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- [00:01]
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- [00:57]
Ben Miceli
Devices early it is a day that will live in infamy. A horrific four year anniversary. And to see the contrast between Vice President Kamala Harris engaging in her constitutional responsibility and what Donald Trump did four years ago leading an insurrection against our country, the contrast cannot be more stark. I want to talk about the certification of the elector votes and where we go from here, but Donald Trump has been spending the last 24 to 48 hours just whining about his various court cases. Post after post after post after post, all caps. Like literally just like dripping with whininess. And it's like, dude, you're the President elect. It pains me to say that, but you are like, can you just try at a bare minimum to even pretend that you can act like an adult? There was a lot of things there too that like, please pretend that maybe you can act maybe like an adult. No, he absolutely can't. He also started making additional posts today, threatening to invade Canada, saying that it should Indeed be the 51st state. We'll talk about that. He also sent Don Jr to Greenland. It was a very, you know, very, very furtive, very difficult, very strange move to make because in Greenland, their ruling party was supposed to meet with King Frederick King King Frederick of the Kingdom of Denmark on Wednesday. But they sent Don Jr. To be there to basically cause strife with our NATO allies in Denmark. Because Greenland is a territory of the Kingdom of Denmark. It's just kind of more Trump creating international chaos. All this while Vladimir Putin plays Trump like a fiddle. Putin saying, not interested in a peace deal. We're not focused. Anything that Trump said is going to be rejected. I want to break that down. How Trump is already, before day one, creating hostilities with our allies and trying to cozy up with our enemies who are playing him. It just looks so utterly, utterly weak. Also, Donald Trump filed an emergency stay, an emergency peel in the New York criminal case where he was convicted on 34 separate felony counts, begging the judge, Justice Merchan, to delay sentencing on Friday. So disingenuous, this emergency motion for stay. The way Donald Trump framed it was like an automatic stay. Like he's already just entitled to stop the sentencing, even though there's no such thing. Just kind of created something that doesn't exist. We'll break that down, as well as Alvin Bragg's response. And then I think it's really important that we talk about a major accomplishment by President Biden over the weekend. He signed into law the Social Security Fairness act, which is going to be giving Americans who have worked hard all their lives to earn an honest living, an earnest living, to be able to retire with Social Security in numerous professions where they were not getting Social Security benefits. What a horrific thing that they weren't getting Social Security benefits, but another example of President Biden delivering. We'll talk about this and more on this episode of the Midas Touch podcast. Brett and Jordi are here, all three brothers, with all of you, the Midas mighty, staying strong. Brett, Jordy, how are you doing?
- [04:36]
Jordy Miceli
Doing well.
- [04:36]
Brett Miceli
You know, it's a, it's a day that brings about a lot of emotions, I would say, for many reasons. I mean, we had the certification, of course, today and the four year anniversary of the January 6th attack. I can't believe that was four years ago already at this point. Jordy and I were speaking about it earlier, but I remember that day, we were like about to be interviewed for some podcast or NPR show or something like that, and the insurrection had begun, like, right at that time. And I emailed the host and I was, I think we're gonna need some time before we do this interview. And the host was like, why? Why? But you said, I'm like, could you turn on the tv, please turn on the. And he was like, oh, okay. And then we just watched those horrific events unfold on live tv. And, you know, I think we're all still feeling the effects from that as a country. And just to see now, you know, Donald Trump getting back in there. It's, it's difficult for a Lot of people. And so, you know, I, I'm just reflecting on all. It just means we have to double up, quadruple up all of our efforts now to do everything we can to hold Donald Trump accountable in these next few years. We need to take confront this head on. We need to do everything possible to turn this Trump presidency into a lame duck presidency even before day one and render all of his attacks to be ineffective. That's what we all need to be doing. That's what we all need to be dedicated to do every single day. Jordy, how you feeling?
- [06:05]
Jordy Miceli
Well said, big bro. Hey, I feel the same sentiments that you just put out there. So why don't we just get into the show Big Brother Benji, where do you want to start?
- [06:11]
Ben Miceli
Well, look, you have Donald Trump posting. Biden is doing everything possible to make the transition as difficult as possible. I don't even want to read the rest because if you want to read it on your own time because it's just so full of lies and gaslighting. I mean, you remember when the transition was frankly not happening back in 2020 and 2021, when President Biden won the election convincingly. Remember the General Services Administration, the gsa, they refused to even sign the most administerial documents to allow like, even like the pens, like the paper, the office space to be transferred, yet alone at the cabinet level, positions where Donald Trump, you know, and the cabinet members refused to provide any of the intelligence to President Biden. Well, there's probably a lack of intelligence when it came to Trump and his cabinet, but just even tell them what was going on, like literally zero cooperation. And then there was literally an insurrection to try to overthrow the results of the free and fair election. And then every single day, Trump, maga, Fox and all their other propaganda outlets worked tirelessly to undermine President Biden and Democrats when President Biden was enacting an agenda that frankly was helpful to the American people and President Biden was doing things as basic as trying to get our country to a place of survival. Like, that's one of the strangest aspects to me of all of this, this collective amnesia, this. You ever watch the movie Men in Black? That wand that they would use to like erase memories? It's kind of like a collective version of that. How people were unable to reflect on how bad things were objectively under Trump, how bad the economy was, the fact that people's 401ks tanked. But setting that aside, we couldn't even get to toilet paper. There were mobile morgues when Trump left. Mobile morgues because people were dying because there was such a mishandling or no handling at all of COVID As Donald Trump would take the stage and brag about the ratings from his press conference. Like this collective amnesia to that aspect of things is something ingrained in human psychology or that that's hard to really even understand. But let's face it, President Biden, whether you like this or don't like this, this is who President Biden and Kamala Harris are. They're, they're law and order people. They believe in the rule of law. They believe in the Constitution, and they follow what their prescribed duties are under the Constitution, even if it pains them to do so. So President Biden invited Donald Trump to the White House. Remember, in my interview with President Biden a few weeks back, by the way, watch that if you haven't watched it yet in the West Wing. We did it in the Roosevelt Room. I said, why would you do that? I said, this guy has done all of these horrible things. Why would you be there in the Oval Office with him, smiling at him, you know, shaking his hand? Why? Why make it helpful to him? And President Biden said, because that's what we do. That's my job. Part of my job is also to ensure that there is a peaceful and successful transition to my successor. That's the way other than Trump, it's always been. That's what my duty is under the Constitution. Vice President Kamala Harris today said something similar as well. You have to imagine how difficult, personal and just her position it was as the vice president to have to certify the results of someone who was so hateful to you and said the most horrific racist things about you, who lied about you at every time, who engaged in all this horrific conduct. And you have to count the votes to say that you lost to this guy. I can't even imagine what that must be like. But she's a professional, unlike some of these Magas out there or most of these Magas who didn't show her the same respect. So first, let's go in reverse order. Brett and Jordan, I want to show you this moment right here where a MAGA Republican Sen. Governor from Nebraska, her husband, her name is Deb Fisher, she's the senior MAGA Republican senator from Nebraska. Her husband Bruce refused to shake Vice President Kamala Harris's hand when she was swearing in all of the senators, including Bruce's wife, who's the senator of Nebraska. So let me just show you this moment here because it's just this to me, this is outside of. It's not a politic. It shouldn't be like, oh, magas, they're just jerks and disrespectful. But Democrats, Vice President Kamala, that's just what they do. They act collegiate. It should just be. Why can't you, Bruce? Well, you know, just act for. For. Just act with respect. You're that petty. Here, just watch this, everybody.
- [11:28]
Brett Miceli
Hold on. Let's start at the other end. Just because I gotta. I gotta pull that one up still. That's okay.
- [11:33]
Ben Miceli
So let's start with Vice President Kamala Harris. Here she is saying what she spent her entire career doing. Let's play it.
- [11:42]
Kamala Harris
Obviously, a very important day. And it was about what should be the norm and what the American people should be able to take for granted, which is that one of the most important pillars of our democracy is that there will be a peaceful transfer of power. And today I did what I have done my entire career, which is take seriously the oath that I have taken many times to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, which included today performing my constitutional duties to ensure that the people of America, the voters of America, will have their votes counted, that those votes matter, and that they will determine then the outcome of an election. I do believe very strongly that America's democracy is only as strong as our willingness to fight for it.
- [12:38]
Ben Miceli
You know, and I think that was also. It was not just a warning, but I think it was a message to the people who. Who didn't vote for her, too. Did you get that vibe, Bretton? I mean, I think she was also just saying to people, too, like, seriously, Seriously, you all were willing 49% of voters. And to be clear, that's not 49% of Americans, because there were tens of millions of Americans who decided, you know what? I'm too busy that day. I'm too busy to early vote. This is not that important to me, Whatever. But I think it's a message to them and the 49% of Americans who voted for Trump, where she's saying, really, That's. That's. If you don't want this, then you don't deserve this. She didn't say it that way, but that's how you do it. But that's how you do it kind of with Cli. It's a reminder. I'm doing my job. All you had to do is vote for the woman, not for the person convicted of felonies, who brags about sexually assaulting women, who was found liable for sexually assaulting women, who's bankrupted many of his companies and who almost crashed the entire country the last time.
- [13:52]
Brett Miceli
Yeah, it's hard not to watch these clips. And, you know, I saw the other clip also the other day of her with Senator, now Senator Ruben Gallego's son, you know, who was very upset about Vice President Harris losing the election. And she was comforting this kid in such a way that, you know, when you see these clips of her swearing in these senators, when you see these clips of her today doing the certification, it's hard, at least for me, not to look at it and go, wow, America, we really screwed this one up. Like, just. Like, just flat out really messed this one up. And obviously not the folks who watch the show, but the country at large. You know, it's. It's upsetting that enough of the country went with this horrific guy in every single way, this convicted felon, this just awful human being to be the leader over somebody who's actually competent and experienced and cares for the country and cares for people. But, you know, as President Biden has said repeatedly over the past few years, since probably day one of his presidency, you can't only love your country when you win. You can't only accept the results of an election when you win. And that's easy to put into practice when you're on the winning team. It's much easier to put into practice in that case when you're not. It's harder. You know, it's hard. It's harder to accept some of these things. And I think it actually takes courage to be able to do what Vice President Kamala Harris did today, which is get out there, do her job, do what needs to be done. And I think she deserves a lot of respect for that. I think she deserves a lot of respect for the incredible campaign that she ran in such a short period of time, and not hatred directed at her based on something that, quite frankly, she has zero control over whatsoever. I just want to be clear that the vice president has zero say over the certification process whatsoever. They've never had any say over it. Mike Pence didn't have say over it when Donald Trump and Republicans were pushing him to overturn the results of the election in 2020. Kamala Harris doesn't have any say in 2024. And in case there was any even discrepancy about that, the Electoral Count act, which was passed in a few years ago after the January 6 insurrection, made it clear vice president has zero authority to do anything at the stage whatsoever. It is strictly a ceremonial job of her reading the vote count to the public. And that's what she did. Despite, you know, not having the outcome that she would have liked, that we all would have liked. Kamala Harris did her job. She did it with dignity, how a states person is supposed to do it. And I have a whole lot of respect for her, not only for the way she ran her campaign, but for the way she's handled herself in these past few days.
- [16:29]
Jordy Miceli
For sure. Absolutely. And let's be clear. Look, she lost, but one and a half percent is not a mandate on the whole party here.
- [16:35]
Ben Miceli
Right.
- [16:35]
Jordy Miceli
Like, it was such a slim. Slim fraction of what she actually lost by. And to see her getting up every day and just, you know, being the person that we all knew she is, you know, tons of class, dignified, just doing the work. Today was my favorite. It was boring.
- [16:51]
Ben Miceli
Right.
- [16:51]
Jordy Miceli
Because that's what today should be. Brett, to your point. Exactly. That's what made the whole Pence thing so ridiculous, is that it's purely ceremonial. Like, today is just her confirming, you know, the results, that that's it. And she doesn't, you know, have any authority to overturn the election here in the. In this moment. And it's a ridiculous thing to sort of ask her to anyway, but she's been nothing but, you know, pitch perfect, especially these last couple of weeks.
- [17:17]
Brett Miceli
Here's what I don't like.
- [17:18]
Ben Miceli
Oh.
- [17:18]
Brett Miceli
You know, and. And it upsets me because I think it's misguided anger, and I think it's really unfair to certain people, to be honest, because I saw today, after Kamala Harris did her constitutional duty here, I saw a lot of anger directed towards Kamala Harris. To me, that just reeks of blaming the victim. And I think that is so incredibly screwed up to blame Kamala Harris for doing her job. Here she is doing what she is mandated to do, and like we've. We've been saying she had. There was no other option. Nothing. There was nothing. Zero other option. It didn't exist. So you're asking her to do an impossible thing, and then you're getting mad at her for not doing that impossible thing. The person who fought so hard for all of us these past few months, the person who threw it all on the line, who put all of her chips on the table during this election. I mean, she deserves, I think, respect for the job that she's done here. Respect for the campaign. Sure. And you could go back and you could say, hey, you know, maybe we could have done X better or y better, or maybe we could have done this or maybe we could have combated this propaganda in this way or whatever it is. There's certainly, you can certainly do your Monday morning quarterbacking, so to speak. But to blame the victim here, to blame Vice President Harris for just simply doing her job, you know, to me, I just think that's, I think that's an unfair direction of, of people's anger, you know, at this time, personally.
- [18:45]
Ben Miceli
Well, I also am not sure that it's the most productive use of constructive time on how we solve which, which is a real important issue. Which, Jordi, you mentioned that in terms of voting Americans, Trump ended up winning by about a point or a point and a half percent. But how is it that so many of those people, if you ask them about their lives and what their priorities are and things that matter to them, and you ask them if they're on food stamps or if they're on social programs or how important Social Security is to, how important the Affordable Care act is to them, do they care about tax cuts for billionaires or tax cuts for themselves? What's their view about access to healthcare? What's their views about access to education and affordability of healthcare? Affordability of education. When you speak to these people, you find that actually their interests align far more closely to what Vice President Kamala Harris was going to do and what President Biden did. But how was it that they were attracted to what Donald Trump was saying? How was it that Trump saying eating cats and dogs from migrants and you need to be concerned about the transgender volleyball player from whatever the school is, San Jose State. How did that drown out the message of, actually, Trump represents oligarchs and billionaires who are going to screw you and they have screwed you before. And the things that you're upset about, whether it's increased prices, that's price gouging by corporations and billionaires that were aided and abetted by Trump and MAGA policies, the housing crisis of less affordable housing or no supply, that's caused by Trump donors, billionaires, oligarchs who run private equity companies, who buy up the supply of homes, commoditize it and prevent regular Americans from being able to afford homes? You know, how is it that the magazines have tried to tear down the Affordable Care act and kick people off of health care? How is it that when you go to all of these red states that could have availed themselves of programs to provide health care to their people, they've, they've turned it down so that they can go and attack Biden? So to me, it's so important that we spend the time figuring this stuff out and making sure that we can message these things the right way, communicate with people, look Americans in the eye and show them what's really happening. How do we build something that takes on Fox, that's active, that's what we're trying to do here every day. How do we build, how do we defeat these propaganda networks that are out there that are causing such harm and such chaos and promoting all of this stuff? How, how, how is there a funnel of, you know, 1112 year old boys who start watching these YouTube videos, who start watching all of this stuff, who start, who get, start with as gamers and then they become, you know, kind of pushed to right wing podcasts and before you know it, they're MAGA adjacent and then they're like full fledged MAGA and have these very anti women views that have been developed over many, many, many years and make them very susceptible to this kind of cosplay, faux alpha culture. We have to address these things honestly and surgically and solve for them. And that's kind of actively what we're trying to do here. Let me show you that. But first, let me show you this photo of Deb Fisher and Bruce, her husband. But we got that photo first. You'll see that as Vice President Kamala Harris is swearing them in, they're refusing to even stand near her. They leave a gap. So for those listening on audio, you know, there's the Fisher family right there and they're like probably about a foot, foot and a half removed from Kamala Harris. They don't even want to be next to her in the photo. And she's just doing her ceremonial duty and swearing at everybody and they're like disrespecting her. And let me show you the moment, just so you can see it for yourself, of the husband of Senator Fisher. Again, she's the MAGA Republican senator from Nebraska. Let me just show you what he does or doesn't do. He refuses to shake her hand as she's just trying to be gracious and just, just do her job. He refuses to shake her hand. Like, how pathetic can you be? Here, play it. Thank you.
- [23:24]
Kamala Harris
Congratulations. Thank you, thank you. Thank you for your work and thank you. Congratulations to you.
- [23:29]
Ben Miceli
Thank you. Thank you so much. So he refuses to even look at her in the eye, refuses to shake her hand. She's the Vice President of the United States of America. Now if you believe that that type of behavior is acceptable or, oh, he just owned her. Oh, that's tough. Or Whatever. There are some real issues. And when we come back from our first break, I do want to talk about the importance of empathy and connecting to basic human values. Whether it's because social media and the overflow of info has just, I don't know, just infected the brains. There's a post, Covid brain rot, whatever it is, you know, even on January 6th, the fact that lots of Americans, most many Americans, don't even reflect on an insurrection and what happened and how bad it was, I mean, that speaks to this, you know, culture wide nationwide brain rot and being able to process things. And again, whether that's Covid related, whether it's info overload, whether it's predatory disinfo, I want to talk about that. We'll show you Trump's weakening America on the international stage. We'll talk about President Biden strengthening America on the domestic stage in his last and final acts, like increasing Social Security benefits for people who deserve them. Oh, we should remind everybody, make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel following this show. As soon as this show ends, we're going to be doing our live chat, our exclusive Zoom meeting on patreon.com Midas Touch so if you ever wanted to meet me, Brett and Jordi, you can meet us there. You go to patreon.com Midas Touch when the show ends, there's a secret link there. You click the secret, secret link. Then you'll go into the room, you'll meet me, Brett and Jordi, ask us anything. There's no questions that are off limits. You can, we haven't even spoken to you yet about, you know, some of the stuff that went into that Biden interview. So maybe you want to ask us about that or more again, patreon.com Midas Touch I look forward to seeing everybody when the show ends. Don't worry, we still have a lot more show. Let's take our first quick break of the show.
- [25:57]
Sponsor Announcer
We want to share an important message from our sponsor, Americans United for Separation of Church and State. If you care about abortion rights, LGBT, LGBTQ + rights, rejecting school voucher schemes and fighting censorship, then guess what, you care about the separation of church and state. For more than 75 years, Americans United has been on the front lines defending your freedom to live and believe as you choose, so long as you don't harm others. And that fundamental right is under attack like never before in our nation's history. We cover that on our shows. We know what we're up against. In the next four years, we're will mean managing the onslaught of attacks from Christian nationalists and right wing extremists attempting to force us all to live by their narrow beliefs. Backed by billion dollar shadow networks, this vocal minority is pushing their anti democratic agenda everywhere. But here's the thing. You can make a difference. I always get asked Ben, what can we do to make a difference?
- [26:52]
Ben Miceli
Here's one thing.
- [26:53]
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- [27:06]
Ben Miceli
Join them.
- [27:07]
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- [27:13]
Ben Miceli
Letter a theletter u.org midas one more time au.org midas thank you.
- [27:22]
Jordy Miceli
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- [28:50]
Let's go. Shout out to our Pro Democracy sponsors links in description of both the YouTube and the audio. Use the links. Use the codes. Let's let them know we sent you. They manage. They look at the traffic that we send from the show. So definitely click the links if you're able to.
- [29:03]
Ben Miceli
So Donald Trump got another loss earlier in the day. We talked about in the intro how Donald Trump was filing this emergency stay where he was trying to appeal, the fact that the New York judge in his criminal case where he was convicted on 34 felony counts, ordered sentencing to take place this Friday. On January 10, Justice Mern read Donald Trump's appeal. Trump referred to it as an automatic stay. Usually for something to be automatic, guess what, it needs to be automatic. And then you don't even need to file it. You just give a notice if it's automatic. But Trump just basically made it up that I'm just entitled to one. And Trump's argument why he should get a stay, why sentencing should be put off is Trump says that he's the president. Now, did you know that? That's what he said. He said being in the transition is basically like being the president. So any of the immunity doctrine given to him by the Supreme Court, which, by the way, wouldn't even say what he's saying it says, basically means that he's currently the president. He didn't use that specific language, but he said he's entitled to transition immunity based on presidential immunity and essentially said they're the same thing. So he's creating another doctrine that he's actually immune from anything during the transition period. It was entirely frivolous. And Justice Merchan, like, literally within about 90 minutes of receiving it, there was Trump filing the appeal request and stay request. Then the district Attorney, Alvin Bragg, filed in opposition. And then like within 90 minutes of all of that, Justice Merchan denied Trump's request to stop his New York sentencing set for Friday, rejecting his bid as, quote, a repetition of the arguments he has raised numerous times in the past. So Trump's next stop is he's probably going to try to rush to the United States Supreme Court soon or go to the Appellate Division in New York, find someone to try to derail this Friday sentencing. Don't worry, we'll keep you posted every step of the way here at the Midas Touch Network and On the Legal AF YouTube channel as well, where Michael Popox doing a pretty good job. He's doing a great job there. But I want to show you this, because the thing I said before the break was there should be things that aren't political that we as human beings should not be so desensitized to, that we're like, oh, that's just what we expect from our leaders. I mean, there was such A difference between the interview I did with President Biden in the Roosevelt Room of the West Wing where he was talking about keeping his word. He was soft spoken, but firm. He talked about helping the American people. His statements were, whether you're in a red state or a blue state, I fought for you and I made sure I kept my word and delivered even more in red states than blue states because a lot of the red states were lacking in the services and infrastructure that blue states had. And then I contrast that to just over the weekend. Over the past 48 hours, Trump has just been just whining on his social media platform over and over again. I don't even want to read these posts. I just want to show you what they visually look like. So for those who are listening just on audio, it's just a bunch of run on sentences that have a mix between like random commas and random punctuation with like all caps. And sometimes what's in caps and what's not is just completely arbitrary as well. And if you think to yourself and it's like one long sentence, like one long paragraph and it's post, post, post, post, post, post, post, like this. And I just ask you if you received an email that visually looked like this from anybody at your place of work, at a social gathering, if you're in a fantasy football league and someone sent a message like that, maybe just in your family, what if you got a message from a spouse of yours and the message of your from your spouse looked like this? Just, just visually you got a text message and it looked like this. Here, just put it up one more time, Brett, so I can walk people through this. Was the message that you got from, from a loved one or a family member, you would, you would inevitably say there is something seriously, seriously wrong with this person, that this is not normal human being behavior. And again, this is one of those things. Why to me, corporate media is so broken that they're just, that they've just chalked this up to, ah, that's just Trump being Trump. That's just, that's just how he is. He's the most powerful position in the country, if not the world. Although he's weakening that position. So he's subservient to Putin and President Xi and frankly others. He weakens that position. But in theory, this is the position of maximum power and just that's how you behave. And not just the corporate media, but you know, smart people, educated people who go along with this because they think that benefits them selfishly or personally in areas. And you're okay with that? If you're okay with that, it's just hard for me to give you credibility in any other aspect of life. If you look at that and you're like, yeah, I'm good with that. And it's kind of like over the weekend also, there were a lot of these MAGA Republican senators who did the weekend show, and they were asked about, like, someone like RFK Jr's views on vaccines because Trump's appointed RFK Jr to be the head of HHS Health and Human Services, the Health Department, which oversees all other branches that involve health. And, you know, the MAGA Republican senators would be like, well, I don't really necessarily agree to it, agree with his positions on vaccines, but there may be some other areas I agree with. So I don't know about that. I mean, look, that's kind of like saying, you know, with the Defense Secretary, you know, I don't know about their views on the military, but there may be other aspects in the Defense Department that I agree with. But when it comes to the military, I think what they're going to do is actually lead to America getting taken over by Russia. I mean, isn't it like the same thing of the HHS head saying, yeah, you know, polio and all of these serious illnesses and pandemics and plagues from the past? I don't really believe in them. But other, but other than that, the guy may have some good points that he's making. I mean, it's, it's. At what level do you stoop to this? And, Brett, I'll pass it over to you for a bit to comment on all of that. But then I also want to talk about, you know, look, Trump's out there talking again today about conquering Canada, and He sent Don Jr. To Greenland to try to send a message to our NATO ally in Denmark, you know, really causing strife in Copenhagen, that America's serious about conquering Greenland and conquering Canada. But it's, it's, it's not. If President Biden did any of that, he would be impeached immediately by Democrats, I think, too, you know, and it would be the biggest story ever. So why do we lower, why do we lower ourselves to such degradation, such.
- [36:57]
Brett Miceli
Trump thinks it's a show of strength, but, but it couldn't be further from it at the end of the day. And when you see Trump sending these messages out, when you see the way that he's interacting with world leaders, it is quite honestly, the opposite of strength. It, it exudes Weakness in every single way. And if he thinks he's being tough towards these countries, these countries are all laughing at us. They are all looking at the United States of America right now going, what the hell is going on over there? Who is this maniac who is about to come in? And so he's really putting America in a. In a bad situation. He's alienating us from our allies every single day. He's causing all these other countries to be in kind of a defensive position against the United States, which is something that your allies shouldn't have to be concerned about, to put it lightly. And it's just absolutely disgraceful. And it's no surprise that it's exactly what Vladimir Putin would want to be happening right now to our country, that everything that he does happens to align exactly with what Donald Trump is putting forth.
- [38:01]
Ben Miceli
Yeah, you know, and. And just look at some of what the other posts are. So this is Trump's post today. Many people in Canada love being the 51st state. Like, that's. That's not true. Mostly all Canadians do not want to be annexed by the United States of America. You may find a fellow oligarch like Kevin O'Leary, who is a big grifter and, you know, and goes on and does these interviews wearing, like, weird shorts and has, like, cardboard cutouts of himself, like, just. Just a freaking weirdo. So you may find a Canadian like that. But no, Canada doesn't want to be taken over by the United States of America at all. So to say many people in Canada love being the 50. This is what you're doing, by the way. On January 6th, the United States can no longer suffer the massive trade deficits and subsidies that Canada needs to stay afloat. Justin Trudeau knew this and resigned. If Canada merged with us, there would be no tariffs, taxes would go way down, and they would be totally secure from the threat of Russian and Chinese ships that are constantly surrounding them together. What a great nation it would be. And again, as you read this, if President Xi Jinping of China made a statement like this, but if you replaced Japan for Canada, and he posted it from an official account that said, many people in Japan love being part of China, China can no longer suffer massive trade issues with Japan. If Japan merged with China, there would be no tariffs, taxes would go down, and they would be totally secure from the United States together. What a great nation. China and Japan would be merged as one. Okay, If President Xi Jinping said that, there would be no one who's like, oh, that's just Xi the Troll, like, there he is. He's just. That's what he does, right? There would be imminent red alert. Invasion is happening any moment right now. Right? Like, if Vladimir Putin said that about, you know, nations that surround him, which he does. We take that seriously. So seriously we've created NATO, right, an entire military alliance to try to stop that, because that is how he talks. So, on the one hand, Trump's statements and threats need to be taken seriously because he actually has the capacity, perhaps not the mental, but access to resources, to engage in imperial conquests. But it also shows to me how weak it is that people are like, yeah, that's just what he does. And think about how if you then don't back that up by actually taking over the nation and that's just part of your troll, or, oh, that's just how he negotiates. Who the hell negotiates like that? If someone started negotiating with me and threatened to kill me as part of the negotiation, I wouldn't negotiate with them. Could you imagine, hey, you know, I'd like to strike a deal with you, but I'm gonna kill you. I'm gonna kill you, and I'm gonna take you over, and then I'm gonna move into your house and I'm gonna live with your family and I'm gonna. I'm gonna marry your wife, and I'm gonna take. If someone did that, and I'd be like, the hell are you talking about? I'm not gonna. Those are fight words. Those are fight. Let's go. So the fact, though, that people don't even take him seriously when he's threatening national sovereignty, even though they should take him, That's. That's so weak. If Biden said that, you'd be like, oh, my God, we're going to be invading. We're really doing this. But when Trump does it, it's a. It's a. It's a troll. That's ridiculous. Charlie Angus, Member of Parliament, who I've had on before, he goes, dear Donald, Canada has something called democracy. It means the leader is accountable to Parliament and can be replaced. I bet Americans wish they had that now. And he says, convicted but civilly liable sexual abusers don't get to lead our nation. We're decent folk. P.S. button up. We're sending frigid cold your way. Love, Canada. And Angus also goes, what struck me about the latest Trump tweets is that he seriously is not fit for public office. His nemesis Trudeau resigned. I was expecting him to do a victory dance. Instead, we got fed this moron slop that not even Maga Dimwitz could take to the bank. Putin must be thrilled at the state of America. And unlike what Donald Trump said, Prime Minister Trudeau did not resign because Canada should be the 51st state or anything having to do with Donald Trump. Prime Minister Trudeau, who leads the Liberal Party, which is in a coalition right now, loosely held together with the ndp, which is the party that Charlie Angus is a part of, although Angus is gonna be resigning soon, the ndp. Prime Minister Trudeau was trying to do whatever he can to allow the Liberal Party to go on and find someone who could potentially beat the Conservative Party. Pierre Poilievre, who leads the Conservative Party, who many believe based on his prior statements is someone who would be very Trumpy, would potentially take away universal health care in Canada and replace it with an American style system as well, and threatens the Canadian way of life by bringing a lot of MAGA stuff into Canada. The Conservative Party in Canada is often called Maple maga. And who did Pierre Poliev interview with recently? The far right wing podcaster Jordan Peterson. And Elon Musk has been intervening in Canadian political affairs to try to prop that up and pushing that and doing the rage algorithm to try to get Pierre Poliev and the Conservative Party to lead, knowing that they'll be part of this right wing coalition that Musk is trying to build. So Prime Minister Trudeau is just trying to create enough circumstances to give the Liberal Party a shot. That's why he resigned when he did and that's what happened there. We've got a lot more to discuss. We're coming to our second break right now. I want to remind everybody though about the after show we're going to be doing at patreon.com Midas Touch P-A-T-R-E O N.com Midas Touch Please check it out right now. After this show ends, we'll probably do it around 9:15 Eastern, 6:15 Pacific. Right around. Then we'll open it up, meet Brett Jordy and I. We'll be happy to chat, answer any questions that you have. If you haven't met us before in a more personal setting, it's a great way to do it. Also, we don't have outside investors so it helps us grow here on our platform. So let's take our last break of the show and we'll be back. We'll talk about President Biden's accomplishments and Social Security Fairness act is a big, big deal. We'll talk about why. Let's take our Last break of the show.
- [45:11]
Jordy Miceli
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- [48:21]
Ben Miceli
To Biden we go. I want to share with you this first. So you know, the reporters, still corporate media, they still want to attack President Biden for his age over and over again. So you're too old. You do this, being the old and it's like just blatantly ageist stuff to me. With age comes wisdom. I'm sorry, I'm not looking for Mr. Accordion Hands screaming, shouting all caps, someone who contradicts themselves, someone who lies, someone who, we've gone into his history and his past before. But you know, to me, leadership should be wielded responsibly and with dignity. And I always think of Teddy Roosevelt's statement, which was actually borrowed from an African proverb about walking softly and carrying a big stick, not being loud and obnoxious and having a little tiny micro stick like Donald Trump. It's about being calm, acting with dignity, building alliances. And then when you need to exert power, you do it smartly. Smart power. That's why President Biden brought in two additional nations that are right by Russia into NATO. It's an unprecedented accomplishment, expanding NATO, strengthening NATO against Russia, stopping Russia from taking over Kiev. Think about these accomplishments and that, what a horrible interview that was. I don't even want to show any of these clips of that guy, that right wing podcaster Lex Friedman or whatever the guy's name is.
- [50:01]
Brett Miceli
Yeah, I. So I was gonna say I tried, I tried watching a little bit of it and I watched some other clips of it and it was just a disaster. You know, you realize. How do I put this? I don't know. I'm just gonna say he sounds like he says the things that Vladimir Putin would be saying if he had a podcast. I will, I will say it like that. And you just get a really interesting sense of how warped their mindsets are that they think Putin is the good guy as they go through this interview and over and over you had the Lex Fridman guy speaking to Zelensky in this historic interview, acting almost like Zelensky was the aggressor. Why don't you want peace? Why are. Why aren't you. What are. Why aren't you doing anything to get peace? And Zelensky pushed back strongly on these statements, which were just the entire time felt just so misguided. I even saw the folks who watched his podcast and listened to. I saw the comments, and even they were like, what the heck was that? Like, what kind of questions are these even? I mean, if you go through it, it was just so completely bizarre. Here's one of Zelensky's responses to Friedman. He said, do you think Putin wants to end the war? It's very naive. I'm sorry. And over and over, Zelensky needed to correct him, because Friedman's approach would be basically like, well, Vladimir Putin, he really loves Russia. He really loves the people of Russia. He's a good guy. Good guy. So why don't you just sit down? Why don't you just sit down and like, just like, give him what he wants, you know? And. And Zelensky's like, do you understand anything? Do you know who this guy is? And it's the same, and it's very generous if I use this word, and I really don't mean it, but it's the same naivete that Trump approaches these issues with, which really isn't naivete. It's. It's. It's really being in the pocket of Vladimir Putin, of Russia, and doing their bidding with all this sort of messaging and, and the way that you approach the world, the way that you attack American allies, the way that you treat Ukraine in this situation. And I just think it's honestly just horrible.
- [52:06]
Ben Miceli
You know, there's a decades long history. I mean, hundreds of years of history, Decades long history. You even want to focus more 2004-2025 about Russia violating everything, trying to take over Ukraine in all these different ways, the rejection of that by Ukraine, the Ukrainian national identity, and then even listening to what Putin's just been saying now, that Putin only way that he would enter into a deal would be if there was total capitulation by Ukraine. Not just simply that Ukraine won't join NATO for 20 years, that Ukraine will be controlled by Russia, all of it. That there won't be a Zelensky, there won't be a free Ukraine, that it will be under Russian influence. That's what Putin's goal is. And then Putin's next goal is Poland and then other Eastern European nations and nations that border and surround Russia. That's what Putin's goal is. He's saying that's what his goal is. And Mr. Accordinghands, Donald Trump is doing what you never do in a negotiation you set by setting an artificial deadline that's already passed. Right. I mean, where's the corporate media on that? Could you imagine if Biden said, I'm going to end a war in 24 hours? Very specific, after date X? It doesn't happen. Could you be front page everywhere? Do you hear any corporate media saying that Donald Trump already broke one of his biggest promises, that he would get Putin and Zelensky in a room together as soon as their election was over and with 24 hours and end the war and Russia's unlawful invasion? No, no. No one talks about that. Even if you're going to be generous and say that and say that Donald Trump really meant 24 hours after inauguration, let me be very clear, that's impossible. That's not going to happen. There will not be a deal on that day and you will hear not a sound from corporate media about that. They just move on to the next one, move on to whatever. We'll talk about it here. That's why we're growing faster than corporate media right now. But it's again, this is a abdication of duty instead, what the corporate media is focused on even right now as President Biden is leaving with dignity. And as that is probably making a lot of people very frustrated. And why you, why you do, why are you making this transition easy? Joe, a lot of people may be saying the media is still ruthless. You're old. You're old. Watch President Biden's response, though, when he was again being attacked for being old. Here, watch this. By being the oldest president, I know more world leaders than any one of you ever met in your whole goddamn life. And that's important. I know more world leaders than any of you have known in your GD life. He said. He's saying, I know more. Don't you? I created, I strengthened NATO. And you're out here trying to act like that's a negative also. One of the things that President Biden did is he gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor, to a number of people. He gave it to Michael J. Fox. For those listening on audio we're showing Michael J. Fox right there, received the award. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton received the award. There were others there. Jose Andres got the award. Magic Johnson was in attendance A bunch of other kind of great Americans received that award. Bill Nye the science guy got the award. You know, it made me think, Brett, as you showed, I think we have this in our archives still, as you showed that clip of Michael J. Fox. Remember when Rush Limbaugh, who's one of the first people to kind of usher in this kind of new age of disinfo and hate media and rage baiting and kind of was the leader of this right wing radio ecosystem that poisoned the mind of so many Americans with the bullying and the hate and the other rising. Just think about Michael J. Fox there, right? Who's, who's, who's clearly been through so much personally with his health. This is what Rush Limbaugh said and Rush Limbaugh has since died. This is what Rush Limbaugh has said about Michael J. Fox. When Michael J. Fox first revealed his diagnosis. Here, play this clip.
- [56:36]
J
In this commercial, he is exaggerating the effects of the disease. He is moving all around and shaking. And it's purely an act. This is the only time I have ever seen Michael J. Fox portray any of the symptoms of the disease he has. He can control himself enough to stay in the frame of the picture and he can control himself enough to keep his eyes right on the lens, the teleprompter. But his head and shoulders are moving all over the place. So this is really shameless, folks. This is really shameless of Michael J.
- [57:09]
Ben Miceli
Fox.
- [57:09]
J
Either he didn't take his medication or he's acting.
- [57:13]
Ben Miceli
So you have that and then, and then remember when Donald Trump, I mean, in 2015, you knew he was the snake before you let him in. Remember when he mocked the disabled reporter, the New York Times reporter, Serge Kovalevsky? Do we have that photo where he like, does the, he like, makes his hand look like the disabled reporter's hand. And it's just horrible, horrible stuff. And then I don't play audio or video clips of Trump anymore on my programs. But he acted it out the same way you saw Rush Limbaugh do it. And again, you have that. But contrast that to what President Biden does and posts about. Since I took office, we've recovered all of the jobs lost during the pandemic and added 7 million more. We didn't just recover, we built a foundation of stable growth for years to come. Or this one. One of the things I'm proudest of is passing the Inflation Reduction act, the bill that allowed us to negotiate lower prices for prescription drugs for the first time. Not a single Republican voted for it. But we got it done. And finally beat Big Pharma. Medicare prescription drug prices capped in 2025 at $2,000. Having Medicare negotiate directly with pharmaceutical companies to bring the price down of these drugs. President Biden tried to expand that program to all Americans. So if you weren't on Medicare, you would have prescription drug prices capped at $2,000 and the individual drugs reduced to the same prices that people can buy them in other countries so that these pharmaceutical companies can still make money. They don't need to make these ridiculous record gross profits so they can have 10 private jets instead of one at the expense of Americans dying. But no, the Rush Limbaughs of today, that legacy of infamy, what do people do? That's socialism. That's Marxism. They're giving that to the immigrants and they make people angry. And now you've screwed yourself. You voted against your interests, even though you're dependent on a lot of these things. You voted to, like, kill yourself. How you vote to kill yourself. And then you're okay with him gutting the Department of Education, saying he likes the poorly educated to keep you dumb, to keep you uneducated, so you don't know about these things. And then you just get mad at everyone and then just both sides it. And then get more angry about the San Jose State transgender volleyball player who's, like, on the bench and does not impact your life at all. Over the fact that, like, you voted to kill yourself because now you may not be able to afford, like, life saving drugs or you won't be able to get an education or they're going to take away programs that you depend on. It's horrific stuff. And finally, I'll show you this clip right here. This is President Biden officially signing the bipartisan Social Security Fairness act into law. It boosts payment for current and former public employees and affects nearly 3 million people who receive pensions from their time as teachers, firefighters, police officers and other public service jobs, which is incredible news. Let me show you the clip right here, if we can play it right here, of President Biden when he signed this into law. Okay, you ready? Get set, go. All right. When I asked President Biden what he wants his legacy to be, he told me it was keeping my word and delivering on the promises that I made. He delivered on the promises he made and more. Yet a large portion of the population in the corporate media vilified him for doing it in a decent, compassionate way that was not loud, but that represented the ideals and values of our country. And they demonized it because it wasn't dramatic enough to give you the clickbait. It wasn't exciting enough to. There wasn't enough drama. There wasn't all of these, you know, constant, you know, whatever happening. But here's the thing. Corporate media too, like the Americans who voted against their interest to kill themselves, corporate media by and large voted to kill themselves as well. You've lost the trust of the American people. And people aren't going back to it. They're coming to places like the Midas Touch network and other sources of independent media where we can speak fearlessly and be unapologetic in our pro democracy voice. And so, Brett, I'll turn it over to you. I'll remind everybody about patreon.com Midas Touch as well. I'm so excited to see everybody there. And because we don't have outside investors, it's one of the main ways we grow. You know, it's like one of the keys to grow so you can meet us, but it also keeps us oligarch billionaire free. And we could build this through people power, Brett.
- [62:53]
Brett Miceli
And one of the things that I would say the oligarchs want, one of the things that, you know, MAGA wants and one of the things that they are quite effective at, and it's one of their kind of keys on how they get things done in many ways, is by dividing people, by leading, by division, by fracturing groups, by fracturing coalitions. That's a very specific goal. I mean, we saw that during the election, the way Elon Musk's shady packs operated, by sharing one message for Kamala Harris about Gaza in one place and sharing an opposite message about Kamala Harris and Gaza and Israel in another place, purposely to try to grow these rifts and grow these divides, and I think we are seeing that continue kind of every single day kind of new outlets, new areas where you see folks and you see these forces trying to say, okay, here's a wedge issue where we could tear people apart, where we could separate people. And so when I look to the past kind of few days in the lead up to this certification, you know, I think you saw that in a lot of ways of people pushing this idea that Congress has to do something here about the 14th amendment. They need to do something now, and if they don't do something, shame on them. If they don't do something, then they are not doing their duty here. The thing is, is that when you put people in an impossible situation, something that the Supreme Court has ruled on, something that they literally have no Power over. Despite what some people may want to tell you, they really had no control over it. What's happening there is you are building animosity towards a group of people who are actually powerless to act in the situation, who are just doing their duty. And you are doing the bidding of these dark forces, and they are distracting you from the things that really matter. You're getting distracted from the hard work that needs to be done. I mean, Ben went through, you know, all these clips and the real dangers that we are facing in the months and years ahead. And that requires a united front to, to move forward in order to protect the democracy that we all love, in order to protect and uphold the values that we all love, not to be sidetracked by impossible issues, not to be sidetracked by things that cannot happen. And so it's all important that we keep our eyes on the ball here. We got to keep our eyes on the ball and to stop turning everything into a circular firing squad. We can't be getting angry at the people who are trying to help. Right? You can't be getting angry at the leaders who are, who have stepped up to try to move this country forward. We need to be directing our passion, we need to be directing our platforms, our voices at stopping this deluge of propaganda. That's what we need to be doing. Whether it's from Elon Musk, whether it's from foreign sources like Russia or Iran, we need to be pushing back against that. We need to be growing the pro democracy ecosystem to make sure that we're not only competing with those lies, but that we are surpassing those lies, that we are crushing those lies, that we are flooding the zone with unfettered truth. That's what we need to worry, be worried about. And we can't be always doing Putin's bidding here and doing the bidding of MAGA by furthering divisions within coalitions and trying to divide people at every step of the way, because that is simply unsustainable. I think everybody wants the same things here. Everybody wants to protect this country. Everybody wants our families to succeed, our families to be healthy and live happy lives, freedom, all the things that we value here in this country and around the world. So we need to come together in order to do that. And so we're counting on you for that. We're counting on really everybody out there. Now is the time where we all got to be stepping up. We got to be putting in the work, we got to be sharing these messages. We got to be doing everything that we can day in and day out using the power of our voice to speak out loudly and to be pushing for action that is feasible and action that will actually make positive change for the betterment of our country and this world.
- [66:49]
Jordy Miceli
Well said big bro. Patreon.com Midas Touch come hang out with us right there in the link. Shout out to the Midas Mighty.
- [66:59]
Ben Miceli
Standing strong again.
- [67:15]
Jordy Miceli
Hey Midas Mighty. Love this report. Continue the conversation by following us on Instagram. It's Touch to keep up with the most important news of the day. What are you waiting for? Follow us now.
- [67:29]
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