Speaker 1: We just want people to you know, live their lives
Speaker 1: and be happy and be able to enjoy it without
Speaker 1: some you know, lunatic screaming in their face every three seconds.
Speaker 2: We should be focusing on the issues that actually occupy
Speaker 2: a lot of the mental space in Americans' minds, that
Speaker 2: are filled with conspiracies, and we should fill it with
Speaker 2: the truth and solutions.
Speaker 3: As we built Midas Touched, that community aspect was almost
Speaker 3: more important than us saying you know, here are our
Speaker 3: political beliefs and here are these political stances, but more like, hey,
Speaker 3: don't y'all want things to be normal?
Speaker 4: Hi? Everyone, I'm Kittie Couric, and this is next question.
Speaker 4: It's no secret that one of the things that propelled
Speaker 4: Donald Trump to victory in the last election was right
Speaker 4: wing media, a potent combination of conservative cable podcasts and
Speaker 4: social media influencers. Now progressive voices are trying to make
Speaker 4: sure that their footprint is as powerful and as big.
Speaker 4: The Micellas brothers have created The Midas Touch, one of
Speaker 4: the few digital networks. Yes, they considered themselves a network
Speaker 4: to crack the code, gaining millions of followers and even
Speaker 4: beating Joe Rogan for the number one spot on Apple
Speaker 4: Podcasts a few months back, So I'm really excited to
Speaker 4: talk to them about what they're doing and how they're
Speaker 4: doing it. First of all, hello guys, welcome to next question.
Speaker 4: Thank you so much. An exclusive, the first time the
Speaker 4: three of you have done an in person interview together,
Speaker 4: right first, that early first Wow, I'm very honored and
Speaker 4: very flattered, and I wanted to ask a little bit
Speaker 4: about your life story. You all grew up on Long Island,
Speaker 4: you all had your own respective careers. Ben, What were
Speaker 4: you doing before you decided to embark on this venture.
Speaker 2: Well, I was a lawyer. I went to law school
Speaker 2: at Georgetown Law was a civil rights lawyer, and I
Speaker 2: was working civil rights cases out in the Bakersfield, Fresno area,
Speaker 2: representing families who lost loved ones in police brutality cases.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 1: So it was through that work that I.
Speaker 2: Ended up meeting Colin Kaepernick, and Colin Kaepernick took a
Speaker 2: knee for police brutality to bring attention to it, and
Speaker 2: then from there the pandemic happened and the Minus Touch
Speaker 2: network kind of sprung out of it. But my background
Speaker 2: was a lawyer. I think my parents were surprised when
Speaker 2: I went into podcasting.
Speaker 3: But I.
Speaker 1: Think they're happy within them.
Speaker 4: I'm sure they are. How about you, Brett, what were
Speaker 4: you doing?
Speaker 3: I was a film and TV so I moved out
Speaker 3: to Los Angeles to go to USC and I was
Speaker 3: in film school there and then I graduated freelance for
Speaker 3: a bid, ended up working for the Ellen Degenero Show
Speaker 3: as an editor there, ran the digital department, post production
Speaker 3: team over there. I had a great experience. Ended up
Speaker 3: working for as a creative executive in film and television
Speaker 3: after that, and then the pandemic hit. Production quickly shut
Speaker 3: down and we started this project and the rest is history.
Speaker 4: Well, you guys were really early adapters for like digital content.
Speaker 4: I remember doing such an incredible job, so you knew, gosh,
Speaker 4: a lot of people aren't watching the show at home.
Speaker 4: We are going to make sure that everyone sees it online.
Speaker 3: And I got to give them a lot of credit.
Speaker 3: On the producers, there are a lot of credit. They
Speaker 3: saw that incredibly early on. And what ended up happening
Speaker 3: was when I got there, there was a team of
Speaker 3: like five people. I was the new guy. There was like,
Speaker 3: you know, four or five other people. By the time
Speaker 3: I left there, you know, we had a team of
Speaker 3: I don't know if you include you know, kind of
Speaker 3: other staff kind of associated with it, probably more like
Speaker 3: eighty people there. And so I saw this entire division
Speaker 3: of Digital blossom and I got to be there while
Speaker 3: it happened. And I never thought that editing and helping
Speaker 3: to create videos that maybe about human interest stories and
Speaker 3: cat videos and whatever we were doing there would end
Speaker 3: up apply to making political videos. But somehow I think
Speaker 3: it ended up being a great education actually and doing that.
Speaker 4: So I'm sure it did. Meanwhile, the baby, Geordy, tell
Speaker 4: me what you were up before you got involved in this.
Speaker 1: Marketing and advertising. Actually, right here in New York, heart
Speaker 1: of Times Square, this agency called Translation Incredible Agency. I
Speaker 1: like to say that they gave me my PhD in
Speaker 1: New age marketing. It was really awesome. It was a
Speaker 1: nimble operation over there. I think they had less than
Speaker 1: maybe eighty to one hundred employees when I was there,
Speaker 1: and so you got to wear a lot of different hats,
Speaker 1: so from the creative department to strategy to account management,
Speaker 1: just kind of seeing campaigns, taking them from the earliest
Speaker 1: stages of development and seeing the whole execution all the
Speaker 1: way through. It was really really cool and seeing how
Speaker 1: they kind of used new age tech and social media
Speaker 1: to really emphasize and reach their audience in different ways.
Speaker 1: It was eye opening at the time.
Speaker 4: So your skill sets really complement each other. You all
Speaker 4: bring something different to the table. And so it's the pandemic.
Speaker 4: You all are getting increasingly frustrated by what you're watching unfold,
Speaker 4: to say the least. And Ben, what was your aha moment,
Speaker 4: like we have to do more? And how did you
Speaker 4: all come together and say let's launch this new venture.
Speaker 2: Well, you heard our backgrounds. We're not political people missing
Speaker 2: from those backgrounds with stories of working in politics. We're
Speaker 2: just people who were scared during the pandemic. We were nervous,
Speaker 2: we were worried about our families, we were worried about
Speaker 2: our friends, and we were sending each other text messages
Speaker 2: about what we were going through, and so we said,
Speaker 2: how do we translate those messages into you know, we
Speaker 2: almost felt selfish if we didn't bring what we were
Speaker 2: talking about to the public. So we just started saying,
Speaker 2: what if we wrote about this, What if we started
Speaker 2: a blog, What if we use bread skills who could
Speaker 2: do videos and editing? What if we use Geordie's marketing
Speaker 2: skills and just start telling people, here's what we're feeling,
Speaker 2: here's what we're experiencing. You're not alone, we're a family,
Speaker 2: and here's what we're trying to do to help each other.
Speaker 2: So we start releasing a article, a video that Brett
Speaker 2: edits Geordie helps coming up with some of the framing
Speaker 2: of it with his marketing skills, and it seemed to
Speaker 2: resonate because nobody had really seen a focus on these
Speaker 2: topics that really focused on the human experience as opposed
Speaker 2: to just kind of an overtly political side to it.
Speaker 2: So people had this kind of aha, like I feel
Speaker 2: that way too, And once we started seeing that, the
Speaker 2: shock to us was like, wait a minute, no one
Speaker 2: else is really talking like that and connecting in that way.
Speaker 2: And so we did it again and again and again,
Speaker 2: and from there it just kind of kept on growing.
Speaker 2: You know, a video did one hundred thousand views, then
Speaker 2: a million views, then five million views, and from there
Speaker 2: it kind of sprung up and a community started developing
Speaker 2: around it, and the months progressed and we started seeing
Speaker 2: that this was actually having a real impact.
Speaker 4: And then you sort of broadened your aperture if you will,
Speaker 4: and kind of started focusing on all kinds of things,
Speaker 4: not just obviously the COVID and the or misinformation or
Speaker 4: how you were feeling and what was upsetting you, but
Speaker 4: the political spectrum in general, right, Brett.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, one hundred percent. You know, I think we
Speaker 3: just you know, we were trying to share our lived
Speaker 3: experience with everybody out there, and so when we saw
Speaker 3: something was that we thought was crazy, we would just
Speaker 3: be like, this, isn't this crazy? Everybody what we're watching together?
Speaker 3: Like is it just us? And like I think for
Speaker 3: a while we were all just looking at each other
Speaker 3: like I don't understand, Like why is this being treated
Speaker 3: like this is normal? Especially was during the time when
Speaker 3: you know, Trump was saying this fifteen cases going down
Speaker 3: to zero, It's never going to come to our short
Speaker 3: it was just lie after lie after lie, and I
Speaker 3: was like we were all like, you know, this is
Speaker 3: going to be bad, right this is and then we
Speaker 3: just kept seeing, you know, all the kind of political
Speaker 3: ramifications stem from there. I think that was a very
Speaker 3: kind of pivotal moment in shaping people's beliefs. And in
Speaker 3: addition to just COVID, I think a lot of people
Speaker 3: at that point were sort of being siloed into different
Speaker 3: kind of groups at that point, and there was a
Speaker 3: deep division that was kind of being put into our society,
Speaker 3: and people were kind of falling.
Speaker 4: Into force by their own self selection are algorithmically reinforve and.
Speaker 3: The fact that everybody was home and everybody was not
Speaker 3: speaking with each other. And so as we develop mad
Speaker 3: to people were mad for all different reasons. I mean people,
Speaker 3: some people were mad that they had to you know,
Speaker 3: be home. Some people were mad that, you know, why
Speaker 3: isn't this Why don't they just take the vaccine? Why
Speaker 3: don't they respect my space? People were all mad at
Speaker 3: each other for all different reasons, and so there were
Speaker 3: these communities developing, and so community became an essential aspect
Speaker 3: to us, more so than the politics of are you
Speaker 3: able to kind of assemble a community that's based around
Speaker 3: kind of positivity and wanting to do the right thing
Speaker 3: rather than a lot of these sort of more malicious
Speaker 3: online communities that exist out there that seek to kind
Speaker 3: of sew division and hatred. And during that time there
Speaker 3: was definitely, you know a lot of that, and so
Speaker 3: as we built kind of might as touched the community
Speaker 3: aspect was almost more important than us saying you know,
Speaker 3: here are political beliefs, and here are these political stances,
Speaker 3: but more like, hey, don't you all want things to
Speaker 3: be normal? Like can't we see that this stuff is
Speaker 3: freaking nuts? And like if we could all just rally
Speaker 3: around that, like maybe we could actually put those political
Speaker 3: differences aside in many ways. And so as we progressed,
Speaker 3: one of the things that we saw was that, you know,
Speaker 3: there were folks who may consider themselves, you know, as
Speaker 3: liberal as could be, joining us. Then there were folks
Speaker 3: who consider themselves Republicans or former Republicans who were joining
Speaker 3: us independence. Like we saw, you know, people coming to
Speaker 3: us for all sorts of reasons. But at the end
Speaker 3: of the day, I think the core was people just
Speaker 3: wanting things to be like normal again, right, understanding that
Speaker 3: what we're seeing then, and by the way, what we're
Speaker 3: still seeing now is not normal.
Speaker 4: I was going to say, I mean, I wouldn't necessarily say,
Speaker 4: and you can correct me if you disagree that your
Speaker 4: content exudes positivity at this moment in time. And I
Speaker 4: feel like you have gone through various iterations, Jeordi. During
Speaker 4: the Biden administration, were you guys a little more dormant.
Speaker 4: There were fewer things for people of a certain political persuasion,
Speaker 4: I think, to be outraged about. So did your growth
Speaker 4: really explode after the election of Donald Trump the second time?
Speaker 1: No, I would say we saw our strongest growth period
Speaker 1: when President Biden was president. During that era. I think
Speaker 1: it's a slight misconception about what we do that you know,
Speaker 1: maybe like like just angry you know, out the world
Speaker 1: or or anything like that. We really just try and
Speaker 1: bring folks facts and data, and it's sort of that
Speaker 1: approach that has led the community to grow. When you
Speaker 1: watch our videos, for example, you know Ben will say
Speaker 1: a couple of sentences, We'll just say play the clip,
Speaker 1: because playing the clip many times is way more effective
Speaker 1: than Ben explaining every little slight detail and maybe even
Speaker 1: giving his opinion in that second. If people are just
Speaker 1: take away the receipts from the videos and we let
Speaker 1: them form their own opinion, that's where we've genuinely seen
Speaker 1: the most growth of the network and of the community,
Speaker 1: because it's to really the values that we care about.
Speaker 1: We just want things to be normal. We just want
Speaker 1: people to you know, live their lives and be happy
Speaker 1: and be able to enjoy it without some you know,
Speaker 1: lunatic screaming in their face every three seconds. And so
Speaker 1: I think we've seen tremendous growth during the Biden administration,
Speaker 1: and we continue to see growth right now as well.
Speaker 1: But again, I think people are always coming to us
Speaker 1: for the facts and for the data, and that's what
Speaker 1: it's allowed.
Speaker 2: To grow, I think, cause we've been there now for
Speaker 2: about five years. A lot of people shut off after
Speaker 2: the last election, and they were looking for fighters, and
Speaker 2: they were looking for people to stand up to them.
Speaker 2: And I hope we've always been authentic to those same
Speaker 2: values when we just started this out in twenty twenty
Speaker 2: as what we're doing now, so as we were out
Speaker 2: there still fighting, and I think people a group of
Speaker 2: people lost a lot of hope after this election, so
Speaker 2: they turned and they saw what we were doing, and
Speaker 2: I think that also helped give them hope, which allowed
Speaker 2: a lot more people to maybe notice what we were
Speaker 2: doing now. And also we were doing things on the
Speaker 2: digital realm that a lot of people are adopting now
Speaker 2: right in our YouTube strategy, our focus on simulcasting videos
Speaker 2: and audio was just a different way to even kind
Speaker 2: of approach this space, which also I think has been
Speaker 2: a bit kind of pioneering, and we could talk about
Speaker 2: that later, but that's part of I think where we're
Speaker 2: seeing and we're humble and grateful for it. But some
Speaker 2: of the recognition is, oh, lots of people didn't even
Speaker 2: know what we were talking about, and we were saying
Speaker 2: simulcast right a year ago or more. And now that's
Speaker 2: the you know, the new lingo.
Speaker 4: You know, if a Martian landed on Earth and you
Speaker 4: had to explain to him or her what the Midas
Speaker 4: Touch Network is in you know, an elevator pitch, how
Speaker 4: would you do it? Who wants to take that?
Speaker 2: I mean, I mean, I think it's a podcast that's
Speaker 2: fueled by a community, and the community.
Speaker 4: It's not just a pot well podcast, I guess, as
Speaker 4: we know are video and audio, but it's sort of
Speaker 4: you're doing everything everywhere all at once. Right but sorry
Speaker 4: the Martian interrupted, you go on.
Speaker 2: You know it's it's it's the community is built on
Speaker 2: you know, I think, core values and principles and that's
Speaker 2: what's the success. And what we're trying to readjust everybody
Speaker 2: to remember is that politicans, the Martians going to I
Speaker 2: may have lost the Martian elevator speech, but I'll give
Speaker 2: you my academic speech for the market. I'm assuming the
Speaker 2: Martians mar well leg well educated mar mars exactly. But
Speaker 2: but I think politics has been gamified into your this team,
Speaker 2: you're that team. You're angry, you're angry, yell at each other,
Speaker 2: and the viewers left a little bit confused, Wait, what's
Speaker 2: what's even the issue? And they try to pick what
Speaker 2: team do I like based on the style of the
Speaker 2: fight and the style of the debate and who's winning
Speaker 2: that fight. And that's the split screen cable news yell, yell, yale.
Speaker 2: So we try to deconstruct that, and we come with
Speaker 2: an opinion and a strong opinion, but we try to
Speaker 2: root it in a trial lawyer approach. Here's the evidence,
Speaker 2: here's the exhibit, here's why we feel this way. Agree
Speaker 2: with us, don't agree with us, but here's here's what
Speaker 2: we're grounded in. And so rather than have a four
Speaker 2: minute segment of yelling with thirty seconds of the actual news,
Speaker 2: we try to root it in eleven to thirteen minutes
Speaker 2: of the facts with opinion.
Speaker 1: But it's the facts that drive it.
Speaker 4: What I would say to the Martian, I would say that,
Speaker 4: but Also, one of the things I think you all
Speaker 4: do so effectively is connect the dots in this crazy,
Speaker 4: fragmented media landscape, you know, with so much happening, particularly
Speaker 4: in the early days of the second Trump administration. I
Speaker 4: think what you do so artfully is is you kind
Speaker 4: of connect, you know, you thread all these things. If
Speaker 4: an expert saying this, and then Caroline Levitt is saying that,
Speaker 4: and you know, you're taking all these different things and
Speaker 4: you're kind of helping people understand and aggregate what all
Speaker 4: these these moments mean.
Speaker 1: Is that that's why you're Katie Kirk no part of
Speaker 1: your yes.
Speaker 3: You know. It's funny because we were speaking about this.
Speaker 3: I think, like just yesterday that there's so much noise
Speaker 3: out there, and you I think we all thought, you know,
Speaker 3: if we went back I don't know even ten years ago,
Speaker 3: but probably more than that, probably thought, oh, with the Internet,
Speaker 3: with digital media, with also there's going to be so
Speaker 3: much information. People are going to be so well informed,
Speaker 3: people are going to be smarter than ever, They're going
Speaker 3: to be on top of everything. It's going to be
Speaker 3: so clear to know what's true and what's fiction. It's
Speaker 3: clearly like the opposite at this point of what we're seeing.
Speaker 3: There's such a deluge of information coming at people every
Speaker 3: single day. So I think one of the things that
Speaker 3: we do try to do is what you just hit at,
Speaker 3: which is how do we cut through that noise with
Speaker 3: a message that's clear, that could resonate, that gets the
Speaker 3: truth across in the midst of just all of this
Speaker 3: chaos that's coming every single day. Certainly that's been ramped
Speaker 3: up since Trump's second administration, where I think part of
Speaker 3: their strategy is also to flood the zone. I mean,
Speaker 3: you think back to what's yeah, you think back to
Speaker 3: what Bannon said in twenty sixteen or whenever he made
Speaker 3: that statement, flood the zone with shit. I don't know
Speaker 3: if I'm lent.
Speaker 2: To say that.
Speaker 3: Weak here, and and that's definitely been their strategy this
Speaker 3: time around as well. Just do so much that it's
Speaker 3: almost impossible for you know, an average person to try
Speaker 3: to keep up with it. But we that's one of
Speaker 3: the things we try to do is really center the
Speaker 3: conversation on you know, these are the distractions, these are
Speaker 3: the important issues, These are the things that are actually
Speaker 3: going to affect you know, you your family, you know,
Speaker 3: your friends, your coworkers.
Speaker 4: These are these things you really need to understand. Yeah,
Speaker 4: for sure, and I think it You're right. I mean,
Speaker 4: a combination of things is making it so difficult to
Speaker 4: stay informed. And a story that happened four days ago,
Speaker 4: the country has moved on and it's like, hey, whatever
Speaker 4: happened to the Associated Press getting kicked out of the
Speaker 4: White House press room? And you know what about all
Speaker 4: these right wing media influencers who are now taking over
Speaker 4: seats that once belong to legacy media? Would you describe
Speaker 4: yourselves as journalists, curators, producers or do you think there
Speaker 4: isn't really a category for what you do? Jordy, you're smiling,
Speaker 4: Go ahead, you.
Speaker 1: Know, I've never thought of it like that. I view
Speaker 1: as as concerned citizens first and foremost, we just.
Speaker 4: Want to they're building a media impure.
Speaker 1: Well, the funny thing about that is a journy. I
Speaker 1: don't mean to no go for it. When we do interview.
Speaker 2: We don't do a lot of interviews about ourselves, so
Speaker 2: we're actually not that and I mean this sincerely reflective
Speaker 2: on like who we are because we center the network
Speaker 2: around the community and around the message to the people,
Speaker 2: so it is always you know, interesting sometimes, you know,
Speaker 2: and lately we don't do a lot of interviews, but
Speaker 2: sometimes when we're reflecting on like who we are and
Speaker 2: what does it mean?
Speaker 4: But maybe just think about instead of you guys like
Speaker 4: as brothers, sort of who is the Midas Network, right,
Speaker 4: you know, And I guess it's a lot of things, right,
Speaker 4: and it's.
Speaker 2: Most importantly it's been built on the community of people
Speaker 2: in America and frankly people around the world who are
Speaker 2: concerned about the human condition and experience. That's how I
Speaker 2: would say it, very you know, very succinctly. But I
Speaker 2: think we are a media network. We run a media
Speaker 2: network filled with some of the best reporters out there.
Speaker 2: We have a great editorial team that breaks stories. You know,
Speaker 2: I consider what I do on a day to day basis.
Speaker 2: I'm reporting on the news, we break exclusives, we report
Speaker 2: on news that happens, and you know, we try to
Speaker 2: contextualize everything.
Speaker 1: Right as best we can. That's all.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: I'm wondering, could you do what you do without legacy media?
Speaker 4: In other words, I know you use a lot of
Speaker 4: clips from MSNBC or Fox or CNN, you use reporting,
Speaker 4: and then I think you make it understandable. As I said,
Speaker 4: you call from a lot of different sources and kind
Speaker 4: of give people the big picture, at least in a
Speaker 4: lot of the content I'm looking at, But the big
Speaker 4: beef while legacy media gets trashed and everything is a
Speaker 4: lot of these content creators and even digital media networks
Speaker 4: could not do what they do without. You know, with
Speaker 4: all due respect to the reporters you have, but with
Speaker 4: this vast array of legacy media organizations that are covering
Speaker 4: the world to are interviewing Scot Galloway on CNN or
Speaker 4: doing something else with some other expert from you might
Speaker 4: run a CLI. So I'm just curious how you feel
Speaker 4: about that. If legacy media poof went away, I don't
Speaker 4: think you could do what you're doing.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I mean I think that I think
Speaker 2: that a lot of the things that we find are
Speaker 2: on social media.
Speaker 4: It's what right our hearings on Capitol Hill. I was
Speaker 4: thinking about that.
Speaker 2: No, so I would say there's maybe five to seven
Speaker 2: percent of what we do is maybe commenting on an
Speaker 2: interview that's on a cable news legacy news network. But
Speaker 2: I don't think that drives the network even a small fraction.
Speaker 2: I mean, the majority of it is people are out
Speaker 2: there saying things either on social media on their own tiktoks,
Speaker 2: on their own instagrams, on their own x accounts, or whatever, or.
Speaker 4: People are saying things on Capitol Hill like Marjorie Taylor
Speaker 4: Green claiming that guy was flipping the bird. Did you
Speaker 4: you guys, I'm sure did a story.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh yeah, we did that. The deceptive photo where
Speaker 3: Represent Stansbury ended up showing the actual photo and then
Speaker 3: who was holding it up It.
Speaker 2: Was Marjorie Taylor Green had the big poster board of
Speaker 2: the head of USA Fencing. Why they brought a USA
Speaker 2: Fencing even though they received no federal funding is because
Speaker 2: there was a Fox story saying that there was a
Speaker 2: trendgender fencer. So the whole conspiracy is is that they
Speaker 2: wanted to punch down on a marginalized community using the
Speaker 2: fencing guy. So they showed a photo of the head
Speaker 2: of USA Fencing in a doge committee and he had
Speaker 2: a peace sign or he had two fingers up, and
Speaker 2: they edited out to look like he was giving the
Speaker 2: camera the middle finger, and they said, look, he's giving
Speaker 2: you all the middle finger. And then Congresswoman Stansbury said, no,
Speaker 2: let me show you what the photo is. You know,
Speaker 2: it's a it's actually a peace sign.
Speaker 4: That was so crazy, remember, and Marjorie Taylor Green just hitting.
Speaker 2: In the cavel. See.
Speaker 3: But that's the kind of thing like to me, I
Speaker 3: don't care what your politics are, like, that's not okay,
Speaker 3: you know, and we should all be able to acknowledge
Speaker 3: that that's not okay at the end of the day,
Speaker 3: to do that kind of deception and to try to
Speaker 3: punch down at people like that. And so I think
Speaker 3: that's at the heart of, you know, a lot of
Speaker 3: what we're trying to get across here. But you know,
Speaker 3: I think one of the other great examples too, And
Speaker 3: you know, I think legacy media certainly plays, you know,
Speaker 3: a tremendous role. And I think there's some you know,
Speaker 3: excellent reporters out there who do a really, you know,
Speaker 3: terrific job, and I you know, I commend their work,
Speaker 3: you know, especially the reporters who are out there in
Speaker 3: these war zones and reporting on these international stories. You know,
Speaker 3: I have so much respect for the stuff they do.
Speaker 3: But I will say also, you know, the a lot
Speaker 3: of the bread and butter of what we've done, especially
Speaker 3: throughout the past few years also is looking to like
Speaker 3: the first hand documentation ourselves. And so I think one
Speaker 3: of the great examples and of one of the reasons
Speaker 3: I think Ben is so good at what he does
Speaker 3: is with his you know, background as an attorney. One
Speaker 3: of the things that we do is we'll go through
Speaker 3: court filings, for example, and so during all the various
Speaker 3: court cases over the past few years, and even everything
Speaker 3: that's happening in the courts right now, because you know,
Speaker 3: there's a whole lot of legal stuff happening right now
Speaker 3: in the various score Oh yeah, we started a whole
Speaker 3: new well channel, the Legal af Channel, because we had
Speaker 3: so many legal stories, right and so so we have
Speaker 3: a whole channel now specifically dedicated to the legal But
Speaker 3: on those the attorneys are going through these source documents,
Speaker 3: the court filings. You know this judge said this, Their
Speaker 3: argument is this, they're analyzing it. And so I think
Speaker 3: that is at the heart of it. And I think
Speaker 3: one of the things our format allows us to do
Speaker 3: that may not be as conducive to a twenty four
Speaker 3: hour news format or a kind of a TV news
Speaker 3: format is we could go there and we could sit
Speaker 3: there and we could say, pull up the filing, and
Speaker 3: we could read an eight page filing and our audience
Speaker 3: likes that. It probably doesn't make good TV, yeah, but
Speaker 3: our audience likes us going through. Okay, now, let's look
Speaker 3: at the footnote on page three, and let's go to
Speaker 3: the paragraph on page and they likely turn the channel
Speaker 3: at that point. But our audience, you know, likes that
Speaker 3: because they like seeing what's actually being said. And I
Speaker 3: think sometimes it's the most revealing rather than you know,
Speaker 3: you hearing what I have to say about this topic.
Speaker 3: Let me tell you what the judge actually said here,
Speaker 3: let me tell you what there, what the Trump Administration's
Speaker 3: argument actually is here, and then you be the judge
Speaker 3: of what the truth is. Hi.
Speaker 4: Everyone, it's Katie Curic. You know I'm always on the
Speaker 4: go between running my media company, hosting my podcast, and
Speaker 4: of course covering the news. And I know that to
Speaker 4: keep doing what I love, I need to start caring
Speaker 4: for what gets me there, my feet. That's why I
Speaker 4: decided to try the Good Feet stores personalized arch support system.
Speaker 4: I met with a Good Feet arch support specialist and
Speaker 4: after a personalized fitting, I left the store with my
Speaker 4: three step system designed to improve comfort, balance, and support
Speaker 4: my feet. Knees and back are thanking me already. Visit
Speaker 4: goodfeet dot com to learn find the nearest store, or
Speaker 4: book your own free personalized fitting. So fair enough, you
Speaker 4: guys do a ton of original reporting, and not just
Speaker 4: on clips that you see on cable news. In fact,
Speaker 4: I thought it was funny. I know that you hired
Speaker 4: this guy and he is sort of like, how can
Speaker 4: I explain him? He's sort of like the tru yes,
Speaker 4: the truffle sniffy dog who can figure out, like what
Speaker 4: is going to be the big story and kind of
Speaker 4: does clip. And I read one of you said something
Speaker 4: like he's so undervalued as the best cable news producer's
Speaker 4: business because in a way, you all are setting the
Speaker 4: agenda for at least more progressive cable news networks, and
Speaker 4: I would imagine even more conservative ones that are often
Speaker 4: reacting to more progressive ones. Right.
Speaker 3: Well, one of the things that we notice, and it's
Speaker 3: a funny thing to see is that you know Ason,
Speaker 3: who's one of the most brilliant people on the planet.
Speaker 4: I might have to hire.
Speaker 2: He truly is a savant when you see what he
Speaker 2: does with like the eight screens and he sits there
Speaker 2: for like eighteen hours a day like it's real.
Speaker 3: And let me just say, he's ours. You can't have it.
Speaker 3: But he goes, he goes through, you know, the clips
Speaker 3: all day long, and you know he's got an eye
Speaker 3: for it, and I think it's something you do need
Speaker 3: an eye for, right, what out of all the things
Speaker 3: that are said during these congressional hearings, for example, or
Speaker 3: on the floor of the house, whatever it is on
Speaker 3: cable news, there's a lot of stuff that isn't newsworthy,
Speaker 3: that isn't exciting, but for you to be able to capture, contextualize,
Speaker 3: and ninety nine percent of the time he's literally just
Speaker 3: putting the captions of what people are saying when he
Speaker 3: puts out these clips. But to pick those moments that
Speaker 3: are the moments that you know, he knows will be
Speaker 3: important for people to see. I think that's a real
Speaker 3: skill and a real talent. And one of the interesting
Speaker 3: things that we see is he'll do that throughout the
Speaker 3: day and then coincidentally, you know on the Shepherd.
Speaker 4: Talking about yeah, you go another lawyer.
Speaker 3: Right, whether it's MSNBC or Fox, you know, they're playing
Speaker 3: those same clips. They have a different perspective on the clips.
Speaker 3: But but they're playing those same clips that Asen pulled
Speaker 3: earlier in the day. I don't think that's any accident.
Speaker 3: I think, you know, that's just how people are consuming media,
Speaker 3: right and it's not just us, but it's a cable
Speaker 3: news producers as well are seeing what happens in Congress.
Speaker 3: Not because you know, these hosts are sitting there watching
Speaker 3: hear you know, the hearings all day, but because they
Speaker 3: see what people are speaking about online, and oftentimes that originates.
Speaker 1: With our team.
Speaker 4: So interesting you talk about your values. You know, you
Speaker 4: describe the trans community as a marginalized community. I couldn't
Speaker 4: agree with you more. I think our values are probably aligned.
Speaker 4: But clearly you guys are left of center. Is that fair?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, it's funny. I just I think that's
Speaker 3: certainly fair, you know, in the kind of traditional political space.
Speaker 4: I mean, if you're thinking about issues that you all
Speaker 4: care about, believe in, maybe describe some of those issues
Speaker 4: like and we all.
Speaker 3: Grew up you know, not that we grew up, you know,
Speaker 3: we didn't growup political, but we're all you know, Democrats,
Speaker 3: and we all have you know, had, you know, beliefs
Speaker 3: that go in that, but we don't we really don't
Speaker 3: view everything like through necessarily a political end. Like in
Speaker 3: that way, we don't necessarily view ourselves as like like
Speaker 3: I don't care what the Democratic Party does, you know,
Speaker 3: I don't care about their internal squabbling. I don't care,
Speaker 3: you know. Like, to me, we're just doing our thing,
Speaker 3: and if we have our values and if people want
Speaker 3: to meet us at our values, that's kind of all
Speaker 3: we care about.
Speaker 4: So are your values?
Speaker 2: Look, I think people should get for a hard day's
Speaker 2: work or just working. They should get paid with dignity.
Speaker 2: I think Americans should be able to be able to
Speaker 2: afford homes. I don't believe Americans should be living paycheck
Speaker 2: to paycheck if they're working. I think that's a form
Speaker 2: of psychological torture. I believe that Americans should all have
Speaker 2: access to healthcare. It should be very affordable or free
Speaker 2: for Americans. I believe Americans should have access to education,
Speaker 2: which should be affordable or free to Americans.
Speaker 1: I believe in equality.
Speaker 2: I don't believe that marginalized community should have to wake
Speaker 2: up and be scared how they're going to be treated
Speaker 2: in a given day. I don't believe that people should
Speaker 2: be bullying marginalized communities. I believe diversity and equality is
Speaker 2: a strength, and equity is a strength, and I don't
Speaker 2: think that the lesson from this past election should be
Speaker 2: running away from that. It should be standing up for
Speaker 2: it and being strong and standing up for it and
Speaker 2: showing actual convictions. I think a lot of marginalized communities
Speaker 2: see fair weather supporters who are with them when it
Speaker 2: seems cool and then abandon them when the seasons change,
Speaker 2: and I think they see that a lot in how
Speaker 2: the media portrays them, how corporations portray them. Oh, everyone's
Speaker 2: with DEI now, and everyone's not with DEI now.
Speaker 1: I think that's bullshit.
Speaker 2: I think you've got to stand with people and be
Speaker 2: who you are, and that's ultimately is the right thing
Speaker 2: to do. But I think that's also what ultimately will
Speaker 2: win elections too, because if your really care, if you're
Speaker 2: really fighting for people, they'll recognize that. And I think
Speaker 2: when they see that you're waivering, they don't even know
Speaker 2: if you're a real ally or not an ally.
Speaker 4: And I imagine working with and representing Colin Kaepernick was
Speaker 4: very transformative. Maybe not transformative, maybe that's not the right word.
Speaker 2: For sure, it was.
Speaker 4: It was in terms of how you view things like
Speaker 4: Black Lives Matter and some of the things that Colin did,
Speaker 4: and as we were talking about racial equality and DEI
Speaker 4: issues and gosh, we've seen so much of that progress reversed.
Speaker 4: How do you feel about reproductive rights?
Speaker 2: Well, it's the first Colin Oh yeah, yeah. On the
Speaker 2: Colin side, nobody wanted to work with us at first.
Speaker 2: When I started representing Colin. Remember that Colin was one
Speaker 2: of the first people, if not the first person Trump targeted.
Speaker 2: Get that sob off the field. Colin lost his job.
Speaker 2: No one would do deals with us, no one did
Speaker 2: business with us, and Colin and I were working together.
Speaker 2: Then then all of a sudden, everybody wanted to work
Speaker 2: with us because Colin fought people perceived what everything was.
Speaker 2: As Colin won, he stood up, everybody was with us.
Speaker 2: And then people leave and then they're no longer. Oh
Speaker 2: we can't do you know, all these corporations, all these groups, everybody.
Speaker 4: Who wanted to invest in and get scared right, and
Speaker 4: they they.
Speaker 2: Were all talking about diversity Initiative, Chief, diversity off, you know,
Speaker 2: all those things. Then they get rid of them. So
Speaker 2: if you look at that, you think.
Speaker 1: Who has my back?
Speaker 2: And I think you need to as a leader, setting aside,
Speaker 2: are you center left, are you left left or you
Speaker 2: left left left? You just as a leader have to
Speaker 2: say I have your back, and I've always had your back.
Speaker 2: I'm the person who was marching with you in Bakersfield
Speaker 2: on the streets, whether you were a Democrat or Republican,
Speaker 2: if you lost a loved one, I was with you,
Speaker 2: and I was fighting for you. And I'm the civil
Speaker 2: rights lawyer who was fighting for you. I was the
Speaker 2: person there. We we have your back, and I think
Speaker 2: that authenticity is what's most important beyond you know, how
Speaker 2: do you describe yourself as it relates to reproductive rights.
Speaker 2: We feel strongly that reproductive rights it's a woman's decision.
Speaker 2: We as men get the hell out of it. It's
Speaker 2: it's it's not for me to even think for a
Speaker 2: moment that I should be in any way controlling, lecturing, talking,
Speaker 2: having anything at all to intrude in the conversation you
Speaker 2: know here, you know, And so for us women's reproductive rights,
Speaker 2: that is sacro saying to the women men stay the
Speaker 2: hell out.
Speaker 4: So you, I think, are anesthetical to the current sort
Speaker 4: of right wing media ecosystem. And I want to read
Speaker 4: a quote from this guy named Michael Tamaski, who is
Speaker 4: the editor of The New Republic. I interviewed him a
Speaker 4: few days after the election and I asked him about
Speaker 4: his essay about why Trump won and when exploring why
Speaker 4: he did, Tamaski wrote, the answer is the right wing
Speaker 4: media today. The right wing media Fox News and the
Speaker 4: entire News Corp, Newsmax one American news network, the Sinclair
Speaker 4: Network of radio and TV stations, and newspapers. iHeartMedia, not
Speaker 4: all of iHeartMedia, normally Lyricy and the Bot Radio Network,
Speaker 4: Christian Radio, Elon, musk X, the Huge podcast like Joe
Speaker 4: Rogan's much More sets the news agenda in this country.
Speaker 4: He repeated that in the next paragraph sets the news
Speaker 4: agenda in this country, and they fed their audience as
Speaker 4: a diet of slanted and distorted information that made it
Speaker 4: possible for Trump to win. Before I ask you about
Speaker 4: how this informed your decision to move forward with the
Speaker 4: Midas Network, I'd love to hear your take on why
Speaker 4: you think, and maybe Jordi, as a marketing person, you
Speaker 4: have something interesting to say about this. Why has right
Speaker 4: wing media been so incredibly effective?
Speaker 1: Yep? I think when you go down that list, the
Speaker 1: Fox News is the Rogans, and you keep going down
Speaker 1: and down to.
Speaker 4: The so called manosphere and all those things.
Speaker 1: Right, there's one thing that that's really standing out to
Speaker 1: me every time you go down through one of those
Speaker 1: lists is who they're funded by. Billion like these billionaire
Speaker 1: billionaire Elon Musk billionaire, Fox News, Murdoch billionaire. You go
Speaker 1: into the Rogan sphere. I don't know his whatnot, but
Speaker 1: but it's it's heavy funding, heavy funding and influence that
Speaker 1: then just trickles down into that quote unquote manosphere. And
Speaker 1: so once you get hit with you know, the Fox
Speaker 1: News clips, it's an ecosystem that all feeds into itself
Speaker 1: and then the algorithm takes it on your social network,
Speaker 1: so you really can't escape it. Like it's it's consuming
Speaker 1: in such a way that it's almost unavoidable.
Speaker 2: People are suffering. People feel pained right now, and people
Speaker 2: want answers about why they feel pain. They can't afford
Speaker 2: a home, and they're seeing rich people with ten jets
Speaker 2: and mansions and they can't afford a home. They don't
Speaker 2: know if they're going to be able to We have
Speaker 2: to listen to people and what they're saying democrats, People
Speaker 2: listen to what people are actually saying to you. People
Speaker 2: are suffering out there, and I think that they're getting
Speaker 2: easy answers from right wing media about where they're suffering
Speaker 2: is coming from. They're being told the immigrants are doing
Speaker 2: it to you. They're eating your cats and your dogs,
Speaker 2: and that sounds stupid to a lot of people. The
Speaker 2: people want an easy answer about why they're feeling pain.
Speaker 2: And when you can blame a marginalized community as they're
Speaker 2: doing it, they're doing it. And then somebody comes in
Speaker 2: and says, I'm going.
Speaker 1: To make you rich.
Speaker 2: I'm going to make you the richest person ever, just
Speaker 2: like me. You're going to be so rich you're not
Speaker 2: even going to know what to do with how rich
Speaker 2: you are. That message resonates with people who are suffering.
Speaker 2: It's built on fraud, but you combine the lies with
Speaker 2: a right wing media network giving you a simple answer,
Speaker 2: and that connects with people. Now, how do you combat it.
Speaker 2: You have to combat it by pointing out that that's
Speaker 2: a lie and that's a fraud. But you also have
Speaker 2: to provide solutions, and you have to speak to people's
Speaker 2: real human condition. You have to look somebody in the eye,
Speaker 2: and you have to say to them, I hear you,
Speaker 2: I listen to you, I understand what you're going through.
Speaker 2: And that's what we could talk about the podcast Bros.
Speaker 2: The media ecosystem, but ultimately whether this massive funding machine
Speaker 2: they're pumping easy and by scapegoating the other and making
Speaker 2: people understand, oh, that's why I'm going through this, and
Speaker 2: that's not why they're going through this. They're going through
Speaker 2: this because people like Trump and other people are the
Speaker 2: ones doing it to them, inflicting that's what's causing it.
Speaker 2: And they've managed to the people who are causing it,
Speaker 2: has managed to convince the people they're inflicting the pain
Speaker 2: on that they're helping them and they're not. And so
Speaker 2: the antidote to that is also simple messages.
Speaker 4: All saying messaging is so important. It hasn't it been,
Speaker 4: because it seems to me there is sort of an
Speaker 4: orchestrated effort to keep it simple but also to have
Speaker 4: it kind of almost echoing throughout the whole ecosystem right
Speaker 4: in a way that is just much more effective.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 4: I think also people think that people are paying attention
Speaker 4: to every little thing and they're just hearing sort of
Speaker 4: this orchestrated effort. I'm not really making sense right now,
Speaker 4: but I think like a lot most people aren't like us,
Speaker 4: like reading everything, or like your guy who's watching.
Speaker 3: The By the way, it is coordinated. And you know
Speaker 3: those people you mentioned, they do work together, you know.
Speaker 3: I'm sure and I've seen certain the evidence of it.
Speaker 3: There's been stories about it as well that there are
Speaker 3: signal chats and I message chats and various things.
Speaker 4: This is what we're going to be, is what we're
Speaker 4: going to talk about. The Rocket Ales used to do
Speaker 4: that every morning off Fox News and they all distribute
Speaker 4: a memo with talking points that every anchor had to
Speaker 4: adhere to.
Speaker 3: One of the things that we noticed early on, and
Speaker 3: I feel like we were written off for it a
Speaker 3: lot is that those conversations were starting on the Internet
Speaker 3: and they would then permeate to legacy media. They would
Speaker 3: then get to people's Facebook feeds. They would then get
Speaker 3: into the conversations that people are having with one another.
Speaker 3: But you wonder, where does this cats and dogs room,
Speaker 3: or where does that even begin from? And you could
Speaker 3: trace stuff like that back to an Internet post, back
Speaker 3: to a tweet that went viral that people spoke about
Speaker 3: and so oftentimes, because everything is so fragmented right now,
Speaker 3: you don't actually know where that information even started from,
Speaker 3: what was the kind of match that ignited it. But
Speaker 3: oftentimes these conversations are beginning in these spaces and then
Speaker 3: they kind of become more mainstream and in many cases
Speaker 3: now make their way to the President of the United States,
Speaker 3: who lives in these spaces as well. But I think,
Speaker 3: you know, I think it's a bit nefarious kind of
Speaker 3: how it operates in a way, and I think folks
Speaker 3: have learned, in my opinion, a lot of the wrong
Speaker 3: lessons from the election. And by nefarious, I mean I
Speaker 3: think people think like these people were created in a lab,
Speaker 3: that you know, the MANI Sphere podcast, that these people
Speaker 3: were created in a lab designed to spread propaganda and
Speaker 3: spread certain lives. But to me, that's not what it is.
Speaker 3: I think these a lot of these shows did begin
Speaker 3: organically and they had audiences, and they connected with people
Speaker 3: through typical you know, life things, or whether it's you know,
Speaker 3: ultimate fighting or or weightlifting or you know, discussing a
Speaker 3: pop culture trial or you know whatever. It may be
Speaker 3: something that doesn't necessarily seem political, but once they have
Speaker 3: you in they could then use that space to send
Speaker 3: people down these other rabbit holes that I think could
Speaker 3: be you know, kind of a bit more dangerous, I
Speaker 3: think in that way.
Speaker 4: So it's like a lifestyle podcast that sort of morphs
Speaker 4: into people in it.
Speaker 3: Then they say, Okay, now that I got you, have
Speaker 3: you considered that the vaccine might be hurt in you?
Speaker 3: You know, like once they get hurt of yeah, have
Speaker 3: you heard of the and and then all of a
Speaker 3: sudden you start getting put down this path, you know.
Speaker 3: I read an interesting article a few years ago at
Speaker 3: this point, I think it was in the New York Times,
Speaker 3: and it was about how the Epoch Times the Epic
Speaker 3: Times is uh, they were.
Speaker 4: I was shinned up that once, and I tried to
Speaker 4: because I always like to hear what everybody's saying and
Speaker 4: how stories are being framed. Isn't it called epochs epocket
Speaker 4: the yacht But anyway, it's like it's like from China
Speaker 4: or something.
Speaker 3: Someone will correct me in the comments, and I was like,
Speaker 3: oh my.
Speaker 4: God, these people are insane. Stop stop stop, And they
Speaker 4: kept sending me stuff. Finally they and so.
Speaker 3: In this New York Times space, they analyzed how they
Speaker 3: pulled people in with viral videos of cats and dogs,
Speaker 3: and they would promote on Facebook videos of cute cat
Speaker 3: videos and cute dog videos, and so they would get
Speaker 3: people to engage with their content because they thought that
Speaker 3: they were engaging. Oh, look at this cute cat who's
Speaker 3: on a skateboard or you know whatever it is. Next
Speaker 3: thing they know they're being pushed. You know, Fauci needs
Speaker 3: to go to prison and on all this crazy stuff.
Speaker 3: And it all started because they watched this video of
Speaker 3: a dog on a rumba or something, you know. And
Speaker 3: so that's what I mean by nefarius, that people could
Speaker 3: get pulled in with things that seem benign or see
Speaker 3: like they're you know, things that relate to their interests.
Speaker 3: Next thing they know, they're taking down this algorithmic hell
Speaker 3: hole and that they really can't escape from once they're in.
Speaker 3: And so I think that's one of the kind of
Speaker 3: dangerous spaces that we're in right now. Also, is you know,
Speaker 3: social media is going to continue to push the at
Speaker 3: you that you engage with and that it thinks you
Speaker 3: want to see. And once you do a few clicks,
Speaker 3: sometimes people get lost in these algorithms and it just
Speaker 3: takes it consumes their life and they just kind of
Speaker 3: lose a grip on, you know, a little bit of
Speaker 3: normalcy and kind of even respect for other people humanity.
Speaker 3: And I think that's kind of one of the dangerous.
Speaker 4: Elspace programs, you to have this visceral reaction to anything
Speaker 4: that is different than your point of view. Yeah, right.
Speaker 4: And I know that you all say the talking point
Speaker 4: or the conventional wisdom is like the left needs a
Speaker 4: Joe Rogan, they need their Joe Rogan. And I know
Speaker 4: you have all said that that's the wrong way to
Speaker 4: look at it. But clearly, to deal with this ecosystem
Speaker 4: that is so powerful, different points of view or even
Speaker 4: truth right needs to have a more potent platform. So
Speaker 4: how do you think different views or truth and everything
Speaker 4: that's going on with the Trump administration gets out there
Speaker 4: and explain to people? And do you worry that you're
Speaker 4: kind of preaching to the choir? I know it just
Speaker 4: asks like twelve questions in one, but how do you
Speaker 4: do that well?
Speaker 2: On the preaching to the choir? I always ask this
Speaker 2: question when people, and I ask about Fox and I said,
Speaker 2: do you think that Fox News is preaching to the choir?
Speaker 2: I say, raise your hand, if you think Fox News
Speaker 2: preaches to the choir, and usually in my group, everybody
Speaker 2: raises their hand and says, of course, they're preaching to
Speaker 2: a right wing choir. I go, do you think Fox
Speaker 2: is one of the more powerful forces in politics in general? Okay,
Speaker 2: so they're preaching to the choir. You don't view that
Speaker 2: as a negative, right right? Okay, Well, what if your
Speaker 2: choir just needs to sing louder than the other choir?
Speaker 2: What if you just need a choir to begin with.
Speaker 2: What if your choir doesn't believe you're a good conductor,
Speaker 2: you should first be a good conductor of your own choir.
Speaker 2: This is going back to what I said before, and
Speaker 2: ensure that your choir knows that you're actually their conductor
Speaker 2: and that you're fighting for your choir. So I think
Speaker 2: that whether you want to say it is the Democrats
Speaker 2: or whoever, I think that one of the problems has
Speaker 2: been that the choir needed to be preached to a
Speaker 2: little bit from an authentic position and saying we're here
Speaker 2: with you, we're fighting for you, and then you can
Speaker 2: start to build and grow because I think other people
Speaker 2: start to see, wait a minute, that makes sense.
Speaker 4: Your choir needed a church to go to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, and to me when you're building, do
Speaker 2: you want to model that on a choir built upon
Speaker 2: values that you don't think are helpful? And this goes
Speaker 2: to your Rogan question. I'm going to tie it all together,
Speaker 2: you know, but you know, but do you want to
Speaker 2: then say we should be like that? Well, you're going
Speaker 2: to start losing people in your choir if you're saying
Speaker 2: I want to start acting that way, because then they're
Speaker 2: going to go, WHOA, what do you mean? I don't
Speaker 2: like the way they're treating, marginalizing. I don't like the
Speaker 2: way they're bullying. I don't like the way that they're
Speaker 2: making a mockery of women.
Speaker 1: I don't like that.
Speaker 2: So why do you want to be like that? Huh?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 2: I think that they just want to see you say
Speaker 2: this is what I believe in. I give you an example.
Speaker 2: Andy Basheer, governor of Kentucky, got.
Speaker 4: Reviewed him on Friday. Oh my god, he is I mean,
Speaker 4: talk about wholesome at all Americas. It's like out of
Speaker 4: central casts like Andy Basheer.
Speaker 2: Rush Chairman, Democratic governor.
Speaker 4: Sixty eight percent approvement right in sixty in Kentucky.
Speaker 2: He doesn't say I'm not for LGBTQ, right, he says
Speaker 2: the opposite. He vetoes any bill that comes his way
Speaker 2: that's anti LGBTQ, and he's then he does a press
Speaker 2: conference and he'll say, this is why I'm vetoing it.
Speaker 2: We need to treat all human beings with respect. And
Speaker 2: they respect him in Kentucky for doing that. So to me,
Speaker 2: if he can do that in Kentucky, we should be
Speaker 2: able to do that everywhere else. And to me, that's
Speaker 2: a great example. I was so impressed in the interview
Speaker 2: I did with him where he conveyed, you know, that
Speaker 2: message to me. So there's that, and then there's what
Speaker 2: Senator Bernie Sanders said to me, which is that the
Speaker 2: most important issues are sometimes the least discussed. And that's true.
Speaker 2: You know, people aren't talking about the issues that actually
Speaker 2: impact us the most, whether that's housing, whether that's healthcare,
Speaker 2: whether it's education, whether it's you know, living paycheck to paycheck,
Speaker 2: and all of these issues are not being discussed, So
Speaker 2: we should discuss them. So to me, in terms of
Speaker 2: building what our version of what's going on on the
Speaker 2: other side should be, I think it's obvious we should
Speaker 2: make sure our choir sings louder, and we should be
Speaker 2: focusing on the issues and actually occupy a lot of
Speaker 2: the mental space in Americans' minds, but are filled with conspiracies,
Speaker 2: and we should fill it with the truth and solutions.
Speaker 4: And what is the reaction among say, people who are
Speaker 4: more conservative, you know, because everyone's all over the place
Speaker 4: and you see like working class folks who supported Donald Trump.
Speaker 4: But if you're tackling the issues they care about, do
Speaker 4: you find that they are gravitating towards your platform?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I mean, look or not.
Speaker 2: I think I'll say this, whether they're gravitating or not gravitating.
Speaker 2: I'm confident that the views and values I stand behind them.
Speaker 2: I stand on business and I stand behind them. And
Speaker 2: I'm confident that that's the approach that will. You know,
Speaker 2: I'm not trying to chase people and beg them to
Speaker 2: be good people. I simply want to let them know
Speaker 2: that here's a place where we feel very strongly about
Speaker 2: these things. There's a massive community now with millions of
Speaker 2: people who watch this. Join it if you want to
Speaker 2: join it, don't join it if you don't want to
Speaker 2: join it. But we are, we are here, and we're
Speaker 2: standing the struggle what we believe.
Speaker 1: And so I don't.
Speaker 2: I don't it may sound I don't occupy myself so
Speaker 2: much thinking about you know, I'm really hoping that I've
Speaker 2: just changed, you know, mister Maga's mind and made him
Speaker 2: into a mister Midas like I. If they want to
Speaker 2: live in their rage algorithm, they want if they want
Speaker 2: to live in there, Remitas mighty the best. Yeah, if
Speaker 2: they want to live in their rage algorithm, then that's
Speaker 2: where they could live, you know, but they should know
Speaker 2: that there's other places where we're going to talk about
Speaker 2: the issues in an impactful, logical smart way, and then
Speaker 2: we're going to layer that with some positivity to day.
Speaker 4: Do you feel that this whole kind of opposite views
Speaker 4: of you know, the Foxes of the world are in
Speaker 4: aggregate gaining traction. You have, for example, pot Save America,
Speaker 4: have Currenter Newsroom. You have a lot of these digital
Speaker 4: companies networks. Honestly, I know you call yourself a network,
Speaker 4: but their networks too kind of rising up and creating
Speaker 4: a force field that is, you know, bumping up against
Speaker 4: this other huge ecosystem.
Speaker 2: I just give you the data quickly, you know, from
Speaker 2: our network three hundred and fifty million or so YouTube
Speaker 2: views every single month.
Speaker 4: I'm very jealous.
Speaker 1: So that's more more.
Speaker 4: We're all like, what's going on?
Speaker 2: Yeah, but that's more on a day to day basis
Speaker 2: on digital and I think we all agree things are
Speaker 2: moving digital. So the cable news wants to go more digital.
Speaker 4: Right So there and there in our forever, I was like,
Speaker 4: what is wrong with you people?
Speaker 2: But anyway go so on that platform, the Mightas Touched
Speaker 2: Network on a day to day basis, and some days
Speaker 2: Fox beats us, but on a day to day basis,
Speaker 2: we'll get more views than Fox on YouTube and then
Speaker 2: seeing an MSNBC and all the rest, Mightas Touch Network
Speaker 2: will beat those. We're the fastest growing substack right now
Speaker 2: of all substacks.
Speaker 4: Out there, substack after Memorial Day.
Speaker 1: So we should do that would be fun and we love.
Speaker 4: Subjects that we're all such good.
Speaker 2: For exactly exactly and then you know, across and then
Speaker 2: on the podcast downloads themselves. Uh, Jordy showed me the
Speaker 2: data today. So in the last month, the Mightas Touch
Speaker 2: Network beat Rogan Tucker, Carlson, Candae Owens, Charlie Kirk, and
Speaker 2: Ben Shapiro all combined for the month of for the
Speaker 2: last month, they do so in terms of in terms
Speaker 2: of growth. You know, I think that that, you know,
Speaker 2: that shows that there is an appetite for this out there,
Speaker 2: and I think that, you know, we got to preach
Speaker 2: to that choir, you know, and expand it. But let's
Speaker 2: start also with fortifying the choir and let them know
Speaker 2: we care about them. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Hi, everyone, it's me Katie Couric. You know, if you've
Speaker 4: been following me on social media, you know I love
Speaker 4: to cook, or at least try, especially alongside some of
Speaker 4: my favorite chefs and foodies like Benny Blanco, Jake Cohen,
Speaker 4: Lighty Hoyke, Alison Roman, and Ininagarten. So I started a
Speaker 4: free newsletter called good Taste to share recipes, tips and
Speaker 4: kitchen mustaves. Just sign up at Katiecuric dot com slash
Speaker 4: good Taste. That's k A T I E C O
Speaker 4: U R I C dot com slash good Taste. I
Speaker 4: promise your taste buds will be happy you did. I'm
Speaker 4: curious because I've struggled with this as someone who you
Speaker 4: grew up watching, I'm sure, and it started in very
Speaker 4: traditional mainstream media now pointing out the facts and what
Speaker 4: is really happening is automatically interpreted as being biased, right,
Speaker 4: And of course I think there's no such thing as
Speaker 4: true objectivity. But having said that, you know, I really
Speaker 4: struggle with that, and many people say, listen, the rules
Speaker 4: have changed. It's okay to say you support trans people.
Speaker 4: It's okay that you say I am one hundred percent
Speaker 4: for reproductive rights. You know, all these things that honestly,
Speaker 4: as personally I hold dear, but professionally I've been trained
Speaker 4: to not share that. I'm curious if you think sort
Speaker 4: of old fashioned, semi objective, knowing that pure objectivity is impossible,
Speaker 4: that kind of journalism still has a place in the culture,
Speaker 4: or is it simply you know, the seventy five and
Speaker 4: up people who are watching the network evening newscasts.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I certainly think it's still as a place.
Speaker 3: But at the same time, I think everything is so
Speaker 3: fragmented now that I think such a large portion of
Speaker 3: the audience are going to places that share a point
Speaker 3: of view. And I think, you know, I think if
Speaker 3: we just did a report that is this happened, then
Speaker 3: this happened, then this happened, then this happened. I mean,
Speaker 3: there's there's plenty of places where people you know, could find.
Speaker 4: Not you know, really I mean fewer and fewer, right, right, Yeah, But.
Speaker 3: I think I think the key thing that we do
Speaker 3: is connect the dots on all those things. And I
Speaker 3: think when you're able to weave it into a story
Speaker 3: and actually connect the dots, I think that's what people
Speaker 3: want to be able to gain clarity on because I think,
Speaker 3: as as we've kind of been saying, there's so much
Speaker 3: information out there that in order to be able to
Speaker 3: digest it and has to be presented, you know, I
Speaker 3: think in many ways, you know, in certain ways just
Speaker 3: to make it clear from even just a storytelling perspective,
Speaker 3: so people get how how does a tariff affect you know,
Speaker 3: their you know, their business or the price they're going
Speaker 3: to pay for goods, you know, and how does this
Speaker 3: affect their medication and their family? Like I think, you
Speaker 3: just I think you need to be able to tie
Speaker 3: it all together in a way, and whether people think
Speaker 3: it's biased or not when you're speaking on those issues,
Speaker 3: to me, I think you just need to put that
Speaker 3: aside because now we live in a time when people
Speaker 3: are going to comment on on everything, right, Like I said,
Speaker 3: and people are going to comment I mispronounced something. We'll
Speaker 3: get a comment, right, it's it's there's going to be
Speaker 3: a comment about everything. You have to almost bake that
Speaker 3: into what you're doing, in my opinion, and just be you,
Speaker 3: you know, and and and and let the chips fall
Speaker 3: where they may. I think the biggest thing that you
Speaker 3: need to do, though, is be authentic, you know, to yourself.
Speaker 3: And I think people could smell bullshit from a mile away.
Speaker 3: And that's why I think when after the twenty twenty
Speaker 3: four election, when there were so many I feel like
Speaker 3: I saw so many democratic politicians and people in media
Speaker 3: and podcasts and you name it, to all the sudden,
Speaker 3: everything I thought they believed in and the communities that
Speaker 3: I thought they supported, all of a sudden they seem
Speaker 3: to be backtracking on that. Maybe we focused a little
Speaker 3: too much on inclusivity, Maybe we focused a little too
Speaker 3: much on reproductive rights. And when you try to kind
Speaker 3: of shape your opinions based around public poland.
Speaker 4: Right and kind of like were the wind driving is
Speaker 4: the DEI people who when it was cool, it was great,
Speaker 4: and now they're like, what what does that stand for?
Speaker 3: Yeah? And so how do I trust you with anything,
Speaker 3: and I don't. I's speaking of mister Maga, Missus Midas
Speaker 3: whatever we were talking about before. You know, I don't
Speaker 3: think you're gonna win. You know, the mister Maga is
Speaker 3: not going to vote for you because you have those beliefs.
Speaker 3: They're going to vote for the Maga guy. Okay, they're
Speaker 3: not going to come around. They may say they respect
Speaker 3: you more or something. You know, you're not get in
Speaker 3: their vote, I assure you. And you're just alienating your choir,
Speaker 3: as we were speaking about before, and you're angering the
Speaker 3: people who you've built trust with because you violated that trust.
Speaker 3: So I think right now, and I think whether you're
Speaker 3: Miightas Touched or whether you're Joe Rogan or you name it,
Speaker 3: I think the most important thing is that you're authentic
Speaker 3: to your audience and that people trust the things that
Speaker 3: you are saying and know where you are coming from,
Speaker 3: and know that tomorrow, if a poll comes out that
Speaker 3: says this big thing you've been pushing may not be
Speaker 3: super popular right now, that you're not all of a
Speaker 3: sudden going to just change your beliefs, you know, based
Speaker 3: on it. And I mean that's that's my thought on that.
Speaker 3: I think you know, one of the things I could
Speaker 3: say about Donald Trump. I'm not trying to say anything
Speaker 3: nice about the guy right now, but one of the
Speaker 3: things I could say is I think he's pushed forward
Speaker 3: a lot with things that are incredibly unpopular, and then
Speaker 3: he's taken his people kind of on that journey with
Speaker 3: him going way back. I mean, remember he was being
Speaker 3: laughed at at these debates and the White House dinner.
Speaker 3: I mean, everyone is making a mockery of him, but
Speaker 3: he pushed forward and he tried to make the case
Speaker 3: to bring people to his side.
Speaker 4: He is a marketing genius, don't you think Geordie in
Speaker 4: a way.
Speaker 2: I would say he's a Ponzi schemer and a fraud.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a good characters.
Speaker 4: I mean you can think dialectically he can be all
Speaker 4: those things, can't he.
Speaker 1: I mean, was Bernie made Off a good marketer?
Speaker 4: Well, I think he's very I think he was very
Speaker 4: I don't think he had a public persona that was
Speaker 4: charismatic and got people to buy what he was selling.
Speaker 4: I mean he did have a small group, right, but
Speaker 4: I don't know just on a well, we don't have
Speaker 4: to get.
Speaker 1: I think what Bro was saying though, too about audiences
Speaker 1: these days, and it's a marketing buzzword authenticity. I know
Speaker 1: I used to say it a lot back in my
Speaker 1: marketing days, but genuinely, I think people are viewing what
Speaker 1: we're doing here at the maas Touch Network as absolutely authentic.
Speaker 1: You know, with three brothers, we don't try and be
Speaker 1: anything that we're not right. We rely on Ben for
Speaker 1: the legal, Bred for the digital, and Me for the marketing,
Speaker 1: and then we bring in experts in specific spaces that
Speaker 1: could speak to issues that we're not experts in. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and we don't pretend that we're experts in, but we
Speaker 1: have a clear value set of you know, right or wrong.
Speaker 1: And if those lean more democratic, well, I think that
Speaker 1: tells you kind of where we are as a country,
Speaker 1: as a society, and we just stand behind it wholeheartedly,
Speaker 1: and I think people like that. I think that's what
Speaker 1: folks are gravitating.
Speaker 3: By the way, that's not to say that your ideas
Speaker 3: cannot evolve, that you cannot change your opinions. I think
Speaker 3: certainly you can. And I don't think your beliefs that
Speaker 3: you had at age eighteen have to be the beliefs
Speaker 3: that you have at age fifty. You know, I think
Speaker 3: that evolution is a part of life. Exploring new ideas,
Speaker 3: engaging with them, changing your mind is a part of life.
Speaker 3: But I think people to your point, know when you go, oh,
Speaker 3: this poll came out yesterday, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: I maybe I shouldn't support transgender people so much. Maybe
Speaker 3: I shouldn't support you know, diversity, Maybe I shouldn't support
Speaker 3: reproductive rights. People see right through that wrap, you know,
Speaker 3: and then they go, you know, they go, this person,
Speaker 3: you're okay, So you're just a fraud. How do I
Speaker 3: trust that anything else you're telling me right now? How
Speaker 3: do I know you're being honest about that? What if
Speaker 3: tomorrow you know some other politician one that was the
Speaker 3: opposite of that, and then all of a sudden you're
Speaker 3: switching your beliefs on that too, Like how do you
Speaker 3: trust somebody you know who's sort of a shape shifter
Speaker 3: like that? And I think it's important to not view,
Speaker 3: you know, as you go from election to election or
Speaker 3: you know, issue to issue, whatever it is, that you
Speaker 3: don't just change with the way the wind is blowing,
Speaker 3: but that you are staying true through those moments, and
Speaker 3: that you're sticking up for your beliefs cuse I think
Speaker 3: at least you know, at least people will respect.
Speaker 4: You right and giving them facts and data that actually
Speaker 4: reinforces your position. I think that's really critical. Just a
Speaker 4: few more questions. I could talk to you guys for
Speaker 4: hours a lot to do it over feer sometimes, please,
Speaker 4: but I'd love to know, just sort of logistically, selfishly
Speaker 4: a little about the secret sauce that has made you
Speaker 4: so successful. You guys have hired a bunch of different
Speaker 4: It's interesting. I didn't realize Michael Cohen was part of
Speaker 4: your network, you know, the former Trump Trump lawyer, But
Speaker 4: you have hired a lot of different people. You have correspondence,
Speaker 4: but you also have sort of what might traditionally be
Speaker 4: called pundits. Do you ever feel like you've got too
Speaker 4: much content that's coming out or how do you kind
Speaker 4: of organize what you're doing.
Speaker 2: So we've taken the twenty four hour cable news cycle
Speaker 2: and we've tried to deconstruct it. So whereas a twenty
Speaker 2: four hour cable news cycle, you'll have how many stories
Speaker 2: in a given day, five to seven that are on
Speaker 2: repeat every day. So we try to take those five
Speaker 2: to seven stories that and I don't watch what cable
Speaker 2: news is those five to seven We program it based
Speaker 2: on what we think are the most important, say seven
Speaker 2: to ten stories of the day, and then that becomes
Speaker 2: basically ten to twelve YouTube videos you know, every day
Speaker 2: from you know, and they're all.
Speaker 4: Your different contributors, right because you do some right and
Speaker 4: do do I'll do yes, I see you too, Jordan.
Speaker 4: Every now every now.
Speaker 1: More so social they do more of the long form stuff.
Speaker 2: So every day we probably have about one or two
Speaker 2: some days three live shows that last about an hour.
Speaker 2: And so that may be the show I do with
Speaker 2: bretton Jordy. That may be a show called Legal af
Speaker 2: that I do with a guy named Michael Popak and
Speaker 2: Karen Friedman Agnifolo and she was the number two DA
Speaker 2: in the minute. These are like top Lords.
Speaker 4: I'm kidding.
Speaker 2: No no, no, no no.
Speaker 1: It means analysis friends.
Speaker 2: By the way, legal analysis, analysis friends some people. It
Speaker 2: could be a play on somebody else, but it's analysis friends.
Speaker 3: Okay, get Clara out of the gutter.
Speaker 2: And so about ten videos to twelve videos a day
Speaker 2: that are about ten to fifteen minutes. And let whatever
Speaker 2: it takes to go through a court filing or to
Speaker 2: provide all of the data where we feel that we've
Speaker 2: covered the issue in a way that people really get.
Speaker 1: So we do that twelve times a day.
Speaker 2: Maybe there's a four am, although now that I'm on
Speaker 2: East Coast time, it's all screwed up, But on the
Speaker 2: West Coast it's a four or five thirty seven, you know,
Speaker 2: and you basically go ninety minutes out and you program
Speaker 2: it like that with two or three live shows a day,
Speaker 2: and some days maybe on the weekend it's one live show.
Speaker 2: And then we have our other social media built around it.
Speaker 2: So we've got the TikTok, we've got the Instagram, We've
Speaker 2: got all those of the Blue Sky, which our accounts
Speaker 2: do very well on as well. And then the audio
Speaker 2: podcast as well, has some the main brother podcast and
Speaker 2: maybe a few selective you know, gase.
Speaker 4: Ever Sleep Yeah. And how do you how do you
Speaker 4: make money off all this stuff? Because that has been,
Speaker 4: of course, the big dilemma for people who have transferred
Speaker 4: to kind of a pure digital platform. They used to
Speaker 4: talk about analog dollars and digital pennies, so that's changed.
Speaker 4: Just more than fifty percent of people are now getting
Speaker 4: their using information from social media. But what is your
Speaker 4: financial model.
Speaker 2: I think it's still analog dollars digital pennies, although the
Speaker 2: analog dollars right are getting a little bit less and
Speaker 2: the digital pennies are getting more, which is a good thing.
Speaker 2: I just spoke recently at a panel and I said,
Speaker 2: one of the most important things I think to monetizing
Speaker 2: it is you don't go in it to monetizing And
Speaker 2: I mean truly, we never went into this thinking how
Speaker 2: do we make the biggest business decisions That naturally grew
Speaker 2: out of building good content.
Speaker 4: And a good base and a big community.
Speaker 2: And then the community exactly, and the community was there
Speaker 2: and that's what we fought for always and stood by
Speaker 2: the community, built the community, and they built us. It's been,
Speaker 2: you know, very mutual. And then as you grow that,
Speaker 2: you know, then you start to get into your digital
Speaker 2: pennies analog dollars, and you start to look at you know,
Speaker 2: what's YouTube CPM which is a different name for it,
Speaker 2: but what's a podcast CPM? And then what's a host
Speaker 2: read CPM? And then you start getting into conversations that
Speaker 2: start to not fully are but start to look similar
Speaker 2: to the way traditional.
Speaker 1: TV viewed things.
Speaker 2: You know, what's a CPM and here's the here's where
Speaker 2: things are moving. I think right now, if you were
Speaker 2: to buy and add a thirty second or sixty second
Speaker 2: spot on a cable news network, your CPM would be
Speaker 2: super high for thirty seconds, and you may be paying
Speaker 2: an outrage. You know, they'll say it's a good you know,
Speaker 2: the networks will say it makes sense, but you'll be
Speaker 2: paying whatever X dollars for that thirty seconds. After the
Speaker 2: show airs, no one sees the ad again, and you're
Speaker 2: one of five ads that may be during that block
Speaker 2: or four ads during that block, and no one ever
Speaker 2: sees it again. And I don't know what the conversion
Speaker 2: rate even is for you know, because it's not even
Speaker 2: really track that way. How many people bought a car
Speaker 2: based on.
Speaker 4: Those those vitamins that tastes like vegetables, right.
Speaker 1: News?
Speaker 2: You know, So if we're getting a million views, if
Speaker 2: we're getting a million views, you know, on a video,
Speaker 2: and then there's a host read you know, read and
Speaker 2: Jordi you know, works with the with the advertisers to
Speaker 2: make sure we're getting advertisers that kind of meet our criterion.
Speaker 2: We're not bringing advertisers that we think are not the
Speaker 2: right fits for us. You know, you start thinking about, well,
Speaker 2: what does that CPM look like? And you know, I
Speaker 2: think it's a more valuable proposition ultimately to an advertiser
Speaker 2: down the road. And I think this is where this
Speaker 2: is where the industry is moving. And I think, I
Speaker 2: think this is why we see so many people looking
Speaker 2: at a model, you know that that I think we
Speaker 2: you know, and again there's been a lot of people
Speaker 2: involved in this, but I think that we've helped, you know,
Speaker 2: show that this is a viable path for one of
Speaker 2: the first and people are seeing it and saying, oh,
Speaker 2: got it.
Speaker 1: I see how Midas did it.
Speaker 2: Let me try to build a network, And that's kind
Speaker 2: of how we, you know, how we think about things there.
Speaker 3: It's interesting over the past few years since we've been
Speaker 3: doing this, we've seen a lot of companies kind of
Speaker 3: come and go try to enter the space. And I
Speaker 3: think the theme that I've seen and the ones that
Speaker 3: have kind of come and gone quickly are the ones
Speaker 3: that start with a top down approach rather than a
Speaker 3: bottom up approach. And by that, I mean, you know,
Speaker 3: you see this big splashy announcement so and so was
Speaker 3: you know, the editor in chief of such and such,
Speaker 3: You know newspaper, and now they're going to make the
Speaker 3: digital network for the future. And they got an eighty
Speaker 3: million dollar investment, and they're gonna open up twelve offices
Speaker 3: around the world, and they're going to hire one hundred
Speaker 3: and fifty staff and and anytime I see that, I'll
Speaker 3: be I give them a year. I mean, how the
Speaker 3: economics aren't gonna even work. I mean, the office is alone.
Speaker 3: I'm kind of sinking, like I don't even understand how
Speaker 3: you have.
Speaker 1: Still dollar penny.
Speaker 3: So like to me, I'm like, I don't even know
Speaker 3: how this is how you think this is.
Speaker 1: Going to work.
Speaker 4: But so how many people do you have all together
Speaker 4: on your team?
Speaker 3: So I think one of the one of the things
Speaker 3: that is most effective about what we've done here is
Speaker 3: the way we've decentralized it. So, you know, I think
Speaker 3: as far as like kind of full time staff is concerned,
Speaker 3: you know, at this point, are probably like ten to
Speaker 3: fifteen like full time full time, like you know. And
Speaker 3: then in addition to that, though, we have dozens and
Speaker 3: dozens and dozens of contributors who are also producing content
Speaker 3: and contractors and people like that.
Speaker 4: So so it's not it's their side hustle kind of
Speaker 4: or is it for sometributor.
Speaker 3: You know, it's one of those things where you get
Speaker 3: what you put into it. And so there are some
Speaker 3: folks who are you know, making videos every day, doing
Speaker 3: to a day you know, you know, are just really
Speaker 3: crushing it and this is like become their main thing
Speaker 3: and now their livelihood is making you know, videos for
Speaker 3: my Touch, which I think is amazing that we're able
Speaker 3: to to folks. And then we may have folks who
Speaker 3: do you know, a video a month or you know,
Speaker 3: a couple of videos a month, and you know this
Speaker 3: will be their side thing. And so I think, you know,
Speaker 3: I think we offer that flexibility to folks you know
Speaker 3: who work with us kind of how much do you
Speaker 3: want to put into it and what's kind of resonating
Speaker 3: with folks. But you know, I think it's cool that
Speaker 3: we've been able to build this platform from the ground
Speaker 3: up completely independently, without a penny of outside investment money,
Speaker 3: you know, getting us to where we are, you know
Speaker 3: right now. And so you know, and and obviously you know,
Speaker 3: we were certainly afforded, you know, privileges of you know,
Speaker 3: all having jobs and being able to take this leap
Speaker 3: that other folks aren't necessarily able to do. And I
Speaker 3: completely acknowledge that, but I think I think it's important
Speaker 3: that you know, you do have that kind of ground
Speaker 3: up approach when you approach it, because when you're dealing
Speaker 3: with when you're dealing with pennies, you can't be spending
Speaker 3: you know, you can't be spending dollars. You need to
Speaker 3: figure out a way to do this. And you know,
Speaker 3: I'll also go back to our roots here. I'll take
Speaker 3: it back to the beginning because during the pandemic, one
Speaker 3: of the things that we noticed was everyone was recording
Speaker 3: from their homes and so we would watch CNN, we
Speaker 3: would watch you know, NBC, we'd watch all the networks.
Speaker 3: Everyone's on Skype or Zoom or whatever, and so we
Speaker 3: were like, we could do that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we've said. We said, well, I mean it's amazing.
Speaker 4: I mean, as somebody who you know, used to have
Speaker 4: hair and makeup every morning or night and be on
Speaker 4: a fancy, you know, desk with life and camera crews
Speaker 4: and everything, and I'm like, there's something great too about
Speaker 4: the immediacy, Like we'd have to call somebody and get
Speaker 4: them in a car and have them come to the studio,
Speaker 4: and there's something great about just being able to talk
Speaker 4: to someone right away. If it's by the way, there's
Speaker 4: a rawness to it.
Speaker 3: There's an authenticity to it also.
Speaker 4: You know scariness. There's people see me without make them.
Speaker 3: I totally do not think that, but but you know,
Speaker 3: I think though it, you know, it requires you to,
Speaker 3: you know, think a little differently, right, You don't necessarily
Speaker 3: you know, I know, and I think Ben knows he
Speaker 3: doesn't have necessarily you know, a studio, music, all this
Speaker 3: stuff lifting him up, and so he has to, you know,
Speaker 3: in many ways focus on the content.
Speaker 4: Right, and there it's a fakiness about like good evening, yeah,
Speaker 4: you know, and.
Speaker 3: I think people see, you know, see through a lot
Speaker 3: of that, and so you know, I in doing it
Speaker 3: in that way, you know, I think ultimately, like if
Speaker 3: anyone is like watching this and like, how do I
Speaker 3: start something like this? Like you want to make sure
Speaker 3: your sound is good, you want to make sure people
Speaker 3: could see, Okay, you want a good camera, good audio.
Speaker 3: Aside from that, people are going to be actually pretty
Speaker 3: forgiving with the rest of the stuff. And I think
Speaker 3: in the beginning also there were so many people who
Speaker 3: would come to us you know, I got this, I
Speaker 3: got this great video, I got this great painting. I
Speaker 3: just need to run it through a few weeks of
Speaker 3: testing and then we're going to make some changes. And
Speaker 3: then if I could just get an investor.
Speaker 4: You just do it restributor. And you know, that's the
Speaker 4: one question I also wanted to ask you. You know,
Speaker 4: you do it in real time, you experiment, you get
Speaker 4: kind of the reaction. I promise, I only have business
Speaker 4: talking to you. Guys.
Speaker 2: We've before you ask We've been very excited to do this.
Speaker 1: We're big Katie. We asked for a lot of interviews.
Speaker 1: We don't really do it. Oh, but we're very big fans.
Speaker 4: Of you, and thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you.
Speaker 4: That means a lot to me. But you talked about
Speaker 4: how responsive you guys are to your community, and I'm curious.
Speaker 4: You know, I love the interactivity. You know it's not
Speaker 4: always fun to read because when you read a mean
Speaker 4: comment or whatever, But tell me what that actually means
Speaker 4: being responsive to your community. Can you give me sort
Speaker 4: of an example of that.
Speaker 2: I'll give you an example of the message that resonated
Speaker 2: and how we do it. If you looked at Senator
Speaker 2: Bernie Sanders and AOC's rallies recently where there have been
Speaker 2: thirty thousand people in fifteen thousand. There's a part of
Speaker 2: it where they go into the audience and they say
Speaker 2: they ask the audience, how do you feel about this?
Speaker 2: And then they just listen and you hear what the
Speaker 2: people are saying. And we do something intuitively similar for
Speaker 2: the past five years where we want to know how
Speaker 2: they're feeling, what they're thinking about issues, and really listen
Speaker 2: and learn from their experiences. And that's where we understand,
Speaker 2: you know, Okay, this is what you're going through, this
Speaker 2: is what you're going through, this is what you're experiencing.
Speaker 2: And so we have that sense in our overall programming
Speaker 2: where they are.
Speaker 1: And another what.
Speaker 4: Is it reading like their comments or is it do
Speaker 4: you have a special site or email address where you
Speaker 4: actually hear from people? How do you do that?
Speaker 2: It's all of the above. I mean it's reading the comments.
Speaker 2: We hold sometimes one two times a month, we'll hold
Speaker 2: meetings with our supporters and with the mightas Mighty as
Speaker 2: we call them, and we'll do zoom chats and they'll
Speaker 2: tell us how they're feeling. They'll explain to us on
Speaker 2: our social media handles, they'll usually you know, at us
Speaker 2: and certain things, and so it's an aggregate of all
Speaker 2: of that and we're just constantly listening to them every day.
Speaker 2: It's not necessary we have those meetings, but it is
Speaker 2: kind of a constant back and forth since this started.
Speaker 2: Just another example is when we started covering Canadian politics,
Speaker 2: which was a big and our expansion internationally, but we
Speaker 2: listened and listened and listened, and a lot of American
Speaker 2: media networks supplant the Canadian experience with their American centric
Speaker 2: views of how Canada is versus really listening to what
Speaker 2: people in Canada are experiencing. And so before we started
Speaker 2: doing any reporting on Canada, we had to understand the
Speaker 2: dynamics of the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party and
Speaker 2: the NDP and the Green Party and how things work
Speaker 2: and what's going on with Carnie and what's going on
Speaker 2: with Pierre Poliev and understanding you know, all of those dynamics.
Speaker 2: And this was it was a relentless listening experience, and
Speaker 2: then we started talking about it and then it started
Speaker 2: connecting in Canada. So the Midas Touch Network podcast became
Speaker 2: the most listened to podcasts in Canada about Canadian politics
Speaker 2: and that, and what we heard from them is just
Speaker 2: such a compliment which told us that. But the feedback
Speaker 2: there was, it's because you're listening to us, and you
Speaker 2: understand that when Donald Trump is making these threats against us,
Speaker 2: it's not a joke. Nor do we view it as
Speaker 2: a trade war. We view it as a war war.
Speaker 2: We view that type of language the same way that
Speaker 2: Ukraine views putin talking about denocification. Is how when he
Speaker 2: uses language fifty first state, it's an attack on our
Speaker 2: very existence and our sovereignty. So we want you to
Speaker 2: understand why it is we're boycotting American products, and it's
Speaker 2: not that we don't like Americans. It's that the leader
Speaker 2: of your country right now is basically threatening an invasion
Speaker 2: against us. And so when you start speaking like that,
Speaker 2: they go, thank.
Speaker 1: You, you know, they go.
Speaker 2: Our local media doesn't even talk about it in those terms, and.
Speaker 1: That's how we felt.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's obvious that you have an audience first mentality,
Speaker 4: and it is surprising to me, as somebody who's been
Speaker 4: doing this a long time, how all these interactive tools
Speaker 4: are at our fingertips and still most media organizations really
Speaker 4: don't utilize them, not to blow my own for a nanosecond,
Speaker 4: But when I was I wrote about this in my book.
Speaker 4: Sorry everybody who works with me, because they've heard the
Speaker 4: story a million times. But when I was at doing
Speaker 4: the CBS Evening News, I was covering the golf oil spill,
Speaker 4: and I said, what do you guys want to know
Speaker 4: about the golf oil spill?
Speaker 3: That you know?
Speaker 4: Because I think you get in a media cycle or
Speaker 4: a news cycle and you kind of repeat the same
Speaker 4: thing over and over again, or you advance the story
Speaker 4: in a small way, but you kind of miss the
Speaker 4: forest for the tree sometimes. So I asked on Twitter
Speaker 4: back then, you know, what are your questions about what's
Speaker 4: going on in the golf And the people at CBS
Speaker 4: were so unnerved by me trying to to understand what
Speaker 4: people cared about, what they wanted to know, and what
Speaker 4: they were thinking and what they were wondering about. But
Speaker 4: to me, if you're serving an audience, why wouldn't you
Speaker 4: listen to them? And I think Brett you were talking
Speaker 4: about the top down approach and kind of serve your
Speaker 4: audience where they are and what they want to know
Speaker 4: instead of what you think they should be told.
Speaker 3: Right, Hey, and what either whether you're a politician or
Speaker 3: a reporter, or you're selling tires or I don't care
Speaker 3: what it is that you're doing, if you don't understand
Speaker 3: what people want and what people are looking for from you,
Speaker 3: you know, I think you're I think you're going to
Speaker 3: miss it. And you're right. You know, now more than ever,
Speaker 3: people are gonna let you know what they think. You know,
Speaker 3: it's they're not shy about it. Better for better, they're
Speaker 3: not exactly shy.
Speaker 4: I used to say, the good thing about the internet
Speaker 4: is everyone now has a voice. The bad thing everyone
Speaker 4: now has a voice.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I mean people aren't shy about it, and
Speaker 3: you know, and and people well may disagree with us
Speaker 3: too at times, you know, but at least we know,
Speaker 3: you know, what they're thinking, and at least they know
Speaker 3: that we're coming from a place of like, this is
Speaker 3: what we really believe in it, and we're not going
Speaker 3: to b su you know, on it. And I think
Speaker 3: that's kind of the most.
Speaker 1: Important corporate news took surgery. Yeah, I was. From my perspective,
Speaker 1: I don't think the minus touch network exists at this
Speaker 1: scale that it does now without our audience, without the
Speaker 1: midas Mighty, and without that relentless relationship of listening and
Speaker 1: feedback that we have every second of the day, we
Speaker 1: read everything, for better.
Speaker 4: Or for worse, We read time to do it every
Speaker 4: but I'm glad.
Speaker 1: You do because it's very important for us that we
Speaker 1: really understand how our audience is feeling. And they were
Speaker 1: with us five years ago when I moved back into
Speaker 1: my mom's basement during in the lockdown. Yeah, doing it
Speaker 1: from there to now I have a kid and I'm
Speaker 1: living with my wife in Pittsburgh, and so they've seen
Speaker 1: us mature in the network, mature every step of the way,
Speaker 1: and it's really been this familial relation ship that we've
Speaker 1: been able.
Speaker 4: To faster and the and the walls have been broken.
Speaker 4: If you want to get smarter every morning with a
Speaker 4: breakdown of the news and fascinating takes on health and
Speaker 4: wellness and pop culture, sign up for our daily newsletter,
Speaker 4: wake Up Call by going to Katiecuric dot com. I
Speaker 4: think there still is this sort of artifice about a
Speaker 4: lot of mainstream media and the way they communicate with people,
Speaker 4: and obviously you all have tapped into that the a
Speaker 4: word authenticity, which I think it's overused, but I think
Speaker 4: it actually still holds.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's one of those cliche for a reason.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, I mean I think that's been one of
Speaker 4: the reasons I've been successful professionally, is I think people
Speaker 4: think that I'm the same on cameras i am off,
Speaker 4: which I am most of the time. You know, I'm
Speaker 4: not fully unfiltered when I do things, and maybe I
Speaker 4: should be a little less, you know, or more unfiltered.
Speaker 4: But before we go, I want to we've kind of
Speaker 4: mentioned the manosphere and young men in this country. How
Speaker 4: old are you been? Forty forty?
Speaker 3: Well, it's about to be forty a few days your
Speaker 3: or over over yes, overselling.
Speaker 1: I don't know when I know When's it going to air.
Speaker 4: On Thursday?
Speaker 2: So h a couple of days before?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 4: Old thirty five? So forty thirty five, thirty two. Tell
Speaker 4: me about what you think is happening to younger men
Speaker 4: in this country, both really primarily gen Z and how
Speaker 4: they have gravitated so enthusiastically, and maybe this is not
Speaker 4: even factually correct. I have to really check the numbers.
Speaker 4: But to Republican, to maga politic and how well, first
Speaker 4: of all, I want to know why you think this
Speaker 4: has happened, And then I want to know what you
Speaker 4: think can be done to change those dynamics.
Speaker 2: I think the idea of alpha has been hijacked by
Speaker 2: the least alpha people in the world. Okay, like a
Speaker 2: JD Vance, we're saying all my masculinities under attack. Okay,
Speaker 2: that's not an alpha thing to say. Like, let's be
Speaker 2: very cliqu When when I hear stuff like that, I'm like,
Speaker 2: what are you your masculinity? This is what you think
Speaker 2: about that your masculinity is under attack? What the hell
Speaker 2: are you talking about? You know, all of this like
Speaker 2: you know, whining that I hear from these magma Oh
Speaker 2: my god, you're coming after me.
Speaker 4: Oh. My friend Joeanne Littman wrote a whole essay about that,
Speaker 4: you know, all doxed and attacked. It was awful. I'm
Speaker 4: going to send it to you.
Speaker 1: You know, you know all of that.
Speaker 2: When I grew up, I don't like the term alpha
Speaker 2: in general. You know, you're an alpha, you know, but
Speaker 2: to me, at least as I was raised, you know,
Speaker 2: being a good guy or good person, but you stand
Speaker 2: up for people to me, like the cool kid or
Speaker 2: the or the growing up when I was in high school.
Speaker 2: Now would be considered that you would stand up against
Speaker 2: the bully. The bully wasn't like the alpha person. The
Speaker 2: bully was like the loser, you know, like why are
Speaker 2: you bullying these people? Like you would want to stand
Speaker 2: up for people. And that's to me what was always
Speaker 2: viewed as like cool and how you know, at least
Speaker 2: how I was raised and being a good man to
Speaker 2: me is being a man of your word, being someone
Speaker 2: of honor, you know, you know, against standing up for people.
Speaker 2: And that's kind of been you know, inverted with this
Speaker 2: to me, this corrosive culture that has you know, basically
Speaker 2: said the opposite that the bullies and the people who
Speaker 2: punch down. That's been viewed right now as like what
Speaker 2: it is and it shouldn't be.
Speaker 4: Yes, just because of Trump, really, isn't it The way
Speaker 4: he speaks and the way he talks and the way
Speaker 4: he demeans people. Suddenly that has probably been interpret as.
Speaker 3: Good for it right in so many ways. You know,
Speaker 3: it's funny when when when you speak about that, I
Speaker 3: think about I think it's in twenty one Jump Street.
Speaker 3: There's a scene in the movie, uh, you know where
Speaker 3: Channing Tatum where they go to the high school and
Speaker 3: they try to be cool as they knew it, like
Speaker 3: in the eighties and tried to be like kind of
Speaker 3: the bullies and stuff, and they're looked down upon as like, nah,
Speaker 3: like we're not into that anymore. What are you doing
Speaker 3: like this weird this weird stuff? And uh And I
Speaker 3: feel like I, you know, I grew up the same way.
Speaker 3: But you know, I think that I think that too
Speaker 3: many people are looking at you know, Gen's Z or
Speaker 3: Jen Alpha right now as being molded and kind of
Speaker 3: set in certain ways, and that this election was, you know,
Speaker 3: a reflection on who they are now and who they're
Speaker 3: always going to be.
Speaker 4: But I do think they're being molded by some of
Speaker 4: these percent they're giving anti women's empowerment bros, I.
Speaker 3: Think one hundred percent. But I don't think that's something
Speaker 3: that is going to be like concrete in them necessarily.
Speaker 3: I think people have their lived experiences, and I think
Speaker 3: one of the interesting things that we've even seen in
Speaker 3: the past few months since Trump has taken office is
Speaker 3: when you look at a lot of those public opinion
Speaker 3: polls of gen Z, they've completely flipped on their head,
Speaker 3: and polls that showed gen Z you know, even or
Speaker 3: supporting Trump back in November December. Now it's something like
Speaker 3: sixty eight twenty something, you know, in the opposite direction.
Speaker 3: So you see how even you know, those shifts could happen.
Speaker 3: And I think when people even go out into the
Speaker 3: world and have experiences and have jobs and need to
Speaker 3: you know, afford medication and need to you know, help
Speaker 3: their mom who's on Social Security, and they see these
Speaker 3: real world things that you know, have been kind of
Speaker 3: gamified in this kind of manosphere world and that have
Speaker 3: kind of been stripped from them, I think the reality
Speaker 3: wakes them up, you know a little bit.
Speaker 4: I think because I feel like they're still watching the
Speaker 4: same people and still getting the same information. And unless
Speaker 4: those people are flipping or changing or abandoning this administration
Speaker 4: of what they're doing, they're going to be steadfast.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I just I don't think they're lockdown.
Speaker 3: I mean, maybe I have, you know, too much faith,
Speaker 3: but I.
Speaker 2: Think you have to look at the going back to
Speaker 2: where we almost started, right as I think you have
Speaker 2: to look at the root cause, which is how is
Speaker 2: this group able to be kind of preyed upon by
Speaker 2: in my opinion, these types of fraudsters and people who
Speaker 2: push this. And it's because, you know, I think a
Speaker 2: lot of young people and young men are scared that
Speaker 2: they're not going to have a future, right, And I
Speaker 2: think it stems from their weakness and that other people
Speaker 2: can pray on it because they're worried that am I
Speaker 2: going to Am I going to have a job? Am
Speaker 2: I going to be able to afford a home? Can
Speaker 2: I bring someone on a date and afford to even
Speaker 2: pay for it? What's my future going?
Speaker 4: But it's also more than that to me, Benett's sort
Speaker 4: of oh, women are making all these strides, right, they're
Speaker 4: more women in college and law school than there are men.
Speaker 4: Or gosh, programs are giving unfair advantages, or affirmative action
Speaker 4: or diversity programs in colleges or whatever you want to
Speaker 4: talk about. I mean, I've seen it play out in
Speaker 4: my own life among people I know, and they think
Speaker 4: when other people do well, they do less well. Right,
Speaker 4: And so there's just been this tremendous backlash and to
Speaker 4: your point, like a lot of whining like oh poor us,
Speaker 4: and playing the victim for a lot of young white men.
Speaker 4: And I think you're right, people are exploiting that. But
Speaker 4: how do you reverse it? How do you get people
Speaker 4: to think differently and to see that this is you know,
Speaker 4: because I do think they're having some real world effects.
Speaker 2: Well, I think you can't solve that by trying to
Speaker 2: imitate it. You just become a worse version of something
Speaker 2: that's not already good. Which is why the learning experience
Speaker 2: of oh, the left needs to find a is the
Speaker 2: wrong advice, because you want to become someone who's already
Speaker 2: kind of praying on these communities.
Speaker 4: So what mean exactly?
Speaker 2: So you have to again, you have to be a
Speaker 2: voice that is a fighter. I mean, you have to
Speaker 2: go back to you have to be a doer. You
Speaker 2: have to be someone who actually accomplishes things and says,
Speaker 2: here's what I stand for. I mean, here are the
Speaker 2: views and values. It's not a zero sum game you
Speaker 2: against other groups and marginalized communities taking your That's not it.
Speaker 2: That's a pathetic way. You know who deals with that?
Speaker 2: Whiners deal with that like not like people who are
Speaker 2: losers deal with that. You you want to be a winner,
Speaker 2: Let's work hard, you know, Let's let's focus on being entrepreneurial.
Speaker 2: Let's focus on actually building things versus destroying things. And
Speaker 2: ripping things apart. Do you want to be a step up?
Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, step up, you know, step up, And yeah.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna be.
Speaker 2: You know, when I talk to sometimes my I lecture
Speaker 2: an undergrad. I have a big class. The semester's wrapped up.
Speaker 2: But you know, at the end of the semester too,
Speaker 2: sometimes I like to, you know, reflect on the way
Speaker 2: that I don't know what the class is political views,
Speaker 2: and I don't inject my political views ever in the class,
Speaker 2: but I do talk about how I have white kids,
Speaker 2: black kids, Latina kids, Asian students in my class, men, women,
Speaker 2: trans in my class. No one in my class ever
Speaker 2: thinks it's acceptable during the class to say, oh, look
Speaker 2: at you, this race, look at you, this person, look
Speaker 2: at you, this person.
Speaker 1: I don't like you. I don't like you.
Speaker 2: I mean, could you imagine what would happen in a
Speaker 2: class if everybody was interacting and treating each other like No,
Speaker 2: we act professional. There's a professor. We go through the semester,
Speaker 2: we get along the diversity and the class, the different views,
Speaker 2: different gen that made the class a more powerful experience
Speaker 2: and we were all.
Speaker 1: Happy with it.
Speaker 2: So as I end the semester, I always go to them.
Speaker 2: So why when we leave this classroom and go into
Speaker 2: now what a political setting or a professional setting. Now
Speaker 2: we're supposed to all of a sudden take this and
Speaker 2: now fight each other, and now not like each other.
Speaker 2: We saw the strength of what made this class of
Speaker 2: one hundred and five people strong. It was the very
Speaker 2: diverse We all liked each other. So go out there
Speaker 2: and remember that this was a valuable experience for all
Speaker 2: of us, and that should be what the real world was,
Speaker 2: and that's what we should be fighting for. Not to
Speaker 2: see in the halls of Congress them not letting people
Speaker 2: in bath. They're like, what are they even doing?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 1: I mean, it's lost her mind.
Speaker 3: She was somebody who a few years ago, you know,
Speaker 3: kind of pretended to be an ally and she's now
Speaker 3: the biggest voice, you.
Speaker 4: Know, against she does the selfies in bat.
Speaker 3: It's like weird, right, It's like like sixty times a day.
Speaker 2: It's like you're on vacation sixty times a day about
Speaker 2: any top at all, even like a hobby would be strange.
Speaker 2: I mean, yet alone, like this is what you you know,
Speaker 2: this is what you occupy your time with. And that's
Speaker 2: how I try to flip it on the you know them,
Speaker 2: you know more than I'm like, this is what you're
Speaker 2: focused on, Like you wake up thinking about bathrooms all day.
Speaker 2: This is your main view, you know, and and and
Speaker 2: that's to me how you address it versus living in
Speaker 2: their framework of all of their grievance and pettiness.
Speaker 3: And hate just flipping on them, you know. I think
Speaker 3: one of the things that people I think one of
Speaker 3: the reasons why people gravitate to the stuff we do
Speaker 3: as well, is because they leave with the information. And
Speaker 3: then I think they also leave empowered. And I think
Speaker 3: folks need to be empowered. They need to feel in
Speaker 3: control of their lives. And I think a lot of these,
Speaker 3: you know, young kids right now don't feel in control
Speaker 3: of their lives. And a lot of it's not their fault, right,
Speaker 3: I mean, this is the situation. This is the hands
Speaker 3: that they have been dealt, and it's you know, through
Speaker 3: decades and decades and decades, you know, whether it's poor
Speaker 3: policy or just shifts in global everything, like whatever it is.
Speaker 3: You know, they're looking now, they're looking at their parents,
Speaker 3: and they're going, well, they had it easy. They were
Speaker 3: able to get a you know, my you know, Dad
Speaker 3: was able to get one job and work you know,
Speaker 3: five days a week, you know, eight hour days, and
Speaker 3: come home or dinner, and we had two week vacations,
Speaker 3: you know, twice a year. You know, they look and
Speaker 3: they go, how the heck am I going to do that?
Speaker 3: You know, even if I had a job where I
Speaker 3: was making six figures, I'm not going to be able
Speaker 3: to afford a house. I'm not going to be able
Speaker 3: to have savings. I'm not going to be able to
Speaker 3: live in a neighborhood where I could walk around and
Speaker 3: get everything that I need to survive. And then in
Speaker 3: doing all that, how am I going to have kids?
Speaker 3: How am I going to be able to afford a family?
Speaker 3: I can't even afford to get a coffee for myself,
Speaker 3: you know. So these are real issues also, and so
Speaker 3: what I don't want to do is write off also
Speaker 3: a lot of this as mere whining and you know,
Speaker 3: you kind of woe is me, But understand that, you know,
Speaker 3: people are hurting, going back to what we were saying
Speaker 3: at the beginning, and that's including these younger generations, and
Speaker 3: so I think we need to empower them and.
Speaker 4: Also like acknowledge, acknowledge the anxiety and struggle. Know whoever,
Speaker 4: they may be right, and I think we.
Speaker 3: Need to you know, acknowledge it. And you know what
Speaker 3: we've seen in those communities that you've talked about, the manuspheral,
Speaker 3: all that stuff, they've acknowledged it, and then they've directed
Speaker 3: that anger at the other They've directed you are you
Speaker 3: can't afford a home because the Democrats are giving the
Speaker 3: money to illegal immigrants and that money should have went
Speaker 3: to you. And then, you know, the second there's a
Speaker 3: social program that may actually help people, they go, oh, no,
Speaker 3: we're not gonna pay for that. That's socialism, that's communism.
Speaker 3: We're not going to do that. It's like, okay, so
Speaker 3: you don't believe in any of this, right, but but
Speaker 3: too often that energy is taken and then it's pushed
Speaker 3: in a negative direction to blame other people for you know,
Speaker 3: for those woes, for those issues. I think we all
Speaker 3: need to figure out a way as a society in general,
Speaker 3: to how do we empower people, you know, in a
Speaker 3: in a productive, positive way. And some of that also
Speaker 3: is going to require structural change and in you know,
Speaker 3: how are we going to ensure that these kids are
Speaker 3: going to be able to grow up and have family
Speaker 3: and have you know, productive lives and have a job
Speaker 3: that they could support their families with and enjoy the
Speaker 3: American dream as they've been told. I mean, we were
Speaker 3: all promised growing up, right, you know, go to college,
Speaker 3: you get a good you know, you get a good job,
Speaker 3: you'll you'll be good. Everything is good. And now that's
Speaker 3: not simply not what's happening in so many cases. So
Speaker 3: I think there's a bitterness that develops, and that bitterness
Speaker 3: is then you know, taken and weaponized for bad and
Speaker 3: I think we need to kind of figure out how
Speaker 3: to you know, take that and put people back on
Speaker 3: the right course.
Speaker 4: That's a good segue to my final question, which is,
Speaker 4: you know, you talk about empowering people, and I get
Speaker 4: very discouraged about the state of the country and disappointed
Speaker 4: and frustrated, and I'm curious. I like the idea, even
Speaker 4: though you know some of your YouTube things are like
Speaker 4: these big bold letters like the video he doesn't want
Speaker 4: you to see, or pathetic meltdown, lock him up. You know,
Speaker 4: it's very kind of I like it. You're saying a
Speaker 4: slightly New York posty about it. To be honest with you,
Speaker 4: with the yellow almost like in your face graphics. But
Speaker 4: I'm curious if you're optimistic about the country, and what
Speaker 4: kind of words of encouragement can you give me and
Speaker 4: other people watching this or listening to this that we're
Speaker 4: going to be okay and democracy is not going to
Speaker 4: go away.
Speaker 2: I am hopeful. I am optimistic, and I think that
Speaker 2: the plan that Trump and Musk had was to pretty
Speaker 2: much control all levers of everything right now and really
Speaker 2: beat down any opposition and resistance. I think what we
Speaker 2: see right now in federal courts is judges appointed by Trump, Reagan,
Speaker 2: George W. Bush on the due process questions. They made
Speaker 2: a lot of bad rulings on a lot of things,
Speaker 2: but on the due process questions, all judges have said,
Speaker 2: at least as of now of this recording, there is
Speaker 2: something called due process. You have to go and follow it,
Speaker 2: and we do not live in an authoritarian country. And
Speaker 2: so federal judges on that question, by and large across
Speaker 2: the country are standing up to Donald Trump more significantly.
Speaker 1: Though.
Speaker 2: I think you see the protests, peaceful protests growing, I
Speaker 2: think that's a good sign. I think what we saw
Speaker 2: with the hands off protest No King's Day, I think
Speaker 2: that's going to continue to grow. And that gives me
Speaker 2: a lot of hope as well. And I think that
Speaker 2: I take a lot of hope that people are in
Speaker 2: the fight right now. I was worried that after the election,
Speaker 2: you saw a lot of people just for about too much, yeah,
Speaker 2: tune out and just didn't anything. I think that we
Speaker 2: now have a opposition and resistance that looks and feels
Speaker 2: even stronger than what we saw back in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 2: twenty eighteen. I think people have seen Trump's reckless on
Speaker 2: and off again tariffs and all of this rhetoric that
Speaker 2: you know, it's the same kind of pattern. He huffs
Speaker 2: and he puffs and does something that causes harm and
Speaker 2: then he withdraws from it and then declares that a victory.
Speaker 2: And there's still some news outlets that report these things
Speaker 2: as victories. It's like he just is the arsonist who
Speaker 2: slightly put out a fire that he created, and now
Speaker 2: things are worse, and now he wants to declare that
Speaker 2: a victory. But I think that the publics that by
Speaker 2: and large is seeing that.
Speaker 4: I mean, Americans are smart, right, I mean a lot
Speaker 4: of them are smart.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think we see Trump's approval right now
Speaker 2: is basically the worst in presentidential history at this time,
Speaker 2: including his first term. As you look across the poles
Speaker 2: and so he still has that thirty five percent kind
Speaker 2: of MAGA floor plus are minus another five or six percent.
Speaker 2: So some poles at thirty nine, some at forty two.
Speaker 2: But by and large, I don't think people like hostile
Speaker 2: takeovers of the federal government. I think people want to
Speaker 2: feel safe going on airplanes and not have a transportation
Speaker 2: secretary kind of panic on TV about flights and staffing
Speaker 2: and try to blame other people. I think people see
Speaker 2: veterans getting fired and disrespected. I think people see education
Speaker 2: being gutted, and I think that people don't like that stuff.
Speaker 4: Women dying in parking lot, I think too absolutely.
Speaker 2: And I think that people saying, you know, you know, no,
Speaker 2: we're not okay with this, and that gives.
Speaker 1: Me, That gives me hope.
Speaker 4: Even slack divism, whati's so called, you know, sitting on
Speaker 4: your chairs and trying to do some thing which was
Speaker 4: derided for so long, I think is actually a pretty
Speaker 4: good barometer of how people are feeling. You know, what
Speaker 4: they're saying on social media, how they're commenting and what
Speaker 4: they're watching, like the Midus network, right, you.
Speaker 3: Know percent Yeah, And then that's why we always say,
Speaker 3: you know, do what you can, right. You don't have
Speaker 3: to go out there and build a media network, right, Like,
Speaker 3: that's not we're asking, right, But but if your thing
Speaker 3: is getting your messages out on social media by sending messages,
Speaker 3: do it like we're talking to a neighbor. I'm listening
Speaker 3: to a neighbor, right, do it. If you if you're
Speaker 3: a painter, paint right, like, whatever it is that you do,
Speaker 3: do it and use that to empower yourself. Also, I
Speaker 3: think one of the things that I also think about
Speaker 3: is just how much throughout history, and not even just
Speaker 3: American history, but in general, they are these big pendulum
Speaker 3: swings and they happen quickly, and you know, I think.
Speaker 4: I've never seen one happen quite this quick and clearly.
Speaker 3: That's what I was going to say. I've never seen
Speaker 3: it happen as quickly as we've seen it happen now,
Speaker 3: and even since Donald Trump took office to right now,
Speaker 3: I think we've also seen a tremendous pendulum swing kind
Speaker 3: of influx. As we are kind of all living in
Speaker 3: this moment, how this will end. When it will end,
Speaker 3: what it looks like when we're on the other side.
Speaker 3: You know, I don't know that history has not yet
Speaker 3: been written, but I know that the pendulum always does swing.
Speaker 3: It doesn't happen on its own, but you know, it
Speaker 3: happens by collective action. And you know a lot of
Speaker 3: people staying engaged and in the fight, but I know
Speaker 3: it will. And that's why when we speak about these
Speaker 3: fair weather you know, folks who change their opinion based
Speaker 3: on the way the wind is blowing, I think they
Speaker 3: may get caught on the wrong side of you know,
Speaker 3: that pendulum when things swing back to you know, people
Speaker 3: you know pushing forward on you know, inclusion, diversity, people
Speaker 3: championing you know, workers' rights, people championing you know, the
Speaker 3: ability for people to afford their you know, medication or
Speaker 3: get their social security or whatever it is. I think
Speaker 3: there's a breaking point that society reaches, and I think
Speaker 3: we've kind of did a a speed run, you know,
Speaker 3: to where we are right now, even a speed run
Speaker 3: to Trump and now a speed run kind of back
Speaker 3: as people are like, oh shit, maybe this wasn't the
Speaker 3: best idea on the planet.
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 4: I did feel like Andy Basheer, who I don't know
Speaker 4: if you all talked about this, Ben, but he did
Speaker 4: have a good point about, you know, the Democrats and
Speaker 4: some progressives I think became a little too precious about
Speaker 4: words and about you know, shaming or judging or you know,
Speaker 4: being self righteous about framing certain issues to the point
Speaker 4: where it was like a turnoff for a lot of people.
Speaker 4: Do you agree with that criticism, Well, I.
Speaker 3: Think ultimately, speak as people speak, you know, don't don't
Speaker 3: try to cook up phrases in a lab. Don't try
Speaker 3: to you know, come up with euphemisms for things, or
Speaker 3: you don't know, you know how many times people have also,
Speaker 3: you know, come to us you know what I think
Speaker 3: you should say, you know, like experts, maybe instead of
Speaker 3: saying the language this way, maybe should say it, you know,
Speaker 3: this other way. And I'm like, I've never heard somebody
Speaker 3: use that phrase in my life, though, Like I can't.
Speaker 3: I don't even know what you're talking about. Honestly, it
Speaker 3: sounds like mumbo jumbo, like.
Speaker 1: A breda tested point three percent.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this tested. I'm like, I don't even know what
Speaker 3: that means. So, yeah, I'm going to talk how I
Speaker 3: speak with my brothers and how I speak with my friends.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I know you say what what you can
Speaker 4: have in a group chat right like, it's it's got
Speaker 4: to be sort of figured out that way, JORDI bring
Speaker 4: it home money I I I.
Speaker 1: Want to echo your point that you said just before.
Speaker 1: Americans are spart Americans are resilient, and it's not going
Speaker 1: to be easy these next couple of years here, but
Speaker 1: democracy will prevail. I genuinely have hope. I know from
Speaker 1: the folks my age, I know where they're sinning that
Speaker 1: right now, and I know from you know, folks around
Speaker 1: Ben and Brett's age and then older, you know where
Speaker 1: they're sinning that. People love this country. This country is
Speaker 1: the greatest country in the world. Americans want this country
Speaker 1: to succeed. The world wants this country to succeed. And
Speaker 1: we just have to put our heads down every single
Speaker 1: day and do the work and make sure that we
Speaker 1: leave this country better off, you know, not just for
Speaker 1: our kids, but for the next several generations of kids
Speaker 1: hundreds of years down the line, because that's how much
Speaker 1: this country means to us.
Speaker 4: And in the mouth of it, mauths of babes, right,
Speaker 4: you did he nail it?
Speaker 3: Or well?
Speaker 4: Yes, you nailed it. Nailed it. You guys ever fight
Speaker 4: by the way, do you ever get into the guards?
Speaker 3: Absolutely, but listen, it's not it's not like but they're
Speaker 3: not like you know, it's it's little things. Honestly, like
Speaker 3: we we don't all that much.
Speaker 4: But you know, if do you like working together, it's
Speaker 4: the best.
Speaker 3: It's honestly, it's a dream like and I think always
Speaker 3: growing up, like we always wanted to work together in
Speaker 3: some capacity, and like as kids, we would like make
Speaker 3: movies together, you know, we would make like little action
Speaker 3: movies or horror movies or mystery movies or whatever, and
Speaker 3: and that that would be like our way of working together.
Speaker 3: I would play sports like whatever it was. Again, we'd
Speaker 3: always love doing stuff together. Then there just became a time,
Speaker 3: it came in time in life where our age difference,
Speaker 3: you know, separate you, separates you naturally. You know, when
Speaker 3: when Ben's already in college and I'm just starting high
Speaker 3: school and Jordi's in middle school, you know whatever that is,
Speaker 3: or I'm a senior in high school, Jeordie's just starting,
Speaker 3: you know, as a freshman in high school. And luckily
Speaker 3: I set the stage to make sure everybody likes, you know,
Speaker 3: but there's always these kinds.
Speaker 4: Of and that you live up to Ben's.
Speaker 3: You know, school president and teachers.
Speaker 1: That's a ridiculous award.
Speaker 2: You wanted the real war.
Speaker 4: It was a teachers awards.
Speaker 1: Him. Yeah, it suck up him. Right here, let's focus
Speaker 1: on the student government.
Speaker 4: Well, I have to say this is especially the longest
Speaker 4: podcast I've ever done, but it felt like the shortest.
Speaker 4: Thank you guys so so much. This was such a
Speaker 4: fun conversation. I learned a lot and just really enjoyed
Speaker 4: getting to know all three of you. So thank you.
Speaker 1: It was great to be here. And you know, we
Speaker 1: did grow up watching you and.
Speaker 3: They are such massive myers of Yes, truly an honor.
Speaker 3: So for this to be, you know, the first show
Speaker 3: that we're actually in person on together. You know, it's
Speaker 3: it's not by accident and where we're really grateful, you know,
Speaker 3: for that, and we're just so thrilled to be here
Speaker 3: with you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you. I'm not just saying that because
Speaker 1: I'm the teachers. I'm not trying to suck out you
Speaker 1: see how you want. I'm genuinely genuinely.
Speaker 4: Thanks for listening. Everyone. If you have a question for
Speaker 4: me a subject you want us to cover, or you
Speaker 4: want to share your thoughts about how you navigate this
Speaker 4: crazy world, reach out send me a DM on Instagram.
Speaker 4: I would love to hear from you. Next Question is
Speaker 4: a production of iHeartMedia and Katie Kuric Media. The executive
Speaker 4: producers are Me, Katie Kuric, and Courtney Ltz. Our supervising
Speaker 4: producer is Ryan Martz, and our producers are Adriana Fazzio
Speaker 4: and Meredith Barnes. Julian Weller composed art theme music. For
Speaker 4: more information about today's episode, or to sign up for
Speaker 4: my newsletter, wake Up Call, go to the description in
Speaker 4: the podcast app, or visit us at Katiecuric dot com.
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Speaker 4: favorite shows. Hi everyone, it's Katie Couric. You know I'm
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