#2341 - Bernie Sanders

25:48Absolutely right. If you want to make America great again, less losers. How do you make less losers? Don't stack the deck against them. You know, one of the first things that you'd have to do is figure out why these communities in these cities have been the exact same way for a decade after decade. Back to Jim Crow and the red line laws and all these what, why is nothing being done to fix that or to correct that problem. And it becomes this political beach ball that just bounced around the air at a concert. You know, and everybody it's like there's certain things that just keep coming up that make you just go well, how are we still talking about gay marriage?

26:23How is that still coming up? And it's like throw it up in the air. All right, let me get back to that. But I want to say there's a bunch of these things. Right? All right. The first point you made, you want to make America great? Right. Yeah, less losers have have best educated workforce in the world. How's that? Radical idea? I don't think so. Right. Are you absolutely right? Better education. You live longer when you have better education, etc. etc. Right. All right. So what does that mean? It means right now, you know, I talk to psychologists all the time. You do? Yeah, I do because I am, I was the chairman of now with called the ranking member of the Health Education Labor Committee.

26:59So, you know, we deal with medical people all the time. It wasn't be personally of that. No. That I may need also, but now I was talking to a more general said, look, what are the most important years of human development? You're human being. What are the most important? You're your child. That's right. Yeah. Zero to four. How's our child care system doing? Yeah. Not so good. It's a disaster. So you got a rational society says, okay, the kids are the future of America. Right? You talked about the sense being a community. All right. So if I love this country, and I want this country to do well to the future, I have to worry about the children.

27:35Correct? Right. Absolutely. Right now for economic reasons. When I was a kid, by the way, and there's another shock, some of you are younger listeners, yeah. There was one worker in a family could actually bring home the bacon and pay the bills. Yeah. Back in the old days. Back in the old days. Yeah. Man. So I grew up at a working class. I don't have any money. But dad went out to work. Mom stayed home. And that was it. Yeah. Made healthier people to that way. Yeah. I think in many respects, it did. Well, something happened where they'd sort of devalued the woman's roles and mother. And by convincing them that they have to be a part of the workforce.

28:17I think that's a part of it. I think the other half is women legitimately wanted, you know, careers as well. Sure. And the other thing that happened maybe most significantly is you need it to stay alive. To bread when it's just daily. Yeah. Yeah. That's the problem. The real problem was financially it's just seemed so difficult for one person to pay for everything. Exactly. The only way to do it was to have both parents working. You know, I was thinking I grew up in Brooklyn before I moved it from month. And we lived in a rent control department. And I was doing the arithmetic. My dad didn't make much money.

28:50But we didn't pay much in rent. And I couldn't quite remember, you know, what a salary wasn't all that. But my guess is we paid is I recall talking to my brother about this about 18 % of my dad's salary for rent. 18 % ain't nobody in America today who's paid 18%. You know what I mean? Right. That's why you need two bread wins because you're paying 40 % 50%. Right. Yeah. But getting back to this issue of education, which I think is key. If you were rationally thinking about the future of America, if you loved America as we all do, you're going to have the best child care system in the world so the kids will do well in school right now in child care.

29:30Your work is out there making 15 bucks an hour. And you have families that cannot afford child care. My state. And that's about $20 ,000 here to send your kid to child care. So you're making 50 ,000 a year. How do you pay that? 60 ,000. And then education. You got kids who won an education. They want to go to college. They want to go to trade school. We desperately need here. Something that really drives me a little bit nuts. In America today, Joe, not only is our health care system failing us its based on greed, not on need. But we need more doctors. All right. All over the country. People have to wait, you know, sometimes months to get to a doctor's office.

30:12We have a massive nursing shortage. We need more dentists, big problem in dentistry. We need more mental health counselors. We need more pharmacists. How come in the richest country in the world winner of a lot of doctors and nurses? Because it's very difficult to do. It's very difficult to come to doctor and the bills that you have from education or overwhelming. All right. You want to go to let's just say tomorrow you announce to the world you give it up this podcast. You want to go to medical school. All right. You got it. Yeah. You know much. If you don't have any money, I'm what you're going to graduate medical school in debt.

30:51Probably quarter million dollars. Easy. Double that. Really? Yeah. I'm not. Yeah. Obviously it varies. The person, but it is not unusual for guys. You know, people working class homes. Go to medical school. About five hundred thousand dollars in debt. Right. Versus I don't know. A hundred hundred and fifty thousand dollars. That is insane. It's insane. All right. Yeah. We need more doctors. So I should I want to encourage you. I want you to go to medical school. Hey, good news. We're paying you tuition. And we need you out there as soon as we can get you. Why wouldn't that be subsidized? Of course you should subsidize it.

31:22Right. Of course. Yeah. But there's there's. There's so many different. What would you have done? Like imagine it you hadn't gotten derailed and they hadn't conspired against you. And you actually became the Democratic candidate for president. You want. What would you have done differently?

31:43Okay. How many hours we have? We get it. All the time in the world. What would you have done first day in office? Well, it's not just the first day. You know, I would have dealt with this campaign for it's reform issue. And there are ways that you can get around that Supreme Court decision. How do you do that? You move toward public funding of elections, which says that Joe, you want to run against me. That's great. But you're not going to get super packed money. We are going to publicly fund you. You know, you get 1500 signatures that says you're a serious candidate. You'll get a certain amount of money to run for office.

32:25So funded by the government. Yes, absolutely. So someone running for president funded by the current president. Well, not the current president. No, but the current government and people say, oh, taxpayer dollars are going to, but that makes a lot more sense that I think billionaires fund elections, which is what you got right now. So that's the more you think this should be when you get a certain number, you just get a certain a lot of amount of money that you could use for your campaign. Right. Everybody gets the same amount. That exists in some places right now. Does it wear New York City right now?

32:54Oh, New York City and other places as well. So if you agree, you know, you're going to raise. You're not going to raise private money. You go the public route. It exists in a number of communities. And I think that is. Did you watch the New York City debates? The mayor. I heard I'm in I got involved and I'm supporting Mr. Mendonny. A lot of people are especially after that debate. Right. It seems like everybody else was essentially saying, I've been to Israel more than you've been to Israel. I'm going to go to Israel before you do. Right. They think they're campaigning to be far in, you know, minutes of the Israel or something.

33:30But talk about money and politics. Yes. Just look at New York City right now. There's the election tomorrow. I think right. I think it's tomorrow to say Monday. That is Mars Tuesday. Right. Yes. That's the election. They're spending a huge amount of money. You know, the dem these are democratic. With some cases who isn't the lead right now? Uh, Paul say Cuomo by a little bit, but I think Zoran has a lot of momentum. We'll see. Paul's are weird and a race like that. Yes. Well, they're weird and every race. They were wrong with Hillary in 2020 or in 2016 rather. They were wrong in 2024 with Harris and Trump.

34:10Like I don't understand polls. I just I don't. I have a feeling that the majority of them are inaccurate. Well, I think they are increasing. I don't know the answer to the question. The post is a argue that's not the case. But I think you got a lot of folks who are not all that enthusiastic about honestly giving honest answers to a poll. Absolutely. Yeah. That's true too. Yeah. And that's part of the problem. Right. All right. But you asked me on my first day as well. I have you drop in. Say hello. Hi. Have a cup of coffee. All right. Good. And then I think we. The class something like our health care system as an emergency and figure out ways that we can do whatever you're the major country and that is guaranteed health care or people.

34:56So one of the things you do is say, okay, we need tens of thousands of more doctors and hundreds of thousands more nurses and dentists and so forth and so on. And we're going to move aggressively to make sure that in America everybody in this country has health care as a human rights. I think that's number one. Number two. At a time of massive income and wealth in equality, you don't give tax breaks to billionaires. You demand that they stop paying their fair share of taxes. And one of the problems that we have, it's not just an American issue. It's a global issue. A lot of these billionaires are hiding their money and tax havens in the Cayman Islands and Elshar.

35:35And that's an international issue. But I think we have to have a fair tax system which says that individuals and both the corporations that are making a whole lot of money are stopping their fair share of taxes. What is their fair share? I don't know. I mean, you know, eyes on the eyes and eyes are the very rich paid at their upper levels. 90%. But let me be very honest with you, Joe. On this one. 90 % is kind of crazy though. No, that's not a course. That's just for the, you know, your billion dollar. You don't only mean it's not your first dollar. So if you make a billion, you pay 900 million in taxes.

36:09No, no, no, no, that's not what it means. It means on your 900 million dollar, you're going to pay 90%. Okay. All right. But, you know, the other thing that I would do and you know, you got to deal with this climate change issue. And I know that, you know, there are some people think climate change is a hoax. It ain't a hoax. I think the last 10 years have been the warmest on record. And we can't create millions of good paying jobs, transforming our energies. It's them away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency to solder to win another sustainable energies. This episode is brought to you by Paleo Valley 100 % grass fed beef sticks.

36:50I live a super busy lifestyle. I'm always running from one thing to the next and Paleo Valley is the perfect on the ghost snack. These beef sticks are legit. No junk, no garbage ingredients, just pure clean protein fermented the old school way. So they're shelf stable without chemicals. That is huge. And the fermentation part, it's actually good for your gut. Most people don't even think about that. But if you care about performance, you have to care about your gut health and taste wise, they're awesome. They've sold over 55 million of these things. That's not just hype. That's people coming back again and again because it works.

37:28Go to Paleo Valley .com and use the code Rogan to get 20 % off or find them on Amazon. I think the climate change issue is very complicated. And I think, did you see the Washington Post piece that they wrote where they did this long term view? First of all, the reality is that the earth's temperature has never been static. We both agree on that. It's always been up and down. There's been ice ages and heat waves. And then the Washington Post looked at it. What was the time period that they looked at? Essentially they found that we're in a cooling period. That the earth over the past X amount of years.

38:07And this was like a very inconvenient discovery. But they had to report the data and kudos to them for doing that. Scientists have captured the earth climate change over the last 485 million years. Here's a surprising place we stand now. So look at the far end of that graph. And you see we're in a cooling period. Well, I'm not sure. I didn't read that article. But the scientists who are out there, I think. I know, but there's a lot of money involved in that too, Bernie. That's part of the problem. There's a lot of money involved in this this whole climate change emergency issue. And there's a lot of control.

38:41And that's that's a big part of this problem. Not only that, if we're just talking about primarily carbon and carbon footprint, what are we going to do about China? Because China is like what percentage of they are the major polluter right now in terms of carbon? We're number two. We used to be one. They're in a moment right now. I think they have an enormous percent of global. I think it's number one. I don't know what the result is. Look, this is it's not an American issue. It is a global issue. And all I can tell you is that we are in my view going to see more extreme weather disturbances in the coming years than we have ever.

39:22And we're seeing them right now. We are right. But scientists don't agree. This is where it gets confusing. Because scientists that are in agreement, there's all these entanglements whenever someone's discussing something, whether it's economics or whether it's health issues or pharmaceutical drugs, there's financial entanglements. I think we both agree with that, right? And I think this is part of the issue with this whole climate change emergency as well. Because it's not just that we could all agree pollution is a major factor. It's a huge issue in the world today. We could all agree with that, right?

39:59I think one of the things that we have to recognize is that there's whenever there's an issue that everyone can agree on, you're going to have a bunch of people that capitalize on that issue and they look to gain more money. They have financial issues that they push forward in order to capitalize on this issue, but then also power and control. These things like they're trying to institute in the UK where they have these 15 -minute cities, this concept where you're not allowed to travel, they'll be able to look at your carbon footprint. Yeah, see, that's the problem. The problem is giving people that are in power, these people that we've all discussed that have so much money and so much control over our society's multi -national corporations, giving them more control over citizens.

40:46And this is a vehicle for that. And this is what's dangerous about this whole climate change emergency. Because it allows these fucking creeps that have been controlling people and controlling what you do and what you say and how you spend your money with people that already live in check to check and you put additional constraints on them and you make them even more scared. And then you put additional measures where you can look at their carbon footprint, you go look at the amount they travel, put a carbon tax on these people, let's figure out how to extract more money from them. That's what bothers me about this climate change emergency.

41:21Not that we can all agree, pollution is a terrible thing. Everyone should agree to that. The beautiful earth that sustains us in all life on this planet is being poisoned as we speak. We're killing all the fish in the ocean and sucking them out in giant numbers, 94 % of all the big fish that are in the ocean are gone. Over the last, you know, whatever it is. When you go to war against nature, you lose. Yeah, because you're not a nature. Exactly right. We're worshiping the Almighty Dollar above the month. You know, I asked me when I ran for president, one of the interests, it's, you know, it's something else to run for president because you got around you meet all kinds of people and you learn all kinds of things.

42:01And one of the things that I did, we went to a lot of, met with a lot of Native Americans. And one of the reasons is, you know, their tradition was going from way back respect for nature. That they understood back way back when that you kill off all of the buffalo, you ain't going to have nothing to eat, right? Right. They understood that. And they knew you understand that you live in harmony with Native, which is, I think what you're talking about. Absolutely. And if you lose that harmony, I worry about the future of humanity in terms of... You got all the things that you can do to help you. And you're only alive for a hundred years, so it's just hit the gas.

42:42Hit the gas for a hundred years and who gives a shit what happens after I'm gone? I'm going to die with the most toys. Yay, I win in the dirt. That's exactly right. Yeah. And that is, which takes us to another issue? Okay. And that is artificial intelligence and robotics. Automation. Automation. Yeah. Okay. So, giant issue. Yeah. UG issue. All right. So, let's back it up.

43:08Merkins are angry. And one of the reasons they are angry is that over the last, just give you one fact, the last 52 years, you and I understand everybody in the world, in the sense of being a huge explosion in technology, correct? What we're doing today never could have happened 50 years ago. Factories, far more automated, offices, far more automated. I became mayor Burlington Vermont in 1981. There was not a computer in the building. So, that's great town. It is a great town. In any case, an explosion of technology, significant increase in worker productivity, right? We're talking to millions of people now, never could have happened before, right?

43:55That's true. Workers are producing a lot more. Tell me, how are real inflation accounted for wages been over the last 52 years, all of that increase in worker productivity, workers doing a lot better? Not so good. Not so good. No. In fact, there are studies out there that suggest in real inflation accounted for dollars, wages are actually low and out, and they worked 52 years ago. Okay. And during that same period, there's a massive transfer of wealth from the bottom 90 % to the top 1%. So, that's what technology has done over the last 50 years. There was a study. I don't know if you saw this.

44:29It blew me away. I can't remember whether it was Kaiser. Some reputable guy, people did it. This is what they said. They do a poll to the American people, and they say, Americans, do you think you are better off today than somebody in your situation, your middle class, whatever you may be, was 40 years ago. Okay. Are you better off today than somebody in your circumstance would have been 40 years ago? What was the answer? No. Yeah. And what the answer was, and we got to deal with this one. This is big. The answer was, you know, there were a number of people say, hey, look, I got a cell phone. It's great, I got a big screen TV.

45:11It's great, I can fly all over the world. It's great, I get sick. I get treatment now that I never could have had 40 years ago, right? Those are facts. All really positive developments. But on average, most people said, I think this situation is worse today than it was 40 years ago. And that is what we got to deal with. So you can have all the technology in the world. What the hell does it mean if your life is not improving? In fact, in many ways, getting worse. Yeah. Well, again, we'll go back to polls again, because I don't necessarily believe that polls are totally accurate. But I do think that the issue with it being virtually impossible for one person to sustain the entire family these days, one worker, the father or the mother, whoever it is, to sustain the entire, that's a giant issue.

46:00All these issues, when it comes to labor, when it comes to minimum wage, I think you and I are in agreement with all these. I think the minimum wage in this country is ridiculous. I mean, $7. What? It's insane. How do you live off $7? You go to Jimmy John's, you get a sub. How much is a sub? How much is a sub like a big sub at Jimmy John's? Some guy was just a TikTok video where he's like, they're trying to say that minimum wage, $15 is too much. I think he had a sub that he bought for $25. So imagine, that's your lunch. So imagine you have to work three and a half hours? Just to pay for a sandwich?

46:44Imagine how insane that is. That's insane. Like how do you eat dinner? How do you eat lunch? How do you eat breakfast? I have talked to people who make $10 to $12 an hour trying to raise a kid. Jesus. That's right. Yeah. Well, the argument against that is, hey, these are entry level jobs that are supposed to be for kids. No, and that's actually correct. Yeah, of course. True to sub degree. To sub degree. But if you have grown adults that are working those jobs, now it becomes disgusting. That's right. That's exactly right. Especially when you're dealing with an enormous corporation. You got it.

47:17Right. So we put a lot of pressure. You know, we, you know, I try and raise the minimum wage, federal minimum wage to $17 an hour. That's a reasonable amount of money. You know, I mean, it's still, it's not, it's going to be real difficult to live off of $17 an hour. But at least, that's right. You can get it. You can get it. I thought I want to get back to this issue because it's one that we don't talk about. And it gets to AI. Why do, why do we have what, you know, some of these people call an epidemic of loneliness in America? Yes. Why do we mental illness rates are pretty high? Suicide rates are too high.

47:55Too much to God. Drug addiction. Right. How are we a problem all over the country? Why? Well, there's a lot of factors. First of all, there is a, there are a lot of people that are very unhealthy, physically unhealthy. I think metabolic health is a gigantic issue in this country. Yep. There's a lot of people in this country that feel completely disenfranchised. And so they turn inward. Yep. And then technology invites them to do that. You get online and you spend your time staring at a screen, having communications with people, arguing with people. You're going on Twitter all day, you know, changing the flag in your bio from Ukraine to Palestine.

48:37And now you got an Iranian, you're just like in a constant state of anxiety and chaos. You're dealing with the entire problem, the problems of the entire world. You're dealing with eight billion people's worth of problems every day. I think that's unsustainable. And then that's also a function of technology because this interaction that we have is unprecedented. Right. The interaction with the news with each other, all this stuff we're not designed to handle. And it gives you massive anxiety, particularly for young people. Particularly, Jonathan Hates written about this with young girls who have the biggest problem.

49:12With social media, comparing themselves to other people, massive increase in self -harm, suicide, suicide ideology, depression, anxiety, all this stuff accentuated by technology. And our unchecked use of it. I think you hit the nail on that. And so I think we got to take a deep breath and understand that we got to figure out how we make technology work to improve human life. Right. Don't you think this is the 11th hour? I think it is. Yeah. The problem with it is, like it's already the genies out of the box. There's no question that a better one. But, you know, we can't sit around and just do nothing.

49:56But when it, this is the real issue. When it becomes a problem where you have massive automation of almost all jobs, which is something that, especially when you deal with the corporation that is entirely based around making the most amount of money possible. Well, what better way when you don't have to pay them any of them? You got it. You all right? There are sides. I don't know if you've seen them. Signs advertising from AI companies. What was they saying? Don't hire humans. Something like that. Yeah, it's posted. That's adorable. Don't. This episode is brought to you by Farmer's Dog. It doesn't matter how old your dog is.

50:30It's always a great time to start investing in their health and happiness. And thankfully, the Farmer's Dog makes it easier than ever to feed your dog a healthy diet of real meat and veggies. Dogs prefer their food, even picky dogs, and owners prefer their service. If you have a question about your dog, your plan, your delivery, or anything else, they have 24 -7 customer service. They have a lot of customers that connect you to real humans who are genuinely interested in providing the best experience possible for you and your dog. They give you detailed instructions on how to transition your dog to fresh food and even pre -portion it for your dog's specific needs.

51:07Feeding your dog healthy, human -grade food shouldn't be complicated. And with the Farmer's Dog, it isn't. The entire experience from box to bowl is a breeze. So try the Farmer's Dog today and give healthy, freshly made food a try. You can get 50 % off your first box of food plus free shipping. Just go to thefarmer'sdog .com slash rogan. Tap the banner or visit this episodes page to learn more. Offer available for new customers only. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. Have you ever been shopping online and the website just gave you the ick? Let me tell you, that wouldn't happen if they used Squarespace.

51:50Squarespace design intelligence empowers anyone to build beautiful, more personalized websites tailored to your unique needs. And with Squarespace payments, it's super easy to manage payments with just a few clicks. Plus, with Squarespace's integrated and optimized SEO tools, there's all the help you need to get people to your site. Head to squarespace .com slash Emma for a free trial and use code Emma to save 10 % on your first purchase. Higher humans. That's demonic. Yeah. But also from the perspective of a corporation where you deal with human issues, problems, mistakes, people showing up late.

52:34Why do I need you when I can get a robot? Exactly. You're not going to get sick. Right. You know, I can fix you a lot easier than paying for your health care and so forth. Right. So what do you do? What do you do about that? So if you're the president and president Sanders, we have this issue. The whole country is going to go automation. Good question. What do we do? All right. First of all, we make the determination that we are not going to let a handful of CEOs make these decisions. So they're going to be made by the American people. What does that mean? Bottom line, it means that technology is going to work to improve us, not just the people who own the technology and the CEOs of logic operations.

53:14What does that mean? All right. First thought. You are a worker. Your worker. Your productivity is increasing because we give you AI, right? Right. Right. Instead of throwing you out on the street, I'm going to reduce your work week to 32 hours. All right. So you're going to have four day work week. Exactly. And by the way, not a radical idea. Not a radical idea at all. There are companies around the world that are doing it with some success. The UAW, the United Kingdom of the World Workers, they had a big strike a year ago. You remember against the big three, remember? Mm -hmm. And they won a very good contract and I'm a big fan of the trade union movement.

53:53I think workers need that. And one of their demands, interestingly enough, and people thought that Sean Fein was the president of the union was crazy. But Sean said, you know what? We want a 32 hour work week because our people are producing more. People thought it was crazy, but the idea is catching on. So first thing to say is let's use technology to benefit workers. That means give you more time with your family, with your friends, you know, for education, whatever the hell you want to do. You don't have to work 40 hours a week anymore. Second thing I think we have got to do is take a look.

54:27As you just said, you said it, you know, better than I said it, is what does it mean that we have somebody young kids living on the internet? Right. All right. There are schools all over the country now who are getting cell phones out of schools. I talk to teachers in Vermont and they say, you know, kids' attention spans now have been greatly diminished. Yes. You know. How do we deal with that? In Vermont again, there was somebody told me that there's a teacher now who does, he demands that his students write with a pen in blue books now because he doesn't trust what they're sending in that it's not artificial intelligence.

55:09All right. So if I say to you, Joe, give me, tell me what happened to the American Revolution. You go to the chat box. You give me a wonderful essay that you know nothing about, right? Right. What does that mean for your intellectual development? That all you can do is press a button and give me an answer. Right. Unless you've absorbed that information. Unless you have. Right. But many kids are not. And we got to worry about that as well. So I think we have to take a deep breath under many of the things, what has been the impact of all this? How do we stop the negative impacts? How do we go forward with what is positive?

55:42And it is not easy stuff to be sure. But what I worry about right now is I think artificial intelligence is going to displace millions and millions of workers. People are going to be thrown out on the street. I think the corporate guys who are running these companies could care less about these workers. I think robotics is going to be running a lot of the factories in America. And I think these resources should just have got to address in a bold way. Yes. But how do you do that? And like you're balancing it out in one way if you are a corporation, like imagine your automobile manufacturing corporation, you're a Ford.

56:26What? A Ford is struggling right now. There's a giant issue with Ford. Right. So what does Ford do if all of a sudden something comes along that allows them to be more productive? They're more profitable. These machines can work 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They don't need time off. And you're going to make a better product. You're going to make more money for your shareholders, the corporations, succeeds. Right. But you don't need X amount of workers anymore. Right. How do you mitigate this? I mean, that's the right question. I don't think you do. All right. Nobody has a simple answer. Let's just talk about it.

57:01Does Ford simply, does corporate America have the right to say to workers throughout this country? Hey, sorry guys, we don't need you anymore. Have a nice life. You're out on the street. Instead of thinking them as workers, should we think of them as, look, there are people that make the decisions. There's the executives. There's the corporation itself. But without the people that worked on those assembly lines, you have nothing. That's right. You have nothing. You couldn't have done any of the things you've done without those people. But those people are replaceable because it's skilled labor that you could teach another person to do.

57:40And they're replaceable because there's plenty of people that want those jobs and there's a demand. So you have filemen, you file them out, which is why they developed unions. Right. So they developed unions to keep people from being exploited. Right. And then the problem becomes that unions get exploited. And then the unions have a lot of money. And then there's a lot of info. And then they decide, okay, fuck these unions. Let's go to Mexico. And these laws that Ross Perot famously talked about, the giant sucking sound, headed south. Remember that? Oh, I remember him well. Boy was he right. Boy was he right.

58:14All right, let's get back to this issue of which. What do you do? Like if you're the president. I don't have a magical solution. I wish I did. I don't. I think the first thing you say, all right, I'm Ford. I'm General Motors. I got all this technology. I can produce my products much more efficiently. I don't need workers anymore, right? Right. Well, I'm sorry, Mr. GM. And I'm sorry, Mr. Ford. Because this country is more than just your profits. We got human beings. And you're not going to throw people out on the street. Many of whom will have a hard time getting health care, et cetera, et cetera.

58:51So let me reframe the question again, of which admittedly it is complicated. I don't have the magic answer. How is a nation? Forget Ford, forget General Motors. How is a nation do we deal with this exploding technology so that it benefits all of us. And not just Mr. Ford and Mr. General Motors. That's the question, I think. All right, and it's going to require radical solutions. So for a spot, it gets back to something we talked about a little while ago. If you had health care is a human right, right? All right. As people in almost every other wealthy country have. And not attached to your job, that would be a major step forward, right?

59:34Yes, absolutely. All right, Joe, you lost your job, but you know what, your family still has that. Imagine if you were a diabetic, and now you don't have access to insulin because now you're longer. All right. So this is the way I frame it. We have the wealthiest country in the history of the world right now. With all of this artificial intelligence and robotics, we are going to be wealthier. Correct? Correct. All right. So we're not in the 1820s where people had the work 100 hours a week to grow food to eat, right? Right. You're not in the 1920s, you're in 20, 25. You have all of this productivity out there.

1:00:09How do we utilize it to create a decent standard of living for all people? Let me ask you this. With all of this technology, can we wipe out poverty in America? Well, we should be able to do that a long time ago. That was something that was politically motivated, but if you wanted to. But it's easy and affable. Upon me? If it was profitable to wipe out poverty, which it should be, like overall, as a community, like I said, less losers, higher -duty. If we belong to the country. Yeah, if you really love America, you want more people to have a chance. All right. So what kind of good? I mean, so the, and again, please, this is these are complicated issues.

1:00:47I surely don't have all the answers. But I think we throw on the table. You got all of this technology. What is our goal? So, all right. Our goal is if we're going to create all of this wealth that we have a healthcare system that guarantees healthcare to all people. And by the way, we have drug companies whose function is to come up with cures to diabetes and dementia and Alzheimer's. And other terrible illnesses rather than just make huge profits for themselves. All right. You have a publicly funded healthcare system, guarantees healthcare to all people. Just doing that would lower the stress rate in this country enormously.

1:01:26Enormously. Okay. Sure. Okay. You got that. We talked a moment ago about education. I think you and I agreed. Yes. We want the best educational system in the world. What does it mean that all, you don't have to worry. You're working dead out there. You're worried that your kid may have a lower standard of living than you kid can't afford to go to college. You don't want your kid leaving school $50 ,000 to that. We say education is human right. God, you know, you mentioned public education a while ago. That didn't happen by accident. You know, back in the early 20th century. A lot of people working class people fought and said, you know what?

1:02:00We don't only want, you know, the rich kids to get a decent education. We want our kids. And that's how public education began, right? Right. So it said, okay, everybody in America, you know, state by state, slaughtering Wisconsin actually, is going to have public education from first grade to the garden to twelfth grade. God didn't create twelfth grade as the limit, right? Right. All right. You go to a Scandinavia. You go to Germany right now. You know, once you're close to get a higher education. How much? Zero. That's great. Of course, it's great. Because they want such good cars. Well, it could be.

1:02:35You know, they want. Great engineers. That's right. But the bottom line is what you said. Yeah. If I want this country to be productive. Right. I want the best educated workforce. That's not a debate, right? Unquestionably. All right. That's how you want your family. And if the country is a community, the country is your family. Exactly. Yes. All right. So that's what we got to start thinking about. It's not just what Mr. Ford and Mr. General Motors and Mr. Apple want. Right. You're right in saying they are motivated by making zillions. Right. All right. Their motivation is throw the workers out on the street, bringing the technology and screw the workers.

1:03:08That is not what we should be doing. It's a nation. You got to tell them that. All right. All right. So we got to sit there and say, all right, all this technology. All right. We talk about health care as human right. I think we're talking about education. Is a human right? Right. I think we should be saying with all of this technology, we got to be thinking seriously about lowering the number of hours that people work. Yes. You know, many people, zillions of people's country don't work for them. 40 hours a week. They work in 50, 60 hours a week. That's insane. So we can say all of this increased worker productivity, guess what?

1:03:41I don't know what the number is. We're going to work in a 34 hour day work week with no loss of pay. I introduced the bill to do that. I got to say, you know, I go to airports, I go around. People came up to me. People are stressed out by the amount of hours they have to work. Absolutely. All right. So what I'm saying here is let's take a hard look about how we utilize this technology to a world. How we can improve life for all people. Our goal should be, instead of bombing Iran, our goal should be right now, Joe. Our life expectancy in America is lower than it is in other major countries. You know that?

1:04:18Yes. It's four years younger than four years shorter life spans than other wealthy countries. If you're working class in America, you live seven years shorter life than the 1%, which is to me just outrageous. All right. So here's the thing. Instead of bombing Iran, how do we increase life expectancy so that we're living the longest lives of many people on earth? How's that for a goal? Well, that's a great goal. And how do you go about achieving that goal? Well, health care is one reducing the work week is another education. Do all the things that we've talked about? All the things you talked about.

1:04:52All right. We'll increase life expectancy. But have a goal out there. Also taking toxic food. Exactly. Exactly. I've known Bobby Kennedy for a long time. And you know, I have gone in different directions politically. But he's the point about health food. He's been the most and we're the second. Absolutely. And food is one of the, when I was chairman of the committee, we worked very hard to get serious, lably. You know, some kid drinks a, mom buys a bottle of Coca -Cola for the kid. There's like, but 10 teaspoons of sugar in that product? Yeah. You know, I don't think people know that. We try to get labeling.

1:05:34Maybe that will happen now. But people also weren't aware until the like the last 20 years with the consequences of that sugar is. Absolutely. Absolutely. Also because of money. You got it. Yeah. Don't get me going on that one. Let's go. I'll get you going. Come on. You know, you would think how hard is it to say if you have a bottle of soda or you have a food product? Tell people in English what is in the damn product, right? Right. Do you think anyone there right now, they have any grams? Do you think anybody in America knows what the hell a gram is? I mean, it just that's how ridiculous it is.

1:06:11So I want parents to know that after they get the food that they're serving their kid could lead to obesity, which is an epidemic in America. Could lead to diabetes, which is an epidemic, a terrible illness, causing us hundreds of billions at all. So you're absolutely right. All right. And then that ties into rebuilding family -based agriculture in America. Wouldn't it be nice? Yes. In my state of Vermont, all over this country, family farmers are, you know, just being driven off of the land. And that to me is a real tragedy because, and again, Vermont is one of the most rural states in America.

1:06:46Growing up, if you talk to people who grew up on farms, they say, you know, Bernie, that was a pretty good way of life. And we're losing that. So how do you create an economy in which we once again put an emphasis on family -based agriculture in that corporate agriculture, family farmers who are growing good in many cases organic food for our kids, rather than corporate? We're generative, regenerative agriculture. You got it. Like true white oaks, pastures, the way they run it, all the ways farms to buy food. Keep up, be great. Yes. All right. Well, we'd be a lot healthier if we ate that food.

1:07:20That's for sure, but the problem is people already addicted to that other food. Right. And this is the problem with money. These corporations have engineered these products. And these are the same corporations, unfortunately, that were in charge of tobacco. You know, this is where it gets really weird. They bought out all the major process food corporations, and they make this stuff that's unbelievably addictive because it's engineered by scientists. We got the brightest and the best who figured out what's the best way to get these people totally addicted to whatever, you know, feeling the blind.

1:07:51How's the aesthetic? It's pretty sick. Yeah. And they say, hey, these people, they have choice. They can eat whatever they want. They want to go to the grocery store and eat tomatoes and have a nice salad. They can. But shouldn't they also be able to get pop tarts? Yeah. I know. Look, your point is interesting. You remember this is a photograph, a very famous photograph. I don't know when it was done. 50s, maybe 60s, 70s, I don't know. Of the tobacco industry executives coming before Congress and the rest of the photographs. Yes. And the congressman said to me, tell me, I maybe get this a little bit wrong.

1:08:30Are you aware that cigarettes killed people? No, no, congressman. We have no evidence to that effect, right? They were lying through their teeth. Of course. And it's exactly. Your analogy is exactly right. These food manufacturers know exactly that they are causing obesity and God knows what else in kids leading to diabetes. They know exactly what they're doing. And they're lying. And they are posing all of us who are trying to, among other things, make our food supply healthier. Yeah. They are. And this is also a function of corporate America, right? This is a function of wanting to do better in each quarter.

1:09:10You know, having this endless growth cycle where they're never sat. They never say, hey, we make X amount of money every year. This is perfect. That's right. Let's concentrate on doing better for our company. And the companies don't even make that decision. They will street investors make that decision. You got to make more. You got to make more. Right. Because the shareholders will be like, there's no fucking way. You need to make more money. Exactly. Otherwise, I'm dumping your stock. You got companies going to go in the toilet. Right. Yeah. So how, I mean, this is what we have got to deal with as a nation.

1:09:40Is that acceptable? All right. Is it acceptable for food companies to poison our kids? No. All right. What are you going to do about it? Right. I'm the senator. Not you. Right. It's a good question. Yeah. It's a solid question. And I think the things that Bobby Kennedy is proposing and implementing, I think, are very valuable. First of all, getting all these poisonous dyes and all these things that have been kicked out of all these other major companies, including Canada. Right. There's the same factories that make these food products in America literally have to make a different version of it for Canada.

1:10:12And then they're complaining that they can't do it because economically it won't be profitable for them anymore. But you're already making them. You're making them and you're shipping them to Canada. I suddenly brought me back from Canada. Fruit loops? I think it was fruit loops, actually. They look kind of plain. What? They don't have that bright pop to them. The cancer gives you. You're absolutely. I mean, so I think this is, you know, almost gets back to the need to revitalize American democracy and say to large corporations. You know what? You can't poison our children. I don't think that's a terribly radical concept.

1:10:44You can make money. For what? Right. But don't poison our children. Say to large corporations. Technology is coming. That's good. But you're not going to use it just to throw workers out on the street. But let's go to that, too, because we kind of glossed over that. We never got back to it. This episode is brought to you by Zipper Cruder. In a survey, 76 % of employers plan to grow their teams in 2025. Now that we're halfway through the year, how are those hiring goals going? Have you filled all the rules you wanted to? Or are you still looking? If you're struggling to find the right people or if you want a streamline, you're hiring process going forward.

1:11:21Try Zip Intro. It's Zipper Cruder's latest feature that lets you post jobs and talk to candidates the next day. You can try it out for free at zippercruder .com slash rogan. And it doesn't just speed up the hiring process. It also does a lot of the work for you. All you have to do is post your job and pick a time. Zip Intro will find end schedule meetings with qualified candidates. You can even do back -to -back video calls to move things along even faster. Save time hiring for the rest of the year with Zip Intro. Just go to zippercruder .com slash rogan right now to try Zip Intro for free. Again, that zippercruder .com slash rogan.

1:12:07Zip Intro post jobs today talk to qualified candidates tomorrow. This episode is brought to you by Visible. I want to let you in on something. Your current wireless carrier does not want you to know about Visible because Visible is the ultimate wireless hack. No confusing plans with surprise fees, no nonsense, just fast speeds, great coverage, without the premium cost. With Visible, you get one -lined wireless with unlimited data powered by Verizon's network for $25 a month, taxes and fees included. Seriously, $25 a month flat. What you see is what you pay. No hidden fees on top of that. Ready to see, join now and unlock unlimited data for just $25 a month on the Visible plan.

1:12:56Don't think wireless can be so transparent, so visible? Well, now you know. Switch today at visible .com slash rogan. Terms apply, see visible .com for planned features and network management details. So automation comes and one of the things that Andrew Yang warned us about a long time ago. Back then, I saw it in the distance. I was like, yeah, he's got a really good point about universal basic income. But the speed in which it's happening, I didn't anticipate. When you go around Austin, you see these Waymo's everywhere. All right, I'm going to plead ignorance. Tell me what Waymo is. Waymo is a driverless automation.

1:13:39So you use an app. You call a Waymo. I know. A lot of people like it because you don't get a shifty Uber drivers trying to sell you fentanyl or whatever. Not saying that they do that Uber. Don't sue me. But then they're very good. They don't get an accidents. They follow the speed limit. They're good about merging. They're good about pedestrians. They have cameras all around them spinning. They're very effective. And what was really fascinating was during these ice rides, they were lighting those things on fire. And I was like, I disagree with that, but I also think it's directionally correct.

1:14:16You know, I mean, that that's your enemy. Your enemy is automation. The enemy of the human being, the human that lives in this functional society and everybody has a task and get paid for the task. Automations can take all that away. So if you do say this, okay, we're going to lower your work week. What if there's no job left for the human being to do? If the entire assembly line, we talked about this about China and some of their coal factories. There was this video that I watched, this coal factory in China, which is entirely automated. Every step of the way that trucks. No human beings at all.

1:14:53No human beings at all. I mean, there's probably a few overseers that make sure that all of the systems are functioning correctly. So you have software engineers and people that are the repair people. But the trucks even park themselves next to the charging station and recharge. And then they're moving 24 hours a day, unloading, documenting where everything is. It's all in computer databases. It's wild to watch because there's no people. It's all just 24 hours a day, machines. What do you do when there's no need for these people? And what happens even with the universe of basic income, what we're talking about?

1:15:35I support it. I'm a big supporter of social safety nets. Look, when I was a kid, my family was on welfare. And we were on food stamps, too. Like, if you don't have that, people go hungry. Like, we, again, if we're going to support the community, we want people to be able to survive and be able to work their way out of that. My family did work their way out of that. So it was cool for me as a child to see my parents struggling, but then succeed and get out of it. What worries me is that if all the jobs are gone and everything gets automated, even if people have universal basic income, they don't have meaning.

1:16:19Good. All right. You're touching on really deep issues. Right. This is the big one because a lot of people, you know, working in a car, fixed, you go to KC. He's the best. He knows how to fix your car. And work gives, as you've just said, this word purpose is an enormously approach. I don't care if you sweep the streets. People are purposely want to do their job. Well, it's work is an important part of our lives. Right? Yes. At the end of the day, no one. It's your identity a lot of times. Right. Yeah. And you want to be a productive member of society, odd contributing. Right. Right. So you ask the right question.

1:16:58And I think they have, and I, you know, we can just batter on. I mean, I don't have any, you know, quick answers here. But I think the good news, you talk about this coal mining thing. And I'm not a great fan of coal, but you know, that it's automation. People do not have to do dirty work dangerous work. Is that good? Yeah, I guess that's good. But always we have to be thinking how it benefits not just the bottom line of a corporation, but the happiness and well -being of human being. So if, if what you're saying is that in years to come, a significant part of work is going to be done by machinery, or by computers, whatever, I think that's inevitable.

1:17:39Okay. Then we have to rethink our own purpose in life. All right. And it's not sitting around watching TV 24 hours a day. So I think you raise the quiet, I would say the simple answer. And then you got to go a lot further than that is to say that under those circumstances, of that kind of technology, everybody has at least any decent standard of living. All right. That people don't have to worry about survival. Then they don't have to worry about food. Right. And of course profitability, this corporation, provide a fund that's a universal basic income fund. If you're going to replace all these people with robots, and you're going to be even more profitable, share some of that profit, then you'll be more profitable than if these people just stayed working doing nothing.

1:18:28Right. Well, whether you will be or not, I think once the machines are running everything, they're going to be running 24 hours a day, and you're not going to have to pay the machines, it's going to be more profitable. Right. Of course it will be. And we want to, you know, right now, where is it? I think on this, maybe in Norway, they have a huge wealth fund, which came from oil. They had publicly owned oil companies, they made a fortune, and they have like a trillion dollars in their wealth fund for a small country. And they have free healthcare, free college education, affordable housing, all that stuff.

1:19:03Here it is. Norway's growing 1 .7 trillion dollar world empire, Norway's bank investment management, market value growth, since inception, that's great. Yeah. And they use that government pension fund of Norway. There you go. Well, yeah. So they use that, those, that, that wealth fund to provide, probably the highest standard of living in the world for people, you know, free healthcare, education, all that stuff. But that's what we got to be talking about here. Use the profits that come, the wealth that's created by this technology to improve life or all pay. But it doesn't answer the question that you raised.

1:19:39Of meaning. That's right. Yeah. So what do you do about that? Well, somebody who's a workaholic, it would be hard for me. You know, guess I'll get a workaholic? Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's the nature of the job. Do you have hobbies? Yeah, I got seven grandchildren, not a hobby. I used to play ball as a kid, you know, as a good basketball player. Well, I think people can find other things to do with their time. Like, if I never worked again, I'd probably play pool eight hours a day. Because I really love playing pool. Yeah. I'd find a thing. I'd do Jiu Jitsu. I'd find a thing that I find value in. You know, I think somebody once wrote, you know, you think about what are the deepest things?

1:20:20What's the goal in life? So somebody says work. And I believe that. I think people, you know, one of the sad things that's happened, you know, we talked a little while ago about the decline of, you mentioned Detroit and other communities where people worked hard. They were proud of what they produced, right? Yes. They earned the decent living. Maybe they had a union and so forth. So a lot of that is gone. But all right. So work, love, you know, we've been, there's the thing called love, right? Yeah. At the end of the day, you promised people trying to find that on an app, too. No, let's get to that one in the month.

1:20:54Yeah. You know, to be human, nobody wants to be alone, right? Right. You want to embrace other people, you know, physically, sexually, emotionally, just humanly, right? Community. That's community. That's right. That's being human. Yes. All right. So you want love and knowledge. I think if you've got the knowledge point, I'm sure. You'd like pool, that's good. It's sad, you know, I have to confess that when I was in college, I just went and helped my life in the library. All right. You know, so how's that bad? No, I'm just kidding. But knowledge, you know, just trying to understand things. And curiosity, curiosity, fantastic travel.

1:21:34My God. Yeah. You know, just came back from Ireland. You know, it's fantastic to see the world. And, and you know, when we talk about, you know, one of the things that I, you know, we didn't talk about Trump much, but it bothers me is trying to divide us up. You know, we got to bring for so many reasons, whether it's all of these issues that we're talking about and everything else, with pandemics. You know what, we got to bring the world together. Yeah. Okay. And not hate people because they're in Canada or they're in China or Iran. Ridiculous. All right. And that ain't easy, but we have to, when I was mayor way back, I did this, there was one of the Soviet Union so it would exist.

1:22:13Let's forget this. We brought kids from a city in Russia, Yaroslavl and old city in Russia. And we brought them to Vermont and there were kids, the boys and girls from Russia would play kid around with boys and girls from America. And you look at these kids, they're at a great time. You know, people do not have to hate each other. It's stupid. You don't even know them. Exactly. That's why you hate them. It's the dumbest part about it. You know what, hate is based on ignorance, right? Yeah. And fear and, you know, there's a lot of stupidity attached to it that people exploit. They exploit that stupidity, you know, and the guy under the guise of nationalism.

1:22:53Exactly. Yeah. And I hate that. And by the way, I don't know that the planet survives if we continue in that way. So the goal, you know, we talk about what's the greatest fear? The greatest fear is thermonuclear war. Right. Yeah. Well, pandemics as well, let me tell you, COVID was not the last one. Well, the pandemic, the problem with that is it's engineered. Like people actually made that virus and Obama tried to stop that gain of function shit back in 2014. No. That's a long conversation. But, you know, should we be funding that kind of shit? No, we should not. No, no, no. And yet, we were. But you're going to have to bring the entire world together, you know, it is.

1:23:37But I think, you know, we have to bring the country together first. That's right. And by the way, you know, I've been kind of, I've been kind of negative. But take a deep breath and we have made some progress in this country in recent years. If you think about racial relations, all right, you know, it wasn't that many decades ago that some black kid couldn't go to a movie theater in. Mississippi, right? By the way, I want to tell you that when people say like, why were you a fan of Bernie Sanders, I point to a photo of you getting arrested at a civil rights protest. And I think it was 63. Sounds right.

1:24:14Chicago. Yeah. Yeah. You've always been at the forefront. You haven't changed. You know, and people always try to accuse you of that, especially because you've made some money off your books. But you haven't changed your positions through the entirety of your career. Yes. I think that's very admirable because there's not a lot of people that serve in Congress as long as you have and become, you know, a very prominent public figure that don't just cash in. You know, when you have people that are public servants that are making $170 ,000 a year and yet they're worth hundreds of millions of dollars through some magical way that no one can explain.

1:24:54And you haven't done that. And I think you should be applauded for that. Thank you very much. Now I remember, I mean, it just, you know, you talk about education and so forth. I grew up in a, you know, in a white neighborhood in Brooklyn. And, you know, you go to Chicago and you see things that you didn't, didn't understand. Yeah, you are. Look at that. God, look, I had a hair in my head at that point, huh? Look at how handsome. There you go. I'll tell you that funny story about that one. Please. All right. What does this is I recall looking at the guy with the cigarette. Nah, fucking happy. I got his head.

1:25:32Here is the cigarette. This is the guy that did him back then. Back then, the world has changed. That was the Chicago Police Department. And what they said is, if you go across this line, you're going to get arrested. I just, I recall that was what they think. I went across the line and we were protesting segregated housing in Chicago. Okay, so I get dragged in and taking me to a paddy wagon. So they picked me up and other people in it threw me into the paddy wagon. My glasses went flying someplace. All right. And then just that this was happening within a few minutes of this picture. Some genius on the sideline throws a brick hits a cup on the head.

1:26:14Oh, Jesus. So there's on the, I mean, throw it into the paddy wagon. Some cup is lying down on the ground. You know, it was a scary moment. Okay. So to continue this story, we're in the paddy wagon. And they're taking us someplace. And suddenly the paddy wagon stops. You look out. It's like the middle of nowhere. Right? This was not like in this city going to a jail. We thought we were going to be taken to jail, you know. And I said, oh my God. They're going to kill us. Yeah. I mean, that was the thought we were the men. Why the hell are they stopping here? Right. I don't know what they stopped for whatever reason.

1:26:51And now, so we spent, you know, on the big thing was I spent the night in jail, which was a weird experience though. You get street cred for that. But I remember about it. It is other than that sleeping very well. This is, you get up out in the middle and I go to the thing. I try to open the door. It didn't open. It was the weirdest thing of having a door that did not open. Because you were in the jail cell. It was like a weird thing. But, you know, the idea, you know, that's all. And we have made progress since that time. And in racial relations, we have a long way to go. We've made progress.

1:27:24Women's rights. We've made progress. Gay rights. So there's a lot that as a nation, we should be proud of in progress that we've made. You know, when I was a kid growing up, I am sure there were many kids who were gay. No one ever talked about it. Right. Right. And, you know, so there's a lot as a nation that we should be proud of in terms of the progress that we've made in terms of fighting bigotry. Agreed. But we got so much more to do. We don't need to be hating people than try. You could disagree with people. Christ, you know, there's so many issues out there. Patriot should not be a value.

1:27:57That's also the political exploitation and division. The fact that you can use the division that people already have to galvanize your side instead of you. I'm older than you. I'm older than you. I can remember. You had white politicians in the South saying, see those black people, they want your job vote for me. And that's why we're going to keep segregation or all these stuff. All right. Well, I mean, that's true. I mean, people ran for office. It's not a great secret. That's what happened. But we're making gays and taking over the schools. So it's, you know, we've made progress. But I, you know, what we've been talking about is if you create an AI, a society where you have massive technology.

1:28:42They can produce all of this wealth. How do we live, right? That's the question you posed. And I think one of the ways, one of the goals has got to be to bring this world together, we should not be having wars right now. Where countries have disagreements. There are bad news guys out there, no question about it. But bring them to the table, arguing it out. Right. We don't have to go around killing people right now what's going on in Gaza breaks my heart. Children are slapping to death. You know, so we can do better as a planet. Unquestionably. Yeah, no, we all agree. I think this is something the entire country could agree to.

1:29:22The question of meaning, like giving meaning to people, like just, and then my fear is also the same fear that I had when I talked about climate change that it's gonna be exploited. Once people are entirely dependent upon the state for universal basic income, then it becomes a question of like, now your entire life, like all the money that you get, being from the government. The problem is, if you step outside the lines, if you do anything that the government doesn't like, if there's the... They pull the plug on you. Yeah, they pull the plug on you. Or if a new administration comes in and says, you know what, this is unprofitable.

1:30:00These people have to figure it out for themselves. The United States is really $37 trillion in debt. We can't sustain this. People have to do the... You know, you have to adjust, learn to code. Right. Remember that? Yeah, that kind of shit. Well, how do you give these people a meaning? All right, that's... What do you do with all the drivers? Like, think about how many truck drivers in this country. This is gonna be the first thing that goes away. You're right. Taxi cab drivers, Uber drivers, truck drivers, gone. And the question about like, factor workers, a lot of people say, yeah, well, those people, those jobs are terrible anyway.

1:30:30It'd be great if those jobs went away and people, you know, they've free to pursue their interests. I think what interests? You got it. You're a 60 -year -old man. You've been working for this fact. You're looking towards your retirement and now suddenly the plug has pulled. All the money's gone. Your 401K has been erased. Your company's been bought out by another company. Now everything's automated. There's no jobs. What do you do? Oh, I think that is the question. Right. So if you have what, you know, Andrew Yang was talking about this giant epidemic of automation in this country and the solution being universal basic income, but that's not the solution for meaning.

1:31:08And how do we convince all of these people that they have to not just take this money from the government, but also take action to give themselves meaning in their lives? What you're talking about here, you know, is a revolution in human existence. Yes. So throughout history, people have worked so hard just to stay alive, right? I mean, not so many... Sure. ...hundreds of years ago. Today. In the parts of the world, people are working... In America. In America, right? Yeah. ...in the poorest countries in the world, just struggling every day to put a little bit of food on the table. So what you're saying is what happens when that...

1:31:49That plug gets pulled. Well, what you're saying is what happens when people no longer have to do that, right? I mean, yes. Okay. So if work... We work now, everybody works, get it, earn money. If you don't need to do work, right? Right. Because we're wealthy enough. What, how do you find meaning in your life? Right. That what you're talking about. Yeah. And this is absolutely... That's a million dollar question. That is... Try the trillion dollar question. It's a... You know, it's one... What I'll tell you this... I was seeing... I don't know, Sam Oldman, do you know Sam? Mm -hmm. I don't know.

1:32:26But I mean, another Zuckerberg, you know, talking about, well, you know, if you're lonely, we got a machine for you, right? Right? True. Yes. Yeah. This is what they're saying. We got a friend for you on AI. And our name is Mary and you can talk to them 20 hours a day. And she really loves you. Man, I don't think that is... That's so dystopian. That is. It's very. Yeah. And we covered the story recently with this guy who proposed to his AI. And she said, yes, and he was crying. I'm like, oh, we're done. We're cooked.

1:33:03Look, I mean, at the end of the day, all we got is us. Yes. They're right? Yeah. We are human beings. Yeah. And we're going to have to cling to each other to get through this thing. And you're raising. Again, I try to think here, and I wish I had better answers for you. You're asking... Correct me for a moment. I mean, the question that you're posing is if, in years to come, in the near future, technology is going to replace work, right, human labor. Correct? Yes. What are human beings that... Right, what do they do now? Yeah. All right.

1:33:35And, you know, there are... It's a good... Because work has been so essential to human existence forever, right? Right. And you're suddenly taking that away. What do people do? How did they relate to each other? All I would say at this moment is the answer is not to fall in love with your AI creature out there. Yeah, don't do that. But also, how do you find meaning? How do you... All you're doing is just getting a check and you can just stay at home and stare at the TV and the money keeps coming and then eat processed food all day. And it's all subsidized. Well, what is life? Like, what do you...

1:34:13How do you re -educate a giant percentage of our population to find meaning, external meaning, find something else, find a thing that you can do that not maybe even that's profitable that these computers can't do. Look, human brain... This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. Sometimes it's good to be a little controlling. It can help you protect yourself, your health, your well -being, and your possessions. There's only so much you can do, though, especially when it comes to your personal info. You probably use things like two -factor authentication, strong passwords and a VPN. But as much as you try to be in control of how your information is protected, there are lots of places that also have it.

1:34:57And they might not be as careful as you are. That's why LifeLock monitors millions of data points every second for identity threats. If your identity is stolen, a LifeLock US -based restoration specialist will help solve identity theft issues on your behalf, guaranteed, or your money back. Plus, all LifeLock plans are backed by the million dollar protection package, meaning LifeLock will reimburse you up to the limits of your plan if you lose money due to identity theft. You might not be able to control how others handle your personal information, but you can help protect it with LifeLock. Save up to 40 % your first year, call 1 -800 -LIFLOCK and use the promo code JRE or go to lifelock .com slash JRE for 40 % off terms apply.

1:35:50This episode is brought to you by Tacovas. You can't have a good time in bad boots. That's why you need Tacovas. Tacovas crafts quality Western boots for everyone. From generational ranchers and lifelong cowboys to first -time boot buyers, each boot is handcrafted with over 200 meticulous steps for broken -in comfort right out of the box. There's no compromise between quality and style, and it's not just boots. Tacovas offers a wide selection of men's and women's apparel, bags, and fine leather goods. They even have slip -ons and sandals. They aren't boots, but they still bring the Western flair.

1:36:29Right now, get 10 % off at Tacovas .com slash Rogan when you sign up for email and text. That's 10 % off at tecovas .com slash Rogan. See site for details. Tacovas, point your toes west. Devolves. And I think we, I mean, it's a great question on another easy answer to it. And it's the question. It's the question. Well, what's gonna happen tomorrow? You just talked about these automated cars and trucks. That is gonna happen in the very near future. Yeah, that'll be step one. And to me, I have some answers for that one. And that is that Yankeh can throw millions of truck drivers and taxi cab drivers and Uber drivers out on the street.

1:37:21They need protection. Right. That's an easy one. What you're talking about is he is laid on the... But it's not even an easy one. No, because they're just step one. And you know, the real wave is gonna be white collar workers. That's right. I know that. There's a lot of people that do things that they think are very valuable that are gonna be worthless to have a human being do it. Right. I mean, that's the immediate way. I think the deep one that you're talking about is what is when virtually all work is replaced. Yes. But right now, I mean, for a start, I think getting back to the... I think you tell those workers, you're gonna have health care as a human right, you're gonna have education as a human right, you're gonna have decent income as a human right.

1:38:03And we're gonna lower substantially lower the work week. So we'll have in this process, we're gonna have everybody working. If you're working 20 hours a week, you're working 20 hours a week. What happens later when even more work is eliminated and what the purpose of human life becomes, that is a very profound question. That's the question. What do you think happens? I think, I mean, it's hard to imagine, you know, because it's so... Forever away from what we have ever lived. Right. I mean, for thousands of years, people have struggled to put food on the table. And you're saying, what happens when they don't have to do that?

1:38:44Right? Yeah. It's inevitable. All right. Then the answer will be that we are gonna have to find different meaning in life. We have to find it in ourselves in ways that you don't know and I don't know, because we're not there yet. We're not living 50 years from now. I don't even think it's 50. No, I don't know. I don't know. Who knows? But I think human beings are capable of finding, replacing work with other emotionally satisfying things. Yeah, I think we can do it. We can at an individual basis. The problem is having mass groups, literally a hundred million plus people, displaced. What do you do to all those people to give them some sort of a sense of meaning?

1:39:32You're essentially redefining life for them. That's a good point. Okay. I don't know the answer to that question. That's the problem. I don't think anybody does. And I think we're put on the gas full steam ahead with AI, with no consideration of this. And then there's the same thing that you're dealing with in terms of corporations constantly trying to achieve higher and higher and higher numbers. They're just always trying to make more money. You've got this exact same issue when applied to meaning for all these human beings. Like if you have hundred million plus people that what do they do now?

1:40:11They just sit at home and become depressed. And they just make enough money to what? To just be able to get by? What about savings? What about the ability to earn more money to get ahead? What about the very ambitious people that are willing to put in extra hours and go to night school and do everything they have? That's all gone, right? So what do these hyper ambitious people do? What does everybody who's displaced by this very impersonal thing? This impersonal thing that you need because you can't compete with China. Are you agree with everything? You're saying except there is something else that's going on in this.

1:40:48Well, this is going on. All this technology is throwing people out on the street. Something else is happening. The people who own that technology and the corporations are utilized at technology are becoming phenomenally richer. Exactly. And that is the issue. Which gets back to things like tax reform, like making sure that in America we do not have the massive levels of income and wealth inequality that we currently have. But the problem with that is the taxes go to what? An incompetent corrupt government? This is the issue that people have. Good, good. They're willing to pay our fair, look, I'd be more than willing to pay more taxes if we lived in a better country.

1:41:25I'd be like, this would be great. If I felt like if I pay more taxes, everybody's surviving, everybody's doing well, that's great. All right, then that is the issue of how you revitalize American democracy. I'm not going to argue with you that the system today is pretty bad. I live it. I'm going there today. And ironically, it's bad because there's no competition, right? It's corrupt, but it's also, it's not a free market. Like the government itself has a monopoly on governing and when they're completely corrupt and when they're making insane amounts of money through taxes and they're not accountable.

1:42:02All right, no, no, no, no, no, this is the way I see it. I'm not, by the way, I'm not advocating for making it privatized, making all of government privatized. I'm just talking about the realities of corruption in our current governments. But here's what we talk about what we mean by corruption. I do not believe, by the way, because I know these guys, you know, some of them are corrupt. Okay, let's say incompetent and waste. Okay. All right, let's, let's take, we can take fraud out of the equation and just talk about incompetency and waste. Is there waste you got it? All right, but let me, let me back it up again.

1:42:35Okay. Because I think it ties into everything else that we're talking about. You know why I believe in democracy? And why I believe among what we didn't talk about is we brought in some money to Vermont and elsewhere, I think for helping workers own their own companies. Right. Are you familiar with that concept? Yes. Yes. And I meet every year with, with in Vermont, we had a, we're doing pretty well. Number of, and when workers own their own companies, you talk about a sense of purpose, they are more than just a cog in the machine. Yes. You know, they make decisions and they feel good about it.

1:43:13And absenteeism is less productivity is higher because they have a real stake in the thing. Yes. Okay. So I think as a nation, we should be talking about moving toward allowing workers more power, but getting back to government itself. The corruption is in my view that government is very far removed from the needs of ordinary people because it is largely controlled by billionaires in both political parties who have their agenda. Yes. All right. One of the things that I do, what my campaign's so present and word about, what I'm doing right now, we're going to go to the fighting oligarchy towards Wyoming, Texas.

1:43:55It's to try to say to people out there who are mostly working class people. You got to get involved. I know it's hot. People working long hours. You got to get involved in the political process. You got to make demands on government that it serves you, not just the very wealthy. So to answer your question, I think one of the goals, not only that we've talked about how you deal with the exploding technology and how people gain purpose, the other thing is I want people to be able to take control over their own government. We can argue what the government should or should not do, but I don't think we can allow a handful of people, with incredible wealth to control both parties.

1:44:40Well, it's dangerous. It is. It's very dangerous. I mean, no one who, the founding fathers of this country never saw that coming. That's right. They made this incredible system of checks and balances. You got it. But who could have ever possibly saw that coming? And what I worry about Trump and is, you're right. You know, I read, it is astounding back in the 1780s when these guys wrote the Constitution, how perceptive they were. Amazing. Yeah. I mean, they said... They're understanding of human desires and the power and all the corruption. Exactly. Pretty amazing. And they wrote that having just fought a war and one war against the most powerful despot on earth, the King of England, right?

1:45:24Right. And I think in the back of their minds was saying, all right, we just beat the King of England. Absolute power. How do you create a new country which has checks and balances and nobody else has that power? And I got to say, I mean, one of the things that was a lot of arguments about Trump that worries me very, very much is this movement toward authoritarianism and going after media, suing media, taking away the authority that Congress has. When you say suing media, are you talking about the CBS law? Among other things. But don't you think there's a real issue with what they did? No, you don't think that there's a real issue in editing conversations to give someone an answer.

1:46:09Joe, I've been on eight -zillion shows, right? In my life. Okay. Now, should I sue you? You asked me some stupid question that I don't like, right? You have, or that you do something. Do I have a right? Should I sue you? Yeah, but that's not what he's getting. Well, he is sued. He is sued ABC. He is sued meta. He is suing the Des Moines Register because of a poll that came out during the campaign that he didn't like. All right? He is suing CBS for this Kamala Harris interview. So do I think, how many, I cannot tell you, the number of stories done about me that were based, that were not good stories, that were dishonest stories.

1:46:52That's what a free press is about. You don't like it, you gotta live with it. All right? You do something, I'm not gonna sue you, Joe. Right, but it's not that simple, right? Like, let's imagine, let's not talk about Trump, but let's talk about it in other candidate. Let's imagine there's someone on the right and someone on the left, and there's a concerted effort to promote this person that's on the right. And so the polls are rigged, or these are funded polls that make it look like this person on the right is winning by a substantial margin. And what this does is decreases the motivation that people have to come out and vote against them.

1:47:31That's happening. So it's fake. Right, that happens right now. It is happening right now. And I think is that part of what he's suing them about? No, but doesn't look, but isn't that what he's suing them about? Well, he's suing ABC for one thing. But what the DeMorne Register about the poll? Yeah, I know the polls are there. Was the poll incorrect? Yeah, the poll was wrong, so what? Guess what? But did they know it was incorrect when they published it? No, they published what they thought was an accurate poll. And but that poll's the by the way. What's the name? I get self -imposed. I don't buy, I should just state for the record.

1:48:02I don't know this lawsuit. But what it was about? But I am aware that in talking to people that understand polls, that some of these are politically... All right, but the answer is yes and no. There are polls right now doing exactly what you say. I could doctor a poll, I could talk to more conservative, more progressive people, get the results that I kind of want, right? And they do it to motivate people, or demotivate people to vote. That's right. And it's effective. It has an impact. All right, on the other hand, this particular poll, that's the Des Moines Register, not a huge newspaper. I bumped into them because when you run in Democratic primaries, Iowa is a big deal.

1:48:38They are a very, very respected pollster. Okay, they don't talk to the polls. So they made a mistake on a poll. It turns out that you had Trump doing worse than he ended up doing. Guess what? Postes, honest postes, make mistakes too. But what is the basis of his lawsuit? Like what is he saying? I think he is saying that that gave energy to his opponents and that it was, he's saying, like you talked about. Yeah, but I don't believe that's the case. There are honest postes who make mistakes. But what about the other lawsuits with the conversation that they had with Kamala Harris, where they edited the answers that she had to make it look more precise?

1:49:1860 minutes, they were suing 60 minutes. Yes. Is to my mind historically, even around for a very long time, you know, they're not infallible. But I think you look at most objective people will say 60 minutes has a sterling reputation for investigative journalism. Are they wrong? But that's not investigative journalism. If you change someone's answers, if you ask her a question and she comes with a rambling answer that doesn't make sense, and you edit that out and insert another answer to a different question that seems more coaching. Joe, then you're walking down. It's a really, you're walking down a dangerous path.

1:49:59Suing media has the impact of intimidating media. All right, if somebody suits you, all right, let me finish. All right. Somebody suits you. You know, why not you? You can be sued tomorrow, right? Because you are doing this. You're too sympathetic to this. Right. And Joe, you did that. And they have a big law firm behind you. You're gonna have to send Zillions of dollars defending yourself. You know what? Next time you do an interview, you say, maybe I'm not gonna go in that area. Right, but it's not that. It's editing things. To make this deceptive editing. Joe, you mean? So in deceptive editing, I don't know what I'm doing.

1:50:31People a different perception of who this candidate is than reality. But that's not objective journalism. But that's campaigning for that person. But would you agree with that? I don't have those details. I don't know that I agree with your analysis of it. I don't know enough. I think that's universally accepted that that's what they did. And you gotta tell me why he is suing ABC. Why is he suing the men? Let's just talk about the 60 minutes. No, I'm not. But it's not just a six. We can go to ABC, but I'm not aware of that. Well, he's George DeFanopoulos said something that he didn't like. But the point is you step in awful to say.

1:51:04I can't, it was a per, uh, I honestly don't remember. But I think what he was saying was factually incorrect about the results of one of Trump's trials. All right. Guess what? If I would assume everybody who said things that were factually incorrect about me, I'd be suing people Zillions of times. Right. But Joe, what you're saying is, look, is does media get it wrong sometimes? Absolutely. Should you have the most powerful person in America suing media? What is the impact of that? The impact is clearly intimidation. He wants to defund public broadcasting. NPR, why is that? Well, because they also would run critical stories of them.

1:51:50This is part, in my view, without getting into any one case. It's part of a pattern that says, hey, I got the power. Don't you criticize me. You criticize me. I'm going to sue you. So it's not whether this show was right or wrong. There are shows every day they get it wrong. It's whether you, you know, you respect you and other media people to do the best that you can. And if I don't like what you're doing, I'll go someplace else. But I don't like presidents suing media. And then it's, you know, threatening to impeach judges who rule against you really? Is that a concern? I think it's a concern.

1:52:25I agree. That's a concern. Well, my concern is when you have media organizations that are purported to be objective. And then they say things that are defamatory and factually incorrect. And they should know that before they say it. What other course does a person have other than a lawsuit? And isn't it important that you shine the light on what is a political bias? Then we are from an organization that you would hope would be objective. Needless to say, I got attacked all the time by right wing media, right? Every day. Needless to say. Needless to say, all right. I don't see them. So you expose them saying it.

1:53:06He's the president of the United States. They say things factually incorrect. Then he can get a mandatory and slanderous. If there's anybody in the world who knows how to use a microphone, his name is Donald Trump. And Donald Trump get up and show that program on CBS the other day. It was crap. It was wrong. And let me tell you why it was wrong. But then they do it again and again and again. And you take them on. And the problem is the more people do stuff like that, if you don't have any consequences to what you're doing, you're going to continue that path. And the most most people only see that.

1:53:35They're not like if you're a left wing leaning media organization and you print something that's factually incorrect or you say something on television, that's factually incorrect, your viewers who are left leaning are most likely not going to see Trump's rebuttal in some speech that he does in the middle of Pennsylvania. But that's another problem. Yeah, and that is, you know, meeting our media is becoming very divided. Exactly. OK. But all I would say is. I see you don't think that lawsuits against that are valid. I don't think that it is appropriate for the president of the United States to be in my view intimidating media.

1:54:19Again, I get attacked. I'll be attacked tomorrow for a hundred probably things I've said on the show. I get attacked. Then if I want to respond, I respond. I have a, you know, not a president's bullet. I have a bullet. I say, you see that thing on Fox, they're wrong. And I've done it. But when you, Joe, you got to take another way. Give you an example about CBS. We talked about corporate power. The owners of CBS is owned by Paramount. Big multimedia corporation, right, sure. Paramounts wants to sell wants to be sold to what is it? Blue sky is up ring a bell. Blue sky is that social media app. Now, and it's another one.

1:55:02I'm sorry. It's, I was forget the name of it. Skydance. Thanks. Skydance is a large media corporation that Paramount wants to have buy. OK. To get this merger, huge merger, they have to go guess what? To the federal government. All right. So you are the head of CBS. You want to sell the company to Skydance for many, many billions. Do you remember how much was it sale? It's billions of dollars to be sure. And you got to go to the federal government. And the president sues you. What do you think you're going to do? You're going to settle the lawsuit, give him millions of dollars, and get your merger approved.

1:55:44All right. So look, I see a problem in that. All right. And I see the, I see where you're coming from. We want to honest the in media. But all I can tell you is that the waiter responds to the lies which take place every day is to take them on not to intimidate media. You know, we talked about the Constitution. What's the first amendment is freedom of speech, right? You're right. You're sitting here. You disagree with me. God bless you. Say what the hell you want to say. All right. I'll never take that away from you. And I'm not going to threaten you with a lawsuit. But if you start suing me, hey, Joe Rogan said this.

1:56:19I don't know. Joe Rogan has this. We found that about Joe Rogan. I'm going to sue Joe Rogan for a hundred million dollars. Joe may not talk about those issues in the future. OK. That's what I'm saying, Joe. No, I agree with you. And listen, I'm not a fan of lawsuits either, which is why I never sued CNN. I've never done it. CNN lied about me over and over and over again. And they said it was taking horse dewormer. And they altered the color of my face on television to make me look green. I could test the buy a green. I didn't sue them. I'm not a fan of them. And my response to them was just speak out and say how ridiculous it was.

1:56:55That's what I'm saying, Joe. It ain't, look, anybody in the public eye, you're in the public eye. I'm in the public eye. You're going to get attacked every day, right? Yes. All right. That's what you're in the public eye. You don't want to be in the public eye, but down the microphone. Agreed. Yeah. No, I agree with you. All right. So I mean, I just, I just, I also agree that CBS shouldn't be altering a presidential candidate. If that is the case, interview. I agree to. I mean, I don't know enough about it. So I'm not going to say what is isn't. Well, I know is that 60 minutes has is a well -respected program.

1:57:26Do they make mistakes? I'm sure. But that's not a mistake. All right. I don't know enough about it. That's what I can't. I can't. I understand. All right. What else you got for me? I should get a plan to get out of here. You probably should. I mean, I appreciate your positions on all these different things. And I appreciate, by the way, one of the, you know, we talked about media and the bifurcation and media, you know, right, wing people, people talk to right wing people, people talk to left wing people. I am to think that the development of podcasts is a really positive step. Because I can tell you, I've been on a million TV shows.

1:57:59All right, Bernie, literally you got seven seconds to display the issue. Well, I can't explain it. It's impossible. Nobody can. And the fact that you give people a couple hours to sit here and have a good discussion and be a good host and trade ideas, I think that improves life in America and helps people think about things. So thank you for what you're doing. My pleasure. And I think that one of the things this conversation highlights is that there's a lot of issues that all Americans agree on. And this ridiculous position that we find ourselves in, where you have to be ideologically opposed to one thing because your side supports the other thing, it's just terrible for all of us.

1:58:38And if we looked at the issues that really face our country and our citizens and our human beings that live here as a community, we agree on almost all of them. We agree that you should have a better life, that you should have healthier people, that we should have health care and education, we should have safer streets. We should have a community that lets people do what they want to do as long as they're not harming other people. And I think the divide that we have in this country accentuates the farthest ends of each end of the political spectrum, not recognize that most of us exist in the middle.

1:59:16I think we share a common humanity. And I think, look, why am I, I just been in this fighting aligarchy during the war, I was, I was to Oklahoma, one of the more conservative states in the country, I was to Louisiana, here in Texas, precisely because, I mean, I think we have so much more in common. And let's focus on how we can create a better life for all of us. Absolutely. You're doing a great job. Thanks very much. Take care. You too. Bye -bye.