The Joe Rogan Experience - #1706 - Billy Corben

Episode Date: September 14, 2021

Billy Corben is a documentarian and producer. His new series, "Cocaine Cowboys: The Kings of Miami," is now available on Netflix.

the joe rogan experience train by day joe rogan podcast by night all day hello billy always good to see you my friend i'm just here so you can give kovid back to florida what if it works like that florida gave it to me i've got something for it i'll have to figure out how to pay Florida back. Don't say Florida never gave you anything. Listen, man, I had a good time down there.

It was a rough few days, but I had a good time. I feel like everybody has the same Florida story and it's just that. Well, Florida is just Florida. You know, I mean, one of the things

that Florida has gotten a lot of positive reviews since the pandemic. You know, of positive reviews since the pandemic. You know, Florida came up during the pandemic, right? I mean, a lot of people were negative on it. They thought that the restrictions were terrible and, you know, he needs to do more. And DeSantis is killing people. But a lot of people are like, you know what?

At least I can go to restaurants. Florida lets you go out. Florida doesn't want to have you have mandates and the tax situation. Florida came up. You got to admit, Florida became a more attractive place during the pandemic. August was the deadliest month in Florida in the history of the pandemic. This past August? Yeah.

One in five COVID deaths in the United States occurred in Florida. Now it's almost as many as one in four COVID deaths in the United States occurred in Florida. Now it's almost as many as one in four COVID deaths in the United States are occurring in Florida. We've had 13 Miami-Dade County Public Schools employees die of COVID. That includes teachers, bus drivers, people die of COVID since mid-August. Jesus. Last month, we had, I think, no less than 20 police officers in the state of Florida die. We had a 10 day period in which we had a police officer a day dying of COVID. If you go to the officer down memorial page, the executive director there, a sergeant from Fairfax, Virginia, says that we,

by the end of the pandemic, it will overtake the terror attacks of September 11th, 2001, as the single deadliest incident in the history of United States law enforcement. I mean, if I told you that there was a killer out there in Florida killing a cop a day, there'd be fucking martial law. There'd be tanks in the streets or be guys in tactical gear and assault rifles, rightfully so. And there is. And it's COVID-19. And these people are interacting with the public, of course, to boot. And it's a tragedy. It's a human tragedy.

What is the difference between the way Florida is treating it and the way other states are treating it? So Florida is having these, like so many cops in particular, dying in Florida. Is that the case everywhere? Is that the case with all first responders that they're all at risk or is it just, is Florida uniquely dangerous? The short answer is yes. And by the way, what the fuck is happening in Florida is an evergreen question. Right. But that is the question. Yeah. But the answer, you know, the COVID-19 for the last two years is the single largest cause of death for law enforcement officers, more so than all other causes combined. That's crazy when you think about the amount of violence and the amount of crime that takes place.

Yeah. COVID-19, number one cop killer for two years running and counting. And this is just everywhere? Just in Florida? That's true nationally, but Florida is uniquely because we're open for business. That kind of pro-business, pro-freedom attitude. You know, listen, Florida has no indigenous industry. Okay? We don't produce anything but oranges and machine guns. That's

what Florida makes. We sell the sunshine. Do you guys make machine guns? Yeah. We have gun manufacturers in Florida. We sell the sunshine. Okay. And that just means we have to, what we sell, we're all just tourism people, right? We, we, we, we knock down the old shit. We build new shit. We build it taller. We build it bigger so we can attract a thousand newcomers tomorrow. It's a Ponzi scheme. The economy is a Ponzi scheme. It relies. It's not self-sufficient.

It relies solely on new outside money and investors coming in the next day. So we subsist from hustle to hustle. So our pandemic hustle was come here. Everybody else is on lockdown. Come to Florida. And a lot of people did. And a lot of people died as a consequence of that so some businesses did did better and people died i mean that's looking at something today that was showing the deaths in florida per capita versus the deaths in california per capital per capita when it was age-adjusted. And Florida had less deaths when it was age-adjusted, when they looked at it in comparative to how

old people die normally anyway. And Florida has a much older population. We do. It was showing that per capita, more people are dying in a very locked-down state like California. Well, I think that, I don't know that that's entire, age adjusted it may be. Yeah, it's age adjusted.

But there's a 27-year-old police officer, a mother of a two-year-old, five-month-old. She died from COVID. Died from COVID. Are they getting bad treatment? I think there, I think it's several things. Listen, treatment is no substitute for the vaccine. It's just not. OK, people, the vaccine is helping people. It is helping people to it's less likely they'll get infected. It's more likely they will survive. That just bears out. I think it's the vaccine. Hesitation is what I think it is. I think that that's the major cause. And it's particularly problematic when you have public facing people like law enforcement officers who are interacting. They can come to your window to write a traffic ticket and that could be a death sentence.

It's very unusual for a 27-year-old person with good health care, someone who's been taken care of, to die from COVID. It's very, very statistically unusual. And that is anecdotal. That's one example. So I'm not saying that that is the rule in Florida. Did she have pre-existing medical conditions and comorbidities? I have no idea, but let's be honest. Americans, by and large, are not in as good a shape as you're in.

Like, that's just, you know, we're all walking, talking comorbidities. That's that's just the reality. But, you know, the the the truth is, is that there is a safe and effective and in fact, free way to because that's the thing, too, is the treatment is not a a pre infection prophylaxis. infection, prophylaxis. You know, it's something you do later. You know, it's not something you do to avoid getting the virus. And here's the thing. Once you have the virus, for some people, that's a death sentence. It doesn't matter how you treat it. Wait a minute. I don't know if that's true. I don't know if that's true because we don't know what they're doing. When you say it doesn't matter how you treat them, if they're treating them with monoclonal antibodies in particular early on in their infection. Which are available in Florida. Yeah, they're available everywhere.

It's shown to have an incredible rate. There's a recent study, Fauci actually talked about it. 85% keeps people from being hospitalized. Absolutely. And I don't begrudge anyone a cocktail or a kitchen sink approach once you get infected. You should try everything that you and your doctor want to do. You were saying for some people, if they get infected, there's nothing they can do. And I'm saying, I don't know if that's the case.

I don't know if they're doing that. I think some people don't know what to do. And they're basically sent home and told to take Tylenol. If they have poor health care, they're getting bad advice and they're getting bad health care once they're infected. I think there's a lot of people who don't have access to quality health care. There's a lot of people who don't have access to health care, period. And there's a lot of people. If you're a cop.

Yes. I mean, that should be paramount. I mean, if you are interacting with the general public the way police officers are during a pandemic, they should have access to the best health care possible, especially if they're infected. I mean, if you're going to ask these people to protect you, you should absolutely protect them. Absolutely. Yeah.

I mean, that's what I said. It's a human tragedy. Well, you know what's happening. But I think that it starts with. Listen, I'm a I'm a documentarian. So I'm a natural born skeptic, but I'm also pro fact, because what we do is cultural anthropologists, which is effectively what documentarians are, is we apply the scientific method, right? We make observations, we ask questions,

we develop hypotheses, we collect data, you experiment, we analyze that data, and we draw conclusions with the best information we have at the time. I don't know how all of these police officers were treated. I know they died. And I know that many of them were not. We're not. In fact, statistically, most of them were not vaccinated. I don't have access to their, you know, to their private health information. that the treatment is not a replacement for your ability to prophylactically prevent either being infected or being severely infected. Whether it's a replacement or not, we know for sure that being vaccinated can protect you.

And it can protect you from hospitalization. It can protect you from the odds of you dying once vaccinated are much lower. We know all that. That's a fact. But we also know there are a lot of treatments available that are not being utilized for people once they get infected. For whatever reason they have their vaccine hesitation, for whatever reason they don't want to do it,

there's a lot of treatment that's available that's not discussed. And I think monoclonal antibodies are among the best. I just did it. I just got through it. When I got through it that quickly, I was like, oh, well, this can clearly be done. I mean, I'm not, I'm 54, you know, I'm not a spring chicken. And when I beat it that quick, I was like, okay, well, this is, I'm not that unusual. I mean, I work out a lot.

I eat really well and I'm healthy. That helps tremendously, obviously, I work out a lot. I eat really well and I'm healthy. That helps tremendously, obviously, to have a resilient body. But also there's treatments available that aren't being utilized or people aren't aware of or they're not getting access to. Some of those things treat symptoms and some of those things are effective against the virus. That's the other thing as well. So the monoclonal antibodies have emergency use authorization by the FDA. I think that's because they are probably the most effective thing that's available right now. And again, I'm a natural born skeptic. So I look at everything sideways. I've been testing negative for what, a year and a half. And I have to think, you know, in Florida that I came into contact with it or I was sick and didn't know it. I was asymptomatic. I just, you know, so I'm skeptical of these. Although in Florida, we literally have tents at the side of the road, COVID testing. So maybe not necessarily the most reliable.

How many places? This is so interesting to me. There's so many places for testing, but so few places for treatment. You know, wouldn't you think that they would set up places that could provide monoclonal antibodies? We do in Florida. They made them publicly available, like really obvious? We have them. Do you make them real obvious? The governor has been on a promotional tour because one of his biggest donors, of course, is the guy who runs the company. In Texas as well.

Yeah. And it's great. And I just wish more people were aware of it. I wish more people. Listen, right now it is a pandemic, I believe, of the unvaccinated, which means that it's a pandemic of the uninformed and misinformed. And I think that, again, I I think that people have don't also don't necessarily have access to the same information that you and I have. For example, you and I know that Inver vermicton is there are doses for humans that's not it's not just a horse paste you know like that's you know full misinformation

that they're distributing they're doing that for some strange reason I don't know exactly why but I don't know that it is I think what happens is is that people don't necessarily know that so they're going down to their local race track or feed store and CNN knows that you necessarily know that. So they're going down to their local racetrack or feed store. CNN knows that. They know that the man who created it won the Nobel Prize for its use in humans in 2015. They know that it's used for yellow fever and dengue fever and has antiviral properties. They know that.

They know that it's used for river blindness. They know that it's been used for over 40 years. They know that. So when they say horse pace and a horse dewormer, they're not saying it because they want people to not take horse dewormer. They're saying it to ridicule this particular medication. I think they have an obligation to inform people that aren't informed, that are literally going down

to feed stores, which by the way is anecdotal. But that's not what they're doing. That's not what they're doing. They're talking about people who are taking the human drug and they're pretending they're taking horse dewormer. Here's the thing. It is not approved. And even the even the big pharma company Merck made forty six billion dollars last year who manufactures and, you know, Ivermectin.

Even they say this is not a proven treatment for either to avoid the virus or to treat the virus. Whereas a monoclonal antibodies, Regeneron, has emergency use authorization. But the reality is, first and foremost. You and I are not doctors. So if we're going to get real specific about this and we start pulling up links, this is going to be a long conversation about COVID and ivermectin. I'm uniquely unqualified to opine on this. I know a little bit about it because of my experiences with it and discussing with doctors, but it's not as cut and dry as anybody wants to pretend it is.

And one of the reasons why Merck is talking about it is they're developing their own antiviral medication, and it's a generic now, which means anybody can make it. So ivermectin can literally be made by any pharmaceutical company. There's a lot of complicated shit behind the scenes. And as a skeptic, maybe you should look at it from that perspective as well. Because what was it, the Japanese, the Tokyo, what was that, the Tokyo medical organization that is traditionally very conservative that just adopted ivermectin use last week and just talked about the efficacy of it.

There's studies of it that have the efficacy of it. There's studies of it that have come out of India. There's studies of it that have come out of other places. There's the frontline critical COVID care workers who've been administering it before there was a vaccine and had very positive effects using it. It's very complicated. And I don't think we should just dismiss their work, particularly when we don't know that much about it. And the last thing I am is dismissive. I think it's important to deal in facts. It's important to say that there's a lot that we don't know.

I think that is, we've learned that a lot over the last two years. There's a lot that we don't know. There's a lot of bullshit going around. Yeah. And, but I think that it's, we do know that there is a safe, effective, free FDA approved vaccine. We do know that. We know that in the event that you get the virus, which may be a breakthrough case, it might happen even if you have the vaccine, that there are monoclonal antibodies. There are good treatments that are also FDA emergency use authorized that you can you can get.

I think that, you know, we know that two of the biggest studies on ivermectin have been withdrawn for all sorts of, you know, reasons and potential fuckery. There's a lot of studies on ivermectin. If you go to the Critical Care COVID Workers website, they detail, there's a long list of studies that they've shown ivermectin to be effective in preventing death and preventing hospitalization. And see, this is a thing where like you and I are arguing about some shit we don't really have expertise in.

I think that that's absolutely true. That's why Netflix's publicist didn't want me to talk about it. Ah, too late. But you went right into it, motherfucker. Look at you. Did I go right in? No, you asked about Florida. You went right into it.

I didn't go right into it all along. Oh, yeah. I asked you about Florida and you went right into COVID deaths. Is that what happened? Yeah. You went into police officers and more people dying of COVID. Well, you asked me about the state's response to the pandemic.

I was just going to talk to you about the preposterous nature of your state that you love so much. You're a defender of Florida in its most ridiculousness. And one of the things that I want to talk to you because I haven't talked to you since the pandemic started.

Last time I talked to you was Screwball, right? Like, how long ago was that? Oh, yeah. What, 2019? Yeah, it was right before the shit hit the fan. That was the last time i talked to you was screwball right like how long ago was that oh yeah what 2019 yeah it was right before the shit hit the fan that was the last time we talked and we're talking about that documentary and then when all this happened and so much of the wackiness and the you know the controversy is coming out of florida like you embrace the chaos of florida yeah florida fuckery is our genre and it's our also our top export i think is as well it's really what we provide the rest of but for you and you i mean look about how much your work is about florida the cooking cowboy series you know all the stuff on a rod like all the there's

there's so much of your your work the petrifying i'm a florida native you know in a lifelong miami and i think the petrifying thing that i a Florida native, you know, and a lifelong Miamian. And I think the petrifying thing that I've learned through the years, and it's not my theory, T.D. Allman called Miami the city of the future. And effectively, the Florida of today is the America of tomorrow. And more importantly, the Miami of today, more specifically. The Miami of today is the America of tomorrow. So if you want to know what challenges we'll face or calamities will befall us as a nation in the years or even decades to come you need only look at the canary in the coal

mine which is which is South Florida do you think that's because of it's very vulnerable to climate change first of all right like there's there's estimates about how long Miami can last yeah not. Not good. Yeah. They don't, they think he got about two decades, right? Isn't that the current thought? I'm a renter. Let me put it that way.

I've lived there my whole life. I don't own any property in Miami. It's probably a good move. I'm not bullish. It does. It seems like it's going to go underwater, right? Yeah.

It'll definitely be underwater. It's just a question of when. It's just a question. It's all like there, like the, the, it'll definitely be underwater. It's just a question of when. It's just a question of when. Because it's all like the ground itself is very porous. Is that correct? Yeah. I mean, we had reclaimed wetlands. That's Miami Beach.

That's where Champlain Towers is. Reclaimed wetlands. What does that mean? It was fucking mangroves. Swamps. Yeah, swamp. And that we reclaimed, which means we filled it in. And there's still porous limestone underneath that. Champlain Towers only had water coming at it from the front, the back, above and below. But other than that, it was totally dry.

This is the tower that collapsed. Collapsed, yeah. I mean, just battered. We're getting battered there. They were on that porous limestone? Now, as we speak, this is the king tides. You know what the king tides are? No. They happen every September, October, and November. Not the entire time, but there's like a week here, a week in there for those three months. It is what we call sunny day flooding. So it has to do with the tides.

It has to do with the distance between the sun and the moon and the earth. And it floods in the sunlight. and the moon and the earth and it floods in the sunlight it we can get as much as 12 inches 12 inches above the highest high tide of the year so it just it's not from rain it's not now here's the problem we're still in hurricane season which means rain exacerbates it inclement weather can we're totally fucked when it rains on top of the king ties but this is just like a day like you just if you are in a low-lying area or waterfront or oceanfront bayfront that's just what sunny day it's perfectly it could be perfectly beautiful and you could have as much as 12 inches above the highest high tide so it's just an unusual level of the ocean yeah it's just a quirk of of the tides it happens happens every year off and on for three months.

Yeah, that's in the we call it sunny day flooding. That's a thing that we have there. I mean, you know, Miami, we make it rain, but now we have sunny day flooding is a thing. And there's nothing they can do like New Orleans, like put up some sort of a

some sort of a wall. So the Army Corps of Engineers proposed a dam so the the army corps of engineers proposed a kind of futuristic post-apocalyptic you know after the flood well pre-flood kind of a wall and miami said no gracias no thank you we don't want that we'll we'll we'll fend for ourselves did they say no because it was too expensive or did they say no because no the army corps of engineers i think was good i think it was gonna be or did they say no because no the Army Corps of Engineers? I think was good. I think was me federally funded They just didn't want this unsightly unseemly kind of a wall in our beautiful town And but what they did want is they wanted a signature bridge

We're building like this eight hundred million dollar bridge that we don't need that's but it's it's super It's super pretty as we say in Miami. It's super pretty and somebody probably got a good deal. Oh, yeah Oh, you better believe the contractors that's the thing that's why the miami of today is the america of tomorrow it's really the corruption dysfunction and non-stop construction that's really what it is it's this anything goes wild west kind of mentality because you know i i said this before on the show you know la is where you go when you want to be somebody new york is where you go when you are somebody and miami is where you go when you want to be somebody. New York is where you go when you are somebody. And Miami is where you go when you want to be somebody else. It's always been a sunny place for shady people.

The Florida man phenomenon. It's just like, you know, if you have, it's not New England. It's not what's your name, who's your daddy. Everyone's nouveau riche in Miami. So no one cares where your money came from. As long as the booze is flowing and everybody's dancing, the music's going, nobody gives a shit. And it's always been that place. It's always been that party place. You were telling me before about how during, was it the

70s, the 80s, these recording artists would go down to Miami? Yeah, listen, Miami is just, it's America's Casablanca, you know, and so some of the biggest records of all time. I mean, back when that was a business, like you could sell tens of millions of albums. Everybody went to Miami. Eric Clapton was one of the first Jimmy Buffett, the Bee Gees, the Eagles, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, the Allman Brothers, Fleetwood Mac, and they were doing all those records that we all still know today from the 70s. They recorded, mixed, or mastered at least in part. Glenn Frey and Don Henley wrote the lyrics to Hotel California in a rented mansion on Miami Beach. That had been the love nest um of howard hughes and eva gardner uh uh winston churchill used it as a winter home uh and um the watergate burglars and howard hunt used it as well and then um stephen stills used it he was hanging out there with like shell silverstein they were it was like a weird scene and then uh eventually the eagles came down to do Hotel California and wrote the lyrics they locked themselves

these two guys in a fucking room and they just the housekeeper left sandwiches and drinks at the door because the door was closed and they came down in bathrobes one day with legal pads yellow legal pads and said we have it we have

we have the lyrics and so everybody and it was a communal scene, too. It's kind of like your place with the, you know, everybody just sort of like stops by. Yeah, people stop by. It was like that because you had all these artists in every room. So there was pickup basketball games outside. You'd drive up, and there'd be the Bee Gees playing,

the Allman Brothers playing Eric Clapton in a pickup basketball game. And to this day, Criteria Studios, they have a wooden upright piano. And the rumor has it one day there was an artist, I won't mention the name, was playing and had a baggie of cocaine on the top of the piano and he was playing and the baggie fell open, fell, boom, puff of smoke on the keys of the piano appropriately. And he grabbed the bag and salvaged what he could and then for the next several months the people at the studio who worked at it would stick a straw between the keys on the on the piano and try to mostly dust they were probably snorting but like we're just trying to salvage whatever they could for their so the the the joke

was that um they had a a line item on the bills. Because that's the thing. They were away from the watchful eyes and ears of the labels, which were all based in New York and L.A. So they would go to Miami and no one knew what the fuck was going on. They didn't have publicists or producers or executives, rather, from the recording studio. So they would send them bills to pay for the studio time. There would be a line item for cocaine, but you couldn't say cocaine.

And I think, by the way, cocaine at that time was probably part of the appeal of bringing the artist to Miami, to be fair. Probably, right? But it was under the category of piano tuning was the cocaine. So you get someone at accounts and a record label would call up and say,

hey, I have a question about this. This invoice. It's there's five thousand dollars here for piano tuning. But there's only one ballad on the album. So what's with all this fucking piano tuning? There was an act. I'm not going to say it, but there was a band who came down in the 80s to record a criteria. And then they came down again in the 90s.

And the guy who runs the studio, Trevor, his mom was the manager before him. So he was a little kid running around this scene. If you can imagine a little kid, Miami in the 70s running around this scene, this incredible place, Aretha Franklin did the respect record at criteria. James Brown did I feel good recorded that song at criteria. It's a really historic place. And so he this band comes in and he says the lead singer, he says, Hey, listen, I don't know if you remember, you were down here 15 years ago, whatever, back in the late 70s, early 80s doing this, this record. And the singer says, I have no memory of that whatsoever, except for one thing. he said one night apparently we were done recording here and someone took us into the neighborhood it's like in a residential kind of area into the neighborhood to this woman's house and she brought out a brick of cocaine an entire kilo of cocaine he said i'd never seen that before she put it down on the coffee table we're sitting on the couch she put it down like this is a big

band uh they put it she put it down on the coffee table. She cut it open. And all I remember from my entire experience in Miami is the smell of that entire kilo of cocaine. Like just what it feels like when an entire kilo of cocaine is opened up before you and it hits you. Have you ever done coke? Never. Me neither. Never. But hearing that, I want to sniff

I just want to take away. I want to know what that's like Can you imagine you or I doing cocaine? Oh my god both of us wouldn't shut the fuck imagine Two of us together in a room with coke they'd scrape us off the ceiling fucking shovel like hey That's fucking that's that Joe and Bill up there. No shit. It's kind of amazing that you've managed to go through high school, college, the whole deal, and not. And live this whole time in Miami. But I went to an arts high school in the 90s.

So cocaine, you know, drug trends tend to be kind of cyclical, you know? They run in the, like nostalgia cycles. They kind of run in 20 year kind of things. Oh, this decade is defined by this, you know? So, you know, you had psychedelics in the like nostalgia cycles They kind of run in 20 year kind of things Oh this decade is defined by this You know so you know You had psychedelics in the 60s Cocaine Cocaine kind of comes in vogue in the 70s

Obviously there's some overlap You know beginning of the 70s Is like the end of the 60s etc But in the 90s it kind of died away Totally and of course pot's a perennial Pot is always hot but by the 90s What happens is yeah cocaine away. Totally. And, of course, pot's a perennial. Pot is always hot. But by the 90s, what happens is, yeah, cocaine kind of fell out of favor. Also, I went to arts high school. No one could afford cocaine.

But the 60s drugs kind of came around again. People were doing mushrooms, acid, MDMA. Ecstasy became a thing. So that trend kind of came around again. And people weren't really doing cocaine when I was in high school. They were doing a lot of other shit, though. When I was in high school, people were doing coke. But in the 90s, after that, I remember someone saying something about coke, and someone was

like, you do coke still? In the 90s, people had stopped. But then somewhere in the 2000s, it seemed to kick up again. And it's like people forget. It's like a group of people ruin their entire lives with coke. And then I don't know if you know about this, what's going on right now in L.A., but there was a terrible tragedy amongst these comedians where four comedians at a party overdosed. Yeah, and they're getting cocaine that's laced with fentanyl.

And one of them survived, and she's in the ICU now, and she started to talk again and text people and stuff, so she seems like she's going to make it. But three people died. Legalize it, regulate it. Yes. Who the fuck knows what you're getting? You get a pill or a baggie of powder from somebody in a club or whatever?

I mean... Stan Hope wrote about it on his Instagram, was getting into it with people, but it's 100% true. Because then you would get actual cocaine. And actual cocaine, you'd probably feel like shit in the morning, but you'd survive. And you would at least know, like, you know, we had this whiskey. You have a shot of whiskey, you know what it is. It's a shot of whiskey.

We all know what it means. We know what that dose is. We know what that's going to do to us. And you can overdose on whiskey. Anyone can. You can all go to the store and buy enough alcohol to drink yourself to death on a daily basis. But at least you know what it is. With these cocaine-laced with fentanyl products that people are getting or heroin-laced with fentanyl, you have no idea.

You're just rolling the dice that the cartel didn't fuck up in this mix. Forget the cartel. Once it gets to retail, that's where they really step on it and cut it up. Yeah, all kinds of people are stepping on it all over the place. It's crazy. Yeah, it's a scary thing, and it's unnecessary. But it's a thing where it's political suicide, I think. If someone came along and said, like if DeSantis said,

legalize all drugs, people would be like, you're out of your fucking mind. You can't do that. He's still blocking the legalization of medical marijuana, which 70 plus percent of Floridians voted in favor of. Yeah, that's a silly thing because people with nausea, people with

anything, any kind of wasting disease, any cancer, people that are dealing with chemotherapy, it is a godsend. There's a thing called NAD. We tried to come up with how you say it the other day, but what it does is it actually lengthens your telomeres. It's something that you take in an intravenous form,

and it's super good for your body. It's one of the rare things that you take that you do it in IV form, and almost immediately afterwards you feel great but this stuff is brutal to take and it usually takes about two hours in a drip because you want to take it very slowly because when you take it fast it just kill it's it's the most unpleasant uncomfortable feeling in your stomach unless you're high when you smoke weed i turn that thing up full crank and i go through a full bag in ten minutes And I'm telling you I barely feel it and I was when I was doing that I was like oh well

This is probably the nausea preventing aspect that chemo patients enjoy and people that you know people with AIDS People that have a really hard time eating food and the the something about marijuana and nausea really hard time eating food and the the something about marijuana and nausea honestly I I know that it's a medicine you know that it's a medicine I think most people even who participate in the prohibition which has been the incidentally the deadliest thing about marijuana has been the prohibition of course it's with every drug yeah you're you're boosting up organized crime and I just so but the point is i also when it comes to the legalization i don't care that it has a medicinal purpose that whiskey does not have

a medicinal hot toddy when you have a little cold maybe you know there's no medicinal purpose you do it for fun and i don't give a shit you know that's that's that's that's the autonomy you know that you it's your body it's not affecting other people. And you want to enter into some sort of deal or contract with a certified marijuana dealer or a dispensary or cocaine dealer for that matter. What do I care? I feel the same way about everything. I feel the same way about cigarettes, motorcycle racing. You do whatever the fuck you want, man. As long as it's not hurting me right i am

100 for you making your own choices you're right to wave your hands and ends where my nose begins yes and bottom line if you're over there yeah what the fuck do i care yeah you know but we have this attitude in this country that drugs are bad right we all grew up in the 80s that just say no all that nonsense that got into people's heads while people all around you are doing sanctioned government approved drugs yeah that are killing people drug dealers in lab coats yeah yeah absolutely but i you know i i we did a documentary called limelight about the um the disco turned nightclub i didn didn't see that one. It was a deconsecrated historic church, a cathedral in Chelsea.

In New York City. I remember that. Pre-gentrification. Yeah. I was around back then. It was fun. Peter Gation bought this, this Canadian guy bought this place

and turned it into a nightclub. And it was the club kids scene. It was all that. And of course, then the rise of ecstasy. And then in this doc, we talk about how MDMA was a useful and effective tool that therapists were using. Particularly like marriage therapy. People open up. They got more honest. They got more, you know, you know they told you know it was like a truth serum you know and like and got

in touch with their feelings and and it was a it was a viable not only was it a viable medicine but it was something that that doctors were availing themselves of in treatment and then the the DEA suddenly and unilaterally classifies it as a as a as a controlled substance and all of a sudden it went from potentially a viable so this wasn't an act of congress this was a bureau an unelected bureaucratic organization who said well you know the war on drugs is kind of winding down we need a new line item right we need a budget. We need hundreds of millions of dollars to fight the scourge of this new party drug, the kids and the discos, it's killing the kids. And so they just suddenly created a new villain overnight, which costs us billions and ultimately trillions of dollars to fight, which was a very real drug. And when doctors are controlling it, administering it at a medical level it's one thing

you got a bunch of guys making pills in their condos you know like with the the synthetic drugs and who knows what the fuck is it is in that you're paying somebody 20 for a pill on a dance floor well at least maps has started to use mdma therapy to help people with ptsd and traumatic brain injuries and this is something that's going on right now. And there's federally approved studies. So because of the good work that MAPS has done in showing that a lot of these people with these traumatic experiences, people that have been assaulted, abused, sexual assault, they can have an amazing relief from MDMA therapy. And so because of that, we have a real good chance of reintroducing MDMA, because of MAPS,

as a therapeutic use medicine, really, which is really what it is. I mean, obviously, it's a party drug. Obviously, it's great. It makes people feel good. But there's some amazing therapeutic uses for particularly for soldiers and again people with traumatic experiences litany of drugs you can abuse but legalize it regulate it tax it yeah it's the only it's yeah it's what it's what's been so frustrating about them the medical marijuana a fucking it's just like Trek it's just like it's

this never- ending saga in Florida is that like, I remember when I went, so I didn't smoke pot until I was, when I tried, I was like 37 years old. How old are you now?

I'm 43. So I tried pot very late. So when I met you, you had just started. I just, well, I don't smoke it right. I tried it.

When do you smoke it? Like how often? Never. I just, I was in, I was in Colorado and that's like, you know and that's like going to Italy and not eating pasta. So you rarely smoke pot is what you're saying? Yeah.

I almost never smoke pot. You do smoke pot sometimes. I do take like a gummy sometimes. I don't smoke it. Like a 10 milligram? Like a little one? I'm a lightweight. Listen, 10 milligrams is nice.

It's a nice feeling? I'm a lightweight. Yeah. Listen, 10 milligrams is nice. It's a nice feeling. I didn't, I don't know. I didn't care for it. I said to my, I remember I was in this pot smoking. I was in this pot church in Denver. That's always a bad place to be. Yeah. You don't want to be in public, dude.

Yeah. Well, anytime someone sets up a pot church, you're like, who am I associating with? I knew the guy. He was okay people. You have wooden beads? He might have. I don't know. I'm high and I'm sitting in these pews.

Right. You know, and it's dark and people are, and I'm just like, I'm like, I don't like this. I said to my girlfriend, I said, I wish I was drunk. I wish I was drunk. this i said i said my girlfriend i said i wish i was drunk i wish i was drunk and then and she's like and we didn't what i said oh she never let me forget this i said i said this will never catch on so there's a never i didn't remember saying that but she said that's what i said this will never catch on and then we went to chick-fil-a. Ooh, game changer. Because hate tastes great. Hate tastes great. We went to Chick-fil-A, and I got to tell you, I'm like, oh, I get it.

Listen, Chick-fil-A is good without pot, but I was like, oh, I get it. Even just the crunch of the chicken. For me, it was an ice cream sundae. I had an ice cream sundae. I was 30 years old. I had not been a pot smoker my whole life i had maybe smoked pot a handful of times and then when i was 30 years old a buddy of mine said he was a musician my friend eddie bravo he's a musician jujitsu guy and he's like dude it helps

me creatively i love it i was like really i just thought i made you stupid i thought it was just a thing that made people dumb so we smoked pot and went to dairy queen and like oh my god baskin robbins that's where my baskin robbins i remember i had a hot fudge sundae and i remember eating the hot fudge with the nuts and the vanilla ice cream i was like this is sensational i've never tasted food like this and i was like i get it now i get it yeah it was the chick-fil-a that made me. I was like, I understand it. Crunch. But it kind of like, it's weird. It makes me feel like my head is kind of like closing in around my brain.

I get this weird like pressure in my head from it. Yeah, you get scared too. I didn't get scared, but it's like, I found it kind of like uncomfortable and annoying. I didn't like, I love to like, I like to drink. Did you try sex on it? No. That's the move. Really?

Oh my God. God, I didn't know what to move you try sex on it? No. That's the move. Really? Oh my God. God, I didn't even know what a move, really. Sex on marijuana? On the bottom, maybe. It feels so different. It feels so, like everything, it's like you can feel the person's soul. It's wild. Really?

Yeah, it's a complete game changer. Still with the gummies? Will that work with the gummies? Yeah, the gummies work. You have to realize that gummies is a different thing because thc is what happens when you smoke it but when you eat it it's processed by your liver and it produces 11 hydroxy metabolite it's much more psychoactive it's like four to five times more psychoactive than thc so it's way more powerful that's why a lot of people when they eat marijuana they think they got dosed because it is essentially a psychedelic and when you take high dose

Edibles high dose edibles with an isolation tank is as wild as any mushroom trip. I've ever done It's really crazy like you see crazy visuals like fucking pyramids and UFOs and like these these Like cartoonish neon figures that are mating I remember I took a really strong edible once and got on a flight and it was one of the craziest Experiences of my life all I did was close my eyes and curl up in a position I had a window seat so it was like my head was up against the window and my eyes were closed and the whole Flight I was watching these animated neon characters breed They were like having sex and making all these other animated characters

And then it was like this weird sort of fractal effect, and it was it was Hypnotic and it was it was insane and it lasted for a good solid hour Pass yeah, man The fuck do you write when you're high like you write jokes and you when yeah george carlin i think had the best idea what george carlin would do is he would write sober and then he would smoke pot and punch it up so he'd have concepts so he'd have these concepts and just figure out you know where the humor is where the irony is and then he would get high that's like the exact opposite of the adage,

which is write drunk, edit sober. That's like the exact, that's like write sober, edit high. But you're trying for funny, right? Like write drunk, edit sober is great because you can take out the self-indulgent stuff and the chaos and sort of whittle it into a more conducive form for human consumption. But there's something about writing high where you find the funny.

It's not like write drunk, edit sober. It's when you edit high, you're literally editing for giggles. You're looking for, and you'll find pathways that are funny. I think George had it. Well, obviously, George is one of the all- greats and he had a, he had a great method. I've used that method, but I also use the get high as fuck method and right. That's a great method too. I like to do that late at night because you know, I have family, I have children. It's, it's, I can't be getting high during the day when my kids are in the house. So what I do is I wait until everyone's

asleep and then I get barbecued. And then usually after a show, like I'll come home from a show like 1230 at night and I'll just sit in front of the keyboard and just start mashing ideas. That's great. I've never, I mean, I've written work drunk before, but I just like, I don't know, it's kind of in my line of work,

I guess a little more important to have your wits about you. Yeah, but it's, it is, there's a, it's a tool, you know, it's, it guess, a little more important to have your wits about you. Yeah, but it's a tool. You can use it correctly and you can get a lot out of it or you can start abusing it. I'm a giant fan of Stephen King. And Stephen King's book on writing is one of my favorite books on the creative process. It's a great book. But one of the things that comes out of that book is, first of all his his thankfulness of his sobriety his love for his family and how he realized he could have lost it

all because he was really like off the rails crazy and doing pounds of blow and fucking drinking cases of beer every night i couldn't tell that from his books interesting well the thing is that's my point is those are the best books they really are the best albums yeah no I read that go back and you read Harry you read The Shining you read Cujo like that was his wildest shit man and he was out of his mind he was out of his mind and he just reached it's not that he can't write without it he absolutely he's one of the crates but the the stuff that he wrote when he was fucked up was magic like magically horrific scenarios you know because he was battling these like real-time demons in his head while he's mashing

those keyboards i'm gonna read that but i haven't read the book his book about writing oh it's really i love you know sometimes like writing about writing is like dancing about architecture, talking about love. But like, it's like, it's, I'm, I'm, I'm endlessly fascinated by writers writing about writing. Me too. And he, his, I think his memoir, that is a memoir. And it's, it's, I think it's one of the best because it's, it's about many things. It's about his life.

It's about how incredible he found his early success and how rewarding it was and how chaotic it was and overwhelming and how he couldn't believe it was real. And then it's also about his demons and struggles.

And then it's also about recovery from getting hit by a fucking bus or a van rather. You know, like, that's what he got hit by. His accident, yeah. Something like that.

Yeah. And his body got destroyed, you know, and then trying to pick up the pieces and start writing again It's great. It's a fantastic book. It's really good But the things that struck me is like man when he was off the rails he wrote some good shit That's it's like that kind of stuff like when you go back and you read The Shining I mean The Shining was about an author that was losing his fucking mind in a haunted house. And in a lot of ways, that was probably what was happening to Stephen King with the cocaine and the alcohol and, you know, and he's writing this crazy shit

while he's battling his own literal demons. The alienation from your family. Yeah. Yeah. All that. Yeah. The fucking chaos in his head. A lot of that is, you know, I had to,

when I was here last time, I had written a play for some reason. And so, um, like writing is the hardest thing. It's the hardest thing. It's very isolating. I literally went into hotels. I got hotel rooms by myself just to,

to sit and write. And it's so so and writing on command it's like stand-up like i think stand-up comedy is like one of the bravest one of the bravest professions because it's like go be funny now be funny it's like you have a date and a time when you have to go and be funny and it's just like i think and it's and it's fucking stressful it doesn't matter how good the material may be in advance. Sometimes it's not going to work. You know, I've seen like my appreciation for stand-up comedy came from watching Legends Bomb. I've been in a room where like I'm the only motherfucker laughing at Gilbert Gottfried.

Where have you been? Where was that? That was at the old Miami Improv. Remember the one at the Seminole? Coconut Grove? No, that was it. Well, not the oldest Miamiami improv but the miami improv before the latin now it's in dural uh it was at uh hollywood the seminole hard rock hotel

oh okay yeah i saw him bomb there i went to vegas in like 2000 ish and i got to town oh my girl at the time and i saw carlin's name on a marquee and I was like well that settles that like I got on the phone I was like Carlin tickets and my grandpa knew some high roller at that hotel I forget which hotel it was and they got us front row and so it was like a comedy club it's a cabaret like you know like style room but like um it was you know with the table you know perpendicular to the stage you know and we were sitting like the fucking stage was right here. And then Carlin was like right up here. And so he was doing that bit about because he was I was actually obviously trying out

material for his HBO next issue, which was the God bit. The I don't believe in God. I believe in Joe Pesci. I believe in the sun. That whole God. He's doing this whole God riff, which was clearly still, I think, working on at the time. And so I'm hysterically laughing and i'm realizing that other than carlin's voice the only thing i'm hearing is my laughter oh god in an empty sold out fucking showroom and i i literally turned because i became self-conscious about it

and i turn around as you imagine this shot from ipov i kind of pan the room and i look at these people these just good god-fearing americans who just were not about carlin dissing the the big guy or the big girl and And they're just like stone. It's like the audience of the producers watching Springtime for Hitler. They're just like fucking appalled. And so I sweep the room. I come back and I look up here

and George Carlin's nose is right here. And he's bending down off the stage at me. And we're practically nose to, and he goes bending down off the stage at me and we're practically nose to and he goes thank you sir and then walk because i'm the only motherfucker laughing in the room he goes thank you sir and then and then stalks off back off the state and i was just like wow oh my god and i watched george carlin bomb and one of the funniest human beings to ever exist in this universe and probably one of the smartest human beings to ever exist in this universe. And probably one of the smartest human beings as well, I'd say. And just an added bonus that he was so fucking funny.

I saw Carlin Baum in New Hampshire in 1988 or 89, somewhere around then. He went through a rough patch where I don't know what was going on, but i was a big fan of his before this and then during this there was a few albums i remember because george would put out a he would put out an hbo special every year and what he would do differently than other comedians is he would write it all out and then he would bring a legal paper on stage and he would have the script for what he was doing. And he had no problem like having the notes on a stool and he would go over it. And he had this one routine that he was trying to close with and it just was bombing. And it was fuck.

It was basically fuck everything. It was fuck Israel, fuck comedy clubs, fuck God, fuck the church. It was like he was going through this whole thing, and it just wasn't working. It just didn't resonate. And I remember thinking, wow, this is weird. Like I'm watching because I brought my roommates, and my roommates were kind of unsophisticated at the time, to put it mildly. And they're like, what is this?

This is fucking terrible. And, you know, we drove all the way to New Hampshire to watch George Carlin bomb. I feel like that's always the way, when you recommend somebody to watch something or see a show, it's always the worst episode that's going to be on, because they're like, you have no taste.

Well, this is when I was just either thinking about doing stand-up or starting to do stand-up. It was in that range. So I was an evangelist. I was like, you got to see this guy. Oh, my God, Dom Herrera is the funniest guy that's ever lived. Come see this guy with me. So I was dragging my friends with me to these comedy clubs,

and some of them were brutes. Some of my friends that I knew at the time from my martial arts days were crazy people. They had no artistic sophistication whatsoever. You had to beat them over the head with the jokes or they weren't going to get it and there was a lot of uh value in that too because you get to watch comedy from people that with people rather that were not comedy fans i got to see like how like sort of subtle stuff just didn't hit them at all ironic stuff you know

it was interesting to see but i'd taken them to see everybody. And when I took them all the way to fucking New Hampshire to see George Carlin, he bombed. Dom Herrera requires a sophisticated palate. Dom Herrera. I love Dom Herrera. He's one of the all-time greats. He's such a great...

Have you ever met him? I have. He's awesome. He's such a great guy. He's so fucking funny, too. And he's a guy that, like, never stopped such a great guy. He's so fucking funny too, and he's a guy that like never stopped working on his act and As opposed to like some comics got to this point where as they got older they just never wrote anymore They sort of relied on their old material where they relied on the reputation

Dom Herrera was always in the trenches still is I was really lucky for a while I was I was I would appear whenever I was in miami in town at home i would go on this show um the paul and young ron show on yeah i know those guys and so ron's gone he retired uh but paul castronova still there and he would have me on the show every friday to talk about whatever movies were coming out that weekend or just talk shit and that was of course the day when the stand-ups were promoting their weekends and so I'd wind up with just the coolest people in in a studio and what I found which was really cool is that because that was time wise that was like the dawn like of Netflix streaming and so all these comics on the road were like all I do is sit in the hotel or in

the apartment and I watch Netflix streaming and so a lot of them had been exposed to my work and it turned out like I'm big fans of theirs and they're big it's kind of the fun thing about this business like the entertainment it's like you know you don't know who your fans are and some of them are much cool me rest assured much cooler than I am um I had wound up I wound up in Janet Jackson's mansion one time in Miami Beach because she summoned us to the mansion. Summoned?

How did she do that? Did she have a horn? To an agent. Oh. Yes. It's a shofar, really. And so we got a call from an agent who was a mutual friend

and he said, Janet is in town. She's renting a mansion on LaGorse Island. island god that's a while lagorse island is where sal magluta from coquing cowboys the kings of miami rented a mansion as well so that's how i knew lagorse i'm like fucking sal magluta's mansion rental mansion so she said she's here recording an album she wants to meet you she's a huge fan and i was like she did she think you were the guy from the Smashing Pumpkins? Yeah, I was like, who does she...

Did she? I'm the one with the hair. Does she know that? I'm like, not Billy Corgan. And who incidentally has at Billy on Twitter? Was he like a fucking investor in Twitter? Like, how did he got at Billy? I don't know, Billy's smart.

So what happens is when people go, want to tweet at him, they go at Billy C-O-R. And my name, I i guess like autofills because they go right past at billy which he has at billy and so i get all kinds of like when they're like upset at how he treated daisy on wrestling on sunday or i'm like what the fuck is going on like you're so mean to daisy i'm like what the fuck is happening like why who who do you think i am but like um but like uh we get so janet wants to to meet you and so we come to this mansion we're sitting with her manager at the time was this great big hilarious dude and we're just chilling on the couch and all of a sudden he looks up and

all of a sudden at the top of the stairway a vision janet jackson she's like in this beautiful like muumuu was like i don't know it's just like seeing like a like nefertiti like like fucking royalty like cleopatra appear at that we're just all just like uh there's like you know the angels are singing and she's beautiful and so like and she like descends the staircase you know we're just like this is incredible and she sits down and she is just like the sweetest, like most casual down to earth person. And she goes into this story. She's like, one morning, my phone rings. It's like four o'clock in the morning.

And it's Jermaine Dupri, not Jackson, her brother. She was dating Jermaine Dupri at the time. And I said, baby, is everything okay? He says, yes, I'm coming over right now. There's something you need to see. And she goes, okay. It's four o'clock in the morning. Shows up at the door.

She's like, are you sure everything's okay? Yes, everything's fine, baby. You've got to watch this. And he hands me a DVD-R written in Sharpie. It says, Cocaine Cowboys. a dvdr written in sharpie it says cocaine cowboys and i'm like i'm like i'm like i'm with their my producing partner alfred spellman i'm just like what the fuck is happening right now what the fuck is happening and she said and i watched it twice she put the d DVD, the bootleg, into the DVD player at 4 o'clock in the morning. And she watched Cooking Cowboys twice.

And she's like, you know, when we were growing up, my sister, she was interested in love story and romance novels. She's talking about Latoya right now. Right. Like, we know too much about this family. Right. You know, so, like, she's like, she goes, I loved, you know, mafia stories, crime stories, Scarface, Crime Incorporated, Al Capone. That was my thing. And so I loved it.

And she wanted to talk about Griselda Blanco, the godmother. And I'm like, this is batshit crazy. So she says, do you guys like sushi? Alfred hates sushi. He says, yeah, I like sushi Alfred hates sushi he says yeah I like sushi she says we should go to Nobu and have sushi next week he's like yeah absolutely love sushi and we went out with Jana Jackson oh my god to Nobu and she's like and we shared it was it was surreal it was just it was a weird wild experience that's what happened with with uh with tony bourdain is i don't drink beer i drink whiskey

or gin and so we get a call from why so specific that's just what i like i like i'm not i'm agnostic when it comes to whiskey i'll drink i feel like any whiskey will i like good whiskey but any whiskey you'll do when it comes to gin i got i'm a little bit more of a stickler because you can't bad gin is a bad night and a worse morning but like but whiskey i don't like i can just i can drink all kinds of whiskey but like gin i'm very i'm very picky about but i don't drink beer and so tony's producer calls and says tony would like to have a beer and stone crabs with you for the show. I said, yes, yes. You better believe I'm drinking beer.

Stone crabs go with beer, though. Yeah, and we had like a local brewed. Miami, we don't make a lot of shit. You know, like we don't have. Like you go to Colorado. And I'm like, oh, I'm going to try some local whiskey, right? Some local, you know. And I'm like, which one of those is like a Colorado? they're like all of them they're all me Miami we don't

have like we make a rum we and now we have some micro breweries we don't we don't man we don't make a lot of shit you know so um so uh we we had a locally brewed beer and stone crabs a cat and jims for the show and talked and then they stopped shooting and we just sat there for like another hour, just chilling and we didn't do much eating on camera and then just eating and talking. And it was unforgettable. You have to know that cocaine cowboys is without doubt, one of the top five greatest documentaries of all time. There's no doubt. That's very nice of you. Thank you.

I've seen hundreds of documentaries. I've never seen a documentary as many times in a row as I've seen Cocaine Cowboys. You and Janet Jackson. So many times I've had people over the house and I was like, dude, you got to fucking watch this. And just looking over at my friends 20 minutes in where they're like, bro, it gets crazier. It gets crazy. And there's a part two.

It does. You're right. It does get crazier actually yeah It really does And now I guess we should talk about this We have a fucking whole series on Netflix now How many episodes is this? Six I'm only two in

I'm two in now But god damn it's good It's like all your shit man It gets better Oh I can only imagine It is a fucking amazing How many insane stories have come out of this one part of the country. And, you know, I had a buddy of mine.

I think I told you this. My good friend Steve Graham did his residency. He's an ophthalmologist. He did his residency in Miami during the 80s, during the chaos days. And he would, like, save Polaroidsaroids of like just some of the craziest shit that they saw best place to ply your trade i mean really whatever business you were in especially in those days you were in law enforcement you were a lawyer prosecutor a doctor yeah and you name it that was the place that you want a journalist god knows that was where you wanted

to ply your trade i know what pardon me a guy was working as an ER doctor, Jackson, at the trauma center in 1980. The Mariel boatlift had just happened. You remember, this is how Scarface opens. Oh, okay. Castro opens up the Mariel Harbor and sends the loudest people to leave. And he empties the prisons, the mental institutions, the hospitals, and just just he said, I flushed the toilet of Cuba onto the United States. And it created a real crisis. I mean, four counties in South Florida nearly got bankrupt because you're absorbing 150 refugees, some small percentage of which are, you know, dangerous people.

And you don't know who they are. Yeah, you can't weed them out. And so but then you have to absorb the infirm and the sick and the young and people who don't have you know health care or housing or or food and so um miami beach looks a lot like like havana like the seawall you know like the the seawall in the malacon it's like it's so a lot of and at that time it was just like it wasn't scarface it was like it was like 75 plus jewish a lot of holocaust survivors literally just god's waiting room they called it just playing out the rest of their lives inefficiencies on ocean drive flop houses that would like 125 a week maybe that was high like that's what you could live in miami beach

for so people on fixed incomes you know social security elderly retired and then it attracted a lot of the Marielitos, particularly the criminal element. And there were places where the Miami Beach Police Department would just literally just drive around the block because they'd keep getting calls to go to this. Oh, this guy just got shot. This guy just got stabbed.

And it was over dumb shit. It was Wild West shit. It was like over a Domino's game. And so one day, this trauma surgeon is working at the ER, and in comes a Mariel refugee with a gunshot wound. And he says to the guy, he's bilingual, he says, tells him Spanish, listen, you're very lucky. He said, if you had been shot, you know, just millimeters this way, it would have hit a vital organ. You would have bled out. You would have been dead before you even got here.

Saves the guy. Guy goes on his way days later he gets another guy another patient a mario refugee with a gunshot wound in exactly the same place he told the other guy that if you shot he got shot there he would die and this guy died and he could never prove it but he always believed that that was a retaliation shooting for the first guy that he had in there but like that happened like people have like stories like that for fucking days. It was the number one mayor's jewelers in South Florida, number one seller of Rolex watches, the Mutiny Hotel, which we talk about in the doc and actually several docs, which was the inspiration for the Babylon Club and Scarface.

They were the number one seller of Dom Perignon. They had to like convert hotel rooms into refrigerated walk-in units for the Dom Perignon because they could not keep it in stock. They also filled the tubs. The Mutiny Girls would fill the tubs in the rooms with the Dom Perignon as well so they could bill the customers. So that was part of where the supply was going. But that was a different kind of party depending on what you were willing to pay. But Miami is just one of those places in that era, you know, when it became America's Casablanca. I mean, look, the the our number one and two industries at that time still today, early 1980s Miami. Number two was tourism, generating upwards of about $7 billion a year into the Miami-Dade economy. Number one, I should say legitimate industry was real estate generating

about $9 billion a year into the economy in miami the drug trade at the time was estimated to bring in upwards of 12 billion dollars a year into our local economy so what you're saying is our number one business was an illicit trade was the illegal drug trade the money laundering and i will tell you i believe it to be the only case study i should say the only successful case study of ronald reagan's trickle-down economics it's the only time it worked was in the drug boom in miami because banditos rob a bank and they ride on into the next town right and they spend their ill-gotten gains they stayed in miami they kept that money in miami so that trickled down from the kingpins to banks and to real estate and to people who were not in the illicit trade.

But just I'll give you an example. Somebody let's do the bottom of the food chain in the drug industry. If you were a weekend worrier, you would want to show up and maybe do some grunt work, do some. You knew a drug smuggler, which was not uncommon in Miami. Everybody knew a drug smuggler. Marco Rubio spent a summer living in a cocaine stash house that belonged to his brother-in-law. Really? In Miami, we're all guilty by geography. We're all complicit by just virtue of proximity to colorful characters. Marco Rubio was like 14. He wasn't in the drug trade, but his brother-in-law was a major cocaine trafficker, and they lived in West Kendall,

in Miami-Dade, southwest Miami-Dade, in a cocaine stash house for a summer. That's like a rite of passage, like a quinceanera or bar mitzvah in Miami. Like, I spent the summer in my brother-in-law's cocaine stash house by Marco Rubio. Must have made a really interesting paper for what I did with my summer vacation. But that's just like, that's Miami. We're all touched by this. And so let's say you say to your buddy, hey, listen, I want to come out and just help you unload a plane, right? Grunt work, physical labor.

What do you get? Guy says, I'll give you $10,000 to come out cash tax free. Come on. So here's a guy not really in the drug business, just comes out to do some manual labor, gets $10,000 cash. This is a guy probably making in those days about $15,000 a year on the books, taxable income. But he's getting $10,000, let's say once a month, cash in Miami. So he's got $120,000 cash. Where? Stash somewhere. Where do you even put it? Cash became like a real liability because it was just, it's so bulky and annoying. People are putting it in walls and burying it and banks are charging you a vig to deposit cash, because they had no fucking place to put it. And so, but you have $120,000, so people spent it.

It went into everything. And that was the thing. If you weren't addicted to cocaine in Miami, you were addicted to that, that money. And that's the legacy, too, is that, you know, the tech hub hustle. It's just the new cocaine. It's just the new Hollywood East never happened. It's just the new modern art hub never happened. It's a hustle.

We have to subsist that way because we don't have any other industry. Well, it also, it's the center of flossing in the country, right? If you think about people that are just driving Lamborghinis and wearing giant rope chains, you think about Miami. The culture is so flashy. Fake it to make it. It's fake it to make it, but it's also people that have it and want you to know. It's all those things, right? Yeah, but that's like some nouveau riche business.

That's what I said. People from money don't necessarily behave. They usually don't want you to know that they have money. It makes them vulnerable. It makes them targets. If you're rich, you don't tell people you're rich. If you're smart, you don't tell people you're smart. I knew this guy whose family was insanely

generational wealth and they got mad at him when he bought a Porsche. They got mad at him. They're like, what are you driving? What are you doing with this fucking thing? He's like, it's a nice car. They're like, you fucking idiot driving? What are you doing with this fucking thing? He's like, it's a nice car. They're like, you fucking idiot. They wanted everybody to shut the fuck up because they were billionaires. They wanted to shut the fuck up.

I think about De Niro and Goodfellas when you say that. Right. The woman with the guy with the cat. Get that fucking, fucking take that back. Yes, exactly. Keep it on the DL, man. But Miami is just universally known for being the flashiest place in the country. I don't think there's a flashier place.

Hollywood is not as flashy as Miami. Not even close. No, and it's, like, where people come from Hollywood also to be that ostentatious. Yeah, to get crazy. Yeah, it's a baller economy. It's like that's, you know, that's what it is. Somewhat somewhere there's more banks per capita in Miami than any other major metropolitan city that was definitely true at one time And we had probably more international branches. You know like branches of foreign banks, and that it was all about Processing cocaine money that was the reason why there were so many banks there yeah

I mean listen. It's not a coincidence that we're now like a Bitcoin hub you know like I mean I meano Cowboys will probably be my next documentary at this rate. I mean, like, listen, we, it's, I'm not saying people use Bitcoin to money launder. I'm just saying they may use Bitcoin to money launder. And so, first of all, I don't even know why a decentralized currency needs a hub.

Isn't that the whole point? Is that it's a decentralized, why does Miami have to be a crypto hub? First of all, we don't have the electricity. We don't have the power. I guess you could use the nuclear power plant, which one of these days is going to melt down. We have more incidents. Oh, is it a bad power plant?

It's not. They forge documents. We have alarms. If you're going to fake it until you make it at Turkey Point, at the nuclear power plant, you've got problems. Are you going to make nuclear cowboys i i listen i i hope i hope to live long enough to me yeah i don't start growing a tail and the the alligators don't start you know turning

into godzilla or whatever but a lot of these older power plants apparently no i'm not very knowledgeable about this but when i talk to people that are physicists they've said that nuclear power plants can be made today and be made far more efficiently and they're actually like very good for the environment in terms of like what you put in versus what gets out but the older ones like when they made them in the 60s and the 70s he's like they're a real problem and we saw it with fukushima because when the backup generator went down and they realized oh, we're fucked like this thing's gonna melt down And there's no way to stop it and now we have a perpetually contaminated area that will be like this way for eons Okay, and ours is on the water, and it's like so is

Like it is like Godzilla shit. Yeah, there's actually actually this hilarious, terrible, like, I can't even call it a B movie. It's like a Z movie. It was executive produced by some Colombian drug traffickers to launder their money through this movie. It's called Island Claws. And it's about a nuclear incident that creates these aggressive, gigantic crabs that are attacking South Florida. And they shot it in Virginia. They shot it all over Miami. And that's the thing, too.

I'm not saying that everything in Miami is money laundering, but everything in Miami is basically money laundering. I mean, what else do we do there? I mean, Willie and Sal, Los Muchachos, the boys from Cocaine Cowboys,

the Kings of Miami, they helped to start a bank with some of their high school buddies from Miami High, appropriately, Miami High. They helped start a bank expressly for the purpose of drug money laundering. Sunshine State Bank. It was a drug money laundering bank. Everybody knew it. It was founded by, it was for expressly for that purpose. And and yeah and they had a guy this is funny this is from a deleted scene um they had a guy an attorney um named juan acosta he was very popular let's say among miami's nouveau riche of the late 70s and early 80s the

sudden sudden millionaires and billionaires that we had cropping up i mean willie and sal were accused by the government of smuggling over 75 tons of cocaine worth over $2 billion with a B. And that was only what the government thought they knew about. So you can imagine. Their co-conspirators said one of them says in the documentary, I think it was more like 175

tons. These guys spent $25 million on their defense in their first trial. Holy shit. Yeah yeah talk about a dream team they had they had they put oj did they get off well you have to it's episode you're on episode episode three you gotta you gotta you gotta get through episode three okay but these guys had this lawyer to set up their offshore companies you know to kind of conceal their ill-gotten gains money laundering you know he would set up these foreign companies, particularly in Panama,

which was at the time a, you know, drug trafficking and laundering friendly state. In fact, we raided it because of that. And so they needed a man on the ground, in country, to be on the corporate documents, right, as an officer, as their treasurer. So this guy, Guillermo Indara, appears on all of these corporate documents as an officer in these shell treasurer. So this guy, Guillermo Indara, appears on all of these corporate documents

as an officer in these shell companies for drug money laundering. Then the United States of America goes and invades Panama under the guise of the war on drugs, ostensibly because Manuel Noriega, the president, was an enabler of drug trafficking, was a drug money launderer,

and so we had to take him out. We brought him actually to Miami, to the Southern District of Florida, to go on trial for this, right? And then we install a new president in Panama. Who do we install? Guillermo Andara, the drug money launderer, who was listed in the documents of all these cocaine traffickers, who was their money launderer in Panama. The United States makes him the president of Panama.

That's a deleted scene, by the way, from our documentary. Why? Why'd you delete that? If you go to Netflix's YouTube page, you can see it there. Why'd you take that out? Listen, I should have called this, instead of Kings of Miami, we could have called it Cocaine Cowboys. We've got hours of this shit.

I mean, because like, there's no, and all the crazy shit that's in the movie, and some people, listen, I say that's tantamount to malpractice, cutting that out of the documentary, but you just have to, it's just time. You just have to, and you're crafting a thing. Listen, the pressure of building a six-part thing, you need, listen, I'm always looking for the button right I'm doing an interview with someone what's the last line right you want to leave them on a high you know what's the I'm always what's the last line what's the

last line here I need fucking I need six of them right buttons cliffhangers some way to get people I take that seriously but I think we've all seen documentary series that were eight hours or ten hours and should have been three yeah for sure the Cecil Hotel one that they did I'm not gonna name yeah there's been a few of those where they they you go oh I see what you're doing here you just you got contracted to do four of these and you really should have done one right and so they're being a little bit more the buyers are being more vigilant about that because there was a one there was a moment where it was like because the first cocaine cowboys documentary was four hours long and then i had to cut it down because it was

no market but there was make it four hours i did cocaine cowboys reloaded in 2014 which is two and a half hours if you've never seen that and it's 60 new material well have you ever thought about take going back and making a director's cut with the four hours and doing with netflix or something along those lines it's basically what Reloaded is. Is more or less. Yeah, because it also was structurally different. I think we found a better way to build it. But what's really weird about this is that Cooking Cowboys, the Kings of Miami, we've been working on it for 12 years.

So basically when I first met you, I was already well underway on this project. Because even though it's the fourth release in the franchise, we'll call it, it was the first story that we wanted to tell. How many people do you have working for you on these things? Like regular? Producers? Editors? Oh, we're a boutique operation. We make everything by hand. You know, like my editors call me a frame fucker. They say, Billy, stop frame fucking. I'll watch every, and I'll be like, no, no, no. It's just like every little frame.

That's why it's so good though, man. I have to think that that's why your work's so good. Scrapes years off the end of my life. I'm sure it does, man. But I'm telling you, it's very, very appreciated on my end. Thank you. When I watch your stuff, you can tell. It's like you don't half-ass anything. It's so compelling. Your stuff is all so good.

Thank you. The ones that I feel click, like that I know are going to work, because you don't always know. You come in with the best of intentions. And after you work on something for 12 years, you can't see the forest for the trees. Right.

I'm sure. And so you do your best and then you just, you know, send it out into the world. And listen, it's not up to me. I always say the measure of a successful filmmaker is not money or critical acclaim or awards. It's that you get to work again, you know, so like it's so I serve at the pleasure of an audience. And if we get the eyeballs and we get to make we get to make another one. And if we get the eyeballs and we get to make, we get to make another one. And so with this one, I just, when they start to, I know it sounds weird, but like when they start to sing to me is when I know they work.

I think some of our best documentaries are musicals. Like they just, they sing, they just move. So my composer on this, Carlos Jose Alvarez, actually the soundtrack drops on Spotify and all the streaming services finally. It's amazing. And I said to him, I said, listen, I said, I want it all rooted in Afro-Cuban beats and rhythms and salsa music. I don't care if it's a suspense scene or an action scene.

I want it all to feel like, be unapologetically Miami and Cuban-American. And I wanted to sweat that. I said, I want you to picture this. Somebody sitting in bed, their know, and Cuban American. And just, I wanted to sweat that. I said, I want, I said, I want you to picture this. Somebody sitting in bed, you know, their feet, and then this is my feet. I'm sitting in bed watching this documentary for fucking six hours. There's four and a half hours, six parts. I want their foot to be tapping the entire time. Just keep time, you know, just like keep the rhythm, like let there be like, and that's

the thing when it like, there's a, it's like a show. Like you want, you want there to be a rhythm and a cadence and a and you want the audience to to fall into that right i mean i don't take the audience's time for granted okay we have a finite amount of time between now and the day we die if you're going to give me four and a half hours of that i'm going to entertain you you know yeah i want to there's going to be investigative journalism in there we kind of, sometimes we call our work, Buddy Todd calls it a Trojan horse. You know, you kind of, you know, you think it's one thing,

but you're getting a little bit bonus. You kind of tempt the audience with the sugar, and then you feed them some broccoli in there too, you know. Because I think that that's, as a documentary filmmaker, especially now with the ubiquity, and there's so many documentaries, there's so much content. This is the golden age of documentaries. Golden age. And it's amazing.

I'm not complaining, God knows. But there's only so much time the audience has. And why watch this and not this? And why spend six parts on this and not ten parts on this? And part of that decision makingmaking is you know they want to be They want to be entertained in this era because there's so many documentaries. Is it harder to get people to to Really zoom in on one. It's it because there's so many choices Is it this this thing where it's hard? It's like hey. Hey over here over here

Is it is it more difficult because when cocaine Cow hard it's like hey hey over here over here is it is it more difficult because when cocaine cowboys came out there was nothing like it and i imagine it i mean obviously it was traded around all my friends like told everybody about it and it became popular a lot through word of mouth but there's so many documentaries now is it more difficult to get attention now for something, for your work? It's so difficult. But you already have a certain amount of momentum because of the stuff that you've already done in the past. Oh, yeah.

Listen, if we had to break in now, it would be fucking impossible. Yeah. The fact that we've been doing this for 20 years and we have- What year did Cocaine Cowboys come out? 2006 on bootleg. That was the bootleg? Bootleg releaseleg release yeah that's where it blew up it blew up in the bootleg market really blew blew up strip clubs walmart parking lots the bootleg guy the flea market the flea the carol city flea market people ripping you off helped you huge

wow huge it was viral before viral was with janet jackson she. She got an R, right? She got. She got a DVD-R. A DVD-R. That's how it went viral. First and foremost, in the hip-hop community. And barber shops, flea markets, and it blew up from there. It was a bootleg phenomenon. A bootleg phenomenon. And we don't, to this day, some people thought we did it on purpose, which some hip-hop artists did. That's like a street team kind of a thing.

Like, you know, sell the shit at the traffic lights, you know? And we didn't. I wish we had. I wish I could say like we're that smart or clever at marketing. But people thought we did it. We leaked it on purpose because it just blew up. Wow. Yeah.

In the bootleg market. And when was 2? 2 was 08. Oh, so quickly afterwards. Yeah. It was like a direct to, I was young. I needed the money. Oh, so quickly afterwards. Yeah, it was like a direct to, I was young, I needed the money. It was like, you know, it's like that porn idea

that one time. It was still great. But did you have like so much stuff that you wanted to cover in one that you just included into? Oh yeah, there was tons of stuff. And that was when, was that when Griselda was out? Griselda was out, you know, she was released just before we finished the first one. She's dead now, right? She was dead, was that when Griselda was out? Griselda was out.

She was released just before we finished the first one. She's dead now, right? She was dead, killed in 2012. Does that give you a little relief? Like, oh, she's not coming for me? Not particularly. I mean, she was chilling in Columbia. Like, she was minding her own business for the most part. And I think she was killed over new beef, not old beef.

Really? Yeah, yeah. New beef. Yeah. I mean, not really. Do you have any idea why? the most part and i think she was killed over new beef not old beef really yeah yeah new beef yeah i mean not an idea why not really new beef per se but she was like she was out there in her community she was you know she went to church every day she went down to uh to the old neighborhood where she grew up and and would go to the butcher shop and talk about somebody who had it coming we all have it coming joe that but that lady had it coming. Like, Jesus. If you believe in karma, and she was actually, you know, she was killed by a motorcycle assassin,

which, you know, one guy in the front driving, one guy in the back with an automatic or semi-automatic weapon. And that was actually a methodology that she is credited with importing from Columbia to the United States. Oh, wow. That kind of helped turn Miami into that cocaine cowboy's Wild West time in the 80s. And so she would, that's a, you know what they say, live by the motorcycle assassin, die by the motorcycle assassin. Yeah. That lady is a particularly powerful example of what's possible

when people start selling cocaine and making millions of dollars and develop that sort of psychopathic murderous you know advancement at any cost mentality well you're also a woman in a cocaine cowboys b-o-y-s in a in a man's in very in a hyper masculine world and you're in a trade where it was a consignment business. And back in Miami at that time, kilos were going for as much as $50,000. So you give someone, you know, she's a wholesaler, gives you four kilos, says go out and sell them. And in two weeks, or how much time you need, two weeks, great, bring me back $200,000. Well, for the end of those two weeks they don't have your $200,000 don't file a lawsuit you have to you have to enforce your trade so she was known for being uniquely brutal in her enforcement and

and and they credited her with upwards of 200 homicides between Miami, Columbia, New York, and California. Jesus. I guess if you're a woman and they don't take you seriously, you have to be particularly ruthless. Yeah. She certainly was. Yeah. And probably a little bit of getting high in her own supply there at the end.

Oh my God. Well, it's a business that, you know, if you're doing that, I mean, and it's so crazy in the first place that you're making so much money off of this illegal stuff that everybody wants. It lends itself to sort of chaotic brutality. And that's the reality. Like, if you want to talk about the success of the war on drugs, I mean, now the drug is as ubiquitous, just as pure, if not more so, and cheaper than it ever was before. And that's not because demand's down. It's because supply is ample. And so this is, it's, it was, they always treated it like a real business.

I mean, like these guys in Kings of Miami, they called it like, they called it the company. You work for the company. They had a headquarters. They had an opera. They had ledgers. They had books. They had records, which turned out to bite him in the ass in the end. Spoiler alert.

No, you know, you're not there yet. But like meticulous records. And they treated it like a Fortune 500 company. They were CEOs of this multi-billion dollar multinational corporation. Import, export. Importing cocaine, exporting cash. Has anybody done it where they've kind of stayed under the radar? Like has anybody ever done it successfully? Where they made a shitload of money,

but did it all wisely, lived small, and got the fuck out of Dodge? Absolutely. Happened in Columbia, happened in Miami. There are people who, but their careers were not long,

and they were not as lucrative, because that's the thing that makes Willie and Sal so unique, is that the average career I would guesstimate in the united states for a cocaine trafficker in that time period was not more than five years not more than slightly longer than an nfl player's uh career you know um three seasons three and a half seasons but like they willie and sal operated for like 20 years that that's only going to end one way dead or in prison that's that's that's it or one of two ways i should say dead or in prison so there were people

who operated for a few years for five years and then just got out and bought real estate gotten to legitimate businesses some did some went to jail but still came out with a little bit of that money to then reinvest in a Medicare fraud operation or some new business. How many bags of cash do you think are still buried in backyards all throughout Miami? We keep pushing the urban development line in Miami-Dade County. We keep slashing and burning the Everglades and poisoning our natural resources. And I don't know where all those people are going to live when we don't have clean water anymore. Or Turkey Point goes belly up

or the floods fucking come or your building just collapses in the middle of the night while you're sleeping. Pythons run out of things to eat. Absolutely. Fucking iguanas. These iguanas, it's like Jurassic fucking Park. I know, dude.

We've been following it on the show. There's all these shows where people hunt iguanas. Yes. And they cook them. Eat them. Yeah, apparently they eat good. Kill them. They're fucking, they Hunt them. And they cook them. Eat them. Yeah, apparently they eat good. Hunt them. Kill them.

They're fucking, they are destroying. And they're huge. Listen, they, and they burrow underneath. Houses. Cement house, seawalls and, and shit. Collapses. I'm not, I'm not saying it was iguanas, but it was iguanas. I mean, they're fucking, and they're scary.

They're so big. And aggressive. And, and they're not native. Right. These are idiots who got them as pets and then released them, and they start mating with squirrels and what the fun, raccoons and possums. You have these fucking crazy, they're like raptors. They're like velociraptors. They're going to learn how to open doors, Joe. They're going to learn how to fucking open doors like the raptors did.

We've been documenting all these YouTube channels where people hunt them with bow fishing rigs, and they're killing these five-foot-long iguanas in residential areas. My dad does it. With a right? He lives on a canal with a pelican. And you have to. Does your dad eat them?

He does not eat them. They're not kosher. So my dad does not. That's fucking with you. No, he does not eat them. They're not kosher. So my dad is not as fucking with you. No, he does not eat, because they usually roll into the canal. He doesn't actually, because he goes over a fence, you know, like Lee Harvey Oswald style, you know, kind of like grassy knoll, I should say, style. He fucking shoots the iguanas.

But they're scary. And like, sometimes they're not dead. You know, they freeze. Yeah, and they fall out of trees and hit people. They fall out of trees and hit people. Here's the thing. They can thaw out. And they're not dead.

They're not fucking dead. Really? They thaw out and they get up and run away. So when it warms up? Yes. Dude, I'm not scared of a lot of shit. You thought I was worried about Griselda Blanco. I'm worried about the iguanas, Joe.

It's petrifying. It's that bad? It's petrifying. And they're aggressive. They don't know. They just come up to you. They'll walk around. I mean, it's a problem.

And they burrow. They burrow. Burrowing thing's a real problem with houses. I do know that. Yeah. Yeah. It's not like buildings are just falling. Oh, get this.

So you saw episode two, Cooking Cowboys, another deleted scene. But we didn't know about this until it was literally too late, particularly for those 98 people who died at the Champlain Tower South, collapsing the surfside. But Alexia Echevarria, she's the beautiful blonde. She's known as the Cuban Barbie from The Real Housewives of Miami. She's the guy that fell in love with Peggy Rosello, who is like the Henry Hill of their operation.

He was a 12-year-old kid who was brother, his older sister married Tabby Falcone, one of the boys. So he's now family. He's a brother-in-law of the kings of miami or the future kings of miami he's the 12 year old kid washing the cars and making more money on a weekend doing that than his dad was making you know this hard-working you know cuban exile but his kids surrounded by these at the time kind of lower-end drug dealers who were about to blow up but getting to giving him 100 200 cash to you to wash a car. And so he grows up steeped in that. He has this sort of like,

you know, you grow up Miami. Like I said, we're guilty by geography. If you grow up in that time and place, people were becoming millionaires overnight. You must like that's the American dream to you. You're like, oh, the streets are paved with gold. This is the opportunity I'm talking about. And it was kind of a warped idea, I think, of what all that was. I'm not making excuses, but just Miami was a different Miami is a different place. And it was a seriously different place back there. Everybody was involved in this industry or everybody knew someone who was involved in this industry. And in some way or another, everybody benefited from this industry. And so Alexia is at this club, Club New 1987. It was one of the first big nightclubs, popular nightclubs in South Beach. And she's there and Peggy wants to get with her.

Jose Canseco is in VIP. He wants to get with her because Miami. That's like the most 1987 Miami thing you can imagine. VIP at this nightclub and you're in a love triangle with a drug dealer and Jose Canseco. She didn't know he was a drug dealer yet. But they wind up, she winds up hooking up with Peggy and she starts hanging out at, uh, for the first time at his apartment on the ocean, beautiful, like blinged out place on the fifth floor of this luxury condo. And they, they hang out at the beach and they're swimming. And then they, they go to

bed. And in the middle of the night, two o'clock in the morning, he gets a call and he says, yo, I got a split, but you could stay here. And she's like, she night, two o'clock in the morning, he gets a call. And he says, yo, I got a split. But you could stay here. And she's like, she thought for sure. He's got a wife. He's got a girlfriend. I'm not going to fucking chill here with this guy. Fuck this.

And so it turns out he had to go pick up a load of cocaine. He had a shipment of cocaine that was coming in. She didn't know that. But here's the thing. And this is not in the documentary. That apartment was on the fifth floor of the champlain tower south whoa yeah so and and true to form if you were building a luxury condo in the late 70s early 80s your market in no small part would have been to drug smugglers and so that that's the apartment that they're hanging out i i and i realized when i was in los angeles

delivering the series to Netflix and and the tragedy happened in Surfside I was like Champlain Tower South that sounds familiar to me and we looked it up and that's where yeah that's where that was his love nest is Miami Peggy's Miami Beach love nest that he took Alexia to damn it all comes full circle crazy just crazy it's It's such a wealth of stories in that area that you would almost think that some of it's fabricated. But if anything, it's underreported. Listen, Florida is the grift that keeps on grifting. I mean, it's just, it's a never, and it's just like-

But you love it. That's one of the things that I love about you. Like, when you talk about it, there's like a twinkle in your eye. You know, it's it's like so a buddy of mine jim defede who's in the uh who's in the documentary he's the journalist that we interview he's the only guy that really covered these guys in an extensive way um he didn't write a book about it but he wrote like feature cover stories for the miami new times and it was the only way these guys to this day there's not a book that you can go out and get to learn anything about these guys. And so he said to me, you know, listen, I'm always trying to push for accountability, for transparency, for better government, always trying to encourage people to vote better.

It's an uphill battle. That's why Florida of today is the America of tomorrow. But the reality is that I want there to be a better Florida. I want to leave behind a better Florida than the one I was born in. I don't even know if Florida is going to be intact. It's going to be the same geological area than the one I was born in by the time I die. But the reality is that I remember Jim telling me one day because he's a local political reporter, especially. He says, says billing just remember The worst people they elect the better it is for our business

For your business. Yeah, because it's like and I'm like what a shitty way of life. It's true, but it's good I think you're good. You're a guy who's sitting on a diamond mine. That's my long Like I don't think you have to worry you have a hammer a chisel like how much work can you do? There's so many stories. I don't think that's a mile long. Like, I don't think you have to worry. You have a hammer, a chisel. Like, how much work can you do? There's so many stories. I don't think that's an issue. No, it's not an issue. But do you think it's possible that the influx of people from New York

that just wanted to get the fuck out of New York and move to Florida and move to a lot of other places, from a lot of other places, do you think in any way that might benefit Florida? No. No? Short answer. No. I mean, there's more mean there's more detrimental yeah and listen new yorkers were never going to treat it as anything more than the sixth borough i mean

that's just how they they look like you said you know come for the fuckery right you know stay for the tax haven you know stay for stay for no no state income tax well and the weather i mean it's hurricane season right now i told you it's flooding in the sun right now. I mean, like the weather, you know? Yeah, but it's still, in the wintertime, it doesn't snow. That's true. If you grow up on the East Coast, that's the thing, is that every winter for four months, it sucks. And I'll tell you, I actually like August in Miami better than I like August in New York, for example.

Right. I actually, I do. I like that tropical. Yeah, it's nice. I like that. Yeah, I like the tropical deposition. The ocean's there. You get a breeze. I like August in New York, for example. I actually, I do. I like that tropical, I like that. Yeah, I like the tropical depressions. The ocean's there, you get a breeze. I like the rain. I actually like, I like, now. It's cleansing.

Direct hit by, yeah, you know what? Honestly, as they all start moving in, I get a little bit of that Travis Vickle in the back of my head. You know, someday rain's gonna come. Wash all the scum away, you know? Like, I get a little bit of that. That's what's gonna happen. One hurricane and these people are gonna head, someday rain's going to come. Wash all the scum away. A little bit of that. That's what's going to happen.

One hurricane, and these people are going to head for the hills. You think so? Oh, no doubt. But the reality, listen, they want to be there for six months and a day, or however long you have to be there to establish residency and not pay state income tax. That's why OJ came there. That's why the Enron executives came there.

You can't take someone's house. That's what it is. It's that kind of haven, you know. I'm always stunned that people move into those high rises. Cause I'm like, if you are in a hurricane and you're experiencing, you know, a hundred plus mile an hour winds, I would imagine that 81st floor is the last place I'd want to be i'm gonna say something that like oh i'm gonna get shit for this joe's like oh they're not gonna give me shit for something i say this pot you probably will too yeah um it's gonna happen again another building's gonna gonna think so it's it's inevitable there's some buildings that are suspect not only not only are there buildings that are some buildings that are suspect? Not only are there buildings

that are old buildings that are suspect that are not being well maintained that have, like I said, water coming at them from literally everywhere. But the,

listen, we have like a, we have a third world government and fourth world infrastructure in Miami. I saw a video of a guy taking a boat under one of your bridges. And he was filming the underside of the bridge, showing all the parts of the concrete that are collapsing. And he's like, I literally am fucking terrified getting under this bridge right now. I mean, imagine how you feel driving over it.

You don't even know. I will tell you, you know know we had a i think something like three or four oh fuck i wish i could remember this it's like three or four of the deadliest infrastructure like failures and collapses in the united states in the last 10 years have happened in miami-dade county jesus One county in the entire country has had the majority of deadly infrastructure failures and building collapses. We had a bridge that they were stress testing. This like that collapse.

They had traffic open underneath it while they were stress testing this brand new bridge. It's called the FIU bridge collapse. This very politically connected contractor did it. Fucking thing collapsed. Killed six people. Oh, Jesus. One construction worker and five people who were just at a red light in their car sitting under this bridge. I will tell you now that happened a few years ago.

To this day. Boom. under this bridge I will tell you now that happened a few years ago to this day boom to this day I don't like to stop under like overpasses or bridges in Miami that's a look yeah that's what I can imagine that's the luckiest guy the luckiest driver that day and did they find out what I mean if it's a brand new bridge is just built shitty there was a design flaws but they knew a week ahead there were cracks in the foundation there's emails in photographs voice messages about it and so they they knew that it was that it was fundamentally flawed but then the kicker is that they're doing a stress test on the bridge nobody shut down traffic and this is a major thoroughfare it goes by florida national

university huge public school is it like wait i don't know i don't but they're like they're they're pulling on core you know they're done and needless to say if someone said to you hey joe we're doing a stress test you want to stand under the bridge be like no no you know just yeah just like ivermectin just say nay nay. Oh, see what I did there? But Netflix publicist is like, shut the fuck up. So anyway, no, but no, but but six people crushed to death. Oh, nobody held responsible. Nobody held accountable.

Why? Why? Because the mayor, Carlos Jimenez, now Congressman Carlos Jimenez, his wife's cousin, owns the company that's the contractor. It employed both of his sons at various times. Marco Rubio is a major benefactor, or I should say beneficiary, Rick Scott. What happened was, while bodies were still trapped in the rubble, you had Marco Rubio, the senator from the state of Florida, working as their public crisis manager, like doing press saying like this is a good company. These are good, you know, good God fearing Republicans. And our mayor, our county mayor at the time, Carlos Menes, calling who was on a junket in Hong Kong, calling in saying it couldn't have been MCM.

It couldn't have been MCM. It couldn't have been these people. These people just got a $70 million contract at the Miami international airport, a new one. Oh Jesus. Yeah. They just, they they're,

they're fixing no punishment. The bridges you're talking about. They have contracts for the water and sewer in Miami Dade to work on some of those bridges that, that the guy was, that was concerned about. If you watch the video, of those bridges that that the guy was that was concerned about if you watch the video see if you can find a video of uh eroding miami bridge it's so bad when this guy's going under it you're seeing

like holes in the concrete he's like look at this shit look at this shit yeah but that's that's all over the place and people after champlain towers like people started sending me shit like their uh you know their underground that's the thing in certain developments particularly on the beach After Champlain Towers, people started sending me shit. They're underground. That's the thing. In certain developments, particularly on the beach, you have a finite amount of real estate. So one of the best designs to maximize the property is to build the parking structure underneath the building, basically. Of course. But you can't go underground because we don't have an underground.

We're basically two feet above sea level, barely. So they build these parking structures. They build these pool kind of platforms where the pool is. And then you have buildings on top of that that are being somewhat supported by these tenuous structures. Somewhat is a good word. And a lot of the new construction, which technologically speaking and design speaking, we are better at it. which technologically speaking and design speaking we are better at it but the problem is is that when you have third world government and fourth world infrastructure there's corner cutting and it's who's my cousin or who's my uncle and it's really that bad in terms of the government

down there it's really that bad um if people think i'm being hyperbolic then why are buildings collapsing yeah they're not really collapsing like that anywhere else. Nothing. Bridges are. We had someone die in a ferry accident. Their car rolled off, drove off like a ferry and died. What first world country does shit like that happen in? It happens in, you know what they say, the great thing about Miami is it's so close to the United States. You know? Well is it is like a foreign country I mean it is but when you say that Miami is like the rest of the United States in the future like What else do you mean other than the problem with climate control?

And like what well first and foremost I mean the the separation between the haves and the have-nots I mean Miami has maybe second only to the San Francisco metro area. It has one of it is one of the greatest income and wealth gaps in the country. We'll see swamp favelas in our lifetime. You know, we'll see people who are in the service trade in Miami but can't afford the cost of living. In fact, the United Way has an Alice report where they say 60%, nearly 60%, like 59% and change of Miami-Dade County residents cannot afford to live in Miami-Dade County. And most of those people have at least one job. So these are not, this is the working poor, people with one, two, three, four jobs who cannot afford the cost of living, the education, the transportation in Miami-Dade.

So that's the first thing is that that is the wealth gap and the income gap. And that is going to become ubiquitous, I think, nationwide. Certainly the challenges of sea level rise and climate change and climate change gentrification. I think also, though, the way the government works, the sort of the kleptocracy, it used to be a narco kleptocracy like Venezuela. Now it's just a kleptocracy where a group of very rich, very influential private business people essentially run cronies into. And that's going to be that's and all of this is being exacerbated by the pandemic because you got a bunch of people sitting at school board meetings going why the fuck do i need to put up with this shit i'm just here to try to help kids like i don't need to put

up with this fuck this who's going to take their place the crazy people yelling at the microphone at them are going to become the next school board members and this is like this is what we've seen in florida it's this and and it's it's a it's a plan to privatize subsidize brutalize so first you privatize bridges industries highways schools with charter schools and private schools you subsidize them with tax dollars and where i say brutalize i mean that because they're private, they may not be subject to the sunshine laws, public records laws, accountability and and transparency that a public institution is supposed to to follow. So you don't even know. And we have charters. We're like one of the number number one charter school states in the country. We're also the number one chart place for closing down charter schools. I mean, they hire child molesters. They hire they have no standards. They have no you know, and they're all we have a guy who sits in the Florida legislature on the education committee, his day job. He works for the largest charter school company in the state of Florida.

So what do you think he's doing about public education? He's misappropriating our tax dollars into his boss's hands. That's literally what he's doing every legislative session and we let this happen. The mayor of Miami he is the mayor he has two private sector jobs, dude. What?

Yes, this is unethical but it's legal. It's fine. This is what this is what this is what legislators. While he's the mayor, he's allowed to keep two private sector jobs. firm. He's a lobbyist, effectively, with a major cryptocurrency digital asset and blockchain practice, which is where a lot of the money is coming from into the new the new the new new rich money is coming from in Miami. So he has two private sector jobs, working for the richest people in town, while he's the mayor of one of the poorest cities in America. And here's the rub.

Because he's an attorney, he claims that his client list is privileged. It's attorney-client privilege, which means that he has a secret client list, which there could be a minefield of conflicts of interest with his public position as mayor, but we're not allowed to know what they are. Just trust me, there's no conflicts. And of course there's conflicts because i see him go out every day as a cheerleader for some of the lobbying for some of the richest most powerful people in town selling out his constituents at the at the expense of his constituents the guys

raised four million dollars to run for re-election unopposed in a city of 450,000 people. What does he need? Yeah. Four million. Yeah. And that's where his power lies, by the way. By charter, he doesn't really have a lot of power. Mayor Postolita, Francis Suarez, he doesn't have a lot of power, but he...

What's Postolita mean? My Cuban friends will know what that means. It's like a poser, a faker, a postcard. It's like, yeah, a guy who gives the veneer of one thing but is actually another one. He is actually, he's a con man is what he is, but that's what Miami is. He's a, by charter, he's a mascot in the head coach's office with his feet on the desk. But where he yields the influence and the power is through that money. It's through his private sector, his fundraising and his private sector gigs.

That's where he can start to influence what's happening in town. And it is not for the better. It is not. It has been terribly damaging to the people of that city and that county. And that's our biggest. People say, how do you fix it? Vote for vote better. Just vote better.

Is there any bright lights on the horizon in that whole area i mean is any of this like newfound capital newfound people immigrating i won't say immigrating to miami moving to miami is is any of it beneficial none of us like taxes but we all we pay them we do our part um it it, it's supposed to help our community. It's supposed to, you know, uplift the country. If you're moving to a place because ultimately you want to avoid paying taxes, you're not necessarily going to have the interest of community in mind so we're not necessarily seeing people who are interested in investing in Miami in a way that's going to be productive for the people there now what it's going to do is it's going to make it more expensive for the people who live there there you know they're going to have to move away I don't know who is going to

wind up being again that's why I say we wind up with swamp favelas you know tentent cities and things where people are stealing realist stealing electricity and water. And I'm already seeing it downtown Miami. You know, everybody complains about L.A. and same thing in Miami under the overpasses, the tent cities. We have entire blocks and stretches in and around downtown Miami of tent cities. And the homeless homelessness problem is a serious problem. Basically, what they're starting to do is just kind of like do sweeps. There's no place to really put them necessarily.

Well, tent cities are a problem in every single city. 100%. Even in Hawaii. Yeah. It's a strange thing when you think about that this didn't exist a decade ago at all and now it's overrunning cities. I think they existed.

I think there wasn't as many people, and they weren't necessarily in as high-profile locations. I can't remember any tents in California more than a decade ago. If you go back two decades ago, I definitely can't remember them. I don't think they existed. I don't think what happened, but my concern is that no one seems to have a fix for it. I mean, Austin has done a good job recently of getting them off of some of the major cities and then moving them into hotels and they've purchased hotels

and motels for these folks. But I mean, when you're dealing with a place like Austin, you're only dealing with a million people and a couple thousand homeless people. When you're dealing with something like Miami or Los Angeles or San Francisco, you're dealing with a place like Austin, you're only dealing with a million people and a couple thousand homeless people. When you're dealing with something like Miami or Los Angeles or San Francisco, you're dealing with staggering numbers. I don't think anybody's fixed it. And there's very little incentives to create affordable housing or to do what you're, you know, what they've done here, which is to buy up properties and start to provide housing for people. There's just, there's very little incentive for it. Listen, we're, we're a community with a, with a transient population and a lack of institutional memory. And so the, the, and the pandemic is actually remarkably, the pandemic helped Miami skip a bust cycle. We, we, you know,

we exist in these booms and bust cycles. We were on the, the, you know, real estate value, property values. We were on a downturn with shit was going to collapse probably in 2020 or 2021. The pandemic saved Miami. It spared us that real heavy bus cycle. Instead, houses are more expensive than they ever were before. Demand is through the roof. It just makes it unaffordable, of course, for any of us who already live there. But it somehow spared us amazingly. This tragedy has been a boom for Florida. When you get caught in you know, has been like a boom for Florida. When you get caught in a hurricane, like if you know a hurricane's coming, where do you go? Do you just, do you fly out of town a week in advance? Like what do you do? It depends on the course of the storm. Um, the last big one for us, I think it was Hurricane what was that back in like 2017 I went to Nashville it seemed far it seemed far enough

out of the did it work out of the cone it were we had a little rain at the end but it was just like it was just rain did you get a hotel room uh got an Airbnb Ralphie May uh may he rest in peace Ralphie um he was just he he had this cold he just couldn't kick that's what he told me when I was there he wanted me to stay with his house in his house

he's like come bring the whole family so this was before right when he was dying this was like weeks maybe weeks before and so he says

come and stay at my house I think he had like empty nest he's like I got this great big house and just come. I'm like, I'm not going to put you out. I'm like, I'd bring, you know, like take over his house. Like, you know, and he, but he was just like, he was like, so, so. And he's like, well, you got to come out to my show.

He did like a weekly thing, like on a weekday, like a Tuesday at this, at the comedy club there. Oh God, I wish I could remember what it was called. Zany's. Zany's. Yeah. It's like a weekday thing. Like night right yeah fucking packed for him right he just comes and packed and he um he sits up there for like three hours like he's just riffing and do and like any there was a lot of hurricane refugees there so he was like we're you know doing crowd work with the i mean it was just buying people drinks it was just like it was

amazing and you could tell he was like he had sniffle like there was something not 100 but he was hilarious and it was hilarious for like three fucking hours he was hilarious and then i go back stage afterwards and and um he was like come out with me come out with me um we're going out we're going out and i'm like how are you feeling he's like i'm not feeling great but we're going out and um i was on my girl was like he doesn't seem like i don't want you to catch something you know like get a cold and and i was like all right i can't make up but we had a we had like a brunch date for sunday we're like let's have brunch she She's like, oh, I know this place. We got to go have brunch at this place on Sunday.

So let's do it. So he calls me up the next day. He goes, I'm not feeling brunch. I'm not feeling well. And I said, you know, and then we left and I was on a plane and I was landing on, my phone was off. I turned my phone on a couple of weeks, you know, a few weeks later, whenever it was, and he was gone. And I just sat on the plane crying on the tarmac at MIA. And I just was like, and I regretted not going out. I regretted not going out with him that night it would have been worth getting a little cold or whatever the fuck it was um but uh you know yeah i'm or the uh the corogan the corogan virus uh give it back to florida baby give it back to florida i'll tell you i'll go right to orlando fuck him in central florida i wonder where i got it you know i'm the problem is i'm doing these arena shows

so i'm in the round. Yeah. Jesus. And I get off stage, and I've got to go through thousands of people screaming at me and high-fiving. So as I'm- Well, at least they're wearing masks. I'm in the center of this. Oh, no. I was just kidding. You're joking.

There's none of that. None of that. And then we were drunk, and then we stayed out late. There's a lot of factors that led to me catching up. Yeah, pandemic drinking. So the only place I pandemic drink now, there's this place, oh man, I'm not going to

blow my spot, but there's this place, it's outside. It's like, but it's like it's a classic Keys kind of bar. It's entirely, there is no inside. It's entirely outside. And it's just like, it's the perfect, like I've only had meetings, like I had meetings there during the pandemic. It was like the perfect spot to go and, because you get reckless.

You get irresponsible. You don't make, nobody says, oh, I'm going to have whiskey and make responsible decisions. Like that's not, so like, especially now, it's just like, you know. Avoid crowds. Right. Or avoid, like I just try to, especially if you're going to drink. Try to, especially if you're going to drink. Yeah, there's some value in getting it, though, and getting over it. Because, obviously, the natural immunity is pretty substantial.

Like, if you can get over it, catch COVID and survive and get over it. I'm not advocating that anybody do that. It's not the chicken pox, Joe. But I just got over it. It wasn't that bad with good treatment. Like, for me, it wasn't. Right. Your experience is, you know, is your experience.

Yes. And no one can begrudge you that. And I said, like, if your doctor has shit to throw at it. Yes. Fucking throw at it. Like, absolutely. Your doctor says, listen, take this as prescribed, and it will help these symptoms or it'll help the virus. Absolutely.

Fucking my way. My fear is that these variants are going to continue to get more and more aggressive and we're going to be dealing with something completely different three years from now, two years from now, and more of them can happen. And, you know, like I had a meeting once with the CDC in Galveston. We did a show down there and me and Duncan were talking to this guy. We're talking essentially about bioweapons, about someone making a disease. And he said, that's a concern. He said, but that's not my concern. He goes, my concern is nature. My concern is that something jumps from livestock to human beings and just runs right through us. And he goes, and it's

going to happen. But then the misinformation. You know, the Russians have been working on anti-vax stuff for decades because it's bipartisan. It's very effective. When you say the Russians have been working on anti-vax stuff, you mean like anti-vax information propaganda on the internet? Absolutely. The psyops and influencing kind of campaigns.

What have you seen that they've done? Listen, it's just, it's a social media shit. That's all. They promote pages and they promote information that, because it's bipartisan. There's people who- They seem to promote anything that gets attention. Anything that divides Americans and gets us at each other's fucking throats. Have you ever seen that? There's an interview from 1985, 86.

There's a KGB agent and he's breaking down how you destroy America. And he's saying, you don't destroy America with weapons. He goes, you destroy it by slowly enforcing propaganda and getting the students to, first of all, getting them to endorse Marxist principles and ideology and slowly erode their faith in government, slowly erode their faith in their institutions, and that they'll attack it psychologically and slowly break down the country over a few years. When you listen to them talk, at the end of this discussion,

I mean, you're like, holy fuck, that's exactly what happened. Like, did they engineer this? Did they engineer the collapse of our higher learning institutions? We already had two countries. We fought a whole fucking war over it with each other. We already had two countries we fought a whole fucking war over it with each other we already had two countries so it already we were already coexisting here so all you had to do was attack that rift yeah that's all you that's what you had to do i'm florida there's two floridas the i-4 corridor where you were in orlando there's north florida and there's south florida

what's the difference? Well, it used to be. It's not quite true. Back when we were considered a purple state, we're a red state now. But, you know, it used to be, you know, Florida was like America's red penis with a blue foreskin that everybody wished we could circumcise. And we could just have two, North Florida and South Florida. just have North Florida and South Florida. And most of the revenue generating locations are obviously South.

They were the bluer places, not so blue anymore. But it was two Floridas. Florida, we still have bars, not stars, but bars on our state flag. Miami was Jim Crow South. What do you mean by bars? As in stars and bars, as in the Confederate flag. We were, Miami was Jim Crow South. What do you mean by bars in your state flag? As in stars and bars, as in the Confederate flag. What I'm saying, we were a southern state. You have that now?

Yeah, well, what I'm saying is it's evocative. It's not directly, it's not stars and bars, but I mean it does have... Pull up the Florida flag. What I'm saying is the design, it's not, I'm not saying it's the Confederate flag, but what I'm saying is it's evocative because we were a Southern state. Miami Beach had Jim Crow laws. Black people could not be in Miami Beach. That's the Florida flag? Yeah.

Wow. Yeah. That looks remarkably like the Confederate flag. It's evocative. Listen, it's a Southern state. What I'm saying is that's- That's crazy. That's the reality.

I did not know that. It's the reality. I didn't know what, I had no idea what the Florida flag looked like. No the Florida flag looked like. I think that's the first time I've seen it. Yeah, no one really knows what these, you probably figured there's, you know, Mickey Mouse and humanity and that's kind of crazy. Now pull up a Confederate flag. Pull up in comparison, Jamie. It's not, it's not that, it's not that similar, but it's, it's, but the point is, it's not a coincidence. That's all I'm saying. Right. That's all I'm saying. It's evocative. And people, up until the 60s, even into the 70s, black people could not be in the city of Miami Beach after dark. Whoa. Unless you worked there.

And if you did, you had to go to the police department and get an ID badge. They literally took your fingerprints and you had to be tagged. You had to have a fucking number. So Muhammad Ali could fight in Miami Beach. He could not stay in Miami Beach. Nat King Cole, Sammy Davis Jr., they could perform in Miami Beach. Even at the hotels, but they could not stay at the hotels. They had to go back over the causeway to Overtown, which had a vibrant, you know,

if you saw the movie One Night in Miami, they had like, it waslife because you had because you had the greatest performers in the world performing in Miami Beach and then being forced into this neighborhood where they they had after parties and after clubs. And like so you had this vibrant culture in Overtown in Miami because of segregation as a Jim Crow. We had a black beach in Virginia Key. Black people were not allowed on the beach in Miami Beach. We're talking about through the 60s or 70s. This is very recent history. So what I'm saying is, is that like, you know, if you have a fault line and you can just drop, you know, you can just drop, you know, like you don't have to attack it with a nuclear weapon. Right. You could just, just kind of rattle it a little bit, you know, stick a wedge in there and kind of shake it.

That's America. We're two Americas. And so people are just constantly ready to be at each other's throats. And so it's very easy to exploit that. That world of foreign instigated propaganda and division is really fascinating. I had this woman on the podcast named Renee DiResta, woman on the podcast named renee di resta and uh she uh had thoroughly researched the internet research agency in russia which just does that it's basically a farm that they're all they do all day long is create pages and memes and work on these pages and develop these memes that are shared amongst like q anon supporters and supporters and just a lot of crazy people and a lot of like divisive ideologies online. And they're constantly stoking the fires. And she goes, some of them are so clever too. It's really interesting because some of these memes that she said she had to look through hundreds of thousands, some of them are hilarious.

And they're made in Russiaussia they're made in russia so people can share them in america and that these will stoke division and the funnier the better because they're more likely to go viral and people will share them if only because if only because they're funny but they did wild shit man like uh she documented that they had a Texas separatist group The short they organized a meeting on Facebook with a Texas separatist group across from a Muslim group so they had this Islamic group that had a Meeting like like a gathering directly across the street from this Texas Separatist group like they did it on purpose where they tried to get them close to each other So they would fight

It doesn't doesn't take that much even Miami you just drive down the street people just start fucking fighting with each other It's just what it's there's a there's a compassion gap in this country compassion gap a compassion gap Okay, we're like, you know country compassion gap a compassion gap okay we're like you know american values values used to be like the golden rule like do unto others as you'd have done to you right the rising tide raises all ships to use a sea level rise metaphor but like now we talked about this with screwball like the new american values are like fuck everybody else lie cheat and steal to get ahead for me and mine. And when you start to circle the wagons that way, you're going to you're going to cause trouble.

I mean, like in Miami, it's like as simple as it's as simple as the way we drive. You know, like we just like we treat each other like assholes. Like we just like, you know, I'm in the way. Yeah, I would like. But this is a shared experience. You're not going to get anywhere any faster by cutting me off or do like user turn signal i'm not a psychic let's just play let's all play by the same rules and we'll all be cool why treat each other like shit we're all we're all pretty happy here like let's let's just let's just chill out i always say like that's that you know my bad joke is like well it's not called your emmy or our emmy it's my fucking emmy And that's how – I'm like, why do we treat each other that way?

Why can't we just learn that this is a shared experience? Listen, I feel that way about when people say – my driver over here today was like, listen, she's like, the ICUs are full. So if I get into a car accident and I need a bed, it's like that does affect me. So people who are getting sick affect me. I don't want people to I don't want a cop a day dying in Florida. I don't want people to die for no fucking reason. You know, did you hear that polio is killing one police officer a day in Florida? No, because it doesn't fucking happen.

There's no polio anymore. It's one of the six vaccines that, you know, all your kids need in the Miami-Dade public schools. Like if there's a way to realize that like these these states are united, we are United States. We are we are literally all of us fighting the same battle every day for our families to have a better life to hopefully you know millennials so the first generation okay to have it shittier than the pre of americans to have it shittier than the previous generation do you really think they do unquestionably they do how so unquestionably they do there's no there's no the the the earning potential the student debt, the the availability of of of jobs, of 401ks, of retirement. Like there's there are 1099 generation.

There are freelance generation gone or the opportunities that provided for the baby boomers after the greatest generation fought a war to create the most extraordinary and robust economy in the world. I mean, they're the first generation of Americans since the Great Depression to not have it better than the previous generation. That's a doc I've always talked about doing. Call it the worst generation,

how baby boomers fucked up America. And the slogan would be, greatness skips a generation. That's what it would be. They had every opportunity. They had jobs. They had what it would be they had every opportunity they had jobs they had mortgages they had credit they had education affordable educations they had and the millennials are just kind of like living at home and i don't think it's because they suck um i don't i don't think that's i don't think that's enough i think that uh it's not because time magazine

called them the people of the year remember when when there was that like mirror, you know, on the cover of Time magazine. I don't think they got full of that. I think there are just fewer opportunities systemically in this country for that gender, for subs and future and post millennials as well. I just I think that there's not the opportunity necessarily available in a in a fair system. Also, you know, where where it's a real meritocracy. It's what I always liked about sports, you know, is that it was as close to a pure meritocracy as we get.

When you take referees out of the equation sometimes, but I just mean that like, if you are the best in a sport, if you are the best athlete, if you're the best condition and the best trained, you are gonna rise to the top. And you don't feel that that's the case with most businesses today? Is that what you're saying?

I don't. I don't necessarily. What do you think holds it back? What do you think prevents it from being a meritocracy? I think there's several. I think it's, I think corruption is, you know, it's a kleptocracy. So I think corruption plays a very big part in that. I think people who are already at the top exert so much influence that

it becomes harder. I mean, metaphorically speaking, if you look at Main Street America, and you look at the mom and pop businesses that shut down when the big box store opens down the street, it could be as simple as that kind of image. But I think it gets much more complicated. You know, when you have people who you have, when you have a stacked, you're playing effectively with a stacked deck. Does that mean there's no such thing as successful entrepreneurism? Of course not. But I'm saying that it's much more challenging, I think, in this economy, in this environment than it ever was before.

And we say there's like a compassion gap. Is that the term you used? Like, what do you mean by that, though? I mean, a lack of empathy. A lack of people saying, like, my experiences are not necessarily your experiences. The world may treat, your life experience may be different. The world may treat you differently as a result of no power of your own, whether it's your gender, the color of your skin, whatever it may be. To just say, like, listen, I don't know everything about all people. to just say like, listen, I don't know everything about all people. All I could do is listen and pay attention and kind of realize that, oh, like, yeah,

you know, the world does kind of treat me different winning the genetic lottery and being born a white man in America. Life's pretty good. You know, it's, you know, it's tough to, it's tough to complain. There are opportunities for me. There are, you know, I can be entrepreneurial and creative and clever and get ahead in a way that maybe other people don't necessarily have those doors open to them. And just just an understanding of that in and of itself, I think, makes your community better, makes your family better, makes people safer and healthier. And I just like and how is it related to a compassion gap?

It's having compassion for other people. It's having compassion for other people. It's saying that I'm going to acknowledge that you that by the way, some people can't even acknowledge when people are going through the same experiences that they're going through. You know, like there there are some what you there are some immigrants who are anti-immigration. We have that in Miami who like who say like they don't see them, their experiences in the experiences of of Central Americans, for example. We have a lot. We have that in Miami. It's very profound. The Cuban exile experience is very is is not very different, but like there's a lack. There's a compassion gap when they see people suffering in Central America trying to escape oppression and crime and corruption and close the borders. And it's like I get it. There are and close the borders. And it's like, I get it. There are concerns about the borders, but like, we can also at least say that, wait

a second, these people suffered, you've suffered, America provided, you know, the people of your country with exile, with opportunity, with freedom. Everybody wants a piece of that. And who can blame them? So at least we can say like, well, how do you say close the door behind me? That's a compassion gap. That's a compassion gap. When you say this compassion

gap, when you talk about this, do you think that there's something that we can do to mitigate this? Is there, I mean obviously you've thought about this. If you've discussed it and you think it's one of our main problems do you think there's something that we can do collectively i think we can be better informed i think we can we can you know listen i i was talking about this

better informed about what about every about other people's experiences about it's part of the reason why i'm a i'm a documentarian you know um i tell stories about a lot of different people but you know gringos cuban americans african americans okay and and i for me they're all miamians you know it's like you give people an opportunity to tell their story or give them a platform to share i think it makes us i think watching documentaries makes us more sympathetic and compassionate no i think so i absolutely do because you're you're learning about shit that you never would have otherwise and people. You relate to people.

Yeah, you never would have. We were talking about that here. I think that, you know, a lot of people give you a lot of shit for what you say. I don't think they give you a lot of credit for what you don't say

and what you do on this show more than talk is listen. And I think that that's, I'm different when I'm on this side of the mic or the camera than when I'm interviewing somebody, which the mic or the camera than when I'm interviewing somebody yeah which is what I do for a living I intellectual curiosity is my business you know it's it's what keeps us it's what keeps you going you know like wanting to

meet interesting people and learn different shit and and you know like I said I'm I'm a natural skeptic so I'm always asking questions but I am pro fact and I think the fact is that that people look at other people in the world and just either they don't like them because they're the same they don't like them because they are different and i just i feel like there there's a way to say like it's cool if they're different but like why can't we uh why can't we just uh uh not why can't we just not hate because of that? I think we need to smoke now. I need to, I need to. Yeah, I'm trying to figure out where you're going with this. You're in this weird place.

I need to write sober and edit stones is what I need to, the Carlin approach. I, I, there's, there's things that I want to say that I'm not that i'm not saying for a very specific reason but i i want to um i think that when we cut off when we cut off what it is that we teach our children or what it is that they can learn and uh i think that that is very damaging. When we cut it off? Yeah. What do you mean? Well, I think when people say that they don't want kids to learn about racism, or they don't want their kids to learn about the history of this country, for all its flaws. This was an experiment in democracy, and it's had varying degrees of success, I think, through

the years. Are you talking about critical race theory? That is one through the years. Are you talking about like critical race theory? That is one of the things that I'm talking about. Yeah. And what do you think about critical race theory? First of all, I think critical race theory is not a thing that's taught or should be taught per se in elementary school. That's not a thing. I think what people have done is they've applied that to all things that they don't want their kids taught.

But it is taught in some elementary schools. Not as critical race theory. There are elements of it that are present in terms of teaching compassion, teaching diversity, teaching that this was a... I think what people are concerned about is teaching children that they're inherently racist,

they're inherently biased, instead of teaching people love and compassion. So their fear is that you're putting people in this position when they're very young, where they already feel guilty, they feel like they did something wrong, and that they're responsible for things that they have no say in whatsoever, especially young children, and that maybe there's a better approach to it. They're also worried about grifters. They're also worried about people that latch on to these socially conscious, socially progressive movements that have good intentions overall, but yet these people are

using these platforms for their own personal gain and profit, which of there are quite a few people like that. And there's quite a few movements like that. And there's quite a few movements like that. And there's quite a few authors that have written books that have capitalized on these movements in this very personally profitable way. And you can see what they're doing. They're grifters. They would have found something else, but they found critical race theory. And it's a very complicated and divisive conversation to have in 2021. But that happens with everything. There's always going to be opportunists and grifters, especially in pure movements.

Right. Because those are the places that you can't exploit. With this infecting the way their children get educated and that they're indoctrinated into these philosophies, these ideas that they think are ideologies, rigid ideologies that can't be debated or discussed. Because if you disagree with them, then you're a racist, you're a bad person. Even if you're not, if you just think like, hey, I don't think that this is something that we should be teaching children, that they're inherently biased and racist. But I don't think that's what children are being taught. You can have that conversation in college and you should be able to freely debate those kinds of issues. But I think what people, what you're saying is it's not just grifters, but there's people on the side of the issue who don't want to teach racism.

Who don't want to teach that there are institutionally places in this country where people who don't look and sound like you are simply treated different. I just think that that's a reality for a lot of people. And I don't think there's any reason to not tell a kid, like, but they're not different from you. They're people who may have some different experiences but want the same things as you, might have the same hopes and dreams as you. And, I mean, that's what we should be teaching kids. I think we're looking at it through different filters, but I think ultimately we have the same perspective on it and that there is a reality of racism and there's also a reality and you have an ability to mold children and you can do it in a positive way and you can teach children.

But my concern is that teaching children that they're already guilty is a very dangerous step. But teaching children that compassion is incredibly valuable and that we are all the same ultimately, and that the differences are our strengths, and that they're fascinating, and they're amazing. And that the fact that one of the great things about this country is you can't really point out an american because we're everything we really are everything it is one of the great experiments in immigration yeah the census certainly proves that yeah yeah the browning of america and the tanning of america it's fabulous and and but i think that here's the thing is that yes we we we want the same thing but i i don't know that i mean kids could feel

guilty about things but i know that they're being taught to taught to feel listen we are ultimately two white guys having this conversation about racism children either we're not in classes right the problem is i've seen videos of people have leaked out of classes where teachers are teaching these things to children that they're responsible for the sins of their ancestors and that this is something that's inherently a part of who they are and i think there's a way to teach the positive aspects of what we're talking about there's a way to teach compassion there's a way to teach open-mindedness and this sort of understanding of the strength of the fact that we're all so different and unique i think those anecdotal examples though it's kind of why i feel guilty sometimes when i

share you know viral videos of fuckery you know in florida it's like some of these things are just anomalies you know what i mean they're just but thanks to the ubiquity of your cell phones and we can kind of take this i don't think i don't know that crazier shit's happening now so much as it is. We're all more aware, you know, aware of it. And I don't know, right.

And I don't know that that's healthy per se. It's, I appreciate the transparency and I like having the information, but I think that when you have to use, to borrow your term grifters who are exploiting an opportunity, it's good to catch them, but I think then it provides ammunition to vilify an entire area of study or an entire movement. I mean, it's kind of what you were saying about some of the treatments, the viable treatments for COVID-19. I think it's the same thing.

It's like you have this, and again, I don't think there's a bunch of people going out to the, you know, to the horse feed shop or whatever. I don't I think that happened like once or you know, I mean, like there's a one one dude, you know, but like it becomes the go to example. It's kind of the same thing here. It's like there's one person abusing, abusing their authority or their platform as an educator, which I think that there's probably more than one person doing that in, you know, in a myriad ways. But I'm saying, I don't think that that is necessarily a, a, a fair cross section of how things are being taught and applied. I went to,

I was a, I'm a product of Miami Dade County public schools, graduate of the university of Miami. I'm basically a functioning illiterate. Let's be honest about it. But the reality is like I was taught pretty well, all things concerned. I don't think I came from a broken system. I don't know what the hell is going on right now in the public school system.

I know a lot of people are yelling and screaming about masks, which has nothing to do with, you know, the education of their children. I know a lot of people are, you know, are pulling their kids out of school and going to private schools and charter schools, which is only going to help, you know, expedite the collapse of the public school system, which I think is a bummer because, like I said, I'm a product of it. And there's a real problem in this country when we don't value one of the most important things that a child ever encounters, which is their education. We don't value it. We don't boosting them to the tune of untold fucking billions of dollars, is that they have the ability to allocate resources in a way that benefits corporations, but they don't seem to be able to do that to disenfranchised communities. They don't seem to be able to do that to places that have been historically poor. And historically, talking about these people that have experienced redline laws and people that you know are still they have the echoes of Jim Crow still in their community whether they still have the same poor neighborhoods same crime-ridden neighborhoods and no one's done anything to fix it well remember when you when you take from the poor and

give to the rich that's capitalism when you take from the rich and give to the poor that's socialism remember yeah but it's it's also what i'm saying is that i understand that i learned that from a meme by the way yeah so i learned that from a probably a russian probably a russian meme no but i i you're right and we had these liberty city um burned in 1980 after um a group of white and hispanic police officers beat a black insurance salesman on a motorcycle to death. And they moved the was such a hot button issue happened in December of 79. Arthur McDuffie was his name. It was such a hot button issue.

They moved. They changed the venue from Miami-Dade County to Tampa and an all white jury acquitted the police officers. And Miami had what is to this day one of the worst riots riots in the history of this country did billions of dollars in damage. I think 18 people died. And there are blocks, entire blocks to this day in Liberty City that have never been redeveloped. This is from 1980. You know that just like buildings that had burned down and just never, never redeveloped businesses that, you know never came back, and places to this day look like that. You're absolutely right. Yeah, it's a major problem in this country that it never gets addressed.

And when they talk about rebuilding places overseas and nation building, like the amount of allocation of resources that have gone to Iraq and Afghanistan, just think about that. Think about what could have been done in the United States. Like when you heard about Halliburton getting these no-bid contracts for untold billions of dollars to do work in Iraq and Afghanistan, particularly Iraq. Well, listen, I mean, that's who won the war, the military contractors and the Taliban. That's who won the war? The military contractors and the Taliban. That's who won the war.

I mean, but at least it's over. I can say that for the time being. But I think that... Jesus, how the fuck did we... I don't know. What do we ever... Well, we always... We started with iguanas.

This is where we went. Frozen and deep and thawed out iguanas. Dude, I'm going to have nightmares. I try not to think about them. I'm going to have nightmares. I try not to think about them. I'm going to have nightmares about them tonight. You should start eating them. I'd love to. I heard what you heard. I heard that they're really

delicious. Yeah, apparently they taste good. I might open a whole iguana restaurant. Do you live near a canal or anything? In Miami, you never live far from a canal. Yeah, get a pellet gun. They're everywhere, dude.

They're everywhere. Yeah. And they claw and they, holy shit. You know, it's always- We elect some of them. But, you know, that's what I wanted to say. Because you make an exceptionally good point, which is what I was getting- When you say why the Florida of today or the Miami of today is the America of tomorrow. It's just like, when I hear and I hear a lot of

this in Miami, it's a lot of this propaganda, which which helps to swing, swing the county and swing the state. You know, there is no, there is no communist threat to the United States. The greatest threat to capitalism, for example, is cronyism. That is the greatest threat. That corruption is what taints the system. I see that in the bridge collapse. Why isn't anybody in trouble? They call it the friends and family program, friends and family plan in Miami. And we have that everywhere. And that manifests itself to the tunes to the tune of trillions of dollars in war. That's the greatest threat is the kleptocracy. That's the greatest threat. There's no communist threat. We are. This is always going to be this is always going to be a democracy. It's always going to be

a capital. Well, I hope it's going to be a democracy, but capitalism is not threatened by communism or socialism. Capitalism is threatened by cronyism. That's the, because it perverts what capitalism, what exactly we're talking about. The cream rises to the top. You work hard, you get ahead, right? This generation will have it better than their parents did. That's being perverted by toxic, it's cronyony capitalism and then it's kleptocracy and then we're just fucked and then you're just either on the inside of it or you're on the on the outside

right so how do we get out of that i think we vote better we vote better yeah the problem is who wants to run for office right that's the problem like where are these where are these great choices when the choice is two men who are elderly, which is apparently all we have available in this country. Old white men still run the show. I mean, it's really kind of crazy, right? And even one of them was an outsider. Our outsider was Trump, this old white man who was going up against an insider and Joe Biden, who's an old white man. I often say the Democrats never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

Well, that's the case in this one. But the reality is, is they, the Democrats, there are left wing, there are extremists in the Democrat Party. They have no power. They might be popular on social media. They might be very loud. They might even have a few good ideas. They have no power in the party. They aren't passing. You talking about like the squad folks? Anyway, Bernie Sanders, for that matter, could be AOC, could be Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren. They have no real power in the party.

You don't see Louis Farrakhan speaking in the Democratic National Convention. The Democrats have time and again, even in the in the 2016 election, which was clearly the outsider election. To your point, clearly the Republicans were like, we're flushing the toilet on the Tea Party. We're flushing the toilet on the Bush political crime family in China. We're done with Jeb. We're done with Marco. We're done with Ted Cruz. We're done. We want this outsider uh democrats didn't quite read the room they they nominated probably i would i wouldn't even call her a centrist i would say hillary clinton was right of center okay and it's like you know it's like when the coach goes uh you know um goes for the two-point conversion if they make it the coach

is a genius if they fuck it up he gets second guessed you know for goes for the two-point conversion if they make it the coach is a genius if they fuck it up he gets second guest you know for the rest of his life people ask about that play the likability factor she's a very unlikable person they she was the most she was one of the most qualified people to run for that office in my lifetime second only do i actually know not even second to i think al gore would come in would come in second i'm an entrepreneur i'm a small business owner i have to hire people all the time you give me two CVs you give me two resumes and you use a sharpie and you black out the name of the of the person on top and you give me the resumes of the two major party candidates in the 2016 election there's no doubt who I would hire

blindly for that job based on the resumes alone. Right, but being a leader of the free world, which is essentially the head of the United States of America, there's a lot involved in people's choices. And a big one is trust. Trust and whether or not they like the person. And they just did not trust the whole Clinton family. They did not like Hillary Clinton.

There was a lot of people that had this feeling about her, that she was this icky insider, that she was a part of this whole system that had not served us. And that was corruption-laced and deeply entwined and big businesses and special interest groups. And, you know, and Donald Trump wisely positioned himself as this guy who didn't give a fuck and was going to drain the swamp and crooked Hillary is going to get kicked out. But that corrupt system is what enabled and benefited Donald Trump. Sure. So what I'm saying is even in a best of the worst competition, I still think she was the

better of the two options at that time. But I think you're right. The marketing was still think she was the better of the two options at that time. But I think you're right. The marketing was. But again, the Republicans read the room. It was the out. I'm agreeing that it was the outsider election, that that was the spin that was necessary there. And the Democrats blew it.

But they did. But same thing again in 2020. They did not nominate a Democratic socialist. They did not nominate. The Democrats did not nominate a Democratic Socialist. They did not nominate. The Democrats did not nominate Bernie Sanders. They nominated again a centrist, arguably, for much of his career, part of it anyway, a right-of-center candidate in Joe Biden.

They nominated a moderate. They nominated someone who could be palatable to larger swaths of the country than Donald Trump. And they didn't nominate anybody popular. They nominated someone who, at least on paper, was like, okay, we'll take it.

Safe. Yeah, we'll take it because we don't want Donald Trump. It was basically a vote against Donald Trump. Yeah, a vote against instability and insanity and people who said only in third world authoritarian or totalitarian dictatorships do we listen and think about the leader of the country all the time. I want to go to work and not fucking think about what the president is tweeting. No, I want to go live my life.

What are your thoughts on social media and like banning people like Donald Trump from social media? Do you think that's ultimately dangerous? I think the private businesses need to have some autonomy. I think private businesses need to be able to make up rules. No shirt, no shoes, no masks, no service. I think you need to be able to have your terms of service. And I think if someone breaks your rules, you say, get the fuck out of my business. But do you think that there's a time where something becomes so big that it no longer is simply a private business and that it becomes a town square? It becomes almost like a utility that you could argue that people deserve their right to be heard. could argue that people deserve their right to be heard. And this is a platform that has a reach that's unprecedented in American history, that there's a thing that people can plug into

and instantaneously reach millions and millions and millions of people. The question is like, did he abuse it? Did he, did he, I don't want to say coerced, but did he help instigate the attack on the Capitol on January 6th? Did using his Twitter account and using his social media presence ultimately endanger people? That was the real question. Yes. And whether or not someone should be banned. Yes from social media for expressing themselves. Yes Well, I think that I don't know if your suggestion is to nationalize effectively Or or regulator in this case over regulator apply

You know laws and rules that apply only to the government to a private corporation I mean listen you can say whatever you want on your platform on your show No one can tell you and you can invite or not invite guests that you wanted. Right, but I could be kicked off of YouTube. If I was on YouTube with this show, they could decide that this show is too controversial. We don't like what Joe and Billy said about COVID. We're going to demonetize or we're going to even delete this episode. That's possible.

Yes. There's forms of censorship where people don't like people discussing ideas. That's one conversation. But this is a platform like Twitter where you have hundreds and hundreds of millions of users. I don't know how many, maybe billions. It's so big you can make an argument that it's like a utility more than it is like a private company But if YouTube did that to you you go to Spotify what I'm saying is you'd have There's no thing other than Twitter like that

and Then you have women like Jen Psaki Who's the press secretary for the White House who says that if you get banned from one platform? You should be banned from all platforms, which is very convenient for them if they can get someone banned that's a critic of the United States government. But oh, I don't think that I don't think that should be the case. I think I think each platform depends on you might use one platform differently than you use another. I don't think that's fair. I mean, obviously, each platform, I don't I don't think the government should impose some sort of blanket or let's go with Twitter.

Why should Twitter be able to decide for Facebook? Facebook has their own terms and their own conditions and you have to follow their rules. No, I thought it was a ridiculous thing for someone to wise to have someone who is in a great position of power who's outwardly calling for some sort of a violent movement or a violent attack. And that can happen, right? Let's forget about the January 6th thing and let's imagine that some senator or some politician is calling for people to aggressively assume control of a building or take control of a place. Like that's a dangerous, dangerous megaphone to use, right? And in that situation, I think we have to be really careful about how we allow people to use any kind of platform, right? Whether it's a social media platform or whatever the fuck it is. In that case, I think that's where your argument can, that's where there's

the argument about Trump and the Capitol Hill attack. That's where it gets real squirrely with me. But other than that, I feel like the answer to bad speech is better speech. The answer is robust debate. The answer is people that are intelligent, articulate, and convincing making far better points. But not dangerous misinformation or, to your point,iting violence inciting inciting violence yeah yeah i mean i think that's and and but i think that again you as the private business owner as a restaurant owner or whatever it is have to make a decision about that guy acting a fool at that table over there right am i gonna am i gonna put my hand on his shoulder and say buddy just

kind of keep it down a little bit or am i to pick him up and use his head to open the back door and toss him out in the alley and say, not in my place? I mean, I think businesses need to have some freedom and ability to make their own rules. I just don't think it's as simple as a small business anymore. I think when you're dealing with something like Twitter, which also has- Victims of their own success? Well, it is in a way, but I mean, they're also inconsistent. I mean, Twitter has the Taliban on. The Taliban is openly posting on Twitter.

That's fucking wild. I mean, the documented atrocities are occurring right now. I mean, you can pay attention to what's happening right now in Kabul. It's not good. And they're on Twitter. Here's the thing. You walk into my restaurant. I don't like your politics.

I could probably refuse you service for any reason. But the reality is if you come in and you don't act a fool in my place, it's a private business. Again, if they come on Twitter and they don't violate Twitter's rules, I don't like it. I don't follow them. I don't want, I don't like their, I don't follow them. I don't like their message. I don't particularly want their, their message on the platform, which is I could leave the platform myself in PR in protest, for example, because they're allowed. But the reality is I just, I block them out. I don't, you know, they don't

exist in my, in my timeline, you know, but the bottom line is, is that the private business owner needs some autonomy, needs some ability to say, control this this space this is my and i get i get it's not a restaurant i understand twitter's not a restaurant problem people have is that it's enforced almost down an ideological division it's it's like very rock solid enforced in a left-wing manner right-wing people are much more likely to be banned and censored. But then I think you have to look at the nuances of this, meaning why were these, why were the people, why was each account banned? What I'm saying is if you're going to incite violence, I don't really care who you're,

if you're a fanatic, I don't really give a fuck if you're left or right or whatever. Ban them, of course. Right, but as a proponent of free speech, which I'm sure you are, you know that this is kind of, it gets slippery when people have the ability to silence their critics or silence their opposition, silence people that have differing opinions. And when you're dealing with a small business like a restaurant, I understand it, but when you're dealing with a small business like a restaurant, I understand it.

But when you're dealing with something like Twitter, when you have access to untold millions and millions of people, it seems like we have to have a very nuanced perspective on this. And we have to really take into consideration the ripple effect of any decision that gets made in terms of silencing voices. Because I think you can all come back and bite us in the ass. I think it's an amazing ability that we have that's unprecedented to express ourselves and to explore ideas. Unfortunately, Twitter is used by a lot of fucking dummies. And a lot of it is just hate and insults and which is normal it's standard

for the the internet right people dunking on people it's all normal stuff but there's also it's it's a portal for information and it's an amazing portal for information but we got to be real careful about silencing voices just because you disagree with them but they do have but i don't think that's what it is. I don't think Twitter is banning people that they disagree with. I think Twitter is banning people who violate their terms of service. It's not necessarily true. We talked yesterday on the podcast about Unity 2020.

That was a website that Brett Weinstein had put together developing a plausible third-party candidate. And the people that they wanted to use were someone very good from the left and very good from the right. The concept was Tulsi Gabbard with Dan Crenshaw, like the two of them together, like maybe something along those lines. And Twitter banned that account. They banned the Unity 2020 account because they thought that Trump was so dangerous, they didn't want any sort of potential Ross Perot type situation where some very charismatic third party moves in and takes votes away from the opposition,

and then Trump gets into office. So they banned it, and they banned it under false pretenses. They said that they were using some sort of a bot to accelerate the use of hashtags, which is not true. And they did an internal investigation that proved it wasn't true. But there's this sort of subjective censorship that's available to them where they can just decide. They can have, what do they call it, their trust and safety commission or some shit. They can just decide, we think this should get, and you've got a bunch of woke kids that are pushing

these buttons and making these decisions and it gets slippery it gets really slippery and i think it there's inconvenient things that you're going to see and there's going to be people that are saying things you disagree with and there's going to be people saying things and arguing things do you think you're just outright fucking stupid but i think they have to be able to argue those things i think they have to be able to argue those things. I think they have to be able to say those things. Otherwise, we don't have a robust debate-based form of communication. And if we don't do that, then we don't know who's right and who's wrong. We just know who gets silenced. And a lot of times when people get silenced, it actually winds up making them look like a martyr. It elevates their point.

And here's the thing. I think we agree on all of that. I think the question is when the real debate is when does a private business cross the threshold into a utility and when should they be regulated that way? Because I think the the I don't know literally less than nothing about the specific example you just you just gave. So I can't speak directly to that. But I know that they need to be able to, they are publishing that speech, they need to be able to regulate the content to some extent. They need to be able to say

maybe you can't put the blueprints to build a bomb, a homemade gun, meaning there has to be you know, there has to be right, there has to be some rules they have to have some, you know, there has to be. Can't dox people. Right. There has to be some rules. You say you can come here and play, but you got to, you know, the house rules. This is what they are.

So then it just becomes a question of when should the government, which also talk about a slippery slope, should the government should come in and effectively regulate. Listen, we've already said we don't like the idea of the government regulating that if what you get banned on one platform you automatically get banned on all of them right that's ridiculous ridiculous right but that that's not how i want the government to regulate it so maybe it's just best to say like maybe the government should just stay maybe maybe sit this one out let this private now now the debate then becomes when is it too big right when is it too big to where we you know uh you know to where we have to have some sort of intervention? I don't know that it's there yet.

Whenever something, you know, gets so big that the government comes in and starts messing with it. I mean, usually what they're doing is their corporate welfare. Usually they're giving them billions of dollars like a bank. When we're talking about this lack of compassion, I think we also have to have this. When we're talking about this lack of compassion, I think we also have to have this. We have to have more compassion by other people's perspectives and viewpoints because there's there's this real, especially today, the polarization in this country is so extreme that there is this instant demonization of anybody who holds opposing viewpoints politically especially and i think that's very dangerous for us it's not it's not healthy it's not wise and it doesn't make for good community like you can have a neighbor who's a hardcore right-wing person and he could be a good friend you can have a neighbor who's a hardcore socialist and he could be a good friend like you can have good friends that

maybe you don't necessarily share their opinions, but you have a certain amount of decency and a certain amount of just love that you approach these people with. And we can get along better in this way. This is one of the worst things about social media and Twitter is that we're not communicating in a manner where we're seeing each other we have face-to-face contact we're reading social cues so people are just lobbing grenades over fences not 180 characters at a time yeah it's not very not very nuanced it's not there's no time for real I I think of how many threads were people like you said like it's just like

okay I'm just gonna go back with a yo mama joke you know if I can end this thing but then like you see people actually kind of come, if they realize they're talking about the same thing or they come to an understanding. I always like those threads where you're like, oh shit. They kind of realize that instead of talking past each other, they realize that they have more in common. Those are great.

I love when people agree to disagree or agree to communicate in a pleasant and civil manner. Those renew my faith. But pleasant and civil manner it's what those are those renew my faith and but then it causes it like it's also to your point causes us to like over politicize shit that just simply is not political i think about all the time like no nobody's agenda is masks no there's no big except for maybe the halloween store okay like there's no big mat there's no mask industrial complex that wants to force me no one gives a shit so why like

whatever wear a fucking mask like is that a contrarian perspective no i think it's it's whatever the opposite of virtue signaling is i guess like a lack of virtue i don't know like it's like it's it's your thing it's, just it, you suddenly politicize things that are simply not political. Some things are just for public health. Some things are just people trying to figure out the best way to navigate an unprecedented once in a generation situation and trying to figure by, by, you know, by science, which is imperfect. You go with the best data you have at the time and things can evolve and things can change they're trying to figure it out yeah and then wearing a mask when people

ask you to wear a mask it makes you not be an asshole yeah what's the harm who gives a shit i don't know if it works i listen for sure they're not all created equal that's for sure because there's really tight this is not a thing yeah these fucking bandanas or my favorite is when people wear a face shield i'm like hey fuck face what's all this what's all this you're you're literally just talking it's going out that like are you stopping just spit from hitting you like the face shield one is madness because there's this fucking gap under there although that said i'd rather the shield at the buffet than not the shield at the buffet i know you're still going under but i'd rather i'd rather the i'd rather

a shield than no shield but and i had a buffet yeah and i just but why is it political why is that political because it seems like the people that are more sensitive to the mask thing tend to be democrats and the people the more i'm gonna live my life with freedom they to the mask thing tend to be Democrats and the people the more I'm going to live my life with freedom. They want the mask. The no mask. Dude. It gets.

Dude. How is it that like how is it that with all the rights particularly post war on war on terror post 9-11 all of the rights that we've been willing to just give up. Or not aware that we gave up. Right. Like in the interest of national security or, you know, I mean, how is the TSA still a thing? How is that still a thing? Okay. All the rights and the indignities that we have allowed.

This is where we, tyranny is a mask, is a piece of fucking clay. Come on. Yeah. It doesn't make sense. Choose your battles, man. But I think it's also like people don't like that you wear it and then you sit down, you take it off. They're like, what the fuck are we doing?

Like, what are we doing? Like, there's non-logic to it. Yes. But there's also this thing that you're doing where you're just letting people know you're not an asshole. And hopefully, you know, and then hopefully one day we don't have to do it anymore. But that's what you're doing. You know, when they say you have to wear a mask and then you wear a mask, you sit down and then hopefully one day we don't have to do it anymore. But that's what you're doing.

You know, when they say you have to wear a mask and you wear a mask, you sit down, it's not that hard. At least we're at a restaurant. And that's one thing that I felt like when the pandemic sort of lightened up and you could start going to places again. I didn't give a fuck if I had to wear a mask until I sat down at my table or when I went to take a leak, I had to wear a mask to go to the restroom. It's not like it's OK. It's like I'm just happy that I could eat at a restaurant and if they put these laws in place maybe that are a little illogical I think they're trying to figure it out as they went along and if there's a way to reopen schools which everybody wants yeah and the price to pay is your kids wear a mask for like if that's what it takes

Yeah To get the economy going to get to get childcare to get kids out of the house to get what what's the what's the big? Fucking D and by the way, sometimes the rules don't make sense a lot There's a lot of rules that don't that don't make sense, but we do and by the way, God forbid God forbid It might actually help somebody or or or save somebody or someone didn't get, we don't know for sure. But if God forbid, that's the worst that can happen is that you have an annoying mask on for a few minutes and you don't get somebody else sick. Like, I don't know, it just like, that's just some dumb shit to me. Yeah. I don't know if it stops people from getting sick. I've heard arguments in both ways. And I've also seen a video where there was a doctor who was explaining that the reason why he wears a mask is during surgery and it's to stop things from getting into the wound. And he said, I'm going to show you what it looks like when you vape and you blow the vape out of a mask. Have you ever seen this video? Yes. It's crazy. Like, it all goes through.

And he's like, vape particles are so much larger than viral particles. He's like, it's not really stopping anything. It's making you feel better. And I'm like, okay, it's illogical. But, like, until this shit is over, it makes sense that people at least want you to wear it or think it's a good idea to wear because it makes it seem like you care like i don't know i don't know that it's just virtue signaling i think i don't know it is either i think it's got to filter something out yes it's something it filters something out yeah maybe it's

a enough of a viral load so you'll barely get sick versus get really sick like who the fuck knows but i wish there was a better solution. I wish there was something more logical, like fucking advanced HEPA filters that suck all the bad shit out of the air, so you know that if you go into an indoor location, you're in fact safer than you would be anywhere else. That's one of the things that they say

that's actually pretty good about airline travel, is that the filtration systems in the airline travel are pretty substantial but i will tell you i used to get sick almost every time i flew on a fucking plane i get a cold every time i that's i honestly might keep up the mask thing post-pandemic knock on when i air travel i might fucking do it i'm you know like people think that yeah just for in the airport and airplanes because i would get a stupid fucking cold, and I'd be down for the count for a couple days every time I get home. My friend Reggie clued us on to these fucking space helmets,

these HEPA filters. They're literal helmets. They go over your head, and they cinch up at the bottom, so you're completely airtight, and you're breathing. It's like they're battery-powered, right, Jamie? Yeah, they're battery powered. And so there's like a fan in there that keeps it from fogging up. And you don't have to worry about shit.

So Reggie wore these when he was traveling. It's wild, though. I mean, you are committing to a look. I'm not above that. I'm not above that. I mean, I would just get as dumb shit cold every time I would get on an airplane. It was ridiculous. If they let you wear it, they'll let you wear it.

I mean, I get it. Would they not let him wear it? I don't know. Maybe not through TSA. No, I've never heard of anybody not being able to wear it, but it is kind of a crazy contraption. You're wearing a space helmet. You're like fucking scuba-ing through the airport.

I don't know that I could pull that off. Maybe Reggie could just pull that off. Yeah, Reggie could pull off anything, but it is one of those things where I don't know that I could pull that off. Maybe Reggie could just pull that off. Yeah, Reggie could pull off anything, but it is one of those things where I don't think I can wear it. Yeah. Also, I have a large head. Yeah, it's kind of a normal head.

I have a big head too, though. Yeah, so I don't know if there's like an XXXL. Oh, it'll fit, dude. It'll fit. Because it fits with Reggie's afro. You know? It'll fit you. I don't know if that's the move either, though, you know?

It's just, I, I, we can only hope that we get out of this with a better sense of health. And at the other end, people really legitimately choose to take care of themselves better. That's one of the only things that's going to help you. I'm like, if this taught Americans to, like like wash their hands and be a little less disgusting. And really with the pre-existing, most Americans have pre-existing conditions. Obesity is a major part of that. It's a huge factor. Yeah.

So if this gets people to say like, you know what? Maybe one of the lessons of this pandemic is to get in better shape, is to take care of myself more, to eat better or whatever. I ate pretty good during this pandemic. I need to get back into general care. Well, it's hard, right? Because you're looking for comfort. Oh, I ate my feelings. When you're just trapped in the house.

I ate my feelings. Oh, yeah. I got to be honest. The beginning I enjoyed. I enjoyed the beginning of the pandemic because it just made me closer to my family, spent more time with them, just spent a lot of time just hanging out at the house. We with them just spent a lot of time just hanging out the house

We watched movies, you know watch a lot of Netflix. It wasn't that bad But then after a while, it just sort of great and grind and turns into the shining No, well not that bad, but you can see how people have a tendency to just they realize the world's fucked So I'm eating lasagna, you know the world's fucked. I'm gonna order a pizza and a know, the world's fucked. I'm going to order a pizza. I had a lot of nights like that. I'll tell you, I did my part for local restaurants in Miami. Again,

went on the apps and, you know, actually a lot of times I tried to avoid the apps and would order direct. So as to not, you know, they don't have to hit that VIG. That's good. Yeah. Cause like they get hit hard.

So like I would just order directly from the restaurants and go pick it up or if they had their own delivery service or whatever I could do. And, and oh yeah, I, I didn't get COVID-19. I might've got the COVID-35. Did you gain that much? No, not that much. Made COVID-20, COVID-25. Are you a regular exerciser? I used to be. Yeah. I used to be. What changed? Um, time. I didn't make the, by the way, not that I had less time, but I didn't make, I'm, I'm calling myself out. I didn't make the time. i didn't make i'm calling myself out i didn't make the time i didn't prioritize it in a way where it's like okay yeah i gotta be on set at 7 a.m or 8 a.m but i'm gonna wake up at 5 you know what i mean to get the workout and like you have to do that i'd rather

because i went to sleep late last night i'd rather sleep in and then go right to set so yeah so it's just a time we became busier i mean we're working on you know four documentaries at the same time now gone are the days where i can spend 12 years on a doc like we did the Kings of Miami or we go one project at a time. Now, listen, I mean, it's a golden era. You said it. It's a golden age of nonfiction content. And so like we get like docs are the thing when you think about it. I mean, listen, I don't know. Netflix wants to be talking about their business, but, you know, a 10 episode season of the crown on Netflix Costs a hundred million dollars. It's ten million dollars an episode

Docs cost less Meaning and and if they rate and people watch it and love it as much so as some of the scripted and premium Big budget shit, then it's a D. It's a bargain for them. It's great for us because we have work It's a bargain for them. They don't have to pay ten million dollars an hour boy No, no, so fucking convergence happened perfect for Tiger King didn't it? for them. It's great for us because we have work. It's a bargain for them because they don't have to pay $10 million an hour. Boy, did the fucking convergence happen perfect for Tiger King, didn't it? It was like the lockdown and then

Joe Exotic. Look who we got for you. We got some craziness. It was an incredible convergence. And that comes out now. I don't think it becomes that zeitgeist-y kind of a moment. It's just just crazy it's like a lot of other crazy it's also very good though it's great it's very good i'm not saying it

wouldn't succeed on its own merits i'm saying the confluence of circumstances that you refer to i mean like you know and netflix is they're so good they're so good at what they do they know so much more about us and our viewing habits than we even that we even know algorithms are super sophisticated they get the they get the content in front of the faces of people that they think are going to be into it based on your that's the people who share passwords it fucks up the algorithms right because they're recommending you shit your mom would like because she shares your so you're like what the so someone wrote a very funny tweet. They're just like, no Netflix. Now that I've watched Cocaine Cowboys, I don't want to watch Grace and Frankie.

It's like, how did you get that? But Netflix is so good. I mean, they just get, whether it's by email or when you turn on the service, right? And all of those, nobody else is looking at, like, the homepage that you're seeing. It looks totally, like, and so they actually called us. They play their cards very close to the vest. Netflix does not tell you anything. Yeah, they don't tell you shit when you have a comedy special either.

They go, you're doing very, very well. Right. What are the numbers? Code words. You're doing very, very well. Code words. Like, no., very well. Code words. Like, no. So I was in a meeting with them once, and we were pitching them something.

This was years ago. Pardon me. Dude's sitting there. Dude's sitting there with his laptop open. I'm trying to look into the reflection of his glasses to see if I can see what he, because he's looking up our shit. Like, what other titles have they had? Like, we're pitching him something new.

I was like, can I see how your stuff, and I got the, you know, kind of like grimace nod, you know, and I was just like, oh and i was just like oh i guess that's i guess that's good and so it's funny that they don't tell you anything but they're but they know oh do they know so much they told us like which were the most popular thumbnails interactive meaning like because they have they generate a bunch of in-service art and they tell you which one people interacted with the most like so which artwork they responded to the most and then how many finishers start it's fascinating and so it's funny so we um we did dog fight um the backyard fighting doc and we um uh it was a license we you know we work with a

bunch of people like we didn't hear anything it launched a a few weeks later. We get a call from like big guy over there. Calling congratulations on the launch. And so we asked him, we said, hey, listen, how's dogfight doing in so much that you can tell us how dogfight is doing very well overperforming here. They're like code words, but no numbers. No, you know. here, there, like code words, but no numbers. And he says, hey, listen, cocaine cowboys, ESPN 30 for 30, the U, and dogfight. What do those things have in common?

And I said, well, Miami and the American dream by any means necessary. And he said, bring us more of that. And so that's, and we pitched, ultimately pitched Cocaine Cowboys, the Kings of Miami. So it's like, but again, those are the hints. Like otherwise there's no,

they were so brilliant. What they used to do for a while. I noticed this. I don't know if they still do this, but I noticed this back in like, you know, the early days of like their originals, like Orange is the New Black, House of Cards. You know, I don't think David Fincher knew what kind of numbers House of Cards were getting. I don't think they told you know, the early days of, like, their originals, like Orange is the New Black, House of Cards, you know. I don't think David Fincher knew what kind of numbers House of Cards were getting.

I don't think they told you anything. But here's what they did that was so brilliant. Like, let's say the show, the new season was launching on a Tuesday. On Monday, they would announce that it's already been picked up for a new season. So one of two, that's two brilliant things. Number one, you've just made a contract with your audience that if you invest 10 hours on this thing, there's going to be more of it next year.

So, you know what I mean? So, so do it. And then if you're, if you're a casting crew, what do you care what the numbers are? You just, all you care about the numbers is that you got, you have a job, you got picked up for next year. So now they don't even care about the job. And of course you can't use the numbers to renegotiate your contract. You can't.

They're just like, and what do you care at that point? You're like, I got a new season. I got a job next year. That's all you care about is you get picked up, right? That's why the numbers matter. And so if you've already been picked up, what do you care? They're so good. And people just watch.

You know what happened so on cookie the first cocaine cowboys it like it took like three or four years for it to become like like a thing i feel like so first oh six it blew up in the bootleg market and here's the thing every window was a different demographic that saw it and got exposed to it like so the first one was like a younger urban audience uh with the bootlegs then there was legit dvd which was like amazon best buy uh netflix red envelope remember the old school days of the the dvds you know yeah blew up there then it went on showtime then it went on cnbc then it was one of the first docs on netflix's streaming service when they launched, when they first launched the streaming service. But every one of those windows opened up, like, the show to a totally different demo.

You know, by the time it gets to CNBC, that's not Young Urban. You know, that's a different, very different audience. So it's just like, but it took that many years for it to kind of, for me basically to get into Ubers and, you know, someone would say, hey, where are you from? I'd say Miami. They go, you ever see Cocaine Cowboys? Where, like, you knew, like, when it comes say, hey, where are you from? I say Miami. They go, you ever see cocaine cowboys? We're like, you knew like when it comes back, when your tweet comes back to you, you know,

when it kind of goes around the world and people are like, are sending you your own meme, you know, you're like, oh, that's cool. But it took years. But like Kings of Miami, boom, they flick a switch, baby. It's on 190 countries and 30 different languages. And everybody is just seeing it. And so it's like it's all 190 countries and 30 different languages and everybody is just seeing it. And so it's like, it's all those windows collapsed.

It's a, it's incredible. It's amazing. It's a pretty stunning network. Unbelievable. Yeah. And the fact that they have figured out how to not just replace traditional networks, but make it far superior.

And then they figured out how to make you, how about I'll give you the whole series in one burst. Sit down for 20 hours, watch it all. You're like, what? Yeah. All the episodes? You're the network. You're the programmer.

You're the network executive. You can binge. Nobody binged before. Yeah. They figured it out. Actually, you know what? It's a DVD experience. Yes. When I first got, I remember what was it? Like The Wire or something like that. The Wire, The Shield. Yeah. they figured it out actually you know what it's a DVD experience yes I did

when I first got I remember what was it when the wires wire the shield I got yeah all fucking night right I wouldn't even realize it yeah the Sun would be coming up I'd be all cracked out I'd be like did I just sit and watch fucking 10 episodes of this thing that was like the beginning I feel like of that and they were a DVD company or you know a distribution company originally you know so like I feel like that's how they were like oh maybe people just what if we just give them the whole fucking season so good so brilliant well I'm glad you got a platform and keep bringing more of that whatever you doing man I love it I'm a giant fan of your work and thank

you I'm happier here I may not be a one-hit wonder, but I might be a one-trick cowboy. Whatever the fuck. It's a great trick, man. One-trick pony. Keep swinging. Thank you, brother. I really appreciate you very much. Thanks, Jeff.

All right. Bye, everybody.