MeidasTouch Full Podcast - 7/17/26

Summary

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The MeidasTouch Podcast - July 17, 2026

Main Theme / Purpose

In this episode, Ben, Brett, and Jordy Meiselas break down the rapidly escalating US-Iran war, the dire status of American strategic petroleum reserves, the collapse of government credibility, and the consequences of Trump’s leadership style both domestically and internationally. Interwoven with their signature brotherly banter and satirical asides, the brothers critically examine disinformation, unchecked power, and how the American public is being misled or let down. They celebrate their community’s engagement, preview their new book WTF America, and offer a grounding perspective amid chaos.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Escalation of the US-Iran War

• Escalation and Civilian Targets: Ben outlines how Trump has escalated the conflict, with US attacks on Iranian civilian bridges, railways, and infrastructure resulting in casualties. Iran is retaliating with drone strikes in Kuwait, Bahrain, and elsewhere (02:15-05:22).
  • “Donald Trump escalating the catastrophic and unlawful war in Iran… hitting multiple civilian bridges… multiple civilian casualties reported out of Iran.” — Ben, 02:15
• Global Implications: The Bab El Mandab Strait and Strait of Hormuz, vital for international oil flow, are at risk of being fully shut down (05:22-08:18).
  • “Iran is now threatening to shut down the Bab El Mandab Strait in the Red Sea… traffic from the Strait of Hormuz completely shut down.” — Ben, 02:20

2. Catastrophic Oil Market and Energy Reserves

• Strategic Petroleum Reserves at ‘Tank Bottom’: The brothers warn repeatedly about oil shortages, blaming the Trump regime for manipulating and depleting reserves (08:18-11:45).
  • “We’re at tank bottom now. If you think of a cup with a straw, we’re below the suction line… can’t suction the crude anymore. That’s where we’re at.” — Ben, 08:18
• Impact on Americans: Expect “lines at the gas station… fuel shortages… It will remind you a lot of COVID lines at grocery stores.” — Ben, 09:41

3. Governmental and Military Dysfunction

• CENTCOM's Lost Credibility: Widespread disregard for CENTCOM’s orders by commercial tanker captains; US authorities are being openly mocked over radio (03:23–05:22; 35:16–36:10).
  • “Now we’re hearing over the tanker radio frequency, ‘Shut the F up. We’re not effing doing it. Get the F away to centcom.’ That’s what CENTCOM has become.” — Ben, 03:23
  • “If you were pinged over whatever radio by CENTCOM, you’d say, ‘Yes, sir.’ Now… the tankers… are saying, ‘Fuck off. Get outta here.’” — Ben/Brett, 36:01-36:10
• Weaponizing Machismo: Satirical focus on “high T” (testosterone) in the military, described as “deranged and psychotic leadership” prepping soldiers for war with absurd propaganda videos and dangerous flyovers (05:24–06:51).

4. Political Disinformation, Projection, and Media Complicity

• Trump’s Tactics: Trump’s leadership defined by psychological projection, chaos, continual blame of others, gaslighting, and “no end that is anything other than bankruptcy” for America (26:40–29:22).
  • “Donald Trump is purposely trying to pump out a fire hose of lies… confuse the population… that’s his kind of strategy.” — Jordi, 25:15
• Media’s Failure: Legacy media “sanewashes” Trump by cherry-picking the least erratic pieces of his speeches, enabling his alternate reality and failing to inform the public of the true severity (51:34–56:22).
  • “I think they are going to cherry pick the most sane parts of whatever happens tonight… and while doing that, they then play into exactly what Trump complains about: ‘You censored me.’” — Benji, 52:48

5. Historic Parallels and Authoritarianism

• Big Lies and Authoritarian Playbook: Drawing on Goebbels and Hitler’s maxim, “You don’t tell a small lie, you tell a big lie and repeat it over and over,” the brothers compare Trump’s communication style to classic authoritarian tactics (42:50–44:25).

6. Accountability and the Todd Blanche Hearing

• Attorney General Hearings: Todd Blanche’s confirmation process as Attorney General is called “awful,” with especially chilling survivor accounts of his dismissive, gaslighting attitude towards Epstein victims (69:47–72:50).
  • “Epstein survivors confronted Todd Blanche and he treated it like a perfunctory audition for votes, not accountability.” — Reading Epstein survivor Lara Bloom McGee's statement, 71:00

7. Moral Clarity and Community Resilience

• Core Solution: The answer is unwavering truth-telling and building informed communities, with their book WTF America and podcast seen as “written by the community, for the community” (47:10; 74:57–76:01).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Tankers Disregarding CENTCOM (Open Defiance)

• “Shut the F up. We’re not effing doing it. Get the F away to CENTCOM. That’s what CENTCOM has become at this point.” — Ben, 03:23

On Media Enabling Alternate Reality

• “I don’t think the American people other than MeidasTouch viewers… actually know the scale and scope of what’s happening. So then a thing happens, and it appears to happen out of nowhere.” — Ben, 27:57

Trump's Delusion and Strategy

• “I think a lot of it is actually quite deliberate, and there is a strategy behind it. And the strategy is to cause as much chaos as possible.” — Jordi, 25:15

Stark Warning About the Future

• “If we talk about the geopolitical situation right now… Expect to lose 30,000 to 50,000 troops per month. I think that would be a conservative estimate.” — Ben, 17:12

Gaslighting and Endless Blame

• “All he gives a shit about is how much money he’s making off of the dips that he’s creating. And for Americans, that dip means personal bankruptcy, family catastrophe, healthcare being ripped away.” — Brett, 29:18

Brett’s Lament on National Disinformation

• “All of the bullshit fear mongering that they would do about Biden this, Biden that… all of those things are actually happening right now on a much bigger scale.” — Brett, 19:04

Centcom, Pirates, and Lost Credibility (Animal Metaphor)

• “There’s a whole law and animal kingdom around the seas... United States Navy, king of the jungle... Pirates were never a good thing until Donald Trump bragged, we’re the pirates now.” — Ben, 34:13

Epstein Survivors and Government Theater

• “Blanche was condescending, repeatedly interrupted, and tried to gaslight survivors... He offered no real plan to investigate anyone beyond Epstein and Maxwell.” (From Epstein survivor, read by Jordi, 71:00)

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Important Segment Timestamps

• Escalation in Iran & CENTCOM's Loss of Credibility: 02:15–06:51, 35:15–36:10
• Trump’s Oil Manipulation, Tank Bottom: 08:18–11:45
• Disinformation, Big Lies, and Mental Decline: 23:35–26:40
• Defiance on the Seas: 35:16–37:32
• Authoritarian Messaging, Historical Parallels: 42:50–44:25
• Todd Blanche/AG Hearing & Epstein Survivors: 69:47–72:50
• Book Announcement & Community Shoutout: 06:51–07:47, 74:50–76:02

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Tone and Style

The brothers blend urgent, clear-eyed analysis with satirical humor and frustration, never hiding their disgust at the current state of leadership and media coverage. Their language is direct, sometimes coarse (“Shut the F up. We’re not effing doing it.”), emotionally resonant, and undeniably partisan in support of democracy and truth.

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Summary Conclusion

This MeidasTouch episode is a blistering tour of America’s cascading crises under Trump’s second term: war, energy catastrophe, information breakdown, and government dysfunction. The brothers expose how gaslighting, media complicity, and reckless leadership undermine security and democracy. Above all, they call for relentless truth-telling and a resilient, informed public, inviting their “Midas Mighty” community to keep fighting “one by one” for accountability. Their upcoming book, WTF America, is pitched as a community-powered guide to survival and action.

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For further detail or a deep dive into any clip referenced, see timestamps.

Transcript

[Benji]

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[Brett]

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[Ben Meiselas]

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[Jordi Meiselas]

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[Ben Meiselas]

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[Ben Meiselas]

got a lot to discuss on this episode of the Midas Touch Podcast. Donald Trump escalating the catastrophic and unlawful war in Iran now hitting multiple civilian bridges in Iran Railways in Iran. There have been multiple civilian casualties reported out of Iran. Iran is striking back. We're seeing right now fires erupt right by the border of Kuwait and Iraq. We've seen Iran strike hard in Kuwait with Shahid drones in Bahrain, in a hotel in Oman. Iran is now also threatening to shut down the Bab El Mandab Strait in the Red Sea. If the United States were to have escalated and hit Iranian infrastructure, the US has hit Iranian civilian infrastructure. I think we can expect now Iran to escalate, shutting down the Bab El Mandab Strait in the Red Sea. We already see traffic from the Strait of Hormuz completely shut down. In fact, when CENTCOM was buzzing and telling some of these tankers, you're free

[Brett]

to go, use the southern route.

[Ben Meiselas]

Use the southern route. Well, after seven tankers in the past several days have been destroyed by Iran for taking the United States advice to use the southern route, now we're hearing over the tanker radio frequency, shut the F up. We're not effing doing it. Get the F away to centcom. That's what CENTCOM has become at this point. Donald Trump making a complete mockery of centcom. CENTCOM making a complete mockery of itself. We'll talk about what's going on there because things are really getting very, very bad. And especially as America has depleted its strategic petroleum reserves, which I've been warning about like a broken record now for a very long period of time. Of course, there was the Todd Blanche hearing. Todd Blanche, the acting AG his confirmation hearing to become Attorney General. Awful to watch someone so lawless, so callous try to get this job. We covered it yesterday. We'll talk about some of the lowlights today. You have the Defense Department right now under Hegseth and the acting Navy secretary. You know, they like to call themselves the War Department unlawfully. But they've been encouraging the military to do these very, like, low flyovers. First at Kid Rock's house a month or two back, which were like, what the hell are they doing at Kid Rock's house? Then in South Carolina over July 4th weekend. Then most recently, there was a flyover, I believe in Pensacola. Very dangerous, very low. Right next to. You could see the. Right next to kids there. And you could see the beat. You could see just the way the kids reacted. And then Hegset says, until morale improves, we're going to keep on doing this. And then you have the US Navy secretary out there also saying, this is patriotic.

[Brett]

This is what we do.

[Ben Meiselas]

And then Hegseth did a whole video that he released about this is now, the high tea, War department high tea. And it's this whole video about we're going to give, like, testosterone injections and medication to soldier, make sure they have their testosterone level really high. I mean, this is the most deranged and truly psychotic group of individuals purportedly leading the United States, or I should say leading us into bankruptcy and catastrophe at all levels. I mean, you know, there was the hearing of the new odni, the Director of National Intelligence, Jay Clayton, who was asked very, very basic questions by Senator Ossoff, and Clayton wouldn't answer, like, who won the 2020 election? I'm not going to answer. I'm not going to answer that question. And with all of this taking place, you have ICE out there continuing to kill people in this country and take no accountability for it. The most latest, the most recent killing, Juan Sebastian Guerrero. There's a photo of him right there and his wife and their baby, who is now three years old, wearing a bluey shirt. My baby girl's favorite shirt is her bluey shirt. And watching her father bleed out on the street as ICE killed her father in cold blood. Talk about this and more on the Midas Touch Network. I'm Ben Meiselas joined by Brett and Jordi Meiselas. How are you brothers doing?

[Jordi Meiselas]

It's good to be here, Ben. Good to be here, Jordi. Good to be here. Midas Mighty and man, we made a big announcement yesterday. And I just got to say, just at the top of the show, I just sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, want to thank the entire Midas Mighty community for the response to the announcement of our new book, W America, comes out October 20th, but it's available for pre sale now. Jordi and Ben got their copies there. Mine is actually upstairs right now. We poured our heart and souls into this book. I know a lot of you have said, where did you guys even find the time to do this? Well, every second we weren't on camera here, we were working on that. And so it's really a work of love. It's really a dedication to you, the Midas Mighty. I hope you find the information in it valuable. There's a pre order link in the description. But really what I just want to say right now is, is thank you. Thank you. Than thank you so much for the incredible reaction to this book. And I'm excited to discuss all the news with you today. Jordy, what's the latest?

[Benji]

Brothers Midas Mighty. It's wonderful to be here. I. I echo Brett's sentiments. Thank y'. All so much for the overwhelming response to the announcement of WTF America. As Ben reads the laundry list of just WTF America moments each episode, I, I just often reflect and I did like do a collective sigh, I guess, with this audience. But look, there's real action to be taking throughout all of this and, well, we're excited to get into it. Benji, where are we starting off today, big bro?

[Ben Meiselas]

Right. WTF is how I wake up sometimes. I don't get all that much sleep, but when I do wake up, I'm on the west coast. And so 4:35am I'll look to see what's happening. And it's usually Trump escalating, Trump imposing more unlawful tariffs like this morning, more escalation of war, Strategic petroleum reserves hitting tank bottom, which I've been warning about. We're at tank bottom now. So if you look at just a schematic of what that means, it means that we're at such a low level. If you think about, I don't know, taking a, having a drink. If you think about this as a cup for the visual and there's a straw in it, you know, when you get below the suction line and you can't really suction any of the crude anymore, that's kind of where we're at right now. And that's one of the ways the Trump regime's been manipulating the crude market. In addition to significantly shorting the crude market at low volume trading times as well, I've been talking about the crack spreads, the three to one crack spreads. It's called that because for every three barrels, two go to gas, one goes to, you know, diesel usually. And so the crack spreads now at $70 per barrel. But this as the price of crude has now passed $80 a barrel, the refinery price is increasing. So the fact that the crack price or the crack spread is at $70 a barrel, which is like record territory, is a very, very bad sign. And it talks about shortages like, so what does this mean in practice? That means we're going to hit fuel shortages soon. That means there's going to be lines at the gas station. It will remind you a lot of COVID Remember when there were lines for grocery stor, lines for food. That's going to come back soon. And you know, I know lots of people like, oh, Ben, you've been saying this for a long time. Well, it's been happening for a long time. And in fact, the Energy Information agency called the EIA finally released their report today. It was the WTF moment. I woke up. WTF you're telling us now, July 16th, that back in June, technically we hit tank bottom. So now we are tank bottom. Tank bottom. Tank bottom. And that's when Donald Trump thought this was. Let's escalate. We should never be in this catastrophic war in the first place. If you are going to escalate, which you never should. Now you think, they think now's the time to do that. So I also woke. You should never. Let's be very clear, you should never be the time to do that. Also, Donald Trump is now attacking civilian infrastructure in Iran. Bridges. A Bandar Abbas Tushiraz bridge has been hit. You can actually see the bridge that's been destroyed. Other civilian infrastructure as well. Bandar Khmer, an important overpass connecting Bandar Abbas to Lar. There were cars on the bridge. At least one civilian was dead, several injured. The Garbara Bridge. At least one dead, several others injured. A railway station west of Bandara Bas. That's the point where the railway connects to the passenger and freight lines. Also, residential buildings near. There have been strikes near residential buildings as well. And Iran has said, if you do that, we're going to strike infrastructure of Arab nations nearby. We're not going to hold back. And as I've been warning about now and again, I've seen some people say, Ben, no one else is reporting that. Are you sure? They're talking about the Red Sea and Bab El Mandab and Strategic Reserves and Cushing, Oklahoma. What are you even saying here with

[Brett]

all of these things?

[Ben Meiselas]

Yeah, well, I've been evaluating what's been happening. I actually didn't need super secret sources

[Brett]

to tell me that's actually one of

[Ben Meiselas]

the things we talk about in Delhi. Wtf, America? A lot of it's happening.

[Brett]

Like, I can see it. I can see what's being said, see what's being done.

[Ben Meiselas]

I can see the troop movements. I can see where we're striking. I can evaluate if it's true or not true. I show you the true stuff. I don't show you the false stuff. I'm well aware that Iran has its

[Brett]

own propaganda arm as well.

[Ben Meiselas]

So it's not like, oh, everything they say has to be true, but I also want to see, okay, this is truly something that happened.

[Brett]

Iraq says that there was an Iranian

[Ben Meiselas]

shahi that struck one of its refineries, but there was no damage done. It was all good. Hmm, that's curious. So is Iran lying or is Iraq lying?

[Brett]

And then you find out, oh, Iraq

[Ben Meiselas]

is now actually shutting down the refinery and shutting down, you know, its production from there. Oh, got it. So there was damage that took place.

[Brett]

And we kind of see this theme over and over again.

[Ben Meiselas]

CENTCOM and the Arab nations that Iran is striking back out.

[Brett]

They'll say it was just the debris that fell down.

[Ben Meiselas]

There was no real damage. But then you'll see the satellite footage and CENTCOM will say, that's not real, that's fake. That's AI satellite footage from Iran. But usually the satellite footage is accurate, we found.

[Brett]

And then a month later or 15

[Ben Meiselas]

days later, or sometimes longer, you'll find, oh, wait a minute, all of those US bases have been hit really hard. Yeah, I mean we, we see things on fire. Like right now, you could see right by the border of Kuwait and Iraq, something. There's a serious fire right there. We know Iran said they were going to strike the infrastructure. We're waiting to get confirmation on what it actually is, but we know Iran's responded hard. I've seen the Iranian shahed drone that struck a Kuwaiti American facility. You know, it's interesting too. I've seen them. I've seen the strikes in Jordan, you know.

[Brett]

Then you'll hear from like Jordan's foreign

[Ben Meiselas]

minister and they'll be like, we don't know why Iran is striking us. We don't have air bases in Jordan.

[Brett]

We don't.

[Ben Meiselas]

We just have troops here.

[Brett]

Part of a previous agreement with the

[Ben Meiselas]

United States, but we don't have, you know, any U.S. bases there. And it's like, what are you talking about? I mean, that's there. There's been a huge amount of US planes that are right.

[Brett]

We can see them in the satellite footage.

[Ben Meiselas]

But by the way, that's why CENTCOM has demanded that all of these private companies that provided, like Planet Labs and other, that do the satellite footage shut it down because people were able to see it and see what was happening. Now one of the ways we get this footage is that China hasn't shut down there so oftentimes. The China kind of companies that are linked with them, you know, are showing some of this footage and there's still others that haven't operated. But the US has anyone affiliated with it shut down its production of these satellite images. And now we're at a point as well where Iran has said that it will work with the Houthis to shut down the Bab el Mandab Strait if the US does what the US Is doing. Now we know the Houthis in Yemen have been working with allied groups in Somalia and the other area by the Red Sea to make sure that both sides of the Red Sea can fully be shut down. So we're evaluating that right there. Saudi Arabia has attacked inside Yemen where the Houthis are just, Yemen's divided. There's kind of the Saudi backed government right there. And then the other main areas controlled by the Houthis and the Sana airport that Saudi Arabia attacked. The Houthis said, well, we're going to strike back at Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. Pakistan, which is the mediator, has a defense agreement with Saudi Arabia, kind of like their own alliance, that if Saudi Arabia is attacked, then Pakistan is obligated to fight in defense of Saudi Arabia in response for Saudi Arabia money. So Pakistan's role as the mediator has basically been, has basically been blown up. And Iran, I think is preparing to strike infrastructure now in these Arab nations. And so this all happens at a time where these strategic reserves, reserves are fully, you know, are fully depleted. And that's like, that's, that's where we, that's where we are right now. I'll toss it to Brett and Jordy, but like that assessment that I just gave you, it's not a Democratic assessment, an independent assessment, a republic, I mean, being a political party, that is, it is independent and objective. It's not a Republican assessment. That's where we are. We are in a much worse, higher escalatory position than at any time in the war, at any time, including the beginning. We are in a much more dangerous and precarious situation than even early March when Trump started, you know, doing all. We are in a position where if you just map out the next moves, the next moves are Iran strikes infrastructure. I'm sure that's what I'll be reporting soon, Bob. El Mandab straight comes next. So Trump thinks he needs to respond with special Forces. Special forces where? Carg Island, Kesham? I don't know, the coast. Special Forces. That will inevitably lead to special forces getting killed. Then where does that lead to draft.

[Brett]

We had a. Trump says we have

[Ben Meiselas]

50,000 troops in the region. Russia is losing about 35,000 to 50,000 troops each month in its invasion of Ukraine. Okay, so a US invasion of Iran. Expect to lose 30,000 to 50,000 troops per month. I think that would be a conservative estimate right there. And then while we're at it, if we talk about the geopolitical situation right now, you have war escalating like never before between Russia and Ukraine. And you know, with Ukraine increasing its abilities to strike the Russian refineries, you know, which it's built up those capabilities, you know, and it's defending itself right from a Russian invasion.

[Brett]

Well, what do you think that's doing

[Ben Meiselas]

to, to the oil markets right now? What do you think that's doing as well? And I know that's not how we should always be thinking about it in economic terms, but you have Russia hitting hard in Ukraine, you've got Ukraine hitting hard in Russia now with deeper and deeper strikes.

[Brett]

You had Zelensky make one of his

[Ben Meiselas]

first major errors, awful error. He got rid of Fedorov, who's their defense minister and kind of sided with the old guard of the Ukrainian troops. There's massive protests right now in Ukraine after they filed Fedorov. I don't know what the thinking was, but there was a fight between Fedorov, who was only in that position for about six months as like their head of their defense, and he was the guy who modernized the Ukrainian weapons and their old guard, the commander and chief person who was running kind of the day to day in Ukraine. And Zelensky sided with the older guard. There are people protesting. Kyiv Independent is out there criticizing. So you've got just the dynamic in

[Brett]

the world right now. All of the bullshit fear mongering that they would do about Biden this, Biden that, Biden this.

[Ben Meiselas]

And you go back, Brett, you've showed me some of those posts from those right wing MAGA people.

[Brett]

All of those things are actually happening right now as we're recording this on a much bigger scale than the fear mongering with Biden. By the way, where that fear mongering

[Ben Meiselas]

caused the oil prices to go up.

[Brett]

Not the actuality, the fear mongering of

[Ben Meiselas]

it is what caused it to go up.

[Jordi Meiselas]

It actually made me truly angry and I was just curious and I don't know why. It's like, I don't know, self harm in a way. I felt like, like I'm just curious what all these people who are like very much silent right now on the situation in Iran, what did they say during the Biden administration about oil? What did they say during the Biden administration about issues with the markets or the banks? And so I looked up some of these figures and you know, I don't even feel like giving them individual the attention. But I'm sure a lot of you know who they are, some kind of big kind of right wing tech kind of rollog, you know, types, investment types. And you know, I looked up, okay, let's look at posts about oil prior to Donald Trump's second term. You know, from The Biden presidency. Let's look up their posts about war or about the banks. And sure enough, every post was a five alarm fire. It was run on the banks, run on the banks. Take your money out. You got to take your money out. Oil's going to be up, oil's going to be gone. Get your oil. Oil's got World War iii, World War iii, World War III is coming. And just an incessant, just non stop push of that stuff. Just constantly pushing that into the ecosystem every single day. And getting the boost from the algorithms of the right wing oligarchs who run the platforms like the Elon Musk's of the world, getting millions and millions and millions of impressions. That was lying to the American people about what was going on and creating this panic, creating this just alternative reality. And that alternative reality is what Donald Trump thrives in. I mean, think about when there were the hurricanes, right, right at the end of the Biden administration. What did they do? These people so discontent, they, they spread fake information, disinformation about what was happening. Remember, they kept going back to that FEMA$750. I can't believe the Biden administration would only do this. Meanwhile, that was like the amount that was automatically dispersed to people that was congressionally approved. And what did Donald Trump do when he came into office? He made that $0 and he's been rejecting FEMA aid from there was the fires here in California, which affected us quite intimately and Donald Trump lying about that, that he needed to turn on a big hose and there wouldn't have been fires without him and if only they raked the forest. And so I think everything, when you look at Donald Trump across the board, you know, you have to really look at him like a deranged maniac, like a psychotic individual. And so one of the frustrating things about when you get into a situation of a war like this is the guy doesn't change, right? A leopard doesn't change its spots. And so Donald Trump in this war scenario now is doing the same thing, the same sort of psychological damage that he did to all Americans over the course of the election and over the course of this term. All of the endless lying, the gaslighting, the alternate realities, that's what he's doing in Iran right now. And that makes it a very difficult situation for Americans sitting at home who are trying to get accurate information about the, the war. This is a matter of life or death. Major information that could affect oil markets, could affect, like I said, lives more importantly. And Donald Trump gets out there every single day and just lies. That's why when I hear the Iranians talk about how the discussions are going and Donald Trump violating the mou, I'm frankly more inclined to believe them because I actually see what's happening beyond Donald Trump's rhetoric. And when I see Donald Trump. Donald Trump say things like, they don't know what they want, and they keep changing their mind and they keep saying different things, and these people are psycho. These people are scum. They're deranged. You can never trust the word they say. They say one thing one day, a different thing the next. I'm like, dude, you're talking about yourself, man. You're talking about yourself yet again. And so it's the psychological projection, the same kind of, you know, the same kind of things that he does to Americans here at home with these domestic. That's domestic issues that's so damaging he's doing overseas right now. But this is an issue, of course, that affects the entire world.

[Benji]

He hasn't just lost his marbles.

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He has no marbles.

[Benji]

The war with Iran exposed, like another truly terrifying vulnerability at the highest level of American government. And that's that the United States President Donald Trump is so obviously and clearly showing signs of his cognitive collapse day in and day out, and yet no one is doing anything about it. And now because of that, we're stuck in it for forever war. Like, I am not an ageist. I think that's like, one of the dumbest is right that you could be. Whether you like it or not, hopefully

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you grow old one day.

[Benji]

But the reality is, at a certain point, Father Time comes for us all and impacts our decision making and our cognitive capabilities. So we have to just understand here, Trump is well past the hey, give me your keys phase of this. He's in, like, the he needs to be institutionalized phase. And now, the worst part about this is that Trump has surrounded himself entirely with these submissive loyalists and yes men. And there's no one there to be like, hey, Keith, there's no one there to provide any pushback, correct his cognitive failures and poor decision making. And instead, you know what they do? They look at Trump and they say, hey, man, how fast do you want to drive today? How fast do you want to go? When someone who is so cognitively addled like a Donald Trump gets validated in those war room meetings, we, as a country, we're just left exposed to an unforced catastrophic escalation. And that's what we're seeing. That's exactly what we're seeing day in and day out, every single day, this war drags on and on as our troops die and get injured, as families are ripped apart, as we start to see gas lines in this country. This is going to keep getting worse,

[Jordi Meiselas]

Ben, And I'll agree with you to an extent. Right, And I completely agree. You know, the guy's totally cognitively addled. He's making erratic decisions, saying things that are not at all tethered to reality. He contradicts himself every single day. And I agree with you 100% on that. You literally see the rot on his hands and on his neck at the same time. I think we all have to understand, though, that a lot of this is a deliberate strategy by Donald Trump. And so I don't want to just write it off as cognitive decline. Donald Trump is purposely trying to pump out a fire hose of lies. He's trying to confuse the population. He's trying to confuse the United States and our citizens. He's trying to confuse the Iranian regime. He's trying to cause chaos. And he thinks through chaos. That's his kind of strategy in order to succeed in these things. And he hopes that he could just kind of drag the stuff on long enough that somebody else eventually comes along and solves his issue, or that he screws it up so badly that he then goes to blame the deep state, or he goes to blame the Democrats or the far left radical communists who wouldn't back him in the war. Right, that's. That's kind of, in my opinion, that's kind of his strategy. And that's what's so kind of cynical about everything that he's doing here. I think a lot of it is actually quite deliberate, and there is a strategy behind it. And the strategy is to cause as much chaos as possible.

[Ben Meiselas]

But just like with his litigations where he deploys the same strategy, right, Continue it, continue it. Delay, delay, delay. At some point, the rubber hits the road, right? Like the. In addition to it being lies and fascism and hate, you know, and resulting in war crimes and killing, it also doesn't have an end that is anything other than bankruptcy. And that's what we've seen in this guy's entire life, right? Like, okay, you're doing all of these things. You're doing all of these things, but, like, what's the end outcome? Is it just to literally keep it going for as much the scam until.

[Brett]

Until what? Well, you hit a point, which is

[Ben Meiselas]

where we're at now, where you're at tank bottom, where Iran is not destroyed as many times as you want to claim that they're destroyed. They aren't. They're responding back with force. They've prepared for this. You're about to have the Red Sea shut down and the Persian Gulf shut down while we hit tank bottom. And because corporate news is too busy greeting Caroline Levitt, it returning back.

[Brett]

Did you see how hard. Welcome back, welcome back. Lie to us, please lie more to us.

[Ben Meiselas]

Literally, it was like, welcome back.

[Brett]

I don't think the American people other

[Ben Meiselas]

than Midas touch network viewers and other people who view networks like ours actually know the scale and scope of what's happening. So then a thing happens and it appears to happen out of nowhere, right?

[Brett]

All of a sudden the media cycle

[Ben Meiselas]

will take turn to Cushing, Oklahoma and

[Brett]

tank bottom and crack spreads and the Red Sea and all of these things.

[Ben Meiselas]

And what does Trump do? Find someone I can blame.

[Brett]

Oh, it was their fault. It was their fault. It was their fault. I was going to do it, but then this person or that person or that. Then you do the scapegoating, then you blame the other. And then Trump actually gets into an area where he feels comfortable because he's not a solution oriented person. He's not a deal maker, he's a destroyer. So then when there is the chaos, when there are the line, when there are all of these things that are happening, what does he do? What does he say? The communists are doing it and mom, the Mini Mamdanis are out there doing it and this is doing it and that person and it's NATO's fault and it's this. And then he injects that. And everybody else who now has to solve the problem, they become swept into this and they're trying to solve the problem. And all he gives a shit about is how much money he's making off of the dips that he's creating. And for Americans, that dips means personal bankruptcy, family catastrophe, healthcare being ripped away.

[Benji]

By the way.

[Brett]

That's why I go with wtf. That's why I go wtf. What the F is going on right here with all of this, with what's happening right now? That's, that's how I wake up every day. Anyway, let's take our last, let's take

[Ben Meiselas]

our first, last quick break of the first quick break of the show. We've got a lot to discuss when we come back, Hit subscribe, Check out

[Brett]

up there on the or there, there, wherever it is.

[Ben Meiselas]

Scan the QR code, pre order WTF America?

[Brett]

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[Jordi Meiselas]

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[Benji]

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. I saw a couple people already doing this in the chat. Hey, if you've already pre ordered WTF America, throw the WTF America emoji in the chat right now. Let's swamp the chat with. Just flood the chat with the WTF America emoji. If you pre ordered it already, let

[Jordi Meiselas]

everyone know or if you plan to. And you know, what I also want to say about this book briefly before tossing it over to Ben is I'm actually, I'm proud of two things. One, that we don't give an F about access. And so we're able to actually, you know, make our feelings heard in this book. And we're not afraid of what Caroline Levitt is going to say to us when she returns from her vacation, number one. Number two, I'm proud that like, unlike so many of these other books out there, we didn't like withhold a scoop in order to sell a book. Right? Like, we need to keep this information secret from the public. Just not how we do things. We got to report things as we actually know about them or oftentimes as Ben has been, you know, doing so brilliantly before they even become the big stories to ensure that everybody is up to date. And those are a couple things I'm proud of. And by the way, for all you, you know, telling me that I look tired, that I have the bags under my eyes, you understand why now We've been, we've been writing a book. Anyway, Ben, back to you.

[Ben Meiselas]

Just want to emphasize this point one more time about how the credibility of CENTCOM is absolutely shot. You know, when it comes to the law of the seas. I know we have a lot of people who watch or in the shipping industry who have worked on tankers, who have worked on the docks. It's a crude example I'm going to give. But there's a whole kind of law and animal kingdom around the seas and the law of the seas, right? And at the very top, indisputably the king of the jungle would be like, the United States Navy. Right, The United States Navy. You know, then you would have, like, you know, the hyenas or like the, you know, would be like, the pirates, right? And, you know, you wouldn't want, you know, the pirates was never a good thing until Donald Trump bragged, we're the pirates now. We're the pirates at sea. So we're the ones who, you know, or whatever.

[Brett]

But.

[Ben Meiselas]

But at the, at the top, you would have, you know, the, you know, CENTCOM, U.S. navy.

[Brett]

So if you would be pinged over whichever radio frequency and you heard something from Centcom, right? From the George H.W. bush super carrier ship, whatever the order

[Ben Meiselas]

is, you would say, yes, sir. Okay.

[Brett]

Now, those super carriers with CENTCOM are pinging these tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, saying, you're free to use the southern route. The southern route of the Strait of Hormuz remains open, to which the tankers

[Ben Meiselas]

and people are, you know, recording what's

[Brett]

taking place over these frequencies.

[Ben Meiselas]

They're saying, excuse my language.

[Brett]

Fuck off. Get outta here. Shut up. You're annoying us.

[Mint Mobile Ad]

I.

[Brett]

It's. I know it's a small thing when the US Is bombing bridges right now

[Ben Meiselas]

and bombing railroads and killing civilians in

[Brett]

Iran, but it is something that is more than just the F off part of it. That's what the tanker captains are telling

[Ben Meiselas]

these super carrier captains. I just want to make that emphasis right there.

[Jordi Meiselas]

Your credibility is everything in life and in life, and the United States has absolutely none right now. And I was like, you know, I wouldn't say hopeful, but I. When I at least saw the. The CENTCOM Admiral Cooper for the first time, I was like, okay, this guy at least isn't like, pounding his chest and like, you know, trying to do these weird macho videos like Hegseth does or whatever. So I was like, maybe we'll actually get some real information out of him. Unfortunately, you know, I always give the golden rule with the Trump administration, with the Trump regime, never give them the benefit of the doubt because they're never going to live up to even your lowest of expectations. But it's as if Donald Trump is, you know, out there and they're telling these tankers who need to go through the straight of Hormuz, you know, it's. It's almost like telling people to like, eat the diarrhea lettuce. You know, eat the diarrhea lettuce. Eat it, eat it. Trust me, it's great. It's great. We're like, I See, thousands of people are getting this virus right now from the lettuce they have, they have explosive diarrhea. Eat it. Trust me, it's great. And they're like, no, I'm not gonna eat it.

[Brett]

I see what's happening.

[Jordi Meiselas]

I see what's happening. I, I, I live in the real world, you know. And so you have Centcom trying to push this fantasy land right now. The same way during COVID that Donald Trump didn't want people to care about COVID And there was kind of a movement where they're like, maybe it's good to go out there, go get the virus. Go, Go get infected.

[Brett]

Go.

[Jordi Meiselas]

It's like, no, I'm not doing that, man. I see people dying. I see what's going on, their tankers on fire. I'm not stupid. I hear what the SAPA Navy is saying to me in the, in the communications. I'm not messing around here. And the fact that the Trump regime is so willing to put, put these captains, these, the people on these boats who have, it's got to be like the heart. Could you imagine that being your job to drive through the Strait of Hormuz? Like, how harrowing in general. And for Trump to just be so willy nilly with their lives, I mean, just shows you just the total lack of value that they, that they place in lives. And again, it also shows this feedback loop that we've been in since day one. I mean, don't you remember right when the war began, when the strikes happened and the straight was closed down, what did Donald Trump say? Donald Trump took to his little social media app and he starts going, show some courage. Go through the straight. Trust me. Show your courage. Be strong. Be a man. It's like, no, I'm not going to the Straight to die.

[Ben Meiselas]

Here's the thing, Brett, I'm going to toss it right back to you, but here's the thing about him, and it's important, and we talk about this in wwe, but here's the thing, right? He was non stop with it, right? Non stop. He never gave up on that message. As crazy, as crazy as it was,

[Brett]

was the same way with the reflecting

[Ben Meiselas]

pool painted blue, the same way he lies about $19.1 trillion, the same way he claims that the tariffs are bringing prices down. You know, we just did the 25% tariffs on Brazil last night. When there's a $435 million surplus with Brazil, you know, the Supreme Court will strike.

[Brett]

He won't stop. He will be relentless.

[Ben Meiselas]

So, Brett, to your point there, though,

[Brett]

he's never stopped saying, do it, do it, do it, do it, do it, do it, do it, do it.

[Ben Meiselas]

It right?

[Brett]

And.

[Ben Meiselas]

And then they do it because he

[Brett]

keeps on saying, do it, do it, do it. And it's a crazy person that just keeps on going, you know, that's his. And I don't mean this in a positive sense. The superpower that he has, that.

[Ben Meiselas]

The evil superpower that, that harm.

[Brett]

He doesn't stop, do it, do it, do it.

[Ben Meiselas]

You know, most humans like, all right, all right. And then they do it finally, not right away bread and not April, not

[Brett]

May, not June, July.

[Ben Meiselas]

Finally they do it right because he

[Brett]

keeps on saying, I got you, I got you, I got you. What happens, happens. Seven tankers destroyed Iran. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. There was a death on one of the ships. And what's he still saying now do it. And so the tankers now July, are saying, f off, F off. But it's an important study, though, into what the problem is. And that's how he's been his whole life.

[Ben Meiselas]

He doesn't give a shit if he destroys your life.

[Brett]

In fact, he likes that. That he doesn't. He doesn't give a. He cares.

[Ben Meiselas]

Am I making money?

[Brett]

Am I making money?

[Ben Meiselas]

Am I accumulating more power? That's the important point.

[Benji]

And he also wants to use you. He wants to use you and your position as a prop.

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Right?

[Benji]

It's why we see the hegseth.

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The, the, the.

[Benji]

The send me video, right? It's all based on this propaganda that's so bastardized. Loving this country in a specific way. And, and the MAGA way is like this, like, overtly machismo. If you're not killing the enemy, you don't love America. If you're not wrapping yourself in the American flag, you don't love America. And all that's led to are the senseless deaths of our servicemen over this war. It's ridiculous. Never tell me again that that MAGA and the Republican Party champion our servicemen and women.

[The Absorption Company Ad]

They don't.

[Benji]

If they did, we would not be in this war. We would not be putting them in this harm because for them, they can't even name why we're in this war. To open the straight now. The straight was open before we got there. What is going on?

[Jordi Meiselas]

Completely agree, Jordy. And you know, the Trump, I, I think at this point, everyone should realize that he views every single other person on this planet as pawns of his to use at his will. Like Donald Trump. It's his world, according to him and everyone else is just living in it. And he'll willingly sacrifice anybody's life. He doesn't give a crap. He really doesn't care about a single soul other than them himself. He's the most vain, narcissistic person on the planet with a severe mental disorder. And that is actually quite dangerous when it gets the situations of war. And I can't help but as we speak about this think, you know, go back to kind of even January 6th with his own supporters when he told them, you know, we're going to march to the Capitol and I'll be with you. And all the stuff that he said, you know, around January 6th. And of course, course he was no, he set the, you know, lit the match, set the fire, had everybody storm the Capitol, and then he, at that point was nowhere to be found because it's not about him. It's not about, I'm going to like, actually be at the front lines with you, or I am going to, to prove that this is safe, I am going to go through the straight of Hormuz. Could you imagine that visual Donald Trump going through the straight of four mood. I'm going to do this to show you that it's safe. No, that's not what what it is. It's you risk your lives and do it. Aren't you a tough guy? Don't you want to show that you're tough and that you have courage? And everyone's at this point is like, no, actually, I don't want to die for you, Donald Trump, and I don't want to die for the stock market.

[Ben Meiselas]

But here's the thing. Goebbels said this, Hitler said it in Mein Kampf. And authoritarians in the past have utilized this. You don't tell a small lie, you tell a big lie and you repeat it it over and over and over again. Think about tonight, Trump's national address. And fortunately, there's a lot of networks that are not going to be streaming it live, which is good, but they're probably gonna normalize it after and not show the crazy stuff. So to me, it's good. Don't show it live, you shouldn't.

[Brett]

But also educate and inform people about

[Ben Meiselas]

what a lie and how harmful it is. Don't say, oh, well, Donald Trump just gave a speech. In many ways that that becomes worse because you're now filtering it through a normal lens. So what we do at the Midas Touch Network is we don't play it live and then we comment afterwards with a fact check about what's actually what's actually going down. And so again tonight, what's he going to be doing? He's going to be talking about the stuff he was talking about in 2020, which we all knew is a lie. But here he is in 2026 on July 16, with this catastrophic war going on with our strategic reserves being depleted, with the American people suffering, with gas prices going back up again, with the American people having health care ripped away. What's he doing? He's going to be talking about elections and communism and 2020 was stolen.

[Brett]

And while he posts photos of Xi

[Ben Meiselas]

Jinping and himself all night, you know him and Xi Jinping, these weird photos of him. He's what, he's going to accuse Xi Jinping of stealing the election for him in 20. That the guy who he like, admires. And it's not even a consistent thing at all, you know, regarding, you know, the way he engages in this behavior.

[Brett]

But the, the important lesson is he's not going to stop ever. Ever.

[Ben Meiselas]

And so the only way to respond

[Brett]

to it and deal with it is

[Ben Meiselas]

strongly, with moral clarity, unwavering, and just stand on business, just stand on it and call out the truth every damn day. And that's what we tried to do here at the Midas Touch Network. Now I just want to share this video with you because I want to

[Brett]

ask you, has anybody, you know, other

[Ben Meiselas]

than on the Midas Touch network, have you seen any news network, you know, that's not independent news, that's not affiliated with Midas, you know, or an independent news source, you know, show the video of the Shahid drone striking into Kuwait, by the way, which is an area

[Brett]

that the United States has military infrastructure.

[Ben Meiselas]

And here, let me show this video for you. Now I can show you lots of other videos like that, but, but instead you'll hear the media asking, and I did a whole video on this, so I don't need to play Caroline Levitt for you. But instead you'll hear the media adopting the fake framework from the United States that Iran was the party that breached the Memorandum of Understanding and that how

[Brett]

could we trust Iran if Iran so

[Ben Meiselas]

quickly breached the Memorandum of Understanding? And, and you know, now that we fully destroyed the Iranian military, how do

[Brett]

we even negotiate with them when Iran's

[Ben Meiselas]

unable to even communicate with each with itself at the leadership levels?

[Brett]

And then it's like this fictitious conversation between Caroline Levitt and these so called

[Ben Meiselas]

reporters who are asking questions. Well, now that they always use the term like neutered. It's part of their whole like, weird test.

[Brett]

Now that we've neutered them, they're unable to talk.

[Ben Meiselas]

And that's why we should have done

[Brett]

this to begin with. But they want to settle and they want to come back and negotiate with us soon. But they're neutered. So their leadership isn't talking. It's like their leadership is talking. We know who their leadership is. They haven't been neutered. They have. They have Shahid drones, they have ballistic missiles. They are successfully targeting US Bases in the nearby Arab nations. They're escalating in response to the US Escalating. We know where this is headed. And so the whole framework of the discussion is some fake, fraudulent fantasy world as well, that that is not even rooted in the reality. And the cause and the consequence is the abyss that we're heading into right now that frankly, we're in where we are at tank bottom, where now, then it gets reported, breaking news. How did we get here? Because it was happening every day and you all decided to, you know, I don't know, chase. Whatever, whatever, whatever. Do you know Barack Ravid was telling you, Trump's stenographer at Axios. Ooh, there's productive conversations. Ooh, no, let's assess objectively what's happening. And by the way, that's the point. I'm proud of the Stand book. So I'm going to keep on promoting this book because I'm proud of WTF America? And by the way, the book which you can pre order right now, it comes out in October. It's a book for the community. I mean, we dedicate this book to you. And one of the main thesis is, the thesis that I put in this book is you. We're the we with you. Fighting with you is the way out of this mess. It's, it's the, it's. One of the key solutions is communities like this getting out the truth. Because you speak to people in your family about. You talk to others about it. All right, let's take our last quick break of the show. It's the QR codes on one of

[Ben Meiselas]

the sides, you know, you know, so

[Brett]

put the emoji as well. If you've pre ordered, click the QR code pre order right now. WTF America? All right, let's take our last quick break of the show.

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[Jordi Meiselas]

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[Benji]

Let's go. Shout out to our sponsors links in description of the YouTube and the audio. Use the links, use the codes. If there's an exit survey, let them know we sent you. Benji, I want to talk about what you're talking about before break this crazy speech that's about to be played tonight. I didn't want to cut you off. So sorry for now restarting here in this segment because I, I think I have an alternate take here. Might be slightly controversial, but I actually think it's at least worth discussing. And Brett, I'm curious your perspective here as well. I think they should air Trump tonight. Legacy media at least, reason being, I don't trust them, Ben, to exactly what you landed on there to report what's about to happen as honest brokers of information. I think they are going to cherry pick the most sane parts of whatever happens tonight. And while doing that, they then play into exactly what Trump complains about. Oh, you've censored me. You censored me. You would see, they would, they wouldn't let me speak. Then corporate media is going to bend over backwards to show the sane moments of what's happening to me. In many ways, I get PTSD at moments like this. To the 2024 debate with Trump and Biden, when they muted the mics, I was screaming from the rooftops back then, like, why are you going to mute the microphone? Why are you self censoring Trump on his behalf?

[Brett]

Right.

[Benji]

He's a crazy person and the world needs to see that he's a crazy person. Now, Benji, with respect to the Midas Touch network and independent media covering it, I fully, totally trust how you're going to cover it, that you will show every single clip throughout this crazy speech and that people will get the accurate information. So I agree in our instance why we shouldn't show it. But that being the case, I think it's necessary that corporate media shows it. And here's the other thing, Brett, before I toss it over to you. Look, the biggest problems facing this country right now are the affordability crisis, the housing crisis, health care crisis. I could go on and on. And tonight Trump's gonna go up there and talk about what the 2020 election being stolen. That's Insane, right? I'm not like that's insane. No, it's truly insane. It's 2026. He's gonna go up there and talk about how state and senate level seats were stolen. That's what everyone assumes he' about. This is a madman. This is someone who, who genuinely is deeply ill, a deeply irresponsible person, let alone president who just hates this country. There is no other conclusion I can draw other than his divisiveness here that he hates this country and he wants to put his hatred so tangibly on its people.

[Jordi Meiselas]

I can't say I agree. I want to say though, yeah, I don't think, I don't think they should show it. I don't, I don't think they should show it. I don't think they should show the election lies. I think if they have advanced notice that they're going to be election lies, they shouldn't show it. And not only that, but I also think they have a fiduciary probably obligation that aside. Right.

[Benji]

If they're trying to avoid it.

[Jordi Meiselas]

But I already said both ways, right. I'm giving both options. So I don't. They should show it because I don't think they should put that on into the airwaves. You know, they're showing it on their digital platforms already. People are going to see it. It's, you know, it is what it is. Right, but, and at the end also, at the same time, you seen all the lawsuits from the, you know, 2020 election and the airing of those lies and the courts hold the parties responsible who are amplifying those lies, especially if they have knowledge in advance that that's what's going to happen. And I, I kind of bet also that even like a Fox, when they air this, I bet they probably do so with some sort of disclaimer, you know, I'm all for people seeing how crazy the guy is. That's why they need to see the crazy in context. And I get it. You think they're going to sane wash him after the fact. And they probably will. And they probably will. And you're not going to, and you're not going to solve that. Is the solution, in my opinion, to play him completely unfiltered? No, I don't. In my opinion, I don't think that networks have an obligation, nor do I think it's in the public interest for people to be fed lies in prime time, you know, especially on these, you know, network channels where there are other shows and things that people want to be watching and Stuff like to interrupt people's lives to put, to pump this toxicity into their living room. I don't think they have an obligation to do it. I actually think it's, it's negative and negative and, and it's also a fiduciary issue for these companies.

[Ben Meiselas]

You know, tiebreaker. We've talked, we've talked about, about it. I don't want to even give it more time because I want to spend the time getting out just the truthful information as, as, as we talk about also in WTF America, we can control what we can control. Right? And what we can control is using every millisecond and second to do our best. Does that mean we're always going to be right about everything?

[Jordi Meiselas]

You know?

[Ben Meiselas]

No, but to do our best getting out the truth, truth not as aligned with this political party or that political party, but being aligned with reality. When Donald Trump says $19.1 trillion was brought in, then you need to fact check that immediately and say, okay, well if you did that, then why are you doing reconciliation 3.0 where you want to do more cuts to critical program that the American people rely on when you already said you got all your money from the so called big beautiful bill, which has been an absolute disaster. But if you brought in $19.1 trillion, you need more money from taxpayers, you need to get rid of more programs like, let's just view it in the most common sense lens. And also you're bragging about the last inflation report, which may have been fine if you stuck to the memorandum of understanding, but just by claiming some random 12 gas stations in Pennsylvania called Freedom Stations are selling gas at $3.47 because we don't even know this opaque system that you're using to basically, you know, fund this thing and lose money. So you can say 12 gas stations are doing this, the 150,000 other gas stations, the prices are going up. We're heading back to four, four dollars a gallon. And now we've hit strategic tank bottom or we've hit the tank bottom of these Strategic Petroleum Reserves and people are paying more money. I mean, I see in the comments what people are saying. I'm paying over $6 per gallon right now of gas. That's the condition in a lot of states. It's going back up significantly and we're

[Brett]

in a period where we're not able to do, we're not going to be able to do an MOU again. You think we'll be able to do an mou? Go back to it nicely and neatly, no Trump has escalated any chance of de escalation into what can only be existential, because Donald Trump is now showing

[Ben Meiselas]

there is no MOU that exists, that

[Brett]

Trump will not stop until there's global

[Ben Meiselas]

economic catastrophe and maybe won't stop even

[Brett]

when that takes place. So Iran's got the message. They knew that this would likely happen.

[Ben Meiselas]

They prepared for it strategically.

[Brett]

That's why they got out 60 or

[Ben Meiselas]

70 million barrels of oil, not all of the oil.

[Brett]

It's not like it's going to be easy for Iran. They don't want war, they don't love war. It's not like they're excited about this. They're going to. They're suffering casualties. This is harming them.

[Ben Meiselas]

It's not like this is a great situation. But they are built on resistance. They're not going to tap out anytime soon.

[Brett]

They saw what happened with the funeral

[Ben Meiselas]

processions for Ayatollah Komene.

[Brett]

And all this does is further escalate and make things works. And Trump can do the gimmick and say, look, Walmart is doing a sale. Beef is down 12% according to the Walmart sale. You can't take Walmart coupons and extrapolate the economic condition of the American people. But for this Trump regime and for corporate news, that just creates a framing of the other side when they both sides a thing. And then it just becomes, oh, there's these numbers, there's these numbers. There's a lot of noise out there. So whatever, we'll just, you know, whatever we can do about it, you know, let's just report that. We'll report this. And no, what we can control is telling the truth. So why we're recording now while Donald Trump's giving the speech and we're telling the truth? There ain't no $19.1 trillion. And that should be the biggest freaking story right now. Now, because how someone claiming they brought in $19.1 trillion but then is begging for money from the taxpayers. That's a quintessential Ponzi scheme. The big beautiful bill, the destructive bill was the first Ponzi scheme vehicle. Then they did it twice. Now they did it three times while he holds up $19.1 trillion and says how rich everybody's getting when that's not taking place. I saw a poll, Harvey Harvard Harris X poll showing amongst independents by a wide margin.

[Ben Meiselas]

What was it like? 59 to 41.

[Brett]

Independence, a economy better under former President Biden than than Donald Trump. And look, those first two years of Biden were Rough. We shouldn't pretend.

[Ben Meiselas]

Oh, it was amazing.

[Brett]

Those were years where you had to fix the mess that was created in Trump regime. 1. You know, people forget how bad it was during that period of time, how catastrophic it was, was when every day you would learn about thousands of people dying each day because of COVID While Trump was saying inject bleach and while Trump was again manipulating the market and doing a lot of the same things back then that he's doing right now. And we're seeing it at play again because he is a bankrupter, a perennial destroyer. He doesn't do deals. He tore up the jcpoa, the Obama non nuclear deal with Iran, then he and Netanyahu invaded. Just like Donald Trump said with COVID in a few days it would all go away. The curve would be bent. Before Easter. It would all be great. One to two cases, max. No worries. He's doing the same thing here. He said it would take three or four days. We'd be done, max, A week or two. Ah, we're still doing it. Ah, they want to make a deal. They don't want to make a deal. They may make a deal. They don't want to do a deal. I'm going to put blow up their bridges. They're smart. I hate them. They're cuckoo. I mean, they're cuckoo. He said they're cuckoo. The President of the United States, referring to using the word cuckoo. What are you talking about? Their cuckoo. That's where we, we went from presidents who, whether you agreed or disagreed, spoke with clarity and authority and used their words carefully. And now he's out there saying the cuckoo. They're crazy. We can't deal with them. Like, we need to take a step back. And the problem is we're now at this place where everybody's been warning against. How do you pull out of this right now? How do you get out of this? With these deranged individuals who right now, their new culture war issue is high t, high testosterone within the, you know, supporting gender affirming care of high tea in the military while constantly doing flyovers. That's their new distraction. Their new distraction is doing flyovers, whether it's a Pensacola, whether it's South Carolina, wherever that are dangerously low. And then when people are like, dude, you're gonna kill the kids. You're gonna blow out their eardrums, like, what are you doing? They go, the flyovers will continue until morale improves. Dude, we flyovers are cool. Okay? This is what Pete Hegson said. The flyovers will then and then the Navy Secretary was out there saying, carry on, Patriots. Carry on everybody. You know, and it's like, we know nothing wrong here. And it's like, okay, we can like, like, the bottom line is you can like ufc. Nope, that's fine. You want to like ufc? Personally, I don't like ufc. I like boxing. I like soccer and football. I like, I don't. UFC doesn't do it for me. But you don't have to be weird about it and do it in front of the White House.

[Jordi Meiselas]

House.

[Brett]

You could like Grand Prix, but like, we shouldn't be emphasizing turning Washington D.C. into a racetrack, you know, when there are so many issues, you know, that are, that are taking. But you could still like it. But why, but why do you have to do it there? You can like flyovers, you could like air shows. I like flyovers, I like air shows. But that doesn't mean we have to like that. It's like some woke thing to be like, oh my God, that seems pretty dangerous when you see the kids covering their ears and when you see that in the past those types of flyovers have resulted before in very serious injuries. And so it's like, oh, you woke. You care about them injuries. You're not patriotic. You don't like. I like to see it. Just stop doing stupid. Just seriously grow up. We don't need to see Apaches that low. The Apaches can fly. It's cool. We got it. We can be patriotic. We could support our troops. We could support forth the military. There's a photo right there of what

[Ben Meiselas]

it looked like, you know, with.

[Brett]

And this is. The White House is going all in on this and they want us, this is one of their things. They want us to be distracted. But here's the thing, and we talk about this in wtf America. We can walk and we can chew

[Ben Meiselas]

gum at the very same time and

[Brett]

we can say, you know what, that's your priority. But you gotta just, you can't do the story just on that. You know what I mean? You gotta be like, this is what they're doing. And let me explain to you why they're doing it. They're doing this because they want some new culture story to divide the American people while inflation is going to be rising again, while the markets are going to be crashing, that Donald Trump talks about all of the time. More significantly, while Americans are psychologically tortured. And you see these videos, you know, saw a fight for progress. Do a video. I showed it before, had tip. Had tip to them as well, where we were they were showing somebody in Pennsylvania and Bresnahan's district, Maga Republic. And you know, and their fridge probably looks like a lot of the fridges that I see with, you know, with our supporters and people who are here where there's like two items because people can't afford food right now here in the United States. And now the Trump regime is going back for reconciliation 3.0 to get hundreds of billions of dollars for the military industrial complex that then work with all of these companies that Donald Trump does his 21,000 trades and, and then he pulls this, this shit right here, you know, these air show, you know, whatever, these low flyovers. So then we're angry and then, hahaha, that's a new way to divide us. And that's the whole shtick. The whole shtick is to find ways to divide us. And then, you know, they bring in, we, we talked about Todd Blanch at length. I showed the hearing. But then you've got Todd Blanch out there who becomes an arm of Donald Trump, not an arm of justice, an arm of the criminal racketeering enterprise that is the Trump regime. And they just go out there and loot and pillage from you over and over again while doing Trump coins and Trump dollars and Trump this and Trump that and Trump airports and all this stupid shit. And the American people are like, man, wtf Stop this, Stop this freaking madness. You know, and then this is, you know, then, you know, then when you people in the Democratic Party, you know, are like, well, you know, I think that the way we, it's like, this shit's existential, you know, And I mean, I get, you know, when you're not in power, but if you are not channeling the existential nature of this moment, you've completely missed this moment right now

[Ben Meiselas]

in history, in this time.

[Jordi Meiselas]

Brett, I could not agree more. And you know, something I want to add also, just about the whole kind of, kind of charade of all of this, right? Everything is a performance in some respect and it's designed to elicit some sort of reaction. And so when you look at the military stuff, as Ben said, what do they want? They want this culture war battle. They want, you know, the libs to get upset and then they want to say, oh, they don't want the military to have fun. Oh look, they hate the military, blah, blah, right? And you know, I actually think these, the, the comments from people like Hegseth and the, the folks who are in charge of the Pentagon right now, I think they're actually like Horrible and appalling. And they're everything against what our military actually stands for. Like, we've all, you know, whether you're in the military or if you've just seen movies about the military, you know, like, one of the top things about the military is discipline, and it's actually following instructions and following rules. And now what we're seeing is the military being encouraged basically, to just be kind of like unhinged frat boys. And instead of getting reprimanded and instead of getting the discipline that the military is supposed to instill in our soldiers so that they actually perform at maximum capacity in battle, they're getting, oh, great job. You did it. Oh, you did it. And, like, I can't help but think, like, you know, that the worst one day is going to happen with one of these stupid stunts. Something is going to go wrong and people are going to die. And we've seen all these close calls already. It almost feels like one of those Final Destination movies in some weird dystopian way. But we saw the Trump, the freedom, 250, whatever fair that nobody showed up to when they were doing that rehearsal with those young girls, and the giant thing fell down from the top of the stage and almost killed the girls, right? That's because of the incompetence of the Trump regime and everything they've done with it. You know, you see, and it's easy to laugh at stuff like the Reflecting pool, right? But that also shows a greater kind of wide, broader incompetence. And you put that incompetence in a wartime scenario, you put that incompetence in structural things that you are building. You know, then when they collapse, you know, the only thing I guess they could do is ultimately blame, you know, blame the other, right? It's the vandals, it's the Democrats, it's the far left commune, whatever they want to do. But the fact is they are causing a lot of trouble for people and they are risking people's lives. And I also want to read, you know, there were the hearings today. I want to read a statement from one of the Epstein survivors, because Todd Blanch this afternoon did meet with the Epstein survivors. He basically. And this as part of the kind of act, the theater, the performance that I was speaking to, this is the perfect representation of that.

[Ben Meiselas]

It's the epitome of that.

[Jordi Meiselas]

In fact, Thom Tillis, Republican senator, you know, somebody who kind of fancies himself as more moderate, he was trying to, you know, act like he was taking a principled stand, right? I'm. I'm not going to. I cannot vote for Todd Blanche unless he agrees to meet with the Epstein survivors. And all the. For the last few days he's been just saying like, you know, I'm not going to. I'm not. I'm not sure what. I'm going to vote. I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I'm not sure if I'm going to vote to confirm him. And so Todd Blanche basically kind of backed into a little kind of fake corner here. Does meet with the Epstein survivors. I heard the meeting was complete and utter disaster. Like, like a train wreck from the survivors. I heard it was appalling. And I. I have a statement actually right here from one of the survivors that I'll. That I'll read you right now. This is from Epstein survivor Lara Bloom McGee and she said, quote, today Epstein survivors confronted Todd Blanche and he treated it like a perfunctory addition for votes, not accountability. Blanche was condescending, repeatedly interrupted and tried to gaslight survivors instead of explaining why DOJ released materials that revealed survivors identity. He offered no real plan to investigate anyone beyond Epstein and Maxwell and gave no reason to believe the remaining files aren't vital to exposing other perpetrators and enablers. Todd Blanche is unfit to be Attorney General. Senator Thom Tillis and the Senate must vote no. And the survivors indicated as well that they reached out to Tom Tillis after the meeting and told them what a disaster this was and that he should not vote for Todd Blanche. And also give credit to Eric Michael Garcia for getting that comment on the record from these survivors. And now what does Thom Tillis do? Right. Tillis essentially awards Todd Blanche with a participation trophy. Oh, he finally did what no one before him would do. He met with the Epstein survivors. And because of that, I'm inclined to vote yes on this nomination. It's all theater. It's all bs. I'll read you the statement from Tillis right here. Let me just make sure I have the most up to date statement from Tillis. I have a. This is from earlier. This is from before the meeting. I have a positive disposition to Mr. Blanche. I've not made a final decision. But he said yesterday he would meet with the Epstein victims today if it could be arranged. I expect that meeting to occur before I am willing to vote. I'm trying to get to yes, but this is a very important part of getting to yes. And then tell us. His comment after the meeting was quote, quote, I commend Todd Blanche for doing what all his Predecessors over the last two decades never did meet with the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein's horrific crimes. I appreciate his willingness to directly engage and listen to them, never mind what the survivors actually said happened once they got there. But Tillis wants to give Todd Blanche all the credit in the world for simply showing up. Even though he just. Even though Blanche ended up just essentially torturing the survivors, he even more. This is the kind of phoniness, the theater, the rot that so pervades the Republican Party, the Epstein class, the Trump regime, all of it.

[Benji]

Absolutely. And it goes back to something I said earlier this week. Humane versus inhumane, right? It's kind of how I view the lens of which I walk through life so often. You get the taluses of the world, the Blanches of the world. You just inhumane, right. And it's seemingly that it's always attributed to one party and that being the Republican Party. Now, by no stretches are the Democrats perfect in any which way. But I just get the feeling that time and time again the Republican Party so often like lets you down and just you being like America, these people don't want to work like the. The Blanches of the world, the televis is they. They don't want real answers because they're scared of what they're going to find and how their party is going to be implicated. That's what it feels like the entire Republican Party, the Congress members, the senators, it just feels like so truly authentic that they are so willing to put party over the people. And to me, that's not how politics should be. That's not how this country gets better. That's not how the affordability crisis in this country gets solved. It's not how the health care crisis in this country gets solved. The housing crisis in this country gets solved. It's just simply not until we actually elect leaders in these positions, no matter the party that want to work for

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the people,

[Benji]

the system doesn't work. And so often and so many times, I just continue to be so frustrated by it. And last, at the end of last episode, I gave the flowers to Ben. I want to give the flowers to this community here because it's exhausting. I know it's exhausting because we're living through it together every single day. And it's meant to be exhausting that they're not helping out the people, that they're not trying to figure out better ways to make this country better for. For everyone, not just the top 0.01% who get the f around in mar a lago it is insanity to me. But. But with us all, I think we could pull each other out of this madness and continue to expose the Blanches, the Tillises, the Trumps, the Hexas of the world one by one. We just. We have to do it. There is no other way.

[Ben Meiselas]

Way, Jordy. Well said, Brett. Well said. Midas Mighty. Thank you. We dedicate WTF America to you. We say it throughout the book and we talk about you throughout the book. And so I view this as a book written by all of us, written, written by the community, for the community, with the community, really kind of channeling, I think, this moment as best we can. Good. So check it out. Pre order right now. Scan the QR code right now to do the pre order. If you have done a pre order, use the WTF America emoji to let us know that you did do the pre order. We poured our hearts into this and so we hope that you will enjoy it. Remember, it'll arrive in October, but you should order it now. That goes a long way to help. All right, thanks everybody for watching. We appreciate it. You a lot more coverage throughout the day. Obviously, things are going to be escalating with this war. We'll be on top of it every step of the way. We're grateful. We're really grateful for your support. Jordy.

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Take it away.

[Benji]

Shout out to the Midas mighty the

[Jordi Meiselas]

mighty Standing strong against the fascist we sing I our soul

[Benji]

we will get

[Jordi Meiselas]

it right

[Benji]

Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscriber to our [e-mail] you'll

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