Jordy (5:40)

Good to see you too. It's, it's good to be back. It was upsetting to have to run away. The last episode for that mandatory evacuation right before we started the episode. But I want to thank everybody for reaching out. Yes, I'm safe. My home is safe. Honestly, I am certainly one of the incredibly lucky ones here in Los Angeles. The fires by me broke out like, literally like a couple blocks away, but the LAFD jumped into action. They were able to stop him pretty quickly, the ones by me and I was able to come back later that night. Know a lot of other people haven't been as, as lucky and it's just been so devastating every single day watching all the devastation that has been wrought as a result of these fires, these winds. And it's been, you know, it's, it's been exhausting. Also then seeing all the commentary on right wing social media coming from Donald Trump and flowing down to even people who I know in Los Angeles spouting out, you know, some of these lies from Donald Trump and these Elon Musk and these other actors of disinformation and lies on the Internet. It's so incredibly frustrating and demoralizing. But, you know, we're pushing through it, we're pushing back. I think if I could describe what it feels like here in LA to folks who aren't here. To me, it reminds me of like the COVID era, when you're kind of in survival mode, when you're constantly looking at the TV for the next update, when's the next, where's the next wave going to take place? You know, looking at the forecast, trying to hear from the experts, and then at the same time getting this deluge of disinformation, this deluge of lies which seeks to counteract the progress actually being made on the ground. Meanwhile, you sort of feel locked in and cooped up and you go to the store and everyone's trying to get the supplies as if it's the end. It really feels a lot like that era. I don't like that very much, but like I said, I'm certainly, you know, one of the, one of the lucky ones here. And I want to send all my love, you know, and, and prayers and everything to, you know, everybody here in la. It's, it's an incredible city. And to see the way folks are coming together in the city to help one another out right now in this time, it's really heartwarming and it shows you the. The good parts of humanity in the sea of the. The cesspool of, of the lies and disinformation that we're seeing out there online. Jordy, how are you doing?

Brett (8:03)

Brett, it is so great to have you back. I see everybody in the comments right now saying that they're glad that you're back, doing, doing well. And, yeah, my heart goes out to everyone still being affected by these fires. I know we have a huge, you know, Midas mighty constituency out there in you. So. So please just know, as I said last week during the podcast, like, we're in this together. We're here for you guys. Please let us know how y'all are doing. Excited to get into the show and really dig in and just. It does just amaze me that as Newsom is literally. And I know we're about to jump into it, but as he's literally, you know, fighting for the people on the ground. Not even like, not. Not Democrats, right? Just fighting for the people of California on the ground right now, trying to get them resources, trying to get them help. The fact that he has to push back against Donald Trump and these, you know, these MAGA Republican lies about how the fire started or, or this person did it, or there's not enough resources like the MAGA lies right now, specifically, it is putting the lives of Californians in the greatest danger. And the fact that Newsom has to spend one second, even just one second of his time trying to just get the truthful information to combat the misinformation out there and the disinformation. It's ridiculous that it even needs to be done as people's lives are literally on the line.

Brett (9:22)

Ben, tomorrow we're actually co sponsoring an event in the Pasadena area for those impacted by The Eaton fires. 12:30pm at 1146 East Green street in Pasadena. We're going to be working with this firm there, Mendez and Sanchez. You see it right there, handing out free meals, free in and out burgers, drinks. I think we're going to have some pizza there as well. No pressure, but if you're in the area and if the conditions are safe, of course you can stop by and pick up just some free food. I may try to stop by at some point in time and just say hello to everybody. But for first responders, police, firefighters, anybody impacted, go. It's a free meal on, on us and on Mendez and Sanchez. All right, Jordy, your point about Gavin Newsom, though, like, let's frame it this way. Gavin Newsom's probably one of the best communicators in politics, right? If not the best communicator in politics, right? But imagine how he has struggled to fight back against the deluge of lies. Even equipped with, with literally every skill set, right? A natural orator, quick on his feet, good looking, like he was built for this specific moment, but it's coming from everywhere and especially during the middle of a crisis. What do you do? How do you deal with that? When your job is governance, not Internet trolling? And the moment you're doing fact checks or debunking disinfo, you're already in a defensive posture versus an offensive posture. And that's why this type of stuff was always off limits in our politics because frankly, it's pretty easy but callous. If you're going to take advantage of people during terrorist attacks or natural disasters, it's the most vulnerable group of people. It's the easiest people to take advantage of. Who does that? Donald Trump, maga. They've changed the game for how this is dealt with. So now think about the last four years with President Biden, President Biden, who's Now in his 80s, who's not the orator he once was, right? He is a speak soft, but get things done. Not someone who's got this rapid response machine because he's old school. He just believed in, let's do deals, let's get out the truth. Come on, people, let's bring everybody together. And Trump and Magna was like, fu, even if you're giving us what we want when it comes to the border and doing bipartisan border deals, f you, we're blowing it all up. No matter what it is, whether it's Afghanistan, besides the fact that Donald Trump was the one who released the 5,000 Taliban prisoners and created the dangerous conditions, whether it was the, you know, derailment in East Palestine, you meant a crash in the Canadian border. You name the lack of baby formula, no matter what the situation was often caused by Donald Trump. It was some way to create and spew the lies. And frankly, I think the Biden administration, which was equipped to govern, was not equipped that people don't give a shit about facts anymore. The perception is almost more important than the facts. And we've existed in a MAGA framework of debunking versus being on the offense with a narrative that connects with the people because there's lies, lies, lies, lies, freaking everywhere. And it's important that we recognize the problem and then learn to solve from it. I've noticed Gavin Newsom, though, kind of picking it up and recognizing, oh, I'm seeing the hustle right here. And he's adapting in real time. And I do think public sentiment is starting to shift a little bit as you're seeing. Wait a minute. These were bad faith actors who were lying that there was no water, and they were lying that. That the fire department wasn't funded, it was actually funded more. They were lying that the resources were not in place. Gavin Newsom lined up the resources two weekends ago in preparation for this, which was kind of an unprecedented effort. And so let me show you this. First, let me show you this video clip of Gavin Newsom, kind of his response, using the kind of bully pulpit of his office to push back. Let me show you this first.

Gavin Newsom (13:56)

I called for him to come out, take a look for himself. We want to do in the spirit of an open hand, not a closed fist. He's the president elect. I respect the office. We have a President of the United states that within 36 hours provided a major disaster declaration over a text. We had support from the President of the United States, Joe Biden, with 100% reimbursement, all the resources you could hope for. Imagine constant communication. I'd like to extend that to the president elect. I don't know what he's referring to when he talks about the delta smelt in reservoirs. The reservoirs are completely full of the state reservoirs here in Southern California that Ms. And disinformation, I don't think advantages or aids any of us responding to Donald Trump's insults. We would spend another month. I'm very familiar with them. Every elected official that he disagrees with, very familiar with him.

Brett (14:45)

We do know, though, from reporting here locally that that one reservoir that serves the Palisades was not full.

Gavin Newsom (14:50)

And that's exactly what triggered my desire to get the investigation to understand what was happening with that local reservoir that was not a state system reservoir, which the president elect was referring to as it relates to the delta, and somehow connecting the delta smelt to this fire, which is inexcusable because it's inaccurate. Also incomprehensible to anyone that understands water policy in the state.

Brett (15:13)

And then Governor Newsom posted this video of Elon Musk. And in the post, Governor Newsom basically says that look at Elon Musk being totally debunked and exposed by firefighters for his own lies. Let me show you that we have this video bread of Elon Musk. If we do, let's play.

Ben (15:33)

So, all right, what about. What about water Availability was water availability. I understand that was like not, not an issue in, in Malibu. Is that correct? Was it water?

Brett (15:42)

Yeah.

Ben (15:43)

So there was water. We have several reservoirs that encinos we use a lot. Now just an example, if we have one building burning. Mm. We could flow a thousand gallons a minute on that one building with the hose lays that we put in this up in, you can imagine, 1,000 gallons per house we can do. Right. So the amount of water we're flowing, there really is no water system that's going to keep that pace. So we have to bring in water tenders which are these big tank water tanks that, you know, 25003000 gallon trucks and they'll come in and that's what we have to do to overcome to compensate. So they park out there, do it. DWTP did a great job. They brought in big water trucks for us and we use them as basically mobile hydrants. All right, Right. And then we have our own agency as well that has water tenders. Okay, I understand. Is that like along the. Maybe correct me if I'm wrong, along in Malibu along the coast, there was no shortage of water in the Palisades, there was a shortage of water at a certain point or is that not? Well, we were just, we were flowing just an amount of, amount of water that the system couldn't overbear just because of how much water these firefighters were utilizing. Okay. All right, sounds good. All right, thanks guys.

Brett (17:07)

Right. Not, not the answer he wanted there.

Jordy (17:09)

Yeah, he, he, he ended that, he ended that spaces really quickly once he didn't get the answer he wanted. And he's been one of the biggest spreaders of all these. Elon Musk and literally every official you speak to, every expert you speak to, anyone who knows a little bit about what they're talking about all says the same thing. The fires were so large, the situation was so vast that it would have overwhelmed any system in the world. And there's not a system that is equipped to handle this as it happened. I mean, as somebody in LA to explain it to people out there, this was a giant fire meets a hurricane basically with up to 100 mile an hour winds.

Brett (17:45)

Winds.

Jordy (17:46)

When the winds are like that, you can't fly helicopters over. You can't do hoses. And when they talk about all these fire hydrants and all that stuff, yes, they had water, but fire hydrants designed to get water out of a house. Like, like one house that's burning. Not an entire mountain full of homes, you know, not, not a vast stretch of land like that. So this is like nothing that people have really ever seen. It's something that, quite frankly, you know, everybody knows knew was a possibility that could happen if the conditions were right and would just so happen to have those nightmare conditions hit here in Los Angeles at the time. And so just to see the constant spreading of the lies, it's honestly, it's a microcosm of the election that we just went through and the last few years under President Biden and this new kind of media machine since Elon Musk took over Twitter and stuff. It's that the truth really doesn't matter. They try to get these lies out there so quickly and the lies spread and the lies actually affect people. They infect people's minds. Because in times of crisis, people are broken, people are facing trauma, people are looking for someone to blame, they're looking to get angry about something. And into that void comes Elon Musk saying, you're supposed to get angry at this person, or you're supposed to get angry at the Delta smelter or whatever. The issue they should have raked the forest has nothing to do with raking the forest, especially when you have 100 mile an hour winds and fire. Nothing, nothing in the world is going to stop that. But you got to figure out, okay, now what do we do? How do we actually figure out, how do we solve this issue? And I've seen day in and day out, the LA Fire Department, all of the kind of workers around the city doing incredible work, all the volunteers around the city doing incredible work, limiting the amount of deaths that we've seen, a lot of property damage, but limiting the number of deaths that we've seen throughout the city. And that to me is inspiring. And those are the people who are actually doing the real work right now. And there have been real resources for folks over here. There's an app called Watch Duty, which I've actually been able to follow along with for actual updates. And the local news has done a great job at letting people know what's going on. But you know, Twitter, Twitter and social media in general, which used to be a place where you could get real time updates, has become the opposite, has become a place where you go to and you don't know what's true, what's a lie, what's made up, but those lies spread. And Ben, like you said, you know, Newsom has had to adapt to this and he is probably more adept at approaching these lies than probably anybody in history in terms of politicians being a modern kind of politician who understands The Internet. His team releasing that video, I thought was very effective. And we see it. I'll try to pull it up again here if I could find it one more time. So when we took the screenshot of this photo, you see the views on the bottom? This was like, right after it posted, and it had 29,000 views. I just checked right before we did the show, and it had more like seven and a half million views. So that's a video. Now that's a mess that's getting out to a whole lot of people. I saw somebody, I think it was Chris Cuomo who tried to criticize Gavin Newsom for posting that video. Like, and he says, I'm paraphrasing. But Cuomo said something like, governor, now is not the time to get into petty Internet squabbles. Focus on your state. And yeah, and it's like, first off, do you think that's Gavin tweeting? Do you think it's Gavin typing and uploading the video? No. But what you don't understand, Chris, Chris Cuomo is this is the battle that we are facing. Yes, he needs to battle the fires. Newsom also needs to battle the disinformation. And what he is doing is what Democrats have neglected to do over these past few years. And quite frankly, even with Newsom doing it, the cards are stacked against him. Everything is stacked against him because the algorithms are designed to suppress him and they're designed to uplift the lies. But the fact that Newsom could do a post like that, get seven and a half, 8 million views on the post, get his counter message out to counter those lies, that is exactly what people who are running these accounts for the Democrats, for anybody who stands for truth. That's what everybody needs to be doing. This is actually a lesson in proper social media management to how to confront these crises on an informational level. And Gavin Newsom right now is delivering a master class on that from what everybody should be able to learn from that should not be criticized, that should be looked at and studied by other people in the party, by other people who are seeking to correct the record.

Brett (22:16)

Exactly that, Brett. It's horrifying to me that MAGA and the MAGA party has made the political calculation, because that's in there. That's what they're doing. They're making a political calculation that is in their best interest, in their best political interest. Not to help people, not to get resources where they need to go, but to spread misinformation and disinformation, actually put Americans lives more at Danger by not doing the things that any normal person would do. Like I always think about, you know, our counterparts overseas right now who are just witnessing the United States politicizing such a horrific event and seeing MAGA time and time again, you know, just spread these lies and not want to help fellow Americans. It is mind boggling, it is terrifying, it is upsetting, and it needs to stop. And I'm glad Newsom is doing what he's doing, Brett, because you laid it out perfectly in real time. He is, you know, putting this disinformation to bed. But it's also at the same time horrifying that he has to spend even one second thinking that there are people within this own country that are trying to get other Americans killed.

Brett (23:31)

Awful.

Brett (23:32)

Awful.

Brett (23:32)

Look, then you have the California Republican delegation. They're at Mar a Lago. They leave the state, they pull a Ted Cruz right?

Brett (23:42)

Cancun cruise.

Brett (23:43)

The Cancun cruise. They're chilling with Trump 3,000 miles away, doing poses with their thumbs up as they're spreading the lies, as they're spreading the disinformation. So the question is, well, what do we do about it? In the next segment, we're going to talk about it. We won't just be descriptive, we'll be prescriptive. I think that Governor Gavin Newsom is giving a masterclass in debunking disinfo, although he was a day or two late, not because it was his fault, but because he was handling the crisis. But what we have to do now in the pro democracy movement is not get distracted by the wmd, the weapon of mass distraction. We have to be clear about what the narrative is and what that narrative is. Donald Trump made a number of promises and he's going to be breaking them every single day. And every single day that happens. Don't go to the next shiny object. We can still deal with it. Take it seriously, but bring it back. You want to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America? Let's talk about the Gulf of cheaper eggs, bro. And let's talk about how are you going to be reducing the price of goods? How are you going to make housing more affordable? I love that post by Adam Kinzinger. I want to talk about that and more. We're going to take our first quick break of the show. It'll be a quick break. Want to remind everybody about midasplus.com and of course, patreon.com midas touch. We'll be right back after our first quick break.

Jordy (25:25)

Okay, I got to tell you about.

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Brett (27:04)

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Brett (29:28)

What's up?

Brett (29:28)

Where are we going next? Ben?

Brett (29:29)

Tooth brushing? I don't know. We're gonna definitely need to have a cleanser. After showing you this next clip from maga, Mike Johnson, speaker of the House, he was asked by CNN if there would be conditions placed on providing aid to California first. The very fact that that question even is asked is baffling. Like you have to ask the question, will you impose conditions? And all over the weekend I did a whole video of this. I saw senators and members of Congress from Wyoming and Tennessee and Louisiana and all of these states trying to lecture us in Los Angeles about them holding back resources from us here. I mean, you have Senator Barrosa, all these mag Republicans from states that get money from California, right? Smaller states who depend on California, which is either the fourth or fifth largest economy in the world. And now you're trying to hold us hostage from federal aid when we're one of the biggest contributors to the federal government far more than any of this. You know how livid this makes me that it's even a question. But what makes me more livid is MAGA Mike Johnson says yes, we're gonna put conditions on it. And then you'll hear in this clip he talks about one of them that they're considering is that we're gonna have to agree to raise the debt ceiling so Donald Trump can add trillions more of, of debt in order for us to get aid in California. What in the world are you even like? Like, honestly, these people are the most, I don't know how to describe it, other than vile, villainous and disgusting. Let's play the clip.

Jordy (31:21)

Are you open to providing conditions at all?

Ben (31:27)

I think we better have a serious conversation about that. Obviously there's been water resource mismanagement, forest management mistakes, all sorts of problems. And it, it does come down to leadership and it, it appears to us that state and local leaders were derelict in their duty and in many respects. So that's something that has to be factored in. I think there should probably be conditions on that date. That's my personal view. We'll see what the consensus is. If I haven't had a chance to socialize that with any of the members over the weekend because we've all been very busy, but it'll be part of the discussion for sure.

Jordy (32:01)

What about the debit limit increase? What about the time is debt limit increase to it?

Ben (32:04)

There's some, some discussion about that, but we'll see where it goes.

Brett (32:09)

There's some discussion about tying a debt ceiling increase for California to get aid. And then you notice he spews the Elon lies as the pretext. Hello, Vladimir Putin, right? That's the Putin Kim jong UN tactic 101. Weaponize the lies to have some agenda, which is ultimately what's this all about? The money. What do they want to do? They want to cut taxes for billionaires and they know they can't pay for that. So they want to raise the debt ceiling and they want to screw Americans so they can make way for massive handouts to the bro ligarchs. Brett?

Jordy (32:54)

Yeah, everything he said is a complete lie. California. It's just the fact California gives the most money to the federal government out of any state. And I will defend California to the death. It's an amazing state. LA is an amazing city. It's a beautiful city. It has a massive economy and ridiculous GDP output, which I think puts it at what the number five like of if it was A country, it would be like number four or five out of all countries in the entire world. So, you know, I think it's funny when somebody from. I won't, I won't hate on any specific states right now, but when some of these senators and representatives from their states try to talk crap on California, it's like, bro, do you know where you're from? All right, you know how much money, you know where you rank for education, you know where you rank in tech, you know where you rank in every category compared to California. Okay? But they tell their people that because it's like one of those North Korea style tactics where you act like these other places. Oh, it's so horrible there. They have it awful there there. Oh, you don't want to go there. And there people buy it. Like you see online. Like, you'll see memes and stuff of people from some of these states and some of these Trump voters who are like, thank God I don't live in California. Like, not, not as about the fires, but just like in general. And it's like, it's pretty nice here, actually. But all right, you know, we're, we're pretty populated, so it's okay. We don't need, believe me, we, we don't need you here. But it's just so vile. It's so despicable to see, you know, Mike Johnson saying that, using those lies as pretext to say, oh, actually they're local officials. You know, they're blaming it on, on people for being Democrats in California. It has nothing to do with political party. Stop putting politics into every little thing. No matter who was in these positions, quite frankly, whether it's Gavin Newsom, whether that was a Republican, whether it's Mayor Karen Bass, whether it's Caruso, whether it's a republic, whoever it is, you swap any of those positions out, this fire still happens. It still spreads in the same exact way. It's just, it's just the fact, because it was nature, it was mother nature, there was no stopping it. Now, I'm happy that we do have competent people who are able to look this affirmat a factual perspective and actually understand how to solve these issues and work on it from where we are right now. But that initial hit, that was going to happen regardless. And I'm sick of these people trying to use California as a political wedge. I'm sick of them playing with people's lives over here. I really have an affinity for the communities in the city, in the state. And I see people busting their ass Right now to help each other. I see people donating so much that I've gotten texts from the donation places saying we, we don't want any of X, Y and Z because we're already full. But if you could bring this, that and the other. And so that's how much this community is coming together. They are overflowing the donation spaces with items. They are working, they are helping their neighbors. You are seeing the community of the city in action. And then you just have these politicians, these Republican politicians in Washington just shitting on the city, making everything about politics. It's just absolutely reprehensible when us, when the people in the city are either in survival mode roads or just lost their homes or their cars or their mementos or whatever. It's just so sickening to me on such a deeply personal level. And you know, we've covered this from the perspective of other states before and how important it is when they did this with North Carolina, when they do this with other states that, that face disasters. And you just really feel it, I gotta say, in an even different way, when it's your state that's going through the crisis and you see these bullshit games that these people are playing in Washington, like enough is enough. I'm the lies. I'm sick of the disinformation. Actually work for the people for once. Stop spreading your bs. Stop trying to be partizan. Just get together, pass a bill, Help the people of this city. Help them stop with your politics.

Brett (36:48)

Our editor in chief, Ron Philip Koski responded to this CNN News Alert. This is what the CNN News Alert was. It said Trump's musings about the U.S. taking over the Arctic territory have thrust it into the spotlight. This is what it's like to visit. And the headline is World Meet Greenland. And Ron Philipkowski goes. Sometimes I think this is a parody site referring to cnn. But what it really is is it's either intentionally, maliciously, wantonly, or negligently. You decide where cnn, which is funded by oligarchs, is going here. But they follow the shiny object, right? Take a look. Donald Trump's talking about invading Greenland. Greenland, Gulf of Mexico, now Gulf of America. Look at what he's saying about Canada. Look, we need to take these things seriously, especially from the perspective that it's uniting the world against the United States. So we should be talking about that and take it seriously, but also realize the Hassan. Okay? Don't be hustled like Trump. Admin1 don't be hustled like campaign every day can't be. Trump said this crazy thing. Trump said that crazy thing. Trump said this crazy thing. And look, I'm not saying that I'm totally innocent in this. I, I want to improve on how you deal with it. I think anybody who takes a cold, hard look at the voting patterns of behavior of Americans, Americans by and large were okay. The at least 49% of voters with how disgusting of a human being Donald Trump is, that didn't seem his low morality, the depths of depravity, being found liable for sexual assault, being a convicted felon, talking about grabbing women by their genitals because he's rich, saying that it's locker room talk in front of a bunch of young Republicans. All of you know, hanging out with Epstein. Back in the day, to 49% of the voters, they were saying, well, Trump's made these promises. Peace in Ukraine, lower prices, affordable housing, jobs. We can deal with a disgusting human being if these promises are going to happen. To which I was like, dudes lied his entire life all the time. He's bankrupted his companies. The reason I'm focused on the lack of moral character and all of these issues is to show you that all these other things are fraud. But people seem to be mesmerized by the lies. And, and Trump being, I guess, an example during this times is a tough analogy. But the arsonist and then blaming the firefighters, the Biden administration for what Trump actually created, not in a literal sense, but during the first administration and how you deal with that. Right. So. So I think it's important that we not get distracted. And as CNN is there, because let's talk about what happened over the weekend. Trump's envoy to Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, said, you know what? We're not going to be able to do peace in 24 hours. Yeah, I know that. I know that. Trump said that. But look, 2,400 hours. How about 100 days? Give us 100 days and then we can create a framework for a framework and then maybe create some conditions for, I don't know. Here's Keith Kellogg, Trump's special envoy to Ukraine, in his own words, let's play.

President Biden (40:27)

It what we're doing.

Keith Kellogg (40:28)

We'll set the conditions for the president and then he'll eventually get to a position where he'll be talking to President Putin and also Prime Minister, President Zelensky as well. And I think they're going to come to a solvable solution in the near term. And when I say by the near term, you know, I would like to set a goal on a Personal level, professional level, I would say let's set it at 100 days and move our way back and figure a way we can do this in the near term to make sure that this solution is solid, it's sustainable, and that this war ends to and so that we stop the carnage. I think that's going to be very important to do. It's going to be important for our national security. It's a part of our vital natural interest. And it's also good for Europe as well and the globe as well as well.

Brett (41:10)

All right. I predict that guy's not going to last that long in the Trump administration. And let me give you another, let me give you another, by the way, serious guy, Vietnam War, 101st Airborne, fought in a number of wars, Gulf War, Lieutenant General. Like he's a serious dude. Like he's not. He's not a bad person to have in that role. But let me show you this other clip of him, though, where he's like, I may be the envoy and I may have said all of these things because then the reporter asks him. But Trump's saying different stuff in you. So what do you say when Trump goes out and says different stuff? Here's what Keith Kellogg says. Let's play it.

Keith Kellogg (41:47)

You know, I don't want to divulge anything that the president says or doesn't say because he speaks for himself. I do not speak for him. We've had an opportunity to talk about it and we'll have more after the 20th of January, when he's officially the president, not President Obama.

Brett (42:02)

I mean, literally, your job is to speak on his behalf on the issue of Ukraine. Like you're there giving an interview, speaking on his behalf. And then he goes, I don't speak on his behalf. And then he changed the goal post from 24 hours to 100 days to build the conditions. Now, again, if you were responsible media, you would be covering it the way we're covering it here, right? That should be your front page story. Trump lies. And by the way, those are not minor lies. Those lies kill countless people in Ukraine because you're toying with people's lives by creating fake frameworks that aren't real or doable. You're destroying the ability of NATO to even operate when you're creating these fake and phony deadlines lines and you're playing right into the hands of Vladimir Putin. Now, what Keith Kellogg recognizes there is actually, what he's saying is actually not something I really disagree with, because you don't want to create a 24 hour negotiating window and then screw yourself by imposing an arbitrary deadline on your negotiations. It's the worst thing you can do in a negotiation is to let your adversary know your arbitrary timeline of what's failure because then you could be cajoled or coerced in the negotiation. If Putin realizes that you're going to fail, he can say, okay, here's what I want. And that's what Putin's been doing, right? Putin's been saying, I demand total capitulation. I demand a total surrender of Ukraine. And by the way, Donald, I'm going to show nude photos of Melania on, on Russia tv and I'm going to have our version of Sean Hannity laugh and mock you. That's what's been going on there. But the sleight of hand, the pickpocketing of Donald Trump of now they've moved the goalpost to we didn't really promise that. By the way, I'm not going to play this video because my same rule of not playing Trump clips, I'm going to extend that to not playing JD Vance clips. Sorry. If you want to watch JD Vance, I like that. But JD Vance is at Ask. Hey, the Biden economic numbers were. Give Fox credit. They asked the right question. The Biden numbers were pretty good, huh? 258,000 jobs created, unemployment down to 3.9%. Basically. That's the lowest unemployment since 1960s. You know, the stock market was up under Biden, 16.6 million jobs created. Pretty good, right? And inflation's, you know, being tackled and it's better than mostly any other nation out there because of the Inflation Reduction Act. So what does J.D. van say? His response is, I wish Joe Biden all the best, but the fact is he has left us a dumpster fire, not just at the border, but with the economy. He then goes on to say, we're going to have to work really hard to try to stabilize things, to try to stabilize the inflation. Not sure what we can do to try to stabilize these prices. And as James Surwicki goes, the telling moment here is when Vance, talking about inflation, says they're going to work to, quote, stabilize the prices for Americans. That's not what Trump promised. Trump promised voters he would bring prices down. It was a nonsense promise. So now they're walking it back to say the goal is to stabilize, to keep the prices stable. So remember what we said at the beginning, that tank, that deluge of disinformation, allow perceptions to take over the facts, change the benchmarks. We're not Going to have peace in Ukraine for maybe 100, 200. Who knows if we'll ever get there? We'll see. When it comes to the economy, we're not going to be able to lower prices. Actually. We need to stabilize things. Donald Trump is a perennial con artist, maybe the greatest con artist, although greatest and con artists shouldn't go along with each other in the history of mankind. All he does is lie. He's created a virtual reality in his mind, implanted it on. The reality inhabits this fake world that he's created and thrusts that world of propaganda and falsehood onto the American people, which is inconsistent with the world that we're actually living in right now. And if you look at Biden's record, if you look at everything thing, it's actually been by fact, not perception. Probably the most successful first term of anyone, maybe in the history of the presidency. Jobs created more than anyone else. 16.6 million jobs created. Stock market record high. Infrastructure Act, 40,000, 50,000 infrastructure projects. Blue states, red states benefiting record low Unemployment never lost jobs, jobs any single month. The American Recovery act got us out of the disaster. Trump left us in with COVID where Trump said, like a miracle, it's all going to go away. It's a little like a miracle. Inject yourself with bleach and Clorox or whatever. He got us out of that. And then he protected veterans with the PACT act, brought the semiconductor industry. President Biden did here with the CHIPS Act. We're talking about massive pieces of legislation and he would have passed a border deal deal if Donald Trump didn't kill it. It would have been so beneficial to us all. But Trump said killing the border deal was a winning issue, a winning issue to maga so they could run on chaos at the border. But by the way, even with that, you want to know the facts, not the perception. The facts are that border crossings are down more right now than they were in April 2020 when Trump was in office. Office. By the way, what was April 2020 when Trump was in office? Why were the border crossings down then? I don't know. Maybe something called Covid that Donald Trump failed to manage properly there. And border crossings actually were not down during a lot of Trump's presidency. They went down significantly because of COVID as did gas prices. But that's not something to brag about when human beings in America can't get freaking toilet paper and there are mobile morgues and, and food lines taking place in America. Now, I'm worked up right now, folks. We're going to take our last quick break of the show. I want to remind you Midas+.com check it out. Also patreon.com Midas Touch we're going to take our last quick break of the show. When we come back, I want to show you President Biden's closing message to the American people. We'll be right back.

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Brett (50:26)

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Brett (52:04)

Shout out to our sponsors links in description of both the YouTube and the audio. Check out the links, use the codes. Let them really let them know we sent you because that actually becomes a thing. I have all these conversations after the fact that the brothers know, know this and they're like your audience tells us that they y'all sent them and like not a lot of audiences do that. So we appreciate the Midas mighty. And I go hey, the Midas mighty are undefeated. Of course they let you know Benji.

Brett (52:29)

You know, I'm seeing all these stats about corporate media that their unique users are down like 97%. Like crazy stats like that. And they thought that, that cuddling up to Trump was going to be beneficial to them or perhaps when the billionaires bought their kind of corporate media news outlets that was their sacrificial lamb to show that they were MAGA to Donald Trump when they did that pilgrimage of shame to Mar a Lago. But what they didn't factor in is pro democracy media. They didn't. They thought they were the only show in town that oh, if we just suppress the news, where's people, where are they gonna get it from? Here, here's where you're gonna get it from and it's great, you know, while, while they did that, you know what? We're, we're ready for the fight. We're ready for the battle. I want to thank everybody who's you know, become subscribers at Midasplus.com@patreon.com Midas to such on the YouTube site people have bought each other. You could gift memberships here and that's been supremely helpful because I think one of the best things is you can see the growth, you can see the research, you can see all of the things we've added in all of these different areas the scope of the coverage has increased. Why am I going on that tangent? One of the ways that also where we grow is one, I think it's important info that you know that. And number two, those pro democracy sponsors help a lot. I know some people like commercials, no commercials. It really helps a lot grow this network. Let's talk about the confirmed cabinet confirmation hearings though that are taking place. The big one tomorrow or if you're listening to this on audio podcast on Tuesday is on January 14th. You have Hegman. That's going to be an interesting one and we're going to cover that here on the Midas Touch network on the 15th. I think the really interesting one of all of these is going to be Christy Gnome for Department of Homeland Security. Pam Bondi, the head of the DOJ, will be interesting as well. She's got the bona fide, she's got the qualification. She was the AG in Florida. But I've, I've seen her, I mean when she was representing Donald Trump in the impeachment hearings, like she was not good. Like she was nervous and it was a really shaky argument that she gave. And so she may be, you know, an operator behind the scenes, but it'll be interesting to see her with the cameras and lights on her there. And then we've got on January 16, Lee Zeldin, EPA Besant, who is the appointed for the Treasury Secretary. We'll be covering all of these though. So check back in periodically to the Midas Touch Network and our YouTube channel throughout the day. And I should give a shout out also to our mods here. They do an incredible job. Thank you for keeping the conversations he here civil. I should give a shout out to you, the Midas mighty and also our editorial team run by Ron Philipkowski. He does such a masterful job, Ron, you know, leading the editorial efforts and then all of our production team led by Adam Salt in AKA Salty. But bro, let's talk about President.

Jordy (56:12)

I just want to say, well, because just because he brought up Ron. Ron wrote one of the most incredible pieces for our substack today about his story about his journey of being in the Marines, kind of becoming a Republican and then becoming a Democrat ultimately and then becoming an independent journalist here at Midas Touch. It goes through his whole history and it's stuff about Ron that I never knew till reading this. And I just found that a really kind of inspiring kind of tale of somebody's kind of evolutionary in their thinking and kind of gaining empathy about others and how they've kind of come to Believe the things that they believe and fight for the things that they fight for. So you can check it out on Midasplus.com I just thought I found it really powerful and I think our audience really like it.

Brett (56:58)

Yeah. And to all the MAGA people who find this talk by Donald Trump funny about invading Greenland or Panama or annexing Canada, think about your family. Think about if you have young people in your family, you're going to send them to die and to risk their lives to attack NATO allies like Denmark or attack Canada. That's, that's what you're going to do. You know, I've had this guy, Corey Hargraves, former army sniper, on a lot. I've been interviewing him and you know, he was out there two tours in Iraq. And he's been telling me like, you know, how he's taken life there, how he came back, you know, struggled when he returned. And he's thinking, he's like, you're talking about sending us to attack. You know, you're trolling or you want us take it seriously. You're going to put boots on the ground. That's what you mean when you say these things, whether you're trolling or not. And Brett, I think about the, you know, Ron's service, you know, to the country as well. And I just think about, about like, you know, just the idea this, the language of annexing countries. It, it is so, it is so vile. But also when we talk about it, remember, bring it back to what, Greenland. What are you even talking about? Talk about prices. Talk about what are you going to do. You said you were going to make all these jobs, right on day one. Housing was going to become more affordable on day one. Oh, wait a minute, minute. Perhaps it's all the Rollog archs who hang out at Mar a Lago, who own private equity companies that they've purchased the supply of all of the houses, commoditized it, bundled it together and have put the prices through the roof. Maybe that's the one of the reasons why the prices are high. I don't know. Maybe the prices are so high as well because all of these people have contributed to Donald Trump. Trump engage in price gouging frequently, by the way. You know what the oil companies are talking about now? They don't want to drill, baby, drill. You know why? Because they have enough oil. What they want to do is artificially suppress the supply to increase the demand so they can make more money and they could focus on things like stock buybacks because us actually, we've pretty much geologically drilled in a lot of the areas where, where they're actually have the supply that they need. There's been more drilling in the Biden administration than in the Trump administration. So let's be fact based. Let's talk about what's really going on here. And it may just be that Donald Trump, someone who's cared more about money than anything before and who's been a horrible manager of money, maybe he, he's conning you like he's kind of on his entire life. But let's end it with this President Biden talking about his accomplishments as he did with me. And I think my interview with President Biden was the last one on one that he did as a video.

Jordy (60:05)

Last video interview.

Brett (60:06)

Yeah, that, that he did in his presidency. What an incredible honor. Not just for me, for the Midas mighty right here. The fact that this community. I'm glad to be in that seat. Seat, but it was really the community in that seat in the Roosevelt Room of the West Wing. But this is what he kind of told me too. And here he is in this foreign policy speech saying that his administration is leaving the next administration with a strong hand to play. Let's play it.

President Biden (60:31)

My administration is leaving the next administration with a very strong hand to play. And we're leaving them in America with more friends and stronger alliances whose adversaries are weaker and underperformed pressure. An America that once again is leading uniting countries, setting the agenda, bringing others together behind our plans and visions. An America which is no longer war, which has made historic investments in American workers, American energies. Many American factories generated this strongest economy in the world, which is now in a much better position to win the future against any competitor. These wins are not partisan. They're American. They benefit all Americans and reflect America's endless capacity for leadership and reinvention.

Brett (61:29)

I'll show you this next clip right here. As President Biden talks about throughout his career, the world has undergone tremendous change. Change. But let me share this with you.

President Biden (61:41)

Let me close with this. Like many of you, I've dedicated a significant portion of my career to our nation's foreign policy. As chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, as a senator, vice president for eight years, and now President United States. I put together one of the most competent foreign policy teams, I would argue, in American history sitting in this room before my eyes. Throughout my career, the world has gone, undergone tremendous change, but certain things have always held true. At our best, America leads not only by the example of our power, but the power of our Example, the past four years, we've used that power not to go it alone, but instead to bring countries together, to increase shared security and prosperity, to stand up to aggression, to solve problems through diplomacy, wherever possible, and relentlessly defend democracy, civil rights and human rights. Because that's who we are. That's who we are. You heard me say it many times before. We're the only country on earth founded on idea. Every other country is founded on geography, religion, ethnicity, or some other unifying factor. But America was built on idea, on an idea, literally, not figuratively. That idea was all women, men are created equal. The idea that has inspired the world for 250 years and counting. We're always reaching to do better, always looking to the future, not our best. Always seeking progress for our people and for people everywhere. It's been the honor of my life to serve as your president today. I'm optimistic about our future, as optimistic as I've ever been. Just have to remember who in hell we are. Heard me say it many times. We're the United States of America, for God's sake. There is nothing, nothing, nothing beyond our capacity if we do it together and commit to it. Nothing. So thank you all for all you've done. I hope many of you are going to be staying the next administration to keep this moving. May God bless you all and may God protect our troops. Thank you. Thank you.

Brett (64:32)

That's the guy they pushed out. That's the guy that the media pushed out that frankly, Democrats didn't defend anywhere strong enough, you know, that they should have history when it's written. And I'm confident that together we're going to get through these next four years together. I am. But we had the guy who was the lib. We had the guy. He was right there. We had the guy. He had the guy, Brett. Yeah.

Jordy (65:10)

I mean, you know, President Biden, obviously older, obviously very old, but, you know, knows what he's doing and, you know, is a real statesman. And, you know, I think when he is not in office anymore, you know, I think. I think we're going to miss that. I think we're going to miss that steady hand. I think we're going to miss that defensive democracy. I think we're going to miss that defense of our allies. And I think some folks are already seeing it now, and I think there will be a part of the country that will wake up down, you know, after all this chaos and, you know, these relentless attacks on our allies. And when people realize that this is not, you know, America, what Donald Trump wants to take us to. But, you know, I, I, I'm happy that President Biden got a chance to lay out his foreign policy, you know, achievements there, including his defense of, you know, getting out of Afghanistan, which, you know, I mean, is something that folks have asked for and, and wanted now for decades. And, you know, and President Biden was the one who actually did it and took a giant political toll for doing so, which, by the way, probably discourages any other future presidents from leaving wars once we are in them, which I think is horrific. And then somehow Donald Trump tries to run as the peace candidate when President Biden is the one who actually got us out of all of our wars and just provided defense and other means to other countries. Actually not presiding over a single war during his presidency in terms of American troops or anything. But, but yeah, no, I think, you know, good speech there by President Biden. To see Ben's interview with President Biden, we have the link in the description to this video. If you've not watched it yet, please watch it now. If you have watched it, please remember to share that video on your social media, send it to friends and family. It's such an honor to have kind of that historical record of that final interview with President Biden right here on the Midas Touch Network, work with you all. I think that's, you know, something I, I certainly take to heart. Once again, I want to thank everybody out there for your kind words for me and Ben, but I want to ask you to send your thoughts and prayers, and I know the Republicans have turned that phrase into something that sounds so trite after like, school shootings. But, but, but send your thoughts and prayers to, you know, all the other folks in LA who have, you know, really had devastating loss. You know, our hearts are with, you know, everybody. This is a strong city, but this is a city that use, you know, help right now. And it's great seeing folks come together here and it's, it's great. You know, I know everybody, you know, in the city appreciates seeing the outpouring of support that, that you all are showing and all the love. So I wanted to thank you for that. We're going to be hanging in here the next few days. We're supposed to get high winds. I'm getting all the warnings on my phones, more fire alerts, more high wind warnings. So we're just sitting tight. I'm hoping that everything is going to be good. But we're going to be here every day delivering news. We got the confirmation hearings. Tune in for the confirmation hearings. Our coverage here on the Midas Touch Network. Make sure you check out Midasplus.com once again read that story by Ron Philipkowski. Excellent piece. Here's a screenshot for those watching my story and why I switched from Republican to Democrat by Ron Philipkowski. Excellent piece. Midas plus is our ad free experience. We're also putting our ad free versions of these podcasts on Midas plus so you could check it out. If you want to meet us face to face, you could do that on patreon.com Midas Touch. Remember to check us out. And something that really helps us out a whole lot like helps us out a ton is if you go and Apple podcasts or Spotify, whatever audio podcast app you use, if you go and you add the Midas Touch podcast on audio, even if you don't think you're going to listen to it on audio because you watch it here, go add it and if you can leave us a five star review. That sort of thing really, really helps us compete with all the kind of right wing podcasts that typically dominate the charts. It's one of the reasons why we're in the mix, why we often beat them. And I want to continue to grow in that space and to get our messages out in a bigger, with a bigger megaphone than they are. We, we need to combat the lies, folks. We need to combat the disinformation. We need to lead with honesty, with integrity, with positivity. And that's I think one of the main missions of this community. So let's all, let's all do that.

Brett (69:23)

Together and then I'll just remind people about the event Tomorrow or today January 14, 12:30pm at 1146 East Green street in Pasadena. If you're from the area area, we'll have free in and out burgers, also a bunch of other free food, Gatorades, drinks. Again, only if it's safe, you know, show up, just you can quickly, you know, grab some, grab a free meal if you're here. First responders, police officers, firefighters, anyone impacted come by. I'm gonna try to stop by at some point tomorrow. I don't want to be a distraction if I'm so I, I, I'll stop by for, you know, potentially for a little bit if I can. Although this is my first week of teaching at, at usc and so I have classes today and I figure out.

Jordy (70:14)

What I'm doing if you need it. Of course, if it is for, it's for the people impacted. So if, don't just go because you want a free burger. But if you're, if you've been impacted, if you're a first responder, police, firefighters, you know, you know, we're trying to help out, you know, as best we can. So it's been great to be able to partner here with, with Mendez and Sanchez to, you know, get some in and out burgers and, and if we have some pizza and stuff, just, you know, try and do, you know, everything that we can, you know, right now in this moment while we also kind of try to, you know, figure out our own safety and all that. So thank you everybody. You know, I just, I'm so grateful, you know, for everybody. It's been quite, quite a week, quite the week and a half, whatever it's been on even though no time. But, but I'm, but I'm thankful for everybody. I have so much love for you all and, and thanks.

Brett (71:02)

Shout out to the Midas Mighty. 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.

Brett (71:36)

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