MeidasTouch Full Podcast - 2/27/26

27:10now they take over Warner Brothers. They're going to run that a certain way as well. And you may be saying, doesn't this violate antitrust law? Aren't there issues about one company now controlling almost all of the media? How could it possibly be that they control Paramount, CBS, and now Warner Brothers, they're going to own it all? Well, the antitrust department at the Department of Justice really doesn't exist anymore. I mean, it's pretty much been gutted. And the head of the antitrust division at the DOJ and the number two are gone. And corporations said, we don't want the antitrust division to really exist.

27:54We want to be able to engage in these types of things. And it's interesting because you may remember in 2024 at, you know, I'm trying to think of where that conference, there was a conference and David Zasloff, who owns the Warner Brothers, was out there and he was asked in 2024 about Trump or Biden. I think this was before Biden left the race. And he said, well, one of the reasons that he liked Trump a lot was the idea of kind of these massive consolidations. And he thought that that would be, you know, helpful and mergers and acquisitions. And meanwhile, I pointed out that Zaslav basically got his job during a merger and acquisition of involving Paramount.

28:38I'm sorry, involving Warner Brothers and Discovery during the time when Biden was in office, but he was never able to actually successfully execute the business once he made the merger. Like he did the Warner Brothers Discovery merger, then he came in from the Discovery side, basically ran the company during Biden's term. And then now that entity should succeed. It should be competitive, right? It should do all the things he wanted. But now it's just going to sell that over and create this monopoly with Paramount, which is, I think, not a helpful thing. And by the way, it's not just the DOJ antitrust divisions that's been dismantled.

29:19The anti-sex trafficking division of the DOJ has basically been dismantled. Their division that goes after crypto has been dismantled. The civil rights division has been dismantled. The DOJ has been utterly gutted at this point.

29:37The MeidasTouch Brothers:To be fair, Ben, the Civil Rights Division, they view their priority as the biggest thing is racism against white people is the current position of the Civil Rights Division with Trump. And I just want to emphasize how big of a deal that this merger is, this acquisition is, because now you're having a Trump lackey who's going to be owning Warner Brothers Discovery, which owns CNN and owns so many other properties, right? This is the whole Barry Weiss situation with CBS, same company, same owners. And this, to me, reeks of all the issues we have with kind of oligarchy, this right-wing oligarchy taking over this media, this media capture.

30:19The MeidasTouch Brothers:And we see here, just the other night, guess who was Lindsey Graham's special guest at the State of the Union? It was Ellison. It was David Ellison, the son of Larry Ellison, David Ellison, who was the chairman and CEO of Paramount. I mean, this is the kind of stuff that we see in Russia. This happens. We know that Trump is pushing for this deal to happen because it's also going to give the Trump administration a lot of control over the media right here now that his buddy is in control of it. He's got his buddy in control of Ellison now is in control of TikTok. He's in control of this. He's in control of CBS.

30:49The MeidasTouch Brothers:There's so much power now given to this one company. And think about everyone now, us, everyone who's competing now with these massive, massive, massive conglomerates out there that control the media. I mean, you know, I don't underestimate this, I think is what I want to say. It reminds me a little bit, but probably on a far bigger scale even of when like Elon Musk took on, you know, took over Twitter and people were like, ah, don't be fearful. Everything will be fine. It'll be the same app. No, we saw what he did there. He purged dissenting voices. And we've already seen what Ellison has done with shows like the Colbert show, you know, when they took over CBS, Colbert's not going to have a show soon.

31:28The MeidasTouch Brothers:That's because of them. I think you're going to see a lot more of that. And we've already heard stories about the Trump administration saying, if this deal happens, there were kind of these backroom conversations happening. I don't know what has come of those, but saying, if this, you know, if we're able to make this deal happen, then I don't want to see this host be on CNN anymore. I don't want to see this host be on the show anymore. And I think you're going to see a lot of that behind the scenes because that's how these oligarchs work. That's how this corrupt administration works. They don't care about actual capitalism and actual competition in media.

32:02The MeidasTouch Brothers:They want to try to just own the airwaves and spread their propaganda as best as they can. And so this is one of those issues that may not seem entirely political on its face. It may seem like an entertainment issue, but this is incredibly intertwined with our politics and with the way people are going to be consuming media. So I think it's incredibly important. Remember, they had already accepted Netflix's bid, Warner Brothers Discovery. They had accepted Netflix's bid. It seemed like that was going to be the thing, but we knew the Trump regime didn't want it to go through. We then saw that Paramount launched this hostile takeover attempt, and they've been successful.

32:40The MeidasTouch Brothers:They ultimately were able to pitch an offer that was a superior offer to what Netflix did. And at the end of the day, whatever is going to give the most value to shareholders is what Paramount is going to do. They gave Netflix about four days or so to give a counter proposal. And then Netflix said, we can't match that. The numbers are too high. And so there you have it. This is going to have major ramifications. And I think it's just important that we follow this story and understand what's happening. I know it's something we've talked about so much, these right-wing oligarchs and what they've been doing with the Trump administration to try to get their messaging out.

33:20The MeidasTouch Brothers:And this is just the latest example. With that, let's take our first quick break of the show. A reminder, make sure you subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers. I got to make sure I remember that and stop saying six at the end of the episodes that I do. How many times have you said six this week? A couple? About six times. Then also make sure you subscribe to the Midas Touch on audio, wherever you get your audio podcasts and leave a five-star review. It's super helpful when you leave reviews and you subscribe both on audio and video. So audio listeners, subscribe on video. Video watchers, subscribe on audio.

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37:38The MeidasTouch Brothers:Let's cook with Hexclad's revolutionary cookware.

37:45Let's go. Shout out to our sponsors. Links in description of both the audio and the video. Use the links, use the codes. If there's an exit survey, let them know we sent you. Brett, you are the superior brother at reading the ads. I'm just going to say that hex clad read me, it was like Oscar winning. Also, I like that you showed your pan during the read. Whoever says, you can't ever knock us for not using the products. That hex clad that you showed during the read, Brett, you're using that every day.

38:13The MeidasTouch Brothers:I do get excited to cook with the hex clad. I'm not going to lie about it. I won't waste too much time. The last thing I'll say, I know Ben loves when we talk about this stuff, is what? You do. You love when we talk about this. Absolutely. I'm the superior brother. The superior brother. The ad reads. The ad reads. No, I'm not saying that I think I'm superior. I'm just saying it's a funny thing. You hurt Ben's feelings now. I was trying to give him a compliment. Anyway, great read. You kind of threw me off. Now I feel bad. I'm going to be thinking about this all night. Probably going to keep me up.

38:41Benji, where to be next? Okay. I want to cover one more thing as it relates right now to the Epstein files, the World Economic Forum CEO and President Borg Bren from Norway. He also was a foreign minister of Norway before taking over the World Economic Forum. He announced that he's stepping down from the World Economic Forum leadership role after an independent investigation was launched into his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. He previously said he had no relationship with Epstein. Then he showed up in the files. Then he said he didn't know about Epstein's criminal prosecutions in the past.

39:21But then in the files, he and Epstein were doing emojis regarding Epstein's past criminal convictions for raping minors, which he actually pled to child prostitution, which is raping minors. And you probably remember Borge Brend from Midas videos. He was the guy interviewing Donald Trump at Davos. Do you remember that? The World Economic Forum, they're the ones who put on Davos, right? The Davos conference. And so he was the guy who said, it's a pleasure to welcome Donald Trump back to Davos at a time of significant economic, technological, and geopolitical change. And this guy, Borge Bend, he was part of the whole Steve Bannon crew, global disruption, and trying to frame it as order while this Epstein class was preying on people throughout the entire world.

40:19Up is down, down is up. That's the potent force of propaganda, right? And just give you an example of it. Today, you had J.D. Vance speaking in Wisconsin and quite literally all the things the Trump regime does, they accuse the other side of doing, right? And so J.D. Vance in the speech just says, you know what? What we have to avoid at all costs is government with bad policy and bad leadership that destroys the American dream. Here's what he said. Play this clip. I'm talking about your American dream. Whether you want to have a good job and raise a healthy, happy family, whether your kid wants to go off and play college football, whether you want to start a business like the one that we're standing in, whatever it is, the great thing about this country is that the American dream comes in many shapes and sizes.

41:13But here's the thing about the American dream. The government cannot give it to you for you, but the government with bad policy and bad leadership, it can destroy that American dream, whatever shape it takes in the lives of you and your children. Like zero self-awareness. I mean, it is -

41:31The MeidasTouch Brothers:We have psychological studies on these people, right? Like, I mean, there has to be deep studies about psychological projection and everybody involved in this entire MAGA movement. How would they even do it? Like, I'm not suggesting it's a good skill by any imagination, but it is impressive that they literally could go up there and say stuff like that. Like, they're soulless creatures. They have been. They have no shame. How you could – like just the physical ability to go up there and not have like something in you be like, right? Like how is it even achieved? I mean, these are, to your point, Jordi, I mean, these are soulless monsters, Epstein class, predators who hate people.

42:20And they're so able to mutate into these fake personalities to just steal and harvest and take and be these predators. I mean, here he goes. When you go to the polls in November, I just want you to remember who's trying to defraud you. who's trying to protect you from the fraudsters. J.D. Vance is saying that they're trying to protect the people from the fraudsters. Here, play this clip. ...the generosity of spirit. And so I want you, when you go to the polls in November, I don't want you to just think about all the great things that we've accomplished, all the great things that we've talked about.

42:58I don't want you just to think about no taxes on tips and lower gas prices. I want you to think, who is going to protect my money from fraudsters? And the simple answer is it's Derek Van Orden and congressional Republicans. It is not the Democrats who created this problem to begin with. What was even going on there? When you think about all the great things we've accomplished, I mean, he's at a manufacturing plant and manufacturing is down. We're in a jobs recession right now. Inflation is surging again right now. Our fourth quarter GDP grew at only 1.4 % when they were saying it was going to be 3 % to 5%.

43:38These aren't good data points right now. And setting aside those data points, American families are struggling right now. People can't afford their rent. They can't afford home. Future generations don't have hope in the future right now. But he goes, I don't want you just to think about the incredible things we've done for you. Like, Like what? What have you actually done? Nothing. You've taken, you've stolen, you've ripped to shreds things. But I want you to think about who's going to protect you from that fraud. You're the fraudsters. You're the people who have pardoned the fraudsters, the drug traffickers.

44:14You're the people who have covered up the sex traffickers. Frankly, the pedo protection ring is right there. The cabal is right there in the Oval Office. You've torn to shreds our alliances. Donald Trump is out there enriching himself to the tune of billions of dollars, giving away our classified technology, semiconductor technology to the UAE and others in exchange for hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars to him personally. That's what you're saying.

44:46The MeidasTouch Brothers:Here's the issue, though, right? Here's the issue. It's that there is a subsect of people in this country who are inclined to believe what people are telling them. if they have some sort of positive view towards them. So, for example, there was a moment the other night after the State of the Union that hurt me. You know what I'm going to say, right? Yeah. And so there was this moment where CNN did like this focus group after the fact about the State of the Union, and they were asking swing voters, so what did you think of the speech? Did the speech move you? Somebody hand up. The speech moved me.

45:21So they said, okay, well, what moved you about the speech?

45:26The MeidasTouch Brothers:It was in a moving speech by Donald Trump. It's quite the opposite. And the person goes, he said 18 trillion in investments. He said healthcare. He said something about healthcare. He said something about healthcare. Yeah, he's taken away your healthcare, and the 18 trillion in investments is made up. It's bullshit. It's a lie. So it's great that he said numbers. I could say, I did a zillion bajillion dollars in investments. But at a certain point, people need to take responsibility, and they need to have critical thinking skills, and they need to understand this stuff. But that is exactly – it goes back to our point, though, about this kind of hostile takeover with Ellison and Parama.

46:06The MeidasTouch Brothers:It's why they won't – it's why it's so important for them to control TikTok and why it's so important for them to control CBS. It's important for them to control the way people are getting information, because when Donald Trump is up there in the State of the Union, the one thing that doesn't exist does not. And this is why we didn't air Donald Trump speech live. The one thing that doesn't exist is a counter. Right. There's no one saying 18 trillion. Hold up. That's bullshit. You know, that that's a lie. Hold on. You're talking about health care. Well, you refuse to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies.

46:39The MeidasTouch Brothers:And now people are suffering and going bankrupt because of it. So don't you dare talk about health care. Where's your healthcare plan? You said two weeks, 10 years ago. There's nobody to counter that stuff. And that works to the benefit of those in power who want to lie to you. So when I saw that, it was just such a kind of microcosm of the information environment that we're in. And it caused me internal physical pain to hear this guy who was probably a well-intentioned person, right? Probably thinks highly of the country. I assume the best of people, right? But he's able to just buy these just incredibly obvious lies that are being told by the President of the United States.

47:20Well, we have to, to your point exactly, get to a point in this country where accountability and truth matter. Like actually, actually, actually matter. It's the double-edged sword to what I always say, because I want to give people the benefit of the doubt a lot. Because I believe in people. I believe in the American people. I believe in people. And so when there's a trillion dollar propaganda arm just consistently and constantly spewing disinformation in your head, I could see how you could be susceptible to the lies. But then on the other side of the coin, to your point again, Brett, critical thinking is so important.

48:01And I think we really have to hold people and our fellow Americans to standards to be able to critically think for themselves and not just spew the regime talking points because you were duped. Why? Because the other half of the country isn't duped. The other half of the country is able to critically think and understand this and be frustrated with the lies. And so watching that, whenever they have the quote unquote swing voters, which I'm not even sure if they are actually swing voters or just MAGA in disguise for the segment, but that's neither here nor there. It pains me to see their reaction just to kind of see where, you know, where the other side of the country's minds are at.

48:44Because again, you're being lied to actively by people who do not have your best interests at heart, who people -

48:52The MeidasTouch Brothers:You just reminded me to remember when our researchers last time during the election, they did the whole swing voter thing and researchers just, yeah, during election, they looked up the swing voter who they presented to the public as, this is an undecided voter. And like all of the person's Facebook and Instagram was all pro-Trump shit, all pro-Trump memes. And we're like, this is your swing vote. This is your undecided voter. CNN. CNN. This isn't Fox even. This is CNN. That's how bad it is now. You know, just wait till, you know. How about billionaire Kelly Loeffler was speaking at that event as well with J.D.

49:27Vance. Looting Loeffler? Looting Loeffler. Kelly Loeffler. She now runs this whole. They picked the billionaire right-wing oligarch to run the small business association, right? It's like when they pick that Casey Means to be the surgeon general who hates surgeon generals, right? They picked the guy to run the EPA who hates the environment. The guy who hates the environment. The guy who wants to shut down education. Yeah, you see a theme? The Department of Education was Shutdown Education, the guy who hates health and kills people and talks about sniffing cocaine off of toilet bowls to run the health department.

50:05You've got the guy who couldn't run a military nonprofit and was forced out after all of his personal issues to run the defense department, and they change it and call it the Department of War unlawfully. You've got the guy to run Medicaid and Medicare services, who was, in my opinion, a scam artist, talk show host. You know, you I mean, I could pretty much go through. You've got the Christine Ome kills her dog, you know, to to run ice and border patrol. You've got, you know, you just just name the position. That one feels a little more on brand for for for that, for those. That's true. It's probably the right answer for ice and border patrol.

50:42Anyway, you have here's what here's what Kelly Loeffler had to say about that. Donald Trump and J.D. Vance, you know, they're they're they're from the real world. They understand your struggles. They're like you. Here, play this clip. The Trump administration knows that there's nothing small about small business. In fact, President Trump tells me all the time, Kelly, small business is big business. And it's true. Friends, this administration gets it. both President Trump and Vice President Vance lived and worked in the real world. And that's why Main Street is coming back. Friends, friends, let me tell you, Donald Trump tells friends every day that small business is big business.

51:27Friends, friends, really Donald Trump who screwed over small businesses his entire life. Friends, let me tell you, friends. It reminds me of a clip I remember when she was running. She used the, she said y 'all like six times in like a 30 second clip. She's just so phony. They're all, they're so funny. And just to clarify, when you said real world, I just, like, it has to be said. Ben doesn't actually mean like real, real world road rules like Sean Duffy. So just, just, just to clarify, because that's who the Trump cabinet, they're a bunch of -

51:55The MeidasTouch Brothers:You have to clarify with this regime because there, because there are people who they pulled from the real world road rules challenge on MTV's reality show into the administration. That is true. All right. Let's take our last quick break of the show. When we come back, I want to discuss what's going on internationally. I also want to discuss a big development with the AI company Anthropic, which runs the AI Claude program, which is integral to our military services. So right on the eve of potential war with everybody, including Iran that Donald Trump is threatening, you have Pete Hegseth telling Anthropic that basically they will be declared essentially like an enemy of the United States, even though their AI is critical to our military operations.

52:44It was used in Venezuela, for example. If you don't let the Department of Defense use your kind of AI programming to kill people autonomously without any human involvement, then you will be declared an enemy of the United States. And also, if we can't use your AI tool, like Claude and your other AI tools to do mass surveillance on the American people, we will declare you an enemy of the country. And either we will declare you as being detrimental to our supply chain to shut you down and or integral to our supply chain to seize your company and take it over under the Defense Production Act, where we will now take over anthropic and run it ourselves.

53:34So here you have an AI company that's basically saying, look, you could use it for a lot of things, but we're not comfortable with you using our AI and our coding in a way that could commit crimes against humanity without any human involvement. And we don't want mass surveillance involving our tools. And the Trump regime saying, if we can't do mass surveillance, and if we can't allow the AI to decide on its own who lives and who dies without human control, we will declare you one of two things which are contradictory. We will declare you as a threat to our supply chain and ban you or so integral to our supply chain that the United States government takes you over.

54:18And Brett, to your point, this is what you see in Russia. With the media, you see the media take over of what's happening here, like Russia. And now you have the regime taking over companies and saying, we're seizing it so that we can do mass surveillance. It's not like Trump's denying these two demands. Hexitt's demands are mass surveillance and autonomous killing where the AI code decides the deaths. And all - Perhaps the most chilling, I was just going to say, perhaps the most chilling thing about

54:55The MeidasTouch Brothers:this is the fact that, you know, right now, Anthropic is being singled out. Why isn't OpenAI being singled out who does ChatGPT? Why isn't Google being singled out who does Google Gemini? Why isn't Twitter or X or whatever is being singled out for Grok, which we already know is deeply integrated now and is being more deeply integrated in the government system? That's right. The AI that referred to itself as MechaHitler is very integral to the government's AI system right out? Why aren't they being singled out? Why? I think the implication is that they agreed to allow this stuff, those companies.

55:31The MeidasTouch Brothers:They agreed to allow the United States government to use their AI to kill people, to do mass surveillance on people. That's my opinion when we kind of look at the broader landscape right now of AI and how buddy-buddy all of these kind of AI CEOs have been with the Trump regime, you know, and remember they want the support of the Trump regime. So they can continue to build these data centers all across the country and take up all the resources of all of these towns and neighborhoods without paying anything. Um, as they just leech and leech and leech and drive people's bills up and take away the water.

56:08The MeidasTouch Brothers:Like it is the most dystopian thing imaginable that's playing out right now before our eyes. Anyway, um, Anthropic was given 24 hours, right? They gave a deadline, 24 hours. You better respond, are you going to, from the perspective of Pete Hegseth, are you going to do the right thing and let us do mass surveillance on people and use your AI to kill people? Well, Anthropic just issued their response and we'll let you know exactly what they said right after this break. First, I wanna remind everybody, you like CCL, it's done, Ben, you like that? We're doing deep teases now. Deep, deep, deep, deep teases.

56:43The MeidasTouch Brothers:That's how it's going. I ruined the surprises. They reject the Department of Defense's office. No, wait for me. They rejected it. But Ben ruined the team. I was trying to say that. But we'll tell you their statement, though, after this break. Thanks, everybody, for tuning in. This is going to be a quick break. Remember, join us, MidasPlus.com. That's our sub stack. So much great content there, including Ron Filipkowski's daily bulletins, which are really, really incredibly special. They catch you up on all of the news of the day almost every single day of the week. If you ever are in a hurry or, you know, like reading your news in an easy to digest format, you got to go to MidasPlus.com.

57:24The MeidasTouch Brothers:Check that out. We got more great interviews, live content there. So much happening on our sub stack at MidasPlus.com. Make sure you're subscribed right here to this YouTube channel. Make sure they help us get to 7 million subscribers. How quickly can we get to 7 million? We continue to grow this platform so we can compete with all of these major conglomerates out there that continue to consume each other, continue to grow. We are competing with them in many aspects. We are beating them, and we better continue to grow and fight back. Thank you so much for watching. We'll be right back after this quick break.

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1:02:32Let's go. Shout out to our sponsors. Links in description of both the YouTube and the audio. Use the links, use the codes. If there's an exit survey, let them know we sent you. I'm a huge fan of iris store. I swear by iris store. So definitely, definitely, definitely check that out. Links in description of the YouTube and audio Benji. That was a deep tease for, we said that we were going to that commercial break like 15 minutes ago. And then we got distracted as we do sometimes. So we said we were going to the commercial, then we teased the outcome, then I told the outcome. And then - Yeah, why'd you step on Brett's tease?

1:03:04You didn't feel like that was - Well, I thought that the issue was so serious and significant that you didn't appreciate brett's tea it was such a monumental decision that i felt i felt bad leaving the tease when anthropic ultimately decides that it is rejecting the offers of hegseth and i do agree that it was an insane thing to tease like there are there are other things to tease anthropic says that maybe brett isn't the superior brother anthropic says that Anthropik says, let me finish the line. Anthropik says that it appreciates the offer, you appreciate, but it's going to stick with what it said before.

1:03:45It believes that it is integral to the military and it hopes the military reconsiders. And if you just think about it structurally though, and this is, again, important to know, how is it possible, Ben, Brett, and Geordi that Donald Trump has bankrupted so many things. Even right now, if you really wanted mass surveillance, which we know the Trump regime wants, and they really want autonomous AI killing and deaths, you really want that right now, and you want to retaliate against Anthropik, and you're going to disrupt all of their software in the military. But you also are threatening to invade Iran.

1:04:34Don't you think that your adversaries are going to realize that that's going on as well? And don't you think, I don't know, maybe you deal with the fact that you have two air force or two aircraft carriers right near Iran and that they've been there for like record periods of time and the Navy and the people who are in the Navy are just absolutely losing their minds right now just about how they're being treated by the Trump regime. Morale there is at an all-time low. And now you're also going to disable your own technology. I mean, you've attacked your allies, so the UK doesn't want to let you use any of their bases.

1:05:15No country wants to let you actually use any of their bases or their land or their airspace other than Israel in order for you to attack Iran. So you've lost your allies. Now you've lost the ability to even rely on their intelligence or their resources, as the United States has always done in the past in wars. You're now going after one of your chief suppliers of, to use the word, superior, some of the most superior AI technology. You are also harming the morale of your soldiers right now. And this is something that's going underreported right now. But as Al Jazeera English writes, there's trouble brewing on the USS Gerald Ford, according to media reports.

1:05:59The vessel's toilet facilities are inadequate. And those that do exist are prone to daily breakdowns. The crew are also unhappy after their deployment was extended. So the people there are literally living in feces and sewer. The internal piping has exploded. So the piss and the feces is all over the floor. It stinks. People are getting sick. And again, morale is at an all time low right there. The deployment has been extended twice. The Gerald Ford's been there for 241 days. The sailors are missing their funerals, missing births, missing their children's first steps right here. The ship's sewage system is failing.

1:06:56It's costing massive amounts of money. Crew members are now leaking to reporters they want to quit the Navy. Morale is described in terms that defense journalists have not used since the Vietnam era reporting. The deployment is on track to reach 11 months. The post-Vietnam record is 294 days. So it's important that you know that this is actually going on. And remember, because we're making these parallels to Russia and American media and seizing companies like Anthropic and others and seizing production, right? I mean, aren't these the boogeymen that the MAGA has always said the Democrats are going to do, which they don't do.

1:07:40And the MAGAs are the first ones to do it. Well, remember the Pentagon got rid of all of the defense reporters from inside the Pentagon, right? That was one of Hegsitt's first things and he has propagandists in there. So now you gutted the defense reporting groups who now still have to report, but they don't have access to the Pentagon transparently as they do before. So it all relies on leaks. So you have all of that taking place. And then you go to Iran with a list of demands after Whitcoff, Donald Trump's envoy to Russia and everything, says, we just don't get why Iran is not capitulating. Aren't they scared of our aircraft carriers?

1:08:23Why won't they capitulate? And after all the reporting is that Donald Trump just wants a surgical strike to declare a victory like he did last time and say total obliteration that Donald Trump doesn't have the ability to stomach any long-term war, nor do we have the resources to even be able to actually do a long-term war. America doesn't have those resources. So if America starts the war in Iran, Iran retaliates around its neighbors, and the likely result will be a massive World War III-style conflagration in the Middle East. That's likely what's going to happen. And we're fast rolling or slow rolling, whatever you want to say, into it right now.

1:09:04So you have that happening in Iran. Off the coast of Cuba, you had an American boat with 10 people on it, people who used to be from Cuba who were living in the Miami area, who were recently on right-wing media, were learning more about the individuals who were on this boat, and basically bragged that they were going to do stuff like this when they were going right wing media influencer podcasts and stuff. They get on a boat, they drive, they go to Cuba, they sail to Cuba, they open fire on the Cuban coast guards, the Cuban coast guards respond as well. I don't know where they promised like the Iranian protesters that if they created and provoked an incident, that that would help the Trump regime and Rubio then go and attack Cuba.

1:09:49I mean, remember what Donald Trump said in Iran, he told the protesters go out there, We need you out there. If any single protester gets shot, if one gets shot and killed, America will be there in Iran to get your back. If you believe the numbers of Trump and Lindsey Graham, 30 ,000, that's their number, 30 ,000 Iranians got massacred. And there's no self-awareness or even reporting that Trump's responsible for that massacre. He told them to go out and do it. And we didn't even have our ships near Iran at that point. Our ships were in Venezuela. If you want to know why their tours of duty have been so long, because Trump's been doing this stuff off the Caribbean, right, the invasion of Venezuela.

1:10:30Then he moved the ships to the Persian Gulf area and to be by and to be near Iran. So the ships then moved into that region, kind of Mediterranean area. And so what the hell is going on there? Meanwhile, you have Kim Jong-un in North Korea saying, just announcing publicly. Remember when Donald Trump would attack former President Obama and be like, I'm going to stop Kim Jong-un. All of the stuff I've done has scared Kim Jong-un. Quite the contrary. Kim Jong-un just making statements on the daily. Here's what we're doing. We're extending our nuclear arsenal. We're increasing our capabilities here, here, and here.

1:11:12Maybe we'll do some nuclear weapons in space. These are direct quotes from Kim Jong-un and what he said over the past 24 to 48 hours. Remember when MAGA would be outraged about, you know, or the predecessors, the Tea Party. Oh, it's so weak that Obama would not, what, invade North Korea when it would do nuclear, when it would do the ballistic missile testing. Well, you just got just straight up Kim Jong-un just saying, here's what I'm going to do. His direct quote is the following. He goes, we have a prospective plan to strengthen our national nuclear force and we'll focus on projects to increase the number of nuclear weapons and expand nuclear operational means and space for use.

1:11:48That's what Kim Jong-un said. China keeps flying its military drones over Taiwan, which it says, it's our airspace. We're going to do it. No comments there other than Donald Trump desperately wants to visit China in April. And so Xi Jinping realizes that all Donald Trump cares about is this big photo op and to just roll out the army and do some sort of parade for Donald Trump. And you can get Donald Trump basically to do anything you want. You got the United States depriving Ukraine of Patriot missiles and depriving Europe of missiles promised to Europe that it said that it would sell because the U.S.

1:12:32said, we're not going to give weapons to Ukraine. You got to buy it. So Europe's like, OK, we'll buy it. Well, then the United States doesn't sell the licenses or give Europe the stuff that it needs to actually give Ukraine, not just the Patriot missile systems, but the actual missiles and the radars and the repairs and everything that comes along with it. And the U.S. is like, ah, I guess we can't find it. I guess there's scarcity. So then Europe's like, OK, well, we're going to build our own weapons. We're going to do a Europe first defense policy to which the U.S. responds. No, no, no, no, no.

1:13:03You can't discriminate against the U.S. by doing a Europe first, Europe buying European military products first. You got to buy America first. Like, why would we buy from you? You've been threatening us. You've been attacking our sovereignty. You keep going after Greenland and Denmark. And you talk about kill switches and you tell us we're too dependent on you. so we're going to build our own weapons. Sure, that's what we'll do. Then Trump's like, no, you can't do that. Don't do that at all. And then meanwhile, the United States abstains in a resolution urging a comprehensive, just, and lasting peace in Ukraine before the United Nations.

1:13:39Russia votes against it. The US and China abstain. 107 nations, our former allies, all voted for it. The US abstained from a resolution on the four-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, calling for a comprehensive, just and lasting peace. But I want everybody to see all this stuff is connected. But a common theme we see is that this idiocracy, this isn't coming from a political perspective, this idiocracy that is this Trump regime is making us less safe. Stop the propaganda and focus what's actually happening on the Gerald Ford ship right now, where the sailors, where our Navy right now, the people on the Air Force carrier, the Air Force carrier, the aircraft carrier, they don't even have the pipes to use toilet bowls.

1:14:32And by the way, shouldn't this be a top story? Shouldn't this be a front page story everywhere? That's why we focus so much on international news here on the Midas Touchdown. All this stuff is connected. And by the way, it's connected to the Epstein files too, because this Epstein class is international in scope. And they were planning a lot of these things. Annexation of Crimea, Brexit, propping up Jair Bolsonaro, insider crypto trading. All that's in the files. And Epstein's like the middleman of that as that's happening. Brett,

1:15:00The MeidasTouch Brothers:Jordy. Well said. And that's why it's so important that we always contextualize these things, like you said, on an international level and show you the ties between all of these various people, because this isn't happening in the United States in a vacuum. Now, there have been a lot of countries that have been able to really go on offense against this authoritarian strain by seeing the disaster of what has happened here in the United States. I'm thinking of countries like Canada who have done an incredible job at batting down this autocratic strain that was rising at the time in that country. Various other countries throughout the world as well.

1:15:40The MeidasTouch Brothers:But some countries still fall prey to this because I think a lot of this right-wing rhetoric, they know how to get to people's heartstrings, right? I mean, think about the way a lot of this rose in the beginning. It's so morally depraved to think about it now, but they came into this by speaking about this idea of a global elite sex trafficking ring of elites who were sex trafficking children and blamed it on their political opponents when those people spreading these conspiracy theories were the people actually engaging in this sort of behavior with people like Jeffrey Epstein. So it's very devious what they do.

1:16:18The MeidasTouch Brothers:And that's why every time you see, you know, a J.D. Vance out there, any of these people, they go, we're just trying to get the child sex traffickers off the street. And they don't want us to do that as they are covering up that very behavior, as they are covering up those very crimes. So, while that kind of rhetoric can be quite intoxicating and kind of appeals to people's almost like lizard brains, right? Appeals to people's just instincts. You have to be able to step back and go, these people are lying to you. You have to, if you're that guy who goes, oh, well, Trump said 18 trillion investment.

1:16:52The MeidasTouch Brothers:Trump said healthcare. Trump said, you got to be able to step back and go, but what's actually happening? Don't fall for the propaganda. Let's look at the facts. Let's look at the receipts. Let's look at the photos. Let's look at the actual data as what's coming in. What's actually happening on the ship? Oh, it's a disaster. Okay. That's what's actually happening. Don't buy this regime propaganda. And it's going to get harder and harder and harder. But that's why we need to continue to grow bigger and bigger. And we need to fight back. We need to combat this crap. And we need to work together and growing our megaphone collectively.

1:17:23The MeidasTouch Brothers:I mean, all of us here in fighting back against the sort of disinformation. Well, that's the coolest thing too about hitting 6 million subscribers and 9 billion views on the Midas Touch Network YouTube channel. I mean this earnestly, and I know our audience knows it. This isn't about Ben Britter, Jordy. Now that we have this megaphone, let's continue to build on it. Let's get this even bigger, even louder, so these pro-democracy ideals and values truly win the day. Brad, you talk about the swing voter again. right we really do have to get back in this society to a place where truth is actually championed right and accountability truly means what accountability should actually mean so for me it's going to be one of the biggest battles i think this country is going to have to sort of reconcile and really go through over these next 5 10 15 20 years however long this democracy can can really sustain.

1:18:21And I truly feel that we will continue to win as a society so long as we bring truth. And I mean, real earnest truth to the forefront of what this country and what these people should really care about. I don't want to be lied to. Don't piss on my face. Tell me it's raining. It's absolutely ridiculous. I keep going back to that swing voter. I mean, what a putz. I like, like, come on, man. I just want to shake you. Like, please wake up. They are lying to you actively. You are the mark. Benji, what's that? I'll just leave us with this too, because we're talking about these manipulation tactics. So earlier today, the white house official TikTok account posted an AI video of the U S hockey star, um, uh, Brady Kachuk, uh, where they attribute the words, it was an AI of him calling Canadians maple syrup eating fucks.

1:19:21You know, I don't like cursing. I just want to let people know what the official White House account manipulated the Team USA gold medal winner saying Canadian maple syrup eating fucks. And the guy didn't say that. Then Kachuk had to address the video and say, that's not my voice. It's not what I was saying. I would never say that. That's not who I am. And now he's embroiled in this. And as our editor-in-chief, Ron Filipkowski writes, well, you know what? You hang out around Donald Trump, and that's kind of the deal. You know, you hang there. You believe it's not, you know, you can go and say, oh, it's not political.

1:20:03It's not, I'm just here because it's the presidency, and this is the White House, and it's always an honor, and this is what it means to be an American. Well, he just took your name, image, and likeness and now attributed the words to you that Canadians are maple syrup eating fucks. And now when people think about your gold medal and people, it's overshadowed by all of this. Not only did Trump steal your valor, steal your win, he embroiled you in something grotesque and disgusting that should have been uplifting for everybody. Men's and women's hockey teams winning gold. How great. What incredible.

1:20:47I love hockey. I don't know if you know this about me. I sit on the board of the Hockey Diversity Alliance with numerous NHL players. I've been on that board for several years. I love hockey. My best friend is it was a professional hockey player, okay? But also, how do you take a moment that's so beautiful, that should be so beautiful and patriotic for the country and turn it into a way to attack the female hockey team and to mock them and then turn it into a political perversion? It's not political to call out Donald Trump's behavior. That's the thing. That is like, oh, you're being political.

1:21:28It's just hockey. I'm not trying to be political. I wanted to root for the team. I wanted to cheer on the gold medal team. I love hockey. I love sports. I like that. Okay. But now I have some asshole in the Oval Office, some pedo protector out there who's now attacking the women's hockey team. And so it's not political for me to say that's horrible conduct. Not just because I'm a girl dad, but because I'm a human being and I see something. And so you say something. And that's kind of the common thing too. It's like, oh, you're turning this into a political thing. Why would you? Because you did it.

1:22:05You politicized it. You made it into a thing. You tried to divide our nation with something like that. And that's horrible. That's horrible. And now the people who went along with it, now you're getting AI placed in your mouth by Donald Trump, attacking Canadians as part of Donald Trump's agenda to conquer Canada and invade the sovereignty of Canada. And that just makes us weaker. It makes us pathetic. You know, and even when people are like, well, I would never say that. I would never, okay, well, then call it out. Say that Donald Trump is wrong. Just say what's actually happening. You don't, why?

1:22:39We're scared of him. Just say what's happened. Say it's inappropriate. It's horrible that the leader of this country would behave in such a despicable manner. That's fine. Say that because that's the truth. and that doesn't make me go oh you don't like hockey are you gonna alienate are you gonna alienate guys what am i gonna alienate i like hockey i sit on a hockey board okay and at the same time i do that i think that being a quote-unquote man also means standing up for the female team that's what it means to be a man also you stand up for people you don't bully that's what being a man's about being a man that the girls team the girls that's not how men behave I know people should behave.

1:23:21Anyway, I'll leave you with that. Because that news came across my desk. And that pissed me off. The whole thing pisses me off. Anyway, on that positive note, thank you, everybody.

1:23:35The MeidasTouch Brothers:Well, here's the positive. And I'll leave you on a positive note. We showed the other day after the State of the Union what people power looks like. We showed what it looks like when everybody comes together as one and actually pushes back against this crap with the truth. And we did it that one night. We could do it every night, right? We could do this all the time. We need to continue to push our energy in that direction positively, right? Use this movement in a positive way. It's one of the most important things to me now that we have a platform that's this size. And as we built it up the entire way, it's always been about uplifting voices.

1:24:06The MeidasTouch Brothers:It's always been about pushing back against this fascist strain. And so let's continue to do it. Let's keep building. Let's keep growing this community. Let's keep uplifting pro-democracy voices. We showed the power of it the other night and we are just getting started. So let's keep up the fight, folks. And that's how you end it on a positive note. Any criticisms with that? I'm just kidding. Jordy. No, I'll just leave with this. Even like right-wing people, just sorry, even like right-wing people like Eric Erickson, like runs like red state, right? I mean, just, you know, just, he even goes, the Republicans in the United States are on the verge of supporting a practitioner of witchcraft for Surgeon General who won't recommend vaccines, but will recommend hallucinogens to connect to the spirit realm and who channels moon power magic.

1:24:53So I'm just reading you what like even someone like Eric Erickson is saying about the right way. Yeah, exactly. What he's saying about the Surgeon General pick who's part of the Maha, RFK, whatever, and go, go and watch the video I did on Casey means. I did a whole very long video where I show other clips of her in the past and how dangerous, you know, how dangerous, by the way, I want to be clear. There are holistic medicines and things that I like, you know, and I'm supportive of it. There's a lot of, there's a lot of stuff out there, you know, that, that, that could be good for you. But this Casey means has shown that she does not disclose her conflicts of interest, that she sells these supplements and pretends that she's not making money off of them.

1:25:40And then she's made her whole brand to actually attack people's health, in my opinion, for her own enrichment. Anyway, I'll just leave with that because I said I was going to talk about it. On that note, Jordy, shout out to the Midas Mighty.

1:26:04The MeidasTouch Brothers:It's the fascist we sing our song. We will get it right whenever. Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscriber to our sub stack at MidasPlus.com. You'll get daily recaps from Ron Filipkowski, add free episodes of our podcast, and more exclusive content only available at MidasPlus.com.

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