Arabia. So here's Donald Trump being asked, did Putin agree to a ceasefire to allow a referendum.
- [25:35]
Benji
Here, play this clip.
- [25:37]
Guest/Reporter
Russia agree or did Putin agree to a ceasefire to allow a referendum to take.
- [25:42]
Interviewer/Reporter
Not a ceasefire. And that's one of the points that we're working on right now. No, not a ceasefire. He feels that, look, you know, they're fighting and to stop and then if they have to start again, which is a possibility, he doesn't want to be in that position. I understand that position. The President feels strongly about that or something. But I think we're finding ways that we can get around that. But I understand President Putin from that standpoint. You know, you have to understand the other side. And you know, I'm on the side of peace, I'm on the side of stopping the war. So. But I think that's, that's a problem that's going to get.
- [26:20]
Brett
So what do you even, what are.
- [26:22]
Benji
Those words even coming out of your mouth? I understand it. I'm on the side of peace. I understand why the ceasefire would cause.
- [26:31]
Brett
More of the war. Stopping the war causes more of the war. Like, do we realize how idiotic the things that he, that he's saying are? And by the way, the reason that we've covered on the Midas Touch network what Putin's been saying, what Lavrov has been saying, what Usikov has been saying, what Dmitriev have been saying, what Peskov has been saying, right? Maybe our corporate news wants to cover what these people are saying. Because every time they talk about Trump's fake deals and how close we are, I'm like, are you listening to what the Russians are saying, they keep saying that they want total surrender. They're saying that the special operation, as they call it, is never going to end. They say that Zelensky is the illegitimate leader. They say Ukraine is an artificial state that needs to be wiped off the map. Like, are you listening to what they're saying? There's not even an inkling or a desire on the Russian side for any peace. So it's like, what are we regurgitating? And at every step, Zelensky said, yeah, we'll do a ceasefire.
- [27:32]
Benji
Yes, we'll do a ceasefire.
- [27:33]
Brett
Absolutely. We'll do a ceasefire tomorrow. All Zelensky saying is we just need security guarantees to make sure that once we do this, it's not then going to result in further invasions and incursions. I mean, just think about what, what the. What the different positions are. Now, I want to show you this right here. As President Zelensky has to stand there, as Donald Trump is saying, I actually think that Putin really wants to help Ukraine by taking it over. Like, I think that the whole goal here is to help Zelensky, and that's what Russia's end game is. Watch Zelensky's face while this is happening here.
- [28:09]
Benji
Play this clip.
- [28:10]
Guest/Reporter
So in your conversation with President Putin, did you discuss what responsibility Russia will have for any kind of reconstruction of Ukraine post agreement?
- [28:19]
Interviewer/Reporter
I did. They're going to be helping. Russia is going to be helping. Russia wants to see Ukraine succeed once. It sounds a little strange, but I was explaining to the president, President Putin was very generous in his feeling toward Ukraine succeeding, including supplying energy, electricity and other things at very low prices. So a lot of. A lot of good things came out of that call today, but they were in the works for two weeks.
- [28:47]
Benji
What in the world are you talking about?
- [28:49]
Brett
Brett and Jordi, I mean, you listen to that. And it's like the fact that Zelinsky has to sit there and take that.
- [28:56]
Jordi
The restraint that you need to have as Zelensky here. I mean, the guy has the patience of a saint. I will say it's incredibly impressive of him. But quite frankly, he knows his life is on the line here. And as I was saying earlier, he's got to play this, do this ridiculous dance with Donald Trump, because Trump really does unfortunately, have the fate of his life in his hands in so many ways. But thankfully, Europe has come together, and Europe has actually shown to be the leader of the free world, along with people like Mark Carney. And I think you're actually seeing that leadership matter right now more than ever, whether it's with funding guarantees, as we saw Prime Minister Carney announce, or whether it's other measures that Europe is announcing. I mean, Frederick Mers in Germany has, I think, been a real big leader in this, in protecting Ukraine. And thank, you know, thank God for that, right? I mean, without that, they would just have, you know, the United States rolling over and Putin, Ukraine being handed right to Putin. But you have Zelensky there, and he just needs to, you know, sort of suck it up during these moments when he's asked to come to, you know, Mar a Lago, you know, and unfortunately, I think he's, like, pressured. He has to do it. Like, people are like, why is he even going there? Why does he. I mean, he has to. Like, his life's on the line. You know, he, he, he's got a calculation that he has to make there. But he knows who Donald Trump is, as you can see on his face there. And he knows who Mark Carney is, and he knows who these European leaders are, and he knows who Vladimir Putin is, and he knows where Donald Trump's allegiance is. Like, lie. And I think that's the important part here. It reminds me of you guys watch Hamilton. Do you guys see Hamilton? You know, like the King song, when he says, when push comes to shove, I'll send a fully armed battalion to remind you of my love. That's kind of what I feel like Donald Trump is saying about Putin here. Oh, he just wants the best for Ukraine. He's just showing. He's just showing how much he loves Ukraine here. He just wants to protect Ukraine. It's like, dude, what the hell are you talking about? There's been the most relentless bombing campaign against Ukraine that we have seen maybe since the, the beginning of the war just took place. We've been following, we've been posting these videos of the Ukrainian people who've had to light their little. Light their towns up by bonfire because the power was out, because of Donald, because of Vladimir Putin's attacks on Kiev, because of attacks on their infrastructure. There are all these horrifying videos of these missile attacks and drone attacks on residential apartment buildings in Kiev. This is a very, very serious issue. And right now we have, I would say perhaps, but not perhaps, we have the single worst person in the entire world who could possibly be in charge in the United States right now, overseeing this issue, in charge in the United States right now. And that's a big problem.
- [31:38]
Jordy
I give Zelinsky all the credit in the world for that restraint. And Brett, just building on your point. Yes, Zelinsky's life, but also the life of his people.
- [31:45]
Benji
Right.
- [31:46]
Jordy
Zelensky holding a lot back there, a lot of restraint, as Donald Trump says. Oh, Putin wants peace. Putin wants peace. He wants peace for the Ukraine. Zelensky just holding his nose there and good for him. I don't know how many people would be able to not just say, hey, man, that's insane what you're saying right now and actually speak out. But I give him all the credit because to your point, B, we have the single worst person in charge right now to be handling this. Not only that he is guilty of, in my opinion here, helping the Russians and helping Putin and helping this prolong. And so what corporate media, Ben, I want to build on to your point earlier as well. What they're so guilty of themselves is they won't just hold Donald Trump's feet to the fire out of the nonsense that he's spewing, but what they'll actually do, and it's way more evil. They'll find a word or I guess two words smashed together when he says, want peace? And then the headlines that night on the evening, Donald Trump wants peace, calls for peace for the Ukrainians and Russians. Oh, what a great. That is so frigging evil to me, man. That, like, that's why I'm so happy we have this show, we have the Midas Mighty. And y' all know that, like I said in the beginning, we bring the receipts. I'm glad that we got to play that clip in its full context here, because you guys know when you're watching that corporate news at your dinner tables, whenever that be, they're going to clip that one teeny portion out. But the response that Trump gave was totally banana land. Like, it was absurd, it made no sense. And yet no one wants to hold his feet from the corporate media side of things to the fire and be.
- [33:20]
Brett
Like, hey, man, what?
- [33:21]
Jordy
What did you say? Like, it's not. It's not adding up and you're not making any sense.
- [33:26]
Benji
Go back to February, right around that time when Trump had Zelensky in and Trump thought, I'm going to bring him in there. JD here's what we're going to do. We're going to corner him, surround him, threaten him, and then this is how it's going to go down. And then we're going to give Putin all of the Ukrainian land. The US And Putin will splice it up. We'll get certain minerals, Putin gets certain minerals, Putin gets the territory. America can try to, you know, extract you know, whatever, you know, additional rare earth elements and stuff from Ukraine. That was the plan. And Zelensky didn't back down and Europe didn't back down. You saw Trump lashing out there when Zelensky didn't back down. And then since then, you've actually had a steady growth and European solidarity around Ukraine. Brett, you mentioned Friedrich Merz in Germany, but you have Prime Minister Carney in Canada. You have Keir Starmer doing a good job. You have von der Leyen, the European Union Commission president, doing a really good job. You have Japan doing a very good job. You have Australia. You have countries across the world supporting Ukraine. And I don't think Trump expected that to happen. And I think if you're Zelensky, you look at the calendar and you're like, all right, I made it a year.
- [34:48]
Brett
Like, we got to make it another year, and we got to make it another year after that. And then hopefully we can get somebody.
- [34:56]
Benji
In this government who's going to, you know, look out for Ukraine. And I think that's Zelensky's calculus. And we've got a lot more to discuss. We gotta definitely discuss what's going on here in the United States, but we should also still talk about what's going on between China and Taiwan and the threats from China. We should talk about what's happening with Iran. We should talk more about this visit from Netanyahu where Donald Trump said that he's spoken with the president of Israel Herzog. And so Israel has a president and a prime minister. The president has the pardon power. The president is Herzog. And Trump says, we're going to get you one. I spoke to Herzog and he says.
- [35:34]
Brett
That he's giving you the pardon for.
- [35:36]
Benji
All of your crimes. Netanyahu. And then Herzog had to respond. We've never talked. This is not true. This is what Trump just makes up fake conversations with people. We'll talk about that and more. A reminder, or maybe the first time I'm saying this, so not quite a reminder.
- [35:52]
Brett
We're going to be doing a State of the Midas address, kind of like a State of the Union address, but the State of the Midas address. The Midas State of the Union address will be doing that January 5th on Patreon where you can join us. Listen to our State of the Union and ask us any questions that you may have. We'll open it up for a long time. We'll answer all of your questions@patreon.com Midas Touch. We'll be hosting our 2026 Midas Touch State of the Union patreon.com Midas Touch. You're not going to want to miss that. Let's take our first quick break of the show. We'll be right back.
- [36:34]
Jordi
As you guys know, I take my health really seriously. But I also know I need to.
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- [38:40]
Jordi
Some days I crush a workout and.
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Jordi
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- [39:56]
Jordy
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 we sent you you Benji, where to next?
- [40:05]
Benji
So you also had Donald Trump at a presser held a meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu today who's also currently being prosecuted in Israel for for his crimes. And you have Donald Trump during this press conference saying that he had spoken with Israel's President, a guy by the name of Isaac Herzog. And Israel like a lot of of parliamentary systems sometimes have a president who's like the head of state and then a Prime minister who's like the the day to day head of like foreign affairs and the actual person who kind of carries out like the commander in chief duties and more of the day to day kind of operational stuff. So Trump says he spoke with Herzog and that in Israel it's the president who has the pardon power, not the prime Minister. So you can't pardon yourself. The president is the one who issues the pardons. So Trump says well I spoke with the President and he's agreed to a pardon and I think that'll be coming very, very soon. To which the President said that we never had a conversation. He had to put out a statement saying there was no such conversation that ever took place, that this is entirely made up, it's all a complete lie, and that that's never happened. Herzog's office disputes this. There has never been a conversation between Herzog and President since the pardon request was submitted. Instead, his office says Herzog spoke to one of Trump's aides and offered an explanation that was provided regarding the stage of process in which the request currently stands. This is how Trump describes it. Just making it up. Just like a total lie. Here, play this clip apart.
- [41:42]
Brett
I think you will. How do you not.
- [41:45]
Interviewer/Reporter
He's a wartime prime minister who's a hero. How do you not give a part? You know, I think it's a very hard thing not to do it. I spoke to the President and I. It. It's on. I mean, he tells me it's on its way. You can't do better than that, right?
- [42:02]
Brett
Please.
- [42:03]
Benji
In addition to the fact that Netanyahu is no hero and that Netanyahu has committed so many atrocities and has caused him and Donald Trump seeing two incredibly destructive forces up there together, like saying, oh, you're the greatest. No, you're the greatest. No, you're so great. No, you're so great.
- [42:21]
Brett
Look at how great you've made the world now.
- [42:23]
Benji
You both have made the world an incredibly much more dangerous place. And he made it far, far, far worse.
- [42:30]
Brett
Again, he's just lying.
- [42:31]
Jordi
They made their own countries a more dangerous place.
- [42:32]
Benji
I mean, made them more countries.
- [42:34]
Brett
Yeah, and countries. The rest of the.
- [42:36]
Benji
Absolutely.
- [42:37]
Brett
And they go, and. But everything that Trump says, dude, is just a lie. It just makes it up like a fake conversation. Oh, you remember when he would say that he spoke to Xi Jinping, he makes up fake conversations.
- [42:48]
Jordi
Somebody on our team described it as like a guy, like, pressuring a woman on, like, a proposal, like, oh, she said yes, or don't you say, yes, won't you marry me? And like, putting them in that kind of public awkward position to now try to answer when somebody said that this is going to happen. And now there's like this public pressure. I think we see that Donald Trump, this is like a tactic that he uses quite often where he just lies, as Pen says. He just makes things up publicly and he tries to create a story around it. And I guess his hope is that he builds enough pressure in order to try to pressure the individual into action. But, you know, in this case, we saw a quick response from Herzog, who came out and said, nope, never had that discussion. That's not happening.
- [43:30]
Benji
Yeah. So Trump is asked about what's going on with China's military operations around Taiwan. Right now it's big story. China announced major military drills around Taiwan and what it's calling a serious warning against any push for independence. Taiwan had to respond with rapid response, exercising exercises, placing its military on the highest alert. Here's how the China Daily, China's kind of own propaganda network, describes what went down.
- [44:01]
Brett
The People's Liberation Army's Eastern Theater Command is dispatching its naval and air forces to carry out combat readiness patrols around.
- [44:10]
Benji
Taiwan Island, a military spokesperson said Monday. That's how they refer to Taiwan there.
- [44:15]
Brett
The vessels and aircrafts will approach Taiwan island in close proximity from different directions.
- [44:21]
Benji
Said she spokesperson for the Eastern Theater Command.
- [44:25]
Brett
She stressed that the move aims to test the capabilities of the troops to conduct rapid maneuvers, form all dimensional posture and execute a systemic blockade and control. Like pretty serious stuff. And could you imagine again if this stuff was happening under former President Biden, not to say that China was not.
- [44:44]
Benji
Taking furtive actions before, whether it was Biden or Obama or Trump in the.
- [44:50]
Brett
First, but not this.
- [44:52]
Benji
Okay?
- [44:53]
Brett
Not this. Let's be very, very, very clear. This is a big deal. Taiwan has to prepare as though there's an imminent war. Japan has had to put out statements in the past few months basically saying if Taiwan is invaded, Japan's going to have to step in. To which China responded with its top diplomats, Democrats saying that, hey, Prime Minister Taka Ishi of Japan, we will chop off your head, we will behead you if you say that again. And then Donald Trump called up Takaishi in Japan, the new prime minister, and said, hey, you gotta chill, Stop, stop speaking negatively about Xi Jinping. That was what Trump's response was to Japan when Japan was standing up for Taiwan. And remember when all of these magas used to be like, we're China hawks. Remember, they were, they're always hawks. We're hawks hawk. We're chai do hawks. We're. We're fiscal hawks. What are you just making up? Why do you get to call yourself a fricking like predatorial bird hawk? You're predators, but you ain't hawks. Like you're a bunch of freaking pushovers is what you. Is what you are. And or you're a bunch of sociopaths creating whatever framework justifies that. At the end of the day, y' all just wanted your own idiotic Kim Jong Un in the United States States because y' all wanted to go to your golf courses or not have to do whatever and you wanted to hand it over so you could be your oligarchs and just do whatever you want to do while the American people get screwed, while you go to your golf club or whatever the hell you're doing, Right. You go to Mar a Lago or whatever. It's ridiculous. So Trump has asked about this, Right? Pretty big deal. What do you make of these military exercises? Watch Trump's response.
- [46:31]
Guest/Reporter
Let's play it exercises, basically, to test encircling Taiwan. Can you explain to us what your knowledge is of that? What do you think about that? Have you had any discussions with.
- [46:42]
Interviewer/Reporter
Well, I have a great relationship with President Xi, and he hasn't told me anything about it. I certainly have seen it, but he hasn't told me anything about it. And I don't believe he's going to be doing it. No. Nothing worries me. Nothing.
- [46:58]
Guest/Reporter
Where there's smoke, there's fire. Right? So if you're in circle, if you're doing naval exercises and air exercises, doing.
- [47:04]
Interviewer/Reporter
Naval exercises for 20 years in that area now, people take it a little bit differently, but in fact, larger than they're doing right now. So we'll see. But they've been. They've been doing that for 20, 25 years.
- [47:19]
Benji
Yeah, okay. No, they haven't. And it's just a very weird framework. We have a very good relationship. Let me ask you, if you had a very good relationship, why aren't they buying the soybeans? I just like how also, like, our media gets so distracted, right, when he keeps announcing the fake deals. How many soybeans have they purchased? Weren't they supposed to buy 11 million metric tons or 12 million metric tons.
- [47:46]
Brett
Which you held as a massively great deal? And then they lied and said, by the way. The same way they lied and said.
- [47:52]
Benji
That the Biden administration never brought back any hostages and only Trump brought back the hostages from Hamas. Right? They go, we've never brought back.
- [48:00]
Brett
He goes, biden never brought in any soybeans at all. We got the soybeans.
- [48:05]
Benji
No, first off, when it comes to the hostages, Biden got back 130, 443. Significant number. And then when it comes to soybeans, the Biden administration in China, China was buying 27, 28 million metric tons of soybeans.
- [48:21]
Brett
So Trump's idea of a good deal was 15 to 16 million metric tons of soybeans less.
- [48:29]
Benji
And then China didn't even buy that. Maybe they bought a million metric tons.
- [48:33]
Brett
Maybe, maybe.
- [48:35]
Benji
And then Trump says, they're a great friend of ours. He's a great Friend.
- [48:38]
Brett
Just a very strange framework. Nah, dude, he doesn't. He doesn't like you like that. And the fact that Xi Jinping can see on Donald Trump that all Donald Trump wants is to be liked by him. You know how easy that is to manipulate somebody like that? As.
- [48:52]
Jordi
As well, he said, obviously, you know, it goes without saying, he said the same exact things about Putin as we showed you before, as we went over before. And it's no coincidence. It shouldn't be a surprise, but these people are not stupid, okay? Xi is not stupid. Putin is not stupid. And they have to be laughing their ass off at how easy it is to manipulate this idiot. Like Putin coming up with this plan. Oh, Zelensky is coming to the White House. He's calling for peace. How do I make this look bad? Why don't you just tell him that he attacked your residents? Brilliant. Oh, oh, easy done, easy done. I mean, it's like the dumbest script writing, you know, if you want to call it that imaginable. And they know that Donald Trump will just accept anything they say, hook, line, and sinker.
- [49:36]
Jordy
And then Trump always has to make himself out to be, like, the hero. So in that case of, oh, they attacked the residents. Oh, well, thank goodness I didn't give them the Tomahawks. Thank goodness. Could have done serious damage there, you know, he's just such a putz, man. And that's just what happens when you have someone so incompetent when just at the helm. It becomes a very scary thing as a society to witness. Like, okay, what's this maniac going to say right now? And I could get, like, how people get exhausted generally with, like, I just need to tune out. But really, we all just need to focus now more than ever, because I'd say what's happening in front of us right now is maybe the most important thing that's ever happened in our lifetimes. Like, this is really scary, freaky stuff.
- [50:13]
Benji
Ben Kim Jong Un is testing his long range cruise missile capabilities. And again, this is obviously happening at the exact same time that China is encircling Taiwan, because they're showing what that alliance could look like. And it's happening at the same time.
- [50:33]
Brett
Putin is engaged in upping and accelerating.
- [50:37]
Benji
The attacks on Ukraine. Like, this is what happens when there.
- [50:42]
Brett
Is a breakdown in the post World.
- [50:45]
Benji
War II global world order that kept.
- [50:49]
Brett
Not saying it was like a peaceful, great time and everything was amazing.
- [50:52]
Benji
Like, let me be very clear. There were horrible wars, there were horrible atrocities. And I do not want to in any way give a pass to certain horrific things that have happened in that time frame. But we avoided by and large world wars of the scale of World War II, of World War I for a significant period of time post World War II. And you know, but for nuclear deterrence right now and mutually assured destruction, like.
- [51:22]
Brett
If you remove that from the equation.
- [51:25]
Benji
Right now, if you think about what's going on in the world, there would.
- [51:29]
Brett
Clearly be a world war right now. I mean, right. I mean, the main deterrent is how.
- [51:34]
Benji
Does that exist in a structure of nuclear weapons.
- [51:38]
Brett
But if you think about it, everything from Thailand and Cambodia and Donald Trump continuing to claim another peace, more war. Peace, war, Peace, war, peace, war, peace, war. Like, just think about the war that's taken place between Thailand and Cambodia that.
- [51:51]
Benji
Donald Trump wants like credit for solving.
- [51:53]
Brett
Like when he hasn't solved these, if anything, he's caused it. India and Pakistan, same thing. You didn't do anything to help India and Pakistan. But, but that turned into a hot war this year with Russia accelerating its invasion and attacks on Ukraine, Ukraine standing.
- [52:11]
Benji
Strong with its European allies.
- [52:13]
Brett
You look at Africa and Donald Trump.
- [52:15]
Benji
Says he solved the war in Congo.
- [52:16]
Brett
Which he did not. Things are actually much worse there. And The Rwanda backed M23 groups and.
- [52:24]
Benji
Others continue to attack in Congo on.
- [52:26]
Brett
A very frequent basis. If you look at just the United States actions threatening Canada to become the 51st state, threatening to take over Greenland in just the past two weeks, the United States attacking fishing boats in the.
- [52:40]
Benji
Pacific and off the coast of Venezuela as well.
- [52:44]
Brett
The United States gloating over, posting videos.
- [52:47]
Benji
Of, of, of war crimes on a.
- [52:49]
Brett
On a frequent basis. The United States dropping bombs in Nigeria and claiming it was to save the Christians when it wasn't even in the area actually where a lot of the terrorist attacks take place. And if, you know Nigeria, the terrorist attacks that have taken place, if anything, kill more Muslims than Christians in Nigeria, rather than just buying Donald Trump's BS propaganda about it is certainly more tribal based than religion based.
- [53:16]
Benji
But if you talk about religions, there's.
- [53:18]
Brett
No specific attacks on Christians going on there.
- [53:21]
Benji
And what Trump really wanted to do, I think was to, to try to.
- [53:24]
Brett
Send, you know, trying to send a message there to the governing, the ruling government right there. One of the main opposition leaders is a Christian. So Trump, the same way we talked earlier about Putin's tactics, Trump is working with the Christian opposition leader in order to try to get that guy back into power or to get that guy into power because Nigeria has some of the biggest oil and lithium reserves out there. And Nigeria's current government has a big, big lithium deposit deal with China, which is investing heavily in Africa. If you look what I just described taking place across the world right now, I know that we, it's uncomfortable perhaps to talk about it, or it may seem complicated, but it really isn't. It's actually not. When you just describe it the way I just described it, how, what other words would you use for objectively what I just described happening in the world, world. And this has all happened under Trump. Now when we come back, I want.
- [54:21]
Benji
To talk about what's going on in the domestic front too, like Trump's crushing.
- [54:25]
Brett
Our economy, covering up for child sex trafficking rings. Things are not affordable. People can't afford homes.
- [54:31]
Benji
Trump.
- [54:31]
Brett
I'm not going to play the clips, but Trump threatened to fire the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell again, who Trump appointed and blames Biden for appointing the guy.
- [54:41]
Benji
And Trump says, I'm going to sue.
- [54:42]
Brett
The guy and go after the guy. We don't have stable markets here. Our macro and micro economic outlook in the United States is a complete and utter disaster right now. But just think about it from a global end, from a US Perspective, are we better off now? Not only are we not better off, I mean, we are in some pretty serious situations right here. And, you know, look in terms of a World War type situation, whether you believe we're in a cold world war right now or an actual World War 3, however you want to describe what's taking place right now, everything is hanging right now on a very, very simple thread. A simple act itself, like the triggers for World War I or World War.
- [55:29]
Benji
II, you know, is, is, you know.
- [55:32]
Brett
Is, is possible with a world order being utterly brought down by, by Trump and it has not made America stronger at all.
- [55:41]
Benji
Let me just, let me just say that.
- [55:42]
Jordi
So, yeah, I agree. And as you go through the comment, you know, your commentary on that, I think one of the interesting things, I don't know if that's the right word, but one of the things is that Trump really wears his pathology on his sleeve. And he also often accidentally or on purpose reveals his true intentions in a lot of these conflicts and wars and all the kind of fights that he picks. And so, so when you see Donald Trump and some of these Republicans speak about Nigeria, they may let the words lithium deposits, you know, slip out of their mouth. Right? When you hear Donald Trump speak about Ukraine, he always talks about rare earths. Are they gonna give us their rare earths? When he talks about China, he uses the same sort of terminology. Even if you go back to the, you know, back in the day, Donald Trump's opinion on like the Iraq war, for example, his regrets about the Iraq war war is not that it was an invasion that killed so many people and that we never should have done it in the first place. It's we should have took the oil. We're stupid. We're stupid. We should have took the oil. Everything in his mind is how do we extract resources, how do we bully people? And when you look at that and then you add that to this idea of these pretexts that we've been describing that people like Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump push in order to achieve those objectives, I think everything boom snaps into focus very clearly. We've got a lot more to talk about in this episode of the Midas Touch podcast. So much, much more to go over has been said, especially here on the domestic front. I want to make sure that everybody subscribes to us on Substack, an incredible growing community. And I got to give a huge shout out, by the way, to our editor in chief, Ron Philip Koski, who has been putting together these year end specials such as the 500 worst things that Trump and his administration have done this year, month by month, documenting it all. I don't know how he even begun to embark on this task, but man, is this an important and valuable piece of work that Ron is doing. Part three just went up today. Make sure you check it out@midasplus.com he has also ranked the top 25 villains of the first year of the Trump regime. Make sure you check that out as well. Sign up midasplus.com check it out. Also the Midas Touch state. What are we calling it? The state of Midas Touch. The Midas Touch State of the union, whatever it is. January 5th. Be there on Patreon patreon.com Midas Touch we're going to do a zoom chat. We're going to break down everything that's happened in the past year and the look ahead on our patreon patreon.com Midas Touch make sure you sign up there so that when we send the secret link out that you receive that secret link. All the viewers on here watching on the live YouTube podcast, make sure you go and check out the Midas Touch podcast on the audio feeds. All the audio listeners, make sure you check us out and subscribe on the Midas Touch YouTube channel. We'll be right back after our final quick break. Don't you go anywhere. Deleteme makes it easy, quick and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches.
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Jordy
Let's go. Shout out to our sponsors links in description, both the YouTube and the audio. Use the links, use the codes. If there's an exit survey, let them know we sent you. That was a Brett, Brett sweep. Brett ad sweep. The fans were calling for more Brett ad reads and so Brett, way to bring it down.
- [61:34]
Jordi
Gotta get, gotta give the people what they want there.
- [61:35]
Jordy
Jordy, real quick. Benji, I know you really care about the this. I see a lot of people in the chat right now asking or throughout this episode asking what my shirt says because it gets kind of cut off. So it's that it says don't be a jag off. That's kind of the central theme of this episode, if I'm, if I'm listening to what you guys have been saying pretty much correctly. So don't be a jag off. One of my favorite Pittsburgh, one of my favorite Yinzer words. Benji, where to next?
- [61:59]
Benji
Just mention briefly that on an obscure right wing radio interview last week, Donald Trump just randomly said that we bombed inside Venezuela. Then Trump was asked about it today. I don't need to show you the clip. Donald Trump said, why would we care about that? Why would I even talk about. Well, who cares? It's like, okay, that's normally a big deal. And could you imagine another former president just mentioning in passing that we bombed inside a country, which would usually be a precursor to war, then being asked about it? Why would I even talk about it? Why would I even talk about that? Well, who cares? I just, I don't want. I know that's why this community, especially here, that we're not numb, we don't normalize it. But I just want to call that out as something that's not normal. That is something that we should take very seriously. And we need to call it out at each and every step.
- [62:51]
Brett
And by the way, when we cover what's going on in international affairs, when.
- [62:55]
Benji
We cover what's going on as Trump engages in this malicious behavior attacking our economy and ripping away people's health care and the Affordable Care act subsidies are what, two days from now officially expiring as we hit the new year. And then people, people are off. Unless they were, unless they were able to purchase it on the exchanges, which I don't know, it's very hard to.
- [63:15]
Brett
Purchase it on the exchanges when it.
- [63:17]
Benji
Goes up 300, 400%, you know, and it's twice, three times, four or five, seven times as as expensive.
- [63:23]
Brett
We can still cover all of that.
- [63:25]
Benji
Right?
- [63:26]
Brett
But then also, that doesn't mean we're.
- [63:28]
Benji
Being distracted by Trump's malevolence. We could still talk about that he's covering up a child sex trafficking ring.
- [63:35]
Jordy
Right?
- [63:36]
Benji
We could still talk about what these MAGA Republicans are doing and how horrific it is. And obviously we've covered in detail. We were the ones who broke the story about the 1.2 million missing records out of the Southern District of New York. I'd like to act like it was very difficult for me to uncover that.
- [63:52]
Brett
It was tedious for me to read.
- [63:54]
Benji
The files that were released, but there wasn't actually all that many, when you think about. And this is what I used to do as a litigator, and I looked at one and it said from 2020. And it was like, we are, we.
- [64:04]
Brett
Are sending you the images of 1.2 million documents for our Cellbrite software in US v. Epstein.
- [64:11]
Benji
So I was like, okay, well, there's clearly at least 1.2 million more records that are referenced. Right.
- [64:15]
Brett
By the way, that's what I would.
- [64:16]
Benji
Do as a litigator. I look at something and I go.
- [64:18]
Brett
Well, it references other records. I don't have these records. Like, those need to be produced. We broke the story. The DOJ admitted it.
- [64:25]
Benji
Donald Trump had his own kind of.
- [64:27]
Brett
Freak out over it. And he was like, ah, now let's just go after the Democrats, embarrass them, name them, shame the Democrats. And now it's going to take so long. So long. But, like, I want to cover this.
- [64:38]
Benji
As well because it's perhaps not getting that much attention, although we covered here in the Midas Touch Network. So Melania Trump's been going around and, like, threatening to sue anybody who mentions her name and Jeffrey Epstein in the same sentence. Oopsies. That I just mentioned her name and Jeffrey Epstein. I mean, she's in photographs with the guy, Right? And so she previously threatened to sue.
- [64:56]
Brett
Hunter Biden for a billion dollars. Right.
- [64:59]
Benji
And Hunter's like, okay, sue me.
- [65:02]
Brett
A lot's been done to me already. You want to sue me for a billion, sue me for a billion. I'd love to get your deposition.
- [65:08]
Benji
I'd love to get your discovery.
- [65:09]
Brett
But Hunter didn't sue her back and she never sued Hunter.
- [65:13]
Benji
Hunter, as far as we know. And Hunter's never been sued but she.
- [65:17]
Brett
Did this to Michael Wolf.
- [65:19]
Benji
Michael Wolf is Donald Trump's former biographer.
- [65:21]
Brett
Okay. Wolf knows where a lot of bodies.
- [65:24]
Benji
Are buried with Donald Trump.
- [65:25]
Brett
And Wolf was potentially going to be the biographer for Epstein. I don't think anybody has spoken to Epstein in detail and at the length that Michael Wolf did during the key times leading up right before Epstein was.
- [65:40]
Benji
Arrested again and before Epstein died by suicide side.
- [65:44]
Brett
And Michael Wolf, a biographer who looks for the needle in the haystack in order to write these incredible books that he does. Could you imagine handing this guy subpoena power? Like, could you imagine letting this guy take the deposition of Melania under oath or Donald Trump under oath? I mean, he's sat and he's had dinners with Trump and Melania in connections with writing, with writing books. He's been in Mar A Lago a ton of this is the guy you're going to go after. So Melania threatens to sue Michael Wolf. And Michael Wolf is like. And she gives Wolf a deadline. You must remove your retract and issue an apology by whatever date.
- [66:22]
Benji
It was like October 21st or something like that.
- [66:24]
Brett
Or else we're going to sue you for a billion dollars and your life's.
- [66:29]
Benji
Going to be miserable.
- [66:30]
Brett
So Michael Wolf is like, hey, you know, in New York there's a law called an anti slap statute which not only allows you to defend against free against lawsuits that chill free speech, these are strategic lawsuits against public policy or.
- [66:46]
Benji
Against free speech, basically anti slap.
- [66:49]
Brett
So in many states you can assert it as a defense to get cases dismissed. And it has this burden shifting analysis where if you're being sued of a matter of big public importance and you believe it's chilling your speech, you file this anti slap motion and then it, then it shifts a burden back to the plaintiff to basically put their evidence in a way that is very compelling for the court. I'm oversimplifying it, but it's often used in a defensive posture. New York allows you to affirmatively sue. It gives you a cause of action if you are threatened with chilling your First Amendment speech. So Wolf's response to Melania's letter, it's brilliant. You got to give him so much credit. He sues her.
- [67:30]
Benji
Her.
- [67:31]
Brett
He sues her affirmatively. Michael Wolf versus Melania. You threatened me to I have to remove my articles and you wanted a billion dollars. I'm going to sue you. My cause of action is the strategic lawsuit against public policy. I'm going to anti slap you with a fricking lawsuit right now. So the lawyer is this Alejandro Brito guy, he represents Trump, Trump in a lot of cases. In the letter to Wolf, this burrito, this lawyer said, direct all your correspondence to me in connection with this. So Wolf said, okay, I sued you. Do you want to accept service? Because in a lawsuit, you have before the lawsuit can actually get officially initiated, you have. You file it. Then you get a summons and a complaint. Then you have to serve the summons and complaint on the defendant. And once you serve it, they then have 30 days from receipt of the service to respond. Certain jurisdictions, it's different time, but generally figure it's 30 days. So he wants to get this lawsuit started. So he calls up the lawyer from Melania and says, will you accept service?
- [68:41]
Benji
No, we won't accept service.
- [68:43]
Brett
Then Melania, from what Wolf recounts, is basically in hiding right now. She's hiding from Wolf, Wolf to avoid service when she threatened him. So this is her plan, just to go into hiding right now. I did a whole video of this, but watch as Michael Wolf discusses what happened here.
- [69:00]
Benji
Play this clip.
- [69:01]
Michael Wolf
This is an update about my lawsuit against the first lady of the United States. I think she's running from us. By suing her, we have the right to subpoena her and her husband and their friends and to ask all concern about their relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. We have tried to serve her lawyer in Florida. He has absolutely refused to take service of our lawsuit. We've sent a process server to Trump Tower, where we understand she lives not in the White House, but in Trump Tower. And that process server, who seemed perfectly familiar with serving people in Trump Tower, a lot of dubious people there. When the server found out that it was the first lady, they panicked. They refused to do it. We got another server to go, and this was just yesterday. They arrived at Trump Tower. They were prevented from getting in by security. Security told them that they would. That they would take any papers and throw them in the garbage. But they did confirm that Melania Trump lives in Trump Tower. So this is a kind of historical point. The first lady of the United States does not live in the White House. She lives in Trump Tower. We will now go into court.
- [70:37]
Benji
So that's what's going on there. At the same time that happened, Julie K. Brown, the Miami Herald reporter who broke the big stories on Epstein and the sweetheart deal with Alex Acosta, who ended up becoming Donald Trump's labor secretary. She broke all those stories in, like, 2018, 2019. She was being trailed by the Trump regime. She was being spied on by the Trump regime. In the latest Epstein files, that dropped even though only a small amount of documents was released. One of them was this. And Julie K. Brown says, does somebody at the DOJ want to tell me why my American Airlines booking information and flights in July 2019 are part of the Epstein files attached to a grand jury subpoena as the flight itinerary includes my mated name and I did book this flight. Why was the DOJ monitoring me? So was the DOJ issuing subpoenas to. To different plane. To different airplane air courts to get Julie K. Brown's information? I mean that's, that's a wild thing. Also, what Julie, you're going to be.
- [71:48]
Jordi
Tracking people in the Epstein case. Tracking the lead investigative journalist who has exposed Epstein. Making that your target is what I'm going to call a tell consciousness of guilt, whatever you want to describe it. The fact that they were trailing her and I got to give a huge shout out out to Julie K. Brown for her steadfast reporting. She's been reporting on this now for a very long time and you could even say that she is probably the reason that Epstein got indicted and was caught finally on these crimes. She deserves so much credit. So definitely support her any way you can on her sub stack, read her writing, share her reporting. She is top notch.
- [72:27]
Benji
Absolutely. So you have all that going on. We're going to stay on the front lines of reporting everything going on with the Epstein files. We know this massive cover up is never going to end by Donald Trump and his regime. I mean, they've already violated the Epstein Transparency act in so many ways. Everyone who's involved in that cover up, frankly, should be charged with felonies when a new Department of Justice comes into power. Because they're all, anyone involved in this is part of a criminal enterprise. Right?
- [72:58]
Brett
They're all, all, they're all part of a criminal.
- [73:00]
Benji
It's wild to think about that.
- [73:02]
Brett
If you're at the DOJ and you.
- [73:03]
Benji
Touch this and you were involved in it in any way, why couldn't the DOJ pursue a criminal RICO case against.
- [73:11]
Brett
Everybody in the DOJ is basically part.
- [73:14]
Benji
Of the criminal enterprise at some level of it and could all be charged with the same degree of crime based on a RICO statute right here.
- [73:22]
Brett
And by the way, just to see.
- [73:23]
Benji
How awful this DOJ is and I'll just, I'll just. There's so many ways to give you examples of this.
- [73:30]
Brett
But just take a look at this.
- [73:32]
Benji
Case right here in California, Central District of California. That's where when I was a litigator, I used to practice the most.
- [73:39]
Brett
So I litigated against a lot of.
- [73:42]
Benji
Department of Justice lawyers.
- [73:45]
Brett
You could disagree with them.
- [73:46]
Benji
They were top notch from top law schools, the best and brightest.
- [73:51]
Brett
And they would go from working in the government to working at large law firms. They'd go back and forth and when they would leave the doj, there would be big law firm jobs for them because these were you. You could dislike the fact that they, you know, could be aggressive or this or that, but they had resources and they out papered you and, and you know, you had to fight. You had to fight. You knew it would always be a fight and that they would put forward top notch work.
- [74:17]
Benji
Work.
- [74:17]
Brett
And when the DOJ would go in front of federal judges, the judges would almost give. It would be annoying when you were going against the doj, but they'd already basically get the benefit of the doubt that they were good lawyers and the federal judge would almost put them on a pedestal in any case. And they'd go in front of these.
- [74:33]
Benji
Judges all of the time.
- [74:34]
Brett
Well, now a federal judge, Judge Olgan in the Central district, he dismissed with prejudice this an indictment against a well known tiktoker who was exposing some of the conduct that ICE was engaged in in Los Angeles. Federal agents arrested this guy Carlitos Richard Parias after they accused him of driving his car back and forth, hitting law enforcement cars that had boxed him in. They then shot him and it was when they shot at the vehicle and some of the shrapnel from the shooting actually hit the guy. But in the order, U.S. district Judge Fernando Olgan dismissed the indictment with prejudice, citing that the defendant was deprived of access to counsel while being detained and the government failure to comply with the court's deadlines, including the release of body camera footage of the incident, meaning the federal government did not even turn over the discovery in the case. So if you think about them not turning over the Epstein files, there was another case that I covered this past weekend involving the lawyer for James Comey where the DOJ was ordered back in early December to return his files back to him that they stole without a search warrant and they were trying to use against Comey by having an FBI agent agent testify about attorney client privilege information.
- [76:05]
Benji
The Comey case was dismissed on other grounds because Lindsey Halligan was not lawfully.
- [76:10]
Brett
Appointed as the United States Attorney. But had that not happened, it would.
- [76:13]
Benji
Have been dismissed on other grounds too.
- [76:15]
Brett
Likely one of them was that this FBI agent that Halligan brought in got this attorney client file of Comey's lawyer and so Comey's lawyer went into a D.C. court that ruled that the government stole his attorney client file files. They order that they delete it and return the files back to the guy. And then the government wrote an emergency motion over the holidays saying that they don't have the technical capabilities of deleting it and turning it over during the holidays. And they begged for an extension until like January 4th. And the court granted a brief extension, but warned them too. Because the court said, I've been telling you over and over again you can't look at these files. Just press the frickin delete button and turn it over. There's nothing to review. Because they're like, we need to review it. The judge is like, there's nothing to review. Freaking press, delete, hand over the files and end this. You don't have the right to these files. So I wanted to highlight those two things because from a criminal defense lawyer perspective right now, where you were being outpapered, outmatched by the doj, the government, the United States versus your client, right? The US had unlimited resources. The lawyers I know who are still at the doj, who occasionally will talk to me off the record or some of the people who left the DOJ just say this is a disgrace. And they're not political people that I know these aren't political people. They just think that this is like that Trump has turned the DOJ into like his crappy law firms that would make fools of themselves before federal judges. And now this once proud DOJ is behaving this way. And just think about all, just not even the high profile cases, think about all the screw ups that they're having. Think about the case that's going on right now. And this is a more high profile one though with the pipe bomber, right? The pipe bomber in D.C. is saying I'm ready to go, I want a preliminary hearing. The government saying they're not ready to even do a preliminary hearing. They know that the government doesn't have the resources to go in court and make arguments just at that basic level, guys. That's what's happening. The defendants know that the government doesn't have lawyers who can show up, up and make a legal argument yet alone actually do the case.
- [78:44]
Jordi
Yeah, you have the worst people running every branch of the government. And you know, the only thing that is required for you to be a part of this MAGA movement, for you to be a part of this United States government as it's currently constituted is not skill or knowledge. Intelligence. It's one thing, it's it's loyalty and it's adhering to, to whatever the cult wants you to believe. Not too different from the mob, not too different from Scientology. I mean, you name it, that's how this, you know, that's how this organization is the organization. That's how this government is run. Kind of like a crime organization at this point. And so you need to look at everything through the lens of that. And when you look at everything through that lens, I think everything starts to make a lot more sense. Like when you see Marjorie Taylor Greene, of all people, speaking out against Donald Trump. Trump and not speaking out against his policies, you know, she agrees with Donald Trump on 99.9999-9999-9999% of everything. Right? But speaking out on one thing, and that one thing is, you know what, Donald? Let's not protect the sex traffickers. Okay, I'm down for all the other crazy stuff, but on this one thing, let's not protect the sex traffickers. And that the reaction that she got from Donald Trump was excommunication, as if she was in Scientology and if she was a suppressive person, as they call it. You're excommunicating. You're hereby no longer maga. In fact, I guess you're just a lib. Now. There was Scott Jennings was on CNN the other day. We don't have to play the clip, but he was like, oh, Marjorie Taylor Greene turned lib. You think we're upset about that? Okay, yeah. The liberal Marjorie Taylor Greene. It defies all logic and intelligence. It's insulting to your intelligence. And so there was another piece out in the New York Times today about Marjorie Taylor Greene. They did a whole piece on her where she gave this interview to the Times and she was speaking about basically being excommunicated from MAGA and this, this entire movement. And there was one area of this story that really stood out to me when she was speaking about this, and apparently she said that she got into this huge argument with Donald Trump about the Epstein files, and she had just held this hearing and she said, I'm going to go on the floor and I'm going to name names. I'm going to name the people who are Epstein's co conspirators, and I, I am going to expose them. She made clear that she does not know the names herself, but she says that the survivors know the names and that they would share the names with her if she pride and if she asked. And so Donald Trump's reaction was not great. Let's Expose the child sex trafficking ring. Let's get it all out there. His reaction, and I want to quote it directly, he screamed at her. And other people heard him screaming at her on this phone call, screamed at Marjorie Taylor Greene and said, don't do that. My friends will get hurt. My friends will get hurt. Whereas Donald Trump's reactions are your friends, your friends. Okay, got it. I thought you didn't know Epstein. I thought you weren't in the same circles as Epstein. You can't get your lie straight. Your friends will get hurt. I think we see how he's handling that situation. I think there's a whole lot of consciousness of guilt. I think, as Ben says, you could draw adverse inferences from the way that Trump, Trump is handling Epstein. I would even surmise that if Epstein was not indicted and everything didn't happen with Epstein, like, Epstein would have been like a cabinet member in the Trump administration. This guy would have been like, Secretary of Treasury.
- [81:57]
Brett
Would have been the Treasury Secretary.
- [81:59]
Jordi
Right. Like, honestly. Right. Like, he would have been like, Treasury Secretary Trump would have pardoned. Like, like, I'm not even being facetious. Like, if you, if that indictment didn't happen, if Julie K. Brown's reporting did not lead to the indictment, you could see Secretary of Treasury Jeffrey Epstein. It's not out of the realm of possibility with this regime and everything in this regime goes through. Are you loyal to Donald Trump? Will you repeat what Donald Trump says, even if it's contradictory, even if it is completely contradictory to the thing you said yesterday? If Donald Trump said his changed his mind on something and is now saying the opposite thing, Are you now saying the opposite thing? That's what everything is measured by this regime. Nothing makes sense. And it's also at a detriment, of course, to the United States when you have people running the government in this way. And affordability is obviously a big problem right now. And when you see the United States government doing everything it can to make the problems worse, be it with tariffs or attack on climate policy, you name it, they are making everything worse. And they're the same way with the Epstein. How they hide it and they don't let people tell the truth. The people in the Trump administration also have to parrot the, you know, party line, the Trump line of, oh, in fact, what you're seeing, what you're feeling isn't actually true. In fact, everything is amazing. And one of the tactics that they use in order to manipulate people is constantly shifting the goalposts. It's going to be great by the middle of this year. Remember Covid, by the way, 2020, everything's going to be open by Easter. Everything's going to be open by Christmas. Christmas every. They kept setting these dates. The dates would come, the dates would go, repeat, repeat, repeat. Now the same things with the economy. It's going to be great by April. It's going to be great by summer. It's going to be great by the beginning of next year. It's going to be great by next Easter. And I just want you to watch how these Republicans are now speaking about the economy. Let me play this clip quickly.
- [83:49]
Guest/Reporter
And then two, two thirds say that things are getting worse. This to me is a messaging issue. How do you continue to tell the American people, look, the big beautiful bill is now law, and that is going to translate into 2026 for you.
- [84:03]
I
There's only one path, Cheryl, and that's going to be in the pocketbook. I think the first and second quarter of 26 is going to show a lot. Remember, all those tax cuts have not been implemented yet in the great big beautiful bill. Interest rates were just cut. I just had a meeting with my brothers yesterday. All the prices in our grocery stores are, are dropping like a rock. Eggs are going all the way down to 99 cents. We see the beef market is dropping. We see sugar is dropping. We see all aspects of the grocery store prices are falling. Gas prices in Trumbull county are at $2 a gallon. Once all this starts to happen and those tax breaks happen, and I think we're going to really see an economy, hopefully by Easter that is roaring. And if you want to win this midterm and you want to keep the gavel, the answer 1000% is going to be in the pocketbook. They understand what they keep by Easter.
- [84:53]
Jordy
Folks just keep dangling the carrot.
- [84:55]
Brett
I had a meeting with, I had.
- [84:57]
Benji
A meeting with Mickey Mouse the other.
- [84:59]
Brett
Day, and Mickey Mouse told me, I mean, okay, like, okay, I spoke to my brothers. I don't. Dude, I don't know who your brothers are.
- [85:05]
Benji
Number one.
- [85:07]
Brett
What is. Oh, he spoke to his brothers. Okay, guys. His brothers told him that when they went to the supermarket. I mean, just even the way Fox frames it, though, Fox goes, what this really is. We seem to have a messaging issue right here.
- [85:22]
Benji
No, no, no, no, no.
- [85:23]
Brett
You are the messaging issue number one. This is an issue issue. Okay? This is an issue that people feel. And the issue gets worse when you message it to them that they should feel good and they're not feeling good because you're hurting them. So let's be clear about that as well. And then when he goes out, like.
- [85:43]
Benji
I spoke to my brother, my brother's like, look, everything's amazing at this point. Like, so if my brother says, dude.
- [85:48]
Brett
Who are you, number one? But Brett, I hear what an interesting status. And I'd love for you to talk about this, though.
- [85:55]
Benji
Yeah.
- [85:56]
Jordy
Just to be fair, that's how I win. A lot of my arguments I have with people, I talk about what you and Brett say. So I said my brother, but they know your brother. I do want to comment on this really quickly. I want to comment on Marjorie because, you know, it's just amazing to me that that's the threshold for, I guess, Scott Jennings to be like, oh, she's a lib now. She's totally lived out. She's doing the absolute bare minimum. I want to make that clear. She is calling out child sex trafficking.
- [86:18]
Jordi
That's it, Jordy, child sex trafficking makes you a lib, then everyone should be a lip. Okay, what does that make you, Scott Jennings?
- [86:29]
Jordy
And it goes so much deeper because it's. It's. You have to. Brett, you're right, exactly. You have to parrot all of the regime talking points all of the time. And it even goes to the guy's hands, man, to Donald Trump's hands that are literally deteriorating in front of our eyes that Fox News decided to run a clip from this podcast on a few weeks ago talking about how, oh, you know what? This is just so normal. That's what Fox News said. And all of their analysts, they're like, if you're an A lister, your hands for you shake so many hands. This is what your hands just look like. Okay? So Fox News, please explain it to me tonight, right? What's the excuse this time now that his other hand is looking very similar to his right hand. So his left hand, you don't shake with your left hand. So maybe I'm not an A lister. So maybe A listers, when their right hand gets tired out, they start shaking with that left hand. But it is. You have to parrot the talking points at all times. Otherwise you're a subservient person and you are a detriment to the MAGA movement. That's what this is.
- [87:30]
Jordi
And if that makes sense, because they lie about everything. You have to. You could only speculate, right? You can only speculate. And so when you look at Donald Trump's latest, you know, hands, you see the bruises are spreading, right? You see what he's saying?
- [87:42]
Brett
Serbian versus subversive.
- [87:44]
Jordy
That's what I said. Exactly.
- [87:49]
Jordi
All the same. And so when you look at Donald Trump's hands, you see, first off, you see the, these, like now you see these holes in his hands as well. You see the bruising spreading to other hand, the other hand, as Jordy said. And now you could even make out that there is a, appears to be a hole which appears to be an injection site. This is the first time a camera has gotten this close where we've actually seen what looks like a hole where the bruising is surrounded. I apologize for the viewers of these images. They're a little gross to look at. But Ben's done in depth reports on, on health and the implications of what these injection sites, parent ejection sites.
- [88:24]
Benji
On Donald Trump's answer, what someone looks like who gets injected by Leqembi. I don't know if we have the photos of like where the, what it would look like if you were taking an Alzheimer experimental drug like Leqembi. And there's a few other ones that, that target the areas of like where Alzheimer's is.
- [88:40]
Brett
And just show this, just play, play.
- [88:43]
Benji
The one on Leqembi. And I did, because when I watched.
- [88:45]
Brett
These videos, like I did a whole.
- [88:47]
Benji
Deep dive into the can be and.
- [88:48]
Brett
And the bottom line is that I. Let me be very clear.
- [88:51]
Benji
I'm giving you my First Amendment freedom of speech opinion right here, Here.
- [88:54]
Brett
Okay. But I know that is not from.
- [88:56]
Benji
Shaking a lot of hands. Okay. I get, I, I know they're hiding this pretty significantly. Okay, Play, play the video about Leqembi for a second.
- [89:05]
Jordi
Carolyn Davis's story of how she ended up in this Emory video. One of the first patients at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta to receive an infusion of the recently FDA approved Alzheimer's drug Le Tembi begins last summer back home in Pensacola, Florida with a pretty brutal diagnosis from a local neurologist Davis went to see after experiencing some memory problems.
- [89:27]
Guest/Reporter
The brain scan or whatever they did at West Florida Hospital, they gave that to the doctor and he told me to get your affairs in order.
- [89:35]
Benji
So when you look at the hand and the fact that he keeps saying he gets these montreal, these MOCA exams, these Montreal cognitive exams multiple times, which you don't get unless you're evaluating somebody who's got issues that are accelerating. That's why you would keep on taking. These are not exams that people take for fun. Sydney Calmagar Congresswoman Dove says, here's the Alzheimer's drug Leqembi. It's administered through an infusion through the hand. It can cause Swelling, bleeding or fluid leakage in the brain, requiring regular MRIs, and it can cause tiredness. And Brett, before I got off on that track, I just wanted to toss it to you because one of the things that as the regime is kind of parroting, you know, this idea that everything's affordable and everything's amazing, it's interesting that people are also now linking climate change as causing an affordability crisis as well as, as being a contributing factor. As climate change is going ignored, it is making things cost more money in the long run and it's causing food prices to increase and it's going to cause systemic issues.
- [90:52]
Brett
It's.
- [90:53]
Benji
People are making that connection, Brett.
- [90:55]
Jordi
Yeah, and thankfully, you know, people, people have wised up to this and it's, you know, very clear. And this is what happens when, you know, an administration like the Trump regime puts ideology ahead of actual facts and ahead of science. It's not just a theoretical thing. It actually screws people over. And these climate issues are incredibly important to focus on. And they're also, you know, other than just being like a nice thing to, you know, do good things for the environment, there are two major things that actually helping these causes assist with and that are jobs. You know, very important. Donald Trump is slashing all of these jobs across the country at all these clean energy plants and facilities, all these projects that were, you know, booming and set to go under the Biden administration's legislation that, that they had passed and prices. Because there is such a incredible strain on the energy grid right now, especially with the proliferation of these AI data centers, which are screwing up a whole lot. They're screwing up the water supply, they're screwing up electricity, they're going into the these towns, they're causing bills to skyrocket. And you know, it's bad enough that that's a thing on its own, but when you are taking away all the supply of the energy for these AI data centers and then you are also taking away the clean energy projects that help provide more energy, it's a recipe for disaster. And so, you know, I'm happy to see some media focusing on this. The Guardians did it did a really good piece on this. I recommend you all read it. It's called US Voters Linking Climate Crisis to Rising Bills Despite Trump's green scam claims. And it says that new, new Polling shows that 65% of registered US voters believe that global heating is affecting the cost of living. 65%. You don't see a lot of polls with that high of an amount of the American People agreeing on something these days. And the article says most Americans now connect the worsening of the climate crisis with the cost of living pressures, with clear majorities also disagreeing with moves by the Trump administration to gut climate research and hold wind farms. New polling has found about 65% of registered voters in the US think that global heating is affecting the cost of living, according to polling by Yale University. Extreme weather events such as floods, drought storms and heat waves exacerbated by the climate crisis are taking a toll on food production, with the recent spikes in the cost of coffee and chocolate blamed by experts, at least in poor part on global heating. Meanwhile, many Americans have faced rising home electricity costs and steep increases in home insurance premiums, with both of these areas also influenced by the climate crisis and the Trump administration's decision to choke off solar and wind power, one of the.
- [93:35]
Sponsor/Ad Voice
Cheapest sources of energy.
- [93:36]
Jordi
It then goes into the data center issue that I was talking about and there is a real backlash to this sort of policy by the Trump administration, or rather the stripping away of these policies of these climate initiatives. It's screwing people over. And at a time when the issue of the day, the issue of the year, you know, maybe the word of the year is affordability. Affordability, Affordability. This administration with the way that they are approaching the climate is not only bad for the environment, but it's bad for affordability. And it goes counter to all the kind of promises that were actually made by this administration and that so many people now are demanding getting solutions for. And that's a big deal. And it's also why we need to stay focused on issues surrounding the climate because they do affect us in our day to day lives.
- [94:25]
Benji
Well said, Brett. I think we covered it all on this episode of the Midas Touch podcast. Always thorough and always wanting to make sure that you're left with really having all the most up to date.
- [94:35]
Jordi
I think this is our last Brother show of 2025. Is that accurate? When is Thursday? I think is the first which is going to be our next brother show. And so what a year it's been, brothers. I mean an incredible year we've had. So many new people join us watching this show. We've been the Top podcast on YouTube most weeks. Definitely the top pro democracy podcast. I want to thank everybody for this year entrusting us. It's been a tough year for sure. But you know, I think we are all in this together and we're all working to share this information. I think the cliche knowledge is power. I believe that And I think that's why platforms not only like ours, but platforms pro democracy, platforms all across the kind of ecosystem are more important than ever right now because we need to find ways to get the truth out. Especially when we see capitulation by networks like cbs, especially when we see capitulation by networks like ABC or by the Washington Post or these universities or law firms or you name it. We've seen a lot of these organizations fall and bend the knee and then we've seen the opposite of that, right? We've seen the organizations that held strong. We've seen the people that have actually stood up and said, we are going to speak truth to power and we do not care what the consequences of that are because getting the truth out is of the utmost importance. And that's a big belief of ours here at the Midas Touch Network. And I want to thank you for being a huge part of that.
- [96:08]
Benji
A reminder, the Midas Touch State of the Union address or the State of Midas Touch address will be taking place January 5th on patreon.com midastouch subscribe there. We'll also have it opened up to answer all of your questions. If you have any questions for us us, we'll take your questions and be great to hang out together. Patreon.com Midas Touch for the Midas Touch State of the Union address.
- [96:39]
Brett
And I want to thank everybody for.
- [96:41]
Benji
Everything that you do. Happy New Year, Happy Christmas, Kwanzaa, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Holidays. Whether you celebrate or not or I celebrate you as being a member of the Midas Mighty. So we're grateful to have you on our team and by our side and let's keep fighting together in 2026. Jordy take it away.
- [97:02]
Jordy
Shout out to the Midas Mighty.
- [97:07]
Jordi
Standing.
- [97:08]
Brett
Strong.
- [97:11]
Jordi
Against the fascists we sing our song. Want to stay plugged in?
- [97:24]
Jordy
Become a subscriber to our substack@midasplus.com you'll.
- [97:27]
Jordi
Get daily recaps from Ron Filipkowski, ad.
- [97:30]
Jordy
Episodes of our podcast and more exclusive.
- [97:32]
Jordi
Content only available at midasplus.
- [97:34]
Jordy
Com.