The Ben Mulroney Show - The wild socialist politics of NYC's next mayor/Saudi comedy is no joke!

Episode Date: October 1, 2025

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Don't worry about it. It's payday. Payday, huh? I bet you it went straight into your bank account and you didn't even check your pay stuff. My what? Your pay stuff. Back in my day, you had to wait for a physical check. Then you had to go to the bank.

Deposit it and wait for it to clear. Your pay really meant something. Payroll was incredibly complex. It's art and the science. It literally keeps the economy moving. Parole professionals do a lot for us. You know, it's about time we do something for them. How about we ask our leaders to name a day in their honor,

a national day to recognize payroll professionals? I got it. This is perfect. Why don't we explain to people just how important the roles are the payroll professionals play in our lives? We can even ask them to sign a petition. We can even ask them to sign a petition to recognize the third Tuesday in September as the National Day to recognize payroll professionals. We'll rally support and bring the payroll party to the next day

The payroll party to the nation. A national payroll party? Precisely. Sounds like a plan. You know, just one thing. What's that? I'm choosing the music. What?

And I'm sitting in the backseat. The whole way? The whole way. Welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. It's Wednesday, October 1st. We've made it to the middle of the week. And it's all down. downhill from here, isn't it? Well, it's downhill for New York, I think. Look, it's shaping up like

Zoran Mobdani, the Democratic Socialist, who won the Democratic primary to represent the Democrats in that election. Looks like he's going to win. I mean, the numbers, if if that election is anything like the election that they had in the city of Toronto that saw Olivia Chow win because she had four people on the right lined up against her splitting the vote, that looks like what's going to happen in New York. He's the only person of significance that I know of on the left. And on the right, you've got Cuomo, you got Adams, and you've got the Republican. All three of them are fighting for the same votes. And he's got a clear path to scoop up everyone to their left. And I cannot see a scenario where he's not the heavy favorite right now. Now, I do this show from Toronto.

I have been living in Olivia Chow's Toronto for quite some time. And I'm here to tell you, New York, that no matter what the candidate tells you, you're in for a hell of a ride. You're in for a hell of a ride. Now, Mom Dani has been saying some, I think, increasingly concerning things. One thing he did not say is that he wants to empty the jails. People are saying he said he wants to empty the jails. That's not what he said.

However, he has been arguing for faster trials, bail reform, and alternatives to incarceration, programs that help people get support instead of just going to jail to reduce the number of people being held pre-trial. We've heard that before. Really? When did we hear that? Was that maybe 2019? Yeah, that's 2019. That's the Liberal Party under Justin Trudeau. Bill C-75. We're living that in Canada.

And that's word for word pretty much. for word. Let's listen to Zoran Mamdani in his own words. Oftentimes we've been found as legislators when we go into these courts, the term violent crime is even used when people are stealing packages. Violent crime is even used when people are accused of burglary

and there happens to be a housing unit in that same dwelling. So violence is an artificial construction. We have to be very clear that what is happening here with these district attorneys. That is violence. That is violence of the highest degree. Okay. Let's

just break that down for a second. He's minimizing, minimizing burglary because that person who is entering somebody's domicile, entering their property, because there might be an empty room in there. You think they're going to, they're breaking in to take a nap, Zoron? They're breaking in because they want to, they want to have a little shut eye. And so that's not violence. That's not violence. but the district attorneys

who prosecute the offenders according to law and order that's violence to the highest degree those are your words this is I thought we had gotten off of the roller coaster of taking words and twisting them to mean something

completely opposite of what they are you know silence is violence which is nonsense what you just said sir is nonsense it is nonsense and the fact that you have useful idiots applauding like train seals is freaking frightening. It's frightening. So here are a couple of other things that Zoran Mamdani, likely the next mayor of New York

City, has said. So he no longer supports defund the police, as he says, at least not in the strictest sense. He once used the language of defunding and harsh criticism of the NYPD. He said that they were racist, anti-queer, and a major threat. Now, he said that he said that in 2020. And given the fact that he's, what, 12 years old, that is a, that you could say that is a lifetime away from who he is today. In his campaign for mayor, he's walked back from that saying he would maintain NYPD staffing levels, work with the police, not dismantle, but shift responsibilities. I think that you could get a lot of buy-in for the idea that the police are not the right tool for every interaction with the public. However, you have to recognize that

Most interactions start with the police. You don't, in a lot of cases, even the fire department can't go into a place if the police aren't there first. In a lot of cases, a social worker cannot do their work unless they are accompanied by the police. The police are central to almost every interaction. They might not be the lead, but they are central.

And to suggest that you're going to minimize them and there are certain places where others are going to be the leaders. Yes, leaders, but not alone. ever alone, almost ever alone. He wants to eliminate or scale back what they call the strategic response group. That's the NYPD unit used for protest, crowd control, and citing issues of accountability. Okay, yeah, that's what you definitely need. You need less police when it comes to riots and large gatherings of protesters.

Yeah, you certainly don't want the police there to make sure that nothing happens or people don't get out of control. Because no one ever breaks the law during a protest. By definition, a protest happens. It's a parade without a license. By definition, it's already breaking the law, which we as a society have deemed acceptable. But if they're going to do that, is it possible that somebody in that crowd is going to, I don't know, assault somebody, break a window, but you want to scale back the police presence there? Okay, that tells you everything you need to know.

Oh, yes. Imam Dani, I apologize. Not 12 years old, 33. In the latest polling, this is, okay, so I was right about this. He's, he's polling at 46%. Forty-six percent. Cuomo's at 24. Sliwa, the founder of the Angels, the, what are they called?

So he's the Republican nominee. The Red Barre guys. Yeah, he's polling at 15%. And Eric Adams, the current mayor, is sitting at 9%. In a hypothetical one-on-one, Mamdani leads Cuomo 48 to 44. That's a fight. That's a fair fight.

But the fact that these other guys are in it is not a good... I mean, this is... It's going to be a cakewalk. But just look at that, though, the polling, though. So, Mandani has got 46% when he's against all these other guys. But when you take two of them out, he only gains an extra 2%. Yeah.

Yeah. So it just shows that every vote that is... that's being placed is either for him or for anybody else. Anybody else, exactly. So, look, he's been asked to apologize for the remarks he made in 2020, and he won't do it. Let's listen. Will you apologize? Because you said you will apologize to the police department.

Will you apologize? Will there be a formal apology? These are the conversations I'm having with officers themselves. So it's not a formal apology. It's like one-on-one if you see somebody on the street. It's in the conversations with the officers. And I think that too often what we have in our politics is the performance of that, speaking to a camera, telling journalists when really it's about the people that you're actually working with.

Okay. I mean, come on, man. I don't like being talked to like I'm an idiot. You are a product of, you're a 33-year-old man. You do everything for the cameras. Don't tell me you can't apologize on camera and also go speak to these cops. You do not want to be on record apologizing for comments that you made because you just, don't want to do it. And this word salad nonsense is should be insulting to people, but you're pulling at 46 percent. So you clearly know something I don't know. This is a, this is a guy who claims, you know, he claims a heritage that isn't his. He claims to be poor. He's not poor. His mom's a millionaire. His mom's a filmmaker. He has said and done some, said some

terrible things, terrible, horrible things. And he's not, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, Listen, he's got the, does he have the courage of his convictions? I don't think so. I think he's trying to split hairs. I think he's trying to thread a needle. I think he's trying to position himself as having evolved on certain issues without actually having to own the things he said in the past. I disagree.

I think he's got his convictions and his convictions are fairly rooted in extreme socialist policies. And whether or not you agree with him or not, it's up to anybody to agree. But yeah, if you look at some of his policies and what he, wants to bring to New York City. Yeah. A lot of people would suggest that, I mean, it's extreme based on where they are at now. Well, exactly.

But look, you've got him on the left and on the right, you've got somebody who others would argue is as polarizing. Let's listen to a little bit of Donald Trump for the sake of fairness. Just to be careful, because we can't let people throw around

that word. I call it the N-word. There are two N-words, and you can't use either of them. You can't use either of them. And frankly, if it does get to use, we have more than anybody else.

Yeah, the other N-word, by the way, he was talking about was nuclear, nuclear. But it's like you listen to that, you go, you have more than anybody else. What are you talking about? Oh, yeah. You know, that nuclear subs. He's not talking about the other N-word.

Yeah, that's terrible. Yeah, exactly. The guy doesn't. Yes. Yes. Yes. We've got more than enough. Oh, my God. I didn't even go there. Oh, no.

Isn't that bad? Oh, that is terrible. Okay. When comedy meets the restricted rules of Saudi Arabia, that's next. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show. Some of you know that one of my very first jobs was working at the Just for Lafts Comedy Festival in Montreal. I did it for three straight summers. I always loved stand-up comics and to work in close proximity to the best of the best for three summers.

It was a dream job. and my love affair with sort of the talent that they have, but also how valuable they are to public discourse has never ended. I find the best make it look so easy and the best find a way to talk about things that are so difficult to talk about. And not only do they talk about them, but they make us laugh about them.

And if you can activate that part of your brain, then you might be able to think about those things from a different perspective. And so what is being now billed as the biggest, Comedy Festival in the world is taking place on the other side of the world in Saudi Arabia, the Riyadh comedy festival. One of the most repressive regimes in the world is hosting some of these comics I was just referencing, who have been, who have made it their stock and trade, who have made it their bread and butter to get up on stage and comment in biting ways over issues in Canada in the United States in Europe. and they're going to a place that deserves criticism

where they are not allowed to criticize however they are being paid handsomely to bite their tongues and then they want to come home and I guess go right back to what they were doing before. I don't know if that's possible. So we're joined now by Mark Breslin,

the founder of Yuck Yuck Yuck, someone who knows even more about this stuff than I. Mark, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for joining us. Thank you, Ben. Thanks a lot. So, you know, to me, I view this as a problem. And I know that there are divisions within this tight-knit community of stand-ups over. Do you go over there and take the money?

And it is a lot of money. We'll talk about that. But do you go over there, take the money and come home and go right back to work? Like, how do you see this? Well, Ben, who wouldn't want to go to Saudi Arabia and party like it's 1399? You know, it's the most bizarre thing. You couldn't write this, that that kind of a regime would want to have a festival made up, as you've said, of people whose whole lives are about making fun and poking fun and

exposing hypocrisies in regimes. Yeah. It makes no sense at all. Why didn't they just do a music festival? Yeah. Well, yeah. But to me, this sort of diminishes any criticism that they will make when they come home. Like a guy like Andrew Schultz, by the way, you know, he's been, you know, I don't look to

him for knowledge or, or, but I do look to him for his perspective, right? And sometimes he says stuff, whether he's for something that Donald Trump does or against, whether he's attacking the left. Well, here he's going to a place where stoning people is legal, where women are second-class citizens. And he's taking what I'm sure is hundreds of thousands of dollars. For reference, I think the lowest paycheck is in the 300,000 U.S. And the highest is over a million dollars for one set, for one set.

Well, let me ask you this, then. what if the people in Riyadh had done their research and decided, hey, this guy, Mark Brezlin has run all these comedy festivals. Why don't we hire him to do that? And they call me and they offer me a million dollars. What do I do? What do you do? Well, there aren't a lot of people who can't use a million dollars. But can I tell you who doesn't need a million dollars? Yeah. Russell Peters, Dave Chappelle, Louis C.K., all of these people are fabulously wealthy. great irony here. These guys are not, they're not living hand to mouth. I would understand it. Hand to mouth. If the, if the, if the economies, uh, if the economy was tough on these standups,

but they have risen to the top of their profession. If they wanted to, they could sell it. I mean, I mean, look, if Bill Burr came to you and said, hey, I want, I want to work out of yuck, yucks for a week, I get, I guarantee you, he could sell out that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, seven days in a row. Yeah, well, we did that with Louis C.K. In the height of all of his troubles, and it sold out in four minutes. Right. Yeah.

So these guys, these guys don't have that issue. Now, what do you think happens, Mark? Let's say they go there. They do their set, and then they want to come home and tell all the jokes that they couldn't tell there. Do you think that this, that what the simple act of going there is going to stick to them? Do you think any of them are going to have a tough time shedding this from their reputation? No, actually, I don't.

I think on a retail level, it's not going to make any difference about people buying tickets to seeing their shows. What I do think will happen is that there's going to be a kind of rift in the comedy community, and they'll have problems working with each other and people who did turn it down. It'll still be controversial. But on a retail level, I think if Bill Burr goes out and goes on tour, I think he'll still sell out. Yeah, yeah, well, let's, you know, the rifts are already there. Let's listen to Mark Marin, who's, you know, he has the courage of his convictions.

Let's hear what he had to say about this. I mean, how do you even promote that? You know, like, from the folks that brought you in 9-11, two weeks of laughter in the desert, don't miss it. I mean, the same guy that's going to pay them is the same guy that paid that guy to Bonsaw Jamal Khashoggi and put him in a full. suitcase. But don't let that stop the yucks. It's going to be a good time. Yeah, well, let's not forget. That's an important point. We are coming up on the seventh anniversary of the death and

dismemberment of a journalist on American soil by agents of Saudi Arabia. That happened. We know that happened. And now these people are going there. Some of these people have been very vocal in their attacks on Donald Trump for what they feel is his wannabe police state and and creating a fear in the media and in the press corps. Here is a regime that killed a journalist, and they are going there, giving that regime cover. You know, we talk about whitewashing and greenwashing, and that's what they're doing here.

They are making it permissible to laugh in and about and around Saudi Arabia. Okay, this is true. But you know, there aren't very many countries around the world that don't have some human rights. issues. It just happens that Saudi Arabia is pretty much the worst. It's pretty much the worst. But let's take a look for a moment if we can at who they actually hired. I looked at the list is about 50 people. I would say about 30 of them are really well-known, like, millionaire-level comics. Only three women. Yeah, yeah, I noticed that too. Now, here's something interesting.

Maybe I'm being paranoid, but I know these three women, and they all perform in pantsuits. Yeah, the comics that they didn't hire, the women comics are all comics who perform in short skirts. Yeah, yeah, of course. So I think that had something to do with the way they chose those few women. Of course, yeah, Whitney Cummings. Whitney Cummings would not be performing, would not have gotten the invite, I don't think. If she performed in a short skirt? Yeah.

No, she wouldn't. No. Like people like Amy Schumer and Sarah Silverman and they're women who, you know, they display their sexuality. Yeah. uh in an overt way the the women that they hired uh do not now here's something else i looked at the list i couldn't find a jewish comic on there really oh interesting now i know louis k has like a jewish great-grandfather and i'm not sure about jessica kerson um she may or may not be jewish but interestingly enough i believe she's gay and i don't know what that's all about and then

let's talk about pete davidson how sad is this his father died and at 9-11 he was a firefighter who tried to rescue people and he died and now his son is going and performing for the people who ostensibly

were involved in the murder of his father Yeah and let's be honest like it would be a hell Pete Davidson would know how to tell a joke that would make people laugh given the fact he's there

but he's not allowed telling that joke so he won't he's going to wait till he comes home he'll tell the joke at home and I don't think it's going to land the same way Well, you know, it's possible that they're all doing this and they'll all come home.

And when they're home, that's when they'll start ripping the, the, the, there's the, the, the, the Saudis apart. That's pretty easy. It is possible. Yeah, and of course, that's the easy way. And, you know, they've got their bank account, but don't discount the role of agents and managers in all of this. What do you mean? You know, well, because the agents and managers would probably take 20% of any of their clients' money. and they don't have to worry about being called out on social media, do they?

Yeah, no, you're right. No. And it wouldn't surprise me, and again, maybe this is a paranoid thought, that these agencies got extra money from the Saudi government to kind of smooth over and make this thing happen. So in other words, get your clients in here, and there'll be a $500,000 check for you that has nothing to do with your client. I wouldn't be surprised if that's how. it happened. Mark, thank you so much for your insights. I'd love to have you back on when this

festival is done and we can do a post-mortem of how successful it was. We appreciate it. Sure. I'd love to talk about humor me, which you did for three years. Yes, indeed. Thank you, my friend. is chaos. Wednesdays on global. As a mother of a four-year-old, this is vacation. Canada's number one reality show is back. This is when Survivor turns into a horror movie. It's trial by Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire.

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