The Daily Show: Ears Edition - Jon Stewart on Musk's Black-Eyed Exit & Trump's Insane New Biden Conspiracy | Carole Cadwalladr

Episode Date: June 3, 2025

Jon Stewart tracks Elon Musk's White House crash, from the high of being Trump's "first buddy" to the low of his black-eyed DOGE send-off. Now that the 100-day honeymoon is over, Jon also checks in on... Trump's other struggling cabinet members, like the FBI's burned-out deputy director, Dan Bongino. Carole Cadwalladr, the award-winning journalist behind the Substack newsletter “How to Survive the Broligarchy,” talks to Jon about how the U.S. government ignored the huge wake-up call that was the Cambridge Analytica-Facebook data breach scandal – a story Cadwalladr broke and which resulted in no legislative protections for citizens’ private data. She warns about the unregulated dangers that data-mining and AI pose to individual privacy and freedom, and what people and institutions can do to push back on big tech’s authoritarian agenda.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 This is an iHeart Podcast. You're listening to Comedy Central. From the most trusted journalists at Comedy Central, it's America's only source for news. This is The Daily Show with your host, John Stewart. We've got a show for you tonight. Carol Cadwallader is going to be joining us. She's a journalist. She's going to discuss with us the tech bro-logarchy and how the entirety of mankind, entirety, will be enslaved by a handful of misanthropic data hoarders. Spoiler alert, we don't make it. Speaking of misanthropic data hoarders,
Starting point is 00:01:16 Doge has finally rooted out one of America's least efficient government workers and marked him for dismissal. Elon Musk is no longer a special government employee. Friday was the billionaire's last day in charge of the Department of Government Efficiency. He's leaving. He's leaving his job to make more family with his time. He f***ed a lot, I think. Or just has a mail order sperm farm.
Starting point is 00:02:05 No, I don't know what he's on. I'm actually, I'm starting to feel bad for this guy. He's been, look at him, he's been there four months. Look at, look at the poor guy. It only took four months to go from this... Huh! To this! Oh!
Starting point is 00:02:22 Look at this f***ing guy! He went from tech titan, giving a mandate to move fast and crush the deep state to... Guy who had a bad night in Nashville bar he can't remember, right? He's got that look like, has anyone seen my shoes? He's got that little beaten down. He's got that look on his face that I imagine his employees normally have. Black eye, thousand-yard stare.
Starting point is 00:02:55 This dude has seen some shit. I'd like to know at least how that happened. Is your eye okay? What happened to your eye? I noticed there was a blues thing. I just was around with the Lex and I said go ahead much in the face and you did. So you're not going to tell us what happened. Do you need a safe place to stay? Look, I believe sometimes do happen when you're roughhousing with your kids,
Starting point is 00:03:30 but I'm also sure the one sentence no parent has ever uttered to their child is, Go ahead, punch me in the face. But you know, Elon spent $300 million of his own money to get Trump elected, irreparably damaged his personal brand and almost all of his business and is clearly suffering some kind of issue. But don't worry, Trump made sure that Elon got something in return. President Trump heaping praise on the tech titan, presenting him with a golden key. And I gave a little special something we have here.
Starting point is 00:04:04 Thank you. A very special that little special something we have here. Thank you very special that I give to very special people I have given it to some but they go to very special people and I thought I I give it to you on as a presentation from our country. Thank you. You couldn't just give them the K. You have to make sure that everybody knows you give them to a lot of people. It's just not that special.
Starting point is 00:04:32 You know I got a bunch of these. I give them to special people. Who's the guy who brings me my diet coke? I give him one for every diet coke. Anyway, enjoy your useless key. There was no need for Trump and Elon to commemorate this epic fail.
Starting point is 00:04:51 This embarrassing display of theater. Look at these guys. Pretending like this is some kind of celebratory victorious send-off for a job well done. Jesus, look, even Lincoln is looking down.
Starting point is 00:05:02 You see him? Look at Lincoln. Look at Lincoln. even Lincoln is looking down. You see him? Look at Lincoln. Look at Lincoln. Even Lincoln is looking down, going... ... This is the most tedious performance I've ever had to sit through. This is...
Starting point is 00:05:23 Mmm. Even Lincoln can't take it. Somebody booth me. I don't like this. Too soon? Is that... Hmm. F***ing Lincoln for God's sake. With all the s*** going on in the world and all the people who are watching Hmm. F***ing Lincoln, for God's sake. With all the s*** going on in the world, I was not expecting the audience to be like, Poor Lincoln.
Starting point is 00:05:57 Just wanted to see you play. Of course, Lincoln wasn't the only one seemingly disassociating in the Oval Office. Of course, there might have been an explanation for that behavior as well. The New York Times reports that Musk allegedly used drugs far more than previously known. Look, whether Elon was using drugs on the job or not, I have no idea. I do know one thing about the television industry though, especially the news industry, and that is whatever unusual images we have of Elon's enthusiastic time in Washington,, those images will now be repurposed and given a slightly different meaning and context, almost comically so, inside addition, do your worst.
Starting point is 00:06:56 Musk's departure comes as a jaw-dropping New York Times report claims he was taking a cocktail of drugs while on the campaign trail. According to the Times, ex-bosé must erratic behavior, including waving a chainsaw around and that notorious Nazi-like stiff arm can be attributed to a daily mix of ketamine, ecstasy, psychedelic mushrooms and Adderall.
Starting point is 00:07:22 They claim he traveled with a daily medication box that holds 20 pills. Why you want to do a brother dirty? That way you gotta do that. Come on inside edition. Inauguration party enthusiasm or reefer madness? inauguration party enthusiasm or reefer madness? And you might be saying, well look, who amongst us has an unwound sometimes little mixture of
Starting point is 00:07:55 ecstasy mushrooms, ketamine and aterol? What could be the harm? He told people he was taking so much ketamine that it was affecting his bladder. He told people that? This dude is a one-man anti-drug campaign. These are your pants. These are your pants on drugs. And I do love the fact, though, that the detail is he's the one who told him he had a platypal.
Starting point is 00:08:38 That means things were so bad, he had to be like, oh, don't worry, it's nothing weird, it's just an overabundance of ketamine. Now, obviously, we on this program would have been delighted to offer an unedited forum for Elon to discuss his journey from hardworking efficiency expert to drug-addled child star mugshot. But he chose to go in a different direction by sort of speaking to your theater-loving parents' favorite news program, CBS Sunday morning, this is true, this was his final Trump administration exit interview.
Starting point is 00:09:12 I noticed that all of your businesses involve a lot of components, a lot of parts. Do the tariffs and the trade wars affect any of this? You know. Tariffs always affect things a little bit. How revealing. Any follow-up wondering what your thought is on the ban on foreign students
Starting point is 00:09:35 the proposal and you're one of those kids right. I mean I think we want to stick to you know the subject of the day which is like spaceships as as opposed to, you know, presidential policy. Oh, okay. I was told anything's good, but no, well, no. Look what Trump has reduced this man to. He has broken this poor man. Did you see an interview? Can't we just talk about spaceships?
Starting point is 00:10:17 I was told we'd talk about... I was told we would both be wearing helmets and talking about... Just a simple boy with a set of Star Wars sheets and pillows, and I really would just like to talk about space. I mean, you can't blame them. This whole project was cutting money from the government, trying to find efficiencies, and sneaking a Trojan horse in the back door and stealing all our data, but Trump is spending $200 billion more than the previous administration did in this amount
Starting point is 00:10:48 of time and creating a deficit exploding big beautiful bill that is the antithesis of everything Musk said he was trying to do. And now he's left softly complaining about it to a guy whose normal news segment is explaining to your grandparents how to download a PDF. You know, I was like disappointed to see the massive spending bill frankly which increases the budget deficit not just decrease it.
Starting point is 00:11:16 And I reminds the work that the Doge team is doing I think about can be can be can be big or it could be beautiful. I don't know if it could be both my personal opinion. No, sir. We will not be body-shaming legislation. I'm going to tell you something, and I speak for all the legislation out there
Starting point is 00:11:41 that in this country, a bill can be big... and beautiful... and... applause applause applause applause
Starting point is 00:11:57 I promised myself I wasn't gonna do this. applause And brave. applause Holy shit! No? Here's my favorite, by the way, so this actually is my favorite part of the whole interview. So Elon actually expressed some dissatisfaction with what was happening with the Trump information.
Starting point is 00:12:14 It was a turn of events that stunned the reporter on CBS Sunday morning, who had no idea apparently that this was being recorded. Right after our interview, CBS Sunday morning, the had no idea apparently that this was being recorded. Right after our interview, CBS News posted a clip of it to promote this very report.
Starting point is 00:12:34 It was that part where Musk criticizes Trump's spending bill. And his remarks became news. It went all the way up to the White House. Yeah. That's what news does. He's saying that like, so am I in trouble? I thought we were just killing time until we got another
Starting point is 00:13:04 Patti LuPone apologizes update. I don't like any of this. But let this be a lesson to Elon and anybody in Trump's orbit. Whatever your passion and political belief, whatever your ideology is, you will go from reaching for Mind Stars to dissolving in a puddle of your own urine and shame and starting a fight club with your kid just to be able to feel. Because Trump... Trump...
Starting point is 00:13:32 Trump... Trump... Trump... Trump... Trump... Trump doesn't believe in anything, man. What, were you with him because of his commitment to rein in Big Tech?
Starting point is 00:13:49 They use Big Tech to censor you. They use the deep state to spy on you. We have to make sure that we are protecting the American people's privacy and data rights. When I'm president, Big Tech will pay. iTunes will have to agree to your terms and conditions. When I'm president, traffic lights will have to click on boxes containing pictures of you.
Starting point is 00:14:15 Capture that. So how's that libertarian paradise vision going for you now? Capture that! So how's that libertarian paradise vision going for you now? The Trump administration is expanding its partnership with Palantir. The company is reportedly going to build a master list of personal information on Americans that could give President Donald Trump immense surveillance power. It's never a good sign when the phrase master list and surveillance power are coupled. No one's ever like, I've assembled a master list of puppies you can surveil for boops. But hey, how evil can pal and tier be?
Starting point is 00:15:02 You got pal right in the name there. Well, look, it's not like they're handing all of our data over to some crackpot CEO. Well, let's not judge a book by its cover. The most effective way for social change Well, let's not judge a book by its cover. The most effective way for social change is humiliate your enemy and make them poorer. I don't think in win-lose. I think in domination.
Starting point is 00:15:33 I love the idea of getting a drone and having light fentanyl-laced urine spraying on analysts who've tried to screw us. Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!
Starting point is 00:15:51 Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!
Starting point is 00:15:59 Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! drug-laced urine-spraying drones. Although if he is serious about that, he's gonna need a source for drug-laced urine. I might know a guy.
Starting point is 00:16:10 Nope, nope. Here's the thing. The reality is this. The reality of Trump is he turns even his most fervent and enthusiastic foot soldiers upside down. Take Dan Bongino, ex-Secret Service agent, Fox News host, and guy who looks like he starts fights at literally games
Starting point is 00:16:27 even though he doesn't have a kid playing. He was very excited for the Trump era. Right now, we're in charge. This is how shit gets done. Trump ain't f***ing around. We are going to hold every one of these people accountable. It is time for total personnel warfare. Fire 100 people on day one.
Starting point is 00:16:46 Fire 100 more. Fire 1,000 more. Fire everyone. We're good at flipping the script on dipshit f***wad liberal commies. You know what's coming? What's coming? Does anybody know?
Starting point is 00:17:10 Well, that last part's going to make for some good B-roll for an Inside Edition story one day. Anyway, Trump made that guy Deputy Director of the FBI because of course. But look what his only three months on the job have done to him. I gave up everything for this. I mean, cash is there all day. We share, our offices are linked. He turns on the faucet, I hear it. He's there at, he gets in like six o'clock in the morning.
Starting point is 00:17:33 He doesn't leave till seven at night. You know, I'm in there at 7.30 in the morning. You know, he uses the gym, I work out in my apartment. But I stare at these four walls all day in D.C. Yeah, that's called a job. You have a job. That's what they are. You go in at a specific time, 6.37, around there, to a specific room, mostly four-walled,
Starting point is 00:17:59 and you're there all f***ing day. It's work. It's a job. And yeah, there probably is a dude in there that you hear all f***king day. It's work. It's a job. And yeah, there probably is a dude in there that you hear all f**king day. He turns the water on, you hear, hey, look at that, he's chewing another f**king sandwich. I hate this job. It's annoying. Yeah, it sucks.
Starting point is 00:18:19 How do you not know that? For God's sakes, you're on the right. Haven't you even read Dilbert? For f***'s sake! Work sucks! And how are you just finding about this now? How is having a job now suddenly destroying everything? But I stare at these four walls all day in D.C.,
Starting point is 00:18:40 you know, by myself, divorced from my wife. Not divorced, but I mean separated divorced. And it's hard. I mean, you know, we love each other from my wife. Not divorced, but I mean separated, divorced. And it's hard. I mean, you know, we love each other and it's hard to be apart. I mean, it's just, it's hard. I don't like to separate it. I mean, divorce. I'm not divorced. I was divorced, but not separate. I'm separate together, but not, of course, alone.
Starting point is 00:19:02 But I go, who knows? I mean, some people, they leave for a while. Who the f*** knows? Guys come over, they come banging people. Who the f*** knows what's happening? I don't know what's happening. Why can't she come to work? Why can't I just bring... Can I bring my wife to work?
Starting point is 00:19:16 Would that be okay? We all miss our wives! What the f***? The only one who's going to come out of there unscathed is press secretary Caroline Levitt. Because I don't think she got any principles in there left to die. President Trump is truly the most transparent and accessible president in American history. We have truth on our side at this White House. I think everybody, the American public, believe it's absurd for anyone to insinuate that this president is profiting off of the presidency
Starting point is 00:19:46 It's frankly ridiculous that anyone in this room would even suggest that President Trump is doing anything for his own benefit That's all he's doing By the way, I think the more she lies the bigger her cross gets Is that possible it's like some sort of weird Pinocchio cross. The president can't be bought. I'm not even upset with this lady. Because just rolling with the punches is clearly the only strategy for happiness when you're working for Trump.
Starting point is 00:20:21 Trump's very open secret has always been he doesn't believe in or care about any policy issue at all. He wants attention, he wants his ego stroke, and he wants money. He wants f***wads and f***wads of money. Remember his 90 deals in 90 days? He made them, but only for his family. Those are the only deals he made. Meanwhile, the world he said he was gonna fix is burning,
Starting point is 00:20:43 like so many nuclear-capable planes in Siberia. And don't bother trying to call him on it, because before you can, he's already moved on to pulling some new crazy thing out of his ass to distract us. President Trump is reposting false claims about former President Joe Biden, saying that Biden was executed in 2020. Since then, clones, body doubles, and robots
Starting point is 00:21:04 took Biden's place in 2020. Since then, clones, body doubles, and robots took Biden's place as president. You're saying that the Joe Biden, who doesn't even know where he is, is actually an incredibly advanced cloned robot? How much ketamine are you on? A lot. robot how much ketamine are you on a lot when we come back Carol Hello. Welcome back to the Daily Show. So I want to tell you about my guest tonight. My guest tonight is an award-winning investigative journalist who writes the sub-stacked newsletter, How to Survive the Burlogargi. Please welcome to the program, Carol Cadwallader. Thank you for joining us. Very surreal. It's very surreal. It's very surreal. I want to introduce you to our audience who might be unfamiliar with your work.
Starting point is 00:22:27 Carol was one of the first journalists that broke the Cambridge Analytica data story. This was many years ago. Back when nobody was writing about it. And give us a little bit of just that backstory of what happened when you exposed what this group was and what happened to you. Well, basically, Facebook lied repeatedly. You'll be shocked.
Starting point is 00:22:55 Carol! They said, no, even this company, of course, it didn't have our data. This is ridiculous. And then guess what? It turned out that this company, Cambridge Analytica, did have that data, this is ridiculous. And then guess what, it turned out that this company, Cambridge Analytica, did have that data. 87 million people's Facebook data taken without their consent. And yeah, we broke that story and it turned out it was grossly illegal and
Starting point is 00:23:18 Facebook got fined a record-breaking $5 billion by the FTC 100 million by the SEC and hundreds of thousands of pounds in other countries around the world and guess what nobody was ever held to account so Mark Zuckerberg got away with it's got free nothing actually changed nothing changed actually the one person who was put through the ringer during all of this. Yeah, yeah. Was you. Well that's the thing I say in all of this we found there was gross
Starting point is 00:23:49 law breaking at every level by Facebook, by Cambridge Analytica, by the Leave campaigns in Britain, by the Trump campaign and yeah only one person got put on trial and that was me. You were put on trial for discovering this very true thing and they really tried to destroy you. Yeah, so well it was a particular Brexiteer who came after me and... The whole term Brexiteer makes it sound like Disney. I hate that.
Starting point is 00:24:18 I'm a Brexiteer, you're a Brexiteer. But they said... You're not, thank God, I hope. What, are you kidding me? I'm in America. We don't care what happens there. No, but it is. But you were on the cusp of, does that story now,
Starting point is 00:24:35 with Cambridge Analytica sort of siphoning the data from Facebook, weaponizing what would get people agitated, and trying to influence those elections, does that almost seem quaint by today's standards? I mean, I think it's the blueprint in many ways for what we're seeing now, which is that it was the dream of big data, which is what could happen if you take millions of people's data, vast quantities of it, because what they did, what Cambridge Analytica did, as well as getting access to all of these people's personal, and it wasn't just, you know, it's
Starting point is 00:25:09 every post they'd ever put on Facebook, every post they'd ever liked, even their private messages, but they combined this with masses and masses of commercially available data. And then what they did is they brought these together to create algorithms which they then used to target people, weaponized against them, to send them Facebook ads, to sort of provoke them in a certain way. And that is, I think in many ways now you can see, is the game plan of what we are seeing now. Which is that there's a question about how effective Cambridge Analytica's methodology was, but the dream of it was this sort of big data surveillance engine in which they would know everything about everybody and they would know how to provoke you, how
Starting point is 00:25:57 to sort of touch every single person and how to manipulate us. Was the change of that, because there is a sense, you think of that sort of in the capitalist sense or the consumerist sense, like if I'll be talking to my wife about a certain something and then the very next thing on Instagram is an advertisement for that very thing and you think, oh, they've weaponized what we're interested in to get us to buy things. But this is a very different scenario in that they've weaponized it to defang democratic processes. Yeah, and more. I mean, I think what is happening now in America is absolutely they are building
Starting point is 00:26:38 a techno authoritarian surveillance state. We can see that happening in real time. This is huge amounts of data on every single person in America that can and will be used in opaque and unaccountable ways. And it is terrifying. But on the plus side. On the plus side. When you hear about that from Palantir, is that, are you describing something generally or are you describing exact, like Palantir is getting all of our data? I mean, that was what they announced. Well, it's DOGE is the sort of tip of the spear here.
Starting point is 00:27:21 This is Elon Musk's unvetted operatives going into every government department and they're going in to access the databases of those separate departments. And now what's happening is that this company, Palantir, owned by Peter Thiel, a very interesting and... Did you see the adjective I picked there? Slow, slow, slow down, Carol. I was like, which adjective shall I go for? We went for interesting. This company owned by Peter Thiel is now amassing these different pots of data. It's putting it into one massive database where it's merging them. It's applying AI now to this database.
Starting point is 00:28:11 And- And what is the AI's purpose? Is it to sift through the data to target you for messaging? Or is it also to prevent you from accessing government programs? I mean, it can be used in so many different ways and I think that's a difficult thing which is hard for people to get their heads around but this is a system of control. This is what other authoritarian
Starting point is 00:28:32 countries do. And there's no regulation on this by the way. There's no regulation. Basically you had since we broke this scandal, it's 2018 the big story then and you know one of the key things about it was you have no privacy legislation in the US. There is nothing to protect your data. You have no rights here whatsoever, apart from California now has a bill. So you had all of this time to do something about it,
Starting point is 00:28:59 and you didn't. That doesn't sound like us. Normally, we're quite prompt with this type of activity. I'll go even further. In the big, beautiful bill, there is a segment of that that says for the next 10 years, they are not allowed to legislate or regulate AI in any way, shape or form. It is prohibited by an act of Congress if this goes through. What does that do to this?
Starting point is 00:29:30 It gives them a 10-year head start on whatever it is they want to do with it? I mean, it's just it is the tech, you know, it's the technocratic dream. I mean, this is what these tech bros want. They want to just build their beautiful AIs and do whatever they want in any way bros want. They want to just build their beautiful AIs and do whatever they want in any way that they want so that they can get to Mars and colonize it, you
Starting point is 00:29:52 know, great glorious goals such as... But how does any of this square with their so-called libertarian principles? It's nonsense. If there is a centralized control of data run by an opaque algorithm that nobody understands but them. And when they want to make changes, grok for like a week, no matter what you asked it would be like, do you know South African farmers that are white or being killed? They can do whatever they want. And is the idea we're supposed to just trust that it's in our best interest?
Starting point is 00:30:25 I mean it's the literal opposite of libertarian but then that's always the thing you just have to whatever they say you've just got to realize it's the exact opposite. So the idea that this is libertarian which is a state controlled machinery to surveil and control every citizen in America to deny them access to services, to make inferences about them about anybody in the country, to label them domestic terrorists based upon you know what these different databases throw up. That is it's authoritarian, it's authoritarian and it you know and it's also the pathway to fascism. That's that is what it is. And that's here's the other thing that really bothers me about it.
Starting point is 00:31:06 So everything that we're doing to China, the tariffs and everything else, is because they don't play fair. They steal our IP. They steal our, what is AI if not vacuuming up anything that is proprietary, not just about our work, but of our souls. Like it is sucking up everything that we are and using it for whatever they wanna do. And what's our recourse to that? I mean, it's just, it's based upon totally illegal behavior.
Starting point is 00:31:38 It's just theft. It's that you have, you know, you have copyright laws, they're just property laws. You don't go into people's house and then just take their furniture and their stereo and then flog it on eBay and claim that it belongs to you and keep the profit. I mean, that is literally what they are doing. And this is the Silicon Valley model. This is the Silicon
Starting point is 00:32:06 Valley model. And this is exactly what's now been transported into government, which is you break the law first, you see if you can get away with it. And generally you do. And do you see is it different in the EU? Did they have a sense of the peril of this and they're acting more robustly? Is this something that you see in the United States as the Wild West? Who is keeping an eye on this? And can we get our own AI to keep an eye on their AI? I mean, I think the point is, in Europe, the dangers of this are much more recent and much more present.
Starting point is 00:32:40 So, you know, the country, the one country in the world which does really understand this is Germany. You know, and it was first it was Nazism and then it was communism. And both of those systems used technology to control and surveil people. And that's why there has been. So how is this, if this is the STASI or this is the KGB or this is the CIA look this country is rife with examples of government Mk. Ultra and FBI surveillance on Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy, you know We are not unfamiliar
Starting point is 00:33:18 with those kinds of police state activities is kinds of police state activities. Is this of a different piece? Is it just that it's more opaque? Is it more efficient at doing it? Are we seeing something really different than we've seen? We are seeing something really different. It's really, really systematic what's happening. There is already, we are all of us emitting, you know, hundreds of thousands of data points a day, a week, which are, you know, they're all being collected somewhere.
Starting point is 00:33:51 And so the idea now that those can be brought together and merged in some vast database, that is going to profile you, that is gonna judge you, that is gonna make assumptions about you. And use for predictive purposes as well. And can be used for, because it it's now we're laying generative AI on top of that. I mean, you know how bullshit chat GPT is.
Starting point is 00:34:11 I mean, it's very good. I don't use that. What are you saying? I do my own work. What are you saying, that these questions I just plugged into chat GPT? But it's just easier, Carol. It is, but it's also just pretty dumb.
Starting point is 00:34:33 It's stupid. It gets things wrong. It hallucinates. It makes up references. That's the other thing. And that is that system which is going to be deciding whether you get Medicaid or not? That boy, did you just nail, I think, such a crucial point there. Beyond even the more sort of dystopian visions of where they're going to be taking this is
Starting point is 00:34:53 the practical application of a technology that is wildly fallible. That is something that, you know, they just put out the Maha report and apparently there's seven studies in it that don't exist. And nobody thought like, oh, we should probably check that. And you know the whole thing of trying to get through to customer services at any of these tech companies. If you've ever had your Facebook account hacked or your Twitter account, you can't get through to anybody. Now imagine that that is you trying to get
Starting point is 00:35:26 hold of your whatever it is, your benefits or the services that you're entitled to. Or the things you've got, social security, Medicaid, any of those things. Exactly. The computer has just said no. You have got no idea what that's based on. And then how do you challenge that? What do you do? I mean, that is the reality that it's absolutely going to be faced, millions of Americans are going to be facing. Right, to try and contact. And it won't be anybody. It'll just be, for this press one,
Starting point is 00:35:53 but nobody will ever come on the line. Exactly. And it's like, if you get turned down, like I say, you won't know why. But also, there's no saying that it's based on accurate information whatsoever. And not transparent in any way by removing the people. Yeah, it's a black box.
Starting point is 00:36:13 It's just everything that's gonna go into some black box, it's gonna get mixed up and it's gonna spit out answers. So you've been looking at this for many years. You have faced a great deal of personal repercussion for doing this. You continue to push on it. Is there anything that you've seen within this move that makes you feel like
Starting point is 00:36:35 we have the ability to in any way slow the inevitability of it? Yes. Oh, Carol. Carol, I gotta tell you. the inevitability of it. Yes. Oh, Carol. Carol, I got to tell you, and I'm going to say this to the audience at home. I probably should have started there
Starting point is 00:36:54 before everybody was on the ledge. What do you see? Because they're just like all of these tech bros. They are selling absolute bullshit, OK? The whole AI. All of these tech bros, they are selling absolute bullshit, okay? The whole AI... CHEERING AND APPLAUSE The whole AI scam is a scam,
Starting point is 00:37:10 and they're making out that it's inevitable, that we have to... They have to... We're having to chuck millions upon millions of dollars at building better AI because the AI is otherwise going to kill us and it's going to come anyway, and it's inevitable. It is not inevitable. It is based upon illegal behavior. Take it, challenge these companies in the courts.
Starting point is 00:37:30 Media organizations, stop doing crappy deals with these people. You worked for the Guardian, they just sold them like an AI company. They just did a really crappy deal with OpenAI. Or as I say, they married its rapist. They're rapist. Ooh. This was the optimistic part of the show. This was the part of the show where you were gonna bring us
Starting point is 00:37:56 all back from the ledge and look what you done. They're all crying again. We can, we have power. We can stand up to these companies. We have to stand up to these companies. We don't pre-obey. We don't make deals with open AI. We do try and stand up for our, you know,
Starting point is 00:38:14 defend our legal rights. This is law, okay? And that's the one thing which the tech companies, these Silicon Valley platforms, you know, just can't tolerate. And that is, and that's always been their strategy, is that they subvert it and they get away with it. And they get away with it because they act fast,
Starting point is 00:38:33 we don't realize till too late, and then it seems too late to try and do anything about it. So we can do stuff about it. And we can also is that, you know, we are giving our data to these companies we have to really think about that you know Instagram is not your friend you shouldn't don't post your kids photos on there I mean if there's one thing to take away from that is that these companies are now allied
Starting point is 00:39:00 to your government which is a you know I have to get out through the border in a couple of days time so I'm slightly wary of what I say but I mean yeah it's not in a good place I understand the only way I would push back is just to say Instagram is actually my only friend Carol I just I can't tell you how impressed I am with the work that you've done that you continue to do the way that you continue to stand up for this even when it has cost you such a great deal in your life. Be sure to check out Carol Substack. It's How to Survive the Brolygarky
Starting point is 00:39:31 and her nonprofit called The Citizens. Is that correct? That's correct. The Citizens, Carol Kadwalik. Thank you so much for being here. We'll be right back. Thank you. Thank you.
Starting point is 00:39:41 Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Starting point is 00:39:48 Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Starting point is 00:39:56 Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Starting point is 00:40:04 Thank you. Thank you. Thankosta. Michael! What do you got for us this week, Michael? Well, John, June is the start of Pride Month, so this week we'll be celebrating all the things that I'm proudest of. My hairline, my athletic frame, and my early pre-order of the Nintendo Switch 2. There's just so much to be proud of, John. So I understand. This month, though, is really more about, like, gay and lesbian pride, not just pride in general.
Starting point is 00:40:33 I see. Well, there was that one time I convinced a cop to tear up my speeding ticket. But I wouldn't say I'm proud of it. We won't elaborate. Michael Kosta all this week. Here it is, your publicist. There is a New York Times report today that accuses you of blurring the line between... Is the New York Times, is that the same publication that got a Pulitzer Prize for false reporting
Starting point is 00:41:13 on the Russia Gate? Is it the same organization? I think it is. I gotta check my Pulitzer counter. I think it is. Explore more shows from the Daily Show Podcast universe by searching The Daily Show, wherever you get your podcasts. Watch The Daily Show weeknights at 11, 10 Central on Comedy Central, and stream full episodes anytime on Paramount Plus.

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