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- [00:01]
Ryan Reynolds
Ryan Reynolds here for I guess my hundredth Mint commercial. No, no, no, no, no, no, don't.
- [00:05]
Brett
No, no, no.
- [00:07]
Ryan Reynolds
I mean, honestly, when I started this.
- [00:08]
Jordy
I thought I'd only have to do.
- [00:09]
Ryan Reynolds
Like four of these. I mean, it's unlimited to Premium Wireless for $15 a month. How are there still people paying two or three times that much? I'm sorry, I shouldn't be victim blaming. Here, give it a try@mintmobile.com save whenever you're ready.
- [00:22]
Ben
$45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three month plan only.
- [00:28]
Jordy
Taxes and fees, extra Speed slower above 40 gigabytes.
- [00:30]
Ben
CD tails. The election is over and obviously not the results that anybody wanted. It's okay to reflect on what happened, but there is simply no time to look back right now. What is important that we hear at the Midas Touch Network, that this community is on the front lines of resisting fascism, of resisting authoritarianism, of calling out the Trump administration and all of his lackeys at each and every turn and to make sure our voices, our herd, our institute, our institutions remain strong. And that is our commitment to you. We are going nowhere and we will be here to protect our fundamental rights, your fundamental rights. And we will not stop. We will continue on with our mission together. Let's call in Brett and Jordy right now. Brett, Jordy, good to see you here. Not the episode that I wanted to have. I did not want to be in resistance mode. I wanted to be in let's build upon accomplishments mode. But here we are. These are the cards that are now dealt and we have no choice but to reflect on what happened, what can improve and how we move forward together. And that's what we are going to do here. We've seen the importance I think of and the power of the media, of corporate media, sane washing and both sides in everything, of investments, massive investments on the right wing in digital media platforms that worked on Gen Z and worked on certain communities to try to influence their voting behavior and shift voting behavior.
- [02:27]
Jordy
But.
- [02:27]
Ben
But here we are, we here at the Midas Touch Network. This is not a network of the blame game or wagging our fingers. We have to learn the lessons and we have to grow. Brett and Jordy, how are you doing? Obviously not ideal, but good to see you both and good to be here with all the Midas mighty.
- [02:45]
Jordy
Not not ideal is. Is one way to put it. You know, these last few days have been tough, but I know it's been tough on all of you out there as well. And we share in those feelings, you know, in the past few days, I've, I've raged, I've shed tears, I've been. It's been hard, it's been difficult. But you know what? I've picked myself back up and I'm ready to get back in the ring and make sure that we're doing everything possible. And what we need to do now is we need to rebuild this network, rebuild this community into the strongest force possible to confront the issues that we are going to face. We have identified the threats here over and over and over again. We have spread this message far and wide, but not far enough. And now we actually have to confront those threats head on. And so our mission from here on out is to confront that, is to actively serve as a resistance where these policies go in the bad directions that we expect them to go. And we are going, going to be a check on power. We are going to be unapologetic. And that is our promise. And I, by the way, I totally get those people who are like, this is. I can't take it anymore. I need to take a rest. I totally understand. But whether you're taking a break now or whether you're taking a break tomorrow or if you already took a few days and you're back in action, we will always be here for you, ready to fight by your side. That is our mission. That is our promise to you. Jordy, what's new?
- [04:13]
Ryan Reynolds
Brett said it perfectly. Ben said it perfectly. We are not going anywhere. We love this community too much. We love this country too much. And right now, this community is genuinely that it is the best pro democracy community out there. And so to Brett's point, exactly, I understand if you need a week, if you need a day, if you need a month, if you need a couple, we're going to be here for you no matter what. Because we love this country and this community too much to ever back away.
- [04:41]
Ben
You know, look, we've already hear Donald Trump and the campaign people and his surrogates right now. I mean, they're still talking about deportations. Caroline Levitt talked about mass deportation. She was Donald Trump's spokesperson. Byron, Donald's talked about these deportations, which Donald Trump said was going to be bloody. We're already seeing certain companies here saying that they will be pricing in Donald Trump's disastrous tariffs into their manufacturing process and into their kind of import cadence. You know, Donald Trump's made a lot of promises, including, I call them lies. He calls them promises. He said that the Ukraine war would be solved on day One, even before he took office, if he was elected, that war is still taking place today. He's made promises to everybody and lied to everybody. Whether he was saying no tax on tips, no tax on this, no tax on that, no taxes in general. You know, it was the Pied Piper of lying, going from community to community, you know, lying, utilizing quite literally billions of dollars from billionaires through political action committees, which was, you know, if you want to think about the genesis and origin of this, right, this was over a decade in the making with the Citizens United case, which allowed all of this political action money to, you know, have no limits at all. And now we see what their vision was back then. But if you think about Fox, if you think about the Federalist Society, Leonard Leo's agenda, the late Roger Ells's agenda with Fox, these things started in the 70s and there was a different vision of America than the American dream that I think people loved. And they were pushing it there and kind of in the shadows, growing their influence on the courts with the Federalist Society, in the media with Fox, I think we've seen in recent years, of course, billionaire oligarchs buying out all the media. It's not liberal media anymore. It's all kind of right wing media to different degrees and variances. So there needs to be a check on that too with pro democracy media, people powered media that's funded, you know, you know, here at the grassroots and built at the grassroots. So that's what we're building, it's what we're going to continue to build. And again, any type of fascist encroachment, any single day, we will make videos on it, we will call it out each and every day.
- [07:33]
Jordy
And Ben, I think it's interesting that the conversation is so quickly shifted to speak about the media landscape, which is something we've been sounding the alarm on. I don't know, the entire existence of this network, which is us saying, listen, this is where we're at. We have the corporate media, which sane washes Donald Trump and has criticized President Biden and Kamala Harris, the entire administration, every single step of the way. So you have information getting out that way. Then you have the right wing MAGA media, whether it's Fox or Newsmax or on whatever it is, which is pumping out pure propaganda. And then you have all of these right wing podcasts in this whole digital network that the right wing has built up thanks to billions and billions and billions of dollars. So our question this entire time has been where's the investment in digital media? From all of these people who want to actually have an outsized voice in this current environment. Why are they ignoring this space? And we're like, hello, we've been doing it. Guess What? We have 6 billion views on the Midas Touch network, A billion in the past 90 days alone. And we need to keep that momentum going. We need to expand this platform and other pro democracy platforms as well and build out this ecosystem into something that is truly special. And I'm happy that finally the consultant class and whoever you want to call it was like, oh, maybe we should have paid attention to this whole new growing medium that's out there. Well, welcome to the party. You know, I'm not going to go on much more about this and criticize you for it, but welcome. You know, we're here, let's do this. Let's build up a media empire or pro democracy that actually gets out the truth, that actually speaks to the issues on people's mind unapologetically without the sane Washington, without the bs. That's what we got to do.
- [09:20]
Ben
One of the things that I see people doing now, which we're not going to do here, is blame this group or pit this group against that group. That's just not, I don't think that's a productive exercise to, oh, it's their fault, it's your fault. I'm not sure that's productive exercise. I think though, that the one that perhaps pisses me off the most though, are people who are my perspective and Brett and Jordy, you can disagree. The people who are out there attacking President Biden and saying this was Biden's fault. We had to dig out of Biden, Biden this, Biden that. It's Biden's fault. Let's be very clear. Biden is overseeing objectively, some of the best data in the history. It's objective. There's not, it's not a, it's not debatable points when you look at certain kind of key metrics. Because the metrics are the metrics. They're the stats that America's GDP is the best in the world, that America's stock market set records after records after records, that the Infrastructure act built over 40,000 infrastructure projects, that unemployment, which is often a metric that if it goes very high, will take down presidents. Our unemployment is at kind of historic low levels. And unemployment levels have been kind of consistently month over month kind of setting was like a record stretch of low unemployment. Wages are up, manufacturing boom. There's never been more oil being produced for all of the drill, baby, drill, you know, crowd. I mean, those are just the objective data. And the bad piece of data, of course, which you don't ignore, was that inflation was high. And I say was high because objectively, inflation through actual things like the Inflation Reduction act and the Infrastructure act went down and went down faster than any other kind of G7 nation or any other nation in the world. And our inflation got brought down to reasonable levels and now, you know, under control at like 2.2%, you know, not 0% inflation, but wages growing more than what the percentage of inflation is out right now. So people have more disposable income just objectively than what the inflation was.
- [11:56]
Jordy
But I mean, 2%'s the Fed target, right? That's, that's, that's in a normal, healthy economy, you have 2% inflation, inflation, and we are just about there right now. And so, you know, from, from the perspective of good governance, what you always want to. And good governance is different, of course, than electoral politics, and it's different than what folks feel. But from a good governance perspective, if you inherit an economy in disaster, in crisis, in chaos, from somebody who left with the worst job record, jobs record since Herbert Hoover, with a global economy as well in shambles due to COVID 19, and you come in and it continues to spike, and then you get it under control and bring it the target levels and do it better than any country in the entire world. I mean, to me, that's a big deal. Sorry.
- [12:40]
Ben
No, but look, so what we're both talking about, ultimately, where the failure was, because we have to acknowledge what the failures are, you know, and the failure is, you know, I think the failure within, if you will, in the sense of messaging it, explaining these things, letting the American people reflect on what a disaster it was in Covid and how President Biden literally inherited the worst economy, though there was no peaceful transition, There was no real transition normalcy at all, where agencies talked to the incoming agency. None of that happened. There was January 6th, and President Biden inherited a freaking mess. And at all stages, what the GOP and MAGA particularly did very well. They were on message every day, kind of just attack, attack, attack, attack. Every issue, no matter what. It was train derailment in East Palestine, you know, a coordinated effort online to try to do a run on banks, you know, natural disasters, you name it. Republicans were on message every day, number one, promoting Trump every single day after the insurrection, no matter what he did, no matter what he said. They were on message all the time. And then they were on message, dividing the country, turning everything into a wedge issue, relentless, over and over and over again over the course of that three and a half, four year period. Now we know that when the Democratic Party, you know, is motivated to do something, they could do a pretty good job messaging because they sure as hell did a great job messaging. Attacking President Biden and continuing to attack him, who was a successful incumbent president, versus spending the time, I think, methodically, you know, to explain to the American people what was happening and that actually these metrics were good things. I mean, if you talk about, you.
- [15:01]
Jordy
Don'T think it was helpful to just attack your own incumbent successful president over and over and over and interesting.
- [15:07]
Ben
And attacking him for things that we now know post election that voters, you know, clearly don't mind. I mean, age, right. That didn't matter when it came to Trump, the ability to put coherent sentences together. I mean, the reality is President Biden was able to do that. He did a good job. He just, he stuttered occasionally and was slower on his feet. But Donald Trump's talking about eating cats and dogs. He's doing like simulating oral sex on microphones. I mean, he's out there cognitively glitching at each and every speech. But, you know, his people rallied behind him. And while they attacked Biden with those physical things and tried to be like, that's a weakness and that's this Democrats, a lot of the kind of Democrat consultant class, as you referred to them, Brett, was they like joined in to like bring down someone who was actually doing, you know, a very good, not.
- [16:05]
Ryan Reynolds
Even Democrats, Republicans who align themselves with Democrats who somehow got control of the Democratic messaging as a pro democracy community, just really cognizant going forward about who we let into our circles because really a lot of the uproar came from within. And it is disgusting to see at the time, it was called out at the time, but now here we are again and these people kind of continue to escape by. And they know who they are.
- [16:31]
Jordy
Well, when I want to be clear, though, I want to. Sorry, I just, I want to be clear as well. And, and just say, just say this. Vice President Harris, I think, ran a fantastic campaign. Yes, I think she did terrific. And, and I want to commend her and her entire team because they, they did an unbelievable job and they were facing incredible headwinds, including, you know, just these economic headwinds that are literally a global thing. And despite the fact that the United States was literally number one in the economy, when and if you look at that, you should Be like, oh, well, handling it the best in the world should probably get you something. Things like inflation and stuff have been a global issue that have ousted incumbent administrations now across like 100 of the time. So we have to acknowledge that. But I want to commend Vice President Harris on her campaign. Is there things that I believe that she could have done better? Yeah. Can we Monday morning quarterback? Of course we could do that. And I don't necessarily want to turn this episode entirely into a post, Mort, but I guess if one's going to be one, it's going to be this one. But. But we could get into that more as well. But I want to say she did a great job and certainly, you know, not. Not a good strategy to attack your own president and give lend legitimacy to these arguments on the other side that were, quite frankly, garbage. Just about all of them. Sorry, Ben.
- [17:53]
Ben
Well, it got to the point where Vice President Kamala Harris was stuck between a rock and a hard place when she's asked a question about the economy, right? If she were to say, hey, actually the Biden economy is doing pretty good right now, when you look at all of the objective criteria, even if she did a slight variation of that, because Biden's economy and Bidenomics and his infrastructure got literally almost no support from, as you say, the consultant class. And all it was, was attacked by the time she took over, you know, and was running her campaign and she was at the top of the ticket. You couldn't possibly now kind of restructure it to be like, actually, I'm.
- [18:34]
Jordy
Actually, the CHIPS act was an amazing thing. Actually. Actually the infrastructure act, really big deal, actually, the inflation reduction. And, you know, and she's, you know, she certainly, you know, said variations of, you know, the economy is getting better, but there's more to do. But frankly, here's one of the issues, and this is, I guess you'd call it a messaging issue or messenger issue maybe. But here's the thing. Democrats take nuanced positions because life is nuanced, right? I mean, I mean, issues are complicated and there's multiple sides to every issue. So if you're asked about the economy and you're like, you know, it's gotten better, but, you know, there's more to do because we could do it. And then the other side is using a sledgehammer on every issue, right? A sledgehammer going, build the wall, bomb them all. Worst economy ever. And just hammering those one line messages over and over and over again. And you're like, well, in fact, if you look at the analytics by Moody's and you look at this and that, and while it is heading in this direction, experts like, you've lost so much of the country at that point, chiseling your talking points. And by the way, and by the way, it's exactly why Democrats are better at governing. Right. Because they understand the nuance of these issues. But you have to figure out a way as well to, to send that to people. And, you know, like I said, I want to be emphatic about this because I think Vice President Harris ran an amazing campaign and probably couldn't have done much better. But there was, you know, certain opportunities, for example. And I'm not saying this would have changed the election because like I said, apparently there were these headwinds that were not being picked up by any of this data as well. And there was a sentiment out there, a very pro Trump sentiment across America that we have to confront and we, and we really got to deal with. But I remember distinctly there was a moment, you know, during one of the debates where, during the debate where I think it was a debate or maybe the town hall, whatever it was, Vice President Harris was asked about the economy. And her answer came from a place of the economy is bad. And this is what we're going to do to dig us out of this bad economy. What I wish answers like that were and what the messaging was, is like, listen, we inherited this disaster from Donald Trump, the word. I remember Obama saying this when he ran. Right. When he ran for reelection. Right. We inherited the worst economy since the Great Depression. I spent the past four years building it back and now our country is the best in the world. Can we do more? Yes. But our country is number one. And I'm going to do X, Y and Z in order to continue to improve it and continue to keep us as a global leader and ease prices up. She, don't get me wrong, they did a version of that, but it wasn't as they didn't offer that much of a defense of our current state. Because I think the, I've been talked to, you know, people have messaged me who are like, you know, the think tank people and say, here, here, you know, we've learned that this messaging moves voters point two or three points to the right point there. And I'm like, okay, I, I don't need to hear it. It's always, it's always B.S. i'm never going to listen to, you know, or hear any of that data ever again. But, but the things people would say would Be like, are sure you want to say the economy's good because you're going to offend a lot of people who don't feel like it's good and you don't want to piss off that group. And if you're not going to fight for your values, who the heck is going to fight for your values? If you're not going to defend your record, who is going to defend your record? All you've done is you've now created a vacuum where Donald Trump comes in and he goes, this is the worst economy ever. We're in a depression. We're in a depression. You have CNN going, we're in a depression. And that's, well, not we're in depression, but you have CNN going, you know, uneasiness about the economy, blah, blah, blah. And then people just obviously internalize all that because there's no counter message to that saying, you know what? Actually, actually things are like, pretty good. Like, could things be better? Or, you know, were egg prices too high last year when we had the bird flu? Can we pull this down? Is inflation still affecting us all our time, still difficult for people? Sure, sure, sure, sure. But we have to acknowledge those fundamental facts that things are actually pretty damn good. And we should be proud of that because, you know, for sure. And mark my words, save this episode, bookmark it. You know that day one, Donald Trump takes office, you know what he's going to say? This is the best economy anyone has ever seen in the entire world. This is the best. Look at the low interest rates from the Fed. I did that. Look at the roaring stock market. I did that. It's the same thing he did the first administration when he inherited Barack Obama's economy so he could keep that going until he starts implementing his policies and crashes things. But here's the thing, he's going to do that. And all those CNNs at Politicos and all those people, they're going to go, this is a great economy. Oh, this is the best. They're going to go right along with it. And you know damn well they're going to go right along with it. And they're not going to acknowledge that the reason for that economy is because of President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
- [23:21]
Ben
Well, abc, always be campaigning, not just for an election. Always be campaigning. Right. For three and a half years, Donald Trump was campaigning and running against Biden. When Biden wasn't running, Biden was running a country. He wasn't running for reelection. And so when the campaign geared off the framing of the campaigns were already kind of set based on someone who was always in a campaign mode. One of the things Obama did well is Obama messaged well. He's a great messenger. So Obama was out there each and every day. And he was, to your point, Brett, reminding people, remember, we inherited a depression or a recession. Remember that every day that message got out. And I think that there was a void and a vacuum that was, you know, left. And I think President Biden was very focused on, you know, being a gentleman. And, you know, I think he thought the rules of engagement or sometimes the rules of engagement were maybe what it was, you know, you know, 30 years ago or 40 years ago or 20 years ago. But every day there was a campaign being run against him and he was focused on we the people, not I, Joe Biden and my reelection. And there has to be, I think, a hybrid of both, you know, and I think that for right now, to go after Biden and to say, you know, he's the one who did this or he's whatever, look, he beat Donald Trump, okay? Like, let's be undisputed fact, he whooped Trump's ass in 2020, he got 81 million votes. So whatever the coalition Biden built, and again, I'm not saying what would have happened here or what would have happened there. It's. It's an unproductive exercise.
- [25:16]
Jordy
And by the way, Ben, I want to say this too, to add to that, that, you know, I'm going to say this in multiple ways. I won't. This isn't a complete and total sea change. This isn't a complete and total shift that every two years things change. Right? President Biden won in 2020. In 2022, there was supposed to be this red wave. It never materialized in 2024, this red wave. I mean, by all accounts, it is a red wave in 2024. We got to be honest about that. But if you remember when Donald Trump was elected in 2016, what happened in 2018, the Democrats took control of Congress in a sweep because people were pissed off about Donald Trump. So this country swings on a pendulum. And so if we get our butts out there and we are actually doing the work and messaging and, and figuring out how to form these coalitions and actually just being direct with people. No, you know, and, and are, and are working this and exposing all this, there's no reason why you can't have the same sort of pro democracy sweep in a couple of years. And the reason why I preface it with what I did, that all, you know, assumes a free and fair election process going forward. And that's something that is a separate concern that is tire is entirely warranted about what is Donald Trump actually going to do when he controls the levers of the federal government. But you know, that's why we need to ensure that we are lighting a fire under the people who are in government now, the various judges, lawyers around the country, because this is going to take a huge coalition of people, of lawyers, of politicians, of activists, of Midas mighty, of everybody to come together and make sure that all the horrific things that he wants to do are stopped in their tracks.
- [27:03]
Ben
Couldn't agree more with you. Let's take our first quick ad break of the day. Before showing you the ad break, I just want to remind you too, we have zero outside investors. So in this pro democracy movement, we are people funded, people powered and the ads go a long way to help. So I understand sometimes maybe people would love an ad free experience. But these are sponsors who have stood with our pro democracy content. And I want to give you at least the context between why we have these ads. These are products and things that we use and they help fund this network. And I think that's very important right now. And we're going against Fox, which is funded by $14.96 billion. We'll be right back.
- [27:47]
Jordy
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- [29:00]
Brett
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- [30:52]
Ryan Reynolds
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- [32:13]
Ben
You know, as we said, Brett, you said, like, look, sometimes the Democrats are so in the weeds on the details and the plans that we forget sometimes for voters, sometimes it's just a very kind of simple message. Like, I saw that there were voters who, and this was like a trend just googling whether or not President Biden was still on the ballot or not. Like, they were literally searching like one.
- [32:37]
Jordy
Of the biggest Google trends the day of the election was like, where's President Biden's name on the ballot? Like, people get so in the weeds and we're obviously so informed about things, things that to us, that's unfathomable. Right? Like, how in the world could you not know that all of this happened? But there are a large chunk of voters who genuinely do. And when you see the ballot and you're looking for names, you know, I guess there's a, it's, it's an indictment of our education system. But we got to acknowledge the reality.
- [33:06]
Ben
And we have to recognize, though, whether it's an indictment or not indictment of the education system, that there are voters out there that are getting information from certain sources that are skewing or persuading their understanding of things. The biggest of which we know is Fox, which is a $15 billion, you know, ship. What was Death Star? I was looking for the term, you know, that projects all of, you know, every single day with the Chirons. Like, if you're a Fox News watcher and they reach so many people, you've been trained over decades and now your kids are, if you're the Gen X, your Gen Z kids have been trained to literally view Democrats as an enemy from within. It's probably how Donald Trump even, you know, often uses that. That's how they've portrayed it now for 30 years. Every Chiron, when Vice President Kamala Harris was giving a speech that if you wanted to criticize it, it was too fill of hope. And optimism. It was all about like, let's unite, let's love, let's be love, like, let's hope, let's unite, let's do things great, let's build in the future. You know, not using any. She didn't say Donald Trump's name once in like the closing, you know, 72 hours or whatever. It didn't matter because the Fox Chiron said Vice President Kamala Harris a message of hate. And then other Chiron would say, vice President Kamala Harris is running a campaign based on fascism. Like, it would say that on the Chiron Fox would literally assemble fake town halls of Trump supporters who like Kim Jong Un, North Korea. Like, we would see those things and we would call them out. We were doing our best each and every day. But the message that it sends to people, you know, like this voter from Allegheny County, Deborah Jemierowski, I mean, she's asked, so she was a Biden voter in 2020 and she's asked why she voted for Donald Trump in 2024. And her response was one word. It was biblical. I'm making a biblical vote here. Play this clip.
- [35:18]
Jordy
I voted for Donald Trump and the reason I voted for him is because.
- [35:23]
Ryan Reynolds
Of his biblical values. I wanted a bit biblical.
- [35:26]
Jordy
I want to vote for a candidate most closely aligns with the Bible. Just everything that's been going on, the economy, inflation, immigration at the border.
- [35:39]
Ben
She's literally just saying words there and they're just the kind of right wing talking points. Biblical, immigration, inflation. Ironically, when you look at the shirt that she's wearing, it's a roofing company that will likely be adversely impacted by tariffs depending on where they get their supplies. So she says inflation. If there was a way to reach out to her or voter like this and say, hey, I'm not sure if you're wearing that shirt because, you know, you work at that company or someone in your family works at that company. But like, you do realize that you're going to be screwed with these plans, right? Like, you realize that inflation's under control. But a $2,000 tariff could mean a $2,000. I mean, a $2,000 increase on your taxes or a 2,000% increase in those supplies in order to counteract the tariff and what that means. So you have to realize, like, how do you reach that voter? Look, 75,000 voters, instead of writing the name of a president, did a write in for the name Haktua, which is a reference to oral sex by, you know, a lady who went viral on TikTok, who now has a podcast called talk to 75,000 counted votes. People wrote Haktua. And as a result, their reproductive rights and freedoms are likely to be kind of taken away because of, As a.
- [37:15]
Jordy
Result, you may not, you know, you may not be able to talk to.
- [37:19]
Ben
Well, you know, look, I, but, but I think it is important, you know, that, you know, that Democrats do realize that obviously a podcast like, like talk to or whatever has significant influence and to engage people and audiences where they're watching certain things. And I know, you know, Democrats in the pro democracy movement, you know, may not want to move in certain of those spaces. Well, then, okay, but then we got to build our own spaces. You know, I think Democrats more frequently. I mean, I remember Brett for the past four years when we were building this platform for over, you know, four years, you know, one of the reasons also, you know, for not having outside investors is one, we pursued our own path. But number two, it's not even something that Democrats look at like, there's no even market for. Let's help build pro Democracy Podcast.
- [38:17]
Jordy
Not just like this, by the way.
- [38:19]
Ryan Reynolds
By the way, I just want to make it clear we're not, we're not even going after the Talk to a podcast.
- [38:23]
Ben
That's fine.
- [38:24]
Ryan Reynolds
You know, let that. It's. We're just, it's a larger indictment of the vacuum in the medium in general that 75,000 people voted, talked to or whatever, whatever, you know, whatever, instead of voting for a candidate because of that total closing my eyes to this digital.
- [38:39]
Jordy
It's a good point. And he also got to. I would assume, and I, and I haven't read that articles, and I don't know if they have the data on this, but I would assume that Most of those 75,000 were also like Gen Z. Gen Z.
- [38:50]
Ben
Right.
- [38:51]
Jordy
Would be my guess. And then this is something you've certainly been sounding the alarm on for a while and, and something we've talked about a lot on the show. And the reason we've talked a lot about on the. Is because we got some Gen Z folks on the staff who have been warning us about this now for what, the past few years. And they've been saying, yo, there's an infiltration happening right now with my generation. Because all they're listening to is they're listening to Rogan and they're listening to, you know, these comedians who. And by the way, a lot of these shows are apolitical shows, a lot of them, which they have politicians on, but they have certain framing and stuff. And then they're also visited often by guests who are from the Republican Party, and then they get exposed to these ideas. So it's like, oh, this is my favorite comedian. I love, you know, he's unfiltered, he's politically incorrect. I love, you know, this, this. This dude's awesome. Next thing you know, you got J.D. vance going on the podcast. And I've had, you know, friends, my best friends, like, you know, listen to all these shows personally. And, and even. Even they made comments to me saying, and. And they, they're smart enough. They weren't brainwashed by it or anything, but they were like, you know what? Like, J.D. vance actually came off pretty good on the, you know, when he was on with Theo Vaughn. Like, I listened to that episode and, you know, and I think it countered a lot of kind of the perceptions out there about him. And I've heard that from multiple people that when people, when, when these people went on these shows, it gave a perspective into these individuals because they're speaking sometimes for an hour, sometimes for like three and a half hours, unfiltered on a podcast and with a figure who they trust as an arbiter of here's what I'm into. And that affects people. I mean, it's a very intimate experience. I'm sure you all know, because you're listening to us here, that listening to a podcast, watching a show, people you like, it's a very shared, intimate experience in many ways. And then when you're engaged in that experience and then you're gradually pulled into, oh, Donald Trump came on to Joe Rogan. Donald Trump came on to this podcast. J.D. vance is speaking with this guy for a while. That's why our staff was like, you know, a lot of the, especially the guys, the guys who I'm friends with, they're all listening to this stuff, and they've been kind of brainwashed into thinking, you know, it's. It's lame to be, you know, support Kamala. It's lame to support a Democrat. And, and by the way, they also said, you know what? You put the values, the policies, you put all of that in front of them in a blind test. And you said, which of these do you prefer? What are they going to choose every single time. They're going to choose every single time. Those value, like the Democratic values. They actually support the Democratic policies. They actually don't like the reproductive freedom bans. They actually don't like all the stuff that the Republicans are offering. But they have these messengers, and it's easy to. If you're losing the culture, which quite frankly, over the past few years, I think Democrats have lost the culture. When you lose the culture, you lose people. Not even on a specific policy basis, or this moves people in this data point and that data point minus three, minus two, whatever, all that stuff means, you're losing the bigger picture. And, and that's what we're seeing with all these organizations. Whether we're talking about, whether we're talking about a Charlie Kirk or, you know, someone less political like a Theo Vaughn or a Joe Rogan or something, you, that, that's what you're seeing. And so, you know, what is exactly the answer to that? You know, I don't necessarily have it right now, but it's certainly not avoiding this new medium. Right.
- [42:18]
Ben
That the answer.
- [42:20]
Jordy
Many people.
- [42:21]
Ryan Reynolds
Yeah, well, Brett, part of the answer is never ceding any ground and continuing to explore and advance in territories where you don't exist. And I'm specifically talking about the digital space medium. That's why, you know, so confidently we could get up here every single day going forward and tell you guys that we are not going anywhere, that we're going to double down on truth and this pro democracy community because we need this now more than ever. All of us do, this entire community, because strength in numbers, folks. And that's why it's just so important to, you know, never give up and never ced any ground. You guys remember when there was that whole, you know, spot like cancel Spotify movement and a lot of, a lot of pro democracy voices had then left the platform for that and look, to each their own. But in my personal opinion, you never seed ground because the second that you stop being a voice on one of these platforms and Instagram, a Spotify, YouTube, wherever, you know, wherever you could show up, you're just giving people territory to now own the space and own the talking points for people that exist and live on those platforms.
- [43:18]
Jordy
By the way, can I be kind of extremely candid about this and unfiltered about this for a second? So like you said, the Joe Rogan and the Spotify, there was this big mission to cancel Spotify, right? What was our perspective during that entire time, by the way? We ended up taking a lot of shit. And what was our perspective the entire time? We said, here's the thing, should they cancel these shows? I don't think so. Should we compete and try to be bigger and better than all these shows? Absolutely. Let's win that war. Let's fight those battles. That was what we wanted. It ended up resulting in everybody attack. I'm not even talking about, like, people on our side, ever, on all sides, you know, viewed that as a threat, I guess, and then started attacking us and acted like we were doing the opposite, but we were like, we need to get into those spaces. We need to be doing exactly that. And I stand by it. And we still need to be doing exactly that. And we still need to be fighting. And we still need to be fighting for ways to spread pro democracy messages, and not only spreading them, but doing it in a way that connects with folks, that could resonate with folks, that has the right messengers, the right way to. The right way to speak. Because truthfully, a lot of it, I think, personally, I think a lot of it is even about the specifics, you know, and I think that's how you get, like, randomly, you'll get like a Bernie Sanders supporter who now supports Trump. And that's like, how. These are two fundamentally different ideas. How could you do that? Because there is a lure to certain ways of messaging things, I think that can connect with people. And I'm not saying to be like that at all, but I'm saying you have to understand how to penetrate through this media environment. You have to understand how to be direct with people. And there are ways. There are outlets out there. They just need to stop being ignored. And this community, Midas Touch, all of you, you play a big role in this. This is the time right now to build. I'm. I'll steal after. Build, baby, build. That's what we got to be doing right now here on the Midas Touch network. That is our mission, and we're going to continue with it.
- [45:07]
Ryan Reynolds
Subscribe to the YouTube if you haven't yet.
- [45:09]
Ben
Yeah, subscribe to. I mean, look, as you said, in the past 90 days, this platform has gotten 1 billion views. I mean, on the YouTube charts, we're often number one, beating, like, Netflix and the NBA or mlb, like, during playoff time. And, you know, to your point, you know, you know, Jordy and Brett, you know, very rarely has, if ever, you know, was anyone like, you know, saying, well, like, I think we need to build more things like that. And look there, whether you like this show, you like this network or not, you would still think that, wait a minute, you're doing a billion views every 90 days, and there's this massive, motivated community out there. You know, maybe, just maybe, you know, you know, y'all are onto something. And what we're on to, something, though, is still that our message. And I vote you've always heard me say this Midas mighty. I'm like, I don't think about this show so much as a political show, although we confront political issues all the time. As a show about humanity and decency and treating human beings the way we should all want to be treated with love, respect and dignity and saying that I think that that's an alpha thing to do is to treat people right or just a basic human decency thing to do. We got a lot more show, a lot more to discuss. Let's take our last ad break of the show.
- [46:33]
Jordy
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- [48:30]
Ryan Reynolds
I recently gave my father in law MD hearing aids and I saw him over the holidays. He was hearing me so much better. This podcast is sponsored by MDHearing. MDHearing is an FDA registered rechargeable hearing aid that costs a fraction of what typical hearing aids cost. MDHearing's neo model costs over 90% less than clinic hearing aids. The NEO fits inside your ear so no one will even know that it's there. Plus, MDHearing just launched the Neo XS, MDHearing's smallest hearing aid ever. MDHearing recently cut their price in half. That means you can get high quality rechargeable digital hearing AIDS for only $297 a pair. My father in law has been so much more engaged with our conversations now that he has the MD hearing aids. He's way more vocal in a positive way and it's really brought the family together. He's been using MD hearing aids for a while now and he swears by them. MD hearing is just as good as premium quality hearing aids. $297 for a pair of hearing aids. This this good is crazy. Edward S. Calls MDhearing the best hearing aid I have used at any price. Robert P. In Texas said these are the best hearing aids that you can buy. Simple to use, durable, and better than hearing AIDS that cost 10 times as much. MDHearing was founded by an ENT surgeon who saw how many of his patients needed hearing aids but couldn't afford them. He made it his mission to develop a quality hearing aid that anyone could afford. MDHearing has sold over 1.9 million hearing aids and they offer a 45 day risk free trial with a 100% money back guarantee so you can buy with confidence. Still on the fence about mdhearing? Well, they were just selected to be the hearing aid supplier for top Medicare Advantage plans. So they're a brand that you can trust this holiday season. Get the hearing you deserve with mDhearing. Go to shop mDhearing.com and use promo code MIDAS to get a pair of hearing AIDS for just $297. Plus they're adding a free extra charging case a $100 value just for listeners of the Midas touch podcast. That's shopmdhearing.com and use our promo code MIDAS and get a pair of hearing AIDS for just $297. Shout out to our pro democracy sponsors. Brett One Skin. Your skin looks as good as it's ever looked, my man. And then Maryland hearing aid. So my uncle the my so My wife's uncle is using it, our uncle's now using it and my father in law is using them. So MD hearing like 5 stars from the Mycellus family, check them out.
- [51:06]
Ben
Look, we know that the implications of this election are not theoretical for we the people or from you who are watching this at home, you know, particularly to marginalized communities and women. That's why our commitment right now is more than ever that we're going to use this platform to do everything we can to resist the fascist encroachment that we can. We approach this clear eyed. You know, we approach this with solemnity and with an understanding of the serious threats that are out there. And we're going to use this platform to resist, to protect our institutions, to protect our democracy and to continue to grow this platform generationally the way that Fox did, except they did for bad. We're trying to do it for pro democracy. And that means there are going to be setbacks. That means there are going to be big setbacks sometimes. But we're not in the business of giving up. We're not in the business of looking back and pointing fingers and whining. We are in the business of moving forward, of being leaders, of respecting this community and the rights and the freedoms of this community, of being very sensitive to the moment, being very sensitive to your fears and your concerns and being with you each and every step of the way. You are family to us. This is this community. And what we've grown to be together is like a big family. And while sometimes, whether it's on a Patreon, I get to see your faces, oftentimes I don't get to see, you know, your, you know, all of your faces. But sometimes you'll see me at an airport or you'll see me at a stadium or you'll see me getting a cup of coffee at Starbucks or wherever I'm at getting coffee. Although the coffee machine's not working at my Starbucks. How does the coffee machine not work at a Starbucks, by the way? But that's a. Yeah, that's like, should.
- [53:25]
Jordy
We, should we do a show for.
- [53:27]
Ben
Like a week that the coffee's not working? You know, I'm like, okay, well what.
- [53:31]
Ryan Reynolds
Do they serve for a week?
- [53:32]
Ben
Over a week?
- [53:33]
Ryan Reynolds
Why you still go? Why are you still going back?
- [53:35]
Jordy
That would, that would seem like priority number one at the coffee shop.
- [53:37]
Ben
Because I keep showing up to see if the coffee.
- [53:40]
Ryan Reynolds
Because now you're so you're committed, you're committed to the bit now you have to just keep showing up I end.
- [53:45]
Ben
Up going to Panera to get the coffee, but I always start at the Starbucks.
- [53:48]
Ryan Reynolds
But I thought you were a tea guy.
- [53:50]
Ben
I, I've been coffee for about the last nine months.
- [53:54]
Ryan Reynolds
Oh, excuse me.
- [53:55]
Jordy
No, no, no. Nobody informed us. But that's, that's why I make my coffee at home with trade.
- [53:59]
Ben
But, but, but as the point is, as I see, as I see you all, I know, I feel I want to do whatever I can in my power to be helpful and to be a, and to be a voice of empowerment, but just whatever I could help, you know, just to help, you know, And I see a lot going on right now in social media spaces, though you know, of words, and you may disagree with me, and it's okay if you disagree with me, but I see words to the effect of, okay, well, you know, if you voted against your interest and now, you know, your relative or loved one gets deported in a bloody deportation, I'm not going to help you. Or, you know, if, if you are, you know, if you voted against your interest and now you want to protest, we're not going to protest with you. Or, or, you know, or we'll call ICE on your family and tell them. My own view is that that's not protected, that's not productive, that's not in my core, it's not in my soul, it's not in my DNA and my fabric to feel that way. I can try to persuade you not to feel that way, but your feelings are your feelings. I'm just going to let you know that for me, even if for some reason you voted to deport your own relatives, which I'll never understand, it is, as a civil rights litigator, which I was before quitting that to become full time here, I didn't care. I didn't even know if the person was a Democrat or a Republican or whoever.
- [55:47]
Jordy
Right.
- [55:47]
Ben
Like, I was representing families who lost loved ones, often at the hands of the government and in different cities and counties across the country. And I was by their side to be helpful against encroachment, against their freedoms, when the government would kill family members or engage in excessive force. And so it has always been my platform and my priority to be a helpful voice. And so I'm going to continue on in that journey regardless of what the vote was or whatever. Like, we have to be a check on fascism, period. Full stop here. And I want to show you some of the leaders who have been, who have been stepping up right now. Congress member Eric Swalwell has been a voice of leadership Right now, here is Congressman Swalwell earlier today when I interviewed him. Here, play this clip. So Congress member, not the result that people wanted. I'm telling our audience, though, now is not the time to give up, not the time to give up hope. Now is the time to get to work. You put out a message today to that effect. What's your message to everybody out there?
- [56:59]
Eric Swalwell
Yeah, let's get loud and let's get going. Because if a young woman in Florida, where a six week ban is now the law of the land, can get up today and find her way through, we can, too. And if a soldier in a trench in eastern Ukraine who just saw their best ally walk away from them can keep fighting, we can, too. And if a high school student who's going to go to school today in a country that's going to arm mass shooters to the teeth and they're still going to get through it, we can, too. It doesn't feel good to lose. It sucks. I hate it. I hate what this winner says about our country and the people who make it so great. But we have work to do. We've dealt with this guy before. He's a one term president coming in. He's in serious cognitive decline. We're not helpless. We are privileged to be among those who can do something. And by the way, there's no time to, you know, mourn or grieve for too long because the next play is going to happen pretty soon when he starts to nominate all of the cabinet officials who will implement Trump's Project 2025. And so we got to be loud. We have to get in front of all of the senators who are going to be voting on this and make our cases to them as to why people like Rick Grinnell and Cash Patel and all these others in the Rogues gallery cannot be in charge of our country. Why our kids need vaccines and we're not going to let RFK Jr. As the health secretary take them away. So there's a lot of plays coming down the field and so we should, you know, be upset, but let's put our helmets on, get back on the field and defend, you know, the yardage between US and Project 2025 becoming the law of the land.
- [58:46]
Ben
Here's Governor Pritzker of Illinois. Let's play this clip.
- [58:49]
J.B. Pritzker
I'm thinking a lot today about my mother. For most of my life, I've been involved in public policy and Democratic political campaigns as a volunteer, as a supporter, as a candidate. And that's most especially because of my mother. When I was just a little kid. I was conscripted by her to stuff political flyers into envelopes while my old brother and sister addressed and stamped them. We watched as Sue Pritzker organized political campaigns out of our living room at a time when women weren't even allowed to have credit cards Without a male co signer, I think about how she supported causes for women's rights, for gay rights, for civil rights back when it must have seemed like the pace of change was heartbreakingly slow. The memory of my mother has helped to give me some understanding that the hope that American women have for our country is not a new manifestation, but an old inheritance. It has been nurtured and cared for over generations, passed down with the kind of persistence that you need to continue putting logs on a fire you may not get to see lit in your lifetime. I know that there are a lot of women out there this week, especially young women, asking themselves if they will ever get to see a female president. And to them, I want to say, I too am tired of having to explain to my daughter and to my son too, that eventually the time will come, but not now. Yet here we are again.
- [60:40]
Ben
Powerful words. And then he made a post that said, well, I'm surprised by Tuesday results. I wasn't unprepared. The General assembly and I have protected Illinois from the damage Trump may attempt to cause. We've enshrined reproductive rights, built a path to clean energy, future reaffirmed labor rights, invested in tech and more. And he says while chaos, retribution and disarray that radiated from the past, Trump White House may be different this time. If it isn't, Illinois remains a place of stability and competent governance. No matter the storm we face, you'll be welcome, safe and protected here. Those are very powerful words from a Democratic governor, letting people know that we're prepared to protect you and fight back. If Trump is going to do the retribution that he says he's going to do, same thing with Gavin Newsom. He goes california is ready to fight. I just called an emergency special session to help bolster our legal resources and protect our state against any unlawful actions by the incoming Trump administration, whether it be our fundamental civil rights, reproductive freedom, or climate action. We refuse to turn back the clock and allow our values and laws to be attacked. So I leave everybody with this. That's along the lines of what we're prepared to do here. We were certainly looking forward to the opportunity to report on moving forward, moving beyond these Trump years and the hate and division and the chaos and the retribution but we weren't unprepared. We're very prepared with how to handle it. We've built an infrastructure that will handle it, and we will be on the front lines each and every single day. We need your help. I certainly understand and feel, as Brett and Jordi said earlier, a desire to just sometimes turn all of this off and look away from all of this. But I'll say this, and as Jordi said, you will ultimately, how you deal with it. We're not going to judge, deal with this how you're going to deal with it, but I want you to know that you're a part of a community that supports you. We support you. We'll be here with you. And we've built a community to be supportive of each other and to help each other get through difficult and dark times and to ultimately come out ahead. And that's what I look forward to. I look forward to knowing that at the end of this tunnel, there will be light. We will be through this. We will weather this through, get together, and we're in this together. And we will be here with you every step of the way. So please, if you haven't subscribed to this YouTube channel, go to midasplus.com that helps a lot as well. Go to patreon.com Midas Touch. We will be holding a live Zoom soon or a live Zoom meeting there. And again, from the bottom of our hearts, from Brett, Jordy, and myself, we love you. We're grateful for you. We're privileged and honored to be by your side here, and we will see you soon. Thank you all so much. God bless you. God bless our troops, God bless our country, God bless our democracy. And thank you. Thank you, thank you.
- [64:12]
Ryan Reynolds
Shout out to the Midas mighty. Hey, Midas mighty. Love this report. Continue the conversation by following us on Instagram at Midas Touch to keep up with the most important news of the day. What are you waiting for? Follow us now.