Kind: captions
Language: en
we all live in the age of conspiracy and
it is your job to find as many
unfiltered angles as possible on the
truth so that you can triangulate what's
real and avoid getting lost in spin
that's why as we all March towards a
hyper divisive presidential election
I'll be bringing on more and more of the
people at the center of this drama and
my goal is to map out their thinking and
understand their base assumptions so I
know where they're trying to take us
from there hopefully we can all see a
wise path forward in that spirit I bring
you entrepreneur and former presidential
candidate VI ramaswami enjoy the
[Music]
Episode V ramaswami welcome to the show
it's good to be back dude for people
that don't know what you mean by back so
you and I filmed a much longer interview
that we're going to get to here in a
minute uh but given the Trump verdict we
both felt that it made sense to come in
and and tie that up in the longer
interview we talk about uh Trump we talk
about America values your purchase of
BuzzFeed all that stuff um but I I'm not
for Trump against Trump but even I had
an emotional reaction to the verdict
because it feels like people are uh
politicizing the justice system in a way
that makes me extremely nervous in terms
of the impact that it's going to have on
the voting public and so I want to start
there what do you think given your
tweets I assume you think this was a
political uh take down miscarriage of
justice but what do you think is going
to be the impact on the voting Public's
perception of our democracy and our
Justice
System look I think it's it's a pretty
dangerous precedent I have been pretty
public about what my view is on the
prosecution itself and I'm happy to get
into the legal meat of that if you're
interested I think for a number of
reasons this
was not a subtle case but an obvious
case of prosecutorial abuse and the
politicization of justice system I think
if you had imagined Joe Biden on trial
in Mississippi or Louisiana with the
same set of facts In Reverse where you
had a judge that had the other party
affiliation and their own daughter
raising funds off the trial as you had
in New York here you had a prosecutor
who ran for office on the promise of
going after Joe Biden I think the left
would be howling bloody murder here and
they would have a good point in that
case because even though I disagree with
what Biden stands for I don't think that
that's the way Justice should be carried
out yet that's exactly the way Injustice
was carried out here so I can go into
the legal basis for the case one of the
most appalling facts about this
conviction is not just that it's the
first time in US presidential history
that a former president and now a major
front runner for US president again was
convicted of a felony but what was most
remarkable is if you're going to have
that kind of historic conviction it
better be a black and white case and yet
the irony is the judges instru
instructions to the jury were literally
that the jury did not have to agree on
what the felony crime even was in order
to convict and I think that's appalling
I think that that's a danger to every
American now what does that mean for the
voting public there I have less strong
convictions right I know what my views
are on the facts I know what my views
are on the Integrity of the justice
system so My Views are set but my
predictions are softer but I'll give you
some of them since you asked anyway
is that I think this is going to have
the effect of actually softening and
winning o softening the perceptions of
and winning over a lot of black voters
to Trump I think a lot of black voters
have been for a long time telling both
sides hey guys the justice system is not
always as Fair as you portray it we have
had numerous experiences people in the
black community would say of justice
that was not carried out fairly in part
because of the basis of somebody's skin
color or the ZIP code where they were or
biases of police officers and now Donald
Trump is suffering an unjust system not
in the base of race but in the base of
political belief I think that that eye
openening event for a lot of people to
say that the justice system is not a
necessarily always a neutral or perfect
system is something that if Trump leans
into that message I think we'll actually
win the sympathies of a lot of black
voters who have not felt heard for a
very long time frankly by both parties
with the Republican Party included and I
think it's an especially important
opportunity for Trump because he
actually bucked the Republican Orthodoxy
and did something that Democrats had
long promised to do but never delivered
which was actually Criminal Justice
Reform which made sure that many of
those people who were locked up weren't
unjustly locked up for far longer
periods of time for crimes that were not
really proportionate to the magnitude of
punishment that they were deal and so
those two things I think actually go
together and especially combined that
with Trump's travels to the South Bronx
and other areas where traditional
Republican candidates haven't gone I
think it's a package to attract a lot of
minority voters and black voters in
particular I also think that a lot of
libertarian minded Americans race
independent but just ideology dependent
Libertarians who are deeply skeptical of
government overreach understand that the
politicization of the justice system is
the last straw and I think should should
and I think will be drawn to Trump as a
consequence of this politicization and
weaponization that's all that's all
really um logical and uh you know a sort
of you're up high looking down on
something with a logical view I'm way
more worried about an emotional reaction
um that you know for talking about uh
January 6 part two like how do voters
feel my my nightmare scenario is Trump
doesn't get elected and voters say yeah
obviously because this was a um a
complete manipulation of the Public's
view of Donald Trump and so the people
that believe in Donald that are his uh
base they are going to go nuts because
they will have a very easy thing to
point at which is the justice system was
manipulated against them this this
election was rigged people have been
saying that now for a while so do you
have any more visceral um concerns about
where this goes on Election Day look I
have a lot of concerns where this goes
for the future of the country we have
set a dangerous precedent now where the
party in power is able to use the tools
of prosecution to take the legs out from
its political opponents if you think
that's going to end with this particular
instance of going after Trump think
again this is the beginning of I think a
downward slide in this country unless we
all frankly across the political
Spectrum step up and say enough with it
we're done with it and actually
restoring a neutral justice system so
it's not just this year I worry about I
I worry about the future of the country
because if you think about one thing
that the United States of America
depends on for our own rule of law and
our own Democratic way of life it is an
impartial Judicial System once we lose
that I don't think we have a country
left so that's what I think is at stake
now do I think that that could manifest
itself even in this election and public
distrust of this electoral process
absolutely I mean the whole system has
basically said we don't trust you the
voters to decide who you're actually
voting for there have been headlines in
the last several years saying the
problem with democracy is the voters so
it's not like this is a novel idea the
people who are wielding the keys in the
managerial class and that we talk about
in the longer form episode when you and
I were together is that they're
skeptical of Voters ability to
self-govern and this is is one of the
tools they're using to say that we don't
want you the voters to take the risk of
reelecting Donald Trump and so we're
going to use prosecution as a substitute
to make sure that doesn't happen that's
going to have drastic consequences at a
moment where we're already skating on
thin ice as a country so if your
question for me is am I worried
about am I worried about this country
being on the precipice right now and
this potentially pushing us over the
edge or too darn close to it I am I'm
deeply worried about it which is why I
think it's important to be vocal at the
same time I'm optimistic that the
American people who they are trying to
dup aren't going to be so easily duped
either and that's the outcome I'm
rooting for and it's part of why I've
taken the extra time and effort and and
pain to be as vocal as I can and
explaining this not just to the people
who agree with us because that's beside
the point you we don't need more people
preaching to their own choir but maybe
to audiences that aren't as plugged in
May understand a headline and say oh
well I don't want to elect a criminal to
be the president pres of the United
States yeah but if that criminal isn't
actually criminal but the judicial
system just went through a sham to teach
you that he was to delude you into
believing something that wasn't true
then that's something that actually will
hopefully ignite a sense of purpose in
people who care about saving our country
whether or not they're Republican what
do you think about Trump's take he said
this is a paraphrase but he said um I
don't know that the American people are
going to stand for this meaning his
guilty verdict and that there is going
to be a Breaking Point at some point or
there may be a break breaking point at
some point How would how are you reading
that
statement at face value I mean it's the
basic fact that our country depends on
an impartial judicial system and if they
can do it to Trump they can do it to
anybody so I do think it's dangerous I
don't use that word lightly I am deeply
concerned about where we are as a
country right now this is not some
ordinary election where we're debating
tax policy this is an election where the
basic rules of the road are on the line
it is kind of 1776 moment in this
country or dare I say maybe even a bit
of an 1860 moment in this country and I
don't want us to get there but I think
that is what's at stake right now and
it's interesting because Joe Biden ran
on the promise of unifying the country I
think he's badly failed to deliver it if
Joe Biden really wanted to unite this
country and keep his campaign pledges
there's one way he could do it he could
actually step up and say you know what I
disagree like hell with Donald Trump on
a lot of policies and I think he would
make a poor president but I'm still
going to Pardon him because this should
not be done through the justice system
and by the way social media platforms go
ahead and at least lift the bans on my
opponent because the American people
deserve to hear from my opponent even if
I disagree with what he says I will
fight for his right to say it that's how
you unite a country and Joe Biden has
refused to do it so he campaigned on
uniting the country he has a clear path
more than any president in US history I
believe certainly since Lincoln to step
up and actually unite the country and
he's squandering it
and I think that that's sad it's deeply
it's deeply concerning to me as an
American it's deeply disappointing to me
as a citizen of this country that's
something Joe Biden could do now before
we get a bunch of uh you know half wit
legal scholar wannabes that say oh no
Biden can't pardon Trump because this is
a State Crime we can go into that bit if
you want actually the State Crime here
depends on the existing of an of an
existing underlying felony charge in
order for the crime to be charged as a
felony so so I want to get lost in the
the nitty-gritty of the law but I think
that that social media I know a lot of
social media people will be like oh I
know the law and Biden can't pardon for
a State Crime just let's just stipulate
it for now the state conviction depended
on an underlying Federal charge so Biden
I believe actually could pardon him I've
made this argument in the pages of the
Wall Street Journal and elsewhere so go
check that out if you're interested but
again forget the plumbing of it my point
is Biden has a historic opportunity to
unite this country he is squandering it
and dare I said I think Donald Trump in
the Republican party now has an
opportunity and an obligation to be the
party that actually stands for National
Unity at a moment where we deserve it
and I think Trump is up for that
challenge in a way how does he do that
in this particular moment yeah look I
think part of it is demonstrating that
he actually cares about National Unity I
know him I know he does I think one of
the things that it's easier to see if
you know him but it's harder for the
public to see is he deeply cares about
National Unity but I think his ability
to gesture towards that to even speak of
it as an important value to him I think
will alone impact voters at a moment
we're we're longing for a leader who
believes that we're one nation I mean I
think there's a basic question on the
table in this election this year
2024 are we actually one
nation like are we in a in a in a
literal sense not a literal sense in a
near literal sense in a meaningful sense
are we actually one country or aren't we
right is there one America right now or
are there multiple Americas are there
two Americas is there a Democrat America
a republican America Maga America and a
progressive America a Black America and
a white America if you read the pages of
most major newspapers or turn on the
media so you're led to believe if you
watch Modern partisan politics that's
what it looks like to many Americans and
I think that's a basic question that's
why I said we're in a 1776 or dare I say
even an 1860 style moment I think a lot
of people would pause today if you ask
them that question to think about
it in a way that ought to concern all of
us I don't think that they would have
paused to think about
that 15 20 years ago but I think today
if you if you ask actually ask somebody
like in a real sense are we actually one
country that's what's on the table I
believe we are I believe we're in our
last window where that can be true if we
step up and actually speak to the ideals
that unite us As Americans I think one
of the things I've enjoyed hearing Trump
say on the campaign Trail and I've
obviously spent some time with him in
the last several months and and this is
a direction where I think he should be
going more but you know leave it at that
but I love the way he's approaching some
of his rhetoric about success success
will be our Vengeance that's a line he's
used several times which I love success
is unifying I think Donald Trump does in
his heart care about nationally but even
if he lets just the people of this
country see that that alone would have a
palpable
effect all right we definitely go into
deeper detail in that particular point
in the longer interview I know you got
to bounce now brother thank you for
taking the time and uh everybody at home
enjoy the rest of the
interview when did we stop being America
1.0
H it was not a moment in time it was a
gradual
process that I think
began with Lyndon Johnson's Great
Society you familiar with this yes okay
so the Great Society was what I view as
one of the great misnomers of American
political history where in the name of
helping a particular segment of the
population the set of policies adopted
actually had a destructive effect in 360
directions a lot of this is what the
progenitors are for the modern welfare
state but this isn't just a point about
government redistribution or monetary
effects of that on our debt and
otherwise it's deeper than that because
it was the rise of a new philosophy that
said that we the people could not be
trusted to self-govern or live our lives
the way we want but instead it's going
to take an elite group of specialized
technocrats and benevolent dictator-like
leaders that look after your best
interests and I think that's really was
when you think about the America 1.0
what what did that represent that was
our national founding that was a group
of founding fathers who said that for
better or worse I'm going to make my own
decisions and self-govern not to be
governed by some Monarch on the other
side of the Atlantic who thinks he's
acting in my best interest and where we
saw that change was the beginning of the
Great Society was not just the
redistributionist policies and the
welfare and Nanny State policies but it
was also the beginning of really
legitimizing this administrative state
right the idea of unelected bureaucrats
that would enact a lot of regulations
that we the people never passed but to
actually serve the interests as they saw
it of we the people and I think a lot of
the conservative backlash to this misses
the essence of what's going on right the
conservative Instinct initially is
that you know what we don't want a
government that tyrannically overreaches
and is hostile to me but that misses the
point where the people who are
perpetrating it don't think of
themselves as hostile to you they think
of themselves as actually looking after
you and that I think is the ultimate
betrayal of America 1.0 is the idea that
you can't be trusted to self-govern you
can't be trusted to self-determine the
course of your own life but instead you
and your life require somebody else to
look after what's best for you that's
where we really I think got to this you
know I would say what would what would
you say um oh put a descriptor on it the
2.0 version that we live in today okay
so the I if you say Nanny state that
sounds terrible but if you say that a
government's job is to look after the
people in the state then it's like okay
I get where we're going you say things
like no nobody's going to be left behind
um those things feel good they make
people feel protected so if it is at
least good in theory why is it bad in
practice yes so I don't think it's good
in theory I think that you you're right
that certain descriptors can make it
sound good but I don't think it is the
idea of a centralized body telling you
that you're going to live your life in a
different way and using coer of force to
do it I don't think is good in theory I
think it is bad even in theory now I
think it can be made to sound good
because we all have internal
vulnerabilities right each one of us has
certain insecurities certain areas where
we have our strengths but our weaknesses
and we want to be able to make sure that
that were taken care of in the cases
where those weaknesses go bad that's at
the heart of insurance right the whole
idea of insurance forget it whether it's
government or private sector but the
concept of insurance is the idea that
certain times things go badly sometimes
that's out of your control even when it
is in your control part of it is you
didn't inherit all of the
vulnerabilities or failures that you
have as a person you insure against that
against a community of people who also
have other vulnerabilities but you pull
that to say that hey as a community it's
in everyone's self-interest to come
together to say that nobody is Left
Behind well I think that's a beautiful
thing when you're talking about freely
consenting adults getting together and
looking at what's in their best interest
but without denying their own agency I
think when you create a government
structure that is instead in charge of
determining what is or isn't in your
interest you actually forfeit that
agency itself so the idea of in a team
or in a family unit let's just start
with that it's it's a good organizing
principle to start with
Aristotle started there he thinks of the
family as more fundamental unit of
governance than the state most great
countries through human history most
great actual great societies have been
built the same way well in a family unit
the same way is you say that no family
member left behind that's the way that
you know I would like to be a member of
my family we're not going to leave each
other behind because that's just how we
do it we're a family unit and that's who
we are not because there's going to be
coercive force that my wife or I apply
to each other or you know to adult adult
to grown children parent children
relationships a little bit different but
you're talking about even a family unit
of grown adults you're not talking about
necessarily a parent coercing an adult
child to do something my relationship
with my parents or my relationship with
my kids when they're grown up is not
going to be based on coercion but it's
just based on the idea that as a family
we look after each other's best
interests because that's where our
commitments are I see the same spirit
that we're actually missing at a
national level amongst citizens right we
as Citizens are also in a relationship
with each other and I do think part of
what we're missing in our country is
that sense of civic duty that we owe to
one another and that we owe to our
nation and in some ways that our
politicians who we elect owe back to us
and so I believe it's not an accident
that it's precisely at a point in our
history where the politicians who we
send to Washington DC and the
bureaucrats who write the regulations
are no longer behaving as though they
owe their sole moral duty to our own
citizens that our own citizens have lost
their sense of civic duty to our nation
I think those two things go together but
that idea of a duty-based
commitment I believe can be and should
be totally separate from the idea of a
government using coercive Force to tell
you what's best for you and that's
what's at the heart of the modern
administrative State that's what's at
the heart of the modern federal
government in the post Linden Johnson
Great Society era that we're in and so
if we're going back to how do we
eradicate that root disease and really I
think Del deliver a lot of The
Liberation that we hunger for in our
modern American moment it's to undo that
premise the idea that we the people
create a government that is no longer
accountable to us but who is responsible
for us I think that's the root
cause if you want to reach your full
potential this year you have got to
focus on providing yourself with the
best possible building blocks for your
brain and body and that is why I
recommend butcher box you guys know
butcher box is a huge part of my life
because they go above and beyond to
Source only high quality and humanely
raised Meats and Seafood this includes
100% grass-fed beef pre- range organic
chicken humanely raised pork and wild
caught Seafood all shipped for free and
delivered directly to your door this
year get exactly what you need to hit
your healthy eating goals butcher box is
offering our listeners their choice of
meat bone in chicken thighs hop sirloins
or salmon for free in every order for a
whole year plus get $20 off your first
order sign up today for this incredible
offer at butcherbox.com
impact and use code impact to choose
your free offer and get $2
off okay I there's an interesting
tension in there for me in that I think
people especially in a time as um
tumultuous as the one that we're living
through right now people really will
make some very extraordinary tradeoffs
between safety and freedom and when I
think
about the reality on the ground of when
you have personal responsibility as a
driving Factor when it's like hey you're
going to get this from your local family
your community your church your whatever
those are going to be the people that
pick you up when you fall down some
people really will get left behind some
people will literally die in the streets
and how do we deal with that
cogently yeah
so look I think we let's start from a
premise of basic concern for the Dignity
of every person okay now let's ask
ourselves are those policies that we are
adopting in the name of helping such
persons actually helping them or not
right because I think there's a separate
question of whether an ideal State of
Affairs is ever possible if God created
a world
in which there is human
suffering it
should at least cause us to pause to say
whether a government can eliminate all
forms of that human suffering we should
at least ask the question and suggest as
a premise that there's three
possibilities for what the government
action could do it could do nothing it
could make that human suffering worse in
the name of trying to attempt to help
that human suffering or it could make
that human suffering better it could do
in principle those are your three
options I think the evidence would
suggest particular ly in the post Lindon
Johnson Great Society view of the world
the post woodro Wilson administrative
State technocracy bureaucratic vision of
the world the very actors who have I
think in some ways earnestly set out to
make the lives of the disempowered
better what they've done is actually
made make the lives of that very
disempowered class worse and they' made
the lives of everyone worse in the
process I'll give you a good example of
this look at Family formation and the
rates of family formation in the United
States of America for the very groups
the demographic groups that the Great
Society was supposed to actually help
and I'll say why am I asking the
question about family formation it's a
relatively arbitrary variable you could
say to focus on and it's a fair question
here's why if you grow up in a two-
parent household you are more likely to
graduate from high school I think like
eight times more grad likely to graduate
from high school you are 8 to 10 times
less likely to end up in poverty or in
prison if you look at every kind of
outcome for prosperity and well-being
health happiness it's off the charts for
people who grow up in a stable two-
parent household does that mean you
can't achieve those metrics just because
you didn't of course not but I'm talking
about at a population scale no doubt
about it from economic to happiness to
wellbeing to avoiding crime to actually
living a free and prosperous life
unambiguously better for kids of every
skin color this goes across race grows
across gender boundaries goes across all
demographic boundaries you are better
off growing up up in a stable two family
environment so then you look at the
incentives created by lynon Johnson's
Great Society what has that done over
the course of the last 60 years the very
populations in this particular case
there was a particular vision of lifting
up black populations in the United
States that was one of the premises of
the Great Society it has actually had
the impact of reducing and degrading
family formation family information
rates were much higher in Black
communities this is true for all
communities but especially true in Black
communities in the 1950s and 1960s than
they are today and that is no accident
that you've actually seen relative
economic stagnation in Black prosperity
in America over that same 60-year period
as you've seen increased prosperity in
other demographic groups so in the name
of helping a particular Community why is
that they create the incentives where
single mothers can actually get more
money now by not having a man in the
house than by having a man in the house
even though that incentive was created
in the name of helping that actual
family right well put yourself in the
shoes of a single woman growing up with
a child in the house you know what I'd
rather be married to Uncle Sam than to
some guy who's not quite bringing in the
same income that that Federal
government's giving me but that creates
the disincentive to have that man in the
house to Aspire to fill those gaps in
the first place so I don't blame people
who respond to incentives but I do blame
a government and a broad set of
Institutions around that government that
have created those perverse incentives
I'm not going to go in the direction of
questioning the motives of many of those
individuals you could do that in certain
cases and cynically I think there are
certain actors who view the whole thing
as a laughing Affair there's some
version of the world which lynon Johnson
might have been one of those people
actually if you listen to a lot of the
closed door conversations that he had
and his attitudes towards black
Americans it's not a Rosy picture
relative to the so-called public
policies that he proclaimed to espouse
in the name of helping them but put the
question of intentions to one side even
if you assume that most people who are
engaging in this project have basically
benevolent intentions I mean King George
thought of himself as having benevolent
intentions that these subjects not
citizens but these subjects could not be
trusted to do what's in their own best
interest they require me to be able to
make sure that they don't in the modern
sense of the world burn their Planet
down and burn out burn down the the
environment in which they live by
spawning modern climate change or fight
themselves to Pieces by creating in
qualities they don't know they're going
to do that they require me as a
benevolent dictator it's not what King
George was concerned about but I'm
translating to the kinds of concerns
that King George would have in the
present it is a kind of benevolence
really that spawned this type of
overgrowth of both the nanny State as
well as the administrative state but you
asked me when we went off track of who
we were the first time around what made
America great the first time what made
America great the first time is
embracing the spirit that we as a people
are free that you're not riding some
tectonic plate of group identity but
that you are endowed by your creator
with your own free will to achieve
anything you want in your life with your
own agency and hard work and dedication
okay maybe not anything you want in your
life because every one of us has
different god-given gifts but at least
that you get to maximize your god-given
gifts even if they're different than my
god-given gift or anybody else's
god-given gift in this room each of them
is different
but we live in a country where you can
achieve the maximum of that god-given
potential without any government
standing in your way even if that means
that that government isn't exactly the
party that lifts you up to achieve it
either might be your family might be
your own experience it might be your own
Community it might be your pastor it
might be your congregation it might be
all of those things but it's not going
to be some government that lifts you up
but it certainly isn't going to be some
government that stands in your way
either you could call that a libertarian
view in a certain sense I am you know I
am a a Libertarian in in a certain sense
of that word I've identified as
libertarian for much of my life I think
I don't call myself a Libertarian
anymore because I care about more
questions than just the relationship of
the state to the individual but I think
America was in a deep sense libertarian
at its founding that we're the pioneers
and the Explorers the unafraid the
people who could accomplish the maximum
of what we're
able are there going to be is that is
that is there any such thing as a
perfect state of the world when that
world is comprised of Fallen human
beings like us no I don't think that
there is such a thing as a state of
perfection on this Earth but the idea
that a government striving to create
that through coercion is going to create
a better society as a result I think has
been a concept that we've disproven time
and again over the course of history and
that doesn't mean that we should be
callous or have disregard to people who
struggle to the contrary I think what
we've done with the over growth of a
federal Nanny state is we have crowded
out the fellow instincts of empathy and
compassion and respect and dignity that
we confer to one another through other
modes of community Through family
through local through local networks
that we've in some ways lost and
degraded in the context of a government
that has played that role instead
there's a really famous quote by uh
Vladimir Lenin not not History's
Greatest man for sure but the quote's
pretty powerful he's an interesting guy
to
say Lord yeah uh but his quote was give
me just one generation of Youth and I'll
change the entire world uh he wasn't
wrong he however pointed his generation
of Youth at a set of values that was
just absolutely destructive to Russia
and cost Untold millions of lives yeah
um what I hear you talking about now now
is a set of values it's tradeoffs it's
there is no perfect world there's no as
Thomas Soul said there are no Solutions
there only trade-offs
so if you had a generation of Youth what
values would you point them at such that
you don't have to rule by Fiat from the
top down that it will actually grow up
from the
bottom so I think the beauty of the
American founding this goes to the
answer to your question is that there's
a tension in there cuz I'm going to
point you to two values that in
principle are in tension with one
another but actually that tension is a
beautiful thing on one hand it is that
you are an individual with total agency
and free will to determine what you make
of your life the number one person who's
in power to determine what you achieve
in your life is you I I don't think that
should be a controversial thing to say I
think that that is it's extremely
controversial I don't think it should be
controversial
I'm with you on that so in fact I think
delivering any message other than this
to a child who is understanding their
own agency I think is actually is
actually uh morally wrong I think it is
a form of psychological slavery to tell
a kid that what you're able to achieve
in your life that there is someone else
other than you who's the biggest
determinant of that that's what we teach
kids today but my number one message
you're talking about teaching the kids
of the Next Generation the simplest
principle without any fancy langu
language attached to it is the number
one person who determines what you will
achieve in your life is
you period it's not a government it's
not somebody else's invisible power that
they're exercising over you I'm not
saying that those things don't exist but
the number one if you're going to rank
order the Thousand factors that are
going to determine what you achieve in
your life unambiguously for every one of
you the number one determinant of what
you achieve will be you and your own
actions and your own choices that you
make that's number
one the second principle I told you
there's two and they go
together is that as you do it you are
still in a relationship with your fellow
citizens I'm going to talk about this at
a national level because you asked about
it in the context of a Nation so I'll
answer it at a national level you're in
a relationship with your citizens with
your fellow citizens that is Co equal at
its core that you may go on to achieve
more or less than your neighbor as
measured by the numbers of green pieces
of paper or the size of your house or
the level of a claim that you get in the
modern world the number of social media
followers you have whatever the artifice
of the generation may
be regardless of the green pieces of
paper or equivalent social media
followers or whatever metric you care
about regardless of the material
differences between you and your
neighbor you are still fundamentally in
a relationship with each other as
co-equal Citizens you are equal at your
core in the way that matters you're
equal in your moral worth and that you
have a civic duty a duty to each of your
fellow citizens that they have back to
you regardless of what each of you go on
and Achieve so I think that that's at
the heart of what it means to be an
American actually is both of those
things on one hand it's individualism on
the other hand it's Unity
individualism and unity capitalism and
democracy right 1776 includes both of
those things it's it's a fun historical
fact that 1776 was both the year that
the Wealth of Nations was written it's
Adam Smith's seminal text that at least
provides widely viewed as providing the
clearest statement from Modern free
market capitalism same year as the
Declaration of Independence written by
Thomas Jefferson that led to the birth
of the American Republic so those two
things in tension with each other right
individualism and unity capitalism and
democracy but that tension rests within
each of us there's two parts of each of
us the part of us that's a that's a
self-interested individual and a
capitalist the part of each of us that's
a citizen with a civic duty to our
country and I don't view those as
contradictory but if you're asking me
what two values would I impart to the
Next Generation to really create a
country
that revives the principles of our
founding and maybe even goes far further
than we ever have those would be the
both of those principles I think are
equally important to impart is that the
number one determinant of what you
achieve is you and you should be
unconstrained in achieving it but number
two is at every step of the way no
matter what you do or don't achieve
we're all still co-equal in the most
important way in our moral worth as
Citizens and we have to regard each
other and behave towards one another
accordingly that's what I would say okay
uh I agree very much however there is a
there's a change that happened maybe
because of lynon Johnson's uh Great
Society but you have a philosophical
change in this country where um by way
of my own personal um collision with the
change in ideology happened when I wrote
the the blog article that I thought
would change the most people's lives and
I honestly when I put it out I thought
people were just going to be like bro
you just changed my life I can't thank
you enough and uh it triggers everybody
whenever I talk about this but this is
the true article that I wrote If you are
hit by a drunk driver it's all your
fault and the goal the title of the
article very interesting and keep in
mind the whole time I'm writing I'm like
oh man I'm giving you the secrets of the
universe you're going to love this going
to change your life because what I'm
trying to remind people one obviously I
would not reuse fault if I were going to
rewrite this because that's just where
everybody derailed what I'm trying to
get people to understand is you can make
a different choice and get a different
outcome and if you're always looking at
life through the lens of solutions like
oh I can do a different thing and get a
different thing you can remain in
control of your life so for me the
reason that the idea of
self-determination yeah should be the
thing that you are embracing with every
fiber of your being the reason I think
that that's effective is it puts you in
the driver's seat now the bad news is
there are going to be wildly Divergent
outcomes different people are better at
different things and if you lack in some
area you just may never be successful
but what I want to understand is at this
moment in time I would say that the
vision for I should be taken care of
what are you talking about like we need
to redistribute wealth like this is
grotesque that some people can get so
rich and other people are literally
going to die in the streets here are
these two rich people talking about how
other people like need to remember that
they can have self-determination
self-determination like everything in
the world is messed up I can't afford a
house uh I'm in crippling debt from my
student loans and I can't discharge it
and when Joe Biden tries to pay it off
you guys stop him at every turn like
it's just the the whole world is [ __ ]
and you're telling me to go make
something of myself that message has
captivated not one not two we're talking
three maybe four generations of people
and I want to know why is that so
compelling and why is it so hard to get
people to recognize from where I'm
sitting if you want to be a superhero
you need only adopt personal
responsibility like it's the most
liberating empowering useful just
fanatically great thing you could ever
take on but that sounds ridiculous to
young people well I think you got to
acknowledge the powerful argument for
the other side which is sometimes you do
get hit by a drunk driver and it's not
your fault sometimes you do get Swept
Away by a tornado right and your house
crashes to the ground and people die in
natural disasters or or other forms of
accidents that aren't their fault all
the time so that runs in the face of the
idea that the only determinant of your
own success or well-being is you but
that's not what I said in the in the
very beginning that's why I try to frame
it exactly
precisely of the thousands of factors
that will determine what you are able to
achieve for yourself in your life the
number one most important factor is you
and I think if we acknowledge that truth
I don't like to Pedal fake optimism I
don't like to Pedal fake self-help
doctrines just for the sake of you
believing that's going to make you
better off it's also going to be got to
be grounded in truth right and so is it
true that if you deliver that message to
people you said you find this compelling
and I don't disagree with you that it's
going to motivate them to do more great
it could do that but I don't believe in
perpetuating that message just because
it's going to have a positive effect
it's also has to to be true so do I
think it is true that you are the only
person who has any say in what you
achieve in life and that you can achieve
anything you want with your own hard
work and dedication no I don't think
that's true might that be a motivating
message it could be a motivating message
for the time being but it's going to be
short-term motivating because pretty
soon you're going to learn into you're
going to run into obstacles in your life
that teach you that that's just not true
when I was a kid I wanted to play in the
NBA I'm six feet tall now I guess there
some people who are six feet tall make
it to the NBA but I also don't have a
lot of other skill sets required to
compete at the highest level of
basketball that no matter how much I
worked was never going to happen for
basketball or even for tennis or any
other sport well you know each of us has
different god-given gifts and that's
just a fact and no matter how hard I
worked or how dedicated I was that
wasn't going to happen there are other
people who inherit genetic diseases or
diseases of other kinds that they that
through no fault of their own will limit
how long or how comfortably they're able
to live their
life that's just not in your control but
here's what I will say is each of us has
our own unique god-given
talents and nobody can stop you from
achieving the maximum of your god-given
potential or at least you are the person
who has the most agency over that and I
actually think that that with that
modification I find that to be a more
inspiring message because that's
actually true it's I think it's when you
think about it it's incontrovertible
what other factors is going to be more
influential on that than you especially
at the level of a popul
there isn't there isn't one more than
that so now now we're talking about that
being true why do people find that
inspiring it's because it's true
actually now today is there a part of
each of us that still you know has an
addictive tendency right do do you do
you have that drink of alcohol for an
alcoholic because he thinks it's
actually better for him while he's
drinking it no I don't think so do you
think that spending that extra hour of
time at 11:00 before you go to bed um
scrolling through social media is
necessarily good for you are you doing
that because think that's actually
better for you or you're doing it just
because it's a thing that you feel
through impulse compelled to do we're
Fallen human beings we're not Gods so in
that same sense if you are offered some
level of if a drug addict offered
cocaine is that something is saying yes
to that good for you just because you do
end up saying yes no it's not and so I
think what I see with the modern
government is we're showering cocaine on
a bunch of cocaine addicts claiming that
it's better for them because that's what
they're clamoring to want when in fact
that's not better for the very people
you're purporting to help and I think
you can separate both of those things
that's the way I look at
it uh so I think let me see how quickly
I can set the table for what I really
think is going on so I think that from
an evolutionary standpoint it is simply
true that the world is going to break
into what we'll roughly call right and
left uh I'll Define them quickly on if
if you're going to create a species that
passes on its information through
culture then you know that the organism
as a collective is the thing that is our
best safety it's the way that we move
forward we're not the strongest fastest
sharpest claw anything like that uh so
our ability to function together in
gigantic numbers flexibly is the thing
that we're obscenely good at and why
we're the the number one Predator the
world has ever seen okay so I'm nature
how do I you can use God whatever God
set a thing in motion to give cohesion
to the group uh a break right and left
on the left this is about compassion I
want to make sure that nobody's left
behind I want to make sure that people
are looked after and cared for I want to
make sure that I'm contributing to the
group super important because if you're
not contributing to the group then
you're not going to have group cohesion
okay on the right uh you're basically
addressing from an evolutionary
standpoint the game theoretic reality
that if you are never going to leave
anybody behind you're going to get
freeloaders and so if there's nobody to
combat the freeloaders you get such a
Paras load on the society that it also
falls apart so you need this Dynamic
tension between the left and the right
and if either one of them gets out of
balance you get pathology now right now
I see massive pathology on the left
we've become so obsessed with the idea
of nobody left behind that getting
wealthy is evil we are in the grips of a
set of ideas that I think don't yield
results and worst of all we don't have a
value that mandates that we look at the
results to say are we moving in the
right direction and even if we did have
that we wouldn't agree on what results
we ought to be striving for and so and
then one last piece I'll put in this
these ideas are extremely complicated
and very nuanced and it is ridiculously
difficult for people to um think through
these problems and now be
unintentionally inflammatory but this is
just true from where I'm sitting uh
intellect plays a role and this is how
you get the idea of the elites there are
some ideas that are so complicated uh
take modern monetary Theory it it is
financial suicide and yet you get a lot
of people that go to B for it
now how do you as an average person
think through the complexities of
monetary policy you don't you're going
to have to Outsource that to somebody
there are going to be a group of Elites
that are
very happy to take up that Banner be
don't worry Timmy I'm going to think
through this for you and all you have to
do is Vote for This candidate all right
that is the very tip of an
excruciatingly large Iceberg but when
you have the the need for dynamic
tension between people who want to
support the group and you have people
that want to stand up for your
individual rights and you need to take
personal responsibility and do your
thing but that both of them tend towards
uh um pathology when unchecked by the
other but you're living in an
algorithmically driven world where each
of them only sees their own side how do
we disseminate the values that you're
talking about in a way where we can
actually
either not either where we can meet in
the middle where we long to hold each
other in that Dynamic tension yeah it's
it's a beautiful Fring I
think I think there's a couple things I
would say um one
is the punchline of how you get to the
answer that you just talked about is two
things one is I I don't think that there
are necessarily Just Two Types of People
I think that that impulse actually
exists if we're willing to admit it
within each of us I think a lot of
people on as you put it right or the
right you could call it classically
conservative
folks will embrace the individualism
side the rugged individual the rugged
capitalist but without admitting that
they also hunger to be part of something
bigger than themselves that's where a
lot of their patriotis that's where
their patriotic instincts come from
right why do a lot of people who have
such impulses also have their own
children or themselves who have served
in the military along the way that's not
explained by just the mentality of how
do I just achieve the maximum while
minimizing freeloading right that that
that behavior pattern can't be explained
and I similarly think that a lot of
people who still worry about who who
worry a lot about Collective well-being
still have individual Ambitions that go
beyond just the collective and so I
think that instinct actually doesn't
just exist within a society I think it
exists within parts of each of us
ourselves now how do you actually that's
that's an observation which I would
which would be my framing would be
slightly different than the evolutionary
split between the between the two camps
soety as you frame your answer one thing
to hold in your mind is you must explain
what I see right any theory has to
account for the world that I actually
have before me um so either challenge me
that these two sides don't go
pathological and I mean I can pick a
society and I will tell you whether they
broke pathological right or pathological
left or whether they're currently
walking that Dynamic tension um do you
agree that even though they're rough
approximations and I totally
a spectrum
of um but do you agree that that these
large Tendencies exist at the population
level I want to think about that for a
second I think as a correlation as as a
general Trend I think it does as a
general Trend it does but you want to
give you an example of something that
counters your hypothesis right in this
framing because you know the way you
view the world is through a bunch of
different different lenses and disted
yeah but but you try on each one as the
analogy I would use like a set of
clothes and Nothing fits quite perfectly
but you try it on and each one each lens
has a has a certain aspect of it that
fits and a certain aspect that doesn't I
think that the best counter example I
could give you is a lot of people who
would fall on the right end of that
spectrum that you just laid out still
make sacrifices for their country such
as serving in their military and putting
their lives on the line that would not
be explained by just falling in the
self-interested self- maximizing
minimize freeloading category right and
I think I think that that theory would
fail to account for the population level
sorting when you see individual
behaviors or even large scale charitable
instincts right like where does that
charitable Instinct come from why does
where does the philanthropic Instinct
come from from somebody whose sole goal
is to minimize freeloading and
maximizing individual achievement it
would neither explain family
participation in the military nor would
it explain individual philanthropy and
so there I think are some just large
scale examples that would not undermine
but at least cut against that Framing
and any framework you use is going to be
imperfect but that would put pressure on
your framework those would be examples
but to the punchline of the question you
asked one of the areas where I think you
would be able to find a common ground
what you call the middle I never use the
word middle because I rarely view a
spectrum as monodimensional
anyway but one of the areas where you
might be able to find a productive
equilibrium there is that many of the
actions that a society might take in the
name of helping those who are furthest
Left Behind are failing to actually let
help those who are supposedly further
left behind and I think that is a basis
for at least finding some equilibrium
some basis of common ground to say at
least here's our principle John RS
offered this I mean there's very little
ground you and I are going to cover that
has not been covered over the course of
human history we're just going to revive
those conversations in a modern context
occasionally you might break new ground
but 99.9% is going to have been covered
already John rolls covered this idea in
what he called his maximan principle
that all else equal if you were behind a
veil of ignorance right so his whole
theory was have you heard of this guy
John rolls yeah okay yeah so he's kind
of viewed as the intellectual father of
modern liberal classical liberal thought
his whole premise was if you sit behind
the veil of ignorance that's how you
should actually design a society is
what's a just Society what's the theory
of a just Society it's one where if we
were all standing behind this black
curtain and this black veil and we don't
know where we're going to end up on the
other side are you going to become a
businessman or are you going to become
somebody who's a popper on the street
begging for food on a daily basis in the
third world you don't know where you're
going to end up across the entire Globe
what stature or situation you're going
to have in Life or be born into you have
no idea what society would we design if
we're behind that proverbial veil of
ignorance that's where the expression
veil of ignorance actually comes from
and the principle he comes up with is
what he calls I think it was he referred
to the maximan principle which is that
the society we would design is one in
which every policy or rule we adopted
was one that was best for the people who
were worst off okay now you could debate
what those policies are I don't
necessarily I'm not a Rian I don't agree
with that but I can I can entertain that
right I think that it's coherent I think
it's intellectually compelling and I
think it's also a basis for at least
attacking many of the supposed policies
that in today's actual practical world
are designed to help those who are worse
off let's just find common ground to
start there first is are they actually
helping those who are worse off and I
think we have a long list of
improvements that we could make across
people who fall into both of those camps
right so the first point I made is I
don't exactly agree with the framing of
those two camps but I think it's a fair
and useful framing so let's let's play
with it for a second playing within that
framework that you laid out which I
think is interesting your question was
assume you're right about that framework
how do we actually find some common
ground and do something that everybody
in that society would agree with I'd say
let's apply a principle I'm not a rosian
but let's apply a Rian principle for the
sake of this exercise and say that are
all of the policies that we're adopting
such as those that are Linda Johnson's
Great Society policies and its progyny
actually helping the people who were
worst off who they were designed to help
and I think the answer to that question
alone is unambiguously no how what
metrics would you use to Benchmark
against Prosperity economic Mobility
family formation happiness drug usage
imprisonment economic Prosperity is is a
proxy for other forms of prosperity that
we could use as a rough proxy as well so
that's what I would say suicide rates
life expectancy actually which in the
United States is not necessarily where
we would want it to be as a leader of
the Free
World so I think that and relative
metrics of the United States compared to
other countries including for those who
are worst off in the United States and
so the argument of course by people on
other side is we didn't go far enough
right you could always argue that but
you could also compare where we were in
the 1950s for some of the very
populations who we were supposedly
who actually were politically less
advantaged than they are even today
we're talking about preil Rights Act for
minority populations like black
populations in the United States where
you lack political equality but on the
economic metrics actually were
surprisingly not really worse off than
today even after this redistributionist
project you know came into existence and
so anyway you're asking what's a first
step towards finding common ground I
think one first step is we're not going
to get to 100% agreement on this but I
think you're going to get some
significant mileage out of this is even
if we all just temporarily agree are the
policies or projects that we've adopted
to lift up those who are worse off are
they actually lifting up those who are
worse off and I think right now we're
failing on that metric alone now at the
end of that we're still going to have
some residual disagreements remaining
right and then the question is is there
anything a government a government could
do to further benefit those who are
worst off versus other institutions
taking care of that load instead I mean
are we sure that a Revival of faith in
this country for example might not be a
more effective way of fulfilling the
human need for purpose and well-being
and providing you a road map for how you
want to live your life better than a
government otherwise would I'm not
saying that could be done centrally but
I'm saying that the way this country is
going to be saved isn't necessarily
going to be by some person running a
government either maybe the Revival of
parents fathers and mothers both or
pastors or coaches each playing their
own respective roles in Saving this
country too I think that's one of the
traps that the redistributionist model
or the collectivist model falls into is
thinking that all solutions necessarily
must be delivered by one modality of
this thing we call government versus
actually recognizing that in this real
world that we live in not some
theoretical world but in the real Civic
world we live in we're not going to be
saved by some president or some Lenin or
figure coming from on high to save us
that if we're going to be saved it is
going to be because we save ourselves in
other ways as well and so I think that's
how we'll get to the you know further
than the first step but at least as a
first step where I think we would find a
lot of common ground before we started
having more philosophical disagreements
we even even in the face of those
philosophical disagreements of being a
collectivist versus individualist you
could look at the Litany of policies
that are not actually helping the very
people that they purport to help and I
think we've got plenty of mileage and
plenty of juice to squeeze out of that
that before we get to actual deeper
philosophical disagreements that divide
us that's where I think we are now does
that make sense if you're struggling to
find the perfect gift for your dad this
Father's Day get him an unexpected gift
that brings you closer together with an
aura digital frame Aura frames are
beautiful Wi-Fi connected digital frames
that allow you to share and display
unlimited photos from anywhere I love
how simple it is to upload photos from
any phone with the Aura app and if
you're giving the frame as a gift you
can even Pur personalize it with
pre-loaded photos and memories Ora
frames were named the best digital photo
frame by wired and selected as one of
Oprah's Favorite Things three times and
right now Aura has a great deal for
Father's Day listeners can save on the
perfect gift by visiting Ora frames.com
impact to get $30 off their bestselling
frame that's
Au frames.com
impact this deal ends June 18th so do
not wait use code impact at check out to
save terms and conditions apply it does
um to me this is far less a
philosophical question and more the
answer to the question of uh this is my
worldview we are all in the grips of a
set of ideas that set of ideas creates
what I call a frame of reference your
frame of reference is the whole life
beer goggles that distort everything you
see you have no sense that you're
wearing them uh
your frame of reference is built up
effectively from your beliefs and your
value system most people confuse those
with just objective truth I just see the
world the way that it really is uh but
that isn't true from where I'm sitting
this is the whole point of the veil of
ignorance right because when you're in
the society then you're all going to see
it from the vantage point that you're in
but is it possible to have a view from
nowhere A View From The Other Side the
the veil of ignorance is itself a frame
of reference so I would say that's not
quite true what what rolls is saying
there and he may be totally unaware I'm
not familiar enough with his thinking to
know but he may be completely unaware
that he has a frame of reference and so
he has a sense of where we should March
people towards and he is going oh I know
where we need to get them let's say he
rounded it to human flourishing that's
certainly me projecting uh and he's
thinking how what's the best way to get
there but what I'm saying is you need to
recognize that you have somewhere that
you're trying to get people which is why
I think it's very interesting that you
at least have a metric by which you're
saying hey I'm going to state where
we're trying to get people and I'm going
to give you a kpi by which we're going
to determine whether we got people there
and the kpis that you gave us uh
economics or are people making enough
money are they doing drugs family
formation life expectancy happiness like
you had a a bunch of really inated for
breaking the laws all that yeah it's all
amazing so now you and I have the same
desire which is to say okay I'm not
trying to I'm literally not trying to
ask you a philosophy question I'm trying
to ask you this is going to become
tactical okay uh so whether you are a
future president which I think a lot of
people that saw you move are like yeah
bro wants to keep going like there's
there's more here uh potentially VP or
maybe it's hey BuzzFeed and you start
going after the world in the way that
you're um historically more prone to do
uh through business but anyway it we
ultimately have to find a set of ideas
so for the sake of argument let's say
that you were advising Trump or you were
in Trump's cabinet
um how do you begin to make policies
because I think we both agree that
people will follow the incentives right
now the government has become the
vehicle of
incentive distribution incentive
creation however you want to think about
that but that is where the incentives
lie right now yeah so how do we leverage
either the stripping down of the
government apparatus or the refocusing
of the government apparatus to create
the incentives that will give us good
outcomes in economics drug use family
incarceration life expectancy happiness
Etc yeah so getting more practical from
the philosophy to the to the Practical I
I enjoy the philosophy discussion there
one critical element that we didn't
cover that I want to come back to
because I was operating within your
frame um I'll just say a word about it
and then if you want we come back to it
later which is one metric on that list
that I didn't include but that's really
important I think it's
foundational is the degree of mutual
respect that we have for one another and
the sense of respect that every citizen
experiences so you think about health
outcomes incarceration outcomes economic
outcomes educational outcomes all of
that is important one metric that's
intangible and that it's difficult to
measure but is really foundationally
important is what is the sense of
respect and regard that every individual
experiences as a citizen of that Nation
I think that's really important I think
we're doing for each other
yes but for for each other but that one
person feels in that society that they
are receiving as a citizen do you feel
like you are respected as a co-equal
citizen by your fellow citizens I think
that that's a really really important
metric where we're doing particular
poorly right to that feels like it's
doing work for a different idea uh is
that doing work for class hey whether
you're rich or poor you should feel
equally respected yeah Rich or poor and
class is actually today in America is
actually not not principally divided
just based on wealth actually class is
almost a separate metric tell me more
what do you mean well I think that
there's a lot of people who I even if
you take part of Donald Trump's rise is
he
represents membership in a class that is
different than the people who might have
similar net worths but view themselves
as as a member of a different class
right I do not track you don't track
interesting can you give me specifics
yeah look I think that an artist a a a
relatively uh 30th percentile of income
person who is
a graduate of I don't know the the Rhode
Island School of Design
or haford college in Brooklyn New York
who you know has coffee at the local
coffee shop and and shops in in certain
types of decorates in certain types of
Arts that they decorate their their loft
apartment with thinks of themselves and
their peers view them as fundamentally
as a member of a different class than a
guy here in central Ohio who has built a
plumbing business that has an average
income that's higher than the artist in
Brooklyn but there's still a certain
classism where the level of respect that
the self-operating plumber here in Ohio
feels in his society in which he lives
is lower
as a level of respect that he feels is
accorded than somebody who may
economically actually make less money
than him because he doesn't speak in
exactly the manner that the media
institutions and the financial
institutions that he interfaces with on
a daily basis actually regard him and so
I think that there is an axis in modern
America where if we just divide this
based on just wealth wealth I mean
there's heavy correlations here but if
we just came down to Pure wealth I don't
think that we're fully tracking people
sense of how respected they do or don't
feel right I think that there are many
people working in the media industry who
aren't particularly like well
compensated or well paid but think of
themselves and roughly by the
institutions in America are regarded
with a greater degree of respect than
somebody who might be working in
manufacturing industries that are in
otherwise declining but still somebody
who's able to live a relatively upper
middle class prosperous life for
themselves I don't think class totally
tracks wealth but that's why I framed it
broadly is the sense that every one of
those citizens has that they are
regarded as co-equal and equally
important and valuable and morally
worthy members of that Society I think
that is an important metric that matters
for a long-term flourishing Republic as
well so I would add that to the list and
I think that that goes to a
philosophical worldview that is a little
bit different than the one you laid out
which is that part of our path to
Liberation is recognizing that the
number of green pieces of paper in your
bank account has nothing to do with your
moral Worth right so part of the whole
project of saying that well this guy has
that many Ys and this guy has a bigger
has a bigger a nicer car than I do or a
bigger nicer house than I do is also at
a certain point stepping back and saying
that that isn't what's important
actually now that's different from
saying somebody if you're living in
abject poverty there's there's only so
much Freedom you're actually going to
have and that's a different discussion
but I do think that there is a certain
Affliction in a culture that is strictly
addicted to materialism or in a modern
sense one form of wealth I mean a lot of
things that many wealthy people
apply would VI for today is I think
today status is measured closer to the
number of social media followers you
have than you do by the number of green
pieces of paper in your bank account so
my only point right now is this idea of
social hierarchy and status is not
limited to the axis of wealth there are
other cultural axes that matter too but
whatever the is in a well functioning
flourishing Republic It's one in which
the fellow citizens in that Republic
truly view themselves as morally
equivalent in their worth even though
they may be non-equal and unequal in
other less important axes that just
don't matter as much whether it's the
number of green pieces of paper and the
number of social media followers you
have or the way you know or or the kind
of car that you drive those are details
compared to the inherent moral Civic
worth of of a human being we can come
back to that philosophical discussion
but I think that's actually part of what
we're missing is Reviving that sense of
mutual respect regardless of the
material manifestations of our equality
I think that's super interesting and we
will certainly get to the policies
because I definitely want to answer that
but I I want to press I'd rather stay
here actually you want to go to policies
we can go there but the policies follow
from this because this is a different
world viw that I think we're missing and
I think it's part of why you saw Donald
Trump succeed the way that he did it
2016 is he gave air to that and since
you have a lot of elite men I us lived
in Manhattan at the time but for of
Manhattan
wealthy classical liberal types that
didn't understand why do you have this
Manhattan billionaire who's got his name
written on gold in front of his
buildings and fly around a private plane
being supported by the every man who's
supporting him not realizing that he's
not one of them and that's a worldview
that's really confined to seeing class
exclusively in the form of wealth I mean
Trump was never really part of the same
Harvard
educated Hedge Fund Class that otherwise
populated the New York intelligencia
anyway and so at every level even at the
highest levels of wealth to everywhere
across the wealth Spectrum there is this
Rift in broader division between the
question of class and the question of
wealth but on either axis we've actually
lost that sense of Reviving co-equal
respect to Citizens and I think you see
a lot of this on the left too I think
there's a lot of people in minority
communities I think there's a sense of
this grounded historically in some truth
in Black America feeling a sense of
disregard as a person as a as a human
being that even after you've achieved
some level of economic success or
Prosperity that you were still regarded
as something other than a full citizen
certainly for much of our history I
rejected that's true today but that's
beside the point for right now are there
points in our history where that's
absolutely been true absolutely it's
been and so I think we miss the total
picture unless we get to that sense of C
equality in that sense that every
citizen has a sense and a true sense
that they really are co-equal regardless
of material attributes in their lives
regardless of their skin color
regardless of their political views
regardless of whether they
know how to refer to somebody by the
right pronouns regardless of whether
they capitalize the be in Black when
they're writing something regardless of
whether or not they adopt the modern
politically correct lingo that changes
by the week to say that no no no just
because you don't speak in a certain
manner or just because you're not part
of that particular Club you're still a
co-equal citizen and you're regarded as
equal that I think is foundational and I
think it's part of what we're missing
and once we revive that the rest
actually becomes a lot easier I think
that's what we as human beings crave
most is a sense of respect and dignity
for who we are yes the autonomy that
comes with that but also the regard the
sense of regard of how you're seen by
your fellow not animals you don't care
how a dog looks at you you don't care
how how a cow looks at you you care
about how your fellow human beings look
at you and that's that's not wrong it's
part of part of being human is that we
care about the way that we're regarded
by others that's what we've lost right
now Rive it well yes so that's a deeper
question I think that a being able to
talk about it in the open is part of
what we revive part of what part of the
reason we've lost it is
one of the things that gives us equal
regard for one another as human beings
is our ability to engage in open
respectful but unfiltered conversation
with one another I think part of what's
fostered and it's been like kerosene
that we've thrown on this fire is this
culture of fear that has suppressed that
dialogue right I think that one metric
for how well we're doing you could put
this on the list of metrics too
is what is the gap between what people
are willing to say in public and what
they're willing to say in private that's
an interesting metric
right now I think that Gap certainly for
the last 5 years that Gap has been
pretty wide right the percentage of
people who are willing to say what they
actually think in
public I think that we're doing
relatively poorly over the last five
years compared to other other points in
our history where we've maybe done
better as a country I think that's a
metric that matters too it's it's also a
proxy for the sense of mutual
self-regard because if you're willing to
say something at the dinner table but
you're not willing to say it in public
that means that a you're worried about
how you'll be regarded by others if you
say it B it means you don't even regard
your fellow human being as with enough
respect to say that he gets to hear what
I have to say so those metrics matter
too that goes to that sense of Civic
respect how do you fix it well part of
that is some of the policies that have
created that suppression of speech right
you'd have your social media account
locked if you happen to say that
covid-19 began in a lab in China or that
you could go straight down the list that
becomes could become political quickly
but the hunter B laptop story being
suppressed on the eve of the last C if
you said that that was a real story you
would have had your social media account
locked well we could talk about all of
the First Amendment violations at issue
there and I've gone at length on that
and we can go there but I'm making a
different point now which is that
degrades our sense of co-equal respect
for one another as Citizens where if you
have certain opinions and you're not
allowed to express them but I have
certain opinions on those matters and I
am allowed to express them that's a
sense in which we literally feel
grounded in truth that we're not in any
sense equal as Citizens in that Society
versus bring back that Civic equality
right that idea and and I think service
in the military is one of the things
that does that by the way it's not the
only thing that does that but serving
shoulder-to-shoulder for somebody who
might be a kid of a billionaire from the
upper east side of Manhattan to somebody
who grew up in a single family on the
southside of Chicago it doesn't matter
you are both there serving a common
cause doesn't matter when you're in a
classroom or on a social media site
together able to each express your own
opinion that's what matters is that
you're co-equal citizens now is somebody
going to be better at one thing than the
other thing and somebody going to have
different types of one person's going to
have more social media followers the
other person's going to have more
dollars in their bank account the other
guy's going to have a different kind of
car and the other guy's going to have a
different kind of house sure but those
are details and they don't matter as
much against the backdrop of that Civic
equality then you get to the sense of
okay are you getting too philosophical
and somebody doesn't have enough food to
put on the dinner table are you telling
me they really are going to be co-equal
just because they're regarded as such
well then it tells us what's the scope
of the problems we need to solve I do
think that somebody should you know be
able to through basic hard work be able
to at least provide for their own family
if they're doing things the right way
but that reduces the scope of what we're
solving for of making sure that
everybody has the basic needs to be
treated to to just live a functioning
life right if you're dying of starvation
the kinds of questions we're talking
about are mostly irrelevant but that
reduces the scope of where our policy
Solutions focus and I think that we can
reduce that scope to solvable problems
if we get to the more foundational
problem of restoring that Civic respect
in the first place and I know it's a
different worldview a little bit than
than we started with it's a different
framework maybe sure I'm not yet sure
that I see it as a different framing but
so
insightful uh here's what I'm taking
away from that so you've really uh made
a phenomenally useful point which is my
ultimate barometer around uh classism is
no longer about just how much money you
make uh that's really in I I really
struggled for a long time with the idea
of the elites I didn't understand what
people were talking about the elites the
elites the elites uh and then it becomes
clearer when I start thinking about the
will to power The Nanny state where
people are like I need to make decisions
for you because you're not going to make
good decisions for yourself and to your
point that could be coming from somebody
who's making $32,000 living an artistic
life in Brooklyn whatever right uh
doesn't necessarily have to be tied to
um how much money they're making okay
super super insight
um now though as we put it
into not existing just in the realm of
philosophy but just tactically feed on
the ground how do we make something
work okay um I'm gonna I'll assume you
know nothing about my background I'll
walk you through a really small sliver
so you can understand the worldview that
I operate under uh I try to break into
the film industry this is in the 90s I
have no idea how to do it YouTube
doesn't exist cameras are not on cell
phones I realized to control the art I
need to control the money and so I
decided to get into business to get rich
I thought it would take 18 months it
took 15 years but it actually did work
and I end up selling a company for a
billion dollars oh really good for you
man thank you did you own all of it I
did not but there was three of us so I
did well hey so um then I decide I'm
going to start the thing that I came
here to do uh before which is to build a
media company now in the beginning I
just wanted to tell cool stories I
didn't have any compelling reason why I
wanted to tell cool stories uh but in
building my last company I had 3,000
employees a thousand of them grew up
hard in the inner cities like hard hard
and I because we're manufacturing I'm
there in the inner cities with them and
so I'm getting to know them seeing them
up close I decide uh I'm animated by the
fact that right now in the developed
world the number one predictor of your
future success is your ZIP code more
than your IQ which I if it's your IQ
that's bad enough but the fact that it's
your Z they've controlled for that in
terms of the data yeah correct correct
so uh looking at that I was like okay
this this I cannot abide and so I
actually buy that now that I think about
why yeah terrifying school systems yep
school systems a set of ideas so for
instance just what I mean by ideas I had
one kid who was clearly able to process
raw data faster than me so I'll call
that smarter than me smarter than me but
he's doing nothing with his life
literally nothing productive it was
absolutely terrifying to see this kid
who I'm like uh you're frighteningly
smart
and yet you're doing nothing and I was
like why aren't you doing anything and
he said oh my mom told me that the world
doesn't want people who look like me to
be successful I was like wait what and
so he's like he'd never thought of it
before but as I'm pushing him he's like
if that's true though doesn't why would
I even try it doesn't make sense so I
was like Wow let's just stop that's the
worst advice you've ever received in
your entire life you need to immediately
stop and recognize that Kobe Bryant has
the right idea which is you can get so
good at something that people can't stop
you yeah and if you just focus on that
get good at a thing you care about and
go execute and you will be shocked that
the world no matter how much they hate
you even if it's true that they don't
want you to succeed just based on the
way you look they can't stop you right
so I then start this thing I call Quest
University and I'm like look I'm going
to show up early I'll stay late I will
teach you everything I know about
entrepreneurship if you want to start a
competitive business I'm here for it I
don't care I just want you to know I
care more about your future than your
own mother and so uh they started coming
in I'm teaching them all these ideas I'm
like literally just think like this act
like this and you can get the results
that I've gotten because I literally
took myself from scrounging in my couch
cushions to find enough change to put
gas in my car to building an at at that
time had built a billion dollar company
and not yet sold it so they all saw like
whoa like he's really done this maybe
this stuff will work now here's the sad
news this stuff really does work uh I
have built three successful companies in
three wildly Divergent Industries just
thinking from first principles anybody
can think from first principles and
still despite that despite me teaching
them all the things that I did only 2%
of them did anything and I became wildly
disheartened and I was like huh you may
disagree and I would love it if you did
because you'll open new avenues for me I
realized I had to give up on
adults they can change but they're not
going to and when you look at there's I
I may be conflating a couple people I
feel bad I really need to I want to get
this guy on the show so badly a guy
named Jeffrey Canada who I attribute
every great thing in education to maybe
some of this is not him but anyway
here's the the punchline uh he grows up
in Harlem at the time the crack epidemic
says I'm gonna send myself to uh Harvard
on a scholarship does I'm going to
change the education system doesn't he
realizes it's too flawed too broken you
have to go outside the system starts
doing these charter schools and he
builds them inside of the same building
that failing schools are in with the
same kid chosen completely at random
from the same school puts them through a
different curriculum and all of a sudden
these kids just like smash every record
everywhere and he said the the whole
thing you have to focus on is mothers
that are either pregnant or about to
become pregnant and get them to read
incessantly to their kids because what
the real predictor in the inner cities
of why these kids fail is the language
centers of their brain don't develop
because they don't hear enough words by
the time they're three and the ratio of
positive to negative is the exact
inverse of middle inome kids so a middle
inome kid hears 70% positive words 30%
negative a lowincome kid hears 70%
negative 30% positive and he was like
you just have to get him to hear the raw
volume of words that a middle- inome kid
hears so they're the language centers
develop and get that ratio positive to
negative right and then obviously he
carries them through the kids through
the school system but anyway the point
being that if you recognize that the
ideas themselves are not enough but that
this really can be turned into
effectively a policy read to your kids
so you need to find a way to incentivize
that uh get them in an education system
where I don't know if he'll like this
characterization what he does but
basically you have to be able to fire
teachers this is pure meritocracy you
reward high performance and you
effectively filter out people that are
underperforming you have exceedingly
high standards even of quote unquote
poor kids and you just say hey here is
the expectation here now I lay all of
that out out because this is an idea
problem and that's why I say I don't
think this is a violation of our framing
you've helped me better understand a
piece of the reality that I'm trying to
frame but my whole thesis is simply this
is an idea problem humans break along
these lines where they tend to like one
set of ideas or another you want Dynamic
tension you don't want either side to To
Rule The Roost but if you judge based on
a
knowable I'm going to keep saying kpis
just to get people to understand how
specific I mean I like your general
buckets I think they are awesome but
ultimately if we're talking at the level
of policy we have to start talking about
what is the key performance indicator I
expect graduation levels to be this I
expect the percentage of eighth graders
that can read at an eighth grade level
to be this and we either are or are not
hitting these if we are hitting these we
do more of it if we are not hitting
these we do less and that level of
accountability is complet completely
devoid y uh in our current system yep
and it feels to me that to really
address what you're talking about to
really make everybody feel equal yep
morally equal regardless of income
regardless of white color blue collar
educated uh elite non- elite
whatever there's no way to do that at
any level other than the family yes like
am I crazy I I don't think you're crazy
at all I think that again what I said
earlier it's kind of funny is
most thinkers over the course of human
history who have had conversations like
this Socratic dialogue you know the
modern podcast is really a resuscitation
of Socratic dialogue that existed
thousands of years ago have come to a
really similar conclusion and there's a
reason for that is your need to both be
an individual but balanced against being
part of a community that is bigger than
yourself there's no better example of
that than the family unit and so the
right unit that trains you to exercise
both of those muscles is at the level of
the family so no I don't think that's a
crazy thing to say I think that that is
the data also points to the same to the
same point it's actually um I'll tell
you the first thing that went through my
head as you were just reciting that data
first of all something that's really
fascinating my first thought went not
even to the level of society
but went to the level of like making
sure I'm going home and reading to my
kids later today and that ties
into kind of an evolutionarily hardwired
Impulse anyway that we're able to use to
our betterment which is we care about
our own children we care about our own
family members like our own kin I don't
think that that's something that we
should hide from I think that don't
think we should be ashamed of I think we
should harness it and use it in our
favor and so yes I think that is much
closer to whatever the answer is you're
a lot closer to the flame there then you
are trying to design some sort of
centralized system of command and
control using coercion to get there
because that's I think the data would
also show been a losing battle over the
course of the last 60 years in the
United States okay so now to close the
loop on the reason that I started this
by saying that I went to film school is
through that journey of realizing okay I
have to give up on adults but that the
family is the only punchline what I
realized was I can't control who your
family is I cannot control what ZIP code
you're born into I can't even control
who your friends are but through the
media I can control what your friends
think is cool and because I'm focused
personally on 11 to 15 year olds it's
known as the age of imprinting the
Japanese actually have a word for it
it's called shownin which translates as
the few years so it's the few years
years roughly 11 to 15 where kids push
away from their parents right they were
just mommy and daddy's little boy girl
until that point and now all the sudden
they become that sort of annoying
teenager yeah and that is just an arc in
human evolution that that just is kids
are going to do that now what they're
doing at that moment is drinking of
culture and culture is ultimately the
thing that makes humans humans we can
pass all this knowledge on so rapidly in
a way that Stacks all the generations
that came before us we don't have to
relearn everything and it rides in the
back of culture but if culture has a
something broken in it
Dei uh now you've got a problem and if
culture thinks things like meritocracy
working hard training yourself pushing
yourself getting better loving other
people seeing everyone as equal and all
of that is cool now all of a sudden you
have a high functioning society and so
the only way that with Tom Bilu skills I
know to make a meaningful contribution
to that and I said that I have a theory
on how to impact people at scale which
is why the show is named what it
is it's to tell stories at that age
group that will show characters
embodying an empowering mindset so that
kids just grow up thinking that's cool
huh now you just purchase BuzzFeed and I
have a
feeling it's a very similar strategy you
just haven't given up on adults how
close am I it's it's interesting you say
that because I uh I agree with you that
changing the country for the better if
it's going to be done in a decentralized
way which is how I think it has to be
done in the most important way is
through culture right is through giving
people an idea of what they can aspire
to and one of the things that you're
doing frankly better than I've done it
is I appeal to reason I appear to I
appeal to argument to logic but I think
you're going to actually touch a lot
more of the people especially in the
demographic you're targeting through the
power of narrative right because I think
there's something about us as human
beings that's wired for narrative right
wired for the Arc of a story and to be
moved to action by that rather than just
through argument and so I I agree with
you it's interesting you brought this
full circle to some of the activities
that I've pursued in the private sector
right my activists play with BuzzFeed
which is you know obviously media
company that I think has lost its way
but even a lot of what else I've done in
the private sector right I started a
company called drive to compete against
black rock and State Street and Vanguard
part of that was not giving up on adults
either it's not teenagers that are
allocating their their money into
ETFs but everyday citizens to say that
you are co-equal you deserve to know
where your own money is being allocated
and how it's being voted just as a side
detour here to give you maybe my
background and then I can answer your
question about how I'm using that going
forward I'm an entrepreneur like you
you know my parents came here with no
money 40 years ago I aspired to achieve
success of the kind that Jack Welch had
achieved he was the CEO of GE where my
dad worked he was you know 10 layers
down in the organizational chart and he
was facing layoffs while I was in Middle
School and that put our family in a I
would say we were never poor but in a
precarious and uncertain economic
position where he ended up going to
night school for years to be able to
have job security I would go with him to
Northern Kentucky law school driving
from Cincinnati Ohio on week nights
after he spent a full day at work
definitely had an impact on my own
upbringing and aspirations but you know
when I got out of college so I went to
Harvard for college studied biology I
got into the world of hedge funds and
said you know what I want to win through
the system of American capitalism that's
how I'm going to get ahead is is do it
the way that the people who had some
level of control over my family's life
direct or indirectly to say that you
know what maybe I can achieve a simp
ilar position of of autonomy myself and
so that's what led me on the journey
that I've been on I started a biotech
company that started from more my
expertise and that was Guided by a sense
of wanting to fix an industry that was
broken and I could tell you all about
that story roant was the company I
founded but the businesses I've started
subsequently royant was not directed at
changing societal culture it was
directed at solving a structural problem
in the pharmaceutical industry and
capturing in efficiency and making the
production of medicines more efficient
and bring down hopefully the cost of
drugs but that was that goal it wasn't a
cultural change in the country pretty
much everything I've done through the
private sector since then has been
directed at impact Theory as you put it
right is driving cultural change of a
kind that I don't think can actually be
done through the government so I stepped
down from my job at rent wrote a couple
of books nothing like writing that
really opens you up to discovering what
you're actually passionate about what
you actually believe if you can't write
it down you probably don't know what you
actually believe I had an English
teacher that taught me that in high
school and I think it's true and so I
wrote I've written three books I'm
working on my fourth now and what I
would tell you about my first book woke
Inc is that I agree with about 95% of
what's in there and that's okay I think
that's a that's a good thing is to say
that you know what the process of going
through not only writing these books but
exchanging ideas with others who have
challenged me on them have caused me to
either regain conviction of what's in
there or in certain cases to modify what
my actual beliefs were when I was
challenged about them when I got back to
how am I going to drive change or have
an impact my first impulse was to do it
through entrepreneurship so I started
this business strive that I was
referring to earlier saying that part of
where I think many people have their
sense of loss of empowerment or loss of
feeling like they can do something with
their own lives is where their own
assets are used in ways that run counter
to their own objectives so many people
may not know this but your own money is
invested probably in things like index
funds in your 401k account or your
investment account and it turns out as a
shareholder you do have agency and
companies you have the ability to vote
your shares to tell the management of
that company that's using your own money
how they're paid how you want them to
behave is it for the pursuit of
maximizing the value of the company or
is it to advance some other separate
agenda
but what most people don't know is that
that vote is cast by large financial
institutions like Black Rock and
Vanguard and State Street and Invesco
and others that for years have been
voting your own shares in favor of
ideological goals that many Americans
don't agree with but maybe even more
importantly do not have anything to do
with advancing your best financial
interests like voting for racial Equity
audits at Apple or emissions cap
programs at Chevron that have nothing to
do with their business interests but
they're using your money to advance
those values when you may not even agree
with those values so a strive a broker
that so strive is an alternative
financial institution an asset manager
that competes against black rock and
State Street and Vanguard and so you
guys what do a higher degree of
communication with the individual voters
so they can cast their own vote offers a
choice with to to the to the citizen to
say okay you have all the financial
institutions have gone in that direction
for for one reason and we can go into
that because Calpers and the California
Pension funds are forcing those
institutions to behave that way we'd say
we're not catering to large politic
sized financial institutions we're
catering to the everyday individual by
saying that this Index Fund or set of
index funds offers one goal what
maximizes your profit what actually
maximizes the performance of the company
that's the sole goal the goal is not to
solve climate change the goal is not to
solve racial inequality the goal is not
to advance any other social agenda if
you wish to do that do that with your
own dollars philanthropically but you're
not going to do or do it through black
rock or State Street you're not doing
that via strive and if that's your goal
strive isn't for you but for the
Americans who want exclusively to
maximize profit and to vote their shares
and to speak on behalf of their own
Financial Holdings accordingly this is
an option that didn't exist that does
exist today but you know I could go on
about strive for a while but that gives
you a sense of how do I want to drive
change that was not through the
government that was driving change
providing a sense of empowerment to the
everyday citizen through an economic
option in the market I love that and I'm
shocked at how few people know about the
way that this kind of thing works yeah
uh that's amazing the move though that I
think has really captured everybody's
imagination is Buzzfeed much more recent
for it's not just that it's recent it's
that so for any of us that have been
paying attention to what you've been
saying for a while now it's like hey I'm
going to do whatever I think has the
most impact on the country most positive
impact on the country uh cut to uh
announc that I'm out of the race oh PS
since January I've been buying up shares
in BuzzFeed y Media Company also again
putting it together with um one of the
things you've said is you really think
that the way the media frames uh the
issues is creating the divisiveness that
they then frame as being divisive and so
they've created this positive feedback
loop of talking about division which is
creating division which lets them talk
about division which creates more
Division and so to see you step into
that is certainly interesting so I would
now fully understanding what you're
doing with strive yep help me understand
what's the goal with BuzzFeed and and is
Buzzfeed in a way going to be like your
mini America where we come in with the
chainsaw we're trying to like you know
obliterate this down build it back up
with a zero budget mentality and can we
take away from what you're doing or
going to do with BuzzFeed how you would
run the country yeah so I think there
are a lot of principles are in common
with the vision that I have for
rebuilding a media institution that has
lost its way and the way you think about
rebuilding a country that has lost its
way you've got a managerial class right
the hired middle bureaucracy that has
betrayed what the original Mission of
this company was supposed to be and like
so many other media companies has really
lost its way by systematically lying to
its audiences I think it is put leftwing
versus right-wing politics to one side
BuzzFeed is a company that literally was
the first to publish the now discredited
steel dossier that divided this country
for years it was a company that told
falsehoods about the hunter Biden laptop
story that forget about even American
politics just think about culture a lot
of the falsehoods about I mean say what
you will about the man Kevin spacy was
acquitted on criminal charges that were
initially perpetrated by a takedown that
came from none other than BuzzFeed or a
company that has elevated Chu is you
know I would say disgusting ugly
practices and whitewashing that you
could go down the straight list of
journalistic failures across the board
and it came from an institution that on
one hand preaches diversity of thought
right they mandate diversity and
inclusion and belonging trainings in the
name of fostering diversity of thought
which I think is critical for a media
institution to actually care about
diversity of thought and competition in
the marketplace of ideas and yet one of
the piece of public data you can look at
as an investor is what percentage of
your employees political contributions
go in One Direction or another and it's
not 50/50 and I don't think you would
expect that for a media institution
based in New York but you look at the
political giving history of buzzfeed's
employee base you and I were talking
about this just you know off air before
the
show over
99% of buzzfeed's employee contributions
since 2010 have not been to Republicans
but have gone the other way and so that
I think is in some ways a mirage it's
it's a joke right so it's not an
accident that the same institution that
has repeatedly failed in journalistic
failures and that has lost the trust of
its own audience base and that has
failed as a business that's down
precipitously since it went public it's
not an accident that that's the same
business that totally lacked diversity
of thought in its ranks those two things
go together and a big part of the reason
why is you have this managerial class
that even for a business that's still
making money on its top line is losing
money on its bottom line that doesn't
have to be because of the bloat and the
sense of entitlement and the sense of
loss of touch with its own purpose and
Mission has caused it to lose its way as
a business in the same way that it's
lost its way as an institution that
stands for its own values of diversity
of thought so sometimes it takes
somebody coming in from the outside to
do things differently right this is a
company that was founded nearly 20 years
ago and it's went public for1 half
billion dollars at the time I started
first buying shares had AET market cap
of less than $50 million it is it has
really lost its way evidenced and you
want to look at kpis you can take a lot
of the soft factors that I'm offering
but the public markets ultimately
delivered the verdict and so one of the
things I'm looking at is how do I drive
change through the private sector the
media is one of the institutions that
the government is not going to be the
one to change and should not be the one
to change but is going to come through
private Market change itself and so yes
I believe that even taking some of my
experiences from strive using the voice
of Sher holders now doing it in my
capacity as an individual to change this
company bottom up that's something that
I decided was worthwhile I had the
financial means to do it I have a Clear
Vision for where the company needs to go
which is number one admit your prior
mistakes number two clean house a lot of
that excess spend as a financial matter
if you if you gut that just like I would
do in the administrative State and the
federal government it leaves more money
for your actual stakeholders in the case
of a company that's your shareholders in
the case of a country that's citizens
but it also gets a lot of that
historical aifi biased way of thinking
out of the system and allows this
company to think like what it is which
is admit you're a startup Embrace that
again start with the blank slate and say
what's a business model that better
Fosters that vision of pursuing truth
and one of the business strategy shifts
that I believe the company needs to take
and if I have influence on it I'll be
directing exactly to do this is more
decentralized audiovisual content
creation I mean the trust right now of
consumers isn't with a centralized
corporate brand it's with individual
content creators Embrace some of those
same principles of individual capitalism
and individualism to say that you know
what operate like what in the financial
world you call a multi-manager platform
hedge funds like Millennium have
operated this way where you give like to
a portfolio manager you get a percentage
of what you make do that for all your
content creators don't just pay them as
Hired Hands give them upside in what
they generate and a company like
BuzzFeed isn't starting from scratch
it's got hundreds of millions of social
media followers 90 or 70 plus Mill
whatever the number is 60 to 70 million
YouTube subscribers but hundreds of
millions across social media channels
it's got the pipes they're failing to
produce the fluid but part of the reason
why is they've got this managerial class
at the company that has sucked the
lifeblood out of its profitability but
have also sucked the lifeblood out of
its way of thinking independently as an
organization I say gut that decentralize
it give people skin in the game and what
they generate and then build what a
company like that lacks today which is a
brand and I think that brand can be in
Pursuit Of Truth No More Lies we're done
with it and do something that no major
media institution and by the way I would
say the same could apply to a government
but I'm talking about the media right
now look its own audience in the eye and
say we lied to you we're sorry we cannot
excuse the mistakes we made in the past
but unlike every other media institution
that's unwilling to do it we're going to
admit it
we're going to lay out here's how we're
going to make sure that never happens
again don't trust us trust our talents
don't trust any one of them we're going
to have platform voices who are diverse
across the ideological and cultural
Spectrum but that we believe that we get
to truth through o the open exchange of
ideas through open dialogue that's what
we're actually going to Foster at a high
degree of quality not just like a social
media platform where it's a free-for-all
and that should exist that's different
but as a publisher where you say that
you know what we're going to filter for
Quality that's part of our job to
deliver you as high quality
but it's not our J to ideologically tell
you how to think rather you get to
actually come to a place where you hear
diverse voices across the ideological
and cultural Spectrum on matters
relating to politics to culture to
finance to Lifestyle to sports and I
think that's a an inspiring vision that
doesn't exist in the media landscape
today that customers are hungering for
but also has an effect of restoring that
sense of Civic equality to say that you
know what just because my views are
different than yours that doesn't mean
that I am lesser than you that you know
what I'm going to worry less about how
my leadership looks whether they look
like the rest of America which is what
they like most corporate boards are
worried about and worried more about
whether they think like the rest of
America the full distribution of how
people think in America and I think that
could be the backbone of building a
great media institution a great media
company in the Next Generation they're
not doing it and you have an ability to
save something and by the way that
particular company right now they don't
have a lot of choice the matter right so
I I took a stake in I've taken a stake
in the company as I said I continued
accumulate in that
stake now they have this founder who
founded the company as a CEO who
supposedly has super majority voting
rights and people say oh how are you
going to drive change the company has a
a clock that's ticking they have debt
that comes due this December so you know
who really holds the rights over the
company is the people who are going to
be able to call that debt in December of
this year which actually think creates
an interesting Dynamic where in a
situation like this for for years you've
had no discipline brought to the
managerial class or the management of
that company in the year 2024 there
going to have to be some hard decisions
that are made and yes now I'm one of the
parties at the table that is going to
I'm the second largest Class A
shareholder of the company I did it not
with a passive intention but with an
activist intention to try to put my
money where my mouth is and actually
drive change through culture especially
with actually even a younger audience in
demographic that is hungry for a
different vision of what a media company
can be a different vision of what
leadership and cultural leadership looks
like to them and so you know I do hope
to succeed in being able to deliver that
and make this an incredibly successful
company in the process but that is
contingent on my on my actually gaining
control speaking of gaining control so
um having watched Elon Musk do something
very similar with Twitter now X yeah um
one of the big confrontations was with
um Agarwal I forget his first name but
pag AAL yep perog
they they I think knew given the
contentious way that that they bumped
him out of the company they were not
going to make progress if that
leadership was still in place now given
the responses that the CEO has given to
some of to to the letter that you wrote
to shareholders very
specifically uh you saying hey the first
people that go out and apologize for
misleading misrepresenting lying to the
public they're going to have a real shot
and there seems to be a sense in cult
culture that you're very right about
that and that we're all hunging for
somebody who's going to plant a flag and
say this is the brand like we're in
pursuit of truth but he said uh and I'm
pretty sure this is very close to a
quote um we will not be apologizing for
our pits or prizewinning journalism yeah
so how do you reconcile that are you
just going to make moves to get them out
like do you really think you can have a
philosophical conversion that seems I
don't think at the CEO level we would be
possible to have a philosophical
conversion if this was any other
business that wasn't a media company
operating in its own Echo chamber and
set up the way that this was with the
voting rights for this founder this guy
would be out long ago and and the level
of you know I think that it's
interesting you have sometimes you have
people who are incredibly successful in
the outcomes they've delivered said
they're going to do something go out and
achieve it create something of value yet
they still are really humble I would
characterize what I see from this CEO as
the ex inverse of that a guy who sold
the dream went public for1 half billion
dollar tanked in the toilet as I said it
was it was less than a $50 million
market cap or so when I was when I was
started to become an owner it's still
about barely over $100 million do market
cap company now as we're as of us having
this conversation right
now and yet this is a guy who has the
hubris of somehow believing that he was
a success so much so that he actually
can't contend with the admission of
prior failure and so you know when you
become part of that managerial class
whether it's in the bureaucracy in the
federal government or the equivalent of
what I call Deep corporate which exists
in the private sector and people talk
about the Deep State well deep corporate
is an outgrowth of that
too you go beyond the point of
individual repair so I haven't met with
him yet as of at least our having this
conversation I'm sure in in short order
I will but based on what I see I think
that what I will say is that if this any
other company there's no way this guy
would be the CEO or given the keys to
come anywhere near spitting distance of
where decisions are actually made and
yet there hasn't been an iota of
accountability or an iota of
self-reflection to look their own
audiences or their own shareholders for
that matter in the eye when the results
on both counts speak for themselves some
of the greatest lies that have been
debunked coming out of that organization
uh stock price that has been in the
toilet relative to what his own
shareholder base bet on at the time that
they went public I think both deserve
accountability and I think that it's
going to take people who are willing to
put their money where their mouth is to
deliver that and I think that now was a
pretty interesting moment for me to get
involved I think that BuzzFeed still
could become a company more valuable
than at the time of its initial listing
I believe that but that's going to
require a massive change in strategy to
pull off and what I laid out in my
shareholder letter i stand by it to the
fullest is that with a true hardcore
Financial cleanup of the house not
catching the falling knife makeover type
stuff but really gutting much of that
cost base and not just the cost base but
the bureaucratic mindset that
infiltrates that cost base gut that get
rid of it start with an actual
whiteboard as a startup a lean mean
startup Embrace actual decentralized
content Creation in a business model
that is lower capital expenditure
intensive but is also more creative and
allowing content creators to share in
the upside do it across the political
and cultural Spectrum to embrace actual
diversity of thought and then make that
your brand say we Embrace diversity of
thought and we stand for No More Lies We
Stand For The Pursuit Of Truth and we do
that through the exchange of ideas
that's powerful stuff that's the stuff
our country was founded on it's the
stuff that a great Media Company can be
built on the back of those bones no
other media compan is doing it today and
the fact they're starting at such a low
base even as of when we're having this
conversation you
know relatively still a small cap
company a little over $100 million doll
in Market cap that's an opportunity to
really demonstrate a turnaround story
for the ages that is possible but I
think if you have a guy at the top who
has no interest in either fulfilling his
obligation to his shareholders or to his
audiences is change going to be required
for that managerial class to pull this
off probably and then you get into
tactics right which is well if the
founder has super voting control of the
shares How could an outside shareholder
with class A shares do it well For
Better or Worse the company has a big
financial problem right now cuz it's
alternative right now is there's also a
real risk of bankruptcy there's a real
risk of bankruptcy this year in December
when they have their debt that comes due
it's a company that has more debt than
cash on its balance sheet now that's a
risk factor there's a risk factor at
every investment that's a big risk
factor for me in this investment but I
also think that could be the Catalyst to
drive the kind of change that otherwise
wouldn't have happened in somebody who's
living in their own insular vision of
the world world the old story of the
frog in the well that doesn't know isn't
able to see outside the well because the
Frog lives inside the well that's
effectively what I see with the
management of BuzzFeed
today okay so what do you say to
somebody who hears the story of a guy
that his own dad was at risk of getting
laid off at GE Y and now is coming in
and uses words like I'm going to gut the
place uh those are real people that are
really going to lose jobs they have
families um what's your response to
people who just think think that's icky
and they they don't like anything about
it well first of all like I think that
let's just talk about that Spectrum
earlier where you talk about the
cultural Elite in this country or the
people who have been at the top of a
self-proclaimed top of a cultural totem
pole a lot of these employees at
BuzzFeed fit the exact description of
what we were talking about earlier class
does not necessarily track wealth so
we're not talking about here going after
people who haven't been propped up in
the cultural hierarchy of the United
States a reverse vision of actual
intersectionality it's kind of an
interesting Dynamic here now a lot of
those going to be good people absolutely
many of them many former employees I've
been struck by this since the time that
my stake in BuzzFeed was disclosed have
reached out to me many people who I
presume at least based on what they said
probably have different political views
than I do but who are deeply frustrated
with an institution that's lost its way
and just as I don't think it's the job
of the federal government to provide
employment opportunity to bureaucrats I
don't I think the job of the federal
government is to serve citizens the job
of a media company is to serve its
audiences and to create value in the
process and so should we have a society
in which we're able to give each of
those persons as Citizens the
opportunity to flourish in that country
yes we should but if somebody was hired
in the backdrop of saying that you know
what I get to work here and in the name
of preaching diversity I'm going to
actually create a culture of exclusion
where anybody who has a different point
of view than mine isn't welcome that my
company's gone down the toilet as a
result shareholders have lost hundreds
of millions of dollars as a result and
that I somehow just get to continue
collecting a paycheck from the debt
holders who were subsidizing me for the
next 12 months no I don't think that
that's the right answer to that question
and by the way in this particular case
that's where this is heading anyway if
the company goes bankrupt right if
company has more debt than cash and it
is losing money on a shrinking Revenue
base that's where this story ends anyway
versus proactively with an actual vision
and a strategy you're able to revitalize
that institution which is the better of
those two choices I think the answer is
clear all right you've been through a
political ringer that I can't imagine
nor do I ever want to have anything to
do with um but I'm very curious so
there's a reason because I can't imagine
that you don't see what I'm about to say
okay but there's maybe a very good
reason that you never say it so I'm
gonna say it and then tell me if I'm out
of my mind and I'm really just blind to
a reality that I need to wake up to uh I
look at a company and I say okay I take
very seriously the fact that if I make
poor decisions the people that are
helping me build this company um they're
going to have to find an alternative way
to feed their family and that will be a
very disruptive moment for them so I
think tremendously about I have an
obligation to the people that work in my
company however as I tell them this is
not a family we are a team and our job
is to win a championship and just like
on a championship sports team if I have
somebody that's underperforming at their
role I am going to find somebody that
can perform in that role to the level of
Excellence that we need to win a
championship and that doesn't mean I
don't love and care about you and it
certainly doesn't mean that you're not
morally equal to me and anybody else I
wish you the best but the reality is
that my obligation is to building an
organism that's going to win a
championship and the great irony as I am
a huge individualist the great irony is
I think the individual is important for
the safety of the whole out in real life
just like man on the street as well as
in a company and so the reason that I
really want people to be strong
individually is the way that we win as
an organism is by being just Ultra good
at what we do quote unquote now so far
at the human level that's been taming
the planet we've done a phenomenal job
of making this a safe place to be
elongating lifespan all of that but at
the company level 100% with with No
Malice nor remorse I'm going to say
you're underperforming I'm going to tell
you what good performance looks like if
you don't meet good performance and we
try to help you and you still can't do
it we are going to cut you
and for the health of the organis for
the health of the organism sometimes you
have to cut off an underperforming
individual and I think people just
they're not willing to face that
truth and because they're not willing to
face that truth we get into this
derangement where somebody gives the
bumper sticker of nobody should be left
behind and because my bumper sticker is
underperformers are going to be set free
to find a better performance which is
the right way to think about it uh but
that bumper sticker people don't like
that well I don't know that people don't
like that I want to give you a lot of
credit for the way you framed that
because I think that it was honest I
find it inspiring right as if I was
working at your company I think that's a
great message is that you as a leader
hold yourself accountable to the people
who have taken the risk of following you
and their families along with them but
that your obligation to them and to that
entire team is to deliver a championship
Victory and just because somebody isn't
in the right place if they're not
contributing to that Championship
Victory here they could be contributing
to a championship Victory somewhere else
and so I think it's part of the Dignity
of each person you're not doing them a
service if they're not set up to succeed
in the role where you've put them that's
your failure or my failure as a leader
if we actually do that
so do people disagree with that I don't
know I mean of course some people will
disagree with that but it doesn't really
make sense and just because someone
disagrees with something doesn't mean
they're right they have the right to
hold their own opinion but they don't
have the right to continue occupying uh
seat on a team where they're pulling
down the other people on that team no no
one left behind well you know entire
team gets left behind as a consequence
and so I agree with that principle that
we don't want no American left behind I
can get behind that that's that's an
America First principle right there but
no American Left Behind doesn't mean
that you put them in a position where
they are failing both for themselves and
for the broader organism I think that we
have to have a system in which they have
the ability to find where they're able
to maximize their own innate god-given
talents and I think that that's part of
what our country demands
require we're not doing that today both
because of government action and also
because of leaders of companies you know
not like yours but maybe companies like
BuzzFeed that are doing a horrific job
of actually putting the best person on
the job maybe even in that case starting
at the very top I think that we need
institutions that revive Merit again in
this country that if you're the best
person for the job you get it period And
if not we respect you and we're going to
set you free to be able to find what
that best job is even if it's not at
this particular company or this
particular organization that's
fundamentally American to me and I think
it actually revives the sense of respect
that we're missing as opposed to quietly
keeping somebody who's an underperformer
in that job what you actually Foster is
a greater sense of hostility suppressed
hostility a greater sense of
condescension other members of that team
who aren't able to actually do what they
do need to do for their families because
somebody else is holding back the team
that's no longer winning that
Championship as a result so my only
feedback to you is
I love the way you laid that out don't
hedge don't apologize for it and I think
that you're going to find a lot more
people who are inspired by that than
people who aren't and for the few who
aren't I do think that they still will
be in a better position to do what's
best for them as a result of you giving
them the ability to do that much to my
dismay or much to my team's dismay I
should say I don't hedge at all uh I
wrote a document our culture document
that everybody has to read before they
can even interview at the company which
outlines in far more aggressive language
than I just laid it out there what we're
looking for that we're here to win a
championship and that I'm only
interested in people that want that uh
and I've been asked repeatedly by our HR
team to uh stop making people read that
so early in the thing oh I agree trust
me on this I'm I I am unfazed and I am
unfazed because I believe in kpis and so
I totally understand that people want to
hear language about you're going to be
protected don't worry you can never lose
your job but as an incentive structure
that does not incentivize people to do
their best like they need to understand
hey you're here to serve the organism we
have an honorable goal so you can be
excited about that we have an honorable
goal we are here to uplift people's
lives and to make their lives better uh
however I'm expecting the hardest core
[ __ ] on planet Earth I like if
you ask in the interview process about
work life balance I'm not even saying
that that's a bad thing I'm just saying
that's not the right thing here it's not
the right fit yeah exactly you are not
going to like working at impact Theory
that's just true now if I didn't feel
like 80% of people opt out just reading
that document then I'd be like yeah
we're not in a weird place yeah but my
whole totally anecdotal but my whole
thing is when I look out at the world
and I see the advice I'll give to people
on social media and the things people
respond extremely negatively to when I
see the number of people that respond
negative L to that culture document it
does start to feel like right now the
ideas that people have adopted from a
value system perspective are out of
alignment with what it takes to win a
championship and so when I think about
even what you're doing at BuzzFeed or
certainly man if you get into the White
House it's like how do we begin
to get people excited about the Bryant
of the world who
worked themselves to a level of success
that now is like it's a little bit
frowned upon from hustle culture and
that kind of thing so I I want to say a
side point about the NBA point because
you brought this up twice a lot of
people don't know this and I just
thought it be an interesting fact to
share brought up Kobe Bryant who I love
and respected and admired as
well it surprised a lot of people to
know about NBA players most of them
actually came from stable two parent
households and middle- class backgrounds
it's actually really interesting I'm
writing a book right now called truths
one of the chapters is about the nuclear
family and in my research on that turns
out that even surprises people where you
kind of have this mental model it's
actually a wrong mental model it's a
wrong preconceived notion just smoke out
part of the reason why most I think most
NBA players today still are black
there's a
historical association with black family
formation being worse than other races
which is true about 40% of black kids
plus 40 plus percent of black kids today
are still born into single parent
households but if you take a look at
people who are succeeding at the highest
level that many kids aspire to when
they're young and has great cultural
respect as well as Financial Financial
respect in our country which is becoming
a professional NBA
player including the likes of Kobe
Bryant they came from actually very
solid family backgrounds that predicted
for their own success so that's an
interesting little story of how we get
back there I think a lot of the answers
Still Point back to both family
formation as well as how we in the way
that you're doing an impact Theory a
cultur rate people beginning at even a
really young age now some of this I
think can also come from the cultural
tone that you said as a US president or
from the top as well it's part of what
drew me to be president is half the job
I think is policy for sure and we spend
a lot of time we spend like 90% of the
time running for president talking about
policy but half job has nothing to do
with policy and the tone you set for our
national character of who we actually
are and part of what we're missing in
the country today is people have lost
their sense of pride in being an
American people have lost their sense of
even knowing what it means to be an
American and so I think if we brought
that culture back having somebody in the
same way that you as a CEO set the tone
for your culture document at your
company and I'm big on believeing these
things my first company Roy vent we
actually had a thing where you could opt
out after two months on the job and get
a really nice exit package and you
either say I'm I'm opting out or at
month two you have to sign officially
that I am opting in that having seen
what I see which is a definitely hard
charging run through walls culture
certainly in the early days of the
company that's what you're actually
opting into and giving up a financial
benefit that would be a great exit
package to do it so for the level of
companies I believe that but imagine if
we adopted a similar
Vision at the level of our nation to say
that you know this is a national leader
who repeatedly reminds us who we
actually are As Americans that's what
George Washington did that was the most
important thing he did as the first
president it wasn't any policy adopted
but his statement of vision of who we
actually are as a nation what are the
National values that we Embrace who are
we we are exceptional we are the people
who actually are the winners both on a
global stage and at the level of an
individual we don't make you apologize
for Success We Believe to borrow Martin
Luther King's words that you get ahead
not on the color of your skin but on the
content of your character and that
you're free to speak your mind even if I
disagree with you I will fight to the
death for your right to say it and we
will excel both as individuals and as a
nation as a whole and be proud of it
rather than hiding success I think that
that has a trickle down effect for our
culture too so the short answer to your
question is I don't think it's going to
be some silver bullet Panacea I think
it's going to be all of the above people
people like you stepping up driving
change through our culture through the
power of narratives showing young people
what's possible giving them an
alternative vision and an alternative
mental model not just doing what many
commentators do is criticize that
culture but offer an affirmative
alternative vision of what that culture
can be parents who step up to the plate
and say you know what I am going to
acknowledge that the most important job
that I may ever have is actually raising
and inculcating my children with the
right vision of who they can become a
president who says my job isn't just to
enact policies but my job to stand for
the national values of who we are and
recognize that through my every action
I'm an emblem of our culture As
Americans something that we lack with
the guy who's sitting in the white house
today in my opinion but regardless I
think that that's something that aspires
to what George Washington gave us in in
his first term as first US president so
I think it's going to be all of the
above that brings that back and some of
it's going to happen naturally
too it's not going to happen
automatically but I think some of it
will actually the Tailwinds will work in
our favor where
where just like for a company I think
you have this I think you have this for
a country too or even an IND individual
you go through these Cycles
where success breeds entitlement
entitlement breeds laziness laziness
breeds
victimhood and I think that that's where
we are right now but then the victimhood
gives you hard consequences that give
you hardship that require you to become
Scrappy again to be able to overcome
that hardship right was the way the old
saying go I'll probably probably botch
it right now but you know Hard Times
create strong men strong men create easy
times easy times create weak men and
weak men create hard times right that's
that's there's a certain cycle of
History he was a quote that's often
wrongly attributed to the founder of of
Dubai I think it's actually I think it
was an American who ended up write
American novelist who ended up writing
it but uh it's the story of as though it
was attributed to the founder of Dubai
my grandfather wrote a camel my father
rode a camel I ride a Land Rover my son
rides a Mercedes my grandson will ride a
Mercedes but my great-grandson will ride
a camel again and so in a certain sense
even if you study the Roman Empire there
wasn't one rise and one Fall of Ancient
Rome there were many Rises and there
were many Falls and I think so it will
be it so it has been and so it will be
with our American culture as well I
don't think this has to be the final
fall now if you never get that cycle of
recovery there is one time where it is
the final fall I don't think this has to
be the one but some of this is just the
natural course of history of success the
success breeding entitlement entitlement
breeding laziness laziness breeding
victimhood
cycle but we're only going to get out of
that cycle if leaders in different
spheres of our culture step up from
entrepreneurs to parents to
presidents and I think that we're in a
moment where we could use people in each
of those roles stepping up to fill that
vacuum I tried to do it as the president
and most people didn't know who I was a
year ago and so that made that Journey
get about as far as it did last time
around but now I'm trying to do it as an
entrepreneur and you know people ask me
what are your plans for the future
forget about the distant future figure
out what you're going to do right now
after I left the race I started
acquiring shares in BuzzFeed and that's
not the only thing I'm doing by the way
there's going to be some other things
that uh that you know I hope to do that
are substantial in driving change
through the private sector too that may
reveal themselves later this year I'm
going to continue through hopefully
cultivating strive and the management
team I've built there to drive change
through the financial markets and
empowering Americans who have a greater
sense of Revival and purpose and
empowerment because their money isn't
being exploited back against them
through an expansion of strive that
hopefully we Implement later this year
you've also been helping Trump get
elected why is he the right president at
this tumultuous moment why him well look
I endorsed him wholeheartedly after I
left the race I ran for president
against him right for the entirety of
last year but having been clear at the
end of the Iowa caucus I got about 8% of
the vote I was going to get about 8% in
New Hampshire it was critical in my view
that we had a decisive outcome coming
out of New Hampshire where that primary
didn't get prolonged longer than it
needed to be so I wanted to throw my 8%
small though that was in absolute
numbers in Trump's direction to be able
to really deliver a decisive end and you
know I'm grateful learned a million
things through the process I can tell
you about my own journey of running for
president but the reason I endorse Trump
is is a really clear reason is you have
a rare opportunity in American history
to put someone back in the job who
delivered results in the time that he
was there you don't have to make this
philosophical you could say you got four
years of trump you got four years of
Biden here you have a guy who forget all
the talk that a presidential candidate
might offer of what they're going to do
he kept us out of War he grew the
economy and I think he did start to
rebuild that sense of American Pride
that we now lacking and have gone back
to lacking in this country so yes do I
want to stay out of Wars do I want to
grow this economy do I want to fix the
immigration problem in this country
which is something that I'm particularly
passionate about and Revive Our sense of
identity and pride I do think that he's
going to be the best person to deliver
that and my job as a not only former
presidential candidate now but as a
citizen is to do everything I can to
make a sacrifice needed to put the best
person I possibly can in that job and to
do my part to do it so that's why I've
been also spending a lot of my time
doing what we can to make sure that not
only is Donald Trump elected but the
people who are going to be able to
implement that Vision into reality
through Congressional races in the
Senate even at the state level if this
is done right A lot of these policies
shouldn't be driven by the federal
government but should be driven by state
and local governments which is why I'm
endorsing state and local candidates
across this country as well to drive
that change that's part of me doing what
I would ask everybody else to do which
is look yourself in the mirror ask
yourself how you're going to use your
own skill set and your own capabilities
and what this country's given you to
save this country and for me some of
that's going to come through the private
sector and some of that is going to come
through politics and for the rest of
this year I'm pedal to the medal on
both there's one thing with the Trump
candidacy even if people are able to all
universally they won't of course but
even if they I'll universally step back
and say I was better under Trump than I
am under Biden there there is a there's
something about the way people respond
to him that creates this hyper division
to a point where the division itself
becomes worthy of um trepidation and so
while I get it he's his own man and he's
not necessarily going to listen to you
but if he were like how would you help
him
metabolize the need to reach people that
right now legitimately believe hey you
are a threat to democracy you just
absolutely cannot be brought into this
tent like how do
we how do we find a way to lower his
divisiveness so here's how I look at it
national Unity is a worthy goal to say
the
least and I I've gotten to know Donald
Trump both over the last several years
but particularly over the last four to
five
months I know that he cares deeply about
National unity and so my advice to him
would be just to tell people that I know
you care about uniting this country say
so let people know what's actually in
your heart he wants America First is a
vision that actually goes beyond
traditional Republican versus Democrat
boundaries I mean Donald Trump was a guy
who actually back in 2016 changed even
the Republicans party's posture towards
our war in Iraq and how we remember it
that it was a mistake and that's a view
I happen to share so he's a guy who has
already put pressure those traditional
partisan boundaries he cares about
National
Unity tell the people how much you do
care about it and that alone I think
will have a hugely positive impact in
reuniting this country and if you listen
to the messaging in recent months I
think he's done a great job of going in
that direction success will be our
Vengeance we're going to have our
Vengeance he said this in recent months
multiple times and and you know I'm
grateful for the ability to spend more
time with President Trump after I
dropped out of the race in January but
listen to a lot of his lot lot of his
messages in recent months I think it's
an inspiring message you know what's
going to be our Vengeance success will
be our Vengeance he didn't say that in
2016 he's saying that today yes he
didn't say that during his presidency
he's saying that today you that one's
going to be easy to misread though and
so my thing is so but even if I give you
a couple other examples even in recent
weeks of showing up in the Bronx right
that's not a place where traditional
Republican presidential candidates go I
went to the south side of Chicago and
Kensington during my presidential
campaign I called in the entire other
Republican party and the Republican
field on the debate stage to do the same
thing none of them did none of them
talked to oppositional media none of
them talked to actual communities that
would disagree with them there were
people in the south side of Chicago
somebody asked me a question she
disagreed with me about racial
reparations she turned around walked
straight out people were booing me in my
face until we got to Common Ground
issues like sealing the Border
protecting people in that Community not
forking over more money to Ukraine and
other Foreign Wars that could be better
utilized in the United States and we
actually found Common Ground the only
Republican who actually stepped up now
and has done that at an even larger
scale is Donald Trump going to the South
Bronx he and I were the only Republican
candidates who just spoke at the
libertarian convention think about that
President Biden was invited he didn't
show up but these are people who are a
separate third party it's on the ballot
in every state there's Libertarians
across this country some lean left or
right on conventional terms but it's a
different party to show up at the
convention of a different political
party and to deliver a speech so I think
many Republicans failed this test
abysmally Donald Trump in 2016 did it
and I think it's a great strategy I
tried to do it in my campaign as well
show up on the other side's Turf go to
left-wing media you may not agree with
them but demonstrate that you care about
open dialogue by practicing what you
preach and so I think he has actually
gone in that direction admirably and I
do think that Joe Biden he ran on the
promise of uniting the
country if he had kept that promise we
wouldn't be where we are so I care
deeply about National Unity yeah I mean
look you've got got other issues I think
with Joe Biden in terms of just
cognitive decline that that one is scary
are they going to swap him out at the
last minute I kind of hope so because
anyway I think I think it's likely just
to stay on Trump for a second so uh I
love that he's going into the Bronx
that's amazing though I think he knows
he's indexing well there um I think it's
amazing that he's going to Libertarians
but there's also if Libertarians are
going to break my guess is that they
would break right so again just take a
look at do you watch the video footage
there I haven't let's assume that it's
amazing was hostile I mean I'm saying
I'm saying you you got a president of
the United States where people are
actively jeering and booing and he's
still there talking to them and gives
another 20- minute speech while Biden
was invited to the same place and showed
up I went there too and an audience was
invited and didn't show upid was invited
and didn't show up in his City it's in
Washington DC less than a mile from
where Biden sits president Trump and I
each flew in and gave speeches to an
audience that did not agree with 100% of
what we said yep I did a I did actually
a debate with their vice presidential
Nomine moderated by not a neutral party
but by a Libertarian party figure or
libertarian party I the guy who is
idolized by that party Dave Smith
moderated it and he's a great guy but
even most people agree with the
moderator and the guy debating me on
some of the issues more than they do
with me but that's part of what
leadership is about is if you're running
to lead a nation show up and Lead that
whole nation I love all of that so the
it's important agreed the thing I'm
getting to though is the there to your
ear earlier point that these lines are
breaking actually in a unique way in
terms of it isn't just class yeah so the
the group of people that I think are
just disproportionately influential that
Trump has got to find a way to unite
otherwise this just ends up being a a
blood B oh God I can't believe I even
said that smart that smart oh Jesus not
what I meant at all for the love of God
but what I'm saying is there's there's
going to be this Collision of
the elites especially in media just
going on about um that he he represents
a an existential threat to democracy
itself and and those Elites and media
are so disconnected with where most
Americans regardless of demic yeah but
he but I think that's going to be an
impossible task I agree but imposs of
his personality think it's impossible
because of the rot of those institutions
I mean this has to do with me take doing
I'm doing it BuzzFeed doing it looking
at actually broken media institutions
the people who run those institutions
have a vested interest in National
division that you use the word bloodbath
I mean just take it actually what Trump
referred to was a bloodbath in the Auto
industry and yet they extrapolated that
line to try to convince Americans every
mainstream publication from The New York
Times on down trying to convince
Americans that he was talking about a
physical bloodbath of Americans here it
was just an I mean from juy smette to co
origin to the Gretchen Whitner
kidnapping plot to you could go straight
down the list the Nashville transgender
shooter Manifesto the hunter Biden
laptop story The Covington Catholic kids
you go straight down the list these
media failures have intentionally tried
to lie and divide the American people
and so are we going to cater to the very
people who have perpetrated that
Division and have benefited from it are
you ever going to win them over I think
that's an impossibility but should we
win over the actual American people
directly who they've been lying to
absolutely Ely regardless of whether
they are democrat or republican one of
the things that I think we in the
Republican Party need to do a better job
of saying and I'll state it I'll say it
right now and I'll say continue to say
to any audience who will listen I don't
care if you're a Democrat or a far-left
progressive it doesn't matter you can
disagree with me on what I have to say
but I will fight to the death for your
right to say it because that's who we
are as Americans that's part of what
unites us I don't hear that from the
other side and that's fine because I'm
not asking for reciprocity I'm ask I'm
I'm demanding of us leadership of where
we're actually going that's what's going
to be required to save the country and
so are you going to win over would it be
a lot easier if the corporate media
didn't behave the way that it did of
course that's why I hold them
responsible and think we need to change
it while you were campaigning you did
something very smart which is I want the
hard question I want the point of
collision and you would take that head
on and so I want to take some of your
behavior and say this is I think what
has to be done uh for Trump if he wants
to actually unite the country and that
would be you gave a guy a microphone
said I'm going to let you talk for 60
second he came there to jeer and try to
shut down your event I'm going to give
you the microphone say what you want to
say for 60 seconds I'm going to be
respectful to you you be respectful back
to me and that's one way to do it uh
you've talked about how Okay the whole
setup of all this brought out the
fighter and me and in the second debate
all people saw was a fighter and if I
had to do it over again I would very
much show a more well-rounded side of me
what I think people see with Trump and
rightfully so is that you have a guy who
either relishes the fight and just isn't
bothered and so he leans into it and
that is sort of in and of itself
divisive and like saying that um the our
our revenge is going to be success I I
actually really get the phrase however
it's still leveraging this idea of
Revenge so when he says success are we
talking about and now we're going to go
political lawfare them to death like now
I'm going to sue all of them and haaha
like I think I think we mean joint
success and prosperity as a nation and
putting the politic
RB through thece system to theast where
it bels now him saying something like
that would be unbelievable and then the
the cigra the one that matters more than
anything is what's going to be his
rhetoric around the election and if I
lose did I lose fair and square and this
is one and people are going to light me
up for this but if actually trying to
unify the country was my shtick I would
be like I here here the the seven things
whatever the 42 things I don't know but
here are all the things that I think
lead to
Shenanigans around using your word
around elections that that really must
be cleaned up otherwise it we just
democracy's on Shaky Ground however no
matter what I'm going to abide by
however this plays out and I just want
everybody to know upfront that's how
this is going to
be that I I don't think constitutionally
he's capable of it but that kind of
thing like now man you you want to talk
about laying down the what is it that
the dove brings you the Olive Branch the
Olive Branch uh that just feels like a
needed thing so here's what I will tell
you there's couple things they say in
response one is let just address the
election point I think one way to unite
the country on this issue is to demand
something of everybody across the board
which is Puerto Rico which is a US
Territory and actually participates in
the primary process they have people in
Congress who don't have a vote on the
floor but do have a vote in committee so
it's part of the process integrated in
the United States the way they run their
elections is single day voting on
Election Day they make it a actual
holiday a workday holiday so everybody
can participate if you you have paper
ballots if you have not voted one year
then you have to re-register to get on
so that way you don't have other people
on the voter role that shouldn't be they
even have you stick your finger in a die
invisible die like you do at in
amusement park such that they don't have
people shown up at multiple polling
locations to vote if Puerto Rico can do
that and they have high confidence in
their election results as a result if
Puerto Rico can do that we can do that
across this country and by the way by
let's talk about National Unity we don't
take any minutes of a day let alone a
full day anymore to just pause and think
about here's what it means to be
American now Memorial Day is one of
those days we just passed the Memorial
Day holiday one of the most meaningful
things I did was we joined a community
here in Ohio for about an hour and a
half from where I live for doing the
full murf honoring a great patriot who
sacrificed his life for this country but
by doing a workout that brought us
together in common purpose in pursuit of
excellence in pursuit of feeling good
not only about ourselves but about our
country that's a small example imagine
if we turned election day into that
every year to say that this is the day
where we celebrate that you get to
express your yourself at The Ballot Box
where every Citizen's voice and vote
counts equally and you take a day off
work to commemorate that act and it's
not just taking a day off and asking you
to reflect on it you have a civic duty
that you're actually expressing that by
the end of that night or the next
morning you will know who you elected
because you participated in it that's a
beautiful thing that brings the country
together too so here would be my
commitment I think it's a great
commitment for Republicans to embrace
here's the deal we're doing to move the
country forward on this issue let's do
it the way Puerto Rico does in the rest
of the United states by the way I think
our friends in Puerto Rico would
appreciate saying it this way single day
voting on Election Day as a national
holiday with paper ballots government
issued ID to match the voter file and I
would go so far as to say English is the
sole language that appears on a ballot
but even if you take that last one off
do the other five things if we get to
that place as a country then
we and hopefully all parties but the
Republican Party included are done fully
done compl complaining about election
security or contested election results
we're done we're moving forward as a
country that's a commitment we're all
making to each other is it controversial
to have single day voting on Election
Day as a national holiday with paper
ballots and government issued ID I don't
think it should be controversial I think
most people on the left if you ask them
on a given day is that a reasonable way
to conduct elections they'd say yes for
the same reason Puerto Rico actually
does it that way today as part of the US
system I think that's the stuff of
uniting a country which is on one hand
delivering substance that everybody on
first principles should agree with yet
on the back of that making a commitment
to say that I don't care what the other
side is going to do my side isn't going
to complain about those results going
forward I think it's a great way to go
now we have a chicken and egg problem to
get there right because the current
election is not going to be conducted
that way you have to have decisive
victories in that election to be able to
create that system so then there's the
question of what leaders leader or
combination of leaders get us there if
you go to the stuff of the Old Testament
right there's a time for David there's a
time for Solomon right not every lead
leader has the attributes of the other
but there's a time and place for every
kind of leader and the beauty of our
system is we the people get to decide
who that leader is for this moment and
the primary electorate the Republican
primary base was clear like not somewhat
clear as crystal clear as they've ever
been probably in the history of running
a Republican primary that the time and
place is for the commander-in-chief
who's going to lead us to victory in
what feels like a wartime moment in the
country but that's going to take action
in repeatability not just promises we
want to go with the time tested tried
and true but the beauty is it's also
going to be people it's not one
president that just leads the country
it's going to be a whole team that
brings out the best of that leadership
and so every one of us is going to have
that role to play and so I'm not one of
these people that's going to wish for
Donald Trump to be a different version
different person than he is no I want
him to be the best version of himself
and then it's up to me and it's up to
you for each of us to look our ownselves
the and say what role are we going to
play in each driving that National Unity
That We crave and what I will say is I
see this in Donald Trump right now he
cares about it internally he does and my
only advice to him would be say it say
what's in your heart because then the
people of this country can see that you
really do care about National unity and
I know he does and I think that that
will be the right Next Step to reuniting
this country now my hope is it's not
just the next four years for this
country we have another 250 years and
then some left to go go and there was a
time for David there's a time for
Solomon there's a time for Trump
there'll be a time for the future but
for the next four years you asked me all
this was the product of why I threw my
support by President Trump after I ran
in the race and you know volunteered to
get out of the race after the Iowa
caucus proud that I ran a race where
nobody knew who I was a year ago and you
know outpaced many former vice
presidents and governors and senators
and people been in politics for a long
time I'm proud of what we accomplished
but at the point it became clear that I
wasn't going to be the next president
why did I throw my support behind Donald
Trump because I think he will be the
Right leader for this moment in a moment
where he's tried and true he's delivered
results and the country is hungry for
those same results and I think he is
going to have an even more successful
second term than his first because
coming in as an outsider one of the
things I'm sympathetic to even running a
campaign as an outsider is there's a
million things I would do differently
not having been in this world I think
the same thing applied to Donald Trump
in his own first four years in office he
tell you the same thing of things that
had he known what he knows he would have
even been in a position to go even
further than he did in implementing an
actual unifying America First Division
and so that's what you know in whatever
way I can I want to help him not only
succeed but to help him lead and reunite
this country in that second term and I
think that is the best bet this country
has for actually getting there I think
the the most pointed thing that you said
at least in terms of what I was trying
to get to is that you're not not going
to ask him to be something that he's not
you want him to be the best version that
he is yes unfortunately I think the best
version of what he is the introduction
of chaos the calling people out name
calling uh more rhetoric the the one
that I'm really worried about is more
rhetoric around uh if I don't win then
you can just assume the election was
stolen uh I I think that's going to be
gnarly now the question becomes but
you're you're very open to going in a
productive direction of how we improve
Security in our elections like let's say
we did get to vter ID
requirements exactly how we do it I've
never thought about but in terms of uh
do I think that those details actually
can matter in uniting us if you get
those basic Solutions and say then we're
not going to complain about results
that's a great way to move the country I
love that I would love an ironclad way
where there was just no way to doubt
love it love it love it secure democracy
I'm here for that uh that isn't going to
happen before this election and so um I
I just think it is you are right and
that Donald Trump is popular because of
the way that he is unfortunately the way
that he is causes a lot of division I
think that division even if the people
are wrong to react as strongly as they
do given that we've had four years but
knowing a lot of smart people that
really believe to the core of their
existence that he is an existential
threat to democracy they're there there
is going to be a seismic impact to this
election and now the question becomes W
if he is sort of classic Donald if you
will and we don't get the elimination of
the language around the election could
be stolen if I lose um I don't know
which one is going to have a um
potential for more violence he wins by a
narrow margin or he loses by let a
positive Vision that I'm rooting for and
I believe is achievable this year and is
as achievable as it's been in a
generation I think this could be a 1980
1984 style Reagan style unifying
Landslide for the country you're seeing
black voters minority voters young
voters all moving in a Direction they
haven't gone before away from Biden
towards Trump you're seeing that in the
early polling numbers I think that
understates exactly how well he could
end up doing because many people have
been historically known to be reluctant
on Telephone polls to admit that they're
actually going to vote for Donald Trump
when they will that I think will reveal
and I think it's at a moment where many
people in those intervening years since
the last time the first time he won in
2016 a lot of those people in the
intervening years
have recognized that they were lied to
by the media now we even they try to
sweep it under the rug but everything
they were told about the Russia
collusion hoax that impeded the first
two years of his presidency all the way
to even the prosecution that we're
seeing in New York I think most people
look at that and say it's garbage say
what you will about the politics of
where wherever you are the idea that
Alvin Bragg is bringing this case after
running for prosecutor on a campaign
promise of going after Donald Trump and
then goes after him for a crime that
nobody can actually name what the whole
theory of the case is he should have
used campaign funds to pay for personal
hush money payments if he had used the
campaign funds they'd be going after him
for that a judge whose daughter is
literally a Democratic fundraiser
raising Millions off of fundraising
pleas tied to the trial that her own
father's presiding over I think most
people regard that as a farce and so we
live in a moment where despite all of
what we've gone through a positive
result that could come out of it is a
unifying Landslide election in this
country and a message that I want to see
and I think Donald Trump is delivering
but I want to see him continue to
deliver it is America First includes all
Americans multi-ethnic workingclass
Coalition of people who might have been
Democrat before who cares doesn't matter
Donald Trump himself was was Democrat
oriented before too to say that and as
Ronald Reagan was too by the way to be
able to say that we're Americans
first that will call the bluff of that
managerial class in the media creating
this projection of division if we have
that Landslide election and then even
for the election Integrity concerns a
landslide minus some of those
irregularities would still be a decisive
Victory that's what I'm rooting for and
so I'm not just a passive analyst here
looking at this and the distribution of
possible outcomes and tell you which
ones I worry about and which ones I
don't I hopefully like all of us
actually am an agent and want to do
everything I can to get to what I think
will be the right
unifying Reviving outcome for this
country and I believe that is possible
and I believe that seven months from now
we will be in a place looking back at
all of the division you've looked at and
say that hey how do how does it feel
cathartic to have that in the rearview
mirror and now we go back to asking what
is possible in the United States of
America to once again be the healthiest
Nation on planet Earth to be the most
prosperous Nation on planet Earth to be
a nation where people have rights that
are unimaginable in other countries but
are unified by our commitment to
exercise those rights and to speak our
minds even if we disagree with each
other to say that we're United in that
common cause As Americans it's January
it's not that far from right now where I
believe that result is achievable for
this country and so is that going to
happen automatically no but am I going
to do everything in my power through
politics and through the private sector
by the way in the meantime to maximize
the chance we get there that's all I can
do right that's all you can
do we're not just passive agents
analyzing what happens in the world we
have the ability to shape and change
that world to make the sacrifices that
our founding fathers did it's easy to
sit here and law them it's harder to do
what they did 56 of them signed the
Declaration 12 of them had their homes
burned to the bottom they were ransacked
and burned by the British five of them
were captured by the British and
tortured until their deaths most of them
many of them certainly died bankrupt
because they had their private property
seized nine of them died in the
Revolutionary War three more of them had
their kids die in the Revolutionary War
freedom is not free it comes with some
level of sacrifice the unity and the
existence of the United States comes
with some level of sacrifice and
commitment and so I think it's easy to
assume this is just Donald Trump's job
or somebody else's job and to sit here
and worry externally versus doing what
people like you are doing that's why
that's why I was looking forward to this
convers with
you we're each I mean you're doing it
through impact Theory but we're each
doing it in our own way for me it's a
split between politics in the private
sector for some people it's just going
to be through family life and you know I
took my son to a t-ball game last night
I look at the coach and his wife and the
effort they put in not far from where
we're having this conversation right now
to bring that Community
together that's a sacrifice that I'm not
making but we're making a different
sacrifice and so that's what I think the
moment calls for right now is every one
of us taking some level of
responsibility rather than expecting
somebody else to do it for us and does
Donald Trump have his responsibility to
do it as well to unite this country and
could possibly have the biggest impact
in doing it yes he does and when I talk
to him and when I think the other people
around and talk to him they're telling
him don't be something that you're not
but be who you actually really are with
a media that is distorting what you have
to say you have to work doubly hard to
show the people what's actually in your
heart and if he does that and if every
one of us is able to do it in the
meantime I think we will get to that
good outcome that I'm rooting for and
that's what I'm hopeful for and if not I
am worried about the future direction of
this country I think we are skating on
thin ice so I'm not going to Glide over
that possibility I'm not going to tell
you that it's morning in America right
now it's not but it can be and that's
what gives me my purpose and motivation
over the next year to make sure we get
to that place and then after that we'll
turn to what happens four years and
eight years and 12 years from now after
that
this has been amazing where can people
keep up with you yeah just social media
follow me at uh you know you could find
me vi G ramaswami on X uh my first book
was woke Inc it's a great way to sort of
get to know me follow strive company
that I found it as well it's an
expression of values that are really
important to me and if I'm doing my job
on BuzzFeed or some of these other
fronts I'm not going to be too hard for
you to find but we'll keep having open
conversations like this I learned a lot
through this exchange even got it some
of this down and and hopefully we can do
this again I look forward to it all
right everybody if you haven't already
be sure to subscribe and until next time
my friends be legendary take care peace
if you like this conversation check out
this episode to learn more we are being
naive not at least publicly entertaining
the possibility that our antagonist
abroad would take advantage of our
famous lack of security and you're going
to see why we have to talk about
genocide somebody has to open these
topics if we are