Transcript of Thursday Afternoon Breaking News Updates with Ben - 6/18/2026 New

Ein perfekter Frühlingstag.

Allergie!

Sonne. Allergie!

Park.

Allergie!

Picknick. Und so viele Pollen. Shop-Apotheke sagt tschüss Allergie und hallo Frühling. Hier findest du alles, um unbeschwert durch die Allergiezeit zu kommen. Als Neukunde sparst du sogar 10% ab 35 € Bestellwert. Mit dem Code NEU10. Du hast ein E-Rezept? Einfach Shop-Apotheke-App runterladen und direkt einlösen. Gutscheinbedingungen auf shop-apotheke.com/gutscheine. Welcome to Ben on Breaking News. I'm Ben Myselis. This is your breaking news. We've got a lot to discuss. Obviously, the developments following Donald Trump's appearance or his physical presence at the G7. His body was there. Not sure of sound mind, cognitive, physical deterioration before our eyes in such a massive way. In a healthy media environment, that would be not just a front page story, but it would be something that everybody would be talking about. It's why I don't ignore it. I don't mean to sound repetitive when we talk about Trump's physical and cognitive deterioration, but just like for the past 4 years, 5 years, we've been on the Epstein beat. We've been talking about the coverup. We've been talking about all of the connections. Mm-hmm. What was going down at Mar-a-Lago, all of the key players, the conspiracy before it was something that was being talked about.

I just think it's important that we don't follow narratives that corporate media is pushing here. We lead the narratives, because at this point we have perhaps the biggest audience that exists right now. And in, in news, and the Midas Mighty needs to get the truth and we get the information out together. So talk about what went down at the G7. We'll talk about some of the developments just even over the past 12, 24 hours. I mean, the Republicans are livid at this memorandum of understanding that Donald Trump entered into on behalf of the United States with Iran. We have everybody kind of piling on JD Vance, throwing JD Vance under the bus and saying it was JD Vance who did it. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] let's blame JD Vance for, for this. I think you all know my view. America should never have been involved in this catastrophic war in the first place with Netanyahu. Objectively, this is a far weaker deal— it's not even a deal— a far weaker thing than former President Obama's deal, the JCPOA, and the Iran nuclear deal there. That said, it's, it's Undoubtedly a surrender by Donald Trump and the United States, but that's because the— Trump lost the war.

That's what happens when you break something, you fix it. You have to. I mean, and of all of the possible options, this deal is the only option that I could think of that was the right move. Now, we shouldn't have been involved in this catastrophic and unlawful war in the first place. Again, let's acknowledge that the deal is a worse deal than the Obama deal. The American people are suffering. Doesn't change that dynamic. Um, but like, I don't think we should rip apart this memory. I want to root for this thing to succeed. Just, you know, where I— as much as I despise Donald Trump and this heinous and despicable fascist genocidal regime, this Trump regime, right? I, I want the— I want there to be peace. I want the Strait of Hormuz to be open. I want there to be, um, as much, uh, relief as possible to the American people. I know it's not going to be a lot. It's not going to solve the harm that's been caused. So as I kind of opened up in a very vulnerable way to, to the audience, it's, it's, it's, it's difficult to report on in the sense that I hold thought one, catastrophic unlawful war, that Donald Trump, Netanyahu, Vance, this whole regime are war criminals, right?

On the other hand, this memorandum of understanding should never have had to follow a catastrophic end of Law 4. But as I look at it, that's, that's the option that, that, that we had. And fundamentally, you know, I think that if there is more, uh, empowering Middle East nations to take agency and responsibility over the Middle East, a removal of the US presence there, um, uh, removing, uh, the US-Israel from Lebanon and Syria and pushing that influence out. I think that's a— I think that it's actually a positive outcome. Now, I, I despise that the Trump regime keeps on lying about this agreement. It's like, if you did the deal, so just, just explain to us why you think this is a beneficial deal. Don't tell us things that are just complete lies, right? Like, own it, own it. You know, there's $300 billion that you're giving Iran, right? That's more than Obama. Don't act like it's less than Obama. That's more than Obama. So sell it to us though. Explain it to us why you think this is a good idea. Where are you going to get the money from?

Tell it to—

we're adults. We can, we can, we can handle the information. Explain the logic to us about, uh, you know, why you think this could bring long-term stability why you think this can bring down gas prices. And just stop the gaslighting, stop being so defensive about it. And when you're defensive about it, then we're like, ah, got it. You don't even know what's in this agreement. I just noticed too that Donald Trump signed the Memorandum of Understanding in Versailles. I think that has unique symbolism, obviously, that we've been talking about. 1919, the Treaty of Versailles signed by Germany.

Mm-hmm.

Represented German humiliation after World War I. It was total capitulation. And so the very idea that Donald Trump would sign this in Versailles— I don't know if it was French President Emmanuel Macron, kind of the newly forming multipolar world order, putting Donald Trump through this symbolic humiliation ritual in the United States, through it by doing it at Versailles, or if it's just coincidental or whatever. when I looked at the document Trump was signing, it seemed to be the document that he was signing that the White House put out was in Farsi. And of course, we all know that Donald Trump speaks Farsi, so it's good that he was really attentive to the nuances of Farsi and the language there. Um, but, uh, you know, there, there, there you have it. And, you know, that follows really, uh, a G7 that if I said it was humiliating for the United States, I the biggest understatement ever. It just objectively was. I mean, you know, setting aside— I mean, I think about past presidents, right, where their words are parsed for meaning and symbolism, and, you know, because you have to speak so carefully, and what do you— you know, what do you mean, and what— when he said that, and, you know, and, and the subtleties of diplomatic etiquette and all of these things, right?

Um, you know, Donald Trump really couldn't walk. I'm not saying this to be hyperbolic or to, or to mock him, you know. I'm just saying it as an objective observer of what we saw. I mean, he really couldn't— he struggled to walk, he struggled to sit down. There was a lot of disinhibition where he would blurt out things. And I'm, again, I'm not saying this to to mock him at all. But a lot of the disinhibition seemed to be in the form of homosexual thoughts, where he would say things to world leaders about being sexually attracted to them, where he would say, you know, you're handsome, you're— you know, I like to stay in the hotel room with you. And he would talk to reporters and say, you know, that they're so 'Good looking, you're so good looking, you're so attractive, you're so attractive.' It was very, just very, very strange to watch. I don't know how else to describe it. And again, I'm not trying— I'm not doing this in a mocking way. It's just that seems to be a disinhibition that he was, that he was objectively projecting. Um, you know, he, he seemed to be passing gas in public a lot.

Um, you know, and then he would you know, just, just say a bunch of, you know, word salad nonsense that people were like, what, what are you talking about? What's he even— what's he even saying? We saw world leaders, um, almost, um, treating him in a way that you would expect of somebody perhaps in hospice care. right? You know, as, as a, as a trained nurse would treat, uh, an, an elderly— or not, doesn't have to be elderly, just an individual in, in hospice, kind of end-of-life type of care. And the world leaders, you know, I mean, you would see Prime Minister Carney go up to him and say things like, you know, Donald, Donald, 'Here's the deal. This is the deal we did with China. I thought you'd like it, Donald. 49,000 caps, caps, caps,' you know. And, and you would have, you know, French President Emmanuel Macron and others would, you know, 'Hey Donald, over here, over here,' you know. He would, you know, constantly— I mean, the, the, the Brigitte Macron thing, it wasn't, you know, uh, the, the, the disinhibition also wasn't kind of purely what I was describing as kind of sexual projection where he was saying all of these things about like loving people and things like that.

I mean, it was also, um, with Bridgette, he was like leaning in for kisses and like multiple, and she's like, come on, man, just stop. Like, like, why do you— saw when he kept like trying to kiss her, um, and she would like pull away and he would like hold on to her hand for 30 seconds. And it was just— I, I'm— we're just observing these things, you know, you know, these things happening. So like, let me show you, um, first A hat tip to my brother Brett, who put together, um, I think a good summary of some of the health issues that just were on the—

for—

I could go on and on and on, but I'll show you the health issues from the first day. Let's play that.

So I've been watching Trump for the past day or so at this G7 summit in France, and there's clearly something going on with his health. He's looked awful. I mean, just look at him in this picture trying to sit down. It did not go well for him. His voice has been incredibly hoarse. He keeps walking in the wrong directions. He doesn't seem to know where he is at times, what's going on at times. His ankles look incredibly swollen. I mean, let's just go through some of the things I've noticed. First, there was this photo, and if you zoom in on Donald Trump's hand, you could see that once again he's got the makeup caked on. Here's another shot of his hand from today. And so that was just his right hand. When you look at his left hand, you see that he has this little weird mark right over here. There's a quick close-up for you. Here's a photo that Ukrainian President Zelensky posted on his social media, but let's zoom in for a second. Once again, you see that intense swelling in his ankles. Then there was this moment where he needed Indian Prime Minister Modi to help him get up a tiny little step.

This moment after a photo where he starts wandering in the wrong direction.

Where are we going?

The other side.

You can see Macron and the other leaders say, "Other side, other side, you're going in the wrong way," and redirect him. Then there was this strange moment where he grabs Brigitte Macron's hand and doesn't let go. He seems to completely lack the strength in his right hand to do his typical handshake. There was also this moment where the world leaders were posing for a photo around this table, and Trump just doesn't seem to know where he is at all. He's just standing there looking off to the side while everybody else is posing.

Regardez-les derrière vous.

He's just standing there, not moving, doesn't seem to know where he is, not reacting at all. And here's how that final photo turned out, courtesy of Reuters. You can see Trump here staring off to the side. —then you can see here as French President Macron is speaking, Trump is struggling to keep his eyes open.

If we provide peace in Lebanon, and so we are ready to take our fair share of the burden and be part of the commitment of the international community in order to support this deal. And we will discuss about that together and with colleagues later on. But it's a very important step.

And you can just hear it in his voice here.

Why are you even bothering? Because it's not really valuable. It's, you know, it's probably half a million dollars worth. It's not very valuable stuff. But I think psychologically we want to get it.

Let's be honest, if any single one of these happened with Joe Biden, they'd be running this on the media like a loop, nonstop, over and over again. We're gonna keep tracking this and more, so make sure you're following our account and go ahead and listen to the Midas Touch Podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. We've got a new episode out. Right now.

At the end there, where he was saying it's really not that valuable stuff, he's referring to uranium and the enriched uranium, and he's saying that that's not valuable stuff. What would be valuable? What does he think, like a Trump trading card is more valuable than enriched uranium? Or he thinks that, you know, a Trump guitar is more valuable? Or the Trump sneakers that we're talking about. I can't really think of many more, um, substances or things that exist, like, on Earth that perhaps have a more significant value in terms of what it is capable of doing than enriched uranium. And that was the whole basis of why he claimed we needed to invade, so much so that it wasn't just the enriched uranium, we had to get the enriched uranium dust. And now, yeah, that doesn't, that doesn't matter. And then also the ballistic missiles don't matter. You know, you know, the whole, the whole thing that they were selling, or they weren't even selling when they went, when they went into the war and then tried to justify, they're like, they're building a conventional shield around the enriched uranium. So the enriched uranium, not valuable.

And the conventional shield, Donald Trump says, you know, doesn't matter either. And, and, and Trump's point— that if you want to call it a point— and what him and JD Vance are saying is, well, Saudi Arabia gets ballistic missiles, Qatar gets ballistic missiles, Bahrain gets ballistic missiles. Why doesn't Iran get ballistic missiles? Which, by the way, isn't a horrible point, you know, uh, other than you can say there was alliances with some of these other places. But then you have to also start to really focus on what, what are we doing in this region in general? Which— what— which is why Ultimately, as I look at the memorandum of understanding, if ultimately it can get the United States out of warmongering in the Middle East and focus more on helping the American people— as much as I've told you I despise Trump and I despise Vance— if ultimately the MOU has the consequence of getting the US out, stopping never-ending wars, I at least—

Naya.

Perhaps naively, I still want to root for that consequence because I think that's in the interest of the American people. We shouldn't be there. I mean, you could say Saudi Arabia is an ally, but, you know, the more people came from Saudi Arabia were involved in 9/11 than, than, than any country, you know, that was out there. And then you have MBS, you know, killing, um, Khashoggi, um, and, and journalists and, you know, and, and people. And they're, they're, they're— So I'm trying to think about, you know, as you reflect generally in the region, You know, the move probably should have always been, you know, this going back geopolitically for a long time, you know, to— this isn't a place where America should be meddling, you know, in. And America should be focused on the American people, you know, and should focus on helping Americans improve their life, not $1.5 trillion military, you know, budgets where all we've had was endless wars that the US has lost. Right? I mean, go through every one of them in the Middle East. So get that. As I mentioned, some of Donald Trump's other disinhibition, I'll just show you some of the comments that he was making during the G7, like with el-Sisi, the Egyptian president, and others here.

Let's, let's play this clip.

He was in a hotel. And I met him. And we fell in love, deeply in love. So we had a good relationship right from No, we met. We didn't know each other before that. We had great chemistry. And I stayed twice as long as I was supposed to. So you look at this man. I'll give you a lesson. He's the most beautiful-looking man. He looks so nice. He's like an angel. The press conference seems to have gone well. You shot your load pretty much, Steve, right? Pretty much.

Yeah, and then you have him— you could go with sound up here, but you can— hear the noise coming out of him. And again, I'm not— I don't, you know, it's not like fart jokes. Like, I'm not trying to— oh, he farted! Like, that's not— that's not the intention behind this. It is to simply point out that from the swollen ankles and legs to the hands to the constant passing of gas publicly, to the constant sleeping, you know, to the disinhibition, that these things in their totality are signaling red alarm. I mean, this is, this is kind of obvious stuff. This isn't, oh, you're being hyperbolic and you're just saying— No, this is what we're seeing. This is what went down. Here you can hear for yourself. Sound up. Let's play this clip.

We ended up with the original members, but then when the election was rigged. That's right. We ended up with the original members, but then when the election was rigged. That's right.

Yeah, I mean, it's obvious what's going on there. And again, it isn't, it isn't to mock him. That's not the intention. Let me show you former President Obama. I just wanna show you how we should be represented on the world stage, right? And by the way, when I see Prime Minister Carney give speeches, I think to myself, that's a good leader. That's a strong leader. That's a smart intellectual leader. By the way, when I hear speeches from the Prime Minister of Denmark, Mette Frederiksen, I like her, you know, it's— I like her speeches. You know, I, you know, some Ursula von der Leyens, you know, I mean, she— no one can doubt that Ursula von der Leyen conducts herself professionally and with clarity. No, there are some things, uh, you know, in her speeches that, you know, I, I feel like in trying to balance, um, the U.S. relationship, she'll say something like, but, but no one can doubt like how certain leaders, you know, are, are, are speaking. I mean, when I see, you know, Anthony Albanese, the Prime Minister of Australia, I say, okay, I get it. That's a, you know, that's, that's, that's a leader.

He's compassionate, real person. Here, let me show you Obama. He goes, um, in a very vulnerable way. I'm not immune to anger or doubt, but I do know that when we lose faith in each other— and he's giving this speech at the opening of his presidential library today. And so I showed you the Trump stuff. Let me show you Obama. Here's what Obama has to say. Let's play it.

I get it. I am not immune to anger or doubt. But I do know this: when we lose faith in each other, when we stop believing that voting matters, that citizenship matters, that our collective voices matter, that how we treat each other no longer matters, And we give away our power to decide our own futures. We open the door to the most ruthless or the most careless or the most fearful among us who see some groups and some people as more equal than others. And see government as nothing more than a way to divvy up the spoils and punish enemies and keep those who are different in their place. I do not believe that is the story of America that prevails in the end. I don't believe it because, For us to give up, for us to give in now, after all this country's been through, to cynicism and division would be a betrayal of our founding ideas, a betrayal of our faith. And I remain convinced that the overwhelming majority of Americans feel the same way, that as unsettled as we are, people Aren't looking for perpetual anger and division. They are looking for fairness and common sense and mutual respect.

That deep in our gut, we want to find a way to turn towards each other again, not further away.

And contrast that to what Donald Trump said about Iran. And ballistic missiles. Um, and I want you to watch Rubio in the background as Donald Trump is saying this. So let's play this next clip of Trump on Iran and ballistic missiles that they have. Some—

In the history of our country. So we'll be working on a parallel effort with the Gulf nations to address non-nuclear issues such as the conventional ballistic missiles, which will be are you talking about? And support them. I mean, they have to have some because other people have some. You got to have some. Somebody said, you shouldn't give them more. And I have guys, I like some of these guys, but I don't think they're smart. Sir, you shouldn't let them have any missile. I said, well, what am I going to do? I'm going to let Saudi Arabia have missiles, but they can't have them?

Yes, sir.

It doesn't work that way. You know, it doesn't work that way. And missiles aren't the problem. Missiles are— they hurt a little location, but they don't blow up the planet. So the Gulf nations will address the non-nuclear issues.

Is he having a conversation with himself from 15 days ago or 20 days ago? I mean, that's the thing. I, you know, I— the point that he is making about warmongers who say we need to wipe out all the ballistic missiles and constantly go to war and do all those things, he was one of them.

That's what he was saying.

That's what Trump was saying 15 days ago, 10 days ago, before he had to accept the fact that America— that America lost. And when you lose and you break things, you have to fix it. And he was cornered. He was a cornered rat. He couldn't go anywhere. And so now he says this, and, you know, and this is again the complexity of sometimes of reporting on this. Because of all of the options, I still think that this memorandum of understanding, as flimsy and as probably not durable as it is because it's not actually a deal and all of these things. Of all of the options that we have, given the regime in the United States that's running, this is the best option. I hear him saying those things and I don't— I mean, I think the, the point that he makes is, what am I going to do, just go, ever go after every country that has ballistic missiles and start bombing everybody? That's stupid. I, by the way, I feel like that's a stupid idea. I don't disagree with that, right? The same time, this is the person who told us we're going to get rid of the conventional shield.

That was your whole— I wouldn't say pretext because you went in without even coming up with the reason, but that was your justification afterwards. And so you brought us into this catastrophic war. You've harmed so many people. You've caused so much pain. Ultimately, to come to the opinion basically of what, of what Midas Touch was saying, right? He came to the conclusion of what we've been saying for, for a very long period of time right now. That's where, you know, and this— think about what he goes here. Like, you all remember from what I've been saying, and this is where our critics, the Midas community critics, people would go after me for being hyperbolic and saying, Ben, you know, I remember I would say— I'm going— I would say, we're about to get into an economic catastrophe. We're about to hit tank bottom. Like, in like a few weeks we're gonna run out of reserves and we're gonna have a global depression if we don't do a deal. And I remember just seeing so many right-wing people and MAGA people, uh, you know, we just might as well, might as well. And then here's what Trump says on Iran War's MOU: I didn't want to see economic catastrophe.

If you kept this going, that would have happened.

Here's what he says, let's play it.

So the one thing I didn't want to see is I didn't want to see economic catastrophe. If you kept this going, that could have happened. But all I know is every time we talked about the possibility of peace, the stock market shot up like a rocket ship. It never went down. They didn't like it. The people, you know, the stock market is more brilliant than anybody there is, including the people on this stage other than me, of course. Let's see. I don't know. What do you think, Scott? Is the stock market more brilliant than you?

No, sir.

Oh, that's a terrible statement. All right. The stock market is quite brilliant. And every time we said something amazing, like we're going to settle, it would go up. And every time we said something negative, like, guess what? We're not going to be able to settle. It would go down very big, Peter, very, very big. Tells you something.

Yeah, it tells me that you're manipulating the market and you're also breathing really loud while you're saying all of these things. And what a deranged and strange thing to talk about the stock market like that. If, oh, and here's what he's posting. The stock market just hit a record high. The stock market, a record high. If you truly believed that Iran or anyone posed an existential threat to the very existence such that you were putting American soldiers' lives and treasury into this, then why would the stock market even be a consideration? Because Based on your prior justifications, if Iran has its conventional ballistic missiles and it can operate the way it does, they will likely use that to shield a nuclear program and then blow up everybody. Why would you need a stock market if the country's completely blown up? Unless, well, just like your own intelligence community said, Iran never posed an existential nuclear threat that required this type of invasion, but that this is, as former presidents have said, what Netanyahu had always been trying to do administration after administration. And, you know, Hillary Clinton recently spoke in New York City and she said Netanyahu would call and he would say, I'm on the tarmac.

We're about to go. You're either coming with us or we're doing it alone. Hillary Clinton said that happened multiple times during the Obama administration, and she would tell Netanyahu, go, go, good luck. And then he wouldn't do it. I think that, you know, the ultimate kind of irony, if you will, is now you hear JD Vance and Donald Trump saying things like Israel shouldn't blow up buildings in Lebanon. Under the auspices of we're taking out a one Hezbollah person or a few Hezbollah people, so we're going to blow up buildings. It really came to the fact that you had to engage in this unlawful, catastrophic war, kill little girls in Manab, cause the American people so much pain, cause the people of Iran, cause the people in the Middle East so much pain, cause people throughout the world so much pain.

Mm-hmm.

For you to now say that he is always the arsonist who creates the problems, and then he wants us to cheer for him like he's Shamu at SeaWorld for putting out the fire that he creates, which often creates more fires. Then he passes this to the next president and then MAGA for the next 4 years, 8 years, they all of a sudden say it was your fault. You did it, not Donald Trump. Well, you were— we're now all of a sudden China hawks and this type of hawk and deficit hawks and all of these things when all of these people are complicit in the weirdest idiocracy warmongering, weakest, most pathetic view of America, I think, ever. And it's on the 250th anniversary of our country. We look weak. We look weird. We look like a bunch of losers. I don't know how other people in our country can't see that. To the rest of the world, the United States is weak, weird, and losers under Donald Trump. That's what the G7 showed. And it pains me as a patriotic American to say that. But when you have someone running the United States like a Trump meme coin or a Trump NFT or a Trump property with mold all over, you know, whatever, you know, that's just not how you run things.

Not— I'm not saying this as a pro-Democratic message, as a pro-independent message, as a pro-Republican message. I'm just saying that there are basic skills of leadership that are so utterly lacking, and that what we see here shouldn't be occurring. Like, we the people need to— I know you do, but we need to have like much higher standards and people who are, who are leading us. We need to pick the best of us, not literally the worst and most grifter con artist among us. We'll talk more about that when we come back from our first quick break of the show. A reminder, hit subscribe, help us get to 7 million subscribers. Subscribe to Midas Touch on audio as well. We'll be right back with Ben on breaking news after our first quick break.

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Welcome back to Ben on Breaking News. I'm Ben Myselis, and this is of course breaking news. Earlier today, The, uh, Interior Department, through their rapid response social media handle, posted a fake photo of the reflecting pool that appears to show no algae infestation, which is not what the actual condition is. And I'll show you what they posted in a moment, but we have a feed where we constantly monitor what's going on in that reflecting cool. We have the overhead view, Jeremy, just to show people maybe what it looks like. So you can see over here, audio listeners, you can see as you get closer to the World War II Memorial and you get closer to the Lincoln Memorial over there, some of that green algae sludge looks like it's a little bit removed, at least from this overhead, but the I would say 85 to 90% of the reflecting pool, including some areas close to the World War II and some areas close to the Lincoln Memorial, are fully infested with the algae. But about 80 to 90% fully infested with algae. Would everybody agree with me looking at this image that that's what it is?

We have other photos of, you know, some of the ducks swimming in the algae. I mean, this is as you zoom in. Yeah. And it's really harmful to the ducks because they put in hydrogen peroxide also, which could kill these ducks and their baby ducks as well. This photo was taken around the same time that the Interior Secretary posted what I'm about to read for you. And I think we, we can see that one of the big issues also is that when you put hydrogen peroxide into something like this, It's gonna— anybody with a basic sense of science would know this. One, the sheer amount of hydrogen peroxide you'd have to put in to kill the algae forever is kind of impossible. But what hydrogen peroxide will do is it will destroy the paint, right? Anybody knows what happens if you put hydrogen peroxide on paint. You know, it's like the most— I feel like I'm back in my like 5th grade science class, right? And so now the blue paint from the bottom is now surfacing, and it almost looks like it's like growing like a creature. Like, it almost looks like it's growing like a, like a stingray.

It looks like stingrays are flying around or like floating around. Do we have that one from Jean-Claude Dam Van? We have that one. It's a silly name handle. Hydrogen peroxide uses paint remover. Anyway, you can see these big mounds of— There's a nice big Chunk of the reflecting pool.

Amazing.

Yeah. Oh, it is blue. How about that? Big chunk of it for you. 3 days ago, I was able to drive right in front of the Capitol. $18 million well spent. Yeah, it looks like a stingray, right? It doesn't look like— it looked like a stingray. You know, it's like growing, it's growing like zombie creatures in these reflecting pool. This is what they, this is what they write though, uh, the Interior Press handle writes: The advanced nano bubbler technology very effectively killed the algae that has plagued every Lincoln Reflecting Pool reopening, most infamously Obama reopening, since 1920. 9— 1922. The reflecting pool water is crystal clear, and our National Park Service team is now vacuuming up the dead algae resting on the bottom of some parts of the reflecting pool, just like the destroyed Iranian Navy resting on the bottom of the Persian Gulf. Is Donald Trump actually writing these? Is he and Stephen Chung and Dan Scavino writing these? I think they are, but like, how could you more perfectly make the metaphor for me that I'm trying to make about the reflecting pool and the algae, that you can't just paint something blue to fix the problem and then just tell people it's a miracle and it's amazing, right?

That's what Trump did during COVID And it's always some scam— inject yourself with bleach, like a miracle, it will go away. The sunlight's going to kill it. In Easter, Jesus is going to kill it or something. I don't understand the Easter one. Jesus is going to get to it, you know, in Easter time. So the curve will be bent by Easter. In the summer, it's going to be so hot that there won't be any COVID. Like a miracle, it's going to go away. We all remember, we remember that cycle. The Nano Bubbler, advanced technology, effectively killed the algae. It didn't, it didn't, it didn't effectively kill the algae. And the thing about algae is that it will keep coming back.

Yeah.

Because the water source is the Potomac, which has algae. And also, if birds or animals or other things go into the reflecting pool, they have the ability to bring algae in, even if you effectively put it through a nano bubbler filtration system. And the algae will come back and it will spread, and it will spread quickly, because that's what happens when you have a shallow reflecting pool in a swamp, especially over the summer. That's what, that's what happens. So that's the reality. And then, and then it's— and then why I bring this up now, first off, how deranged is that? Like, just really deranged. But then, you know, you go to this JD Vance press conference today, and I'll be real with you, there are some things that JD Vance said in this press conference that I said I agree with, particularly when he would be very critical of Israel's occupation in Lebanon. I listened to it. I mean, I might— just because I don't like Trump and JD Vance doesn't mean I'm gonna just say everything they say is wrong, because, you know, sometimes I get, I get that, you know, is there anything they say?

Look, the bottom line is you shouldn't have got into this unlawful war with Netanyahu in the first place. But when JD Vance says something that I agree with. I'm not going to lie to you and say I don't agree with it, even if I despise JD Vance and think that he's a liar and a chameleon opportunist who will do whatever he can to get power, including kill us all. I think he's a real sicko, but it's the reality. But I'll show you first some of the stuff that he said that I obviously don't agree with, and it goes back to what I was saying there in the Reflecting Pool. And here, JD Vance talks about how, um, he can't just stand on business with his, with, with his memorandum of understanding, right, with, with what he and Trump did, because that's what grown-up leaders would do, right? But like losers and weak and insecure people would have to go up and say things like, the Obama nuclear deal allowed enrichment, ours won't. The Obama deal gave them a billion dollars of American money. This gives them zero. The Obama— this is better than Obama. Grow up, grow up.

It isn't better than Obama. The Obama deal, in terms of it actually being a deal and it accomplishing something that was, um, actually being complied with and followed, was a stronger deal. But why does everything have to be relative to Obama or Biden, right? That's just, that's setting aside Democrat, Republican. You know, we're recording this live June 18th, 2026. Well, yeah, why do you have to keep bringing up Obama and Biden? Just stand on business and say, say, we like this deal. We think this is a strong deal. Give peace a chance. We believe that of all of the options, this was the strongest. I'm just saying that to say that that's what leaders do. Losers do this. Let's play the clip.

And where we're coming at it is we already destroyed your nuclear program. And so if you promise and show verifiable pathways to not rebuild it, then we're willing to give you some sanctions relief and things like that. So it's a fundamentally different perspective. Now, there are all these substantive differences as well. The Obama nuclear deal allowed enrichment. Ours will not. The Obama deal allowed the accumulation of stockpiled weapons-grade material. Ours is actually leading to the destruction of that stockpile of enriched material. So there are many differences. The Obama deal gave them over $1 billion of American money. The— this deal gives them zero. Zero. $0 of American—

I mean, again, quite literally everything he said was false. And that's not cool because just stand on business of your deal. Just stand on the business of your deal. And you don't have to lie about Obama. When you do things like that, that shows me how insecure and weak you are. And that shows the rest of the world. You said that Obama's deal. Allowed for, uh, enrichment and yours doesn't. Yours does allow for low-grade enrichment. Non-weapons grade is actually allowed under the terms of what you suggested. The IAEA is supposed to meet tomorrow, on Friday, in Switzerland. The same organization that Obama utilized, that's going to try to use a similar framework. And the idea was then that Iran could use nuclear power for non-weapons purposes. And this purports to try— because you haven't done the deal yet, but the IAEA will be coming in to try to do the same exact thing that Obama did. And now you're just doing it with all of these concessions to Iran. And then you went on and said Obama allowed for like a weapons stockpile. It didn't. Mm-hmm. That's just, that's just an objectively false statement. You said Obama gave American dollars.

That's just false. It didn't. It didn't. It unfroze money. Well, it unfroze less money than you're unfreezing, but the Obama deal unfroze money that traced back decades to the, to around the period right around the revolution, or kind of pre-revolution. It unfroze $1.7 billion.

Mm-hmm.

If you take a look at some of the other sanctions that were unfrozen by Obama, you can make an argument that all of the sanctions combined that were unfrozen could exceed $100 billion. If you add them all up of unfreezing, that wasn't American money going to Iran. Right now, Iran will probably make off of this Trump deal not just $300 billion in an investment fund that the U.S. has to facilitate. And when you go, oh, but that's not taxpayer dollars for the U.S.— of course it's taxpayer dollars for the U.S., indirectly or directly. So just say not directly. Say it's not like the American taxpayer is going to pay $300 billion. So you want to know the indirect path? It's pretty obvious. That $300 billion that the U.S. is now fighting for. We're fighting for a $300 billion fund for Iran, where you would expect the president of the United States to fight for $300 billion funds for the United States, right? I mean, when you think about What was it, $200 to $300 billion for rural hospitals that were cut by Donald Trump's so-called big beautiful bill? Well, $300 billion of a private investment fund is going to Iran.

Now, that's just the reality. We got into a catastrophic and unlawful war because you all followed Netanyahu into this. I think you also wanted to cover up the Epstein files. I still believe, as far as all options go, this is still still the best option. So explain to us why the $300 billion is a productive investment. And ultimately, if it could lead to slashing our military budget from $1.5 trillion to $500 billion, because now we don't need to spend that extra trillion in the Middle East, and we'll still have— spent more money by leaps and bounds than any country, you could sell me on it. You could— I mean, again, just put aside— I don't believe that this catastrophic and unlawful war shouldn't happen. I get it. We shouldn't be the ones paying for it. I get it. But again, you need to speak to us all like we're adults. Here we are in this situation. Don't tell us there's no algae when there's algae. Don't tell us that everything's amazing when it's not amazing. Don't tell us we're in a golden age when we're not in a golden age, when people are suffering right now.

So I'll go back to though now where I've seen JD Vance say some things that I, that I listened to, and I was like, you know, I, I thought, you know, he, he makes a point here. JD Vance is speaking to the parliament in Israel, and he's speaking to Netanyahu. As part of this press conference he held. And he was basically saying, I'm not sure why it's wise for you to attack us. Without us, you won't have any weapons or you won't have anything. Here's what JD Vance says about that. Let's play that clip.

What I will say, and this does bother me, is that you have seen people within Bibi's cabinet who have come out and attacked the deal and in some ways very to personally attack the president of the United States. And I guess my message to them would be twofold. Number one, Donald J. Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time. And he happens to be the head of state of the world's superpower. If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful the most powerful ally that I have anywhere left in the entire world. And the second message I would give to some of those cabinet members— Bibi, to his credit, has not gone down this path— but to some of these cabinet members in Israel who are attacking the president of the United States, the other thing that I would say is that over the last 3 months, 2/3 of the defensive weapons that have protected your homeland have been built by American hands and paid for by American tax dollars.

The problem for Israel is not Donald J. Trump. And anybody in Israel who thinks their biggest problem is the president of the United States needs to wake up and smell the reality of the situation that country is in. Thank you all.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

When he was on a podcast with New York Times, he also said, my response to Israel would be, what's your proposal? You're a country of 9 million people. You just think you're going to kill everybody? That's how you're going to try to get out of this? Here's what he said. Let's play it.

But yeah, you've seen people in their system, Ben-Gvir and Smotrich, who've attacked the deal. And I guess my response to them would be, what is your exact proposal? And you know, you're a country of 9 million people. You can't just kill your way out of solving every single national security problem that you have.

Look at what But you got into this war with Netanyahu. You were shoulder to shoulder last June, last February. Oman negotiated a deal. Said you want to put aside Obama's deal, put aside Obama's deal for a second, because that's obviously very triggering to the snowflake Trump regime. People. February 27th, Oman's foreign minister goes on CBS, announces a deal between the United States and Iran that doesn't have any of these concessions that the current deal has for Iran. Nothing about Iran controlling the Strait of Hormuz, because they didn't then. Nothing about Iran being able to, you know, continue with its, you know, continue with proxy groups. And none of that, none of— no $300 billion fund, no, none of the— none of these things. That deal was done February 27th, and right when the deal was done and all you had to do was say yes and then we wouldn't be June 18th where we now have an MOU, which isn't really even a deal. You could have just said yes on February 27th, and instead Netanyahu calls Trump and says, I'm doing it right now, we're, we're attacking. The same tactic that Netanyahu used with Obama and Biden, that they said, okay, go do it on your own, we're not— we don't, we don't have your back.

The same way now you're hearing JD Vance and Trump say those things, whether they mean it or not is TBD, and I think lots of question marks, and I think we know the answer, that Trump and JD are probably going to fold like a cheap suit very quickly. But then you started this war, and now you seem to be in a 5-month, 6-month period or less taking all of the exact opposite positions that you took, but then also not acknowledging the why, and then gaslighting all of us again, like we're not supposed to realize that you were the arsonist and now you want to be the firefighters putting it out. And we know that you did this with Netanyahu. You did this. You were the big champions of this. You told everybody that you would be greeted like heroes in Iran, and it would be amazing, and this would be easy, and it would be like Venezuela, as you described it, and the world would love it, and this would be amazing. And the incongruity in all of this, obviously, is that— Yes. You're pretending the algae isn't there. You're pretending we won when we lost.

And this document makes a lot of sense when you lose, and it makes a lot of sense— perhaps, I'm not sure about the $300 billion funds and all these things, but, but a deal that empowers the Middle East to do the Middle East. That allows the U.S. to focus on the U.S. It doesn't mean that America should shirk its role globally in being a force for good, but we know under Donald Trump it's the opposite. America is a predatorial country. But my point is generally that I think, and the American people, I believe, feel that we've gotten into all these never-ending wars in the Middle East where America's been losing lives and treasury for nothing, and it's only made the problem worse and exacerbated it. And a fundamental rethinking of America's position there was needed. And it shouldn't have taken being on the verge of global economic depression And now we've admitted to Iran what the situation is. Like, they, they knew before what the situation was. Iran's a very sophisticated society, you know. So when— again, it's a version of saying the algae isn't there when Donald Trump and JD Vance would like portray Iranians as like cavemen, you know, like they're the cavemen screaming Allahu Akbar or something, like running around like And it's like, that's not the Iran— you don't understand the Iranian society and its pride in its history and the Persian thousands of years of history and the sophisticated engineering and culture and the complexity amongst different groups and factions.

And, and, and what's, and what's the true dynamic there. And so you've portrayed victory, no Algie. Crystal clear, it's blue. But then you've done the equivalent of throwing hydrogen peroxide and nano bubblers and all of the things, versions of that at it, which don't reflect that you've actually done what you said you've done. So it creates this sense of confusion and loser behavior and, and defeat and, and awkwardness and just never-ending nature of this. American people are saying— No, I saw a stat. Before going live that for the first time the national average in gas right now— ain't this in California, so, you know, take it for what it's worth— $3.99. That it went down dramatically. I'm not sure that necessarily you're gonna feel that over this long 3-day weekend, or, you know, or not. I'm certainly not here in California, I can tell you that much. Um, but If that's true, as the gas companies have put out that stat, I want that to happen. Just because I hate Trump and I hate Vance because of what they do doesn't mean I want to root for $7 gas prices so I could dunk on them and see, look, I, I, I— people are really suffering right now.

People are— it's, it's— and this is part of the problem, I think, with media in general, and especially as we get close to midterms when people are talking about persuasion and focus groups and, well, this ad move people in this direction and that direction, you're, you're fundamentally viewing things wrong. Especially you see these conversations amongst the Democratic Party a lot right now, this debate Should we have more centrist candidates? Should we have more leftist candidates? Should we have candidates who look more like this person or more like that person? And then you have all of these political pundits who pretend to know it all, say it's got to be this and it's got to be that. And I like to say to all of that, just stop, just stop, just stop. What we need to be doing is we need to not love the sound of our own voice. What we need to do is listen and to hear what people are experiencing right now. And when you listen to the American people about what they are experiencing, what their fears are, what they're going through, We should just respond to that as human beings.

It doesn't matter if you're gonna say that this type of Democrat or that type of Democrat or this type of person or this politician or that type. Just be someone who fights for humanity. Listen to what people are saying. They'll tell you they are psychologically tortured right now. Every day because of what this Trump regime has done. And the lies and the chaos compounds that psychological torture each day. People have had their healthcare ripped away. People can't afford their rent. They certainly can't afford to buy homes. People aren't getting jobs when Trump promised We're gonna have a job boom. And lots of people saw some of those jobs coming back for the first time under Biden, and they see a lot of those jobs fading away right now. And also when people are able to get jobs, sometimes it's part-time, seasonal, or when they get a job, it isn't paying them the money that they need to afford rent. Mm-hmm. To afford basic necessities. The war has compounded the problems that Trump has created. It didn't create them, it's compounded them because Trump's trade war against the world, his other reckless policies, the tariffs everywhere, the prioritizing his billionaire oligarch buds over the American people has resulted in inflation, which was heading to 2% now going up to 5%, and it was steadily heading down to 2%.

That's where it was going. And so people are psychologically tortured in this regime. You compound that, AI, data centers, an uncertain future, other opportunities being taken away from the American people. Mm-hmm. Never-ending wars. You add all of this together and you have people who really are worried. You add to that ICE raids and Border Patrol raids and the division and the divisiveness and the hate and the vitriol. People are scared. And I think about— Yeah. —different models too. I think about in Pennsylvania, where you have a governor like Shapiro, who is leading in the governor's race by 30 points, 35 points. Governor Shapiro, a Democrat in a swing state. And lots of people would say, yeah, Shapiro's more— Liberal. Centrist, right? They want to give it a label. Okay. Then I look at the incredible leadership of Mamdani in New York City, uniting the city, being with the people, delivering on the promises, working with the governor to bring an agenda that helps the people, not afraid of this label or that label. And delivering an agenda that works. I think about Zoran Mamdani's incredible leadership, and I think that we have to just root our politics in the people, not try to focus on persuading you to like me more and more.

Listen to what people are going through and deliver for the people. I watch Senator Ossoff's speeches in Georgia, and to me, that's some of the closest speeches I think we have to what I was seeing with Obama, uh, in 2007, 2008, right? And especially as you see the Georgia governor's race now with, um, with Bottoms. Potentially, you know, pulling ahead there significantly. You could imagine a scenario there where Ossoff has a lot of momentum in that regard. I think about California. I think about Newsom's approach in fighting back and how that threatens and intimidates Donald Trump such that Donald Trump's launched a DOJ criminal investigation against him. I think people, right? And it doesn't, it doesn't mean we have to agree with everything this person or that person does, but I just think fundamentally we have to focus and listen and truly show people that we're there and that we care and that we're fighting for them. Because if you don't do that, the void is filled by con artists. You see, a con artist like a Donald Trump or someone of his ilk, they see the vulnerability of people and they know how to prey on it.

They see it and say, aha. They sense it. Con artists sense it. They know how to prey on it. And make these promises and drag people who are fearful into their orbit. And if we're not listening and paying attention and you're focused on, oh, 3 points of persuasion here, 2 points of persuasion here, this ad's gonna do it, that ad's gonna do it, this is gonna do it, that's gonna do it, and not saying, why am I doing this? Why am I doing this? You're always going to allow this void to be filled by the charlatans, the con artists, the Trumps, the people like that. So I hope we can kind of round out this episode by, by, by that perspective also. Um, and I think, I think you just always got to be here fighting for people, caring about people, truly caring about people. And that's what I see in leaders like Mamdani as well. All right, I'll stop preaching. Everybody hit subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers. Thanks for watching. Help us get to 7 million subscribers. Tell others about the show. Subscribe to the Midas Touch on audio. I'll see you on the Brother Show tonight at 8 Eastern, 5 Pacific.

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Mm-hmm.