#2470 - Pierre Poilievre

[MUSIC] >> How are you, sir? >> Pleasure to meet you. >> It's great to be here. Thanks for having me. Great to be back in Texas. >> I'm glad we finally did this. >> Yes, me too. >> I wanted to do it the first go around. >> Yeah, I know. Well, when I got the invitation, we were in the middle of the election. And we just don't leave the country during election campaigns. >> Yeah, that's it. >> And the problem we've had is we can't get you to come to Canada. And so we've actually hatched a full strategy to get you into Canada. Because we think it's going to do big things for our tourism numbers. So do you mind if I present you with something right out of the gate? >> Sure. >> All right, this is from a gunsmith and machinist in Calgary, Alberta's name is Jay. >> And he's designed, look at this, Calibur. Guess what the way it is? >> 70 pounds. >> 70 pounds, that's the way you have it. >> Says on the front here, Jamie says here on the front. Jamie pull it up, say got that. We've got, you see here some other stuff for a stand. >> Wow, that's really cool. >> Look at this stand here. So we've got, seeing his believing, which I think was the slogan of the first UFC that you were the commentator for. I think it was number 13. >> 12. >> Number 12. >> Yeah. >> And then we've got here your favorite quote from. >> This is his name, the Japanese martial artist. >> The Martin Musashi? >> Yes. >> And it says, if you know the way broadly, you will see it in everything. >> Yeah. >> So that's here. And then Morse code, there's a thank you letter for you. >> [LAUGH] >> You've got your flying saucer. >> Wow. >> And we've got your logo here too. So, but most important of all, we've got a subliminal message, which is the Canadian May belief. >> So cool. >> Every time you do a kettlebell swing, you do a snatch, you do a clean. You're going to be seeing that May belief and you're going to be reminding yourself that you need to come back to Canada. >> All right. >> All right. >> Present that to you there. >> Thank you very much. >> You're welcome. >> Very cool. Is that in the way, Jamie? >> I can take it off. >> We'll take it off. >> I'll just pick it off. >> Okay. >> You're put it down here. >> So I saw your interview with Pabble. >> Yeah. >> And I'm a big kettlebell freak. >> Are you really? >> Yeah, absolutely. And I started researching him after you had him on. And I was trying to, I love history. So I was thinking, why did the Russians come up with this? And it turns out they used it as a counterweight at the farmer markets. So they would say, you know, you come in, you have to say, this is how much potatoes you're buying. But instead of trying to do it by eyeball, they would put what is now a kettlebell on one side of the scale. And then the produce on the other. And then at the farmer's expeditions, you have these big Russian farmers want to show how strong they were. So they would pick them up and do all kinds of displays with them. And then the Russian army took it on, the Soviet army took it on. And then that's where Pabble picked it up and then brought it over the Atlantic and introduced it to America. >> Wow, that's crazy. So it was just accidental that they made this very functional tool for fitness. >> Yeah, it was just, you'd go to a farmer's market, you want to buy some barley or some potatoes. But you don't know if you're actually getting the real weight. So they'd have a scale, a balancing scale, and they'd put the kettlebell on one side and the produce on the other. And then you knew you got the right amount. And then of course they have these big farmers, farm fairs, and they're showing off their horses and their cattle and stuff. And they'd want to do strength displays. So these farmers are throwing these things around. And the Russian military picked it up. And then the Soviets of course took over and they took it on. And then Pabble, I think he was a bellorussian though if I'm not mistaken, Pabble. >> Hello, I'm Susan. And he brought it over to North America. But the ancient Chinese did it as well. >> Really? >> Yeah, the ancient Chinese, the Shaolin monks have used them. But they didn't do it with cast iron. There was sort of a concrete block. And they did for strength training as well. >> Oh, wow. Little history. >> Yeah, so I'm a big kettlebell freak. I love it. And I really, I started to study what Pabble's teaching. I wanted, I think he's in a accreditation or something. If I ever get time, I might take it. >> Yeah, strong first. >> Yeah. >> That's his organization. >> And you're doing, you have a whole program, I think you do clean to press and then. >> Yeah, I do a bunch of different things. >> Swats with overhead, swat and all that. >> It's a great functional tool just for your whole body. >> Right. >> It's really one of the best pieces of exercise equipment I think I've ever found. >> Yeah, I think he calls it a cannonball on a handle. And the thing I like about it is the, it's like a catap, catapult like it. All of the lift is in that instant where it flips over your hand. >> And there you go. >> Oh, see the original ones. Wow, that's crazy. That's so interesting. So the handle was just to pick it up and carry it around. >> Yeah. >> Wow. >> So how a real functional use. >> Well, it's just amazing how good it is for a piece of exercise equipment that was accidentally designed that way. >> Absolutely. >> And I think it's far superior to a dumbbell exercise because there's no, a dumbbell you get a consistent lift, but that's not real life. If you're in a fight or you have to pick something up heavy, it doesn't lift consistently. It's explosive in that small range. And when you're doing a snatch, by the time you get up to your shoulder, the thing's weightless because the catapult, the catapult effect has taken over. And now it's actually negative weight lifting your hand up in there if you're doing it right. But like if you're in a fight or if you're in a wrestling match or you're trying to push really hard against a heavy object, it's all about explosive power. And that's what kettlebells give rather than just this sort of freeze and contract thing that you do with dumbbells. >> Have you always been a workout guy? >> Yeah, look, I was big into sports and tell my mid teens. I was on the wrestling team. I wasn't great. I was good, but I wasn't great. Then I got a wicked tendonitis in my shoulder and it ended my athleticism for like four years. And that's how I got into politics. I was so bored. I got home from school. I had nothing to do. So I took my to my mother. >> tendonitis got you into politics? >> Yeah, that's what it was. I just couldn't get rid of it. Every time I thought I had it beat, I'd go in and I'd train and it would be full of inflammation. No one could do anything about it. And so I was like bored out of my mind and I said to my mom, like you go to these local meetings with the conservative association, like take me to that because I'm going crazy. >> That's nuts. >> Yeah. >> So what were you interested in when you first went there? We just didn't like the way things were running. What was it about that got you so curious? >> Well, I grew up in a suburban neighborhood in South End of Calgary. My folks were teachers. I was adopted. My mom was a 16 year old. She was obviously a single mom. She put me up for adoption to school teachers. There was electricians and oil workers and police officers lived on our street, normal, hardworking, good folks. And I always grew up with the impression they were getting screwed over and that the government didn't listen to people like them. Didn't listen to people who grew up on streets like ours. And living in Western Canada, there was a greater sense of that. We call it Western alienation at the time. And there was this guy, kind of a quirky guy, but a really brilliant guy, an impressed and manning. And I saw this billboard of him and he had his fist up and it said enough. And I said, yeah, I like that guy. So I got involved in politics. I started reading about different things. I read a biography on fiddle Castro and then I read some more. >> Just instead. >> No, no, not just instead. >> Right? >> No, no, no. >> No. >> Is that this pier? >> That was pier. His dad was pier. I had issues with pier Trudeau too. >> It is a great conspiracy theory though. >> Well, it is a hell of a, I don't think it's a true one though. His dad is pier. >> Unfortunately. >> His dad was very controversial. I grew up because he did a lot of damage to the oil sector and we're from oil country. And so that was one of the things that I felt kind of resentful about the national government. And one of the reasons I got involved is because the West deserved a fairer deal. And but I read a lot of books like, you know, Milton Friedman, Capitalism Freedom and I came to develop a philosophy based on just maximizing personal, financial, religious freedom. Let people make their own decisions. And that animated me to get involved in politics and fight for that and I've been doing it ever since. >> Wow, that's a fascinating transition from wrestling and tendinitis, deeply involved in politics. >> Yeah, I mean, like, you know, your sports guy, if you had suffered an injury that took you out of Taekwondo when you were young and you simply couldn't compete at anything, you'd probably be looking for some other adventure. >> Yeah, we saw it. >> Well, we're lucky that STEM cells weren't around back then. You never would have gotten into politics. >> That's right. I would have been a wrestler. I don't know if I would have won any awards. But yeah, that was how I got started. And I got very active very quickly. I got my first internship making $600 a month when I was 16 or 17 years old and, you know, take two trains in a bus in an hour and 45 minutes each way. But I was so thrilled. My dad bought me a used suit and a used pair of shoes. And I thought, this is so incredible. I'm an important guy. I wear dress shoes. I wear a tie. It didn't matter that the tie was bad. bought from some dead guy whose family had sold it to a used store. that was my start and I loved it. - Well, I'm really excited to have you in here because I've seen you speak multiple times and you're a very reasonable intelligent person that makes a lot of sense. And that is a rare thing in politics. And I love Canada. Like I just say, I don't go up there anymore, but it's because I think the government went horribly wrong over the last X amount of years, but the people are amazing. It's like, I always said that Canada has like, it's like America with like 20% last assholes. (laughing) Like every time I would go up there, like people are so nice. They're the nicest people. And I think that's part of what went wrong for Canada is that people are rule followers and they're trusting and kind people and this wolf in sheep's clothing, snuck in and it was pretending he was a sweet guy and passing all these crazy laws. And just when we saw what happened with COVID, with what happened with the truckers and people's accounts getting shut down for donating to the truckers, like the whole thing was so concerning because Canada was like a part of America almost. I mean, you're a different country, but it's like you used to be able to go over there with just a driver's license. It was like, it was such a cool place. I started going to the Montreal Comedy Festival in like 1993. I loved it up there. It's like one of my favorite places to be. - It is just for laughs. Just for laughs. - Yeah. Good, how's your French? - Not good. - Okay, we'll work on that. We'll get you some French lessons. - It's terrible. I don't know any French words. My wife is learning French though. It's interesting. She's got this app that she's learning French. But it's just an amazing place. It's a great country and to see it go the way it's been going and sliding the way it's been happening over the last X amount of years. There's just so many things that concern me. One of the things that really concerns me is this assisted suicide thing. Had one in 20 deaths in Canada is now assisted suicide, that's insane. - Well, listen, my view is that people should have the choice, but the concern we have is the suggestion that it would be offered to kids or offered to people whose only condition is mental illness. - Right. - I don't agree with that. - My concern as well. If someone's got a good friend of mine went to Oregon to end his life, because he had ALS. But I mean, he was gone. I mean, he could barely talk at the end of his life. His name is Michael Lair. He was a regular guest on Killtony. Great guy. And it was horrible. I mean, watching him fade away and he wanted to go out on his own terms. He went to Oregon for assisted suicide. And there's a place for it. But I mean, there was a kid recently in Canada and he did it for seasonal depression. I'm sure you're aware of that case. Like who allowed that to happen? Who didn't counsel this young guy? Who didn't give him a hug? Who didn't tell him about diet and exercise and changing your surroundings, your lifestyle and just do something to give you some hope and happiness? Like seasonal depression? Really? You're going to end your life, this beautiful life on this planet for seasonal depression. And that's what we have to do more to give people hope when they're suffering with mental illness. Yes. Give people the sense that they can take back control of their lives. I think we do have to promote fitness more because it gives people-- it turns them into a subject that controls their surroundings rather than an object being controlled. It teaches people that hardship is temporary and that the aftermath is positive. And we have to give people-- reinstall people with a sense of meaning when they're going through hardship rather than to say that it's all over. And I think our system needs to be geared towards giving people all the best options to live on rather than just suggesting made as the automatic path for the system to impose on people. So one of things our party is pushing for is to make clear that public servants who are getting phone calls from people who are in need of help for something. They shouldn't be offering that. They shouldn't be offering made. People can seek it out if they want. But when you're calling up saying, I'm poor or I'm struggling or I'm having a mental illness or I've got an injury, we shouldn't have a government worker saying, well, consider made. Well, the unfortunate thing is that any organization that gets formed wants to grow. And you get financial incentives, and then you hire more people, and then it gets bigger, and then what do you have to do? What do you have to keep doing what you're doing? Exactly. What are you doing? You're killing people. So you're going to kill more people because you're actually financially incentivized to put more people through this program and their lives. That's very sad. I think we have to get to a point where people have the freedom to make their own decisions. But they also have hope that there is an option for them. Yeah, and that's what we're trying to do. And that's what we're trying to do. The exercise thing is not just give them control of their lives, it makes them happier. It's been studies that show it's much more effective than antidepressants. Absolutely. The first of all, there's the physiological side, which affects the brain. But it's also the sensation of discomfort that you push through knowing that you have to focus on the thing you have to do. And that, I think, it helps us in anything we're encountering, whether you're going through a divorce or a bankruptcy or an injury or an illness. If you know that pushing through to the other side because you've got a meaning there, that can give people hope for a better life. My favorite psychologist is Victor Franco. Victor Franco. And he developed this logos treatment, which was basically giving people a sense of meaning. He survived the Holocaust in the concentration camp because he had a sense of meaning that he wanted to-- his book was stolen from him in the concentration camp about this theory. And he wanted to live on so he could survive and write that book. And then he found his-- in his teaching that it wasn't so much people's circumstances that determined their happiness. It was whether they had a meaning in life. And he tells this incredible story of a group therapy session where he had this very rich woman who was married to a very rich man. And he had an next to him, another lady who was living in terrible poverty. She'd lost his son and had a second severely disabled son. And he said to both of them, what will your life look like when you're 80 years old and you're on your deathbed? And the wealthier lady said, well, I will look back and think that I had some fun and enjoyed the simple-- the luxuries of being very wealthy and having an easy life that there wasn't a lot of meaning to it. And whereas the mother who was struggling with a disabled child and had lost another one said, well, I gave my first child a great life, a short one, but a great one. I struggled to give my disabled child a good dignified existence. And I leave this world satisfied and happy that my life had purpose and meaning. And the less than I take from that is that it is not about whether you have a gazillion dollars or whether your life is easy. It's whether you have some meaning to invest your life into. And I think we have to infuse people's lives with meaning so that they can live a good life. Well, that's a great message. And I think it's one of the most important parts of being a leader is having a great message and having a great philosophy and having a great perspective. And I mean, that's what disturbed me the most about when Trudeau was running the country. But I didn't feel like-- I felt like he was manipulating people with woke politics and ideology and that it was just this weird slippery slope that people were falling down where they're losing rights and you're losing your ability to express yourself. And it just really disturbed me because I always felt that Canada was like one of the freest places. And one of the most open-minded places. And it just-- I didn't understand how it could fall so quickly. This episode is brought to you by Visible. Folks, there's one thing nobody wants this season. And that's getting catfished. And it's not just dating profiles that are putting you at risk. It's also big wireless carriers. You know the type. Looks great at first. Promises a low price. But once you're locked in, surprise fees. And an expensive bill that isn't what you were expecting. Your night and shining armor? Visible wireless. It's one line wireless with unlimited data and hotspot for just $25 a month taxes and fees included. Now that's a green flag. The best part, Visible, is all digital. So you can switch as fast as you can swipe. Don't fall for the trap of getting catfished by wireless. Visit Visible.com to learn more and start loving your wireless carrier. Terms apply. See Visible.com for plan features and network management details. We still-- we are a free country. And we are a democracy. We have preserved that. My lead-- I had it with this funny moment when Joe Biden came to Parliament Hill. And I said, Mr. President, I'm Pierre Paulier. I'm the leader of his majesty's loyal opposition. And he said, loyal opposition. How can you be loyal and opposition at the same time? What the hell are you talking about? And because you guys have a system based on a republic whereas ours is the British system. And in our system, the opposition is an act of loyalty. That's what our system needs. It means that if you are opposing the government, you're doing it out of loyalty to the good of the people. In our House of Commons, you have a half circle in your Congress. We have two sides in our parliament. It's two and a half sword lengths apart because they used to little kill each other in the old English days. But the idea is the opposition is to prosecute the hell out of the government, make the mighty low. The most powerful people in the country are supposed to tremble every time they walk in that place. No, every mistake they made, every abuse of power, every corruption they might have done can be exposed and in front of all eyes. Our system is really designed to constrain the power of government through what we call parliament. I don't work for government. I work for parliament. And parliament works for the people. We call it the House of Commons because it's the House of the common people. It's green in there because they used to meet in the fields of England. I really view the world of our parliament to limit the power of government, to maximize the power of the people, make people bigger, stronger and more fulfilled by having the government narrowly focus on the things it's supposed to do. Roads, military, basic social safety net, borders, police, etc. But then leave people alone to live their lives. If I were to start a political party from scratch, it would be the mind-drowing damn business party. You know, just get the government to do its job well, do four or five things really well and then let people live their lives. Well, that sounds very reasonable. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, anybody that doesn't go along with that, anybody that's opposed to that, that doesn't even make sense. No, look, like I said, the way I grew up and everything I've seen ever since, when I talk to farmers or factory workers, electricians, I find they know just as much or more than the so-called experts I encounter on parliament Hill. Like back during COVID when all these governments were printing money and all the politicians and bankers said, "Oh, this is great. We'll look at all this money we get to spend." I walk around communities and I'd have like mechanics say, "You know, we're going to have inflation." And I would say, "Yeah, it makes sense to me." And I'd go back to parliament Hill and the experts would all say, "No, no, there's not going to be any inflation." And sure enough, all that money filtered into the economy, bit up all the goods we buy and everybody got smoked with higher prices. But the point is that it was the common people who don't study this stuff for a living, who don't read endless reports and studies who could just figure out that if there's money pouring into the economy that's not matched by goods and services, it's going to bit up the cost of everything. So that's my experience and my ideology is the common guy knows how to make his own decisions. We need to empower him to do that. Yeah, just to add to people's lives. Exactly. So there's a narrative in America and the narrative is that you were about to win and your party was about to win. But then Trump came along and said he was going to turn Canada into a 51st state. And everybody went crazy. Is that accurate? I wouldn't say they went crazy. I mean, it was a very upset. They should be upset, though. I mean, it's a crazy thing to say. It is a crazy thing to say. Canada is not for sale. We're never going to be the 51st state. We love Americans as neighbors and friends, but we want to be uniquely and we want to be sovereign as Canadians. It's our country. It's where we grow up. You're a patriot. As an American, I'm a patriot as a Canadian. It's where my grandfather arrived. It's where our collective ancestors put on military uniforms and sailed to fight wars. It's where our grandkids are going to live. We're very proudly Canadian. So we're never going to be the 51st state. And I just wish you'd knock that shit off so that we can get back to talking about the things that we can do as two separate countries that are actually friends. Did that really have that much of an effect up there? Like did people take him seriously? I think at first everyone thought it was a joke because we've always had these jokes like in a one day we're going to take over Vermont and Detroit should be part of Canada and all that stuff. But then he kept saying it and saying it and it became a lot of people got upset about it. And I think understandably so. Understandably. Yeah. I talked to him before about it. It was like so funny. I was like, first I was joking, but then people were like, it's a good idea. That's not a good idea. I was saying that. I can assure him of that. And the tariffs aren't a good idea either. We should get the tariffs out because there's so much that we could be doing together as neighbors and partners if we got rid of those tariffs. I think what are the biggest problems in America today? Affordability, security. And we can help with both. We knock the tariffs down. Let's look at affordability. We have the fourth biggest supply of oil anywhere on earth. You guys pay a huge price discount for our oil because we're effectively all our infrastructure to ship it is north-south. And it's a very unique heavy oil. So we accept, unfortunately, and for now, a price discount on the oil we send you, which can translate into more jobs and paychecks but also lower energy prices. You've got $5 a gallon right now in lots of places in America. You're buying, I want to produce more so we can sell 2 million more barrels of Canadian oil into the US market. And then there's housing. You've got huge housing pressures on young people. They can't afford a place to live. We're the biggest supplier of lumber for home building of any country that imports to the United States, exports to the United States. We've got very low cost but high quality soft with lumber. We could be shipping. Or the best truck, the best selling truck in America for 45 years now is the Ford series. It's aluminum. It's a military grade aluminum body. You guys can't make enough aluminum here. You don't have enough box site or electricity to convert it into aluminum. You get your aluminum from us. A tariff does not bring the production to America. It raises the price of the aluminum and therefore the F series truck. Get rid of that tariff. You lower the cost of an F series truck for the minor in Appalachia or the electrician in Ohio. That's just on the affordability side. There's a lot we can do with our minerals to make the continent a hell of a lot safer as well. I think it's an America's interest to come towards a tariff free deal and trade freely as friends. That will be good for both of us. Have you had conversations with Trump about this? No. I believe in the rule of one prime minister at a time. I thought like hell the win, I didn't win. We came very close. So I've said, listen, I'll leave it to the prime minister to do the negotiating. I've said I'll support him anyway. I can't even in my visit down here. I'm sending him text messages to tell him what's going on, trying to support his work because we both want what's best for Canada. Where are your elections now? When do you have the next elections? This is a strangely hard question to answer because we're in a weird system. Yeah, it's weird in comparison to ours. Yours are fixed. As you know, ours, we have technically fixed election dates, but the government can fall at any time. It's very simple. A rule is that if the opposition parties bind up and they can vote down the government, that is to say the majority of MPs in the house say we've lost confidence in the government, the election is now. Or if the prime minister decides he wants an election, he can call it and the election is now. But it has to be sometime in the next roughly three years. Oh, so you have a deadline? We have a deadline. We have a deadline, please. Yeah, that's right. But it could happen tomorrow. The, it wouldn't necessarily be tomorrow, but like, you know, in the next few weeks, if there were a non-confidence vote and the government lost it, then they go to an election. So it's kind of like the British system. Interesting. Yeah. Oh, it is the British system really. We adopted the British system almost identically. So when you're campaigning, you're essentially, this is like a long game. Yeah. You're just laying out your strategy, laying out what you would do to make Canada a better place. Yeah. Well, we have two roles. So I said I'm the leader of the opposition, but I'm also prime ministering waiting. So the notion is that the Canadian people should not only have a government, but they should have an alternative. And that alternative has two functions. Capital opposition, it's actually called that, I think it's a proper noun, a capital O, official capital O opposition, and also government in waiting. So you have to be prosecuting the government. You have to present to yourself, to people in a way where they say, yeah, that guy or that team could actually be the government. Though those are the dual roles that I have to carry out. Interesting. And how long have you been attempting to become prime minister for? How long has this been going on for? Not exactly four years because I launched my campaign in February of 2022. Was this something that you had always had in the back of your mind? I'd say in the back of my mind, but it wasn't something I was set on. Like I thought maybe one of my 50s or 60s, I would try it, but I was in no rush to do that. How old do you know? I'm now 46. And so what motivated you to do it? Well, you know, after COVID, as COVID was unfolding, it wasn't just the COVID policies themselves. It was the economic policies, because I've been very focused on economics in my parliamentary career. And I was seeing the size and cost of government, not just in Canada, but all around the world, growing so much, and that inflation was just destroying the working class people and that it was going to get a lot worse. So I ran on the platform of making Canada the freest country on Earth. We had a tradition of freedom in Canada. One of our earliest prime ministers, Wilfred Laurier, we asked what's Canada's nationality? And he couldn't actually list an ethnicity or a religion because we were already mixed up even a hundred years ago. We had scots and Irish and first peoples. So he said, look, French, French most of all, French and English and first nations. So he said, Canada is free and freedom is its nationality. And I wanted to reinstate that idea. I wanted it to be the freest country anywhere on earth. So I ran on that platform and won the leadership and then ran in the last election and stayed on after that election. That's kind of the last four years of my journey. And so the way your elections work now, so you're essentially just stating your case and going around and talking about what policies you would implement and how you would do things differently and just waiting to see how it all plays out. So we have, see, our prime minister is different than the president. He's actually part of the legislative branch. So he comes in to the House of Commons and we debate multiple times a week, he and I. So it's not just, you know, in your system, the Republican and Democrat hold like four debates right before the election in our system, we're always debating. So he comes in, he's on one side, I come in, I'm on the other side and I ask him like six consecutive questions and then he answers. And we go back and forth and that's called question period. Then we have these committees where we prosecute and propose on finance, natural resources, healthcare, you name it. So we're constantly prosecuting the government also proposing better ideas at the same time. So like the other day, I proposed to bring back the auto pack between Canada and the US to have terror free trade going both ways across the border. So that's an example of how I'm in a position actually offer solutions, even though I'm not in the government. And then hopefully government actually steals my ideas. And I've been encouraging them to steal my ideas. So what is this coffee, by the way? Yes. Yes, I'm a terrible caffeine addict. Two, cheers. Cheers. Oh, and shout out to George St. Pierre for hooking this up. Yes, George is a good man. He's the best. Great guy. He said he's going to have me do some pad work with him at some point. Oh, really? That's awesome. He's here all the time. Fantastic. Yeah, he's the best. He's one of the best representatives of martial arts you could ever hope to meet. He's got humility. I remember him. He came to Parliament Hill years ago and I thought, geez, he's going to be, because he's a hollyby cocky and swagger, but he was so down to earth. Oh, so much humility. For what he's accomplished in MMA, I've introduced him to people and they have no idea who he is. And then I go, that is one of the greatest fighters that ever walked the face of the earth. Absolutely. He's so nice. That's the Canadian way though. Like it's soft spoken and gentle and kind, but don't piss us off. Yeah, that's what Trump fucked up. I wonder what would have happened if he didn't go along with that 51st state nonsense. I mean, that is the narrative in this country, like I said, that if he didn't do that, that you would have won. Well, you never know, but I try not to cry over spilled milk. I focus on what I have to do and live in the present. But this new guy, Malat, have you followed him? Mike Malat? Oh, sure. I know him. Yeah. He's going to be fighting Winnipeg. I think he's the next GSP. He's very good. You like him? Yeah, he's excellent. He did a great job in Montreal. Mm-hmm. If you saw him there, but I mean, I've been to many of us called bunch of his fights. Is that right? Yeah, he's a, my buddy is his trainer, Crouallon. I'm arguing in Hamilton. He's a, for Hamilton, steel town guy. And anywhere we're hoping that he has a big win in Winnipeg. So. Well, you guys have one of the best gems in the world, TriStar in Montreal. Is that right? For Asahabi. It looks. Okay. There's like maybe a handful of great masterminds in MMA as far as coaches and for us is at the top of the list. Is that right? And what's his-- He trained GSP. And Karate or kickboxing. Oh, well, boy, time. I mean, he's, I mean, he's a true mixed martial artist, Black Belt and Jiu-Jitsu, kickboxing, ever, I mean, he can do everything. And he has a TriStar is a place where a lot of people from America go up there for their camps. Interesting. Yeah, I have to drop in and see those guys. So it's phenomenal. I mean, like I said, GSP trained up there. A lot of fighters trained up there. And he also had a great working relationship with a lot of people in America. So he would come down and they would exchange fighters back and forth and train with each other. Yeah. Well, we have a great martial arts tradition in Canada. I don't know if you know Mike Miles. He brought Muay Thai from Thailand to Calgary, like back in the 70s or 80s. He still got a great gym there. Do you know who Johnny Faterio is? Yes, he's a buddy of mine. Oh, really? From Ottawa, yeah. Oh, no kidding. Yeah, he was a hero of mine when I was a kid. Yeah, he's incredible. When I was kickboxing, he was like my idol. Really? Does he know that? I never talked to him. Well, he's going to see that. I bought his book. Yeah. I bought his book. I started running Stairs because of his book. Right. Because he was talking about how it increased his leg muscles and his kicking power. I remember that. It was in one of his documentaries or something. He said his kicks weren't strong enough. So he would do Stairs. But I went and trained it as Dojo a few times. It's in South Ottawa. He was incredible. He was one of the truly elite kickboxers of his time. He was a great boxer. Like, I know he never competed as a boxer, but his hands were fantastic. Right. Well, that's really what separated him from a lot of other people. It was like his accuracy and his technique was pristine. He told me that he would spend hours studying the distances that your limbs would have to travel depending on how you moved. He was kind of like a scientist in the way he learned and studied. He was all about simplicity and removing anything unnecessary. I think Bruce Lee said that. He said simplicity. He hack away at the unnecessary. What's the shortest distance to hit the strike? He's got a great, he's a really good heart too. He has a Jiu-Jitsu club as well. When I went in there, there was a blind fellow who was into Jiu-Jitsu. What you can do is blind person because it's so much about feel. But with COVID, he couldn't do Jiu-Jitsu anymore because they disallowed that kind of close contact. He actually found a way to train this guy with focus mitts, even though he was blind. It was really incredible. Oh, wow. Yeah. It was incredible amount of patience he had invested in making sure this young man could keep doing his physical activity throughout COVID. Wait a minute. So, the allowed pad work, but they didn't allow Jiu-Jitsu? I don't know if it was a government policy. It was a policy at the gym because you're just so wrapped up and sweating all the way to this. The gyms in America, everybody just kept going. They kept going. They would put foil over the windows and hide or coming through the back door. A lot of the gyms in LA, that's what they did. They just plowed ahead. They just figured out a way to not get in trouble. Some people did get caught and get in trouble and nothing ever came of it because it's pretty unconstitutional to tell people that they can't work out together. Like the government really didn't have the right to tell people that they couldn't do what they wanted to do. That was a legal thing that you can do. Like all of a sudden, there's this mandate. There's this law or rule being passed down or at least it's being promoted that you're not allowed to go to a gym and work out with other people. But those are the healthiest people. Those are the people that are least likely to get sick. This is crazy to say. You know if you're sick and if you just have a good gym with good people say, "Hey, don't show up if you're sick, everybody should be okay." These are the people you should worry about the least. We need to have common sense again. Too many governments in the Western world have gone way too bossy. They're just looking for every excuse to boss people around. That's what we have to push back again. Because EV mandates or excessive control of the internet or the massive increase in the cost of government, which is really like appropriating the private voluntary economy into the coercive government economy. That's what we're seeing across Europe and the UK, parts of the United States, as well as back home. So we need to reverse that trend and get people back in charge of their lives. Well, the narrative has always been that rights lost are never regained or are very, very difficult to regain them. So how could you reverse that? Well you have to keep fighting. We did regain our rights after COVID and the people have to look at the history of it. Which rights did you regain? Well, all the mandates are gone now. Of course, but those were ridiculous anyway. They were ridiculous, but a lot of the repeated business, they ruined people's lives, social lives. But freedom has always had to be taken. You go, our tradition goes back to 1215 with the Magna Carta, the great charter. And most of the freedoms we have today were in that original document. Right to a jury trial, no arrest without charge, no confiscation without compensation, no taxation without representation, all comes from that one document, the Magna Carta. And it was because King John was taken aside by the barons and they said, "Listen, pal, this is the choice. Either you sign this and follow it or we overthrow it." you. And as a result, we got the Magna Carta and all of when you guys had your Boston Tea Party and said you can't tax our tea because we don't elect you, that was an appeal as Englishman saying I'm not, we're Englishman, we have the right not to be taxed unless we vote for it and we're going to throw you out otherwise. But that came out of the fields of running meat in England in 1215. So it's a long march towards freedom and it's never actually done. Like there's no permanent victories or defeats, you just have to keep going forward. So if you were elected, let's say you get in right now, what's one of the first things you would do? I would unblock our resources. So we have the most resources of any country in the world per capita, bar none. We need to have to make it happen though we need to have the fastest permits anywhere in the world. And the lowest taxes on producing those resources were the fourth in oil, the number one in uranium, number one in pot ash for fertilizer. We have the fifth biggest supplier of natural gas. We have the longest oceanic coastline. Like we have 12 of NATO's, sorry we have 10 of 12 of NATO's defined defense minerals. So you know you had that guy, a Palmer lucky on. I don't think he can make his stuff without Canadian minerals. I mean maybe I'm wrong maybe he'll correct me but like night vision technology, you need to have you need to have germanium for that. You need to have galaeum to make semi conductors and radar. You need to have aluminum for armored vehicles and airplanes. You need cobalt for heat resistant alloys and fighter jets. You need tungsten for body sorry armor piercing ammunition. We have it all. And what I want to do is unblock those resources. Produce them in abundance for ourselves and our allies. Make you know 200,000 dollar paychecks for our trades workers. Build up an enormous strategic stockpile of it so that we have tons of leverage in international relations. And if God forbid there is ever a global conflict we would have all the resources necessary to win it. So but we need to we need to pass we need to get rid of a lot of laws that are blocking and and replace them with laws that have fast permitting so that we can produce this stuff on scale very quickly. So is the concern the environmental impact of extracting these things? Is that what's holding it up? That is the that's the ostensible reason but I just think across western the western world like Europe, UK parts of the US and Canada there's a problem with bureaucracy just growing way too damn big. Like you know the first nations in our country are incredibly forward looking. The Squamish built 6,000 units of housing on 10 acres of land. You can believe it in a town in a city of Vancouver where it's very hard to get a permit to do anything because it was their land so they did it. They're trying to build they're building now an LNG liquefaction plant where they replaced an old 30 mills. They cleaned it up and put an LNG plant there. But the federal government took a lot of time 14 years to give them a permit. So we need to think like their thinking which is entrepreneurial speed of business get it done quickly. That's how you develop like we have this community in my district it's called hardest 600 people they manage 100 billion dollars of oil in a town of 600 people. Why is it there? Because their municipality offers a permit in one week with one page and I wanted to tell this story so I called them and I said can I have someone come and do a video with me and they said we don't have anyone here. We don't have like bureaucrats that can help you they're all out on their farms right now they come in they stamp the permit and they go back to their farm. Well that's why we have 100 billion dollars of energy moving through the area which is bigger than the GDP of many countries because they have fast permits and that's what we need in Canada we need to be the fastest place to get things done. But don't you think you need some safeguards to protect the environment and how do you balance that out? Protect it quickly we can figure out what what whether a project is damaging to the environment in weeks and months rather than decades like there's nothing you're going to learn in year 14 of the review that you couldn't have learned in in month 14. So there's ways to protect the environment. When the Germans so with the Germans had to break their dependence on Russia after it invaded Ukraine they approved an LNG import terminal in 60 days they completed the whole damn thing in less than 200 days and guess what no environmental problems they they got their engineers to sit down and figure out how to do it quickly and that's the that's the mentality that we need to get in Canada. So what would you be able to do to bypass all this bureaucracy? How could that be done legally? Well you slim it down to one project one environmental review instead of 20 or 30 you have a fixed timeline that the bureaucrats have to give an answer of six months rather than just as long as they want to drag it on for and the other thing I would do is study areas where they're perfectly situated to have a project like a pipeline or a mine or an LNG export terminal or a port expansion and I would pre-permit it. I would say to our officials go in study make sure that the environmental aspects are all in good order I'll lift you a pre-permit and then anybody who comes along and wants to build it as long as they follow the terms and act responsibly has a guaranteed permit before they even apply for it and that I think we would have a roaring economy if we did that. That sounds awesome but the great fear is that if you do have an impact on the environment that impact is often permanent and then it's devastating and I've seen some of the oil extraction that they've done up in Alberta where you look at the area it looks like like scorched earth. No no no no no no no no no is that most responsible oil extraction in the world. But when you when you see these what is that one area that often gets criticized for it Mac? Is that what it is? Yeah it's they're open pit mines you open them when you take out the you take out the bichiman you subtract you you separate the sand from the oil you you make it less viscous by putting diluent in it and you ship it off and then after the oil is after the mining is done they resurface it and you wouldn't even know there was a mine there. And there's no impact to groundwater no impact to the environment. I mean there's an impact no matter what you do but at the end of the day the people who live there are very healthy and very happy and they're the strongest supporters of the expansion of the oil sands. It's an incredible because economically it's incredible it's the best resource in the world so it's like there's no decline rate you guys have shale here but you know as the years go by you get less and less out of a shale reservoir we we have very little decline we can keep producing and producing. We have what's called the insitu where there's an entire oil sands operation under your feet you could be at an a forest hunting and you wouldn't even know that under your feet they're extracting it through a whole system of pipes where they inject just steam steam vapor that loosens up the oil it sinks down it goes into another pipe comes up to the top and you can have beautiful pristine nature the bears the the deer the bird they don't even know that there's extraction happening under their feet so we have the best industry the most responsible industry anywhere in the world it's been a really disgusting PR campaign by extremist environmentalists and frankly some of our competitors to try and make our industry look bad but it's the best industry in the world. Yeah they got me yeah I saw some videos on it and I was like oh my god what are they doing to the ground now we're doing to the earth it looks horrible they're all it's all bullshit we have the it looks horrible yeah but I mean it that's just a superficial look at it you I'll take you for a tour in the oil sense you'll be amazed we have the best engineers in the world and by the way the first nations people absolutely love it because it's lifting their people out of poverty they're getting enormous job opportunities out at one of our MPs is a former chief that where they took 18% unemployment brought it down to three balanced their budget another one of my members of parliament northern british columbia negotiate a 40 billion dollar lng plant on his on the high's lateratory it's completely eliminating poverty for the first nations there and by exporting clean Canadian natural gas which we can liquefy 25% cheaper because it's cold as hell in Canada they actually displaced dirty coal overseas so instead of Asia burning coal they're burning clean Canadian gas that's delivered by first nations partnerships so this is the best way to do it makes everybody richer and makes our entire continent better off it seems so simple the way you're laying it out I don't understand why this has been implemented yeah this is this is the story of my life it's frustrating is it that but it's if it is it that simple is it really that this is what's holding everything up the bureaucracy and the the time it takes for permits and yeah like a lot of things right relations we have the same thing in housing and and so do you like if you look at you look at California's California is terrible like why is there such a housing shortage in California it's because it takes forever to get a permit and there's always bureaucracy standing in the way and it totally screws over the working class youth who can't find a place to live because they're not being built and we have that challenge in Canada as well and that's why proposed ideas to cut the bureaucracy and the taxes so that we can build affordable homes for our youth because right now we have a whole generation that can't afford homes and that was one of the biggest issues I ran on home ownership is necessary for family formation for civil peace and society where you know everybody feels like they have a piece of the pie we need to expand home ownership but to do that you've got to get the government gatekeepers out of the way speed up the permits free up the and cut the development taxes. So let's assume that you got an office. How much time would it take to start implementing these things and how quickly would that impact be felt by the Canadian people? Look, I think a lot of them can move very quickly. There's a lot of projects that investors are sitting on, but they don't have certainty and permits. So I would unblock that. And I think in the first year you would start to see immediate benefits for the working people who'd be getting these jobs. Some of it would take more and more like a medium term. Like the second thing I would go after is just the inflationary spending, which is a big problem all over the Western world. People just can't afford to live. I don't know if you encounter that around here. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, inflation is crazy. So I mean, the national debt in America just went up to 39 trillion. Right, which is bigger than your GDP. That's a lot of money. So explain this to me. 50 years ago, a barber and a barber and a waitress could buy a house with a big yard for a dog and raise four kids, meeting potatoes on the dinner table every night. And now an accountant and a lawyer can't do that. Why is that? Well, there's a lot of spending in a lot of making money, a lot of just-- just earning, you know, just making dollar bills with nothing behind it, nothing to back it. This is the biggest fraud perpetrated on the working class people in the last 100 years. Printing money is just insane. The idea you just print more money. It's like-- and people go, OK. Well, it looks painless at first. But if you have an economy with $10 and $10, it's a buck and apple. You double the number of dollars to 20, but you still only have 10 apples. Well, all of a sudden it's $2 and apple. It's not that the cost of apples has gone up. It still costs the same resources to grow the and pick the apples. It's that the price has gone up because the value of the money has gone down. So in America, over the last 55 years, you've doubled the number of homes in America, from about $70 million to $150 million. You know how much the money supply has grown? 30 times. You have twice the homes, but 30 times the cash. So what's happened? Housing costs have gone up 15 fold in 55 years. And now an entire generation of kids can't afford homes. We have exactly the same problem in Canada. This is the biggest wealth transfer from the working class to the elites, from I say the Habnots to the Havjots, and Washington and Wall Street love it, by the way, because it inflates the stock market. It inflates the bureaucracy. Politicians get to spend, CEOs get their stocks inflated. But it destroys the working people. And we need to get back to hard money. Everything should be getting cheaper, by the way. You know it takes 60 to 80% less resources to grow food. We grow four times the food on the same acre, get four times as much milk from the same cow. We use 80% less water and fertilizer. So why isn't it that food is not less expensive? Because all of those gains are being erased by monetary inflation. So it's not that food is more costly. It's that the value, the money we use to buy it, has less purchasing power. And we need to do what the Swiss do, which is they don't print money. They have balanced budgets. They have almost no deficit. And they have almost zero inflation in Switzerland. They have the strongest money in the world, the Swiss franc. And we would all be better if we operate like the Swiss when it comes to our money. So in a real world scenario, like you take over Canada, how would you go about implementing this? You've got to cut bureaucracy, consultants, which consume, by the way, $26 billion of spending. How big is your debt in Canada? 1.3 ish trillion. Oh, it's a baby debt. It's compared to you guys are ridiculous. Wow. But you know, you've gotten away with it because the dollar, the American dollar, is the reserve currency. So all of these countries prop up the value of the US dollar by keeping it on reserve. Better hope that doesn't change. Yeah, better hope. We don't have that luxury. And so, but we do have a lot of debt. And we have a lot. We have provinces too. They're quite indebted. But I would cut the bureaucracy. I would cut consultants. Foreign aid had cut way back on foreign aid. We give a corporate welfare of these checks to corporations. I believe business should make money rather than take money. So I would get rid of that. We're giving a lot of money to fake refugees, people who come in and don't actually-- are they're not actually fleeing danger? Like I love real refugees. My wife was a refugee, but I have no time for people who are pretending, but they're not really. And what do you mean by pretending to be a refugee? How are they doing this? They're not actually endangered in their home country. So they've come to be declared themselves as students and then wanting to stay declaring a refugee status. And this is common. Yeah, it happens. It happens. I mean, they just want to have a better life. So I don't begrudge them as people. But we can't spend money on social service, stay in hand, social services, advanced programs that we as Canadians don't get for people who are not paying. So you're not opposed to them being there. You're opposed to them getting-- Well, I'm opposed to them. If they're not real refugees, they shouldn't be brought in as refugees. I think we have to distinguish between those people who are actually in danger in their home country, which is the definition of a refugee and someone who just wants to come in excess of their proper immigrant-- Is this that common that it's actually affecting our economy? Right now it's a challenge, because we had a big number of international students in temporary foreign workers that came in in very large numbers in two or three years. We were bringing in about a million people a year, which in America's terms would be 10 million, like just if you're doing per capita. And it really caused a housing shortage, like some places where you have 26 of these students living in one basement. So we're trying to unwind that now. And how do you do that? Well, when they're work permit and their visit reviews that runs out, then we have to encourage them to head back lawfully. Right. But you don't want to do it ice style. No. Now, I don't think we need to do that. I just think we have to be orderly and lawful about it. And is that supported by the Canadian people? Yes, because we're a very welcoming commentary. We're a nation of immigrants, but we're also a nation of laws. And there's a general consensus like across the spectrum in Canada. The population growth was too fast for four or five years. And so we're trying to unwind that now. What are the other things that you would have to do to drop your debt and sort of balance your budget and begin to turn things around? Well, in addition-- so I like this idea that actually believe it or not, that Bill Clinton and the Republicans did in the '90s in the US. It was called the Pagola, a very simple principle. Every time the administration wanted to bring in a new dollar of spending, they had to match it with a dollar of savings. So there was no extra net spending for like eight years. And that's when your government balanced this budget and paid off $400 billion of debt. That law lapsed in 2002. And immediately after that, America went back into deficits. And you have an emerge. You've been in deficit now for 25 years. This is about internalizing the scarcity. Every creature in the universe, every bird in the trees, every fish in the seas, has to live with scarcity. Maximizing use of scarce resources. The only creature who doesn't do that is the politician, because he's always using someone else's money. It's like, oh, well, just print it or borrow it or tax it. It's not my money. And so they routinely show up to their cabinet meetings and say, well, I've got a new idea. It's $100 million. Where are you going to get it? I don't know. We'll print it. We'll borrow it. We'll tax it, not my money. But if you had a law saying you can't actually bring a proposal to cabinet unless you have matching savings to pay for it, well, then you'd have these politicians walking up and down the hallways and their departments looking for waste and rooting it out. So instead of making the single mom, the senior or the small business owner live with scarcity, I want the politicians and bureaucrats to live with scarcity. And that's what I would impose by law on my government. Well, it's just a rational way to deal with the problem. Like, don't spend money unless you could save money. Exactly. That's how you balance things out. I mean, Clinton did balance the budget. He did. During his time, and people forget that, because we've always assumed that there's always been this extraordinary debt. But that's not the case. Through the 1990s, I mean, he did a fantastic job at that. Yeah, I mean, it was that Congress was very disciplined as well. And the American people just got fed up and said, we're not tolerating these deficits anymore. And they imposed scarcity from the center. And by the way, the economy boomed, because the government was restrained, and the free market economy could just roar. And that's another part of the equation, by the way, is unlock the power of free enterprise. Like, this is the 250th anniversary, not just of the Declaration of Independence, but also of Adam Smith's wealth of nations, where he basically, for the first time in human history, described the free market system. And that was starting to flourish in the states and in parts of Europe. And that system basically started to come into place after the late 1770s. The growth since. Once the free market system has come into place in the world has been 200 times faster than it was before. Because there is the most powerful system for generating material benefit for the people. And that's what we need to restore in Canada. I want to make it the freest economy in the world. Well, that all sounds amazing. How the hell did you lose? How can a rational person vote for that? I mean, you're not saying anything that's restrictive. You're not saying anything that is in any way infringing on people's rights or liberties or it just sounds like it's just a 100% positive for Canada. That's what I think. That's my mission. And I think it will be popular. And we'll get there. Canadians do things through evolution, not revolution. So I'm just going to keep pushing my ideas. And I think overwhelmingly we'll win the next election. So it sounds like I just can't see how someone would listen to what you're saying and say, I find fault in this. Other than like the potential and environmental impact of extracting resources, I could see how a lot of the greenies would get like really upset and get their panties in a bunch about that and be very incredulous to the idea that you're going to protect the environment while you're extracting all these resources. But if you could lay it all out and also lay out this enormous economic impact and how it would uplift impoverished communities, how it would completely change the economic landscape of the country, it just only makes sense. That's why I'm baffled. Well listen, the people render their judgment, but I mean, it's a have to do a better job of proselytelling. Well, what were the criticisms of you? Like what did your opponents say that like people that resonated with people? What were they trying to say? It was funny because they all disagreed with my ideas. They said these are all very scary ideas. Scary. And then they said, first of all, they said that I had no policies, then they said they're scary policies and then they stole my policies right before the election. But hey listen, if the government that's in power now steals all my ideas and does the things I want to do, then I have one. That's why I came here. I didn't just do it so that I could have my name on the door. So I keep saying to the Prime Minister, steal my ideas. Right. But he doesn't want to. Oh, he, I won't criticize him in foreign soil. I will. But good for you. Yeah, I mean, we have a mutual respect. That's what a Canadian thing to do. That is a great thing to do. So polite. That's what I'm saying about Canadians are so polite. It's funny. Your security guy was talking about the Canadian standoff of, you know, when you get to a door, you go first. No, you go first. You go first. You can stay there all day. Actually, look this up the other day. Rio actually has an apology act. We always say sorry in Canada. So they wanted to clarify that sorry is not a legal admission of guilt. So like we get into a car accident and say, sorry, man, I was terrible. Your bumper doesn't mean that I'm guilty. It's actually in law. So polite. Even if somebody else screwed up, you say sorry. That's funny. That's so Canadian. But you know, the great thing about Canada is we've always sorted our shit out peacefully. The Protestants and Catholics tore each other's eyeballs out in Europe for like hundreds of years. And then we came to Canada and just got along. And that's the great thing about Canada. Like you can come, you know, Muslims and Jews, Christians and, sorry, Protestants and Catholics, Hindus and Sikhs. They come to Canada and they just get along. They live on the same streets. Eventually we all start intermarrying and it's a great thing about Canada. Well, it really is a great melting pot. You know. And like folks get to keep their cultures. Like at the same time is blending into the Canadian identity. Like my wife's from Venezuela. And so like, you know, oftentimes I'm in the house and there's like 16 Latinos and they're all speaking Spanish. I have no idea what the hell is going on. And they have this food. It's called a jackass. And I said, they don't start cooking this stuff. I said, I'm going to do your mom just call me a jackass. Because that's what it sound like. I don't speak any Spanish, but I should know. They're yapping in your house. It's a great, my kids are starting to learn Spanish. So I'm going to be outnumbered. They better learn it. Yeah. Yeah. So what else is an issue in Canada that you would like to fix? I'm talking to those napkins. We have to, I got an allergy I'm dealing with. We got a tough and up our justice system. It got way too soft. And what's wrong with your justice system? Basically bail. We all believe in the basic principle that you're innocent until proven guilty. But if someone's convicted as have like 150 prior convictions and they're newly arrested on their latest crime. Yeah. I don't think we should be releasing them onto the streets. And so we got two lacks on bail. So there's now a consensus in Canada that you should have severe restrictions on repeat offenders. Like in Vancouver, they had to arrest the same 40 guys 6,000 times in one year. 40 guys, 6,000 arrests. So they're basically being released within hours of their latest arrest. So we're, we're, we now brought a built up bipartisan, multi-partisan consensus to fix that. And we're pushing to toughen the bail system and ensure that it's the repeat offenders. A tiny group. We don't have a lot of criminals in Canada. They do a tremendous amount of crime. So if you take them off the street, you put them in prison, you can basically reduce the crime rate dramatically. Well, we probably have more crime percentage wise in America, but it's still a small percentage of the population that commits the crime. Yeah. But it's the same issue like in New York City. It's extraordinary. The amount of people that are repeat offenders. Yeah. And they just let them go. And California, no cash bail. Let them go. It's like, it is bananas and it doesn't make any sense and it doesn't make anybody help. I understand you want to be empathetic and I understand these narratives that the prison system is racist and the justice system is racist and these people have never been given a great shake in life. Well, if you want to fix that, start in these impoverished neighborhoods, established community centers, established better education, fund that, but don't let hardened criminals back on the street when they, they're habitual. If you've been arrested 40, 50 times, it doesn't seem like you're getting any better. So whatever rehabilitation process they have going on there, that's not working. So keep doing the same thing over and over again. And let's you like crime. I don't understand why you would do that. This has been, you know, it's imposed by these so-called experts. They tell, oh, we've done all these studies that show that these soft, uncrime policies work. But everywhere it's been, it's been tried. It's been an absolute disaster anywhere in the Western world. We have a town called Pentectin. There's one guy who the police can tell by looking at the crime rate, whether he's been in jail or not. When he comes out of jail, the crime rate for the entire town of Pentectin actually coats that so crazy. But you just keep them in prison. That seems so simple to solve. It's like, there's so many of these problems with government that it's just like rational thinking is. Exactly. One of, one of great interviews that I loved about you, you were eating an apple and you were talking to this guy who was being completely ridiculous. You were asking him to define the issues that he had. And it was so funny. It was like, this is what happens when a rational person meets a person with empty narratives. It was such a weird moment because you just kept eating that apple. It was such a good apple. It was so good. That's the thing. And the thing is, I didn't even realize I was being taped. I thought it was a print interview. Oh, that's hilarious. That's why I think I was so relaxed. But so I'm in the most beautiful place in the world. If you have a minute of the Okanagan, it's unbelievable. Like it's lakes, it's mountains, it's nice dry weather. And there's orchards and vineyards there like you'd love it. And so I'm in an apple orchard and I'm walking around just talking with people and my staff says this reporter wants to do an interview and I'm enjoying the apple. He comes up, starts asking questions. Nobody who was there thought this was a moment like we'd thought nothing of it. We dumped the whole thing. My staff unbeknownst to me was recording my whole walk. We dumped this 50 minute video on the internet and no one noticed it. And like three weeks later my phone blows up and people say, hey, how about that apple? What are they talking about? This apple thing. And then within three days everybody's talking to me about this damn apple that I had almost forgotten about eating. Well, we're that conversation sort of embodied this issue. It really did because you have rational thinking and empty narratives colliding. Right. And then you're eating an apple. Like you're so casual about it. You're actually eating an apple, which was so perfect. I mean, you couldn't if you planned on it like if you had a PR team, I think you should be eating an apple. They'd be like, I like it. So he's casual eating fruit. It's healthy. You know, it was totally coincident. It's like I don't know where not planned and not even notice. Like I said, no one there thought this was going to be a moment. We just like totally forgot about it. What made it America? It was viral in America and we were like, how come that guy's not the prime minister? Well, that hell's going on. Well, in the meantime, you can buy Ambrosio apples from the South Okinaw. And I'm really plugging a lot of sales for the Canadian economy today. You know what I found out about Canadian maple syrup? What's that? It is actually a super food and it is actually better for you than honey. Is that right? Yeah, it contains a bunch of polyphenols and a bunch of like healthy nutrients. That's right. - But maple syrup was just a guilty pleasure. You poured on pancakes. - No, it's totally amazing. - Really good for you. - So you take it before your workout? - No. - No, I just watched a Instagram video yesterday. - Help me. - So he sent it to me and I was like, what is this? - We'll have to send you a bunch of maple syrup from Canada, if you can. - Oh, I've got a bunch of-- - I've had a bunch of-- - We actually have a maple syrup reserve in Canada. Like a reserve of excess stockpiles. - Like oil reserve? - Well, we don't have an oil reserve. This is something I want to change. I want to have an oil reserve, but I also want to keep the maple syrup reserve 'cause we're Canadians after all. There's nothing more Canadian than that. - Well, it's so delicious. I can't believe it's good for you. Make sure that's true. - I mean, in what way is it true? - Are there nutrients? Let's put it into perplexity. - No, I didn't. - Our sponsor. - I compared it to Versani. I'll give you what it showed. - Well, it's not saying it's like better. - Maple syrup and honey are both sugary, but maple syrup is slightly lower in calories. Glycemic index has more minerals like magnaise, magnaise, and calcium, while honey is a bit higher in calories, has a slightly stronger impact on blood sugar. Well, this guy on Instagram was very convincing. I wish I saved it. - I think it's convincing. I think you should go with it. - I'm in it. - Yeah. - I'm done. - Stick with it. - It tastes better too. - Yeah, it's the best. It's fantastic. Put that with a little bit of Greek yogurt. You're protein. - Oh yeah. - That's what I do. - Greek yogurt. - And maple syrup, maybe start a trend. 'Cause everybody uses honey on their yogurt. - No, maple syrup from Canada. - 'Cause it's not from Canada, it's not the real deal. - Well, there's a lot of fakes here, right? - There's a lot of junk out there. When you go to a pancake house and they have that stuff in the little plastic cups, that's garbage. - Corn syrup crap. - Yeah, you don't wanna have that's manufactured crap. - Well, that's just the case with honey as well. I had a woman in here once it was a beekeeper and she's explaining to us that a lot of honey is not actually honey. They water it down with corn syrup. - They're just like shit in our food these days. - Yes. - I believe in eating clean. - 100%. - Well, that was one of the primary factors for me supporting this administration was RFK Junior in this make America healthy again initiative. 'Cause I think, you know, I had my friend, Brigham Bueller yesterday from Waste of Well on and, you know, we hammered this many times over and over again, but people need to hear it. We spend more money on healthcare and we're sicker than we've ever been before. And we have more chronic illness and we have more money. None of it makes any sense. It's completely ridiculous and it's obvious that people are eating the wrong things. And there was so much outrage of him implementing all these healthy choices and trying to get rid of dies that are illegal in Canada. Like the same cereals that the same factory sells in Canada. They sell with natural dies and in America, we demand them to be more colorful so we put poison in them. - A real thing. - Yeah. Is that, you know, what are the, what do you think are the dietary habits that are making people in the Western world sick right now? Like is it the dies, is it the sugars, is it the carbs? Like what's getting people in them? - There's a lot of things. First of all, it's processed foods. Process foods is an enormous percentage of a lot of Americans diets. Things with massive amounts of preservatives in them. And that's, like if you want like a general guideline, eat real food, eat real eggs, real vegetables, real meat, real fish, you'll be healthier. As soon as you start having things that can sit on a shelf forever, except things like rice and, you know, normal beans, like things that are dried, that makes sense that they can sit there. But if something can just sit on a shelf for a long period of time and you consume it, how is it just not rotting? Like I'm sure you've seen where they've taken a McDonald's Big Mac and they've just let it sit, take it a cheeseburger in a box and the guy pulls it out like 10 years later, it looks exactly the same. That's not food. - The bacteria didn't want to eat it. They looked at it, they were like, I'm not eating that. - If bacteria doesn't eat it, mold doesn't eat it, that's crazy. - Exactly. - Why are you eating it? Like there's something in it preventing the mold from growing. - It is that. - Well that stuff fucks with your gut bacteria. It's terrible for your body. And empty calories and we consume an enormous amount of processed food in this country. And if you want to be a healthier person, eat real fruit, eat real food, eat real vegetables, eat real meat. Is that simple? - Yeah. - That would fix 90% of our problems when it comes to people's diets. - And we, when my wife once looked at some of the baby formula we had and she said, she looked on it, she said there's no expiry date on this. This never goes bad. - That's crazy. - That can't be a good thing. - Right, meanwhile breast milk you have to freeze. - Exactly. - Yeah. So, and then what about on the fitness side, what do you think we can do? I mean, beyond you've done a lot, just talking about it. With the size of your audience, you've probably got a lot of people off the couch. But what policies do you think we could push that would get people physically active working out, moving again? - Well the real important thing is community. The easiest way to get fit is to get around a bunch of other people that are also involved in the same endeavor. If you have a bunch of friends that are unhappy with the way their life is, just go walk together. Say, hey guys, let's all go for a walk after dinner together. - Right. - That's all decide, as a neighborhood, to go walk. - Just walk for a half an hour after your meals at a lower glycemic index. It'll change your body. It'll make you healthier, you'll feel better. - Right. - It just does so much for you, just movement and activity. And if you're involved with a group of people that are also inclined in the same direction, they're also trying to get better, trying to get fit, then you kind of, you feed off of your atmosphere. People imitate the people that are around them. And you get support from the people that are around them. Make it a little healthy competition. Who can do the most exercise and who can do the most, whatever it is, whether it's a sport or whether it's a game or whether it's just something that you enjoy doing that's physically, physically taxing slightly. It doesn't have to be a crazy kettlebell workout or a jiu-jitsu class. Just take a walk. Just if the world, if the United States or Canada or anybody that's got problems with their health, just decide to start walking every day for 20 minutes. It'll change your life. And then add things to it. Add some body weight squats, add some pushups, skip a little rope. Do something. Take a yoga class. Right. Absolutely. You need activity. The human body has needs. And when those needs are not met and your biological requirements aren't met, you get developed anxiety, you get overweight, your muscles atrophy, your bone density decreases. You can't open up a jar anymore. There's all these problems that can be solved with just simple movement and activity. You don't have to become a fitness nut. You have to become a gym rat. Do something and that alone. And then change what you eat. Drink more water. Stop drinking soda. Stop drinking so much alcohol. Stop eating processed food. If we just slowly but surely get this in people's heads. For the longest time, people didn't think there was anything wrong with eating processed food. They didn't think there was anything wrong. They thought sugar just gave you extra calories. That's it. They didn't realize the catastrophic health consequences of consuming all this sugar, the increase in type 2 diabetes, all these problems that people are having, that people are having because of poor diets. So what's your theory though on how that happened? Why did that happen? Why did what caused millions of people to shift their diets away from good wholesome real food towards the processed garbage? Well, first of all, marketing and availability. They always say the center of the grocery store is what you should avoid because the center is all the stuff that doesn't need to be refrigerated. Everything on the outskirts, all the vegetables, and the fruit, the meats, the milk. That's all the stuff that's healthy because it has to be refrigerated because it's not it goes bad. Things that can just sit on a shelf, but things that sit on a shelf forever, those are the things that are the easiest to profit from. Because you don't have to worry about storage, you don't have to worry about refrigeration when you're processing or when you're moving them and transporting them. Just education is the most important thing. There's a lot of people that don't know how much their diet impacts them. And then there's also the problems that happen in this country where the sugar industry literally bribe scientists to pass the blame on saturated fat and pretend that this was the cause of all these heart issues that people were having and all the obesity that it was just fat. So then people started eating all these seed oil rich foods like mayonnaise or excuse me like a margarine and corn oil and canola oil on this. When it's better just to have tallow or butter. Yes, it's like natural food. Your body knows what to do with it. Beef is like a super food. A nice fatty piece of beef, best thing you can eat. It's so good for you. You got iron, you've got fat, you've got protein and creatine. It's all packed into that one super food. It is. And people, there's a lot of people that live very healthily off a carnivore diet and that stounds people. They don't understand it because they've been pushed into this idea. Well, one of the things they did in America that's great is they reversed the food pyramid. Our food pyramid was all grains at the bottom. It was all wheat and grains, which is, like there's nothing wrong with eating that as long as you're being smart about it. You don't eat too much of it. But if that's your primary diet, like guess what? Your insulin's going to spike. You're going to be hungry all the time. You're going to get fat. This is so good. Yeah, so good deal. When I cut the carbs out and I went basically into ketosis, I felt great because instead of having all the ups and downs when my blood sugar was down, when you're in ketosis, you basically live off your fat stores. Yeah. You have a consistent flow of energy whenever you need it because I've got some here. And so I feel lighter. I have to sleep less now. I don't have to sleep as much because I don't eat the big heavy carbs. I cheat once in a while. But the big heavy carbs that your body breaks down, you got to sleep more. I don't have to work through all those heavy carbs. So how do you feel it when you eat them? I love carbs. Don't get me wrong. I love Italian. I love spaghetti. Right. I love pizza. I love Italian subs. I love them. But I eat them sparingly. Absolutely. And when I eat them, I feel it. I feel it. It's amazing while you're eating it and then you're like, "Oh, you're going to hit with the tranquilizer dart." It's just not good. It's not good for you. If I eat a steak, I feel great. If I eat a steak, I don't feel in any way tired. After I'm done, I don't feel exhausted, like completely full. Also, they have a high satiety rate. Like, if you eat just steak, you're only going to eat what you need. Like, your body knows when to stop. But if there's mashed potatoes next to the steak, and spaghetti next to the steak, and bread, and all these other things, you're just going to keep eating. Exactly. And then cake and butter, and ice cream, and all the other stuff. You're going to keep eating. And you're going to consume excess calories. But beef is really expensive now. Like, it's really hard to put a steak on your plate. These are the average guy. It's insane. It's twice as expensive pork in Canada right now. Well, there's also this dumb narrative that cows are responsible for climate change. Right? It's just absolutely insane. And whoever started promoting that needs to go to jail. Because you've done a terrible disservice to people, especially regenerative farming. That's actually sequester carbon. Absolutely. And it's healthy for you. So the farming, the ranchers in my area are fantastic. They produce an incredible product. We got the North America as the smallest cattle herd since 1951 this year. That's not. Very small herd. And that's why it's so hard to get beef. Why is that? I think there's been a demand spike in the last couple of years. Beef prices were low for long, so a lot of ranchers got out of it. I just said, "We can't stay in this business losing money every year." And then all of a sudden, the price has started to go up. And moods have changed a lot on beef even in the last three, four years. So now they're trying to keep up with the demand. But I'm happy to see the ranchers doing well. But I'm sure like to see middle-class families to be able to afford to have beef again. But my theory on one of the reasons why the marketing has shifted towards all this processed crap, and this goes back to my obsession, which is inflation. Because instead of just raising the prices, they downgrade the quality of the food. They strip out the nutrients, and they inject garbage into our food. The companies do. That is ultimately less nutritious, but the price tag doesn't necessarily look like it's changing. So it's one of the more insidious ways that the system is able to charge you to pass inflationary costs on without you seeing it in that the price tag that's underneath the price tag. They also engineer food to be compulsive. You're more compulsively going to eat. Is that right? Yeah, sure. Especially chips and stuff like that in America. What country do you think does nutrition the best around the world? Well, that's a good question. Well, Japan has one of the lowest obesity rates. And when you look at Japanese food, what is it? It's like fish and rice and vegetables. They don't use glyphosate. I don't think. I think the way they process their wheat is very different than ours. We have a higher glutin in our wheat because we have more complex glutins in our wheat, so we have higher yield. And then on top of that, they dry all the wheat out with glyphosate at the end, which is fucking terrible for you. And they were trying to ban that in America, but then Trump passed an executive order stopping it. And the thing that Kennedy kind of ran on is that he wanted to stop the ubiquitous use of glyphosate. And especially glyphosate, you know, used with wheat to dry it out. So it's not used as an herbicide. It's used to dry out the wheat at the end so that it doesn't get moldy, which is crazy. You're spraying poison on wheat. And most Americans, if you test them, have glyphosate in their blood. You know, and the apologists will say, oh, but it's safe levels. Well, we don't really know what that means. You were talking about decades and decades of consuming this stuff. That can't be good. I mean, it literally kills plants. It destroys gut bacteria. It can't be good. It would be better. When you eat overseas like a viaposta or bread in Italy, you feel better. It doesn't kill you like it doesn't America. It doesn't like, oh, you don't get that same feeling. Interesting. I don't know anything about glyphosate, but one of the things I have is-- Do you guys use glyphosate in Canada? I don't know anything about it. I feel bad saying that, but I should do my homework on that one. We have corn that's engineered to survive glyphosate. We have round up ready corn. So that you could spray glyphosate on the corn that kills all the other things that you don't want growing. But how can that be good? They did a test of California wines. And what was the number? It was like some preposterous number of California wines tested positive for glyphosate. Is that right? In the high 90s, I think. Which is just nuts. Yeah, I don't know anything about glyphosate. I have to admit. Well, it's-- It's pretty tricky to you to peak my curiosity. The problem is in America, our food system is entirely dependent on it at this point. They want to change it. And so there's a lot of strategies. One of them is they have these machines that use lasers. And these lasers go over a field and actually target the weeds. So instead of spraying poison on them, they just zap these weeds and they can identify the difference between the weed and the cry. Really? Yeah. That's incredible. Yeah. The wine was 10 out of 10 tested. 10 out of 10. I was looking at the Japanese obesity thing. They have an interesting law that they put in place in 2008 where I believe it says workplaces have to measure people's waste of adults over 40 to find out if they're potentially overweight. Wow. Those people don't get fined. The companies get fined. So they have to then provide them counseling, diet advice, exercise guidance. Wow. And they also use a lower BMI than we do. There's a start to 25. It says it's because they have a higher risk in Asian populations for obesity. Interesting. That is. I wonder if that's because a lot of rice consumption. Way lower. 4.4 to 6% compared to 42%. Wow. That's crazy. Their obesity rates are 4 to 6%. And we're 42. 42 is nuts. 42 is so crazy. I find out what the Japanese are doing. My next stop is going to be Tokyo. Yeah. Well, they eat healthy food. You know, but that does make sense. I mean, implementing something like that. It sounds very restrictive, you know? I mean, I don't want a teleguy. He can't have a gut. I have a lot of friends that are fat. I love them to death. I'd like them to be healthy. But I wouldn't, you know, I don't believe you should have that kind of control over people. I think you should encourage healthy behavior. I don't think you should mandate it. Yeah, we need carrots, not sticks. Yeah. You can carry it literally. Literally. But the system is like, you know, I think of the opioid thing. That's an incredible story, really. That's a horrible story. And, you know, the fact that no one's going to jail for that is infuriating. They should have. What they did and what the deception that they use to pretend that that stuff is not addictive, that it's not the same as heroin is just absolutely atrocious. And the fact that they got away with it and that the sacchar family, just that one family. I don't know if you've ever seen the Netflix docu drama series. Yeah. Or was it called painkiller? They're the guys from Purdue, right? Purdue pharma. Yeah. I think they were Purdue pharma. Yeah. I mean, how many lives were destroyed by that? Well, half a million ended in the US. Yeah. At least. 50,000 in Canada. We lost more people in the last 10 years to opioid overdoses than we lost fighting in the Second World War. True. And that's so crazy. And we, you know, these companies, I mean, it started in the States with Purdue and a number of others where they basically started lying to the system and paying, they actually paid bonuses to distributors for every overdose they caused. Why? They contract the overdoses and then paid bonuses to distributors because that was an indicator of how successfully they were pushing the drugs onto doctors and pharmacists and the system. No. But in the court, because there was a huge lawsuit and the companies had to pay $50 billion because of an American government lawsuit against them, but they actually paid bonuses for overdose rates. That's true. That's insane. It's wild. And they basically, they were very, very strategic. They said we're going to go to working class neighborhoods where there's heat. huge unemployment, so you know in the rust belt of America, where people were out of work, and they obviously had some minor industrial injuries and said, you know, this will solve every ache and pain, take oxycontin. And it felt great when they first started taking it. And then it spread into Canada as well. And then it mutated in from oxycontin into fentanyl, which is 100 times more powerful than heroin. It can stop your lungs in 15 seconds, but absolutely deadly. And we, you know, these companies, these dirt bag companies should be paying hundreds of billions of dollars to cover the treatment and recovery of the people whose lives have been ruined by this. Well, it's just insane that they only had to pay a percentage of the amount of money that they profited. It is insane. They should have gone to jail. They should have had to pay. First of all, give all the money back. Yeah. I mean, what you did was unbelievably evil. Absolutely. And you were allowed to profit from it, which is crazy. For years. Even the Sackler family, the amount that they got fined was a small percentage of what they actually made. I don't know people live with themselves when they do that. They're so fast. They have to be. They basically got into the entire system, the healthcare system, the medical equipment community, and they pushed these over prescriptions. And then they got this crazy idea that they pushed in places like Portland and Seattle and San Francisco that the government should start giving out opioids that are safer than the ones that are on the street as an alternative to keep people from having contaminated drugs, which made the problem even worse because those the the the addicts would sell those to kids so that they could buy the harder stuff off the street and it expanded it even more. And so one of the things we're focused on. My plan is massive treatment and recovery programs to get people off drugs. Abstinence based treatment is incredible. It gets very successful. And we're saving lives now in Canada. You get them in. You get them counseling group therapy treatment, sweat lodges for first nations, people's physical exercise is a big part of it. I went to one treatment center in Saskatchewan and they actually bought these rusted out weights and had the guys like lifting weights and the bureaucrats are saying, well, why are you spending money on weights? What does that have to do with it? He says, well, it's been the best thing we had. These guys started to see their biceps grow and they're like, I want to look like this. And if I take drugs, I'm not going to look like this. So it was one of the best things they did. Then you get them into jobs and treatment and there's one guy that I met in BC. He was going to kill himself. He drove his car into a brick wall because he was so ruined by his addiction, but he didn't die. He couldn't even pull it off. So he actually went into treatment, turned his life around, started a business. He's got six employees and now he's going out on the street and like helping pulling guys off the street and bringing them in and saving their lives. So it's actually a really hopeful ending to the story. If we can get shift all our resources over to treatment and recovery services, which is one of my big objectives. Are you aware of I began? No. So former Republican governor of Texas, Rick Perry, is involved in this eye-bagane initiative here in Texas. And one of the things that they found, he works very closely with veterans and obviously a lot of these guys, they come back from the war. They have PTSD. They have a lot of pain. They get addicted to pills and then they have an incredibly difficult time getting off of it. And there's a treatment called eye-bagane. And eye-bagane comes from the abogatory. It's like a natural psychedelic that has no recreational use whatsoever. It's not fun. And it's apparently a brutal 24 hour experience, but it rewires the brain. It stops the pathways of addiction. And just one eye-bagane treatment, one session, the amount of people that never go back to using those drugs is in the 80%. Really? When they do two sessions, it's in the 90s. Wow. It's incredible. So they're implementing it here. And Rick Perry, who was like a staunch anti-drug, hardline Republican guy, great guy, but realized from talking to these veterans, maybe you have to have an open mind. And look at this, we have this blanket term that we use for drugs. And we say, "Oh, eye-bagane's a drug. You don't want to take drugs." But this psychedelic, this eye-bagane, apparently it's like a 24 hour review of your life that in some way, some chemical way rewires your system and stops the pathways of addiction. It's like a factory reset. Yes. Wow. Yes. That's crazy. And so they're starting to implement it here in Texas. And they're going to use it for that study. So they study this? Yes. And they've done, is it approved like as a treatment or what? Well, it's being approved here in Texas. And they're trying to do it in other places. And I know a friend of mine, my friend Ed Clay, he started a center down in Mexico. And the reason why he did it was because he got hooked on pills. He heard his back. He got hooked on pills. He had to figure out how to get off of it. And he did one eye-bagane session, got clean. Really? And it was like, I need to educate people and help people with this. It's why I don't. We start this system and it's very successful. I know multiple people that have done it. And especially veterans that have done it and had profound changes in their life because of the amazing. Yeah. And again, there's no recreational use for this. There's no chance of abusing it. Okay. It's not fun. Like to get people to do it twice is very hard. Okay. But even doing it once. But if you do it, it's incredibly effective, much more effective than any other form of therapy. Really? Yes. Okay. Well, I'll have to look out for that one because we need it. We still have a challenge up in Canada. I can connect you with Rick Perry. Okay. And he's, he's him and Brian Hubbard are incredible with their advocacy and the promotion of this. What they've done is really amazing. We got to get people off these drugs and you know, we're doing, we're making some good progress in Canada. Our biggest challenges are just the long term aftermath of the opioid problem. Like you have had here. But like I think, I think we can overcome it. And we have to try some new things in order to get people off these things because they're, because it's, when you're doing fentanyl, it's Russian roulette. It could be, you might not have more than a day to live if you're still taking that stuff. So dangerous. And it's in everything. It's in so many different street versions of pills that people think are safe. Right. Like Xanax. There's like illegal Xanax, like street Xanax. And there's fentanyl on them. People take it and they die. Right. Absolutely. I've met so many mothers. They just come up to me at my rallies and things and they tell me the story and they show me a picture and he said, man, it's a beautiful child. That child looks healthy and smart and she went to a party and they were hand in the shit out. There's a high school kid here in town that took a street out of all and they had fentanyl and he died. Is that right? Yeah. Somebody sold them what he thought was out of all. Look, that's what killed Prince. That's what killed Tom Petty. Out of all? No. No. Fentanyl. Fentanyl. They got street drugs from someone like they're both in pain and they, they become addicted to the pills and then they got like a pill from a roadie. I didn't know that. It took it and died. I didn't know that. Petty, did he sing last dance? Oh, he's last dance from Mary Jane. That's really sad. Oh, he's sung a bunch of amazing songs. American girl, I mean, Tom Petty was a legend and died because of fentanyl. Prince, one of the great musical genius of human history. And fentanyl got him to? He died from fentanyl. Yeah, he had hip pain. He needed a hip replacement. His hip was blown out and he was in agony all the time. So he started taking pills and then next he, you know, you're hooked and I've had family members that got hooked on it. Is that right? Did they get through it? One of them didn't. Yeah, I mean, he, he heard his back doing construction and started taking pills and now he's a waste. That's the sad thing. That's the sad thing is it's they're good people and they're not law-breaking people. No. Often it's folks who work in physically demanding jobs. They get an injury. Exactly. And it's easy to judge, but when you're in excruciating pain and you find something that makes it go away, it's understandable. Also, if you're not educated in these subjects and you just trust the doctor, you go to a doctor and the doctor says you need pain medication and then all of a sudden you're on it. It's easy to see how people get locked into that and then they can't break loose. Well, the path way to that. Physical addiction is so well known and studied. It's very, very addictive, which is why it's so horrific that they actually promoted the fact that these things are not addictive when they were promoting them. They knew exactly what they were doing. They were absolute crux and I'm hoping we get big settlements out of them the way you did down here and I want to put all that money into treatment and recovery, get people off these drugs and rescue them. I think we can save these lives. The treatment it works, it's tough. Like the people go through it. They say it was the worst experience of my life to go through that withdrawal, but it can be done and you come out stronger on the other side. It can be done and I think the most important thing is prevention and education and letting kids know like, hey, this is not what you want to get involved with. You want to have a happy successful life. This is going to stop that. This is going to keep you from having it. This might kill you and it's definitely going to ruin you. Yeah, but you're right about fitness though because when I was young, I hung around with a lot of people, got into a lot of trouble and I could have ended up there. The reason I didn't frankly is sports. I had something else to drive me. So it's one of the reasons why you need to get our young people's active and sporting activities when they're in that age group because if you're not giving them an outlet then they'll end up down that scary path. >>Oh 100 percent. And also you realize that if you want to be effective in sports, you can't party. >>Exactly. >>It'll rob you of your vitality, it'll rob you of your performance. >>No, when I played hockey and I showed up a few times hungover and I was just shit like it was parable. But you learn pretty quick that you got to be on your game. So we've got to promote more of the fitness at the youth level as well. And is that happening here? >>I remember when I came down here as a 16 year old. I haven't been here in 30 years. We got into town and the people who were hosting us were driving us to their home and we saw the stadium and there's like 20,000 people. And it was in Houston and I said, "Is that the Cowboys playing?" And they said, "No, that's the high school league." It's like, "Okay, in Canada we don't have high school leagues with 20,000 people coming out." But the sports are so massive here. >>Football is gigantic here. It's a religion. It's incredible. >>Yeah, it's crazy. >>And who do you cheer for, by the way? >>In Texas? >>Yeah. >>New you personally. >>Well, I've got into UT football. >>Okay. >>I really love going to the UT games. It's so fun and they're so enthusiastic and they just love it. It's like when you're a part of it when the touchdowns get scored and everybody's cheering, it's so contagious. It's really amazing. And it's just like the enthusiasm they have for it's like, "Wow, this is a great, these people love this here." But I've been to high school football games and it's the same thing. Like, pack stadiums for high school football games and you're like, "This is nuts, man. These people love their sports." >>We're like that for hockey in Canada. >>Oh yeah. >>Yes, serious, serious. Parents are very fixated. And I think it's actually a good thing. Some people say, "Oh, it's terrible." I think it's great to have parents that are competitive because they're pushing their kids to be better and more excellent. And even if they don't end up as NHL hockey players, it gives them that competitive ed. And I want us to be a more competitive society. >>Well, when I was a kid, I worked at the Boston Athletic Club and one of the people that I was a fitness instructor when I was 19 and one of the people that I worked with was Bobby Orr. >>Oh, really? >>Yeah, Bobby Orr used to come there and train him. We used to have to help him get on the VersaClimber machine because his body was so wrecked. >>Really? >>He had so many surgeries. His knees were so destroyed. He had scars all up and down his knee because he had knee surgery back when they were just experimenting. You know, they didn't really know how to fix knees. They just cut you open, screwed things back together again and then it would blow apart again. And then you'd wind up having another surgery. So he had many, many knee surgeries and he could barely walk. >>But he was still doing some kind of physical activity. >>Oh, yeah. He was playing a racquetball. >>That's how old was he at the time? >>This was 1986. So I mean- >>Cheese, that's like what, 40 years ago? >>Uh-huh. >>Yeah. So he was, you know, he was probably in his 50s, 40s or 50s. >>Now he was actually. >>He could barely walk. I mean, his knees didn't straighten out. >>Really? >>They were always like slightly bent and they only bent that much. His range of motion was very small. So you had to help him get on machines, but that nicest guy, the legend. You couldn't believe he was really there. He would walk into the gym and he was like, "Oh, really?" Yeah, as I was 19, I never met a famous person. And I was like, "That's Bobby Orr." >>Absolutely. >>That was nuts. But it also made me realize like, boy knee surgeries, no choke. This guy was like an incredible athlete and now he can't even straighten his leg out. >>Yeah, it's all temporary. You got to take care of yourself. >>Yes. >>Do you have residual injuries from fighting back in the day? >>Yeah, I've had three knee surgeries, two reconstructions. >>Was that from Taekwondo? >>Yeah, I know. >>And Jujitsu, one of my ACL injuries was from Jujitsu. >>And what injuries are the most common in Jujitsu? Knees, backs, necks, shoulders, those little ones, elbows. >>Is that because of the arm bars and all that stuff? >>Yeah, not tapping. That's a big one. A lot of guys get hurt just because they're ego because they don't want to tap. >>And you don't strike me as the type of guy who taps very quickly. >>Well, when I was younger, I was really stupid and I wasn't into tapping. >>Right. >>But as I got older, I got a lot smarter. Fortunately, I got a lot better. So I wasn't in a situation where I had a tap a lot. >>Right. >>But if I did, I just tapped. And that's the smart thing to do. And I would tell people, treat it like you're playing basketball. Don't treat it like it's your life or death. >>Right. >>The game is, if a guy gets you in an arm bar, he's essentially breaking your arm. He breaks your arm, he can kill you. >>Right. >>That's the game. >>But don't treat it like that. Treat it like you can tap and keep going. >>Right. >>Or you cannot tap and your arm's going to be destroyed maybe for the rest of your life. >>Right. >>And I've seen that happen with people, whether they're forearm snaps and they have to have plates in it and then it's a chronic injury for the rest of their life. >>Right. >>Yeah, no, I can imagine that. >>And I was talking about in Taekwondo, you told the story once about how you really clocked a guy. I think it was a real kick or something. >>Yeah. >>And that freaked you out. >>That changed my whole outlook on fighting because I realized that could happen to me. And I had knocked people out before but I'd never knocked anybody out where they didn't get up. Like, usually they get up and they're wobbly and they get sat down and the medics take care of them. And after a while they're walking around. And this guy never got up. And I never really got over that. I never had the same lust for hurting people because it was just, I was young. You know, I was 19 and when you're 19 you think you're invincible. Or you don't think about the consequence. I knew I could get hurt. I'd been hurt before. I'd been kicked really hard and punched really hard before. I knew I was vulnerable but I didn't think there would going to be anything permanent. >>Did the guy ever get out of the hospital? >>I don't know. >>Really? >>I don't know what happened to him. >>I don't know what happened. >>Maybe he'll hear this show and give you a call and say that he's all right. >>Oh no, he probably don't want to talk to me. >>Well, your spinning pack kick is incredible. I saw you in GSP doing that video where you were showing him how to do the back kick. >>Yeah. >>Did he ever use that in a fight? >>Yeah, he did. He did. He landed it. >>Yeah, he used it a lot. >>Yeah. >>It's a thing that like, you have to almost grow up doing it. >>Right. >>You know, unless you're dealing like John Jones developed it later in his career. >>I saw that. >>He's a wizard, but he kind of like started implementing it. Like sort of three, two, three, three with his career. Did you teach him how to do that? >>No, no. He worked with a type of no coach in Albuquerque. >>Okay. >>And he just really worked on that one technique specifically when he went up to heavyweight because the guys would be first of all less agile and mobile. And also it was the kind of technique where you could stop a guy with one shot. >>Right. >>And when your guy is smaller than most heavyweights as John is because he was a light heavyweight, so he was fighting at 205, most of his career, and just as a challenge decided to go up to heavyweight. But he's so intelligent, he realized like, I need a one shot that I could put people away. So he spent hours and hours every week just going over this spinning back kick. >>Really? >>To the body or the head? >>Yeah, the body. >>Yeah. >>And it was like getting hit by a car. >>Right. >>You get hit with that. >>Like a wheel kick to the head is really difficult to develop. It's like a fast twitch thing that it's almost like your body has to evolve and grow doing that to really develop the kind of speed that you could pull it off on a skilled opponent in a fight. >>And the accuracy. >>Yeah. >>Like a trying time that all. That must be incredible. >>I mean, there's this freak athletes that could pick it up later in life. There's some people that are just really good at everything. They just have amazing dexterity and coordination. But for most people, like I learned it when I was a kid. So my body matured doing those things. My body matured kicking. It became a part of just my average normal movement of life. >>Right. That's amazing. The spinning back kick though, is it typically a body kick? >>Yeah. >>Throw it at? >>I've thrown it to the face too, especially a jump spinning back kick to the face. >>Wow. >>But the-- >>I wonder, wasn't it really the Koreans that developed so they could actually kick a man off a horse in war? Is that why the kicks are so high? >>I don't think so. I think it was just because they were-- they're smaller in stature. And they realized that you had to have more powerful kicks. >>Okay. >>You know, like, because your legs are always carrying your body around. There's a lot more mass to your muscles and your legs. And there's a lot more force you can generate with your kicks. >>Did you ever see the fight between Rick Rufus and that Moitai guy? >>Oh, yeah. >>Wasn't that incredible? >>Yeah. That changed kickboxing. We've showed that fight a hundred times. >>Right. >>It was amazing because it was like Americans versus Thai and-- >>Well, we didn't really understand leg kicks. >>Right. >>Because P.K.A. karate. And I found this out later because of Benny Orquitas who came in the podcast. He told me that the reason why they didn't allow leg kicks in P.K.A. karate was because of Bill Wallace. So Bill Superfoot Wallace famously had one leg that he kicked with. It was because his other leg had a bad knee. >>Right. >>And he didn't want anybody kicking his legs. >>Interesting. >>He promoted this idea that only have above the waist kicks. >>Right. >>And that's what we had in America. That's what Johnny Vittaria fought more. >>That's right. He fought Rufus himself, actually. >>Yes. >>Yeah. >>Yeah. >>Yeah. >>Yeah. No, that was incredible because if you looked at the art form, Rufus was so much more beautiful to watch than the Thai guy. He broke the guy's jaw in the first round. I think, hey, you know, he knocked him down a few times. Was it once or twice? >>He knocked him down a couple times, I believe. But it was, and the guy just kept chopping his leg and then I think he went out and in a stretcher because his leg was busted in like nine places. He didn't know what to do. He didn't understand it. What was really interesting is his brother, Duke, became a Moitai World Champion at that fight. Was that the guy who was at the fight commenting after the fight? Yes, I remember that. But he was saying it doesn't take any time. There's no scale. He was embarrassed by that later in his life because he became one of the top MMA trainers. Really? And he took on Moitai. Yes. Well, he became a Moitai World Champion and he developed Rufusport, which is a great gym in Milwaukee, a top gym, developed World Champions like Anthony Pettis. So he was a pioneer. He was one of the guys that had to figure it out. And he spent time in Thailand. They all learned it. They had to learn. And where's the best place in Thailand to go? Is it Foucai? Is it Bangkok? Where'd he go? Oh, there's so many good places. Thailand's the real motherland of Moitai, obviously. Right. And it's like Foucai, it's amazing. Bangkok's amazing. I mean, there's so many amazing gyms that are in Thailand. They're tough. There's whole strips in Foucai. My wife and I were there in vacation once and we just stumbled on this whole street. And you could do, there was sort of American style boxing. There was a crossfit type thing. Then there was that Tiger Moitai and a bunch of other Moitai facilities. And then there's like street vendors that were cooking meals specifically for people who are there training. Like you could buy a beautiful, hard-boiled eggs and avocado and chicken strips. And this is like high protein just catered to the people who come from around the world to train for like five, six weeks in a clinic. And there's people that do it just recreationally. My friend Mark, he's a businessman. He's in his 60s. And he did it? He went over to Thailand to train. Did he survive? Yeah. He trained. He spars all day. I saw him the other day. He had a black eye. He's in his 60s. I'm like, what are you doing, man? And you wanted to be a MMA. Would you go to Thailand and do like two months there and then go to Dagestan to learn how to wrestle? Is that a best combo? If you were starting out, if you're a kid, I would say wrestling. Wrestling is number one. That's the most important thing to learn. Because if a guy can take you down, he could do whatever he wants to. If you could hold you down and hold you down and beat you up. If you don't know how to wrestle, you can't fight. You need at least to learn wrestling. Just to understand wrestling, take down defense. You did get to later in life, didn't you? Yes. Right. I didn't start your G2 until I was 29, I think. Yeah. And who do you like right now? Who do you think is the most interesting fighter to watch these days? Oh, there's so many. It's impossible to say the most interesting. There's a guy from Spain, Ilya, to Puria. Yeah. I really like to Puria. He's what David Goggins calls uncommon amongst uncommon men. One's more confident. I don't think I'm good. Thank you. I'm not a freak. I mean, he's just incredibly talented. He is. Weirdly talented. Like his last three fights, he knocked out three all-time grades. Holloway. Yeah. Holloway, Alexander, and Charles Oliver. Right. So that's crazy. Volkanovsky, who's like one of the greatest feather weights of all time, knocked him out, knocked out Max Holloway, another one of the greatest feather weights of all time. Right. And then Charles Oliver, one of the greatest lightweights of all time, knocked out three guys in three fights. And there's no one as a resume like that. And he's not like, as I understand, he was a Greco-Roman guy. Right. And as he came a boxer later on. He's just how do you describe it? How do you describe? So I'm not I'm not knowledgeable in this area, but the way he almost looks like he has a Philly shell. Is that a Philly shell? What he does? What's the little bit of that? Well, he has amazing defense. It's just amazing awareness and he pattern recognition, technique. It's like he's a combination of all things, right? Incredible confidence, incredible intelligence, insane discipline, work ethic, but just great training methods like he does everything right. And then insane confidence like his confidence is insane. He when he fought Charles Oliver for the lightweight title, he celebrated his victory the night before he had a party to celebrate the night before the fight and then went out and knock Charles out in the first round. And said he was going to knock Charles out in the first round. That's incredible. One punch. Boom. But you know what impresses me most about him is how he got up after that kick to the head. He talked. That was incredible. Yeah. And you know who else did that was GSP? Oh, GSP took that college contest and he went down, but he recovered quickly. Yeah. And he was talking to me about how, because I said to him like in politics, you get hit, you get hit, right? And not physically if you're lucky, but you have to get up quickly and react to it. And I asked him, how did you do it? How did you, like how does your brain go from taking that kind of hit to getting back in the fight and turning it around? And he said he like it's too very deep breaths through the nose and then out through the mouth and get some oxygen back into your system and focus your mind. I thought that was an incredible lesson. Well, I mean, it's all in how you get kicked because you kid just get knocked out. And then it's over. It is nothing you can do. If you get shut off, you get shut off. Right. And certain people get shut off. It just, you just get kicked. You get kicked and it kind of glances off of you or you can get kicked and it just slams right in the side of your neck and the lights go dark. Right. But if you're, if you're still able to recover and think quickly, it's incredible to have that kind of pre-programming to read you for a moment like that. Well, I mean, that's a big part of his, what I was talking about, the camp that he comes from. I mean, Ferasa Hobbie is like one of the most intelligent and one of the most brilliant trainers in the sport. Who's this? Ferasa Hobbie. He's the guy from Montreal. Oh, that's a star. So he's the guy who trains just. Yes. Yes. Trains GSP. OGSP, OK. Yes. OK. And I mean, I think that is, that's a big part of why GSP was able to recover. Like they prepare for everything. Right. You know, it's like there's nothing left to chance. Like he hires people to try to knock George out in training. That was one of the things he did. He would give them more money if they could knock him out. So they would just, so he would be like fully prepared when he was fighting. Like they leave no stone uncovered. Don't you have to like budget though the number of heads. Yeah, 100%. But he was pretty confident that George, I mean, it wasn't like he was doing this with the beginner. He was doing this with a world champion, one of the greatest of all time. OK. You know, he wanted George to be in danger. You know, so George had to fight like he was going to fight inside the octagon. Right. In danger. Because John Jones said somewhere that he had like every time he gets hit hard in, in camp, he's, he said like I just, that's part of my brain budget. That's, that's been taken away. Well, that's why John's so smart. Yeah. He recognized that. There's a lot of people that don't think that way. John also famously won't take a fight on short notice. Is that right? He wants to be fully prepared for a fighter. He's not a guy like when he fought Chale Sun and they offered him a Chale Sun and fight on short notice. And he said, no, like there is not a time, no disrespect to Chale. He's a great fighter. No, there's not a time on this life in this earth where Chale Sun and it's going to beat John Jones. It's just not going to happen. He could have taken that fight on one day's notice and still beat Chale Sun and he's that much better than him. But he still wouldn't take it. He's like, no, I want to be fully 100% prepared. That's smart though. Yeah. And so he wanted to make sure that there was not a chance that Chale could do anything to him that he would have been able to wouldn't have been able to do if he was trained. Do these guys hate each other? Sometimes. Is it? But most of them, do they respect or is it depends on the fight? It really depends. Like when Ilya Toporia fought Charles Alvaro, he actually apologized to him before the fight. He said, I'm sorry it has to be you. I really like you. [laughter] Kind of crazy. He's got to be careful. But he's hated people. He's hated people he fought to. There's some people that just rubbed you the wrong way. There's some people, there's strategies to get inside your head and fuck with you and for you to fight with emotion. Well, he'd be hitting with Connor McGregor. With McGregor, he really hit him. He wasn't going to almost didn't let go when the tap happened. Yeah. That was something else. Is Connor ever going to come back, do you think? Only Connor knows. I mean, if he's going to, he has to do it soon. I mean, I think he's 30. How old is he now, 37? He's jacked now, eh? Yes, but I was in meat. Well, not anymore. He came back down. He was on the Mexican supplements for a while. Okay. Because he was trying to recover from his leg break. Right. So when you fought Dustin Poirey. I remember that. He got on some stuff to try to recover for that. I don't know what he got on, but clearly it helped. He got huge. He got super jacked. The problem with getting super jacked like that is then you get addicted to what got you super jacked. Because if you're on steroids, you feel like Superman. You feel like you could just run through walls and then you get off of it. And now your endocrine system has to kind of catch up to the fact that you've been giving it exogenous testosterone for all these months. And so that takes a long time for you to get back to a normal healthy level. So you feel like shit, it's hard for these guys to get off of steroids. Right. I can imagine you get addicted to being this right. I've never done it. I don't plan on it. How old is he? 37. Almost 38. That's getting up there. Yeah. Who's the oldest fighter that's ever been in the octagon? Like who's a serious competitor? Probably Randy Cotour. I think Randy won the World title. The World Heavyweight title in his 40s. Wow. Yeah. But Randy didn't even start his mixed martial arts career. I think I was there at his first fight in 1997. And I think he was 34, 30. 45, but we ever had an MMA fight. He was just an elite wrestler who made his way into MMA because there's no real professional outlet for actual amateur wrestling. Did you ever interact with the Gracies? I remember way back in, I remember MMA, UFC 2. It was the second one, remember that was when it really kicked me. The first one was a little bit strange, that big fat guy was tooth went flying out. The number two was the one with Shamrock and Gracie and Dan Severin. Was he in number two? Dan Severin the wrestler? I think he was later. He might have been three or four, but that was kind of the first generation of big names. Oh, Hoy's Gracie changed the world. Yeah, he was a slow style though, man. You had him patience to watch him because he's just lying his back and weight, weight, weight. Well, with Dan Severin, he did because he had a catcher been a triangle. He eventually tapped him and no one even understand what was going on. Why was he, he's got his legs wrapped around him? What the hell was going on? And then all of a sudden Dan Severin's tapping out. You're like, this is crazy. So a man who weighed literally a hundred pounds more than him or close to it. Right. On top of him and Hoy's beat him. Well, Dan Severin didn't appear to have any finishing moves. Like he was thinking, I got you on your back. I've pinned you. I've won the wrestling match. You can give you a little nookie's vocal sandwiches. But then of course, eventually that anaconda comes in and either chokes you out or takes your arm. Well, no one understood Jiu Jitsu until Hoy's came around. You know, other than the Brazilian. And he was his dad, wasn't it? His dad that introduced it to the family. His dad and his uncle. So it was Carlos Gracie and Iliot Gracie who are the real founders of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and then Carlson Gracie. Okay. And those guys were the pioneers and they were having no rules fights in the 1930s and 40s. Wow. Did they bring it over from Japan? My Ada brought it over from Japan and they taught the Gracies and then Iliot Gracie famously had a match with Camora who was a Japanese judoka who broke Iliot's arm with a Camora and that's how that technique, that's why it's called a Camora. Yeah. Yeah. In catch wrestling they call it a double wrist lock. But we call it a Camora because Camora broke Iliot Gracie's arm with this. Iliot just refused to tap and it's like, and eventually it snapped his arm. Wow. It's incredible. No, they're having these long no rules fights in Brazil long before anybody had any idea what MMA was in America and then Hoy's brother, Hickson, who was the best out of all of them. Hickson was fighting people when he was 18 and like these big arenas. In Brazil, yeah. Unbelievable. And then they then I guess Dana White brought it in with UFC and. No, it wasn't Dana. It was there was another organization before Zufa owned the UFC and this other organization, they started it with Hory and Gracie. So Hory and Gracie was the guy who founded the UFC. Okay. And originally they were talking about putting like a moat around the cage and having crocodiles and it showed up. They wanted it to be like completely insane because what it was for Hory and Hory is a brilliant man and what for him what he wanted was to promote Jiu Jitsu and he's like, this is going to be the best way to open up schools all over the country and to show this art that my father had created. So they had really taken some of the ground techniques of judo and really refined them to a razor sharp edge and also one of the things that helped a lot was that Iliot was a small man. He was only like 145 pounds and so he had to use only technique and leverage. He couldn't rely on brute strength and so it was one of the best sort of advertisements is to have hoist who was also fairly small. He was only 175 pounds beat all these big giant muscle bound guys with pure technique because they didn't understand what he was doing and he was like, this is going to be brilliant. This is going to and it worked. I mean the name Gracie and Jiu Jitsu are so. It's everywhere now like we even have them in Canada where these these schools will have the Gracie name and obviously they have no attachment to Gracie's you're the Brazilian Gracies but everybody wants to learn the Gracie style. Well they probably do have a like Gracie Baja which is a huge affiliate of gyms that they're all over the country. They're all they're everywhere. How they good? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh there's like it's very difficult to have a bad Jiu Jitsu gym today. Why is that because they're so competitive? It's too competitive. Okay. So there's too many good gyms like in Austin alone Austin alone is like 10 amazing Jiu Jitsu schools. Is that right? Oh yeah. Do you go do you go and roll quite often? There's a place right up the street. 10th planet Jiu Jitsu which is the school that I started with in California. Well I started with them a chop well I actually started with Hicks and Gray or I started with Hicks and Gracie and then I went to Carlson Gracie and then I that was just because I didn't know there was any difference in the Gracies and then Carlson Gracie was closer to my house so I was like oh go to this Gracie place it's closer. This is when I was a white belt I didn't know anything and then when they closed when that gym closed then I went to John Jacques Machados and so I started training there in 1998 and that was that was in the Valley in California but then one of John Jacques black belts my best friend Eddie Bravo he started 10th planet Jiu Jitsu and then I trained there as well. Okay and in Canada we see a lot of places where they do Moitai and Jiu Jitsu so you're striking and you're grappling all in one. 10th planet here has a Moitai program. Oh is that right so that's a lot of those gyms have that. And you went to your first as a commentator you did it like for free didn't you? No no I got paid in the early days in the 90s in 1997 but it wasn't much. Okay. I was losing money but when the UFC was purchased by Zufa in 2001 that was when I was on Fear Factor and I met Dana White and I became friends with him and he asked me as a favor to do commentary on this one show that they had UFC 37 and a half it was on Fox Sports whatever it was there was a cable channel so those best damn sports show period had this UFC show and he said would you do me a favor and just do commentary on this one event. Right and I said okay I'll do it for this one and he's like I want you to do it again and then it was like okay. So I was like I just wanted to do it for fun. Like for me is like I like going to the fights and I like going with my friends and having a good time and I did like the first 15 of them for free. I just I knew they were hemorrhaging money and I didn't need any money. But you loved it you loved being there. It was like a candy store. Well also it was very happy to try to promote this thing because for me it was the ultimate expression of martial arts like we need to find out what's the best style. And I'd kind of I had been so engrossed in that world in Japan with pride and all these other organizations that they had over there. It's like what happens if an alligator fights with a tiger? What happens with a lion fights with a bear? We got to match them up and find out. Well it's humans versus humans. Right. So it's just style. It's like we need to know. Because you don't want to waste your time doing something that didn't work. Right. And there was a lot of people that wasted their time doing stuff that didn't work and we didn't really know what that was until the UFC came along and then we're like oh and now the evolution of martial arts from 1993 when the UFC started to 2026. In those years martial arts have evolved more than they have in the last 30,000 years. Right. Well it's like the gap between theory and practice. And like Bruce Lee when he when he started with Wing Chung but he said that a lot of it was just ornamental and he called it dry land swimming. It's like you know you wouldn't actually do that in a fight and then he got into a lot of contention with the scholars of the art form. It's a very beautiful art form Wing Chung but I don't know if it I can't imagine it works that well. Well it is. Well Wing Chung is effective. There's a lot of techniques that into a fight is between like a Muay Thai guy and a Wing Chung guy who would come out of it. The Muay Thai guy. But it doesn't mean the Wing Chung is not effective and you could use Wing Chung in Muay Thai or in an MMA fight but you have to know everything. That's the reality of it. It's like Taekwondo. Taekwondo is not effective by itself in an MMA fight but if you know MMA and you know Taekwondo then you could do like with Edson Barbosa did the Terry Adam and knock him out with a wheelchair. It's a spectacular fashion. Right. Learning all the techniques. Like a big blend. Right. Like you get some Muay Thai, some karate, some. Yes. That's what MMA is. Mixed martial arts. I mean it's like you take all and that's Bruce Lee's philosophy. Absorb what's useful. He was the real first mixed martial artist and when it was very dangerous to do that because people hated him. I mean they would attack him. He would have to have fights with people because they thought that he was disrespecting their art. Right. And he combined Western boxing and wrestling. He learned judo from Jean LeBel. He learned things from everybody. He learned karate, savant. He learned all these different martial arts and was absorbing what's useful and putting his own. So Jikundo, his style was really the first mixed martial arts. Is that right? Yeah. Do people use it anymore? Well yeah there's Jikundo schools. Sure. Yeah. I mean a lot of what Krav Maga is. The Israeli martial art is like kind of a combination of things along the same lines of the way Bruce Lee did it. Is Krav Maga a good effective martial art system? Every martial art system is effective if you have a great instructor. But on their own, like the best styles are the real ones. really strong styles like Jiu-Jitsu, Moitai wrestling. Those are the best style, Western boxing. Those are the best styles on their own. But what Krab Maga is is a combination of all those styles. And so if you have a great instructor in Krab Maga, yeah, you'll learn great Moitai, you'll learn great Jiu-Jitsu. It's essentially mixed martial arts. But with a lot of emphasis on real world applications, street fights, dirty stuff, like eye gouging, poking people in the eye, kicking them in the nuts. Yikes. Stuff that works. But that's what you, like, you see it in an MMA fight all the time. A guy gets poked in the eyes, like, hang on. And he has to stop. He's not against the rules. He's against the rules. So this guy's getting punched and kicked. And look, Tom Aspenal, he was in the heavyweight title fight. And he got eye poked in the first round. He's had to have two surgeries since then on his eyes. And he hasn't been able to fight. They had to stop the fight in the first round from an eye poke. Oh my god. It's very effective. But in Krab Maga, they're like, go for the eye. Because in a real world fight for your life scenario. If you're in a war, it's for these really military, I think. Exactly. So they have to prepare for, you know, unusual situations where you're trying to survive in a situation where your arm has been-- your weapon has been removed and you're just trying to fight for your life. Exactly. Well, just in a situation with hand to hand combat, you need to learn how-- you need to know every-- if a guy takes you down, you can't be lost. Oh, we have to get back up so I can fight. No, you have to be able to fight on the ground. And that's the idea of it, like incorporate Jiu Jitsu, incorporate leg kicks, moy Thai, Western boxing, even jik kundou techniques, even Wing Chun techniques. Really? There's a lot of hand trapping and things in Wing Chun. That can be very-- It looks really cool. What they do with that, wooden dummy. Uh-huh. Yeah. It looks-- Well, there's-- Exactly. I've never really got into that. But if you do get into that, you'll learn blocking techniques and you'll learn-- That actually work. Yeah, sure. OK. But you-- they'll work if you know the other stuff. Right. They won't work if a guy just shoots a double on you and takes you down and starts pounding you. You don't know what to do when you're on the bottom. Right. You have to know how-- And this is what really MMA has taught the world. It's like you have to be able to defend yourself everywhere. Standing up on the ground, you have to be effective in all the realms. Right. But still we have a lot of people that are pure specialists that do really well in mixed martial arts, because they're so good in one area, like Alex Pereira, who is the middleweight champion, light heavyweight champion, and now he's going up to heavyweight. He's going to be fighting at the White House card. Alex Pereira is one of the greatest kickboxers of all time. Right. He's a two division world champion and kick boxer. But his style is all kickboxing, but he just developed-- take down defense. You can do it all. You can do it all. But he doesn't submit anybody. If you're fighting him, you're going to get-- it's going to be a stand-up fight. Unless you could take him down, he's not going to try to take you down. He's going to try to fuck you up. He's going to try to knock you into another dimension. Thanks for the warning. I'll try to put point the guy's fight on the street. Yeah, he's terrible. What do you think I ever saw? Is there this video of John Jones on the street somewhere? And he bumped into-- he was talking. And he leaned on some guy's motorcycle. I think he might have been in Asia or something. The guy had no idea who he was. And he started screaming at him. Oh, no. And John said, I'm very, very sorry. And he turned around. He ran away like he was terrified. And it was obviously-- he wasn't in any danger. But it was so hilarious that this guy had no idea who he was picking a fight with. That's hilarious. It was a guy who has no ideas like flash before his eyes. But he took it well because he was like, you know, I don't have anything to prove. Yeah, John's not a type of guy that would do anything. Also, what a lawsuit. Oh, yeah. Your answer weapons. I mean, his whole body's a weapon. But most of those guys are really nice guys in real life. Is that right? Yeah, because they get all their aggression now. They don't have anything to prove. They're not the type of-- they know what they can do. They don't have to prove it to anybody. Well, you should come to Winnipeg. They have a fight coming up. I think it's in-- I think it's in April. It's in April. A UFC in Winnipeg. Yeah. I've avoided UFC in Canada. Well, come on up. I've avoided it just because of the government, just because of what was going on as a protest. I was like, this is so fucked. Well, we'll come back up and-- Well, if you win, I'll go up there. Well, we should. We should get you up before-- You can go Prime Minister. I promise I'll do all the UFC events that they have in Canada. We need you up in Canada to come do one of your comedy shows. And it would be great for me to-- I still love going up there. I still love going to Massie Hall. Yeah. I used to-- Toronto? Yeah. I love performing there. I did-- You used to do Montreal. And how old were you when you were in Montreal? Oh, I started. I think the first time I was up there, I was like 25. Such a beautiful city. I think it's gorgeous there. I love you. You can come back here. It's amazing. It's a beautiful province. Amazing food. Shout out to Joe B for one of my favorite restaurants in the world. It's a Montreal. Yeah, Montreal is a great place. And you should come out to the Prairies too. Go to the Calgary Stampede. I've heard that's awesome. Oh, it's amazing. I've been to Edmonton. I've been to Alberta. Yeah, I've performed in Edmonton a few times. And I've hunted in Alberta. Where? Well, my friends John and Jen Rivett, they have a-- They have a guide, I mean, the guide people up in northern Alberta. It's all like a black bear hunting. Yeah. So it's like-- There's a lot of great hunting. I don't hunt myself, but there's a ton of great hunting and a lot of hunters in Alberta. Oh, yeah. Well, there's talk about Alberta separating. That won't happen. What was that about? It won't happen. Some people are frustrated, but they-- You know, there's some legitimate frustrations, but at the end of the day Canada is going to be united. And I'm born and raised Alberta. And Alberta is a seriously patriotic country. Very patriotic. Yeah, they're great people, hard working. Some of the nicest people you ever-- They are great people in Alberta. They are a hardy people. It's cold up there. It is cold. It's a lot of survival. Exactly. You've got to be tough to survive the cold and get out of the car of a country like we have out of that cold weather on that big open land. But people just keep on going. And Alberta's got a real kind of rugged individualism. Yes. And people love their agriculture. It's great ranches in Alberta. Beautiful grasslands in Saskatchewan. Doesn't Brock Lesnar have a place up there? I didn't know that. I think Brock Lesnar really bought land in Alberta. Really? I don't think he owns a ranch up there. Actually, I had heard that from somebody. Yeah. I've never seen him fell in love with it. Well, he's a big hunter as well. Right. I think he fell in love with it up there. This is just so magnificent. It's so gorgeous. It's a great country. And the woods are so dense and beautiful. And you've got wolves and bears and moves and everything up there. It's amazing country. The Canadian Rockies are spectacular as well. They're a worldwide attraction. You go to Lake Louise. It looks like a tropical lake because it's all this run off from the mountain melt. And you think you were in the tropics because it's this turquoise green. That's where I grew up. I love Calgary. I love southern Alberta. That's really my home. And so you got to come to the Stampede. Greatest outdoor show on Earth. A lot of Texans go up for the Stampede because it's a rodeo. It's a huge rodeo. Yeah. People don't think cowboy Canada. They don't think of that. But yeah. Calgary, they've got some serious calories there. Oh, yeah. No, they really do. Yeah. Look, I love Canada. If you did your comedy show in Calgary, you'd get a massive turnout. Okay. Great. Think it over. I see. I was supposed to be up there before COVID. I was supposed to do a show up there for 420 for April 20th. I was going to do it in Vancouver. That's another great city. Every year I would do these 420 shows, like these, you know, 420s, the marijuana number. And Canada, now you guys have legal marijuana too. I'm in legal for 10 years. Which they should have in America. It's so ridiculous. They just recently decided to make it schedule three. Is it state by state? Yes. It's legal in the last days. But it's still not legal federally. It's goofy. If alcohol is legal, marijuana is far safer. It should be legal. It's ridiculous. It's also a personal freedom thing. Leave people alone. It's like no one's robbing banks, smoking weed, fucking killing neighbors. It's crazy. That's a personal choice. Yeah. It's not heroin. It's not opiates. It's not like, maybe you shouldn't do it if you have mental health problems, right? But there's a lot of people that just like take a pot, gummy and go to bed and it makes them sleep better. Leave them alone. Leave people alone. Let people have a glass of whiskey. Let people have a glass of wine with dinner. Leave them alone. Like stop climbing up with laws where you can impose your values and your morals and your judgments on other people. Let them have make their own personal look. If you want to eat a fucking cheeseburger, eat a cheeseburger. If you want to go and have five big Macs, you should be able to. I don't think you should do it. But I don't think there should be a law stopping you. And I think that should apply to a lot of things in life and we'd be a lot better option. Well, the bottom line is, if you cannot trust a man to govern himself, how can you trust him to govern for others? If you think that human nature is so flawed that people cannot make decisions for themselves, then how could you possibly trust human nature to make decisions for other people to impose decisions on their lives? And who watches the watchman? In other words, we're constantly told we need to be. We need to be kind of guided by these people from ivory towers. But who are these angels anyway? They're just human beings like everyone else. So when you give them more power and more, you give them the power to impose their will on people, then that ultimately gets abused. Yes. So even, you're right, even when somebody is doing something that I don't agree with, and I would think it would be better for all of us if they didn't do it. The mal that is done by giving me the power to impose my decision making on them is worse than the benefit of the human nature. benefit of trying to direct them towards a better decision. Well said. That's my philosophy. That's why I like you. Well, that's right. You make a lot of sense. It's pretty simple. I think all the best things in life are simple. We over complicate things. Government is way too complicated. I think we need to get back to this simplicity. The greatest speech in the English language was Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg address, 271 words. Einstein compressed mass and energy into a five character equation. Bruce Lee was an advocate of simplicity. Simplicity is a virtue. I think we have to get back to simplicity, especially in government. Simpler, clearer, easier to manage. That's the philosophical take I pursue. I appreciate that. Well, I think leaders have to have humility because the problem is that if you are an egomaniac and you're in power anywhere in the world, then you're going to want to just continually impose new rules and laws to make yourself bigger. Whereas if you believe in freedom, then you have to be able to say to yourself, "I don't know better for this other person." He knows better for him. It's hard, but politicians have to think that they have to trust the people. Nobody wants to have, he left people alone on their gravestone. They want to think, "Oh, he built this. He imposed that. He made this grand initiative that he imposed on the people in order to have a legacy." My legacy is just to let other people build their legacies in their own lives. I think the idea of forging a legacy based on controlling people and imposing your will is ludicrous. Exactly. The problem is history is littered with people like that. Absolutely. Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan. So many people that imposed their will and left a legacy, but is that good? I don't think it is. It's also their dead. This is how it works. It doesn't matter. Nobody walked by one of those magnificent tombs in Petra and said, "Well, I'd really like to be inside there." Exactly. And while you're alive is what's really significant and the most impactful thing. Like, do well. Do good for the people. And I think your message resonates with me. Thank you. And if I was a Canadian, I would vote for you 100%. Thank you for that. Well, it's a privilege to do this work. I consider it very humbling and I'm very proud to be Canadian and to take the message of Canada here to our American friends. Well, I'm glad you're here doing that. And I think this is going to have a big impact. I really hope it moves the needle up in Canada. Absolutely. And down here, we've got to get these tariffs gone. Get the tariffs gone. Well, let's work it out. Right on. And if you win, I'm coming up there. I promise. Well, we're going to try to get you up there earlier. I'm going to keep working on you. And you look at that maple leaf on your new kettlebell every day. Eventually, we're going to work subliminally into your subconscious and get you up. Well, look, like I said, you don't have to sell me on Canada. Right on. I love that gift. So thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Thank you for being here. Thank you. It was awesome. How are we going? Thank you. Thank you. Bye. [MUSIC PLAYING]