Piers Morgan Uncensored - Piers Morgan Uncensored: Patrick Bet-David

Episode Date: February 19, 2024

He’s is an author, an entrepreneur, a veteran, a co-owner of the New York Yankees, a former Iranian refugee, and one of the most influential podcasters in America. Patrick-Bet David is Uncensored Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

He's an author, an entrepreneur, a veteran, a co-owner of the New York Yankees, a former Iranian refugee, and one of the most influential podcasters in America. By definition, we're already at World War III. Iran needs to know right off the bat. You don't fear them. You've got to protect the border, and we're not doing it today. Don't send a penny to Ukraine. But why would you be happy for Putin to win?

Respectfully, you don't live here. I want debate. I want exchange. Let's argue. David is uncensored. Well, I'm delighted to say I'm joined now by Patrick. David, Patrick, great to have you on Uncensored. It's great to be on with you.

I thought it might be quite fun to start in a rather different way. Rather than me telling an audience, many of whom will obviously know all about you, some of whom will know nothing about you. I thought, given what a brilliant salesman you are, never mind anything else, you could sell yourself to me to spend, you know, 30 seconds, 40 seconds, To people who don't know you, it's such an extraordinary story. Tell it for me quickly. Born and raised in Iran, lived there 10 years, escaped Iran six weeks after Khomeini died, went to Germany on July 15th of 89, lived in Germany at a refugee camp for a year and a half, came to the States, November 28, 1990 to Glendell, California, went to the army afterwards, got out, wanted to be a bodybuilder, the next Arnold Middle Eastern version, went into financial services, worked out Morgan Stanley Dean with her, stayed in the industry for 20 years,

build an insurance company eventually, of 50,000 agents nationwide, few hundred offices, which I sold two years ago, and then part-time started a YouTube channel that grew into a media company and a consulting firm. I mean, it's an amazing story. It's made you very successful, very wealthy. There are a couple of nuggets about your story,

which really leapt out to me. One is that you call one of your four kids Senna, your daughter's called Senna, after Ayrton Senna, who is one of my all-time favorite sportsman of any sport ever because he was dashing, he was daredevil, he took the ultimate risks, he was a natural born winner, a killer on the track. But I remember a million people turning out for his funeral in Brazil, I remember watching his death live on television and the impact it had on me.

It was absolutely devastating. But this extraordinary outpouring of grief for him, you know, all men wanted to be like Senna, all women wanted to do other things with Senna. He was an extraordinary life force, wasn't he? Is that why you wanted to call one of your kids after him? Listen, I mean, I watch his documentary probably 100 times. There are so many things about him that's a killer competitor to the point where he complains after an accident in Monaco and says, you guys move the tires two inches.

They're like, no, we didn't move the tires two inches. No, you moved the tires to inches. They go and investigate, they realize one of the workers in the morning without telling anybody, moves the tires two inches is why he hits the side. The way he was, he loved his country. He won for his country with the shoulder, holding up the flag. His relationship with his mom, his dad, how he wanted to make them proud. And the day when the race comes, there was already an accident and it's emotional.

He's afraid. He's nervous. It's the new car. So to me, we were at the hospital when the baby was born. We had four names we were choosing. I wanted Senna because I want that as the name. I want Senna Rosebed David. It was Madison, it was Danica.

It was one other name. Let's just say Senna ended up winning us the main name. And we can't think of calling her anything else but Senna Rose Bed David. When you look at your own journey, your own life, your business career and your own life itself, what parallels do you see with Senna? What have you drawn from him? From the beginning of time when I was a kid, you know, feeling like, like you are, God puts you here to do something big with your life, and you don't know why.

You can't explain it to anybody. And then having a fire in your belly that you can't explain to others. You can't explain to them. Listen, I don't know if this is normal or not, but there's something on my belly that I feel that's constant. I can't stop it. You can call it a spirit of competition. You can call it the spirit of pride in my background and my father in the way I was raised

in the life God has given me the strange experiences I've had. And then combined that with finding an industry where I finally realize that I can use some of my talents, whether it's the fact that I love people and I love numbers combined with debates, you know, a proven of point that chip, all of that combined together. I see a lot of the parallels with him. And I just, listen, I connected with them so much to the point where I rented a house in Port of Iarta eight years ago. And I brought all my executives. And for three days, all we studied was Senna.

It's all we studied for 30 days. That's all it was about studying center and his mindset because I think it's a mindset that very few people have in sports today, those who do are the type of people I relate to. Yeah, I mean, I totally agree. I think that there are certain sporting gods over the years who just are on a different level to the others. I'm thinking of people like Michael Jordan.

There are certain Tiger Woods in golf. There are just certain people who transcend their sport because there's something about them. And it normally is a thing, it comes back to what Jordan said about, you know, you can take thousands of shots. But it's the ones you miss that effectively generate the champion inside you. You just keep taking, taking, taking, taking. And you mustn't be deflected or deterred by failure. In fact, you should be fueled by it.

Yeah, I mean, listen, in the world of business, for me, my vertical leap was maybe six inches on a good day, that I can jump. So I couldn't jump. but I knew I could sell. I knew early on in Germany at a refugee camp when I wanted the new Super Mario Brothers, I found a way to make 250 marks to go to the seers of Germany.

It's called Cowfowl, to buy the Super Mario Brothers, to brought it back to the refugee camp. I was a celebrity in the refugee camp. Everybody wanted to play Super Mario Brothers because nobody had it. I learned sales in that moment. And then later on, if sports is not going to be your thing, there's a lot of people in business.

that have the similar mindset to a Michael to Senna. You can put Musk in that category. You can put some political people in that category, whether it's a Trump, whether it's a Kennedy, whether there's certain people you can put in that category that they're relentless. You've interviewed a lot of people, as I have, who have been the most impressive to you in terms of their mental strength?

I would put Kobe at the top. Kobe, to me, is a mental, competitive, giant who was, you know, he knew how to use the ammunition on whatever you gave him, but also at the same time, he was so crystal clear on how he was going to play mind games with you, to confuse you, to throw you off your game. And it was a very interesting thing watching him. I mean, he's born August 23rd, 1978.

I'm October 18, 1978. We're six weeks apart. When he came to LA, I think I've watched every single thing he did. His last game, 60 points. He was a very unique, you know, right before he came, came into the, you know, how sometimes we talk before the interview. He comes in. He's talking to my wife. He's talking to the kids. And I watched to see how he was with people free hitting the stage. And he asked the question. He says, so how nervous are you? There was 6,000 people at this event.

I had him and President Bush and Jordan Peterson. Wow. And I said, no, I'm good. I'm pretty comfortable in a setting like this. He says, yeah, me too. I said, well, you played in front of 20,000 people for 20 years. I know for a fact, you're comfortable. But when we went up their peers, We've had a lot of strange guests at events where you see the star traction like how people are attracted to them. We had to get security to push everybody back because everyone ran to the stage.

They just wanted to get close to this guy. It was a different kind of an experience with him than others I've interviewed. He also, he gave you that great line about that Shaq O'Neill, he thought, could have been the greatest of all time, but he just lacked that extra thing which propelled Kobe, Michael,

Jordan, I think you could say the same with Curry. You could say the same with LeBron James, perhaps. It just elevates them just above the others. Yeah, and it's funny. When I asked that question, everybody covered it. ESPN first take. Everybody was talking about it. But the person that covered it first was Shaq.

He DM me. And he's, what a stupid-ass question that is. I don't know if you can use that word on TV. But he says that to me and says, you're, just go run your small little company. And then he blocks me. Really? I'm like, yeah, he blocks. me for two and a half years, there is zero interaction. And then one day, finally, I'm like, I've got to

figure this thing out, you know, after many attempts, he finally agreed to come down. So he comes to one of the events I'm hosting, you know, my, the manager says, hey, Shaq wants to see you, I go to the back. It's now been three years since that exchange. And he looks at me, says, I just want you know, that's still a stupid ass question. I said, Shaq, that was a great question. He said, that's a terrible question. He's not 400 pounds. He didn't have any kids. He was this. He was I was already a family man. I said, I totally get it. But look, I'm a big fan of both of yours.

I'm glad we're doing the conversation now. And he was the only interview I did at MGM Grand Arena, where my nine-year-old son at the time sat next to me during the entire interview. I've never had one of my kids in the interview. Shack invited him to the stage. He sat right next to me in a nice suit. And we had a good one-hour conversation with Shack.

It was fantastic. Yeah, I interviewed Shack once. He was great. I mean, he's a man mounted, obviously, but incredibly charismatic guy. But I kind of agreed with Kobe Bryant. You know, and I think that's what made Kobe different. And I think Jordan was the same. These guys just were on a different level.

It's quite funny about sporting heroes because you recently bought a home in Florida and the value of it absolutely rocketed because a certain Lionel Messi bought the one next door. Yes, Leonel Messi did buy the house next door. It's funny because at first they were trying to buy our house. and we got multiple offers. We couldn't obviously tell it at the time to the public

because it was, you know, keeping the privacy at this point, you know, everybody knows the stories out there because the realtor who made the offer. It was three offers that we got. We said, listen, we can't do this. The toughest thing about the offer that they made to us was coming and explaining to my 9-year-old son at the time, 10-year-old son, to say,

who's a big, you know, soccer fan. I was with him at his game until last night, 9 o'clock lights are turned off. He's still practicing to say, listen, Messi wants this house, but we have to say no, Daddy. He said, Dad, let him live with us. They'll live on what's, they're not going to live with us. How this works.

And it was, yeah, he bought the house. They're literally like, when I take a shower, they're 50 yards right ahead of my house across the, in the same island that we live on. And, yeah, listen, we went to, what do you call it, Halloween, you're going trick or treating. He's out there trick or treating just as a gesture. Literally like with everybody taking pictures talking.

I don't, you know, certain people who are celebrities and they know it. You know how certain people are not celebrities, but they think they're celebrities, right? And you know who I'm talking about? There's a lot of them out there. And then there are those who are celebrities, but they don't know it. I don't know if Messi realizes how big of a deal he is. Security knows. The Fort Lauderdale cops know, the community knows. I think he just thinks he's lying on Messi who loves his country and won the World Cup and he loves his family. The World Cup is obviously coming to America. Do you think that America is ready to declare soccer, as it would call it?

I hate that word. Obviously, I'm a football man. It's what we call it here. But do you think that America is ready to make soccer a fully fledged fifth major sport in the country? I think it's the fastest grown by valuation-wise. I mean, you're seeing what Inner Miami is worth now, what it was a few years ago, from 25 million to 100 million to a cup 100 million to a half a billion to one and a half million. billion and you know, you got major league baseball teams that some of them are worth two billion.

You know, MLS, some teams are worth more than some NHL teams. So I think what has happened right now with a guy like David Beckham coming here to, you know, Florida and deciding to get into the game, he goes on place for L.A. and then comes to the market like this Miami. And as a visionary, he sees what could possibly happen to Miami. His timing could have been better. And then him and others recruiting a messy and a swarthy and a swarthy. and others come in here.

The other day, we're having, you know, food. We're having lunch at this Italian restaurant in Fort Lauderdale. Regular place, it's a pizza joint. Suarez is sitting right next to us, just having it. I mean, in Europe, people would lose their minds. And I'm watching everybody. Most people don't know who he is yet in America, right? Because he's different celebrity in Europe or South America, Central America,

than he is here. But I think it's going to take a minute, but they're definitely accelerating the process. I've been to a game where you're watching Messi at the state. It's not the best stadium. They're building a real one in Miami. And you're just watching messy in front of you. You're seeing the fan base, especially Miami. It's Hispanic. You know, people understand sports here. They appreciate sports here. Dana White called Miami the LA of 10 years ago. Everyone's coming through here. UFC's biggest gate ever the fight out of all the UFC fights they've ever had. Number one is officially Miami. beating out Madison Square Garden. So, Pierce, you've been to Miami before many times. I'm sure you've put a plate. It's a very different climate.

But to get it in U.S., I think it's going to take minute. And I heard that they announced that World Cup final. I believe it's going to be at the Jet Stadium in New York. They beat out Dallas, which I think is a better decision to do it in New York than Dallas because more celebrities are probably going to go New York. I would have liked it to be in Miami, but I don't know if we have the location for it yet. There's going to be games here as well. COPE America, but the decision was made for that.

We'll see what's going to happen. It's going to take a minute, but they're definitely accelerating the process. Did you reimagined, Patrick, in your wildest dreams when you were growing up in Iran of those very young early days, one day you would end up owning a slice of the New York Yankees, one of the most iconic sports brands in the world? Probably when I was a kid in Iran, I thought it was more likely that a gremlin from New York was going to attack me than owning the New York Yankees. My worries were different worries.

I was worried about dodging bombs from Saddam Hussein when we were at war with Iraq for those eight years and I'm living in the capital, we're escaping to all these other places. But when you come to the States, and for me, when I lived in Germany, my love for baseball cards happened in Germany. I lived in Germany, 89, 90.

That's when they won the World Cup. So this is when the famous singer in Germany was Matthias Chaim, Madame Ish Lib Dish, this whole song. You know, we would always sing it. And David Hasselhoff was God. in Germany would be watching. I worked with the half phone. America's Got Talent for years.

And he kept telling me, I'm the biggest thing in Germany that they've ever had in music. And he wasn't far wrong. He's not lying, by the way. He's not lying. He was probably bigger than Michael Jackson and Germany.

Like, you couldn't, that guy was admired, love, you know, at the highest level. But when you come to the States and that love of baseball cards and you open up the Beckett, baseball Beckett, which shows all the prices for baseball cards,

and you see 1952 tops, Mickey Mantle, $25,000, I say to myself, oh my God, $25,000 so much money. I got a couple dollars to my name. And I said, what if one day I play baseball, major leagues? Didn't happen. What if one day I'd buy a Mickey Mantle card? I did.

But what if one day you become a owner of the Yankees? I mean, that's fantasy dream level. When it happened, we were in Bermuda when we got the phone call from the lawyers. It was an incredible experience. Family was celebrating. It was a great experience. Coming from a very troubled upbringing in the way that you did in terms of what was going on around you, in terms of the environment, both in Iran and of course living in a refugee camp, these are things that can make or break people. I've interviewed many people over the years who've been made or broken by those experiences.

Clearly, demonstrably, in your case, it's made you. How? How have you used that as fuel to make yourself so successful? You know, Pierce, I will tell you, I think the idea of making or breaking is so close on going any direction. Like, if you go back in your life and you think about, what if I would have gone in that car? What if I would have befriended that guy and gone with them on that trip? And we know what happened to them on that trip. What if I go here? What if I, there are so many what ifs, right, that life kind of worked in your favor.

And we like to kind of take credit for everything at the end. Well, if I really did all of it myself. This is why for me, I think there's a, you know, man upstairs who's also got his hands on some of this. Of course, some of it's going to be on your decision as well. One of the best things I ever heard years ago was pray like it's up to God, but work like it's all up to you. That's the part I live by. It's a discipline that, you know, you work and drive the way it's going to be to you. But look, there was moments in my life, like I'll even tell you, my dad, we brought up David Hassel.

I don't think I've ever told the story. We're at Sherman Oaks Burger King. And I'm sitting on 14 years old. My parents got a divorce already, and I only see by that every other week. So when I come and he takes me to Malibu Castle, it's like a golf place and a hitting place, miniature golf. And then we would go to this mall, and then we'd go to this Burger King. He would take me. So I'm sitting there, and all of a sudden, Pierce, you will not believe who's sitting there having lunch with his wife, the one and only legendary Mr. Baywatch, David Hassel.

Here's, I lose my mind because I just get in Germany. He would love hearing this, by the way. God is sitting over there. He's like, who's that? I said, Dad, look who that is. That's David Hasselhoff. That's David Hasselhoff. I'm going to go shake his hand and get an autograph.

Look at my dad. My dad at the time, modest, cashier at a 99-cent store in Englewood next to Greatwood. There is nothing we can brag about. We've never lived in a house. To the Persian people who know cars, we drove a Gianne in Iran. That's like a pinto on stereo. It's absolutely the worst car you can have. We didn't have a lot of money.

And my dad sits me down and he says, you're going to go ask that grown man for his autograph. He needs to come ask you for an autograph. I said, Dad, you're crazy. You're out of your mind. But again, the thing he was shaping in a mindset is act like you belong. Stop thinking the people.

So these subtle little references that a mentor, a father in your life that puts an Indian insecurities of always thinking someone's on attack to hit you or take you or keep you, kill you, that's a very, very advantageous edge in the world of business. You know, if you build your business as if someone's always trying to put you out of business, you're going to be prepared. You're not going to be arrogant, cocky, millionaire. You've got money and not realizing that others want your spot. It's a very competitive climate. So some of it, yes, could have definitely taken me a different direction. But luckily, and with some good counsel

and making the right direction decisions, life kind of ended up working out for me. Did you go over to see Hasselhoffer at that day? I did not. I actually never did. And he ever met him? I've never met him. No, I never did. I've got to introduce you guys, because he's a good friend of mine.

And we got to know each other very well. He also gave me the best advice I think I've ever had, which was he, we were judging America's Got Talent. Some way, Dallas or somewhere. And he said to me, it's just like the 2007, 8, and he said, have you had an invite to the Playboy Mansion, midsummer night's dream party. I said, actually, I have. Yes, I have. Yeah, he said, it's going to be wild, man. We're number one in the ratings. It's going to be crazy. He said, the chicks are going to be all over us. I went, well, hang on, hang on. I said, I'm taking my fiancé. He went, you're doing what? Anyway, another act came out, and we were

judging this act. And I can see him simmering away with incredulity at my decision-making process. And when it came back to another little break, he turned to me, he said, you forgot the golden rule of the Playboy Mansion. You never take sand to the beach. And I saw him but the Playboy Mansion and trust me, he hadn't taken sand to the beach, but it was an insight into the half. He's an extraordinary character. I mean, he's been in two of the biggest TV shows of all time. And then he kind of lost it a bit. Then he bounced back with America's Got Talent. And then there was a moment for him actually is interesting, given how much you clearly revere him. But he, he said to me that he was really struggling with that new stage of his career.

And what advice would give him? I said, you know what? I would embrace 100% being the hoff. Be that guy that people want you to be. Stop worrying about whether you're still the number one TV star. It doesn't matter. Be the hoff. Be this larger and life character.

And he did. He kind of morphed into the hoff. He did the T-shirts. He did the tours. He did the... And he began to really enjoy life again. And it was fascinating to watch him come to terms with the fact that actually that's all people wanted from it. It didn't need anything else.

Just be that guy. Yeah, it's so interesting. You're saying that. There's a couple of experiences I had with people that made me think of that. I interviewed Mike Ditka. I don't know if you know Mike Ditka, Chicago, Bears, one of the greatest of all time. This guy was a badass coach, tough guy, Hall of Fame tight. And one of those guys that if you got into a fight out of bar, you want him to be on your side. You just know he's going to show up and fight. And I asked him a question about how I think ESPN at the time released him for the comments he had made about calling Kaepernick, and he was like very apologetic, apologizing as if he was wrong. And I'm like, man, I don't want to see this guy.

I see you as a bad ass fighter. Be that person, right? Just go be that person that you are. But yeah, I get it. I mean, look, I bet when somebody goes from the limelight where everywhere you go, people know who you are. And then you have a fall, everywhere you go, people know you fell. And give you that look, and it's no longer the same look. it's got to play games with your mind,

but only if that's the pinnacle of life. Obviously, when I saw David Hasselhoff, I was 14 years old at the time. It's a very different case study today in my life at 45 years old. If I see him, I would go back and see who he was. And when I used to review him at 14 years old, even Germany.

But I saw his whole entire story, movies, things that he's done. He's a big part of media. And I'm glad he's back up again. I'm going to definitely connect you guys because you love him. Let's talk about slightly more serious things, because you're in a kind of unique position, I think, to judge where we are in geopolitics, not least, of course, what's going on with Iran and the United States. You've been a citizen of both countries. Where do you think we are right now?

I mean, is it, as some people think and fear, are we nearer to World War III than we've ever been? Or do you think this is all saber-rattling and not likely to lead to anything of great consequence? But by definition, we're already at World War III. By definition, not announcement, but by definition, with the amount of countries that are involved through proxy. If you actually added the countries that are funding the proxy wars, put it all together. I think there has to be the exact number out of changes quite often 22, 23, 24 countries to be considered a world war. We're definitely at a number like that. However, to lower the temperature, we don't want to say that because we don't want people panicking because if they do, the economy takes a hit, et cetera,

I do want to kind of give you some insight about Iran when we think about this direct approach to attacking Iran, right? Nikki Haley, take them out, right? Lindsay Graham, let's take these guys out and these rhinos or these neocons or these liberals that were all anti-war, that now they're pro-war to the point where even a joy read is saying, here's Biden about to go to war again. And she, you know, hot Mike, hey, well, here's another effing war. And then boom, they got to come back and apologize for it. This is what you have to know about Iran. Iran has the second largest military in the Middle East, second to Turkey.

You don't mess with Turkey. You have to also know how to mess with Iran. Iran has 587,000 active soldiers, 200,000 reserve. On top of that, let's not forget, Hamas is theirs, 40,000. Hezbollah, 100,000. Houthis, 150,000 to 250, that's a million people they have that serve for them. their masters of proxy. Aside from that,

everybody's wondering, well, we got to prevent Iran from having any kind of nuclear weapons. Okay, really? Go three days ago to Wall Street Journal and read the article that they said, a billionaire today, if a billionaire wanted to build its own nuclear weapon,

how long would it take him and how much would it cost them? You know what the numbers are? $1 billion and five years. You mean to tell me Iran doesn't have a billion dollars and all the time in their hands to build something? of course they do. So if you tackle them like this, it's not going to work out for them.

At the same time, peers, is we have to keep in mind what worked, what methods worked with Iran. They have number three oil reserves in the world. Number one, I believe, is Venezuela at 24.4%. I think number two, Saudi at 21. Number three is Iran at like 17%. So people have always wanted the oil from Iran until Iran finally under Shah realized, hey, we got a lot of oil here. Let's sign his 25-year contract from 1954 to 1979. You've had Crown Prince Rezal-Palabia on multiple times. And then after 1979, we will renew the contract.

So the way they took out Mossadegh was with the help of MI6 and the help of CIA. The way they took out the Crown Prince Reza al-Sal-Palabi was with the help of MI6 and the help of CIA. You don't attack Iran like this. You can take them out if you want to. For sure, we could do that. But if you do that, you're better off using intelligence to go on the inside because what Iran fears the most is women. They fear their women. Believe it or not, the leaders of Iran at the top, they are so scared of women. It's not even funny.

They are so scared of the youth. It's not even funny. They're so afraid of additional sanctions that we could put on them. It's not even funny. They fear sanctions. They fear women. They fear kids. They fear another revolution taking place.

So if something happens with the sanctions, I think Trump was this close. He was this close of disrupting the economy there to be able to make some changes. But unfortunately, things changed the moment administration changed. But Iran's a different kind of a country to go to war again, not the way we're doing it right now. Excuse me. Does part of you, Patrick, yearn for what Iran used to be? When you look at Iran's reputation now around the world, it sort of brings with it immediate fear to people, distrust, you know, they're all negative feelings that many people have towards Iran.

And yet people don't know who've been there. So it's the most stunningly beautiful country that the people are amazing. When you go back to those very early days when you were there and obviously talking to your family as well, does your heartbreak a bit that it's no longer that country? There's no question about it, of course. I mean, I was born. I could tell you where I lived, what hospital I was born at and what school I went to and what we did when we would go to Parkish Shahan Shahi and they changed the name where we used to go to Bandar Pahlavi, Fort Pahlavi, they changed the name. When we used to go to Karaj, where my dad worked us like the Palm Springs to L.A., there's no question

about it. When they had Kabare Tehran, which is like the club Frank Sinatra and all those guys used to go to, Elizabeth Taylor used to date the ambassador of Iran Zahidi, who just passed away a couple years ago. Iran used to be the rich people used to go to U.S. Europe, but the wealthiest amongst wealthiest used to go to Iran. That's what Iran was in the 70s. And I'd love to see another opportunity for that to be taking place so I can take my kids back there.

I haven't been there since July 15 of 89. But the way they're going about doing it, in order to do that, it's going to take a good four years of disciplined action, not in the direct way. Iran needs to know right off the bat. You don't fear them. Let me just kind of give some history. Carter is the best case study for Biden, by far. Carter is the best case study for Biden,

and Reagan is the best case study for Trump. Those are the two best case studies of matching up against each other. Forget personality, just purely think policies and results, right? So Iran ends up getting 50 U.S. hostages students, and they hold them for how many years? For 444 days, a little over a year and a half, 4144 days, but minutes

after Reagan is being elected, inauguration, they released them. Why? Because Iran respects somebody that tells them, I swear to God, if you do X, Y, Z, we will make your life a living hell. And I'm telling you up front, but I would much rather just have a relationship with you. They like that.

But they used Carter till the last second to squeeze everything they could out of Carter, Just the same with Iran is using every single ounce they can squeeze out of Biden until the last second. They're not going to let up until they see somebody coming in that they fear. And if they don't, they'll keep going for another four years. The U.S. presidential election is, what, nine months away now. And I look at it from across the pond and I go to America a lot. But when I'm sitting here, I sort of have a better sort of outside view of it all.

It does seem quite extraordinary that America, this extraordinary power. of 340 million people with the biggest economy in the world, the biggest military. A lot of the best brains and such a dynamic heartbeat to the place can only come up with Biden and Trump again. Biden, who looks like he can barely string a sentence together or stand his two feet, Trump is facing 91 criminal charges and is also heading into his 80s. How is it that a country like America can get itself? into this kind of position again?

You know, how is it? It's the constitution and the structure that we currently have, and these are the two people that America wants more than anybody else at a time like this. It's capitalism. Anybody else can get in there and compete. If you're born in America, you're above 35 years old, you can go and show the world that I'm the next guy

and I think I can be the president. Guess what? DeSantis went in with $160 million. You know what America said? We like you for Florida, but we don't like you for America. Nick E. really went in and said, Hey, I got Ken Griffin's money.

I got LinkedIn money. I got money from everywhere. Look at the type of smart people that support me. You know, I even got military people that support me. I got Boeing. I got this. Nope, we're not interested. Vivek comes in.

Oh, wow, who is this guy? Very interesting. I like the way this guy talks. Maybe I just don't recognize him enough for 2024. Maybe I'll entertain him for 2020. Can we do a be back with him? Can we put him on a follow-up list in about four years and see what he's going to be doing? Because he's really interesting.

Tim Scott. maybe you're an operations person, maybe a VP, you're not a number one. Asa Hutchinson, not interested. Marianne William, not interested. RFK, wow, very interesting. Let me get the straight. You're a Democrat who don't like the way vaccines were used, and you write a book about Fauci that sells a million copies plus,

and you're supposed to defend what Fauci did, but you don't, and then you leave the Democratic Party to go become an independent. Your family is upset at you, and you have a real thing. history of people targeting your family, your uncle being assassinated, your father being assassinated, you know, all these rich history and then they're not giving you secret service, and you're getting 21, 22, 23 percent. This is a very interesting candidate. You have the worst medical voice.

Some people would have said, this guy's not going to make it. America didn't care if you can't, if you don't have the best voice. They care that you have substance. Look where America was at that they simply wanted a different argument. He's also 69, 70 years old, right? So we don't have a lot of options. Of course, Pierce, there's a section from Republicans and the Dems that wanted a Newsom Desantis matchup.

They wanted DeSantis to climb California against Florida. They wanted that to take place. A lot of people wanted that pay-per-view fight. But Americans on the right simply said, we don't want dissentists. Here's the thing, Patrick. I get the Trump phenomenon. I absolutely get it. I spoke to him the other day.

We have a love-hate thing. We sort of fall out and get back together. And he's like that with almost everyone around him. I see a lot of qualities in Trump, see a lot of negatives. It's pretty obvious what those are now. People know what they're voting for, and he's surging away in the GOP nomination polls, and I'm not surprised.

I get his appeal, because people think he's a kind of wrecker of the status quo. He's someone who could just barrel through normal Washington nonsense and get stuff done. And they think he's got unfinished business. And they think, you know what, before the pandemic, he did a pretty good job with immigration and with the economy in particular.

And on the foreign stage, no one quite knew where they were with him and that kept the peace. So that's kind of where he is, despite all the negatives. I don't get the Biden phenomenon. So I don't think there is one. Biden is a career politician who was at his best maybe 20 years ago. You can see the footage on video of him, you know, when he's a firebrand senator. He's great. He's not that guy anymore.

He's clearly suffering from either senility or dementia and it's getting worse. And the idea he can do four more years, I think is ridiculous. It's for the birds. But for some reason, the Democrats seem trapped, almost paralyzed into this idea that it can only be him. And I don't get that. I get the Trump thing on the right. I just don't get the Biden thing on the left. Let me ask you, peers, you've been around for a while, longer than I have in this world,

media politics. What do you think the DNA of the democratic strategies behind? I'm talking about like the Obama's, the Michelle's, the Pelosi's, the real power players, right? What do you think their DNA is for them to say, you know, well, let's just take a loss here and we'll go focus on 2028. Do you think they're wired that way? Well, I would be astonished if even if they were,

they were prepared to get Trump back into the White House. Perfect. I'm with you. So we're in the same page. So I don't think for a second these guys are sitting around saying, let's just take the L in 2024. It's okay. let's focus on 20. I don't think they're,

I think they're going to fight to the very, very end. And if they lose, then they're going to make the candidate's life a living kill for four years. They're still not giving up, right? That's the wiring of the left

on what they do. Having said that, if that's the case, do you really think they're going to go with Biden? Do you really think that's what they're going to be doing? Do you really think the team

on Obama's camp that's going around kind of underground asking donors, hey, how do you feel about a Michelle Obama candidacy? Do you like a Michelle Obama candidacy?

How about the fact that people in Las Vegas who, Las Vegas is not in a business of losing money, House rules. They always win money, right? Let's look at the odds on how much odds have changed. If you wanted to go bet a year ago, Michelle Obama, I want to say it was 100 to 1. If you bet 100 to 1, Michelle Obama is going to be the president. Yeah, we'll put Michelle Obama there. No way it's going to happen.

You know right now, number one odds of becoming the president in 2024, Vegas, Vegas odds, gambling is Trump. Number two is Biden. You know what number three is 11 to 1? Michelle Obama. Is it really? Why is that? What do they know

that the rest of us don't know about? Is there something going on there? Is there some insiders? You think Vegas is going to give up that kind of money to people? No, they're not going to. And this is a gambling thing.

For some people that are pure politicians, they gamble on who becomes a president. So I think Newsom, their biggest problem isn't going to be Biden. I think their biggest problem is going to be Kamala. Here's why. I'll give it to you in 30 seconds. I think for Biden,

Jill is going to come out and Jill is going to say to follow. his wife, first lady, she's going to say, you know, after months of talking about this, I finally, I couldn't do it. This is how much Joe loves America. I finally was able to convince Joe, Joe, you've done a great job for America. Look at the economy. It's time to spend time with the grandkids. This is what we need to do. And Joe has finally agreed, but it took a lot of effort. America will buy that, right? That spit job will buy. You'll be a hero. But then Kamala, Trump's going to say, look what they did. The same part.

that says, therefore, the black is the most racist party. They asked her to sit in the back of the bus. That's what he's going to do. And the left doesn't know what to do with that. So the only way they can counterbalance that is with Obama. So if they have a nuisance Michelle, that's going to be a formidable opponent if they go against Trump and who he chooses as VP. I think they're going to make that announcement at the DNC and then run from there.

Fascinating. Fascinating. You might well be right. I just can't imagine they're going to let Biden, if it's Trump, in particular, have another go, because I think he'd get a flatline. Immigration is a massive story, not just in America, but in the UK, and in fact, all around Europe and many other countries. And it's pretty obvious why is that you've got millions and millions of people seeking a better

life, and they see a way to do that, and social media has shown them how this can work. And so they're taking their chance, and they're rocking up in huge numbers now on the southern border in the United States and on the seafront in the UK. You've been an immigrant. You know, you owe a lot to the United States, obviously, and indeed to Germany when you were a refugee there. What's the answer to this? Because, you know, in the UK, for example, it's projected at the current rate of legal immigration, we could have a population spiked to about 73 million by 2036, which would be simply untenable for the pressure it would put on all the public services, schools and hospitals and so on, and roads and so on. What's the answer here?

So number one, the answer, basic answer is we've got to protect the border, and we're not doing it today. Eight and a half million people have already come in during Biden's administration. It's estimated that it could even be up to 15 million. We're just given the low number of eight and a half million. They're saying it'll be at 12.09 million by the end of his administration. that's shocking. First time, Pierce, in the history of America in the month of December, that more illegal immigrants came into America than actual kids being born in America in a month of December. First time ever in the history of America where this was taking place. And while you're watching all this stuff, here's what's so interesting. Are you following the border

bill that they just proposed this week where everybody's talking about it? Okay. So it's $118 billion, right? A hundred and eighteen billion dollar border bill is what they're calling it. Imagine if I came to you and I said, Pierce, you say, all right, let's build this house and I want this, you know, house to do this and I want to build a tennis court and I want to build this. No problem. $3.8 million. And you're like, okay, cool. What question you're going to ask? Where's that $3.8 million going into? I give you all this stuff and I say, $400,000 is going into the house, but $3.4 million is going into cars, it's going into motorcycles. You're going to be like, wait, wait, what does that have to do with my house? Well, no, it's part of the bill.

We're going to fix your house, right? $118 billion, they're calling it a border bill, of which only $20 billion is being used for the border. $60 billion is going to Ukraine. Why is $60 billion of $118 billion bill going to Ukraine, and you're worried about American border you claim? I've got a solution for the Democrats. I guarantee you they will not do it.

Here's a solution for Democrats. If they're watching, Democrats, if you want to beat Trump, Why don't you do the following? Take the $118 billion, put it all on the border, shut down the border for the rest of the year in 2024. We don't want anybody coming in here until we figured this thing out. Send a national guard there. Don't send a penny to Ukraine. Don't send a penny to anybody else.

Build a wall, protect the southern border. And 2024, you will win the election. But you know what the key is? You won't do it because you want to send that $60 billion to Ukraine. Okay, so let me just pick you up on that. So I don't necessarily disagree with part of that, which is your plan for the southern border. Something dramatic has to be done. It is completely open at the moment.

It's an insane situation. And the amount of fentanyl coming in, never mind anything else, killing nearly 100,000 Americans now a year, is completely out of control. So that has to be dealt with. On Ukraine, I've been struck by how many Americans share that view that you should just stop giving money to Ukraine because America was always about stopping Russian dictators from having their cake and eat it. And whichever way you look at the history of Ukraine and Russia and everything else, you can't get away in my eyes from the fact that Vladimir Putin, one of the worst dictators in the world, has always harbored a desire to undo as he saw the damage of the breakup of

the Soviet Union, always saw Ukraine as basically still his and Russia. and he's just launched an illegal invasion. He's killed a huge amount of people, and he wants to keep the land he's taken. And I don't think he should be allowed to. I don't think it's in anybody's interest, Americas, Europe's, the UK's, or anybody's, that Vladimir Putin gets a big win

and gets to invade a country, which was declared a democracy many years ago, and just helps himself. And I'm surprised that people like you you with your background would allow that to happen almost by default. I agree with you about the southern border thing. But why would you be happy almost by default for Putin to win? This is not about being happy. This is about when I have problems in my own country and I'm not solving it and peers respectfully, you don't live here. When you go into the streets and you've been to

New York because I have a home in Los Angeles. I do live there a lot of the time. Okay, when you go, if it's in LA, homelessness, 46 out of 10,000. What are we talking about? The crime of who's coming up? There's people that are coming up that are former terrorists in camera, telling the people, you have no clue who I am, you should know who I am, because you'll see what I'm going to do to you.

And then you got Chinese people, 28,000, 60 minutes. I don't know if you saw it or not showing how they're coming through the border. We got a lot of problems in America right now. If we want to help Zelensky out a little bit at the beginning to see what's going to happen there, I get it. Six months, maybe. Twelve months, maybe. He's going to come every year asking money.

How long are we going to go with this? Look, look at it. It took six years to defeat Adolf Hitler and the Nazis in World War II. After he invaded Poland and then carried on invading countries until he was stopped. I mean, I just don't think Putin is going to stop at Ukraine. I think if he smells weakness, he'll just carry on. I don't think there's any doubt about that. And I'm just surprised why you would feel happy is not the right phrase,

But you would accept that as a consequence of taking all the money that America, because without American money, Ukraine loses, that if you take that money and just give it all to the southern border issue in the United States, then Putin wins. And I think that causes a bigger problem going forward for the West than anything going on the border. And I don't understand also why you can't do both. You know, it's a bit like the argument in the pandemic. Well, why did we shut down all the other hands?

health issues, heart disease, cancer and so on. Why were they shoved to one side to deal with COVID? I agree. Why couldn't you have done both? I mean, that's the whole point of defending your country, defending your people, is that you don't let everyone just die of heart disease and other things because you're concentrating on a novel coronavirus. So I don't understand why you can't sort the southern border, but also help Ukraine to prevail against a murderous, invading Russian dictator. because the consequences, I think, for the world, if Putin wins, could be catastrophic. Why doesn't NATO do it? Why don't more European countries pay more money into it?

Because it's not a NATO country. I mean, I think Trump was absolutely right that NATO countries have to pay their way. They've all got to pay their percentage, which they weren't doing until Trump rattled their cage. Wait a minute. You said, it's not a national country. But whose border do they affect more, ours or Europeans? Well, and are we going to be in the business? I agree.

I agree. But you could take the same argument about World War II. when America finally got attacked at Pearl Harbor, that was the trigger to get involved and effectively defeat the Nazis. But at some stage, that was going to have to happen, right? I mean, at some stage, you couldn't let Adolf Hitler take over the whole of Europe.

America couldn't allow that to happen, could it? I don't think anybody disagrees with that. But then look at the contradiction there with how they're treating the different war in U.S. when it comes on to Israel and then the way they're treating, Ukraine against Russia. By the way, of all this money that we're given to them, did you see the story the other day that five of the military leaders in Ukraine of the money that were given to them,

$50 million dollars went to their pockets? Where is this money going to anyways? No, I'm sure. Listen, I'm sure, I don't doubt for a moment that it's been riddled with corruption, as many countries are. I just think the principle of allowing Putin to win is something I find unconscionable. I just think we would regret that enormously. I think we would regret that I'm going to that. I don't think that's what it is, though. I don't want to, I'm speaking on my behalf. Not everybody else.

I'm giving you my position. Some are going to agree, some are going to disagree. That's going to be their position. But I will tell you this. When you go to a country like Ukraine, who's got a lot of great natural resources. I've been there. I went to Kiev and interviewed Zelensky.

Totally get it. And we give all this money to them. And then all of a sudden on the back end, Black Rock, I believe, Vanguard State Street, they got a $400 billion project to rebuild Ukraine? You've read that story before. What is that all about?

That's a pretty nice project to get to build Ukraine back up. And I'm sure you remember a man named who wrote the book, what is his name? The guy who goes out there negotiating on behalf of the country

and economic hitman, Perkins, economic hitman, he wrote this book. That was his job. He would simply go to world leaders and he would sit there and say, hey, you're going to take this money from us.

We're going to come build it here. If you don't, going to take you out, but we're going to destroy your economy. We've got a lot of stuff on you. This certainly feels like an economic hitman type of an opportunity where one of these big companies like a, you know, State Street, Vanguard, BlackRock, you get a 400 billion dollar contract. That's a beautiful opportunity. So one has to be skeptical to say, I don't really know what's going on. I don't know why we're sending our money over there. I'm just not comfortable with it at this point. Let's pivot to something a little less contentious. And that is you've got

this fantastic room at your home, a thinking room, you've called it, was a massive painting of you surrounded by great figures from history, Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, Ayrton Center, of course, Tupac Chacore, and others. And I presume you go in there and you think and you're inspired by these people. That's the point of it, is it? Yes, I call it the dead mentors. And, you know, it's in a vault, you know, where they're debating two books.

This painting is about two books that are debating. If you see on the desk, there is a communist manifesto, and you'll see Atlas Shrug, but I and ran. And you know, you got MLK, you got Tupac, you got, you know, Iyretton Sena. You also have Milton Friedman economists there. And, you know, I like debate. I like discussion. I like, I actually love what we just did the last seven minutes.

I enjoyed it. I think that's how we get to the bottom of it. I think we need more of it. So for me, anytime I want to kind of go and see what feedback in council that would give me, especially areas that I have blind spots, I go sit down in that room, do something, do some reading. It definitely helps me out. I mean, the reading part is very interesting to me

because with your kids, you have this strict rule. If they want to get a Lego set, they have to read 40 books, and you keep account of that. I mean, I love that because I think that reading, particularly for young people with very short attention spans now because of smartphones and so on, they've lost that ability to just sit and read and consume books. My wife's a massive consumer of books.

She loves literary stuff. And as a result, our daughter does the same. She just reads books all the time. And I love seeing her do that, because I think the best way to avoid mistakes, actually, is to read. Just read, read, read, read, read, and learn about life and history

and the way things have been done right and wrong. And you can evolve your brain. But if you don't read as a cornerstone of a democratic society, I think you're in real trouble. And by the way, I think it's also the great equalizer, meaning you don't have to be a millionaire to read books. You don't have to be a billionaire to read books.

You don't have to have a special last name to read books. You don't have to be a Vanderbilt, not a Kennedy, not a Clinton, not a Trump, not a Jordan to read books. Books are not that expensive to go nowadays. They're easy to find. You can pick them up, at least most places in the world, they're easy to find. And the more you read them, then all of a sudden your eyes open up.

I remember one time my dad, we had this uncle, his name is Albert, and he would come to our house and he always liked to watch Kings of Comedy and he loved Bernie Mac. Albert's Assyrian. He's in his mid to late 60s at the time and he doesn't speak a word of English. But he would sit there watch Bernie Mac

with Kings of Comedy and he would laugh. You would not believe how loud he would laugh. And I would say, Uncle Albert, did you understand what he just said? Nothing. But he's so funny to me. And my dad, it's this special moment in my dad and I's relationship.

He says, look at Albert. He says, you will never meet a happy. than Albert, never reads a book, never follows the story, never knows what's going on with the news, but he's the happiest person I know. He says, be very careful reading these books, because once you know and get closer to the truth, you will never have that kind of happy simpleton happiness ever again. And there's a lot of truth behind it because reading kind of also messes with your head. It gives you a lot of freedom. You can't be controlled, but at the same time, you also think in a different way than the average person does, depending on what you read at least.

What do you do about smartphones with your kids? Do you let them have phones? Nope. None of my kids have a smartphone at all. They can only play iPads on the weekend, Saturday and Sundays. And they get two hours after they finish reading their books is when they can play. And then everything else is with us. Everything is controlled at this age.

My oldest just turned 12 this last weekend. I have a 12, 10, 7 and a 2-year-old obviously is too young. But no, we don't give them iPhones. none of my kids have a phone. The only thing my oldest has is a phone, what is watch phone, that is only calling us and text. That's it.

So it's protected. I think that is really important. And I think it's the exposure, the open exposure to social media in particular, whether it's Instagram with all the issues around that, whether it's X with all the contentiousness that lurks on there. I think it's allowing kids to have their brains

just bombarded, with negative dopamine 24-7. Never used to happen when we were young, right? I mean, you weren't able to have that experience. I remember talking to Dr. Phil about this, and he said, you know, when you were young, if a crocodile in Florida attacks someone on a golf course and ate them, it's very unlikely you would know about that

if you didn't hear about it first and in that area. Now you'd be a kid in India or Australia or the UK and you'd be seeing a video of this person being eaten by the crocodile within half an hour. taken on someone's phone. And you're getting that imagery all day long, along with horrible imagery from Gaza, from Ukraine and so on. The war stuff alone on social media, I find it fries my brain, and I'm 58 and thought I've seen it all. God knows what it does to kids. I totally agree. And by the way, the tough part is with us having the discipline is when they go to

school, sometimes other people and their friends have a lower standard than you do. So not only do you have to be careful with the standards you follow, but you also have to be asking the parents who maybe are taking your kids to their place, maybe they're hanging out together, hey, what are your standards when it comes onto iPad and video games and ask them? Because, look, I was a kid, you were a kid.

We're eventually going to do some dumb stuff and we're going to get access to whatever we want to get access to. The only difference is we didn't have access to the stuff these guys got access to today, okay? Horn is way too available for kids, and they're seeing it at a much younger age, I saw a stat the other day that an average 23-year-old woman in America has been with more men than the average 53-year-old woman in America. Wow.

What a weird stat right there. The average 23 to 53. What? How is that even possible? Because of what they have access to with the different apps and Internet, it's a different game. We have to be more protective than ever before with our kids. The other big issue is this whole issue, the culture war issue, the woke phenomenon, which I think has been. an appalling one in many ways and completely alien and antithetical to what it was supposed to be originally in the 60s,

when woke meant being aware of social or racial and justice, it's now become a new form of fascism. And you're seeing that manifest itself now in our universities, both here and we've seen in the United States. It's been absolutely appalling to witness that kids are entering academic centers, which are basically now run by left-wing fascists. who are behaving in exactly the same way that they always profess to hate most. Yeah, the left has a monopoly on kids' mind today, 13 to 1. In colleges, they're 13 Democrat, left professors to one conservative right. That's a monopoly at the highest level. It's madness.

Absolute madness, because that's not debate. Pierce, when the Hillary Clinton-Trump debate, the big one, took place, the one that you'd be in jail. You know which one I'm talking about. I'm at Harvard campus in the Chow Hall where you have dinner. This is when I was taking an executive education course for three weeks there. And I'm there with professors and some of the folks, students that are in there. There's 300 students and professors in this room watching the debate.

All I looked, I sat on the sideline, didn't celebrate or say anything because I just wanted to know what the hell is going out to Harvard. You know, when you're in Iran, you think Harvard like Oxford, you think like the greatest university. The absolute pillar of academic excellence. Absolutely. There's not like there's nothing about those. And you would imagine the home of free speech, right? Somewhere where they would hear all voices, they would all be heard, all given a fair hearing. And students would be trusted with their big brains.

You've got to be smart to be there to make up their own minds after hearing everything. And it's so furthest thing from what you just said right there. Because 300 people, I said, didn't say a word. Every one of them, not 299, not 298, 300 out of 300 celebrated everything Hillary Clinton said and booed everything Trump's. Completely ridiculous. Next day, I went to the professor. I said, this is what you guys call this? And I'm a pretty vocal guy.

It's brainwashing, isn't it? Yeah, I'm brainwashing. I want debate. I want discourse. I want exchange. I want, let's argue. Let's sit down. Let's be respectful.

Look what you did during Israel. and October 7 attack, what did you do? Basim Yosef. You brought everybody on, hey, go. You know, go at it. Go talk. What's your view? What's this?

What's that? And yes, we were drawn. I think, I would say the number one, I don't think anyone contributed to this discussion worldwide more than you did, positively. I think you were number one. More than anybody else you can go watch. You were number one because we would sit down.

We're like, whose peers going to have today? Oh, shoot, this is good. Oh, wow. That's a good point. Man, he's got a good point. The lemme go research. Is that really what... This is more Harvard than Harvard once used to be.

Yes, this is what Harvard should be. It should be the fulcrum for that kind of passionate debate on all sides and then allow students, allow them the freedom and the time to make their own minds up. I mean, I see, you know, I think that I talk a lot on this show also about things like the gender wars, and in particular, the kind of invasion of women's sport by the trans lobby. And when you see a six-foot-four-inch biological male destroying biological females, women, in a swimming pool or on a athletics track or whatever it may be, you just think, how on earth have we got to this place? And how, I just think in 20 years' time, we'll look back on this time in history, think, what the hell were you all thinking? And why were you allowing this to happen?

So, Pierce, this last weekend, my son turned 12 years old. We took him to Universal Studios, where he wanted to go. And we go in there and we go to this place where it's Mardi Gras next to their biggest ride that they have rock and roll, whatever. It's a great great ride. And I see 50, you know, members of the LGBTQ community dressed as trans men dressed as trans, shown off their chest as if it's boobs. And they're coming and talking to our kids. And they're like, hi, how are you? What's your name?

Being overly friendly. I'm like, wait a minute. What the hell is this all about, right? at Universal Studios. So my son, 10-year-old son, says, Dad, you know, those guys, you see, they're part of the LGBTQ community. I said, yeah, what do you think about it?

Look at what he says to me, because this guy's reading books and they kind of study different things for themselves. He says, well, you know, he probably didn't have a good father figure because he didn't have a father figure in his life. So watch the stats here, peers, for us to be thinking about.

Fatherless homes, okay, worldwide. Worldwide, average is 7%. 7%. China is 3%. India is 4%. Kids being raised without a father. That's the number. You know what it is in U.S.?

23, 24%. How does that mean any sense? We have the highest number in the world. And this happened back in the 60s when LBJ came out with his program that he initiated in the 60s. It used to only be 4% of kids were born to a single mother that's how it was back in the day, only 4% to 60s.

Now today's 40%. The statistic, you need a father in your house to discipline the boys, discipline the kids, and a father would back on. I see videos nowadays for the father to say, my son was 2 years old, 3 years old, told me he's a girl. And as a father, I felt it was the responsible thing to do. And I'm going to do what are we taught? You belong in jail for doing something like that to take that away,

that innocence away from the kids. So the same people that think, you know, we should be 21 years old to drink, we should be 18 years old to smoke, we should be 18 years old to vote, we should be 18 years old to join a military. Believe an 11-year-old can go through a transition sexually? Where is the logic behind it? I think it's actually a form of child abuse. I've said this. I think it's outrageous to even think about this before they're at an age where they can make a more mature decision about what is going to be an extraordinary thing in their lives. and often unchangeable.

It's like you say, you can't let them have a drink, but they're going to change, effectively try and mutilate themselves at the age of 10, 11? It's absolutely insane to me. I want to talk about you. You had a very, I thought, very washable, quite contentious time with Bill Maher, who I love, on his podcast.

I've done that podcast in his little club, which is a little den, where I got pretty drunk on tequila, I must be said, and couldn't remember half of what I'd said. I liked your combat with it because it was very watchable. I know you felt a little bit less comfortable with it afterwards, but there was a big flashpoint where you were talking about the fact that Bill doesn't really like kids, doesn't want kids, and you're completely the opposite.

You would have, as you say, you'd have 20 if you could. On reflection, when you look back at that debate, what do you feel about it? You know, for me, it's my first time, so I didn't know he was going to smoke, you know, two joints and have the tequila and all this stuff. You know, it's more entertainment. And I actually think it's more about him talking, like, in a weird, strange way, one of the guys commented says, this is how Bill does his therapy session, but the guest doesn't know it. And I think it's an element.

It might be true to that. Yeah, I felt the similar when I did it with him. I think it's therapeutic because I felt like I was, within 10 minutes, I'm like, he's not interviewing me. I'm interviewing him. And if you watch a podcast, he spoke for 90% at the time. I spoke for 10% of time. I'd be curious to know how different it would be if there's no alcohol and weed involved

on where that conversation would go. But definitely, I mean, he's not a guy. Well, you'd have a conversation a bit like he does on real-time his show, which I do a lot. And I love that show. It's nothing like his podcast. But his podcast has a unique field to it. Totally.

I kind of enjoyed the experience. Totally. Listen, first of all, you saw the house is a beautiful house. That property, five, eight, it's a sick of a property that he's got. No, I mean, look, Bill is. like I said to him, and I'll still say it right now,

he's one of the most necessary voices we had during COVID because he called out his side a lot on a lot of different issues. And he does a lot on the woke stuff too. He thinks a woke left's completely ridiculous. Constantly in the state he lives in. But obviously we're on complete different stages on kids, on God, on family, on Newsom, on Biden, on a lot of different issues. We're not on the same side.

Let me ask you, Patrick. I mean, you've made a huge amount of money. You've had no money at other stages in your life. Does money, it's the old question, isn't it? But does money buy you happiness, or does it buy you security? And does that in itself bring a degree of happiness? Money buys you freedom, bigger megaphone. Money buys you and makes the pillow softer.

Money buys you boldness. Money buys you the ability to not give a flying, you know what, when people want to bully you. money buys you a lot of different things. And to me, those things are very, very important. I want to make a better argument later on with my family, once we have kids, for them to want to come spend Christmas with us.

And to do that, there's certain things since I was 23, 24 years old. I wrote out what I want my life to look like when I'm a grandfather. I want those guys to want to come and see daddy and their grandpa. Money buys a lot of those things. Now, does money buy permanent happiness? absolutely not. Am I solving? Should man solve for permanent happiness? Absolutely not. There's a difference

between fulfillment, a fight you're fighting for, a cause you're going after, correcting and injustice. If a person that's doing something like that, they're not happy most of the time. Matter of fact, the best leaders I've met in my life are the most frustrated, dissatisfied people who hate the position they're in or the fact that people are being bullied and taking advantage of that they use the frustration and the boldness to do something big. That's not because of happiness. So happiness is being sold so much as what we should strive for, but I think it's a lot of short-term highs what it is.

You should be striving for being fulfilled and being a leader amongst leaders, and that takes a lot of work. It absolutely does. Patrick, it's been an absolute pleasure. I've wanted to interview for a long time. We haven't been able to get together before, either in L.A. or here.

Finally done it. I hope to see you next time I'm in L.A. And continue. It's an important discussion. I loved having a debate with you about your. Ukraine, we don't scream at each other, and we can agree to disagree. That is actually the bedrock of a democracy. It's what a society, a good, strong society should be able to do. It's what we've lost so much of, I think, in the modern world. We've got to get back to it.

So Patrick, David, thank you. I appreciate it. Anytime, thank you. And thank you for the work you've been doing, because your voice is also very necessary. I appreciate that very much. Thank you.