Club Random with Bill Maher - Russell Brand |Club Random with Bill Maher

Episode Date: April 3, 2023

Russell Brand visits Club Random. Bill and Russell discuss the difference between hedonism and addiction, how they each define joy, America in pain, pondering vs. partying, religion and the curtailing of inquiry, the greatest threat to America, the concept of enlightened self-interest, Joe Rogan’s work ethic, MSNBC vs. Fox News, and their mutual admiration of Dave Rubin.

What do you got there? Cigars, would you like one? No, Cigars. Cigars is cigarette without any manners. And Englishman said that. Churchill? No, I don't know which one. I just assume it must have been.

Of course, it's in Englishman. It's witty and it's an erudite and sweet. Exactly. What do you think an American would come up with that? No. You've luchoned with it by an American. I believe the English race was created just to give us American something to quote from.

That's our whole function is to give you a back story. Right. Alexicon with a nice green. Thank you very much. So you're cutting a cigar. Now you can also use that for circumcision, you know. I actually botched one before I came in. I thought I'd trim the foreskin out of respect for your country.

I know it's preferred here. Not that I imagined that our fallacies would necessarily be involved in the conversation, but I gave it a trim and it's not been a complete success. I'll level with you. Is that the correct plural of fallace? Fallace, you reckon? Well, I mean, when you say fallacies, it sounds like fallacies. The word, so like,

fallacies. Are you saying that your penis is a fraud? Yeah, and I'm afraid. I guess you'd be saying that our penises are a fraud. It certainly take them in some peculiar direction. I bet you your penis has seen some things. I mean, what? Why are you winsing?

It's something to be proud of. You're one of the few like rockstar comedians. Did you see me that way? I still see you. Look how you're dressed, like how you look. You played a rockstar twice in movies, I think, right? Right. And you married a rockstar.

And you just, and you're unharrow heroin, I mean, you're a rock star, you know, and you have the look. You have the look. When you say like that, it can't buy that. It sounds fantastic. If you could buy it, I would have done it by now. The thing is, Bill, is that whilst that sounds like a tremendous set of experiences, I was of course there while they were happening.

They were mostly rather bleak. They were all on the state. I find that hard to believe. People say that all the time when they describe this life, that the rest of us could only dream of, you know, with the women, the drugs and the guns and adulation, the partying, and I'm like, why can't you people just enjoy this?

I feel I certainly would. Possibly there's a difference between Epicurianism, hedonism and what I think I have, which is addiction. And I suppose addiction means that the trying to remedy a spiritual or possibly from a secular perspective psychic condition through sort of external means. And rather than, oh, I'm a joyous, paratical sort of sex-buck-a-near. For me, I was just on like a kind of, I'm unhappy. And also, I'm like a... By the way, sex-buck-a-near is the greatest name for a band. Yeah. If you ever start one. And if you wanted to make a port man too out of those, fuck a near, seems so available. Right, Port Man Tone, another great word.

Yeah. Well, I'm sorry you didn't have a better time having a better time. Yeah. In the rest of us. Look, actually, I'm not seeking any sympathy from it. I'm just sort of remarking, Bill, that like, when I hear my life described, I think, oh my God, that sounds so cool.

And indeed, was everything I aspired to as a young man trying, I think, to somehow mitigate feelings of unease and emptiness, probably in common with many comics and entertainers. And when I did it, it just did not work. And it has left me one of the few areas where I imagine we are somewhat at odds, did not work and has left me one of the few areas where I imagine we are somewhat odds only with a kind of spirituality as my last remaining option. Why do we have to drag all this depressing psychological stuff into it when it just would be great to get a lot of drugs and pussy. I don't understand why we

have to overthink it and complicate it. And it's just like when I was in your position. It is. And I will stand by it. I'm a one-issue candidate. I'm drugs and pussy and not overthinking it. I mean, not, not pussy, but like, you know, yes, I mean, just rock star sex, I mean, is there a man alive who doesn't, you know, at some point in his youth aspire to that? There certainly wasn't, when I was 13 years old, what would you be if you could have anything?

A rock star. The girls throw themselves at you. Right, just that, just that. Just girls throw themselves at you. Just that, just girls throw themselves at you. You had me. Absolutely. And certainly it's what I aspire to. But even in your description of it, it was an adolescent fantasy.

And the problem with adolescent fantasy is you grow up, I grew up, and I found myself inhabiting something that didn't endure for me. You described me as an idealist and I am an idealist. And I'm feeling like, what is idealism, I suppose, is the suggest that there's a tell-os, that there's an object that I'm moving towards. And for me, that's a sort of, I don't know, is it self-actualisation, is it redemption, is it love, is it to live a worthwhile life? I mean, what are all of the principles that we're discussing

when we are in a conversation around politics? What's undergirding it if we don't have any ideals? I mean, if it is just the sort of brutal pragmatism of who gets what, you know, in and out of those, those sort of highly consequential conversations. But surely whether or not you believe in God or if you believe in America or whatever values you hold, we're sort of saying there's something we're aspiring to, there's some meaning. So to just wrap up what I feel about the hedonism is, I now know that what I saw out was the fantasy of a boy and it doesn't work.

It didn't work. Not to say that they weren't there. It didn't work for you. It worked splendidly for Rod Stewart. So, you know, let's not lump. We're all different people. And from, you know, again, I'm sort of being facetious about this. But the idea that because you went to this different model of marriage and children, whatever that is that people do, that means you grew up and I didn't. I must reject that because, again, I think you're projecting. It's something I haven't grown up. Of course, I've grown up.

And I'm just as mature as some other immature people in lots of ways. But no, I don't feel like I'm immature because I never wanted to go into that model, which I have seen fail so much more than I have seen at work. So do I feel the need to spawn to be labeled a grown-up? I don't. I'm also suggesting that the only route to maturation is to have a family or to procreate or even enter into social norms around matrimony. I'm not suggesting that at all. The distinction I'm making is that for me, when I lived hedonistically, it didn't work. And I recognize that as I'm talking particularly as an addict.

But can I ask you in percentage wise, like what percentage of it didn't work? Certainly there must have been a little percentage that was fun. And then there was like, like a hangover. It's like, if you ask me after I've had too much to drink when I have a hangover, would you trade? No, I would, I would love to trade. Yes, I would love to go back to last night and not be drinking. I would give that fun up because this is just too painful, but I didn't see it coming that bad.

Is it like that? There was no joy in Munville. There was no joy before the pain. They, a common trope around addiction is it was fun, then it was fun with consequences, then it was consequences. And for me, it was quite concentrated, even now, I've, I've, 20 years, I'm 20 years clean from substance misuse, now, drinking drugs. And still now I can feel in me the pallet of emotions and yearning that leads to overuse, for example, of substances. It was so clear that what it was in me was a sort of a psychic or spiritual yearning, a sense that this is not enough the world. And I'm talking now about the world I inhabit, it is a a boy, as a child. This isn't going to fulfill me. I need something else. I need, what is it? Values, is it community?

Is it connection? Is it meaning purpose? What is it? And I feel denied that. The one things that concerns me, I suppose, about the secular framing of the ideological sphere, is once you extract a sort of, a shared purpose that for me has to have a sort of, isn't it, if not a sprinkling of the divine, it's actually a divine crucible. And what is pleasure alluding to? That's what I'm saying, I suppose. Like when I'm like sort of if you're in love

with someone or if you're making love with someone or if you're high, what is it that you're touching? What is this ulterior thing? So, I mean, who said art for ourself? Was it Oscar Wilde? Why isn't that the same thing as pleasure for pleasure stuff? Why does that allude to anything? It is the end. Sometimes the journey is over. Some people I think just like to stay on the road. the end. Sometimes the journey is over. Some people I think just like to stay on the road. I like to be home. And home is like, if you, you know, are not every day is happy, of course, but a day when you're like feeling good, you have things to look forward to. You feel like you're doing something useful. And you also have pleasure in your life, excitement with other people and conversation sex.

I don't, I don't, like, I don't wanna go further. Like, that's as long as I'm on earth. Now maybe, we don't know, maybe in the next world, if there is one, there is some other dimension, but on this, I'm not gonna get to that dimension. Or you say you can through meditation and just that kind of stuff. I mean, some people cannot live without that dimension. I wonder, even taking something as broad, yet particular,

as the opioid crisis in your country, that we can't allow it to be lost on us, that there's a significant, for a portion of the population that are in so much pain that they need to obliviate it somehow. What is the source of this pain? Now, when you say pleasure, you know, it doesn't leave anywhere, we're from an evolutionary perspective, we are aware that it is entirely per functury. We're aware that food feels good in order to mandate that behaviour, that sex feels good in order to encourage that behaviour. So there is at least facility in him. I wonder sometimes, I ponder the unanswerable. I wonder what is the function of pleasure and as someone that has I suppose gotten myself into

I want to say it's not works for me very well You know now that is a distinctly we're obviously different men and like I one of the things I've been blessed with is I'm pretty non-judgment and actually about the way other people live I don't sort it's not like I don't care about I recognize I don't know You're just passionate about what you believe. Yeah. And we are different in the sense that you said it like you ponder the unponrable. I go, well, that's not ponderable. I'm under it. I'm wasting my time. Ponder it. When I could be partying. This is wasteful ponder. No, I feel like, you know, was it Freud who said, you know, it's based this work and love?

Those are the two things that we have. And I don't go much beyond that. Like that spiritual dimension, I don't, you know, I'm, you mentioned Larry Charles before in Religious. And Religious is not a mean-spirited movie at all. That's why I think it did pretty good because people didn't see it as an attack on religion.

They just said, you know, here's the reality of this. And we're not hating on anybody. But it says, the message of the movie is, I say, I'm from the church of, I don't know. I'm not definitive about there is not a God. Who the fuck knows? I can't answer the questions that are unanswerable. The difference between a religious person and a non-religious person is we both admit there's these questions.

I don't make up stories to answer them because I know there are stories that are made up. So like, can I tell you how the universe began? I cannot. And neither can you. So when you give me your story, I'm just saying, I know people with a faith think that that makes them sound some sort of sublime and all I'm thinking is, well, plainly you heard this story and now you're repeating it. And that's really all there is to it. And those things that are beyond us to know while we're on earth,

I just feel like why my massacistically torture yourself trying to figure something that you can't in this life. It's like I picture somebody who's, there's a wall, they're standing in front of it, and they feel like if I could just get a little higher, I could get there and look over the wall. When they don't realize the wall is a million miles high, they're not even close to doing that.

And yet they're thinking if I could just just see a little what you can't. So, you know, I think that makes it easy to be not a troubled soul because I don't have one. That's pretty great. I mean, I really admire that. And I certainly agree, but when we contrast what is known with what is unknown, we have to accept that we are dealing with a negligible amount of data, even with the wonders of cosmology and the quantum world, the little that we understand amounts to zero. I suppose you need to have something. Can I have that circumcision thing? Yeah, absolutely. I thought you'd never ask Do me feel penis No for my cigar

They always put a big Fucking thing on the end of it these clothes cigarettes. Is that what that is as a club? Exactly I take a cigarette a simple man enjoying a clove cigarette and he said every week clubhouse. I do not know what they're putting in these clubs because is it? It's having a positive effect. It's so fantastic. Yeah, it's been 20 years for you, huh, mate? Yeah, 20 years.

And you never, you never won just one day out of the blue. You never just go, boy, it would be good to just smoke one joint and be hot. You know, just just pot. I mean, you know, that's a pretty benign. You must have had some good times on pot before it all went sour. Well, I do actually remember feeling quite, I don't know where I put my suit. I'd like Mary Poppins a route in around in my little carpet bag. For my decision, get on, get on, leave it on your dick. Did you?

I lost my, I lost my nerve halfway through. Like, but you are a circumcised, right? No, actually not. Like a lot of English people, we are very unwilling to give up any part of the aspect. I'm clinging on to every millimeter. It's so gross. I always said it looks like something that lives in the ocean. So, so you didn't... Don't you enjoy... Well, the thing is you're denying yourself a variety because when you retain

the foreskin, there's times where it entirely retracts and retreats. There's other times where it pops out to say hello. You see like a glimpse of it. Yeah, it gives you... It's just a... Every time I look at my hand, I'm like, okay, you don't know who I'm going to meet. Sorry about this. It's okay. You don't have to make So about this is missing with your my big you've asked for and I'd like to help people Yeah, I mean we just I love it's a journey to help. I live to help. It's it's it's hysterical Sorry, no, no, I think it's a delightful version of this show Not good. This is really a show, but it's on a very special episode

Russell brand searches endlessly. It's sort of a metaphor for what we were talking about. Right. You're a researcher. I'm a seeker. I won't stop seeking. Exactly. Isn't that interesting the way that happened? Do you think that's some kind of cosmic?

Yeah. You do. I do. I think that continually we'll be granted. Yeah. For kind of show, do you think? I can't. You think so, confident, Bill.

For kind of show, do you think this is? All of the epicureans, this guy lives in pleasure. Granting. You think so confident, Neil? You think so, Neil? You think so, Neil? All of the epicure. And this guy lives in pleasure. Oh, fuck it. I mean... Well, I've never had a guy blombing, but if I had to have one,

I'd pick you. That's a really very lovely compliment, and I'm going to be watching out for your media appearances to see if you make good on this pledge. Do you all forget and move on? How often do you come to America? Or if I was in a bar, do you come to America often? Oh, infrequently. No, not frequently.

Not these days. I've not been for a while because I don't know if you know. I've heard of this. There was a pandemic. You've already slowed people down. It affects itself. But you still like your story. I love America. I've got green cards, no matter what. So, does that mean I am American?

I wish I liked Ginny's. No, no, I love it. You know what? I always say when you're a sports fan, I have found it. Is it mule? I don't. It was a moiled. Moiled. That's the name of the people that do circumcision in a two-dayic faith.

And you know something, want to hear something gross, of course? It's where I came, Bill. I'm surprised I've heard of anything else. Okay, so sometimes the moiled gives the baby herpes. Oh, that's not right, is it? That can't be. Is that part of the ceremony? No, that's not right.

It's definitely not right. But because like, this has happened many times, like, because they have herpes and then they bite, there's a part of it where they bite the penis, or something where the penis goes in the mouth and You know, I'm all for People doing whatever they want. I mean again when I preached against religion It's I was certainly was never saying well you shouldn't be able to know of course you can think any crazy shit

You want but when it bleeds into bleeding and and child abuse you know you I mean I would even say it and child abuse. I mean, I would even say it's child abuse that when they seek the Buddhist, supposedly the we're not religious, we're better than you actual religious people, we're more spiritual. And yet when the Lama dies,

they snatch a child who they have divine to be the reincarnation of the recently dead llama. And I've seen a documentary on this and the mother is weeping, of course, because they're taking her two-year-old away and the child is weeping because he's being separated from his mother.

And he has to go to some monastery where they, because he's the reincarnated llama. And we're going to examine his poop or whatever they do to, you know. You know, which is just to do. On what amounts to, let's face it, a hunch.

Of a hunch. No, this is a Dalai Lama. A hunch and best. First of all, I mean, you have to believe in reincarnation. Now, maybe you do, do you? No, I mean, what have to believe in reincarnation. Now, maybe you do, do you? I mean, what I feel like is that once we start to frame the unknowable within the ordinary,

using quotidian language to describe the ephemeral who are in danger of saying stuff that's kind of stupid. And yet we need ceremony and yet we need ritual. I just say, would say that if the ritual does involve biting off a baby's dick or snatching a child from his mother, you should absolutely sure this doesn't have a motive. Do you want to be sure about that? Yes, because, well, I mean, well said because religion certainly is known as the biggest pussy scam ever. I mean everybody's got one.

Cops will pull over a pretty girl and you know that's a big thing with cops and girl. I don't know any pretty girl who doesn't have a story about a cop who tried to fuck them pull them. Yeah, you need to ride or you know you know, ask whatever their shit is. Everybody's got a scam. And, but boy, religion, their scam is, a lot of it is, I'm the prophet and God told me to fuck all the chicks in the compound. Yeah, and also they're not in the Catholics

with the little boys. That's right, they're not particular about the genitalia. Like, there's sort of equal opportunities. You're right about that. A many good cult has been ruined. I'm gonna cut off my finger. like, they're sort of equal opportunities. You're right about that. Many of good cult has been ruined. I'm going to cut off my finger. Do you hold it there?

Do you want me to help with this? Because I don't want to look at it. Show me how you operate this thing. Yeah. What we're taking off the top end is that, that's like a guillotine, like a leaf loss, like that, bloodiera stock,

because the holding us back, ropes, pier, that, and croutes like that. aristocracy holding us back ropes pier that improve just like that And what is this thing called this? I don't know. I guess is he's still gonna be called a cigar car Pro like you know in your country. I'm not a mini-moil Mini-moil I might if I do or he's not included or a portable Moil yeah, I mean it's a mini-moil. I like that. Let's go to the moil, mini-moil. Let's go into business. We brainstormed a few names. We've gone with mini-moil. Let's go. I'm going to use this. It's called a scissors. I don't know what that is.

Well, you've gone with that stuff. You've got love. You know, Caravanelia. I always say, if you live long enough, you do everything. And now I can say, I use the mini-moil. And I have no one just already used it again. I'll stick with the scissors. Someone asked me recently if I wasn't a comedian, political talk show host or a podcast or what business would I start? I don't know, maybe open an animal rescue shelter

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you get your podcasts. Now you were talking about reincarnation, you were talking a lot of the more roco-co aspects. I would do some more. Yeah because it is quite austere and stringent and we're not saying that there's a god necessarily and all of this stuff but we are following a flume of smoke, a flume of smoke, a divine level of not this child was a llama and I wouldn't disparage to divine, never on this child was a llama. And I wouldn't disparage. Any body's religion does what you're saying becoming.

But I suppose what my spiritual beliefs amount to is a kind of benign intent towards one another and the potential for an ulterior realm, i.e. that all apparent separateness emerged at some point from unity. And that is underwritten by the most rudimentary explanation of the Big Bang, all of the matter and phenomena was held within us.

What are you thinking about the Big Bang? Well, as Terence McKenna says, give us one free miracle and we'll explain the rest. What proceeds this? I mean, it's glorious and obviously demonstrable for a... But I mean... But it doesn't solve the problem for the Tuesday before the big bang is, of course. But also, and I look, people who I really think are way smarter than me, I know they are,

about this subject, which I am very limited in astrophysics. Okay, that's just not my area. Let's get into this. I know the basics, but just the real basics. But, you know, I fully believe Neil deGrasse Tyson knows this stuff on a level that I cannot understand. So I really, my point is, as someone who's not religious, I'm also just taking this on faith, because when you go into what the big bang is that everything in the universe fit into something

Yeah, that as as they could fit into your mini-moil That's right. We could snip that maybe that's the cause it and let's go into how what what is fitting into something the size of a quarter Okay, imagine the earth being so compacted that it could fit into a quarter Now if I just said the whole Earth could fit in, you'd be like, that is so ridiculous. Okay, now let's add all the other planets and our sun and say they could fit in there. Oh, wow, now you're really stretching it.

Okay, but it's not just our planets and our sun. It's all the planets and all the sun. So we're talking about trillions of stars, maybe trillions of galaxies, certainly hundreds of billions of galaxies, certainly hundreds of billions of galaxies, all fitting in something that small. Now that does sound as ridiculous as God said to his child, son, I'm going to send you down to earth and I've knocked up this Palestinian woman, she's going to have you

and then you're going to die and come back to life. Now, I don't believe that happened. But the other one about the big bang is almost as silly unless you're at astrophysicism. Similarly, they require a curtailing of inquiry. At some point you have to stop investigating or you go well, I don't make sense what all reality, what is the nature of consciousness, how does consciousness emerge from biochemical power processes. Why is Newtonian physics falling apart in the quantum realm, everything that we understood

to be real? Why is matter mostly space? And what I'm saying is that in the end through brinkmanship, you find yourself at the point of miracle. And the reason that I embraced spirituality is because it suggests a sense of ethics. Not that, I know many great atheists, and both comics, Ricky Gervais, and Brian Cox,

and my country and stuff. And we mostly agree, be moral, love one another, be of service, all of those things. And there's so white focus on the points of distinction really when you agree on what appear to be the most fundamental aspects of it. But for me, the idea that what we are honoring is non-separateness, the glory of diversity and individuality, the kind of the sort of ever-expanding, fractal nature of our reality, all of this wonder, all of this awe. And somehow, is it relevant to the way we organize our systems of power or not?

What are we gonna do? Because once you extract the possibility of unity, once you extract the possibility that love has some value, some resonance and impact is perhaps, in fact, the felt experience of Ones. Are you pouring that about knowing what it is? I want to get...

No, it doesn't, Mack, continue. I'm listening to what you're saying, but I want to hear it. Is that you're in? Tell me, finish this thought. It's just, yes, I forgot that this was the soda. I said, but... All right, then, as long as you stopped, I'd like this was the soda. I said, but... All right, then, it's long ago just stopped.

I'd like to make this point, but I feel like when religion is ethical, it's coincidental. I'm not saying it's not religion can't be, but it stumbles upon it almost appazardly. The Bible, I mean, the Ten Commandments. Most of them have nothing to do with what we would call ethics or morality. The top four are just about God being jealous.

Actually, well, here I would differ. I really? Interesting perspective ones on the Ten Commandments. If you consider them instead of edicts, you know, and I know that the name Commandment suggests this. So, I've just commanded that the name Commandment suggests this. I've just commanded that. So if you ignore that, and how I like to look at it is, if you consider when you are enlightened, you will not steal, you will not kill.

And as for the point of worship, no other God's than me, all of us engage in idolatry. What I believe the point that is being made is if you do not find God, if you do not find your own God, which could be love, which could be America, which could be nature, which could be abandoned and limitless things, if you do not find that, then everything is potentially God. Your lust suddenly is God. Your desire for entertainment is your God. Greed is your God. You shall worship no other God's than me. And this God is, see, submission for me Bill, is not just about supplication so that you can be

organized into a lovely little flock. It's about, if you, it's the first system that you need to conquer, is the self, the self. If I can't overcome my ego, then I will leave. That is my God. That's how I take it. I get that. You're right. I do.

It's quite complicated. What's that? You're new American character. This is my new American character. But you're being very charitable to the author of the Ten Commandments, who lived in the Bronze Age and did not have your flowery interpretation. It's nice that you can put that on it.

I mean, yes, that's a lovely way to interpret it. It's not what he meant. What he meant is there's a man in the sky. This difficult isn't it for us to discern what, as it went through Aramaic to Greek, to King James, but think like that back then. They just did it. Think like that back then. They didn't know what germs are atoms.

I'm, they were scared. They believed in gods in a very real, I've studied the Bible. I took a course on it at Cornell. The Bible, they definitely were not making them. This was not metaphorical. It was not. I think that, I think that,

I think that if you look at that book as literal, then I feel that its value is limited. And I think most articles of faith bear the inflection of the culture that they were produced by necessarily and understandably. But what I would say about my obviously limited understanding of harmonics is that people appear in the desert faiths to be aspiring to some kind of unity. Now I know there's stuff in there that's very like that's somewhat odds with our modern take on reality. But I also would pull you up on, you know, this is only a couple of thousand years ago.

10,000 years ago we were basically the same pre-agriculturally. For hundreds of thousands of years, we lived in little tribal societies, organized around manageable relationships. Our nearest ancestors, the primates, when they hit communities of 78, they split. And I feel there's so much to be learned from the values that preceded civilization as we understood it, particularly in a time like this of fracture and nihilism. So I'm not dismissive of any of that documentation, not least because these, how do these myths survive? Who do they serve? Now you can make somewhat cynical arguments about like Protestant ism succeeded in Northern Europe because they identified the work ethic.

So it was like a good way of getting people into the grind, useful for agriculture, useful even when the industrial revolution took place. But just because of the utility, I don't feel that we can be dismissive of it. And also, Bill, the challenge that it's left for me is once we exclude the spiritual path, we are left with post-enlightenment rationalism.

And what that seems to lead to is the reverence for the individual, celebration only of the primal urges and the primal desires. And that which can be imagined. Right. And believing excessively in spirituality and things of a beyond the realm of Earth mode leads to flying planes into buildings and lots of other horrible things.

But don't you think there's a counter-arguments? All of that. Those things were about dominion and territory. And territory. And then once you let the balloon off the ground, once you take off those blocks and let your mind just go completely free up in the air with nothing to tether it, then it's very easy to go from, I love my God to, you know, you have a

different God, I really should kill you. But because that's true in the post-Westphalian tree, age of nation, I love my nation. So therefore, I don't like your nation. I mean, what is the distinction between a religious ideology and nationalistic ideology when it comes to the boots on the ground and the drones in the sky? We're killing you rationally at a distance. Sorry about that wedding we bombed. You know, I'm this, I'm there. You are going to bring in the Treaty of Westphalia. Which I believe was failed is on the table, Bill. I believe it was 1648. I believe it was that, that.

And I believe it was 12 minutes before 5. I believe it followed the defenstration of Prague where they threw him out the window where we get the word defenstration. Wow, the window. At your go. And that word has now come back into Vogue. Not just because Putin does it literally,

but it's a word that people use when they're talking about someone being canceled. He was defense-strated. Which is great because it's from French, the finesse of wind up. So to throw some an out of a wind up. You throw a bit of language. But I want to know, who is this guy, Herman Nudex? No, I don't know that word.

Herman Nudex means a literary set of books around a particular faith, the Herman Nudex, the canon of a particular religious set of ideas. Like the Quran plus the Islamic Herman Nudex, Christian Herman Nudex, the set of documents that underwrite a particular faith. Have you studied these like in their original? I mean, you seem so learned on this. You must read a lot. No, I mean, well, I try, yeah, I try to read, but this is...

Well, that's what a third grader says. Of course you do. No, but... But all of the squiggles. How much do you say would you read a day? And do you read books, like actual books? Because that's gone out of style. But I'm gonna stick up for books. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do.

And I sort of have a, I suppose what I have like most auto-died acts is sort of shallow knowledge in a variety of areas. I've not been educated. So I- Cocktail party knowledge, would you say? That's what I've got. Except for what I feel like I have.

Except for when I've had to legitimize my solipsism, there I have studied. Like, you know, when it comes to why am I like this? Why do I feel this way? What other people felt like? And don't you think that politics is an extension, usually just a big personality we're born with? I feel like being, I mean, you are arguing

with John on the show and it's so funny that people, they have a lot of trouble like following your politics because it doesn't follow the neatly cleaved divisions that we were in. Yeah. Like, you'll go after MSNBC and it's not because you're a fan of Fox News. No. I mean, it's kind of like to the left of that.

So or it's not in anywhere that you could say, oh, that's left or right. It's just how you see it. I feel like I do this exact same thing and people, they don't like it when someone doesn't have a team or a lot of people don't. The people who do like it, they like us a lot. But a lot of people just can't get there because we don't have a team and you can't predict what our take on something is gonna be.

That's right. And that is, I know it sounds like we're clapping ourselves on the back, but I mean, it's also just true. That is so lacking. I think it's been great what you've done having the chats with the people on the convention or right. If we're not going to have these conversations, what the hell's going to happen? These people are not self-deporting.

It's half the country. You have to talk, you know what I mean? When you look at the internet and all that kind of shit, it's always this, we own them, or we're gonna own them, or like somebody said, does something that they don't, it's stupid or not up to par, oh, they got, oh, they got destroyed.

It's like all this language that keys people up to think that they can, that the answer to the thing when you don't agree with somebody, and I, you know, all these people, I don't agree with, of course, is to destroy them. Yes. Especially when you know I'm 67 years old, like, their big thing is with, they don't like something I say, it's just, they don't attack the argument itself.

It's just, you're old. As if that's an argument, I was like, yeah, exactly. That's why I know some shit and you're making a dumb argument, or not even finding an argument. I will say, even on this point, that when we're talking about anthropology and how society is my organized, how families and tribes might organize, the annihilation of the category of the elder is in error.

When you're chatting to Bernie Sanders on the show, I'm thinking these guys have been around long and a me, they know stuff I don't know. I've asked a ray of things and maybe I will learn something if I shout up from it, perhaps you'll notice, though, I talked a little less in that moment. I have regard and reverence for that. Both as part of a, because of my personal practice, about how I might learn more and how I, or treat people, but also because in other areas where it might be easier

to enter into conflagration and conflict, I feel that it's vital. Like, I saw the other day after the release of the capital, kill Jan Sixth, to Fox News, in particular, Tucker Carlson, in a British newspaper, the Guardian, like, you said, like, I'm just sort of reading capital, kill Jan Sixth, to Fox News, and in particular, Tucker Carlson, in a British newspaper, the Guardian, you said, I'm just reading it, I kind of mentioned what led me to do it, and I regret that I did.

And it's just said, they release documents, you know, Kim McCoffee, to the far right TV presenter, Tucker, far right. I mean, I kind of like, you know, it used to be like, even in your country, to be like even in your, like country, like you know, you'd have people in your family that are Republican and they're putarian and people that are lefties and whatever, and we'd all just crack on and chat, thanksgiving. Exactly.

Not like, like far right, I think if far right, that means that that's a haircut, that's boots, you know, you can't just be far right because you're a traditional conservative person. Well, I don't know if you saw this, but when the Italian Prime Minister Maloney was elected, okay. So we never really got to it on Arshad. I wanted to, I guess, we're in at a time, but like the papers were like they were apoplectic. Fascism has come back to, yeah. And they could not stand this. And like, my position was, I don't follow Italian politics that much. I've read some of her statements.

It doesn't sound like fascism to me. It sounds like things that we've heard people in this country on the right. It's a lot about, we need to not forget our roots and traditional stuff, like family. And I understand why there's a backlash as some of the shit that's going on. It wasn't particularly, it was like, I'm a mother and I'm proud to's a backlash as some of the shit that's going on. It wasn't particularly, it was like I'm a mother

and I'm proud to be a mother. Okay, it's not fighting words. And also, I wanted to make the point because they kept saying, well, her party has fascist roots. So did the Democrats. They were the party of slavery, okay? And Jim Crow, the Democrat, then they outgrew it.

So to put that on her, the roots. Yes, all our parties of roots. We all grow from corrupt places. And now I see she's invited to the White House. And again, I don't know who this brought is. I'm not defending her. I'm just saying the immediate hair trigger, oh my God, the world is ended, Italy is elected a fascist, it's just the kind of thing that makes me go,

I don't trust you in the media, I just don't trust you. There's some truth in that, but it's your narrative. I think they call it something like, I don't know, some kind of journalism now, where it's like advocacy journalism, where it's like, we're not even trying, we're not even proposing that we're neutral on this and just going to tell you what happened and give you the facts.

We are going to inject our advocacy into the front page where we used to reserve it for the opinion page. Bill, I feel that the terrifying truth might be that the liberal establishment has been co-opted by the very interests that in the Bush-Chainy era we were understood to be Republican. It's been co-opted by military industrial complex interests. It's been co-opted by a pharmaceutical interest. It's been co-opted by financial interests. And they are simply unable to have the conversation about why there is not a political party that represents the interests of ordinary Americans. The one, under the same on your show, that it's the affiliate party of ordinary working Americans now, like more people would say the problem,

a comparable thing has happened in our country. It seems that there's been a sort of a professionalization, if I did offer such a term, of both the media class and punditry and politics more generally, and there's a kind of distaste for working people. I was trying to get out with the Brexit argument. They don't like ordinary people. And the only way to mask that is I think by,

rightly, honoring important issues around identity and excluded cultural groups. Those are conversations that need to be had. And I think they know that those conversations need to be had, but I think they are only willing to have those conversations because they recognize that you cannot bring to the table anymore an agenda that will affect the interests of the powerful. Like he said, like he said,

they were bought out by the same financial interest that we'd conventionally associate. I'm a shini in the advocacy for war that you can't talk about peace, you can't talk about diplomacy, that you have to vilify and reduce every narrative. The Zelensky is a hero and Putin is a monster. This is a lot of the world that I live in.

Wait a second. Zelensky is a hero and Putin is a monster. Well, the Panama paper suggested that Zelensky, like a lot of Ukrainian politicians, has some interesting business dealings. Well, and he restricted the Minsk agreement. And there was a peace deal on the table and the West lobbied Zalinsky, not to take that peace deal. So said the former Israeli pro-Nistra.

Because his country got invaded illegally. I mean, I can't, I don't know why you're... Well, I would say Bill, because of the... Ever since the fall of the Berlin Wall, there's been encroachment on former Soviet territory that there was a NATO inspired coup in 2014 and that there are significant profits being made. It's the same in a sense.

Look, I would offer this. I'd feel a lot more comfortable about... Wait, it was coup in 2014. The 2014 coup in Ukraine. That was... Crimea. By US interests. Why would we back a coup that gave Crimea to Putin? They lost Crimea in 2014. Ukraine. The ongoing, I think, Bill, to say that this is a humanitarian war that has an inadvertent side effect and created all

this opportunity for profit for the military industrial complex is as naive as suggesting that the farmers you will call industry would keep good on their pledge to not profit from the pandemic. I'm not entering into the territory like geopolitics is bloody complicated. Putin is clearly a former KGB hardcore dictator style politician. But I think that when we extract the American unipolar agenda, the idea that there can be a global hedgemen that America want to destabilize Russia. I think if you don't include that in the conversation, but what you get is a limited conversation.

We don't want to destabilize Russia. We were hoping after the Berlin Wall fell, and then two years later, Russia, the Soviet Union fell, we were hoping Russia would become, you know, one of the nations of the world that joined the family of Western democracies. There was no reason why they couldn't have democracy. They sort of gave it a go, but it was, you know, obviously the past was so corrupted that

the future was not going to be untainted either. And then we did make mistakes. I would agree with this, which you probably, I'm thinking in the direction you're going in, I don't think we should have kept rolling Nate. First of all, why NATO, if there's no Soviet Union? Yeah. Like, I'm not saying we should have necessarily disbanded NATO, but instead of getting more, oh, strong NATO, more countries,

it should have been like, okay, we're saying that the Cold War is over. So why do we need an organization that's against you? That was a terrible message to say. And I think that set things off. It may have gone to shit anyway. I mean, Russia is a tough place. And the people have been brutalized by communism, which is horrible for the soul, not to mention the pocketbook.

But yeah, go ahead. Can I give you a bunch of facts? Oh, boy. So, then you can riff on them, because I'd love to see your take on these facts come from our content, on our show. Like our research, Glean from some great journalists, and it mostly, okay, say this kind of meta-journalism. We accumulate facts. We don't use anything that's not been endorsed in mainstream media.

Let me get you up with some of this stuff, because I genuinely want to hear you take. But let me give you the whole thing as an overview. And then you can, as Bill Mar, because there's face it, no one else can do this. And that gives you up out. Okay, so for me, Israeli Prime Minister, and I've hardly been, it said recently, a Russia-Ukraine

peace deal was blocked by Western powers. We know that Boris Johnson visited Ukraine and the council to Zelensky against taking the peace deal that's on table. That's just one thing. Let me hit you with all this stuff. Zelensky is vowed to retake Crimea, but Russia said that's the red line that will spark nuclear war. We know that, all right? Republicans sent it lead a Mitch McConnell said in December 2022, the most basic reasons for continuing to help Ukraine degrade and defeat the Russian invaders are cold, hard, practical, American interests. And then they're just wide and this out a little. The Pentagon spent $14 trillion after 9, 11, 55% of it went to four profit defense contractors. The average American taxpayer contributed $2,000

to the military last year, more than 900 of that went to corporate military contractors. At least 15 politicians who shape US defense policy have investment in military contractors. Military contractors split their checks more or less evenly between Democrat and Republican candidates last year. And Biden appointed a black rock, a former black rock MD to the cabinet in particular to sort out this this the post-Ukrainian reconstruction. Okay, stop. These are good facts, Bill. These are facts, possibly. I don't have a fact checker here. I don't doubt it. You're not going to need one. Wait, wait, but it's so far from the point. I mean, I feel like your antenna for conspiracy theories. I mean, you have a good antenna, and then sometimes it does not serve you well, because like, even if all this stuff is true,

it's just more complicated than that. Both things can be true. It can be something that is a worthy endeavor to stop Russia from invading another country, and it also could be the case. It is the case, of course. People in the defense industry are looking to keep having reasons to make weapons and so forth.

There are people who absolutely have invested interest in war, those were your facts are saying. It doesn't mean even if all that is true, and I would agree, because there are people of invested interest in warga. That doesn't mean, even if all that is true. And I would agree, because there are people of a vested interest in war. That doesn't mean logically, it doesn't mean that every war is because of that. I would also be for another reason, and then these people go on onto that. It's called the shock doctrine.

When you take advantage of a crisis, it's going on, but it also could be the case that the war is a valiant endeavor. To a point, not excluding that. Not until they bombed Ukraine to nothing. I mean, it's a very valid question now to ask. What I'm saying is, do you think it's a coincidence that the mainstream media only reports on one aspect of this conflict, It only gives you one narrative. I'm not like, I am obviously not in a, look at my glittery trousers. I'm not in an opinion position to offer a definitive opinion on this, but what I will say is that sometimes when you took

my antenna right, this is what I think is like, I've, this war in Ukraine is motivated by a genuine and legitimate need to rightly and correctly support Ukrainian people who are under attack and suffering because of a war. Because when I've been looking at life, I know it's how often humanitarianism is the motivation of the military and national complex. So, you always say, who can we help now? Who can we help now? And wouldn't it be great if we had a system that was like, oh, just to make sure that there is no other motivation,

there can be no profit extracted from this conflict. But the aid offered will not end up in Raytheon Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman Baye, B.A. He says, what a map of viewful system. So as long as that is one of the possible reasons, isn't it the most likely reason? I, well, again, now I feel like... I'm not saying, I'm talking about concocting.

I feel like now we're just making, like, you've made your point and I've made mine, and now I feel like we're repeating ourselves because like, I'm just gonna say again, and I, it's how they get in here, me. Like, both things can be true. It's just, you know what I'm saying? No, the key to that earlier, but it has to be in the monster. Until then, it's a hero, and I'm like, well, hang things can be true. It's just, you know, everything is a monster.

Until it's a hero. And I'm like, well, hang on, what about this shit? Because do you think like, how long are you thinking for a late ski is going to get support if you're interested to converge with the MIC? Throwing your hands together, like, oh, and the one hand, yeah, Putin is a murderer

who pushes people out of windows and starts wars and all these crimes against humanity. And this guy has some shady business dealings. He's Ukrainian. He was born with a shady business dealing. I mean, that's what the country was known for before this. But okay, let's start. What do you mean?

I pocket. What? We're pocket, that's pocket. We made up for it. We actually get it through shots. I don't know. No, no, I'm in the closet. We actually get it through shots. No, no, no. I'm in the corner.

I'm in the corner. I just want to know, does that look like more than a shot? I have said that's a generous shot. But it's a shot glass. So why are they- What else can I say? Trying to get me drunk. I'm just going to be a little.

But I suddenly realized, I was trying to think it was in my mind, why, what is his accent that amuses me so much? I just, your accent is exactly the accent that Eric Eidl uses in money Python when he's playing the dumb guy. Why? Which one? Like a wretch, you know? Like in one of the Romans of it, dude.

Like, well, I mean, I love you. Even though there's an insult in that. No, I'll say that. It's more like. No, it's a compliment because the contrast of how bright you are with that character who is not. I know. But you sound alike.

It's because I'm from Essex, which is the New Jersey of my country. This is the dirty little shit truck. You know because I'm from Essex, which is the new jersey of my country. This is the dirty little syndrome I've been trying to cross the Atlantic with. The voice that he does. Yeah, of course I do. But what I would offer you as a Monty Python, a Fessionardo and devotee is it's more like holy grail, where he's like, come on, witness the oppression of the system. We're Michael Paley and that could all look at how they're pressing me. Who made you king?

I didn't vote, yeah. We're in an arcosy into clists. That's a close. I mean, that will be. the oppression of the system, Michael Paley and that could all look at how they're pressing me. Who made you king? I didn't vote, yeah. We're in a narco syndiclist. That's, uh, that's so close. I mean, that movie, yeah, the great. I could watch it every year like there was a divorce. It's just, it's just first of all so funny. Yeah.

Like just funny, funny. Yeah. And then the points they were making, they're so pressing. There's, there's one where he, remember, he's, he wants to be a woman. I want to be known as Loretta, red. What's the point in finding people right to have babies when he can't have babies? Where's the baby? He's going to keep it in a box.

I mean, that's like something someone could have written for us for us last year because of all that kind of stuff that's going on. This is, I suppose, why my true ideology, my true religion, is comedy. Because the ability to continually refer to, isn't this bloody ridiculous? None of us know anything. We're all putting on a show for God's sake. I'm trying to be some mess.

My life's a mess. I don't know, I cope with my own life. I don't know how you're gonna solve the conflict in Ukraine. I'm saying what you're gonna do about the influence of corporations on American government. I don't know. The truth is I don't know. And it's bloody ridiculous. And, you know, like having record. And I think this is why you were seeing, do you agree? The emergence of

a comedic commentary in the political space. I suppose maybe it began with you, John Stuart, that kind of stuff. And then maybe before you, like, Carlin, Kicks. And what's different, yes, I mean, there was always some of that. What's different is that what I was doing when we started was something that they said could never work, which is having the host also render an opinion. The other guy's like Johnny Carson never did that. It was like, no, you'll alienate half the audience. And my theory was, no, they can like you if they disagree with you. In the 30 years since I started, that's almost completely switched. Yeah. Because

now to survive like in the late night American talk show, you have to just be preaching to that liberal audience, which is, you know, mostly what I would agree with too, but it's like it's so indoctrinated. And it's so like, all we all have agreed that this is the premise. Like, Melonese a fascist. That's a perfect example. We all read it in the York Times, and now that's what, or somebody read it for us, told us. And now the Italians are taken over by the fascists.

And like, no attempt to like look under the surface or far a differing point of view or just and So just stuff that will make people clap in the audience because this is what my team believes This is you know, Ivermectin is horse medicine or whatever it is You know, I think you brought that up today and like that wasn't really good example I mean they absolutely did like Just it's Ivermectin. It's a drug. It's not a politician And they absolutely did like, just, I've remected it to drugs. It's not a politician. How you can like, the way that in this country, like, can just need jerkingly take a very

obstinate side of an issue that's just like, what are you talking about? Either it works or it doesn't. Doctors prescribe it to humans. It's not, it's maybe it helps and maybe it doesn't. Maybe like some drugs, it helps some people and not others. Well, that to me is the most insane thing that this becomes like, you are a witch because you believe it or you are a genius.

It's not that dramatic. I found most helpful on this subject as was written by a former CIA analyst called Martin Gurri, he wrote a book called The Revolt of the Public. He had a apolitical role within the CIA. That's how he describes it as a data analysis. He says that in 2001, this is presumably a fact, as much information was published that year as in all human history up to that point.

And in 2002, because they had the advent of the internet. And then in 2002, the amount of information doubled again. And then every year since, the amount of information published has doubled. He said that when you look at it on a graph, it looked like a tidal wave, and it had the kind of impact that a tidal wave will have. Information is being generated and created. You can't generate a central narrative and not have it challenged in the same way

that you could 50 years ago. Now, a single journalist or individual with a phone can create content that can be seen by millions and millions of people. As soon as a narrative emerges, there's a counter narrative, there's a counterpoint, you know, like, wow, discussion there about Ukraine. Again, I'm not like, you know, these are not nailed on facts. Maybe these are discussion points that ought to be included in the mix when you're talking about something as potentially in century has nuclear armageddon. You want

to make sure that you've considered all of the facts and that you have a media that isn't so beholden to centralized interests interests that it's not including all the other facts. He said, mind gurry, that what he, you know, he says that he goes, I believe in liberal democracy. That's what I believe in. This is guys not a radical. But what he's saying is that we said we saw it first with Napster, then the Arab Spring,

then the Occupy movement that the potential for disruption became so, as it became so sort of ravenous and potent that they had a choice to make. Even we're gonna have to alter the way that power operates, except that there are numerous publics, numerous views, numerous perspectives that people hold very dearly, all we're gonna have to double down on authoritarianism.

How easy that the Democrat Party, the shrine of liberalism, social liberalism, open-mindedness investigation, became the party of authoritarianism. The argument, of course Bernie Sanders made all the economic arguments, but he says more broadly and beyond the distinctions between the two parties, is you now have to double down. And it even taken in your late night talk show thing is like, that's over now.

They've got their audience. The Republican right have got their audience. The Democrat left have got their audience. Play to your audience. Count the money. The pop has changed. But again, for proper perspective, I hope you would concede that the greatest threat has come out of America as far as falling into authoritarianism, came from Trump claiming that he did not lose an election,

he plainly lost, and getting a giant chunk of his party to go along with that. That is the threat to authoritarianism. Other threats do exist, including some from the left. They are not nearly on that level. I may say, don't you think it's a great threat that whoever wins an election, the changes, as are not nearly on that level. I may say, don't you think it's a great afret that whoever wins an election, the changes as we discussed on your show

are not going to be significant enough for most people. But that's the real threat, the front phrase. So, you know, the reason that most of the lobbying money is split 50-50 is because they're perfectly fine with either party getting in. I've been hearing this for, I don't know, since I was a teenager. Right. No, I've been hearing this for, I don't know, since I was a teenager. Right.

No, I've been told you yet. Oh, no, I've been hearing. Let me tell you first. Don't jump your cue. I've been hearing since I was a kid that, why don't people get in the streets? Things are so horrible. And it's like, I finally realized

because for, like, I finally realized, because for like probably a majority, but certainly a great preponderance of people in America, life just isn't this unremitting nightmare. And so yes, as a liberal, do I believe for the people who life is a nightmare? We should constantly be working harder to make it, so it's not for them. Yes, I do.

Am I willing to give a big chunk of my money and I do to alleviate that misery that we're all kind of in this together and it's not just not cool if some people are really suffering. Yes, I do. But the reason why Bernie's don't get elected and there isn't people in the streets all the time is because most people is like on a very basic level, they get it that maybe America

is actually still better than most places we could be. And I'm not really doing that bad. No one's actually starving. We have lots of problems and they're a homeless on the streets and lots of shit. But you know, I get up every day. I fucking do what I want. I have material goods, the toilets work. Yes, it's a mess in a lot of ways,

but, you know, am I going in the streets? No, I've got a meeting tomorrow for something for my business because this is still a country where I can start a business. And like I can reinvent myself. That's a lot of what people like about America. Is that face you're giving me because of the smoke? Or you because of what I'm saying?

I guess it's what I'm saying. It's the greatest of that. It's such a bad face. You have. It was like a far, smell of fart things. It was just awful. And especially, I'm so right. No, it's because, I think it's because of despondency and despair and a kind of... And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful.

And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful.

And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful.

And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. And I'm so grateful. of the contested elections, because my personal perspective is, it doesn't actually matter who gets in for a significant number of people. And I'm sure you're right when you're talking about like the professional cast or coastal folk or most people that enjoy the affluence

that I've been afforded over my lucky little life. But I also believe that, I read a good book by a man called Mark Fisher, God rest his soul, though he was an atheist and thanked me for saying that. He wrote a book called Capitalist Realism. He said that what had he said, he believes that the great triumph of capitalism has been that we can no longer envisage a system beyond it.

He said famously, is easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. People aren't even willing to imagine that there's a possibility of... Capitalism is a corporate and stay interest. Because capitalism works for a great deal of people. That's why it's popular. Looking less enlisted. The same way, like, stereo became popular.

Like, it could have stuck with mono, but we were like, you know what? This is actually better. It kind of works. It doesn't lose something. I guess that's why they keep putting albums back out in mono and I'm like, I don't know, why don't you just put them back on on 78? For fuck's sake, why are we going backwards? Or the kids, they like vinyl? Like, you know, I have my old vinyl. It's like, please enjoy listening

to shitty sounding records that are scratchy. I would say in a way, people are on the streets. People have been on the streets, not in enormous numbers, protesting, protesting for an end to current conflicts. The Black Lives Matter protests and obviously the movements around Donald Trump and the movement around mask and the trucker protests and all of the agricultural protests in Germany and Sri Lanka and Holland all around the world, people are protesting. Do you know a lot of people who have been in protests

or in the streets? Cause I don't know anybody. Well, I mean, it's just like, it's just like people were sympathetic. Maybe it's cause I'm older and my people my age don't go out and do anything. Well, I'm going to fucking street. And I go to a restaurant.

I'm not doing all that. It's amazing how ages this country is. But what I mean to say is that there are significant protest movements, but I think what there is is a clear lack of a real vision that probably since Clinton and Blair onwards, no one is suggesting anything other than the management of decline, kind of intimate bureaucracies where we biometrically measure and manage our own health. No one's saying we could do something fantastic with America.

Rhetorically, of course, great claims are made by Iversight, but no one suggesting that we could reorganize the site. No one's anticipating what the AI revolution is about to be held, the loss of jobs, the despair, the despondency, and that is likely to engender. And we were sort of seeing a return to feudalism. Yeah, then that beautiful film, The House I Live In, the great writer of that show, The Wise, you know, when it comes to the opioid crisis and the addiction crisis in your country, he said, well, why don't we just admit that in a post-manufacturing America, we've got

no need for 20% of the population. They're redundant now. They're debunked. We can lose them. And sometimes I think it comes down to simple demographics, that this nation can carry a good, many, deeply dissatisfied and unhappy people and by God it looks like it is. Because it, this ain't nothing, all of this conflagration that's going on in this country, mostly seemingly housed around the culture wall, where I think they're quite happy for people

to quibble and quarrel and roar. Because ultimately, that doesn't affect the interests of the kind of the elite establishment interests that I'm interested in addressing. And that Bernie is tried to address. And I would offer you this because it seems as a result of during the conversations that I have had with some former Democrat party presidential candidates, that that party almost consciously, deliberately and explicitly decided they would rather have Trump win and win themselves with Bernie. I'd like to put that to you, because that, for me, if that is true, that's it.

I will answer that, but I will answer it in first and this way. Can I just take this conversation, same topic, but a little more toward the pedestrian diurnal. I mean, I know you went to lectures, you know, I've just told do any lectures. I just told you I'm from the New Jersey of England. I know, but you may be sipping. But you do think like an intellectual. I mean, it's because that's exactly what I'm saying. Like, let's go to daily life and see if daily life

matches with your theory of life. Because like, as you go through your day, now maybe I live in a charm world. Of course you do. Of course I do. I don't think I live in such a charm world where I go to an office, you know, I see people who work there not all like making giant salaries. One person that that show is, I'm like I say, but this flat edge feels very generous. It's a good job, but it's just a job. We all do it. I have to it. I'm the same as them. Like, oh, there are days like, oh, God, I don't want to.

I'm tired of it, but I got to keep working and we work, we all do our best. And I don't think they're unhappy. And then if I go out and get coffee somewhere and even a waiter or even the guy who's like the valet guy, they don't seem miserable. Like, oh, my God, I'm going to pray. They're like, you know, they're living their lives.

Like, when I was in my 20s, I was poor. I got it. Like, you know, I'm working my way up. And there is opportunity and there's stumbles along the way. And there's lots of problems. And we should keep working on them. But it's like, I don't know if it's going to get better by being massively rewriting human nature,

which is impossible or the way the world is constructed. I think people are selfish. I think you have to always factor that in. Anytime you're developing any kind of economic system, people are selfish. And they will go toward what makes their life better. Hopefully not at the cost of somebody too much, but sometimes, you know. You believe in in light and self-interest, but also I don't figure you for a misanthrope.

I don't feel that at the heart of your belief is people are bad because at the core of my ideology is not even a begrudging but an optimistic love of humanity. And my belief bill is that if we enshrine, elevate, celebrate, and possibly even legislate the higher principles about nature, compassion, kindness, service, unity, a willingness to sacrifice. And this is where it does get personal because I have to ask myself, what are you willing to give up Russell Brand in order to live in a feral world? And I'm not just talking about taxation because by the way affluent like sort of being a millionaire entertainers, ain't the issue. We're talking about billionaires offshore corporations with unprecedented power that make the carnigies and the Rockefellers look like sort of quaint little guys with jacks and dimes.

But I feel my guess is that you live a very nice life and my opinion of that is you should. You're talented, you worked your way up and but you can't like enjoy it without having some, I think, inappropriate guilt or like it shouldn't be this way. It's the world is only what it is. We're always trying to better it, but just enjoy. And though you shouldn't trade places with someone who's not doing well, we should lift that person up.

That doesn't mean we have to put ourselves down, lift up the people who need lifting. I agree with this entirely. I mean, you're absolutely agree with that. I prefer to be in the part where you're making yourself crazy for no reason. Maybe. Really? I'm open to that.

I'm open to the fact that something... Well, can I absolve you of that? God, please. There's no reason to worry. Is it okay? Am I doing all right? Absolutely. And your life hasn't been a peck-dick either.

You've had some really trying times and all that addiction and, you know, bad press. I mean, you're and you know bad press You know, but you know you how old you know 47 47 per year like right you're perfectly where you should be I mean and by the way there's nothing you couldn't do in job business. I don't know Just not want you must not want to but you like doing what you're doing. I do you think you must just not want, you must not want to, but you like doing what you're doing. You're a crusader. You know, time to like getting spandex and do it. You would be such an awesome, you know, you're perfect for like the Marvel universe.

I mean, you could be the villain, you could be the air you, Dite Man, you could be like something. I have a calling and I'm, you know, like we discussed in jokes about. Remember, it seems like an eternity ago when I was rifling through Miracac sack in search of the mini-moyle that you mentioned that I am a seeker. And what, when you say something like we should lift people up, that I feel that there is no chance of that happening with the kind of entrenched systemic interests

that we have now, because as they say in the circles I move in is not a bug, it's a feature. There is a requirement for endemic pro-poverty. There is a requirement for an abandoned and suffering class of people. There is a requirement to distract us with conversations that whilst important will not alter the trajectory of ordinary people's lives.

And you know what? I agree with all that, but I can't help it. I wish I could. I mean, I don't mean I can't help the situation, I'm sure I can make some small contribution. What I mean to say is that this appears to be the most organic expression of the drive that I've always felt. I mean, you know, you became like a, you're ultimately with two standup comedians that we've had breaks in various ways.

And for me, the standup comedy, it seemed like, oh my God, this is the purest form I can just go up there and I can say whatever I want. And like you, I'm sure I did it for nothing in clubs for a long, long time open Mike's spots, I'm paid gigs, I did it, I got bottled on stage, I got dragged off stage.

Me too, a tough, tough times. And I'm so glad. Isn't it great that it is so? It's so great. When people ask me and I say, how do you do it, Stan Ep? I always tell them, if you're really one of the truth, you have this idea, so much pain, sad clowns.

Where it said, there is a shitload of pain, but it's all like in the first few years. Then there's things that are not perfect, but it's that like in the first few years. Then there's things that are not perfect, but it's that beginning where you're learning to be funny in front of people when you're not funny. I mean, you probably were a hit right away, because you just have a natural gift of the gab that, and I mean, the fact that you don't like, I mean, I would love to see you live and you don't, you know, I'm American DJ. Yeah, yeah, I did a shit. I do.

I've not been here for a while, but like I do do, I do live gigs. I'm not like, when I talk to a Rogan, he says, like, you know, you should, like, it's a do-e to do the clubs and stuff. And like, but like, stand-up says, you know, like, I worked hard to get that audience. And now I'm going to play to them. I'm going to play it to people that love me, that come to

see me because they want to hear what I've got to say rather than that, that, that aggring me for swaying these fuckers. That is so funny. I mean, I have the highest regards for Joe Rogan. I really do. I wish I could do it show more. I did it last year. Yeah, no, I watched. Like, that is such a Joe Rogan thing to say about. Like he has that he's that kind of comic. I've known that comic since I started. There's a kind of comic whose like it's almost like we're in the army. The army of comics and they're just very,

you know, they're just very, and I get it. I mean, I love comedy too. I just don't have that like, you know, you know, you got to, when I started, there was a lot of rules. Uh-huh. Like, well, you got to have six clean tonight show shots before you moved to California.

You know, we had this like template. Wow. Yeah. And then, yes, you get clean. So that's like 30 minutes of very clean material so you can do it on the tonight show. And then you'll get a sitcom. You know, that was the thing. We all wanted to be in a sitcom You know, that was the thing.

We all wanted to be in a sitcom. Yeah, that was the pathway. That was the route for the elite achieving comic. I, like, I sometimes feel guilty again that I don't do that. Like, yeah, get out there and do them clubs. Suffer a little bit. Go out there and win them over and get, make sure that you're opening five. He's good and that he's beautiful.

Like, I love, like, then there's like then, I feel like Bill Burr, he would play anywhere and he would make it work and Looie would play anywhere, like he would make it work. You know, like I, a Chappelle, like a door, those contemporary American comics at the top rock order them guys. And I suppose we're like, for me,

and I'd love to hear more about your contemporaries and how you came up and stuff. I feel like, for me, there's a been a, there's this shamanism in stand-up comedy. There's a real ability to create beautiful feeling in that route to explode, stuff to explore incredible ideas. And I sort of, when I, I've had like, you know, the reason I did movies and all that stuff

is because it's just hard not to, if people offer you those things, you feel like, oh my God, I've got to do it. But for me, it's a world away from what I actually want to do. You're very lucky to, lucky end, of course, a diligent and vestidious to have carved out for yourself this position where you can operate in what seems to me to be the perfect environment.

That's amazing. And it doesn't happen for very many comics. And of course, there are reasons there. It's lucky. And lucky. I mean, HBO has been a great place. I mean, we survived for a while on ABC for six years, even. But HBO really gets me.

And I do well for them. So it's like that rare marriage where, and they're genuinely nice people. They're like people you can deal with. They're not there. Yeah, I mean, they caught it. They sort of, for a long time, had it to themselves this mode of operation,

which was to hire people to do shows and then completely leave them alone. And we trust you. Just do your thing and we don't interfere a lot. And for a long time, they had that to themselves. Other networks were too stupid to do that. They wanted their network executives to always make notes and just too much meddling. And finally, the other ones got the hint that the real talent is always going to migrate

to the place where they can be free. And HBO has had some bombs because they let somebody they trust them. We don't all head on 1000, you know? We don't all get it. And that's okay. That's what art is. It's sometimes it's failing.

And when it's failing, it's thank God only failing for 13 weeks. Yeah, I had my shot at that. I did a show on FX And when it's failing, it's thank God only failing for 13 weeks. Yeah, I had my shot at that. I did a show on FX where they gave me probably a little too much freedom, you know, like, and I misused it and mispented. A little too much. But that's their loss, really. And what you should be on an American TV every night. Well, with the show I have now, I did this deal with Rumble, the five shows. Exactly.

It is amazing. TV's, like, TV's, like, kids don't even have TVs. No, it's an old media. Moving towards obsolescence, presumably, other than in some, like, particularly, this manageable space, I would assume. And what I have now, doing a show five days, a week streaming live uncensored

tackling the idea of appealing to an audience that I know are ultimately more open to sort of right-wing politics, but doing my best to convey ideas beyond that, that ultimately. So what is Rumble now? I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, right-wing voices, but it doesn't have any skin in the game with regard to the kind of content that is put out, except for that you continue to own your content and you can say what you want. You can talk about what you want. And like for me, freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom

of speech to them and criticize people. It means freedom of speech to attack establishment and look for ways to bring people together. I mean, I suppose, a reemergent populism. And I feel that this spider, like a left-wing populism, as it was initially intended to be, it was assumed there will be an accompaniment to the trade union movement, a true popularity, the empowerment of people as much democracy as possible, as much control over communists possible, a row ability to confront establishment power and even state power. The two heads of the Hydra being an over empowered state and an over empowered corporate world.

Now that we have those things essentially combined in absolute symbiosis. Is this Dave Rubens? Dave Rubens on there? I know Dave's been on. It's on his company though. But it is. Dave owned, I believe, locals, which is the sort of membership aspect of Rumble, which is essentially like YouTube. He's been here, I love him.

Yeah, he's a great guy. Yeah, and we don't agree politically. No. But we laugh about it. It's, yeah, and the pre- here's the problem with where we are media-wise, as a specific free speech, you know, as comics we adore free speech.

It's my lifeblood. I couldn't meet you. I'm so grateful to the people who came before me who were martyrs for free speech, you know what I mean? Lenny Bruce had nine trials, I think. You know, trials, actual trials. Not like, oh my trials. No, I mean, we're actually putting you on trial. So free

speech, I mean, when I was younger, I mean, there was no doubt in my mind who the champions of free speech were and also the threat and the threat was all on the right and the champions were on the left. And that's not how I feel now. So when people say, like, oh, why are you harder on the left? Well, that's one of the big reasons, because I certainly appreciate the threat of free speed from the right. I mean, Trump said, if anyone took him seriously, like if he was a normal president, where you didn't just hear something crazy again today and then write it off, people would have been very alarmed because he would say things like, you know, the media is the enemy of

the people. I mean, this is like Hitler talk, you know. And maybe we should look into the New York Times or Emma said, maybe they shouldn't lose their light, you know, just stuff that's really threatening. So I get it. There is threat on the right. But the left is much more in my face, much more constant, much more a daily problem. They just want to catch you and find people like a cantilever. They're just a mean girl attitude to it and it just squashes and puts fear in people. So people don't speak their mind when people are making cringy apologies. I always want to say, you know what, maybe the woke people should apologize to me and people like me for all the things they robbed us

of never hearing, jokes that were never told, because someone was just too scared to say something, you know, letters, emails, things that were never written, thoughts that were never expressed, because it was just easier to go along. So, when I hear about a free speech platform, unfortunately, now that to a lot of people, and including me, my antenna goes up,

like, is this actually a right wing platform? Because the right, it's funny, because the right actually, I think, once this kind of free speech, that's what, like, I know a lot of doctors who were reasonable people who should have been heard on COVID. But MSNBC wouldn't put them on. We should have brought that up today.

Yeah. I was moving into it. So they only had a little link. So they could go with Fox News. So then they get branded a conservative because they're on Fox News. And they're saying, I'm not. They're just the branded a conservative because they're on Fox News and they're saying, I'm not. They're just the only ones who would put me on.

There were people that invented vaccines that were being called an Eve Vaxes. The whole thing became, he became hysterical. But I mean, that's the problem with, so like, when I hear about this organ, I'm like, is it really a bunch of just right-wingers or is it really free speech? So tell me. Well, I believe that those categories are starting to just a right winger. No, I mean, this is how I approach this. People should be able to believe politically what they want to believe. It seems to me that if you're on the libertarian right, that you would believe in people's right for freedom of expression, right on what is currently regarded as the far left, whether you know, if you want to be left alone, you should be left alone to be who you want to be.

And in fact, some kind of truce around traditionalism and progressivism seems to be the necessary one, at this point. You be as progressive as you want to be, you be as traditional as you want to be. Let's leave each other alone. We'll go and kill each other over this stuff. We've got bigger fish to fry. Right. And so the way that Rumble is regarded, I spoke to Rogan about this, is being portrayed as a right wing space. And there's no doubt that there have been right wing contributors that have accelerated. It's ascent as a platform. But the reason I'm there, I'm going to be interested in condemning people, criticizing

people because of their life, not choices, because of their culture. I do believe in freedom. I do believe in freedom. Right. Right. But the reason I'm there, I'm going to be interested in condemning people or criticizing people because of their lifestyle choices, because of their culture. I believe in freedom. I do believe in freedom, but I feel that you cannot have that freedom without an open dialogue and an open discourse around all of these subjects and the ability to make mistakes and the ability to be wrong and to resolve these issues collegially and collectively with, in good faith, not be looking for ways to find easy sort of,

to tag it back to Trump or to tag it to this and to me. And they'd like to, there has to be some good faith arguments. Bill, I need a P quite bad. And I'm like, young. I got a weirdo for rap this up. I could talk to you on it. Is that this wrap up shuffle there? Yeah, yeah.

But, um, oh, I'm good. Shall I shuffle? Wait, wait, I just can't, I just... Oh, you're shoving it, but just say something. Sh'm sure I shuffle. No, no, wait, I just can't. Are you shoving them up to say something? Shuffle back. What's going just? What, what were you just talking about? You were like quite high because of me.

Whole-I've spoken. I'm completely in the same mood of a spin-off. But what were you just saying? I was saying that we need to, we got bigger fish to fry than we have to have a truce between traditionalism and progressivism. You get the idea. It's the same stuff I'm always saying. Are you going to let me do a peak? Because I'm actually in some distress. It doesn't take

me long. Right. No, let's just, this was like... We're going to wrap it up on the peak. I think so because I worked all day. I don't want to. I feel like I'm taking advantage of you. I know what I was going to say. I admire you for so much bigger. You're so passionate about these things. But I just mentioned Lenny Bruce. So I was going to say. You know, I admire you for so much bigger. You're so passionate about these things. But I just, because I just mentioned Lenny Bruce. So I'm going to say that that's a sign from the universe.

And by the way, Dave Rubin's always trying to convince me about the universe, which I find amusing. But I'm going to pretend that such a thing is the universe. Because the United States is, and say that Lenny Bruce, you know, he forgot to like be an entertainer because he was so passionate. Right. I don't want that to happen to you. I don't think it will. It never has. You proved that, like, not just here, but on real time today was just like, you know, you bring it, man.

And just that's, you know, I don't know why why I'm anointing myself as the person to give you advice you probably don't need. No I'd love to. But please you're just such a great entertainer. Please don't like just you know I know the the world is falling apart and it's certainly mostly your fault. But you know that old saying don't pity the mornory likes his job. Thank you. We had a laugh didn't we? I'm going to do it because I am quite desperate. I'm so sorry.

I'm so sorry. No, I'm so sorry. Oh God. you