TRIGGERnometry - What Does This Mean for America - Jason Calacanis

00:00:00.640 I think that the country will survive.

00:00:03.140 And do you know how I know this?

00:00:04.460 No.

00:00:04.860 Because we survived four years of it, back to back the last eight years.

00:00:09.560 The media started to realize clicks and link bait drove revenue.

00:00:16.640 That led to, I think, the audience starting to lose faith in it.

00:00:21.400 And it was kind of like a self-owned by the media.

00:00:25.100 So how do we have 80% consensus on every major issue but feel like we're at war with each other?

00:00:32.620 What would cause that?

00:00:33.860 If you feel bad about where the world is, it's because you're consuming too much social media

00:00:38.320 and you're getting distracted by politicians and you're being manipulated by the media.

00:00:44.260 Jason, great to have you on the show, man.

00:00:45.940 It's great to come here and still your producers.

00:00:48.240 Yes, you're laughing because we've had a great time bantering before the show.

00:00:51.880 We have.

00:00:52.240 You were taking the piss out of us for being comedians who do serious conversations.

00:00:56.780 You're trying to steal our stuff.

00:00:58.140 You're doing all kinds of things.

00:00:59.440 But actually, we really wanted to have you on the show to talk about more serious stuff.

00:01:03.300 Okay.

00:01:03.580 One of them being we're recording this on the Sunday before the election.

00:01:06.900 The election, as this goes out, has just happened.

00:01:10.320 We probably don't quite know what's happened.

00:01:12.520 We'll talk about that in a second.

00:01:14.140 The one thing that a lot of people have been talking about, you're a podcaster but also an investor

00:01:18.800 and you've been in the media world your entire career, is this is like the podcast election.

00:01:24.020 Yeah.

00:01:24.160 That's what people are saying.

00:01:24.980 What do you make of that, first of all?

00:01:26.580 Well, it is Wednesday if you're watching this at home and that sound you hear outside are the riots.

00:01:31.880 I think media is a pendulum and it goes back and forth and trusted media has hit an all-time low.

00:01:41.300 And I started my career as a journalist and we took it very serious back in the 90s.

00:01:47.000 It was kind of a vocation and you were really trained, hey, your job is to present the truth, tell the story, give the facts, let the audience decide.

00:01:55.280 You know, they're smart, so just give them the facts, you know, the who, what, when, where, why, and we're done.

00:02:00.440 And they'll make their own decision.

00:02:02.380 And over time, that's changed a lot.

00:02:04.440 And I think I've seen the media kind of turn over a couple times now.

00:02:09.420 One of the businesses I had started was a zine.

00:02:11.780 So in the 90s, the height of being kind of punk rock or being an entrepreneur in New York was to create a zine.

00:02:20.380 And a zine was a magazine without the budget, basically.

00:02:22.960 It wasn't glossy.

00:02:23.600 You would do a photocopy.

00:02:24.700 And so I had one called CyberSurf.

00:02:26.080 I had one called Silicon Alley Reporter.

00:02:28.340 And the way you kind of made your way in the world was by saying the things and having the conversations in those publications that the mainstream media at the time were not willing to have.

00:02:40.020 So we had Spy Magazine, Esquire Paper Magazine.

00:02:42.800 I think you guys had Time Out, Mondo 2000, 2600, a hacker publication.

00:02:49.360 There were all these kind of really interesting.

00:02:50.540 Then blogs came out and I was involved in that.

00:02:52.780 I had a company, Weblogs Inc., that did Engadget, Autoblog.

00:02:55.760 We sold it to AOL.

00:02:56.880 And that was very disruptive because, again, you had writers who didn't have editors.

00:03:01.080 And then you look at podcasting.

00:03:03.140 Well, the media became biased.

00:03:05.440 We'll get into why that is.

00:03:06.560 But also I think the media started to realize clicks and link bait drove revenue in a very significant way.

00:03:18.360 And then the audience was like, I don't believe all this stuff because the headline doesn't match the story.

00:03:23.660 Right.

00:03:24.460 So like the headline was written by somebody who worked in the social media departments, literally at a publication like the New York Times.

00:03:33.300 There's a group of people who write the headlines and BuzzFeed and Gawker, some of these, you know, early publications that hacked the system would make 10 different headlines in their social media department.

00:03:45.400 They would test them on Facebook with $10 against each one, whichever one performed, whichever two performed, they would edit those and punch them up.

00:03:54.280 And then they would spend $1,000 on Facebook to get the first, you know, whatever, 100 likes on it.

00:03:59.340 And that led to, I think, the audience starting to lose faith in it.

00:04:05.300 And it was kind of like a self-owned by the media.

00:04:09.800 But then it's very hard to have a two-hour conversation or a three-hour conversation and pull that off.

00:04:17.880 And experts started going direct.

00:04:19.520 And when experts started going directly to their audiences, you had a large number of members of the audience with their AirPods in and their phones kind of become addicted to this longer format.

00:04:35.880 And then you have Joe Rogan and countless other podcasters kind of do what Howard Stern did.

00:04:42.600 You know, Joe had a big, Howard Stern had a big influence on, I think, Joe Rogan and a number of people in podcasting because he would go long.

00:04:49.820 He had a three- or four-hour radio show in New York, probably 30 million people listening to it at the peak.

00:04:55.560 And going long was like a really kind of an interesting piece of what he did.

00:05:01.320 And he had a technique.

00:05:02.800 I've studied all these interviewers' techniques.

00:05:04.520 And his technique was to pretend he didn't understand.

00:05:07.700 So he'd be like, oh, yeah, so you were in that rock and roll band.

00:05:10.480 And, yeah, so what's that like? 0.96

00:05:12.600 You know, like you're on tour and you're, like, on a tour bus and he's playing dumb. 0.64

00:05:19.320 And they're like, yeah.

00:05:20.140 And he's like, well, there are groupies?

00:05:21.560 Do you meet girls?

00:05:22.280 And they're like, oh, yeah.

00:05:23.320 You wouldn't believe it.

00:05:23.920 And then all of a sudden Van Halen's telling this crazy story.

00:05:27.960 I think that's what happened in podcasting is, you know, you take off the expiration date and the time where, oh, well, we're just getting into it, but we have to stop.

00:05:38.560 People get very interesting in hour two.

00:05:40.720 If you can get somebody to the second hour, that's why any time I interview anybody, I put the harder questions at the end and the more banal ones at the beginning.

00:05:50.380 You just let them kind of warm up.

00:05:52.060 So when we had Trump on the pod, I, you know, asked him about abortion a little bit later.

00:05:58.160 I asked him about immigration a little bit later in the pod.

00:06:01.240 And my final question, they pulled him off the show by the end because it was going a little bit long, was going to be on January 6th.

00:06:07.560 And I had that sequence in my mind.

00:06:09.700 We'll just go a little bit harder on each one.

00:06:11.740 We'll start with immigration.

00:06:12.720 That's kind of easy.

00:06:13.940 Then we'll go to abortion, Roe v. Wade, and then we'll go there.

00:06:17.180 But, yeah, it's definitely the podcast election.

00:06:20.540 And I think if Trump wins, we will look back on it and say J.D. Vance and Trump doing really well on podcasts was a big part of that.

00:06:29.060 And if men start voting in the United States and men consume a lot of these podcasts, then it's going to be very interesting because men in the United States, as you probably know, don't vote as often as women.

00:06:38.420 Right. And interesting for me, you are the kind of the lone leftist now, I think, on the All In podcast. Is that fair to say?

00:06:46.680 I have always been a moderate.

00:06:48.240 I voted probably one-third Republican in my life and two-thirds Democratic.

00:06:52.100 So I've always considered myself a left-leaning conservative, you know, or moderate.

00:06:56.600 I'm very conservative on fiscal issues, the size of the government, you know, maybe interventions globally in wars.

00:07:03.900 And then socially liberal, like if you want to be gay or straight or whatever, pansexual, go for it.

00:07:10.800 You know, whatever you do at your house is your business kind of thing.

00:07:13.260 Well, your buddies have gone all in on Trump.

00:07:15.320 Big time.

00:07:15.660 To coin a term. You haven't.

00:07:17.080 You are the lone voice holding the line, right?

00:07:19.420 Well, I mean, I don't like either candidate.

00:07:22.640 I fall into this double-hater group where I think one's an authoritarian and of low moral character.

00:07:28.020 And then I think the other one's a bit of a puppet and a socialist.

00:07:31.180 So if you ask me to pick, I'm just going to tell you the truth.

00:07:35.040 Like neither of these are candidates I would ever nominate or vote for.

00:07:39.260 Right. The reason I bring it up is I was curious to hear you say that you thought the media had gone biased and you wanted to talk about why, which I really also want to talk about.

00:07:48.100 But one counter-argument to my own argument would be it feels to us, because we are in the center of it, like this is the podcast election.

00:07:58.600 But the New York Times still has a gigantic audience that's doing very well financially.

00:08:04.100 And we kind of live in a world where you can find data and evidence for whatever belief you have, right?

00:08:09.980 So I could say, well, look at Jeff Bezos on the Washington Post.

00:08:12.960 He's come out and reprimanded his own team.

00:08:14.720 Or I could say, look at the New York Times, still crushing it.

00:08:17.320 Yeah.

00:08:17.740 Let's talk about that.

00:08:18.840 What is going on in the media?

00:08:20.180 Why did they become biased?

00:08:21.240 And is it really true that podcasts are taking over or are we in that trajectory, but not quite?

00:08:26.980 I think we're in a transitional phase where people are starting to realize they need to come to their own conclusions.

00:08:34.740 They need to maybe consume multiple sources and determine the truth of themselves, which they should have always done.

00:08:41.220 They should never have trusted any one person, whether it's the media or government.

00:08:45.580 You should always kind of collect your own information and come to your own conclusion.

00:08:48.260 I think people are kind of figuring that out.

00:08:51.260 You know, the bias started, I think, in the United States, at least, with Rupert Murdoch and Fox.

00:08:56.920 That was really where picking a side.

00:08:59.780 I remember when Fox started to, you know, Fox News became prominent in New York.

00:09:04.900 It was like, whoa, these guys have picked a side.

00:09:07.580 That was like a novel thing to do.

00:09:09.320 And then MSNBC, people forget, was Microsoft and NBC had done a joint venture in the 90s to bring news to the Internet.

00:09:18.240 That's the origin.

00:09:19.520 That's the MS and MSNBC. 0.88

00:09:21.640 And they decided, you know what?

00:09:24.320 If Fox is way over here on the right, we'll just pick the left.

00:09:28.080 And you lose half the audience.

00:09:31.120 But then the audience is much more loyal.

00:09:34.020 So even though you've alienated half, which was what you never wanted to do in media or you never wanted to do as a CEO of a company, you don't want to lose half your customers.

00:09:44.080 You want to keep all your customers.

00:09:46.020 What they realized was you could own that audience and they would watch you for three, four, five hours a day.

00:09:52.060 And that was really, I think, Rupert Murdoch's big innovation in the U.S. was Fox.

00:09:56.020 Then you had, you know, when Trump won, if you believed he was an existential threat.

00:10:02.220 And if you talk to people on the left, they believe he's an existential threat.

00:10:05.320 And you could make an argument as to what happened on January 6th, an election denial.

00:10:10.300 You could very reasonably make an argument that they tried to overturn the election results.

00:10:15.320 In fact, a lot of courts have determined that.

00:10:18.140 And whether you think it's lawfare or not, there's a reasonable case to be made that they did.

00:10:22.800 Now, if you're really, really extremely far left and you actually believe that this person is Hitler, I don't, but some people do, you would do whatever you have at your disposal to, you know, stop Hitler.

00:10:39.640 Like we literally make movies about going back and time machines and would you kill baby Hitler is like a question. 0.56

00:10:44.380 So I think the media saw themselves as a tool to stop Hitler, to stop Trump.

00:10:53.100 And so that distorted everything they did.

00:10:55.480 And you see it in the U.K. as well with The Guardian would say, like, subscribe to The Guardian and we will do more journalism to stop Trump.

00:11:04.280 The Washington Post, The New York Times, like literally in their marketing materials would put at the bottom of the story.

00:11:09.880 And I think The Guardian still has it explicitly.

00:11:12.120 If you want to see more journalism like this to stop Trump, to stop authoritarianism, back us, right?

00:11:18.880 And that, I think, has made people just not trust media at all.

00:11:25.460 They just assume they're, you know, they've picked a side.

00:11:28.340 And I don't think they're wrong.

00:11:29.540 I mean, if you were to ask me which media hasn't picked a side, I would have a really hard time.

00:11:34.460 Maybe The Economist, Financial Times, some of those publications, Wall Street Journal, most people would say, who study media would say they're the most, you know, center, not picking a side, objective.

00:11:47.820 Do you think the future is podcasts where people go, look, these are my opinions, these are my thoughts, but I'm going to host people from different sides of the political spectrum?

00:11:56.800 And actually, that's a far more honest way of doing it than the BBC saying we're neutral, when the reality is nobody's neutral because we all have our opinions and our thoughts on various issues.

00:12:08.600 Yeah, you know, different publications have different standards for that.

00:12:12.200 And I think disclosing them is important.

00:12:14.180 And so the public has always been confused about, for example, the editorial page.

00:12:18.200 So having an editorial page at a publication and saying, our editorial page is a group of people who are separate and you know their names and they write these editorials or we don't use our names on the editorial page, but they act as a group and then they pick a candidate and they give their opinions.

00:12:34.080 But on this side of the business, these other pages of the same publication is straight reportage.

00:12:39.440 It's just the facts.

00:12:41.840 I think consumers have always had a problem with that and you probably just shouldn't mix the two.

00:12:45.500 You should just take the opinion stuff out and leave that to Fox, leave it to MSNBC.

00:12:50.440 Those are opinion.

00:12:51.560 They're not doing journalism.

00:12:52.920 They're not sending reporters out.

00:12:54.420 Now, the BBC, Reuters, AP, Wall Street Journal, they're hiring reporters to try to tell stories, to interview people, to try to tell the facts as best they can and maybe be objective.

00:13:05.440 But the problem is definitely when these things are side by side, it's too confusing.

00:13:09.160 Then you add to it, oh, the New York Times is going to add journalists who are doing podcasts and they're giving their opinion.

00:13:18.160 And then you watch them on Twitter and they're writing all this crazy stuff that, you know, these business leaders or authoritarians or, you know, whatever it is.

00:13:28.200 And they're doing spicy tweets at the same time they're doing reporting.

00:13:32.540 That kind of kills it, right?

00:13:34.220 And I think the public gets smart.

00:13:35.820 Then they discover those tweets.

00:13:37.200 They put them together with the story.

00:13:38.580 And I advise all the startups I invest in to not talk to the New York Times or not talk to CNN.

00:13:46.160 Don't talk to any journalists.

00:13:47.880 Just go direct to your audience because they're just going to write a negative story.

00:13:53.120 And it's pretty predictable now.

00:13:54.680 If you were to just look at the last hundred stories by the New York Times on technology or even capitalism writ large, it's going to be negative.

00:14:03.240 That's just their approach.

00:14:04.420 You know, it's such a good point because I remember watching Newsnight, which is a very famous political BBC daily show.

00:14:10.920 I don't even think it's actually in existence anymore.

00:14:13.300 And I remember, I can't remember what the issue was, but Emily Maitlis, who is meant to be impartial because she's a BBC journalist, did a monologue to camera about what she thought about this particular issue.

00:14:23.340 And I remember just being so angry because I was thinking it is not your job for you to give me your opinion.

00:14:29.340 It is your job as a BBC to hold the neutral position, bring in people with different opinions and moderate a discussion.

00:14:37.040 And actually what you've done by doing this is betray the mission of the BBC.

00:14:41.820 Yeah, I think if you look at podcasting, back to podcasting, people understand Joe Rogan's a comedian who has a passion for MMA fighting and he is a commentator and a sportscaster.

00:14:55.960 So I think they probably go in with the understanding that he's just having a conversation.

00:15:01.860 He's not attempting to do journalism.

00:15:05.200 Now, random facts and interesting things can come out of it.

00:15:09.120 But, you know, it's up to consumers now to really figure this stuff out.

00:15:13.360 And maybe they should have never trusted journalistic publications.

00:15:17.460 Maybe we shouldn't have trusted the BBC as much.

00:15:20.320 There's a really weird thing, though.

00:15:21.600 You're all paying for that through your taxes.

00:15:24.380 So if you're paying for it through your taxes, you would hope that they would have some rules of the road there, right?

00:15:30.160 We have a similar discussion here with public radio, where the government does give modest funding, not to the level of funding the BBC here in the United States.

00:15:39.840 And that colors it as well.

00:15:42.200 And you probably don't want to do that.

00:15:43.680 And what do you think about the business side of all of this?

00:15:47.080 Because you're an investor.

00:15:48.340 And one of the things that might be happening is, you know, given that you can't have 7 billion podcasts in the world, basically, right?

00:15:57.640 Particularly when it comes to the monetization side of things.

00:16:00.040 Everyone can have a podcast.

00:16:01.460 But if I'm consuming content, I am not going to give $5 a month to 30 podcasts because the admin alone will kill you, right?

00:16:09.380 Even if you're a billionaire, it doesn't really matter.

00:16:12.180 So there are some models where there's a consolidation element, like the Daily Wire.

00:16:16.680 They've brought together a number of personalities under one umbrella.

00:16:19.560 Is that how it's going to go?

00:16:21.060 Or is it going to be the way it is now, where just the people at the top are going to get further and further away from everybody else?

00:16:27.640 They're going to pull away.

00:16:28.900 What do you think is the business future of this space?

00:16:31.900 Probably similar to writing or music.

00:16:34.860 There are people who write in their journal every day because it gives them equanimity and nobody reads it.

00:16:40.280 And then there are people who write on social media, long posts, and 100 of their friends read it and go, wow, this person is incredibly funny, but 100 people read it.

00:16:49.000 And then there are people who write for the New York Times or BBC or write books.

00:16:52.220 You've got a book coming out on teaching.

00:16:54.700 We'll look forward to that, August 25th.

00:16:56.680 Thank you very much.

00:16:57.680 Great plug.

00:16:58.100 A little plug there.

00:16:58.680 Yeah.

00:16:59.840 At finer booksellers everywhere.

00:17:03.060 So, you know, or music.

00:17:05.060 You know, people play music at home or they sing around the piano at Christmas or something.

00:17:09.460 And then people will do it professionally and everything in between.

00:17:12.480 And that's really what, you know, Gen Xers thought.

00:17:15.280 Gen Xers really thought the magic of the Internet would be someday everybody would get to produce content, have other people consume it, 0.98

00:17:24.880 and it would rise and fall based on how good it was.

00:17:27.680 Mission accomplished.

00:17:28.880 You know, like anybody can start a podcast.

00:17:30.980 The tools are such that literally anybody can do a live streaming show and compete with the BBC, and people do.

00:17:37.040 And people who you wouldn't expect.

00:17:38.260 You know, the Dilbert creator, Scott Adams, now gets 10,000, 20,000 people every morning listening to him.

00:17:45.240 He's a cartoonist.

00:17:47.260 Talk about politics, you know, and he just did it as a side hustle and he has no producers.

00:17:53.400 And he just presses a button and goes every day.

00:17:56.380 And he's built up a really significant audience.

00:17:57.940 Yeah, we've had him on the show a couple of times.

00:17:59.040 Yeah.

00:17:59.440 So, you know, he's a perfect example of somebody who's not doing it for money.

00:18:04.000 Money might be a side product of it.

00:18:06.580 And I think that's super encouraging.

00:18:08.980 It should be.

00:18:10.120 And you've always had that in comedy, right?

00:18:12.260 Open mic night was like a tradition.

00:18:15.000 And the Internet has done that for radio.

00:18:16.900 And, you know, it used to be you had to start in the United States, like in some really local town as a radio host.

00:18:24.600 And then you would go to a B city and then eventually wind up in New York, L.A. or Chicago.

00:18:29.760 And you had to, like, pay your dues for a decade refining your craft.

00:18:33.060 And now it's all open.

00:18:34.140 So it's wonderful.

00:18:35.220 And who cares?

00:18:36.680 Like some people will make a living.

00:18:38.580 Some people will make a fortune.

00:18:39.820 Some people will be like Joe Rogan and get a nine-figure deal every five years.

00:18:44.240 And other people will make $9,000 a year and will pay for their car payments.

00:18:49.000 I think that's, like, the wonderful part about this.

00:18:51.340 And all the new talent that gets discovered is amazing.

00:18:54.240 It is.

00:18:54.700 It is.

00:18:55.320 Well, speaking of talent, on your podcast, one of the things that I really like about the All In podcast is I've had my battles with David Sachs about Ukraine and stuff like that.

00:19:04.000 But one of the things you guys do is you have your battles on air as four guys that actually respect each other and like each other.

00:19:10.380 Or maybe that's a facade.

00:19:11.360 I don't know.

00:19:12.060 You're looking at me with suspicion.

00:19:14.880 No, no.

00:19:15.340 We are actually great fans.

00:19:16.960 Of course you are.

00:19:17.780 And so that's kind of what I'm asking is we know all the data now shows that America and much of the rest of the Western world actually is polarizing very rapidly in terms of who people marry,

00:19:28.660 in terms of who people hang out with, in terms of the kind of differences of opinion that people will tolerate in friendships even.

00:19:34.980 But you guys, you do duke it out and you have disagreements.

00:19:38.880 Is that an important thing for people to be doing now, to disagree respectfully but publicly?

00:19:45.460 I hope so.

00:19:46.700 I mean, one of the great pieces of feedback I've gotten from the first four years of this All In podcast is my friends and I, like, listen to it every week.

00:19:57.840 And we debate it and we get into arguments about Ukraine and Putin and, you know, we debate Trump versus Biden, Kamala, the hot swap, all this stuff.

00:20:09.620 And if we can show people that you could have a debate and still be friends, I guess that's a good thing.

00:20:16.440 And it's kind of weird for me because as a Gen Xer, you know, you would go to Thanksgiving and I'd have two of my Irish uncles, you know, who were for Reagan or Bush and then another two or three who were, you know, for Clinton or whatever.

00:20:32.260 And it was totally fine.

00:20:33.780 Everybody could debate an issue or two and then just move on and still be friends.

00:20:37.860 And so I think, you know, this polarization and the extremes has a lot to do with social media.

00:20:44.460 If you are tribal and you pick a side, you're going to get a lot more followers than if you're nuanced.

00:20:49.920 You know, if you were to ask me a question about Ukraine specifically, I would be like, yeah, you know, we should, I'd have a very nuanced take.

00:21:00.260 Like, yeah, maybe we shouldn't put NATO on Russia's doorstep.

00:21:05.860 But conversely, it does make sense to me that free countries should be able to join NATO if they want to.

00:21:13.480 Why should a dictator get to choose that?

00:21:15.280 Both of those things can be true.

00:21:17.400 And so having a tolerance for ambiguity is like one of the highest forms of intelligence is if you can keep these disparate ideas in your head with that and not have to pick a side.

00:21:28.180 The problem is, you know, the world wants you to pick a side.

00:21:31.680 And if you do pick a side, the bells go off.

00:21:35.040 You get more likes.

00:21:36.000 You get more people to like you.

00:21:37.640 I don't care if people like me.

00:21:39.100 I'll be totally honest.

00:21:40.060 I've been far more successful and happy in my life than I ever thought I could be as a kid from Brooklyn.

00:21:45.940 I hit the lottery seven times.

00:21:47.600 I've made more money than I could ever spend.

00:21:49.460 I've got a beautiful family.

00:21:50.680 I honestly don't care.

00:21:52.500 And so it would be very easy for me to come out for Trump and to go to the rallies with my friends and tell you, oh, my God, Trump is the answer for everything.

00:22:01.240 But I actually don't believe that.

00:22:02.780 I believe he's not a good human being.

00:22:05.000 OK, let's investigate that.

00:22:06.840 Why?

00:22:07.160 Because of his character and the way he's treated individuals and all his business dealings.

00:22:14.940 Yeah.

00:22:15.680 So I guess the...

00:22:17.840 Don't forget the elections happened.

00:22:19.440 Yeah.

00:22:19.860 OK.

00:22:20.400 But I'll be totally honest.

00:22:22.260 I think that the country will survive with four more years of Trump or four more years of Kamala Biden and the DNC machine.

00:22:29.940 And do you know how I know this?

00:22:31.420 No.

00:22:31.820 Because we survived four years of it back to back the last eight years.

00:22:35.720 We actually literally survived Biden and Kamala and we survived Trump.

00:22:40.800 I believe the United States is strong enough.

00:22:42.880 The operating system that the founding fathers architected will survive either one of them.

00:22:49.140 Well, before you do this, why don't we find out what you think has happened?

00:22:51.980 It's Wednesday afternoon here in the U.S.

00:22:54.220 Oh, take a guess.

00:22:54.700 Yeah.

00:22:55.220 What do you think has happened?

00:22:56.760 Well, all the statistics are saying and all the surveys and prediction markets are saying Trump has a lead.

00:23:02.500 And then...

00:23:03.540 But it's close.

00:23:04.660 And so the last time Trump won, everybody was saying the opposite, that Hillary had a lead and was two-thirds chance.

00:23:11.800 As a poker player, I can tell you a one-third chance of winning is very significant.

00:23:16.820 I've seen people put large amounts of money into the pot and going all in when they have a one-third chance.

00:23:23.100 Like, that happens one out of three times.

00:23:25.200 It's like not that uncommon.

00:23:27.060 So I think either thing can happen.

00:23:28.920 And if either one does happen, I just hope we can get through the counting of the votes without it causing another January 6th.

00:23:39.480 You know, you invest in startups a lot, Jason.

00:23:43.020 And startups, and correct me if I'm wrong, they have a disruptive element to them.

00:23:47.980 That's kind of the purpose of a startup, is that it's going to come into the market, disrupt, change the market.

00:23:53.340 Do you think that Trump is a disruptor of politics if you look at pre-Trump to what has happened?

00:23:57.760 Clearly, he's disruptive, yeah.

00:24:00.620 I mean, he's a Democrat who ran as a Republican.

00:24:03.440 He believes in a woman's right to choose, but then overturned Roe v. Wade.

00:24:08.440 He believed in banning TikTok.

00:24:10.580 And then he got a $50 million donation from one of the big investors in it and flipped his position.

00:24:15.260 Yeah, he's super disruptive.

00:24:17.580 And aren't there some positive elements to that?

00:24:22.000 Of being disruptive?

00:24:23.740 Yes, particularly looking at politics.

00:24:27.760 And the political system.

00:24:30.060 I mean, sure.

00:24:31.940 I mean, being disruptive if you do something innovative and it makes a better system could be positive.

00:24:37.780 I'm not a fan of burning it all down for the sake of burning it all down, if that's what you're saying.

00:24:42.220 No, that's not what I'm saying.

00:24:43.480 Oh, okay.

00:24:44.040 No, what I'm saying is that Trump appeals to people who maybe felt more marginalized, that politics wasn't for them.

00:24:51.200 Steve Bannon is a genius.

00:24:53.420 Yeah.

00:24:53.820 His strategy to get the Republican Party to take on the causes of the working man and woman in the United States was a brilliant masterstroke.

00:25:03.860 Steve Bannon is a genius in that regard.

00:25:06.580 He took the Republican Party, which stood for big business, and flipped them and had them represent and become a populist party.

00:25:14.920 That was absolutely stunningly brilliant.

00:25:17.740 You know, one thing I want to ask you about that, because I think that's a really accurate assessment.

00:25:21.580 I was stunned when Trump won in 2016.

00:25:25.340 I think a lot of people were, yeah.

00:25:26.420 Yeah, of course.

00:25:27.260 Francis and I in the UK, we both voted Remain in a referendum.

00:25:30.520 That's kind of like voting for Hillary in 2016, right?

00:25:34.400 So when Trump got elected, I was like, well, if I'm stunned, that means I've got the wrong information.

00:25:40.200 And it's a step by definition.

00:25:41.920 So I watched every interview that Steve Bannon did.

00:25:44.600 I spent hours and hours and hours, because I was like, this guy is literally telling you how he did this.

00:25:50.560 Yeah.

00:25:51.620 Why haven't the Democrats done that?

00:25:54.620 I think they're in the process of doing it.

00:25:56.420 I think what you'll see come out of all of this is race to the center.

00:26:00.800 I think people are realizing the trick of using the extremes of each party, the extremes on the left or the extremes of the right, that that hack has been burnt out.

00:26:11.200 So Trump was able to win the primaries by going after evangelicals.

00:26:15.360 He promised them he would overturn Roe v. Wade.

00:26:17.460 He promised them he would get two or three people on the Supreme Court specifically to overturn a woman's right to choose. 0.98

00:26:23.520 And he did it.

00:26:24.320 Then he realized that would not win him this election.

00:26:28.240 So this election, he said, I did the greatest thing ever.

00:26:31.920 Let the states decide.

00:26:33.460 Okay.

00:26:33.620 Everybody wants the states to decide.

00:26:35.900 And now the states are going to decide it.

00:26:37.460 I'm not involved in it.

00:26:38.480 But he told this group of people, and he won that.

00:26:42.000 Remember the primary had to beat like 12 candidates who were, remember the, I don't know if you saw the Republican debates in that 2016 era.

00:26:49.540 I mean, it was like, who's not running?

00:26:52.160 It was, they couldn't even fit that many people on stage.

00:26:55.000 It was comical.

00:26:55.740 I think they maybe had seven or eight people on some of these debates.

00:26:58.880 And he worked the system there, and now he's working the opposite.

00:27:01.740 He wants people to believe that he had nothing to do with overturning Roe v. Wade.

00:27:05.560 And that J.D. Vance, who is for a national abortion man, is not going to do that either.

00:27:10.840 And that these are not the droids you're looking for.

00:27:13.900 So I think Trump is a master at communication and manipulating people.

00:27:20.280 I agree with you.

00:27:21.420 And you know what I find really interesting is whenever...

00:27:24.560 I agree with you. 1.00

00:27:25.880 He's incredible at manipulating weak, dumb people. 1.00

00:27:32.000 Okay. 1.00

00:27:32.980 What do you mean by that?

00:27:34.160 He's a master at manipulating people.

00:27:37.540 People? 1.00

00:27:38.120 Especially people who are suffering, weak, or dumb. 1.00

00:27:41.280 Yes. 1.00

00:27:42.740 I would push back on that because...

00:27:44.700 You would, I know.

00:27:45.300 Yeah, yeah, I know.

00:27:46.240 Because maybe I'm... 1.00

00:27:46.980 Because you're weak and dumb, mate. 1.00

00:27:47.980 Because I'm weak and dumb. 1.00

00:27:48.840 That's what Jason's really saying. 0.99

00:27:50.220 Yeah, yeah.

00:27:50.460 I'm all of those things.

00:27:51.960 But I think what Trump is very...

00:27:53.900 That's my friend.

00:27:54.640 I'm joking.

00:27:55.520 No, no, no.

00:27:56.440 I'm devastated. 1.00

00:27:57.580 Fuck you. 1.00

00:27:58.040 No. 1.00

00:28:00.000 No, what I think Trump is very good at is identifying the things

00:28:04.140 that are very important to people that the elites do not want to talk about or is not

00:28:11.000 important to the elites.

00:28:12.720 So, for instance, the border isn't really important to the elites, the fact that there

00:28:16.800 is a porous border, because the reality is it doesn't really affect them on a day-to-day

00:28:20.600 basis.

00:28:21.520 Plus, it's kind of beneficial to them when it comes to driving down wages, etc.

00:28:27.380 100% beneficial.

00:28:28.420 In fact, in the United States, people don't know this, but the Republican Party was for

00:28:33.000 an open border.

00:28:34.200 We had a thing called NAFTA, you know, the National Free Trade Agreement.

00:28:37.320 They wanted North America to operate largely like the EU does, where you could just travel

00:28:43.360 between the different countries.

00:28:45.240 And Mexicans could come work in California in agriculture and then go back to Mexico. 0.78

00:28:51.200 And the border would just be open.

00:28:52.800 You could just show your driver's license and go back and forth.

00:28:55.420 Kind of like going between countries in Europe is pretty fluid.

00:29:00.240 And the reason was we wanted to have more low-wage workers.

00:29:04.100 That was the Republican position.

00:29:06.140 And so Trump is a genius in that he was able to convince people, hey, you know, America,

00:29:12.280 this, you know, incredibly tolerant place that is a melting pot where we allow the world's

00:29:18.440 immigrants to come, especially ones who are suffering in their countries.

00:29:22.380 And all that we ask is that you integrate yourself into the country, learn the language

00:29:26.280 and become part of the melting pot.

00:29:28.420 Yeah, he was able to convince them that their jobs were being stolen by Mexicans and that 1.00

00:29:34.860 it was lowering their wages when, in fact, it was Republicans who were sending those jobs,

00:29:38.400 business leaders, overwhelmingly Republican, who were sending those jobs to China with globalization.

00:29:42.260 And the Democrats were absolutely pro-globalization at the time.

00:29:46.720 Yeah, and I agree with that as well.

00:29:48.900 But it's also, there's a security element to it.

00:29:52.300 I think over the period of time that Biden has been in power, I saw a stat, I think it's

00:29:56.040 11 million illegal immigrants.

00:29:58.100 Now, that is an unsustainable position for a country to be in because what you don't have

00:30:03.360 is a border and a country is defined by its borders.

00:30:06.600 How many millions of people should be able to come into the United States every year?

00:30:10.260 That is a decision that people need to make and people need to agree upon.

00:30:15.060 But what you call-

00:30:15.580 You just said 11 million was too many.

00:30:16.840 Illegal.

00:30:17.400 Illegal.

00:30:17.800 But those are illegal.

00:30:18.020 Okay, illegal.

00:30:19.000 Okay, but I'm just saying, let's put the number on the table.

00:30:21.680 Is 11, what is the right number?

00:30:24.300 And the reason I'm bringing this up-

00:30:25.080 Zero.

00:30:25.100 The right number is zero.

00:30:26.000 Zero people should be-

00:30:26.780 Zero illegal immigrants.

00:30:27.820 Got it.

00:30:28.220 Okay.

00:30:28.900 So the question, I think, that will resolve this issue eventually for the United States is

00:30:35.660 to look at what Canada, New Zealand, Australia, many countries have done, which is a point

00:30:39.060 system.

00:30:40.260 About 75, 80% of Americans believe we should have an orderly border.

00:30:44.460 They don't want to have people crossing illegally.

00:30:46.900 I don't think anybody really does.

00:30:48.720 I wonder who the 20% are who believe that people should be able to illegally cross the

00:30:53.320 border.

00:30:53.580 I think they maybe don't understand the survey question.

00:30:56.020 If I'm being totally honest-

00:30:57.000 Or they're the ones running the system.

00:30:58.520 Yeah.

00:30:58.780 Something's very weird.

00:30:59.780 Like, under what circumstances would you want people coming in illegally, to your point

00:31:03.420 about the security system?

00:31:04.260 Um, but in the United States, it's incredibly insincere.

00:31:07.980 Both sides could solve this issue, and they've manipulated the public.

00:31:11.920 All you have to do is say, there are really three buckets of people who can come into this, who we need to address coming into the country. 0.85

00:31:19.940 There are people who are in line properly.

00:31:24.560 And then there are people who are refugees who are leaving a country where they would be murdered if they went back. 1.00

00:31:30.660 And then there's talent recruitment, getting the best and brightest into this country.

00:31:36.360 And if I was running for president, I'd say, look, we have three groups here.

00:31:41.240 We want to have the most talented entrepreneurs in the world.

00:31:43.900 So anybody with a PhD and master's degree, and this is what I asked Trump about, and he said, I guarantee you, I'll give a green card.

00:31:49.740 I'll staple it to their diploma.

00:31:51.200 I don't know if you saw that clip when he was on the show.

00:31:53.640 Now, they walked it back a bit because their party needs to be xenophobic and maintain this position that all the jobs are being stolen by these low-wage workers who are coming to the United States.

00:32:06.980 But we should be recruiting the best and brightest, especially from communist countries, dictatorships, authoritarian countries.

00:32:14.120 Why? For every smart person we take out of China, Russia, North Korea, any dictatorship they're on, they lose a smart person, we gain a smart person.

00:32:26.660 Like, this is like a double win.

00:32:29.460 On a compassionate basis, we can just pick a number of how many people we can absorb.

00:32:33.420 With over 300 million Americans, maybe 0.1% of the population we could all agree on, 300,000.

00:32:39.200 Sound reasonable? Okay.

00:32:40.340 And then in the middle, the line of who we need, that should be done based on merit, and there should be a scorecard.

00:32:48.860 And it could be how many degrees you have, speaking the language natively, and then what positions we need to fill.

00:32:54.820 We need to fill a lot of healthcare positions, nurses, doctors, et cetera. 1.00

00:32:57.600 So for the next five years, we might say, hey, that gets you one or two or three points if you have one of those degrees.

00:33:03.720 And if you speak the language fluently, you get two points.

00:33:06.940 If you speak it partially, one point.

00:33:08.420 If you don't speak it, zero points for that.

00:33:10.340 And this sounds crazy.

00:33:11.680 This is how they do it in Canada.

00:33:12.960 This is how they do it in New Zealand, Australia.

00:33:14.680 You have a merit-based system.

00:33:16.140 In the United States, it's incredibly cynical, and both sides of the political spectrum are manipulating people.

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00:33:51.520 To tell us more, how are the Democrats manipulating people?

00:33:56.480 I think, well, they're in office right now, and they've left the border open, and they've said that it's not open and it's not a problem.

00:34:04.660 So that would be manipulation.

00:34:06.440 Some might say gaslighting.

00:34:07.500 And your point about Trump and jobs, I think that's more of a 2016 talking point, if I'm being honest.

00:34:13.360 Right now, what I hear out of the right in America, just as an outside observer, feel free to correct me, is basically Elon has forced the right to adopt what I think is a very sensible position, which is we're pro-high levels of high-quality immigration, and we're totally against illegal immigration.

00:34:33.460 Yeah, I think Trump is doing what he does.

00:34:35.800 He is pandering to the crowd, and he's adapted his position to win this year, which is what politicians do.

00:34:42.840 They adapt their position to win.

00:34:44.600 Number one job of a politician is to win.

00:34:46.620 I would not – do you know how you can tell if a politician is lying?

00:34:50.280 Go on.

00:34:50.920 The lips are moving.

00:34:52.280 I mean, basically.

00:34:53.740 Kamala basically going to the center is a lie. 1.00

00:34:57.180 I think she's far left of center, and then Trump having this position is just a lie to get votes.

00:35:02.000 Okay, so give us the scenario by scenario.

00:35:04.700 We're sitting here on Wednesday.

00:35:06.260 We may not have a result yet.

00:35:07.700 Yeah.

00:35:08.620 But if Kamala gets elected, you're basically saying she's a fraud. 0.83

00:35:13.220 That's what you just said, right?

00:35:14.600 I think she, like all politicians, is saying what she needs to say to get elected.

00:35:20.380 Okay.

00:35:21.480 So if she's been elected, are you happy?

00:35:23.320 I am for having a split government.

00:35:29.280 You know, we have different aspects to our government here, the executive branch, legislative branch, et cetera, judicial branch.

00:35:35.060 I would like to see some stasis and them not be able to pass too many laws and spend money. 0.86

00:35:42.180 The number one issue for our country is that we are adding $10 trillion to the debt every administration.

00:35:50.340 I guarantee you if we were sitting here in four years, we could do this podcast again.

00:35:54.060 And in four years, we'll be sitting here, and either one of them will have put $10 trillion in debt onto the United States.

00:36:02.620 I'm really glad you've made this point because there are people who, economists out there, who go, look, modern monetary theory.

00:36:09.960 You can keep printing money.

00:36:11.640 It's great.

00:36:12.400 It showers, we shower people with money.

00:36:14.300 It's going to be like a hip-hop video.

00:36:15.940 Everyone's great.

00:36:16.780 Everyone's got a diamond-encrusted cane.

00:36:19.260 You're a money guy.

00:36:20.180 What's the problem with that?

00:36:22.600 Have you ever met one of your friends who, like, lives above their means?

00:36:26.060 Yes.

00:36:26.180 And you're like, how do you afford this house and then these two cars?

00:36:29.960 And then all of a sudden, they lose their job, and it all blows up, and they lose their house, and the two cars get repossessed.

00:36:35.040 You can't live above your means for any sustained period of time.

00:36:38.600 There's a reasonable amount of debt.

00:36:40.460 We're using debt to build a business or to invest in an economy.

00:36:43.900 So if you were going to, I don't know, build some infrastructure, this beautiful house that you guys have here in Austin, I don't know how well this podcast is doing.

00:36:52.020 We're crushing it, man.

00:36:53.060 I know.

00:36:53.560 So you just go to different cities and buy a luxury house like this?

00:36:56.880 No, we're not you.

00:36:58.080 It's an Airbnb, mate.

00:37:00.080 Oh, what's that?

00:37:01.480 What's an Airbnb?

00:37:02.340 How does that work?

00:37:02.780 Look, his respect level is going down.

00:37:04.560 Oh, I thought you bought this.

00:37:05.500 I mean, you saw this place.

00:37:06.640 It's gorgeous.

00:37:07.820 We're looking for an investor.

00:37:10.820 Wow.

00:37:11.360 For a podcast with two comedians.

00:37:13.240 That's right.

00:37:13.900 Wow.

00:37:14.180 It's a unique original idea.

00:37:15.620 Yeah.

00:37:16.020 Right.

00:37:16.320 We're looking for $10 billion for a 10% stake.

00:37:19.180 Yeah.

00:37:20.000 Yeah.

00:37:20.880 No, we're happy to negotiate.

00:37:22.580 We'll do a great deal.

00:37:24.500 A billion here, a billion there, mate.

00:37:26.120 What's a billion?

00:37:27.800 Yeah.

00:37:28.180 Well, that very much comes back to the actual serious point, which is the debt.

00:37:31.520 Back to the debt.

00:37:32.680 Yeah.

00:37:32.940 I mean, if you want to be happy in life, I think living below your means and controlling your expectations is super important.

00:37:41.800 Uh, uh, Elon always had a funny thing he would say, like, um, happiness is expectations minus reality equals happiness.

00:37:51.220 So, like, if you put your expectation that we're all going to be flying on private jets and have three homes and be famous, like, you're going to be pretty disappointed.

00:38:00.680 I think austerity and living below your means is virtuous.

00:38:04.300 Um, and I can tell you, having had many friends get very, very wealthy, like, uncomprehendable wealth.

00:38:12.820 Wealthier than us.

00:38:14.140 Yeah.

00:38:14.520 Well, I said uncomprehendable.

00:38:18.240 You're comedians.

00:38:19.240 Come on.

00:38:19.900 Um, but comedians have done incredible.

00:38:21.740 You have that happen where a comedian will make $30 million for a special.

00:38:25.740 Ricky Gervais gets it.

00:38:26.540 Yeah. 0.88

00:38:26.780 I mean, he kind of laughs at how ridiculous his pay is.

00:38:30.800 Um, so, uh, I can tell you, like, when you go out and you have a steak or, like, a hamburger, there's no difference between, like, four or five people going out and having a hamburger and, like, two or three of them are billionaires, two or three of them are not, or just millionaires.

00:38:47.500 And then one or two people are just, you know, civilians, working class folk, which is how I grew up. 0.88

00:38:52.940 Um, yeah, it's no difference in the hamburger and the joy of it.

00:38:56.800 Or if you go skiing or if you go for a walk or you hold your kid, you have a two and a half year old, like, same experience.

00:39:04.320 And if you actually have this overwhelming amount of wealth, it creates massive anxiety and unhappiness in most people I know who make a lot of money.

00:39:12.380 Really?

00:39:12.920 That's interesting.

00:39:13.740 Why?

00:39:14.340 How does that work?

00:39:15.020 Because they've worked really hard and they believe that if they became famous or got to a million subscribers on their YouTube channel, all the noise and insecurity would go away.

00:39:25.680 And once they had the money and they had the plane and the house, the noise would go away and the insecurity and the doubt would go away.

00:39:34.100 And then it doesn't, which then magnifies it.

00:39:36.920 Oh, no.

00:39:38.460 I've made a hundred million dollars, a billion dollars, and I still feel bad about these issues.

00:39:43.760 There's no way to solve these issues is what they come to the conclusion.

00:39:48.300 And then they realize, oh, you have to do some self-work.

00:39:50.560 There's some process here of dealing with those issues that money can't buy. 0.89

00:39:55.320 I know it sounds ridiculous.

00:39:56.980 No, it doesn't sound ridiculous at all. 0.56

00:39:58.520 There's certain voids you can't fill with material things.

00:40:01.560 No, it does take the edge off.

00:40:03.580 I will say, like, you know, if you do not have to worry, because I lived with my parents having to live paycheck to paycheck, week to week, day to day sometimes, that does create an underlying fear.

00:40:15.900 And I grew up with a fear of running out of money.

00:40:19.000 And I think it was probably why I was driven in business.

00:40:21.340 And a lot of the people I know who are the most driven are the people who come from that circumstance.

00:40:26.640 And in fact, it's kind of a trope in our industry that the kids of immigrants are the best people to bet on because their parents were just scared to death.

00:40:35.700 Are they going to get kicked out of the country?

00:40:37.040 We have to work and we have to meet this child, get into an Ivy League school.

00:40:41.120 It's the only way that we're going to survive as a family and the bravery it takes to leave your home country and go to America or another country, in your case, Russia, and then going to England.

00:40:51.240 Like, this takes an amount of chutzpah and fearlessness.

00:40:56.060 And, yeah, if you can do that and then raise your kids with that same fear and paranoia, they're going to be really great entrepreneurs.

00:41:04.300 Well, actually, that's a good question for you because, you know, you had the trauma as a young man watching your father's business be taken away.

00:41:12.080 And I know that...

00:41:12.820 You did your research.

00:41:14.080 Me.

00:41:14.700 Yeah, you did your research.

00:41:15.560 We're not that wealthy.

00:41:18.120 In Brooklyn.

00:41:18.880 We kind of...

00:41:19.540 Literally 17 years old.

00:41:21.000 He used to own a bar, right?

00:41:22.440 He used to own a bar, yeah, pub.

00:41:23.800 And they came because he was behind on the taxes.

00:41:26.720 Guys with shotguns like the ATF and everybody put the locks on and took everything out.

00:41:33.380 My dad said, I'm going to jail.

00:41:35.760 Take care of your mom.

00:41:37.300 And I was supposed to go to college.

00:41:39.440 And he said, I have no money for college.

00:41:40.980 But good luck.

00:41:42.520 I'll be...

00:41:43.440 Take care of your mom.

00:41:44.680 Take care of your brothers.

00:41:47.260 Yeah, come visit me in jail.

00:41:50.320 That has to have a profound effect on you.

00:41:53.140 I remember with my dad, when my dad got fired from his job through no thought of his own.

00:41:58.360 And I was at school and I said to him one morning, hey, can I have some money to get the train to go to school?

00:42:02.740 He went, I don't have any money.

00:42:05.380 And I'm going, well, how am I going to get to school?

00:42:07.400 And he went...

00:42:08.400 So I had to bunk.

00:42:10.780 I had to jump on a train and dodge train inspectors in order just to get to school.

00:42:16.000 Yeah.

00:42:16.760 I mean, that gives you fire in a way that nothing else can.

00:42:20.340 How old were you?

00:42:21.440 15.

00:42:22.120 Yeah.

00:42:22.500 I had a similar experience too.

00:42:24.140 What was yours?

00:42:24.760 Well, my father was one of these guys that did very well in early 90s Russia.

00:42:29.100 And he went into Boris Yeltsin's government.

00:42:32.300 And then for various political machinations, reasons, he was falsely accused of tax evasion, had to flee the country.

00:42:38.520 And so I went from being the son of a very wealthy guy to literally sleeping in a park for several weeks.

00:42:44.660 So what I'm saying...

00:42:44.940 See, that's actually really hard because you think you're up here.

00:42:48.380 Yes.

00:42:48.700 And then the distance is here.

00:42:50.220 Best thing that ever happened to me, though.

00:42:51.540 Yeah.

00:42:51.820 Best thing that ever happened to me.

00:42:54.060 See...

00:42:54.460 My point is we deserve $10 billion for 10%.

00:42:57.300 Women... 1.00

00:42:57.940 We are the kids of the immigrant who will make it work.

00:42:59.860 Yeah, who will make it work.

00:43:00.660 Women go to therapy. 1.00

00:43:01.920 Yeah.

00:43:02.300 Men start podcasting.

00:43:03.100 Men start podcasting.

00:43:03.700 There we go.

00:43:05.060 But it is true. 0.90

00:43:05.840 If you talk to any successful entrepreneur or even somebody in the entertainment industry, which is incredibly entrepreneurial, you will see some sort of like trauma there that filled that battery and made them go.

00:43:17.880 And sometimes the harder it was for them, the harder they'll work because you have that fear.

00:43:23.100 They keep running.

00:43:23.700 And it's also gratitude as well.

00:43:26.560 So my mom's Venezuelan.

00:43:28.820 Everyone on the podcast is now going to drink.

00:43:30.880 But I realize how lucky I am to be in this position.

00:43:35.180 Yeah.

00:43:35.280 I realize how lucky I am because there are people way smarter, way more talented, way funnier, way better looking than me.

00:43:40.600 He said that before we started, actually.

00:43:43.740 Who are literally thinking to themselves, how am I going to get water?

00:43:47.980 Not food, water to drink.

00:43:50.400 This is really important to have perspective.

00:43:52.560 That's why I don't get super worked up about like if Trump wins or Kamala wins, like my family will be okay.

00:43:59.980 We're in good shape.

00:44:00.940 And I have been so blessed in my life to, you know, hit the lottery six or seven times.

00:44:06.280 Like, what are the chances?

00:44:08.240 It's bizarre, right?

00:44:09.240 And so I do think gratitude is one of those ways to fill that hole.

00:44:13.740 And then whatever trauma you had is a 15-year-old who now has to hop the turnstile and commit a crime because their dad lost their job through no fault of their own.

00:44:24.660 And then you see your hero who's supposed to protect the family.

00:44:28.840 They have no armor and they have no sword.

00:44:31.660 They can't protect the family.

00:44:33.160 It's literally what happened to both of us.

00:44:34.900 It is the hardest thing to see that happen to your dad because you could see it in their face that they know that you know that they failed.

00:44:43.820 I mean, let it sink in how hard that is.

00:44:46.400 Well, you have the opposite problem, which is why I brought this up, which is you're very successful and you've got three kids.

00:44:52.140 Yeah.

00:44:52.480 And this is one of the things I've been wondering.

00:44:54.320 A lot of people, there's a lot of conspiracies always about families that have managed to preserve wealth and the right mindset through the generations.

00:45:03.000 The Rockefellers, the Rothschilds, they're all kind of, they're usually treated with suspicion because it's so bloody hard to pass down that attitude over generations.

00:45:12.620 How do you do that when they're living in the lap of luxury?

00:45:17.000 Well, maybe don't live in the lap of luxury, I think, is part of it.

00:45:20.320 So, you know, when I travel with the girls, you know, we could afford to fly business class, obviously, and we fly coach.

00:45:31.480 Because I have friends whose kids have never flown on a commercial.

00:45:36.120 Commercial.

00:45:37.040 They fly private only.

00:45:38.200 They fly private only.

00:45:39.340 I have literally friends whose kids have never flown commercial.

00:45:43.180 And, you know, I think that is actually, it's good for them.

00:45:47.720 And then people will see me and they're like, what are you doing in coach?

00:45:50.300 I'm like, I'm flying to New York to see my family.

00:45:52.780 And they're like, no, no, but you're in coach.

00:45:54.600 And I'm like, yeah, it's a good deal.

00:45:57.680 Why don't you leave it at that?

00:45:58.460 But in sincerity, like, I don't think showering your kids with, you know, this kind of experience is a good idea.

00:46:08.120 And I think having kids work and get jobs is also good.

00:46:12.640 I met a lot of young folks when I went to work in Manhattan.

00:46:17.440 You know, like, getting from Brooklyn to Manhattan was, like, the really hard goal that everybody had in Brooklyn.

00:46:23.500 Now Brooklyn's cool.

00:46:24.360 Everybody wants to be in Brooklyn.

00:46:26.060 When I was there, the goal was to leave Brooklyn and get to Manhattan.

00:46:30.200 And, you know, when I met the kids who lived in Manhattan and went to Ivy League schools, they didn't know how to work.

00:46:36.120 They had no grit.

00:46:36.840 They didn't know how to hop the turnstile.

00:46:38.260 They didn't know how to hack the system.

00:46:40.440 And so they were too soft to actually perform.

00:46:43.620 And their anxiety level was really high.

00:46:45.560 It was very bizarre to see.

00:46:47.020 And then I just would be like, well, I'm going to come in an hour before you get here.

00:46:50.840 And I'm going to stay two hours later.

00:46:52.380 And I'm going to read all these books on how to do this technology stuff.

00:46:56.300 And I'll just beat you through sheer force of will.

00:46:59.080 Is that what it is?

00:46:59.740 So you need a bit of childhood trauma, hard work.

00:47:02.720 Is that it?

00:47:03.160 Or is there some other things?

00:47:04.140 It certainly helps.

00:47:05.000 What else?

00:47:05.660 What else makes it great?

00:47:07.160 Well, great entrepreneur.

00:47:10.440 I think the ability to lead other people and to get them motivated and to be relentless and not give up, that doggedness is so critical.

00:47:21.420 Because you have to find purpose in pursuing something in the face of just constant pain and suffering.

00:47:31.100 It's almost like marathon runners or something.

00:47:33.920 You have to really get good at the feeling of having blood in your mouth and getting punched over and over and over again.

00:47:42.460 It literally, entrepreneurship, if you're doing anything meaningful, is constantly trying to solve problems and failing.

00:47:52.520 And just getting beat up day after day after day.

00:47:55.140 In a way, it's very much like stand-up, I'm told.

00:47:58.480 I'm told that the first couple of years of stand-up is just horrific.

00:48:02.360 Brutal.

00:48:02.880 You get bombed.

00:48:03.940 People laugh at you.

00:48:05.000 You get off stage. 1.00

00:48:06.180 The other comedians are like, oh, you really suck. 1.00

00:48:10.800 And then at some point- 1.00

00:48:11.220 They don't say it like that.

00:48:12.020 No. 1.00

00:48:12.140 They say, you really suck. 1.00

00:48:13.320 Because they enjoy watching you fail. 1.00

00:48:14.560 Yeah.

00:48:14.940 Right.

00:48:15.340 But it's almost like there's some recognition that the way to get there is to go through it.

00:48:22.720 And I think that's entrepreneurship.

00:48:24.500 It's like you have to go through that pain and suffering and failure in order to become good at it.

00:48:30.460 And it's hard to watch.

00:48:33.300 People really suffer.

00:48:34.560 But it's also a gift that here in the United States, you can start a business and raise capital.

00:48:39.380 And people are like, that's a really crazy idea.

00:48:41.720 The chances of that succeeding are very low.

00:48:44.240 Here's a bunch of money.

00:48:45.080 Let's do it. 0.93

00:48:46.020 Because you've convinced them that you're crazy enough to do it. 0.69

00:48:48.760 You have the skill to do it.

00:48:50.120 You're not going to give up.

00:48:51.360 And that you have the ability to execute on some level.

00:48:54.580 You know, what you're saying is true.

00:48:56.860 I think you've missed one part of the equation.

00:48:59.780 Of the pie.

00:49:00.460 I think you've got to enjoy the blood in your mouth.

00:49:03.380 Sure.

00:49:03.900 Absolutely.

00:49:04.740 That's a very good point.

00:49:05.860 Yeah.

00:49:06.000 You get that taste of the iron.

00:49:07.700 Yeah.

00:49:08.180 It's like, hmm.

00:49:08.900 Yeah.

00:49:09.540 Yeah.

00:49:09.840 I agree.

00:49:10.620 I agree with that 100%.

00:49:12.040 If you do not feel like, yeah, I'll show them.

00:49:18.180 I'll get this done.

00:49:19.300 I'll figure it out.

00:49:20.360 Yeah.

00:49:20.540 You're not cut out for it.

00:49:21.500 I mean, the logical thing to do if you've gotten punched in the face over and over and over again

00:49:26.180 is to extract yourself from that situation immediately.

00:49:30.000 If you got on stage and bombed five nights in a row and everybody told you, my God, you 1.00

00:49:36.420 suck at this. 0.99

00:49:37.540 And they laughed at you. 1.00

00:49:39.260 The logical thing to do would be to say, yep, I suck at this. 0.96

00:49:43.100 I am not coming back next week. 0.98

00:49:44.740 But then somehow, I don't know if it's narcissism or pig-headedness or just blind faith, some

00:49:54.420 number of comedians come back the next week and get one laugh and it fills their bucket

00:49:59.380 enough for them to not quit.

00:50:00.900 But how many of them quit?

00:50:02.640 Loads of them quit.

00:50:03.580 Most people quit after their first gig.

00:50:05.620 Yeah.

00:50:05.800 One and done.

00:50:07.820 99% I would venture.

00:50:09.740 99% of people who've ever done stand-up quit after the first gig.

00:50:13.640 It is.

00:50:14.220 And then another 0.9% quit after the second gig.

00:50:18.560 Really?

00:50:19.040 So you basically eliminate everybody in the first week.

00:50:21.660 Pretty much.

00:50:22.180 Because if you've had a bad first gig, you never do it again.

00:50:25.040 If you had a great first gig, you go into the second gig thinking you're the dog's bollocks.

00:50:29.600 Yes.

00:50:30.100 I'm invincible.

00:50:30.960 Yeah.

00:50:31.240 You have a terrible gig and then you're like, oh, okay.

00:50:33.480 And then you quit.

00:50:34.160 This is so interesting when it comes to human nature.

00:50:36.580 It turns out the most successful people in venture capital, investors, are the ones who

00:50:41.840 have early success.

00:50:43.540 So if you have early success in venture capital, a virtuous cycle starts.

00:50:49.960 So in my first seven investments, I hit Uber, Thumbtack, and DataStax.

00:50:56.340 Three out of the first seven companies I invested in became worth over a billion.

00:50:59.420 One of them became worth over 150 billion.

00:51:02.520 And so you would look at that and be like, that's the equivalent of maybe doing three

00:51:09.500 Dave Chappelle skits, his three best skits in a row in your first time running a show.

00:51:16.560 And what happened after I did that was everybody said, oh, you're really good at this.

00:51:22.560 Let's give you more money so you can invest in more companies.

00:51:25.400 Those are called limited partners, LPs.

00:51:27.140 They're the money behind the GPs, the general partners, which is a fancy way of saying a

00:51:31.700 venture capitalist.

00:51:32.940 So that early success led to people giving me money for my first fund, a $10 million fund.

00:51:38.840 Then the founder said, you invested in Uber and Thumbtack?

00:51:43.280 Oh, yeah.

00:51:43.740 I know those companies.

00:51:45.480 Can I tell you about my company, Robinhood?

00:51:47.520 It's a stock trading app.

00:51:48.600 And so then I invested in Robinhood.

00:51:51.060 So then more founders started coming to me with their ideas.

00:51:55.140 And then I just said, well, you can get me on Twitter.

00:51:57.860 I'm just at Jason.

00:51:58.720 DM me your idea or email me anytime.

00:52:00.820 My email for life is Jason at Calacanis.com.

00:52:03.900 Email me your idea.

00:52:05.500 And to this day, I have 20,000 people contact me and my firm every year for funding.

00:52:10.060 It turns out that would be the equivalent of like you go into your first poker game and

00:52:17.040 you win.

00:52:17.500 And I've seen this happen.

00:52:18.540 People win in their first poker game.

00:52:20.800 They come back the next week.

00:52:22.020 If they happen to win again, then people say, wow, you're really good at poker.

00:52:25.520 And then you know what they do?

00:52:26.440 They go buy a book about poker.

00:52:29.260 They go watch poker clips on YouTube and they start studying the game and they get better.

00:52:34.020 So randomness, early success can drive people's motivation to do stuff.

00:52:41.440 Whereas the people who failed the first two times, they should have the same experience,

00:52:44.480 which is I failed two times.

00:52:45.920 I should probably read a book on comedy and I should talk to some comedians about what

00:52:49.860 I did wrong and I should study the tape.

00:52:51.720 Instead, they give up.

00:52:53.180 And the people who got early success should say, you know what?

00:52:55.320 I got lucky early. 0.52

00:52:56.600 I should be prepared to fail again because that was just random dumb luck.

00:53:00.400 Or maybe I should study it and figure out why those jokes work.

00:53:03.060 What was it about those jokes that worked or those bets?

00:53:07.560 And then if you think about raising kids, if you said to a kid who hit a three-point

00:53:12.580 shot in basketball, wow, you're great at shooting threes.

00:53:18.380 Why don't you come to practice and I have a three-point coach.

00:53:21.900 I'm going to have you work with the three-point coach.

00:53:23.460 We're going to make you even better.

00:53:25.000 Just that one little act, which would cost almost nothing to do, could change the trajectory

00:53:31.300 of somebody's life.

00:53:32.140 So just keep that in mind when you're talking to folks.

00:53:34.860 And I always do that with entrepreneurs.

00:53:36.660 I've had an entrepreneur the other day who stopped me in an airport.

00:53:39.820 He says, you don't remember this, but I pitched you on my company.

00:53:42.840 And I said, oh, really?

00:53:43.760 Did I invest?

00:53:44.360 And he said, no.

00:53:45.940 I said, okay.

00:53:46.760 He said, but I told you the idea.

00:53:50.040 And I remember it like yesterday.

00:53:51.120 You told me there were seven other people who had pitched that idea and failed.

00:53:54.700 And I said, oh, I'm sorry.

00:53:56.160 I dissuaded you.

00:53:56.820 He goes, no, you did the opposite.

00:53:58.100 And I said, what did I say?

00:54:00.700 And he said, oh, you said those seven people failed.

00:54:04.600 What's your plan to make it work?

00:54:06.860 Because sometimes the person who comes up the hill after those first six or seven people,

00:54:12.160 they take the hours and then you take the castle.

00:54:14.660 So what's your plan?

00:54:15.980 And I told you the plan.

00:54:16.940 And you told me, you said, I'll never forget it.

00:54:20.780 You told me at the end, I don't think many people would be able to make this idea work,

00:54:25.180 but I think you could.

00:54:26.760 So you should give it a shot.

00:54:29.280 And I said, well, how did the company do?

00:54:32.520 He said, oh, it totally failed.

00:54:34.140 I said, oh.

00:54:34.660 But I did the second company after that with the things I learned.

00:54:37.220 I found this other opportunity and I sold it for whatever, tens of millions of dollars.

00:54:41.160 And I realized, wow, you have to be very careful.

00:54:45.980 What you say can impact a person so dramatically.

00:54:49.300 Absolutely.

00:54:49.900 And you are not even aware of it, especially if you get to the second half of your career

00:54:53.840 where people actually put some value in what you're saying.

00:54:57.100 So I now have a rule.

00:54:58.860 I never underestimate anybody.

00:55:01.400 I always just tell my team when we're sorting through the companies,

00:55:04.300 this person could have the worst idea ever.

00:55:07.580 They could figure it out.

00:55:09.200 So let's hear them out.

00:55:10.680 Let's assume they're going to figure it out.

00:55:12.920 And if they're awkward and they're persnickety and they're hard to deal with

00:55:17.700 and they're cantankerous or otherwise odd,

00:55:21.280 well, those are the people who eventually figure it out in my experience.

00:55:25.380 So be super kind and take them seriously.

00:55:28.100 I think it's because I really agree with that because one of the things that is so important for life

00:55:37.600 and one of the things that we don't teach kids is resilience.

00:55:42.240 Resilience, the ability to take a hit and keep going.

00:55:45.420 The ability to have failure and learn from your failure, not take it personally and move forward.

00:55:52.060 And if you look at anybody who is successful, you get what happens on the surface and you think,

00:55:58.680 oh, they've had it easy.

00:55:59.480 But you scratch the surface.

00:56:00.840 It ain't been easy.

00:56:02.160 It would have been easier for you with what happened to your dad to think,

00:56:06.440 oh, my life's over.

00:56:07.420 What am I going to do?

00:56:08.220 I've got to do this, be overwhelmed, go into a spiral of negativity and ultimately choose a path

00:56:14.040 that would lead to a life that is miserable.

00:56:17.800 But you didn't do that because you have resilience.

00:56:20.700 And that's such an important quality.

00:56:23.020 Yeah, I had anger and I had fear if I look back on it.

00:56:27.400 And I think when you look at motivation, like I think about motivation a lot.

00:56:31.560 Like there's Maslow's hierarchy of needs and self-actualization.

00:56:35.860 And different motivations can be very effective at different points in your career.

00:56:40.980 Fear and anger are very powerful, very powerful motivators.

00:56:45.880 And I look back on it.

00:56:47.300 I was absolutely scared of running out of money and not having power.

00:56:52.040 And I did everything I could in my late teens and early 20s to accumulate power, money, strength, notoriety,

00:57:01.980 everything possible.

00:57:02.880 I started a magazine.

00:57:03.980 I was a black belt in Taekwondo.

00:57:05.280 I ran marathons.

00:57:06.700 I just did anything I could to make money, be powerful, be important.

00:57:11.360 And then after a while, I realized like, well, there has to be something more to this.

00:57:17.420 And those short-term motivators run out.

00:57:21.480 Like the I'll show them motivator.

00:57:23.360 And you have to find another one.

00:57:24.740 And, you know, the one I've come to now is it's just so delightful to see people succeed and

00:57:32.920 you've gotten to play some role in it.

00:57:36.140 You just got to be like, it's kind of like Obi-Wan Kenobi.

00:57:40.340 If you guys ever watched the Star Wars series?

00:57:42.260 Yeah.

00:57:42.380 I think we're all of the same age.

00:57:43.700 Like if you watch the Clone Wars, which is an incredible animated series that goes into

00:57:48.580 like the real depth of the character, Obi-Wan.

00:57:52.680 He was just really, really like narcissistic, powerful Jedi who they would send on the most

00:57:59.000 elite missions with his Padawan, Anakin Skywalker.

00:58:01.320 And then he got older and realized, you know, like, I have to bring balance to the force.

00:58:05.780 There's like a higher thing to do here.

00:58:08.280 But in the beginning, he was just like, yeah, send me on a crazy mission.

00:58:11.180 Let's do crazy stuff.

00:58:13.300 And so I always try to carry that with me now when I'm working with founders who I find

00:58:18.440 myself working with people who are half my age.

00:58:20.240 I'm like, how did I become 54 years old?

00:58:22.040 I don't understand.

00:58:22.900 I feel like I'm 30.

00:58:25.620 And they're so motivated and they want to just go win the war, you know?

00:58:30.000 And I'm like, yeah, maybe I could help them not lose a limb or two because the Jedi stuff 0.99

00:58:36.280 is kind of serious business.

00:58:38.280 And they just go run into the fight.

00:58:40.780 Lightsaber's out.

00:58:41.460 Let's go.

00:58:42.160 And then they just lose a limb or two.

00:58:43.900 And I'm there and I'm like, yeah, maybe next time let's not run directly at the Sith Lord.

00:58:49.000 Like, let's be coordinated in how we go about this.

00:58:51.740 And it's like a very delightful place to be in life, I have to say.

00:58:54.940 I wake up every day and I'm like, I can't wait to talk to enthusiastic, young,

00:59:00.000 young people about the business they're starting.

00:59:02.380 And even more pertinently, some people lose, unfortunately, lose an arm or a limb,

00:59:06.380 but you can still function.

00:59:07.680 Yeah.

00:59:07.880 I think the greatest tragedy is when people lose themselves.

00:59:11.500 That's the moment.

00:59:12.660 And I've seen it with friends and people who get into comedy and they have success

00:59:15.960 and they do well.

00:59:16.700 And you're like, oh my God, you, there's, the shadow has come out and it's running rampant

00:59:24.160 now.

00:59:24.720 Yeah.

00:59:24.900 That's the thing about that dark, those dark forces, right?

00:59:27.300 You can go either way.

00:59:28.440 Yeah.

00:59:28.780 And especially with comedians, it seems like they're dealing with a lot of demons.

00:59:32.820 Not the satirists.

00:59:33.700 The satirists seem to be the primal.

00:59:36.760 Yeah.

00:59:37.260 Jason, it's been great having you on.

00:59:38.560 We're going to ask you our audience questions in a second.

00:59:41.040 Okay.

00:59:41.220 Before we do, the question we always finish on is, what's the one thing we're not talking

00:59:45.300 about that we're releasing people?

00:59:46.380 Oh, before I answer the final question, head over to our sub stack and subscribe.

00:59:51.220 What is the URL?

00:59:52.440 It's in the description.

00:59:53.520 Yeah.

00:59:53.660 It's in the description.

00:59:54.860 Just go subscribe.

00:59:55.740 Why wouldn't you?

00:59:57.160 You know, I think it's such a great question.

00:59:59.320 I think optimism.

01:00:01.820 Everybody is so polarized.

01:00:04.460 But there is actually a lot to be optimistic about.

01:00:08.480 And that's why I like when people fight on our podcast, other podcasts, and they get all

01:00:13.400 worked up about Trump and Kamala and the border and Brexit and all this stuff.

01:00:18.800 There are much bigger issues at work that are going to be solved by entrepreneurs, technology,

01:00:26.300 and innovation that are hard for human minds to comprehend.

01:00:31.580 If you were to tell somebody living 200 years ago, our lifespan, or that you would be getting

01:00:39.180 paid to talk once or twice a week on your podcast and make a living for talking into a

01:00:47.260 microphone, and it was recorded, and then everybody else on the planet could watch it

01:00:50.320 for free, that would like blow their minds.

01:00:53.460 Just our lifespan would blow their minds, that the average human, you know, lives 70 or 80

01:00:58.060 years, we are on the cusp of solving energy, fusion, renewables, batteries, solar, et cetera,

01:01:10.860 and nuclear.

01:01:11.880 And at the same time, we are solving superintelligence.

01:01:17.980 And the ability for anybody to learn any skill has already happened.

01:01:24.060 It's called YouTube.

01:01:25.020 Like, literally, there is almost nothing you cannot learn by watching a YouTube video.

01:01:31.260 And then all the Ivy Leagues, about 10 years ago, put their courses on YouTube.

01:01:36.940 And I'll go watch an MIT course on macroeconomics, and I'll look, and it's got half a million views,

01:01:44.180 and I'm like, how is it possible that all the knowledge inside these institutions is now

01:01:50.840 available for free, and we're not absolutely over the moon about it?

01:01:55.640 And then, it's available to everybody.

01:01:59.400 Like, we were not, I don't think, maybe you were, but I think two of the three of us here

01:02:04.560 were not ever going to get invited to the Ivy League schools.

01:02:09.640 And now you can consume it all for free.

01:02:11.280 And then you think about water and food insecurity and energy being solved.

01:02:15.660 Well, water being solved is just an energy problem, right?

01:02:20.000 Desalinization.

01:02:20.620 There's entire countries that live off of desalinized water.

01:02:25.000 And then you think about food insecurity, and you think about water.

01:02:27.960 Well, food is just a product of water and sunlight, so you could actually have unlimited food.

01:02:32.020 And then, oh, these robots that Elon and a number of other companies, Boston Dynamics,

01:02:37.220 are working on combined with AI, combined with the batteries, combined with energy,

01:02:40.960 they're going to be able to build anything, including themselves.

01:02:45.380 The abundance that we're living with is a big part of the anxiety we have.

01:02:51.060 And I think back to gratitude, which we talked about earlier in the conversation,

01:02:54.840 getting back to gratitude, we should be so optimistic right now.

01:03:00.040 The things that we agree on outweigh the things we disagree on 100 to 1.

01:03:05.400 The problems we are solving outweigh the problems we're experiencing 1,000 to 1.

01:03:11.020 Yet everybody feels bad.

01:03:14.760 It's because of social media.

01:03:16.540 It's because of being manipulated by politicians.

01:03:19.060 Just pause and assess the fact that you and everybody you know

01:03:22.120 is in all likelihood going to live a long, prosperous life.

01:03:26.540 And even the people in the world who are living in abject poverty,

01:03:29.720 that goes down 15 million, 100 million people a year,

01:03:33.240 leave that designation of living in abject poverty.

01:03:38.160 In our lifetime, the number of people in abject poverty will hit zero,

01:03:42.340 or they will be captives of a dictatorship.

01:03:46.140 In other words, they would not need to live in abject poverty.

01:03:50.360 Just by buying iPhones, we had 300 or 400 million people in China

01:03:54.620 that were living in poverty become part of the middle class.

01:03:56.980 The same thing is happening in India as we speak.

01:03:59.100 The entire world is getting dramatically better.

01:04:03.580 And if you feel bad about where the world is,

01:04:06.180 it's because you're consuming too much social media

01:04:08.460 and you're getting distracted by politicians

01:04:10.700 and you're being manipulated by the media.

01:04:12.920 Just pause and reflect and look around you

01:04:14.720 at everybody you know and love and how well they're doing.

01:04:17.460 And it doesn't mean they have a private jet or they're famous.

01:04:21.560 It just means that you had a great dinner with them

01:04:23.760 or that you hugged your kids and you took them to soccer

01:04:26.640 or whatever you do in England with your kids.

01:04:31.500 And the world is awesome right now.

01:04:33.780 The world is absolutely phenomenal.

01:04:36.220 And I have to keep reminding people who think

01:04:37.880 we're in the middle of this existential crisis that we're not.

01:04:40.340 Do you think one of the reasons that people do feel that way

01:04:44.800 is that prosperity and material success,

01:04:48.940 as we talked about with individuals,

01:04:50.860 is not always filling the void that people have.

01:04:53.480 And so the longer we live and the more comfortably we live,

01:04:56.900 the more we have time to look inward and to be unhappy.

01:05:00.360 Absolutely.

01:05:00.640 And you're being addicted to devices

01:05:05.960 that take all of the joy out of life.

01:05:09.900 If you look at what these devices actually do,

01:05:13.240 we put our devices down.

01:05:14.440 We had an amazing conversation for 90 minutes.

01:05:17.020 I feel like I could hang out with you guys every week

01:05:19.020 and have a dinner.

01:05:20.540 Like I just felt like I met two great new friends.

01:05:23.840 But you would never have that experience

01:05:25.480 if we didn't put our phones away

01:05:26.880 and actually give 100% of our attention

01:05:28.940 to each other for 90 minutes.

01:05:30.980 That's probably what people are experiencing

01:05:34.560 in a very large way, and young people especially.

01:05:38.220 They are missing.

01:05:42.380 It's not that these devices are causing the damage.

01:05:44.880 It's that they're blocking the things

01:05:46.380 that enrich your life from happening.

01:05:48.520 It's so easy to just scroll TikTok for two hours

01:05:51.560 than consume a comedy show or go to a theater show

01:05:55.020 or go have dinner with friends.

01:05:57.060 And so it's blocking the joy.

01:05:58.780 Young people don't have friends anymore. 1.00

01:06:01.460 They're not having sex anymore.

01:06:03.060 They're not partying anymore.

01:06:05.040 They're staying home and they're FaceTiming their friends.

01:06:08.260 And I think these devices have a lot to do

01:06:10.480 with people's unhappiness and then doom scrolling.

01:06:13.600 If you think about what we've done to our brains,

01:06:17.360 human brains were not designed to consume funny things

01:06:22.400 back-to-back for hours or tragic things.

01:06:26.520 So we are firing our dopamine.

01:06:30.420 And the most, right now, if we all thought about it for a second,

01:06:34.420 there's probably six or seven really incredibly funny things

01:06:38.020 that have happened in the world that are trending right now.

01:06:41.880 And the producer's looking at one of them right now.

01:06:45.320 That's how compelling it is.

01:06:46.640 You have no choice but to look at it.

01:06:49.780 I don't think our brains were designed to be that stimulated.

01:06:53.900 Either tragically by like, oh my God, look at all the horrible stuff that happened.

01:06:57.680 The squirrel's been murdered.

01:06:59.520 I can't stop thinking about this poor squirrel.

01:07:01.440 And the family that had the squirrel taken from them.

01:07:05.940 Like, there's tragedy happening all the time.

01:07:08.980 And then to subject yourself to it is literally, quite literally,

01:07:14.480 the topic of A Clockwork Orange.

01:07:18.280 Have you guys seen this film?

01:07:19.600 Sure.

01:07:20.020 A Clockwork Orange.

01:07:20.680 And they pry his eyes open and he's forced to watch a feed

01:07:26.200 of all the horrible things that have happened in the world

01:07:29.640 over and over again.

01:07:31.740 And he's a captive.

01:07:33.820 We've done that to ourselves.

01:07:36.260 We literally have pried our eyes open and we're forcing ourselves

01:07:39.480 to consume all the bad news and then all the good stuff

01:07:43.280 and the sexy stuff and the funny stuff and the tragic stuff.

01:07:46.260 It will make your mind, you know, get very burnt out.

01:07:50.680 And I think there's a dopamine burnout that's occurring in society.

01:07:55.120 That's why everybody's on edge.

01:07:57.020 That's why, like, this election feels so contentious.

01:07:59.600 80% of people agree about almost every one of these issues in the United States.

01:08:04.180 Now, it might be 50-50 on the candidates, but if you look at gay marriage, abortion,

01:08:09.760 or women's rights to choose however you want to frame it, 1.00

01:08:12.880 the border here in the United States, all of this is about 70% or 80% consensus.

01:08:19.100 So how do we have 80% consensus on every major issue but feel like we're at war with each other?

01:08:25.280 What would cause that?

01:08:27.500 You're being manipulated by the media, by the politicians, by the social networks.

01:08:33.200 You just have to unplug from the matrix and then assess it for yourself.

01:08:37.400 Even when you talk to somebody who's like super pro Kamala, super pro Trump,

01:08:41.180 if you'd actually discuss the issues, we actually probably agree on the border.

01:08:46.760 But we probably have been meant to fight about it because I'm perceived as a left-leaning moderate

01:08:55.180 and maybe you're more right-wing.

01:08:57.160 I don't know.

01:08:58.080 Are you?

01:08:59.240 He prefers the term far right.

01:09:01.240 He's like MAGA. 0.93

01:09:02.180 He's like lunacy MAGA. 0.98

01:09:03.920 No, we're kidding. 0.96

01:09:04.900 No.

01:09:04.960 We're both people who are just like totally in the center and then the left went crazy.

01:09:10.120 So we just were like, what the hell is this?

01:09:11.960 I think that's probably most people are moderates and most people are good people.

01:09:17.600 So anyway, to your question of like what we should be talking about is the fact that we have consensus

01:09:22.620 and the world's problems are being solved as we speak by good people called entrepreneurs

01:09:28.160 and the people who choose to work with them.

01:09:30.940 And we are literally, because of what Elon did with Tesla, and I give him a lot of credit

01:09:38.300 for this, because it used to be that in the United States, major cities were dealing with

01:09:43.900 smog and we were going to be living in a world like Shanghai and some of the cities in China 0.77

01:09:49.660 where you would lose five years of your lifespan if you didn't smoke cigarettes because of the

01:09:53.980 pollution.

01:09:54.620 Like literally, if you lived in Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, like some of these places, five

01:09:59.120 to 10 years they estimated would come off your lifespan.

01:10:02.600 If I could tell you the amount of suffering of a city with 30 million people losing five years

01:10:07.600 each, 150 million years of life lost, that's like a huge tragedy.

01:10:13.780 And then EVs now are working.

01:10:17.180 It's like one guy put the entire world on his back and then built this incredible team.

01:10:23.660 And if it wasn't for Elon going bankrupt, he literally went bankrupt trying to keep that

01:10:28.800 company alive and pulled the rabbit out of a hat getting some investors to bail him out

01:10:35.260 when the Model S was coming out back in the day.

01:10:39.140 If he hadn't done that, you'll realize there'd be like billions of years of lifespan removed

01:10:44.700 from people living in major cities strictly because of pollution.

01:10:48.100 But nobody's talking about that right now.

01:10:51.500 We basically don't recognize all the good stuff that's going on.

01:10:55.620 It's one of the pernicious things about human nature.

01:10:59.340 I think we, as a species, were designed to avoid like the river with the crocodile because

01:11:05.460 we didn't want to die, like quite reasonable.

01:11:07.160 So we obsess over the darkness, like the pathos, like it's, and we just have to take a moment

01:11:14.820 and assess reality.

01:11:17.660 Like just take a moment and assess reality.

01:11:19.840 Unlimited energy, food, water, and resources for everybody on the planet has already occurred.

01:11:26.720 It's just not evenly distributed.

01:11:29.220 There's just some evil people blocking it from getting to other people, but we've kind of

01:11:33.600 already solved all these problems.

01:11:35.060 Excellent.

01:11:36.440 Well, Jason, thanks so much for coming on.

01:11:38.280 Head on over to Substack where we ask Jason your questions.

01:11:42.960 Does he have any guilt, full on Alex, about running from a Democrat city because of bad

01:11:48.920 policy and then moving to Texas, a well-run Republican-led state and voting Democrat again?

TRIGGERnometry - November 07, 2024

What Does This Mean for America - Jason Calacanis

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