Ep. #743: Andrew Huberman, Jonathan Swan, James Kirchick

Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO late night series Real Time with Bill Maugh. [Music] Thank you. I can see you're very happy today. Yes, I agree. Great news. Trump is back on TV. Did you see what happened this week? First, you got very mad at the president through CNN, MSNOW, and Politico, out of the White House. And then all the other networks in solidarity, including Fox News. This is pretty interesting. In solidarity, I said, "Well, we're not going to cover him at all, either." So no one was covering him, and then a judge saved Trump's ass from the worst fate he could have, which is not being covered. And made them go back, and now the press is back at the White House, and Trump was like, "Fine, first amendment, whatever, you got me." "You got back in there and report on me so I can sue you." But they didn't really take this lying down at the White House. The White House has reduced a new app called Trump TV, which countries that are, shall we say, not democracies would call state TV. Really? So we have that now. State TV are top stories. Tonight, gas prices are down, and Iran is begging for a deal. Speaking of State TV, a guy who does it really well. President-G of China, he was here all week. Have you seen that? Oh, yes, he came in, landed on a big, beautiful new plane. Trump went out and gritty. Is this for me? Oh, oh, my God. They have, of course, had a big banquet. G didn't eat much. He was very full from eating our lunch. This should have been the AI summit, because here, finally, we had all in one room the two most powerful leaders in the world, with AI, G, and Trump. Plus, at the dinner, Sam Altman, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, hung from the video, all these people, Tim Cook, head of Apple, sat next to China's first lady. She said to him, "How's the iPhone business?" He said, "It's good. It'd be better if you could make the kids work faster." The problem with these summits, with Trump and Jeff, is it me or do they have them like every two weeks? I feel like they're always with each other, and Trump thinks that G could give a fuck about being his friend. So it's all personal. Trump did everything he could to show him around. He showed him the new spot where the limo drops people off. That's been improved. Really, I'm not making this up. Showed him a new helipad, the ballroom. Does he know that China builds like entire cities in a week? And he's showing him the new driveway. It's like showing Gordon Ramsay how to reheat pizza, you know? So, you know, it just seems like this administration is very into redecorating, redecorating or annihilating. I've said it before, it's the most macho and the gayest administration ever. And the latest, the latest redecoration obsession is Trump is like, "We need an arch, yesterday." Fuck all the cities in the world have an arch. I didn't know that. Oh, okay, yeah, great. I mean, you know, I could Paris, yes, Berlin, and St. Louis, okay, we're looking bad over here without an arch. Fucking Biden let us go archeless for years. Luckily, my good friend President G is an understanding man. He accepts that we don't have an arch, because the not one has one is criminal. And if anybody knows about an arch criminal, it's Donald Trump. My kid, it's always this lovely little kid. So, that is our agenda here in America, arch annihilate. He was at the UN, Trump, the UN met this week, and he was there before the she-thing, and he talked about annihilating Iran again, and then he met with Mondami. This is the third time he's met Mondami. Wow, went over to Gracie Mansion, so that was his week. She, Mondami, for a guy who hates communists, he likes hanging out with them. I'll tell you that. But the war in Iran is really dragging down his approval rating. I mean, he's even losing the people who used to be his, the bros. You know, the Latinos who voted for him and bigger numbers last time. There's only one demographic now that thinks the war is going well. Pedestrians, they may love it, because. Gas, I got to tell you, it's pretty expensive gas. Here in LA, they gave up on putting the numbers on the sign. It just has market price. I was at the gas station there. I saw a guy put the thing in the tank. It was just a little drop at the end, and he took it and he rubbed it on his gun. All right, we got a great show. We have Jonathan Smarlin, who is in structure. The first stop, he is the host of the Hibirman Lab Podcast, an author of the new number one bestselling book, "Crotacles." An operating manual for the human body. Andrew Hibirman, Andrew. There he is. Oh, yeah. Did you see you? Okay. So, you have a new book out. What's that like? It's number one? It is. It was number one New York Times bestselling. Oh, fantastic. You call it a manual. Yes. And you speak out. I love this part. You speak out against biohacking, because I see that always when you're scrolling through stuff. Everything is a hack. And you talk about how hacks are really. Well, they come from hacks, don't they? And they're really kind of bullshit. Yeah, it's like taking a paperclip to fix a pair of glasses. It's a temporary solution. What's in the book are tools that are based on scientific mechanisms that exist in all of us, from birth until we die, that you can tap into. Specific ways of breathing, using access to sunlight at specific times, learning to get better at learning, learning how to increase focus, and on and on, mitigate stress. And all of those are anchored in real known physiological mechanisms. So there's no mystery to them. And I don't claim ownership of any of them, but I share them with the readers, and then they can use them if they like. How many of them may have to do to be really healthy? I mean, I feel like I don't want to make this all about me, but. You seem like you're doing it really well. Yeah. Well, I mean, like the sun went. I've been doing a lot of this stuff before it was cool. You know, I've been talking about all this alternative stuff for years. People thought it was crazy. Now it seems a lot more mainstream, but I mean, like the sun went, I get up at the crack of known. You know, doesn't mean I'm less productive. I'm just productive at different times of the day, but that's not good, right? Well, regardless of when somebody wakes up, could be 5 a.m., could be 10, could be noon. Getting some sunlight in your eyes in the first 30 to 60 minutes after you wake up is a great idea, because it just sets in motion this huge wavefront of molecules in the brain and body that make you more alert, more alert and calm, better able to focus. That's the best for your immune system throughout the day, and most importantly, it sets you up so that 14 to 16 hours later, you get tired and you can go to sleep more easily. So it sets a timer. So if you start that timer at noon, what time do you go to sleep, though? Well, let's. I mean, I believe in getting the right amount of sleep. I mean, sometimes you have to be. I sometimes have to be in bed 10 hours to get 8 hours of sleep. I don't even get 8. You know, 7.5 or something like that is that's a good night. But again, I'm just as it doesn't matter because the hippies have always told me that it matters when you sleep. That like the healing takes place between 10 and 2 a.m. or something like that. You know, I'm not even asleep. - Yeah, that's nonsense. - Oh, good. - So the, um, fantastic. The truth is, there are these so-called chronotypes. I talk about this in the book and how you can, people can figure out there. Some people feel best going to sleep late, waking up later. Some people waking up early, going to bed earlier. And you can shift. It does change across the lifespan. But the truth is, most people find that. And if they can manage it with their work and other responsibilities, if you can adhere to your chronotype as we say, that is going to be best for your health. So really to bed early to rise is great for early risers, who want to be early risers. Otherwise, change it up. But that light in the first hour is ideally for sunlight. That's a real thing, regardless of when you wake up. - I can do that. I remember when COVID hit, right before they took us off the air because of, oh, you know, it was so dangerous. But I said, you know, the "S" is, just take care of your "S" is sugar, cut down on sugar. Sun, get sun, stress, sleep. Of course, we did the opposite on all of them. Everything we did the opposite, people did. I mean, Gavin Newsom said last week, you know, it was insane to close the beaches out here. And in hindsight, well, some of the people were saying in present day time, go to the beach, that it was the beach, sunshine, fresh air. I feel like COVID and how we treated it may have turned people more to like our alternative way of thinking about things. You think that's true? - Yeah, I think it's true. And I think it made what used to be called alternative or just Eastern or niche mainstream. I mean, the reason I started the podcast, which of course I did before the book, was because during the pandemic, there was a lot of discussion about vaccines and that was the business of other people to handle. I decided to focus on the problems that I did not see the NIMH or anyone else doing good messaging about, and that's how to manage your stress, how to keep your rhythms, your biological rhythms intact so that you could be at your best mood, have your immune system functioning at its best, and social connection, nutrition, exercise, how to do that under the conditions of the lockdowns, et cetera. That was the mission of the podcast when I launched it, and eventually became a bunch of other things in this book. But indeed, all the things you describe are crucial for the immune system and for just general well-being. Most of the things that you would do for a dog or a cat, or even for a fish tank, like turn the lights on in the morning, turn them off at night, make sure it's a good ecosystem. Most people don't think about doing that for themselves, but we need to control our own ecosystem as much as we can to be at our best health. And that's not hippy biology, right? That's-- - Oh no, you are not a hippy biologist. - No, I'm definitely not. - You're a real one. - I'm not right. - Right, that's, I mean, that's just how our brain and body work. These rhythms of day and night and the sun, of course, is what anchors us to that is vital. If anything, one message that people could really take from this conversation is you want the brightest possible days, don't get sunburned, but have the brightest possible days whenever they may start for you. And you want the darkest possible nights that you can manage with your job and schedule. Those two things alone have been shown in studies with huge numbers of subjects to greatly benefit mental and physical health of all kinds. - Okay, so do we play a little lightning around here since we don't have all that much time? - I know it's hard for you because you have great things to say. - And I'm not known for being succinct. - No, I know, but just give me like the skinny on like a few things that I like, I want to know because you go into a lot in this book. You know, what's a real thing and what sort of a trend? - Okay. - Intermittent and fasting. - Real thing, but just lower in calories will do it too, but it really helps certain people control their caloric intake. Meaning some people is just easier to not eat the croissant at all than to try and eat half. - Right, so that intimate and fasting meaning like you eat within an eight hour window of the day. - Yeah, like 11 a.m. too, as 7 p.m. The problem is most people don't stick to it or they find that they stack everything towards a late meal and then it can disrupt their sleep. But it can work as a tool for caloric restriction but there are other tools like smaller meals throughout the day or you know, just a standard three meal a day thing. - Peptides. Yeah, I hear a lot about peptides. My question is, what is a fucking peptide? (audience laughing) Does I hear it? (audience clapping) Well, there is a category specifically of fucking peptides, but really, there is actually, there are some that are FDA approved for treating hyposexuality. - I mean women. - Yes. - And then we're-- - How about-- - Would you want to treat it? - Well, there's it. (audience laughing) But let's talk about the most common peptides. So the ones that most people are familiar with are the GLPs, right, that are for weight loss. - Those are peptides. A peptide is a string of amino acids that makes up basically proteins in our body. - Why is it controversial? - Like, what is the downside? I've heard that, you know, it can do good things but it also could trigger bad things in your body. - The GLPs. Okay, so in rapid-fire format. So the GLPs have been shown to be very successful for inducing weight loss. They do have side effects at the recommended dosages. Many people are starting to micro-dose them on their own accord, a term borrowed from the psychedelic community. So taking much smaller dosages, same effects, lesser side effects and costing less. There are people who are reporting apathy but as a result of taking the GLPs at the recommended dosages, but not everyone, and some people have reduced alcohol craving when they take them, so that could be good for most people, perhaps. The other issue with the GLPs is that unless people are doing resistance training to keep muscle, there can be robust muscle loss, which will then lower metabolism if they come off the GLPs, then they have to go back on. Now they have a smaller but fatter body with a lower metabolism and the cycle can contain it. - But peptides themselves, all of them, and there's other ones. There was one called MK-377. - Then there's a huge category. - What is that? - So MK, so they, one you're referring to and a bunch of similar ones are what are called growth hormones to keep the dogs. They stimulate the release of growth hormone in sleep, which can lend itself to bodily repair, fat loss and maintaining your building muscle. Perhaps some other benefits, but increasing growth hormone can be problematic over time. It can lead to some problems with blood sugar regulation, if these things are used too much in the wrong instance, and there are a bunch of other. - Can they give you cancer? Can they give you cancer in your body? Can they make that grow too? - In theory, they could accelerate the growth of cancers that already exist. - That's all I mean. - But some of those are FDA-approved, but then there's another category. - That means. - Which are, well, yeah, so that's interesting too, right? - Yeah, as a consequence of the pandemic, now FDA-approved and the CDC says exactly. - I always felt that. - Yeah, so a lot of people feel that way. - Okay. - So, and then there's a final category, which are the peptides for which you hear a lot, like BPC157, for which there's a lot of data in animals, showing that it can accelerate wound healing, reduce inflammation, but for which there's essentially zero formal data in humans, but you now have millions of people saying that it helped them get over their shoulder, their knee injury more quickly. People are taking these things like crazy, because it's kind of the wild rest, west right now. Yes, most of these come from China. It will be a great thing when these are manufactured in the United States under practices, where we know that they are sterile, that what's labeled as being in the bottle is actually what's in the bottle. I think we're going to get there soon. Meanwhile, the GLPs are coming off patent, so the new one coming out from Eli Lilly, I have no relationship to Eli Lilly, is this red at true tide, which is a GLP plus some other things that led to 30% reduction in weight in the trials. This is going to be a trillion dollar drug, and there's a lot going on politically to try and make sure that that patent is protected. - A million dollar drug. - And as a consequence, the compounding pharmacies that allow for the distribution of peptides at lesser cost, those are getting, they're under some pressure legally. So this is a big deal, right? It's all about medical freedom. Should you be allowed to take peptides if you want, even if there are no human data? - Okay. - I have my thoughts, but some people say no, some people say yes, I say yes, but only if people are aware of the risks, so knowing the risks is really important. - And you got to answer this one quickly. We want to talk about this bar this week on the panel, you know, if you'll get on that, that where the people were all wearing masks. - What bar is this? - Let's watch the show and you'll see. (audience laughs) It's a big controversy this week, but it's not the only place we've seen people wearing bars, all these DSA meetings. I see pictures of people on the street. What is your take on why people, five years after a pandemic? You know, you studied the human brain. What is going on with people who, like, want to wear the mask and think they need to, this level of paranoia at a place where it's so inappropriate? - I mean, if they're wearing it for reasons related to fear of infection. - They're not. - Okay. - Some of them are, but most of them are not. It's a political statement. - Yeah. I mean, I was thinking a lot about this recently. I think it relates to that Banksy painting. You know, the mask with the, you know, the protester. I mean, I think it's a political statement, right? - Okay. - And I think there's also, when people wear masks, I often think, you know, they have this, I don't wanna call it an advantage, but they have a vantage point where they can see you, but you can't really see them. So it's also a way of, you know, remaining anonymous. It's kind of like being online. You see a lot of people saying a lot of things from the mask. - Right. - And now, we should ask ourselves, though, why do they feel they need to do this? And I don't know. I would let, I know you in question. - Yeah, I'm gonna get to the bottom of it. - All right, great. - Always great to see you. - All right, I'll see you soon, Andrew. - Thank you. All right, let's meet on panel. (upbeat music) Hey. (upbeat music) Gentlemen, how you doing? Okay, he's a White House correspondent for The New York Times. I get you're back on the job. Now, this week, and co-author of the number one, bestselling regime change inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump, Jonathan Swan. (audience cheering) How do you think it's going to be? We're right here for the Atlantic and author of Secret City, The Hidden History of Gay Washington, James Karczyk. Jamie, good to see you back there. (audience cheering) All right. Can I start with the UN? Because this is the UN week. I look for it to it every year. It's always this time of year in September, the weather's nice, you know. And New Yorkers love it, but the parking situation. I'm sure with all the diplomats in town. But it's just, I find it's weird. And I'm glad there is a UN. But my gosh, like, we bombed Iran's entire leadership. And then their president is in the same room with Trump. It's just weird, like Hitler and FDR. And they're like, also, we're in the same room during World War II. I mean, that's when Hitler was bad. But, (audience laughing) and also Xi comes here. And he's Iran's ally, which contributed to killing American troops. And yet, he gets paraded around, like they're the best friends. And it's just weird that we have the two things going on at once. I don't know if this is-- - This is an unusual president who seems to base our foreign policy mostly on his own personal relationships. And that's why he behaves like old buddies when he's meeting with the dictator of North Korea, okay? Or Xi. And he treats the Danes, by the way, who were like the only country in Europe to save their Jews, had the most casualties for capita in Afghanistan, are amazing allies of the United States and have been for a very long time. He treats them like they're the enemy by talking about taking Greenland. So it's just insane. I don't know how to describe it. It's been like this for the past 10 years. - Yeah, I mean, John, you wrote the book on them. I don't know why you've seen quiet. (audience laughing) No one has played Trump better than Xi Jinping. I've had innumerable conversations with European diplomats and they're always talking about how do you play Trump? How do you work Trump? And it's the most preposterous conversation. Do you suck up to him? Do you do this? Do you give him a land? And the answer is, none of that stuff actually works. The only thing that works is raw power. And what Xi Jinping did last year, he didn't suck up to Trump. He never even seen him smile. What he did was Trump declared a trade war with the whole world. A whole bunch of countries start trying to negotiate with him pretty please, pretty please. Xi Jinping was prepared. He had the rare earths, he had the magnets, and he essentially flipped him the bird. Trump got very worried about it and then he sent Scott Besson, the Treasury Secretary to Geneva, to organize a datont. Ever since then, he's been in very dovish mode with China. Doesn't want to upset anything. And the problem for small and middle powers, like Jamie's talking about, if you're Denmark, whatever, you don't have the leverage to do any of that. So the only, it's a collective action problem. The only way to deal with Trump is working together as a whole. Yeah, I don't think Xi wants to make this trip, or walk around and look at the declaration of independence. In the auto-pan, Biden's auto-pan. He's very proud to show him that. But he does it because he understands. It's great for him, because Trump really thinks that it, a personal relationship with Xi matters. There was a scene in Euphoria. Did you watch Euphoria, where the stripper has a snake, that she sleeps with, and she's like, oh, it's so great, because you know, it cuddles around me at night. And the guy says, it's not cuddling. It's sizing up for when it eats you. [ Laughter and applause ] Can you guess who the snake is? Who the stripper is in this analogy? Okay, the other one is Netanyahu, is it the UN yesterday? He said, "Israeli genocide in Gaza?" Is the biggest lie of the century? This is the exact point I was trying to make a couple of years weeks ago on this show. I feel like it is the central point. Obviously, then, Mandami said the speech was baseless lies meant to sanitize his genocide against Palestinians. Either it is a genocide, or it's not. It is a word in the English language. We can define it. We've had seen genocides before. To me, it is plainly not a genocide. It is a counterattack against an attack in a war that's been going on since 1948 in different forms. And the way -- the fact that they insist on using this word, to me -- that's what I was trying to say -- a couple of years ago -- is the essential part of it, because when you -- if you get people saying that a certain group of people have committed genocide, then all gloves are off about how much you are allowed to hate them. And I think this is behind all the anti-Semitism going on in the world. So let's just get it on the table here -- Genocide or not? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. Look, if it's a genocide, it would have been the first genocide where Israel vaccinated -- where the country committing the genocide, vaccinated the population, where they sent them two million tons of food. Israel could commit a genocide -- Yeah, yeah. -- in a week, probably. They haven't done that, because they have no intent to do it. And the intent is what matters when it comes to genocide. So I agree with Netanyahu and you. It really is the biggest lie of the 21st century. And I'm telling you, I'm predicting right now, it will be a question on the 2028 Democratic debate stage. Raise your hands -- Right. -- Raise your hands if you think Israel committed a genocide. Well, it's not just a question on the debate stage. There was Representative Haley Stevenchys from Michigan. This week was followed to her car. This goes on all the time. I showed her tape, but some other, the guy, Brad Wiener, who's Brad Scott Wiener was running for Nancy Pelosi, and a crowd gets around him and say it, say it. You have to say the word. The -- this woman surrounded her and said, "Just say it," and she said, "You see what the gallows." Is what -- yeah? No, I was just going to say, the interesting thing is that there were all these other litmus tests that existed in 2020. And you see politicians, I peep booted edge, took out. He had his pronouns on his social media account. He got rid of them. Right. So there's actually an effort to get away from what AOC has called "Work One." But the new litmus test is Gaza and genocide. That's replaced a lot of these old litmus tests. But this hate -- and this brings me to this bar that if you're wondering, we're going to do the bar now. It's called the last ditch bar. And this kind of thing will see with the gallows. These kind of talk that whenever somebody isn't exactly on your page that comes out at the mouths of these people, and it does on the right, too. But it never used to be this way on the left, not to my memory. So, okay, here's what's going on at the last ditch bar. It's in Massachusetts. It's a very woke bar, which is fine. Their mission statement for dikes, transsexuals, transsexuals, gender freaks, workers, and friends. I live the way workers and friends are fourth and fifth on the list, which is fine. I've been called to freak myself, all right? I'm all for freaks. But economically, it wasn't working, because even though there was a coverage charge, if you couldn't pay, they wouldn't make you pay. Homeless, they were welcome in there. Not the cops, but the homeless. But also, it was masked, as far as I was asking the doc about this. You had to have a mask. So, because they're losing money, one of the owners was living in her truck. They said, "Okay, one night a week. Let's make it Saturday night. Maybe we can pay the bills and keep the staff paid. If we just have one night a week, where it's mask optional. And, of course, the tolerant left did what they always do. It became very intolerant and left." And statements like, "People like you killed disabled people in the name of your own leisure and convenience. And I hope your venue gets firebomb." This is what I'm talking about. This level of hatred that is out there. What is your take? This is one of the reasons I don't frequent lesbian bars. [LAUGHTER] But, let's turn to lesbian. It's not justice. More importantly, I think the mask has become, for a certain segment of the left, their version of the MAGA hat. It really is. Yeah. Exactly that. But, this story, as much as we want to make fun of it, and there's plenty to make fun of, it actually speaks to a growing divide between gay and lesbian people and queer people, okay? To be gay or lesbian is a sexual orientation. That's it. To be queer is to embrace a whole political orientation. There are straight people who identify as queer. It's about deconstructing gender, which is how you get in that story, a lesbian who uses he/him pronouns. Explain that to me. How does that work? How does a lesbian use he/him pronouns? And-- Yeah, how it does? And so, the example of this, you mentioned Scott Weiner. What was also said to Scott Weiner-- Who's gay? --who's gay and very left-wing. Even after he started using the word genocide, it wasn't enough. And what did they scream at him in the park in that video? Since you supported Israel, you're no longer queer. Right. And that is-- You know what? I appreciate the honesty of that sentence, because that's what it means to be a queer. To be a queer is to support the Palestinians over Israel, which as a gay person makes, of course, no sense, right? And there was a poll done two years ago, and it was a poll of the LGBT community. Who identifies as what within the LGBT community? About 15% identify as lesbians. About 21% identify as gay. 56% identify as bisexual. sexual, that's a subject for another show. Or after the show. Or after the show. [LAUGHTER] But 0.5%, 0.5% of LGBT people identify as queer. So why are we allowing this 0.5% of the community to speak for all of us and use this word, which, by the way, older gay men that I know, over the age of 50, this was the last word that they heard before getting their headbashed in. OK, so it's actually very traumatizing for gay men of a certain generation. You hear queer. To hear the word queer, absolutely. But they were called. And it's actually having all this queer trans extremism is having a real impact. I mean, support for gay marriage has started going down. It started going down in 2002. Now, I don't think that's because millions of Americans just woke up one morning and said, oh, we're homophobic now. We supported gay marriage, we're now homophobic. I think it's a backlash to this queer extremism. And as a gay man, that's something I really worry about, frankly. The interesting thing that's happening is you see something like this. And then there's this other element of the Democratic politics, which is, I don't know if you saw the story this week. There's the Democratic Senate candidate in Alaska, Mary Peltola. So some of my colleagues reported she was using homophobic slurs, calling people retards, using the word retarded. That would have got her canceled in 2020, 2019. The party's rallied around her. So I can't really make sense of where the line is anymore or what gets you canceled. You have these cross currents. But the one issue, as you said before, seems to be Gaza. That seems to be the one thing where they've oriented themselves around a litmus test. Gaza is woke to 0.0. It's Gaza. Because no one's-- they're all-- it's very interesting. It's not right to say that they're talking about mask mandate. Like, you don't hear candidates say, you know, mask mandates and defund the police. They're actually running away from all that stuff. It's completely oriented itself around. Oh, I don't think they're running away. I think they're running-- 100% like look at El Sayed, Mam Dhani. They're distancing themselves from defund the police from the stuff they said previously. Try it. It's the Israel issue, that's the new litmus test. All right. Well, that's not even the biggest story of the week. The biggest story of the week is that we know now that there is time travel. I don't know if you-- [LAUGHTER] What? There is an old painting called Mr. Pension and the Settling of Springfield. If you would want to show it now, please. Yes, this is a venerable old page. Springfield, Massachusetts. One of the first colonies in the new world, Massachusetts, Bay Colony, very, very esteemed. And if you look closely, one of the Indians there is holding what looks to be a cell phone. You see that? And so a lot of the internet thinks this is proof that there is time travel. It does look like a cell phone. I'm not going to lie. But anyway, whether you believe that or not, we got some of the things that are on that cell phone. Would you like to see-- [APPLAUSE] All right. For example, seven signs. He's just not that intervene. This pilgrim ate nothing but corn for 30 days. Then this happened. 10 things that were totally normal in the 1620s that would get you canceled today. Smith, the haunt is updated. John Smith and Pocahontas seen arguing in canoe. And we have the first sketches. Massachusetts mother who killed children to temporarily be which. The surefire smallpox cure, your medicine man, won't tell you about. Why many couples are waiting till 15 to get married? And it will kill us all in four years. It's the fear over the apocas overblown. [APPLAUSE] All right, let's talk about Trump because that's your book. It reads like a novel, by the way. Thank you. Really great read. And I've said this before on this show many times. I think this is the end. It's really coming. I think it's really coming. I mean, I feel like the president has finally given the Ick to people in a way. How he escaped it for as long as he did is amazing. When you think about the things that a guy could never do if they weren't him, that would give people the Ick. McCain is not a war hero. Grabbing pussies, you know, I mean, it's a pretty bad clapping for that. Yeah, grabbing pussies. But if you've missed some of this stuff, I just tell-- oh, zombie lies. I hate zombie lies. The zombie lie is-- Trump is indomitable. No, keep up, people, keep up. It's really going in the other direction. I mean, the Supreme Court, he talked about them last week. These are not the people I interviewed. By the way, you're not supposed to interview them where they're the president. But because they wrote it against them with his mail and balloting, here's just some other stuff. Quick stuff. Byron Donald's good friend of our show, Real Big Trumper, took Trump endorsed off his website. Maria Alvira Salazar in Florida. These are all Republican. These are all things coming from Republicans. She says we feel betrayed. Is running ads against him on the immigration issue. There's a Republican who wants to impeach Pete Hague set. There are four Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa Republicans coming out to end the war and have Congress demand that he end the war. There are Republicans now wanting to investigate Don Jr.'s wedding, merely because it was financed by Putin's good friend. [ Cheers and applause ] Tucker Carlson is asking for the 25th Amendment. Remember that one that says you couldn't remove a president if he's not so? That, you know, Mike Pence must be like, "Oh, we're doing this now, huh?" And, you know, the bros, his biggest fans, they feel betrayed. They don't like the war. They don't like the Epstein thing. We didn't get the full story on that. The tariffs, even the maha people, the make America healthy again people feel they didn't get what they asked for. You know, and the corruption, you know, everybody hates the boss's son. So that thing with the wedding financed by the Russians and you get your own island for three days, this kind of shit, it's just not flying. So, John, what does your take here now that you -- I mean, how long has your book been out and how much has changed since it came out? It's changed profoundly. I mean, we make the case, and I think it's indisputable, that last year, 2025, Trump controlled his own party in Congress like no president in American history. Right. He got senators. There were senators who thought that Pete Hegseth was grossly unfit, grossly. And they still voted for him because they were scared of Trump. And now you have all the things you just read out. What's really interesting to me is whatever you think about Donald Trump, historically, he's always had a pretty good radar for staying on the right side of populist issues. He's always -- he really knows he's got a fingertip feel for it. And you're seeing him now on the wrong side of some really big populist issues like, you know, data centers, the public hates data centers. They hate them. It's visceral. We talk to Republican strategists. The polling is so upside down on that issue. It's becoming a major, major source of anxiety. It's just AI in general. And when you listen to Trump, he sounds like Jensen Huang. He sounds like Mark Zuckerberg, full speed ahead. You know, the Iran war, again, whatever you think about the politics and the policy, he is on the wrong side of that now. The public is against that war. The issues that he ran on, gas prices, cost of living. He's on the wrong side of that. And a lot of Republicans, I talk to, don't know how he gets out of this. You know, I understand why people think he's super, superhuman because he's shown us so many times before that the physical, political physics don't apply to him. But it's hard to see now. When things are going good, I mean, we see this in other countries. We see this in communist China. It was communist. But like, as long as you're giving the people a good economy, you can get away with a lot. I mean, people, it's not like Trump fans didn't know he was crazy. It was like, OK, he's crazy, but he's our crazy. And my stock market numbers are up, that kind of stuff. When the money goes, the one thing you can't lie to people about is money. They know how much money is in their wallet. And you cannot bob your way through that one. And I feel like that's where he is now. The credibility is just shot. 27% approval he has on the economy. That was always his best issue. Always, always his best issue. 27%. It means a lot of Republicans have decided that he's bad for the economy. Are you surprised that Fox News joined the boycott earlier this week when he threw those three? Yeah. And he threw, Politico was one of them? Yes. Politico even left wing? No. Very odd. I don't know why he threw it. It's odd that he threw them out. It was, yeah. I mean, I wasn't surprised in January. I know CNN, MSNBC, he's always barking at them, but okay. See, through them, then MSNBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox News joined in and said, you know what, we're part of this gang, not part of his gang. And then we're all in solidarity. That's not unusual. I mean, during the Obama administration, I remember there was some situation where they were, they didn't take them out, but they excluded them from some sort of precedent. They did. And all the other networks stood in solidarity with Fox. And so I think on these basics sort of press freedom issues, you will see the networks and the media outlets, the major ones, right of center, left of center, they will stick together. And what about Trump TV? What, is that legal? I mean, can we, I mean, I was saying it's state TV. I think you kind of summed it up pretty well, actually, in your monologue. Yeah. And what goes on, you know, is it like infomercials? Yeah, it's a bit of a mystery to me as well. I don't know how that works. But you have said before that he answers more questions than Biden did. There's no question, obviously. I mean, the paradox with Trump is it's two things are true. He, every reporter in Washington has his cell phone. I have his cell phone. I'm sure Jamie does. I don't, actually. If we called him now, he would probably pick up, okay? It's also true that two months ago, my colleagues reported a story about Air Force One and the Katari jet and security concerns. And 48 hours later, FBI agents showed up on their front doorsteps and served them subpoenas. And the colleague at the Washington Post, the FBI, went through her home, seized her electronic devices. This stuff's not normal. So, I don't want to be both sides of it. But during the Obama administration, they tapped, they tapped the AP Bureau's phones. That's true. And the phones of AP reporters, they tapped their phones. And they named James Rosen, a Fox News journalist, as an unindicted co-conspirator in a leak case. So, you never get me to defend Obama. And they subpoena James Rosen, your colleague. Obama was horrendous stuff. You never get me to defend him. But, I mean, I look this up about, but freezing out one, yeah, they did it with Fox News. Josh Ernest, this is, he was in the Obama's, he admitted it. He said, the White House has demonstrated our willingness to exclude Fox News from news-making interviews. And he did done. She was also in the Obama's. He said, we're going to treat them the way we treat and opponent. This is exactly what, you know, this is what I always say about this country. Everybody's like, you know, this is the worst thing in the world except when we do it. And then it's always perfectly okay. But it's not actually the same. No, it's not the same. Because he is not letting them in the door. But I'm actually more concerned, like the way a leak investigation is supposed to work is going to the journalists for the subpoenas is the last resort. This was the first resort. You send the FBI to the doorstep after 48 hours. That's just intimidation. It's different. It is different. I feel like the pattern is the Democrats do something. And then Republicans use it as an excuse to do it triply bad. Yeah. And say, well, come on, your guy did it. I mean, was Biden a little corrupt? A little. Not like Trump. But not like Trump. But not like selling mean coins. And that kind of shit. Yeah. Okay. My last issue. Have you seen the Klan shoes? Yes, I have. Okay. This is an ad. Show the ad, please. I mean, this is, I don't know what the fuck this is. This is a Nike ad. And I would normally say, and of course, people immediately said, this looks like a Klanzman and somebody who was lynched. And I said, well, this is, you know, a Nike ad. Why would they do that? And show it again. Yeah, it looks like a Klanzman and something. Like I don't think they did it on purpose. And normally I would say, oh, wow, the woke. They're always just barking at anything they can. But like, my take on this is not that Nike would try to do that. No. What, what could they possibly have? Even if they were racist and they're not. There are a bunch of people in Seattle in 2026. Okay. Stupid. How, people are just fucking stupid. It puts me in mind of the, whoever the executive was at Red Lobster who came up with the idea of endless shrimp. And then Hank rupting the company like, did you not think endless shrimp might be a problem? Wait, it's Converse. Not Nike. Oh, okay. Sorry. I don't want to get Nike. It's very important. Very important. Converse. But whatever it is, they were shoe company. They sell a lot of shoes to a lot of people, including a lot of black people. What, what, what is, who has this meeting of 20 people? And not one of them. That's crazy. I don't know. It goes, you know, I suspect. I don't know. I think there might be something. No, nobody, nobody went around the room. What is that? Is that just, you know, intimidation? Like, I don't want to be the one to speak up. Well, maybe the boss's son designed that ad, right? And no one wants to tell the boss that his son is a fucking idiot, right? So you ended up with something like that. Oh, it's a theory. So, I saw on the news today that El Sayed and Michigan says he would do my show, even though he doesn't like the way I talk about people like him. It's not people like you. I would love to have you on, sir, by the way. And I hope we can make that happen. I talk about Islam. It's, it's never personal and it's never about race. It's about ideas. Religion is an opinion. That's all religion is. A group of thoughts that form an opinion of something. I have different views on what, you know, how women should be treated and things like that that we will discuss. I hope I hope you will accept our invitation. Alright, time for New Rule. Okay, New Rule, clickbait headline writers and really must try and find the tiniest shred of dignity. This one, one wrote about Taylor Swift's surprising family nickname, which turned out to be that her niece's call her Aunt Taylor. You see the problem here to be surprising. Something unexpected has to happen. It's like a story. The shocking thing Taylor and Travis did on their wedding night and you click and find out they fucked and fell asleep. New Rule, the competitors at the World Gurning Championships, where you're judged on your ability to contort your face into something rotesque. Must be congratulated, you gave it your all, but this year's winner is, once again, Madonna. New Rule, don't ask me to read your book. I have to read books for work. The last thing I want to do when I get home is sit down and dive into your 388 pages of self-published bullshit. So when you ask, did you read my book yet? The answer is always going to be the same. No, I haven't had time, but my dog devoured it. New Rule, laughing cow cheese, has to explain why the cow doesn't look happy anymore. And what's with the message we need to talk? We need to talk. Oh, no, mommy. Are you in daddy fighting? Has he found someone else? It's that land of Lake's whore, isn't it? I knew it. She's always on her knees. New Rule, we have to do something about sinkholes. Every week there's a story about a sinkhole somewhere, like this week's report of a 47-year-old Long Island woman who had to be rescued after disappearing into a massive one in her backyard. Luckily, she'll be fine. As for her husband, back to the drawing board. And finally, New Rule, it's not a crime when people from opposing parties work together for the good of the American people. And it shouldn't be a scandal if they talk to each other. Democratic House leader Akeem Jeffries recently met with Jared Kushner, and as often happens, he was treated as a collaborator. Yeah, that's what Democratic government is. Collaboration, but bipartisanship is such a dirty concept now that we can only practice it in secret, like how Republicans do with homosexuality. I know it's hard to believe, but we used to actually celebrate it. Democrats and Republicans would sign bills together, all smiles, and then crow about the victory in how working together made it happen. They'd use dozens of pens to sign the bill so they could hand them to each other, and then they'd say, "We disagreed on plenty, but today America won." Now, if you handed a pen to someone from from the other part. They take it and stab you in the neck like Joe Pesci and Kissimino. (audience laughing and clapping) This is what government used to look like. Here's what it looks like now. Meeting with the other side, but having to hide your face behind office supplies. Can anyone really imagine Mike Johnson and Hakeem Jeffery's clasping hands today? Boo, get a room, Pussies. How dare you come together in a place called Congress? (audience laughing) Congress says a 16% favorability ranking. And one reason is, even when they do something good, no one's bragging about it on the campaign trail. Because working with the other side is sus. Compromise? That's for assholes, real leaders, real leaders fight. That's how we're going to fight. I will fight for you. Yet I'll get what you don't fight for. You always fight. Fight like hell. Fight, fight, fight. Are you ready to fight? (audience laughing) Hoke fight. (audience laughing and clapping) Good news stories get buried because they're tainted by cooperation. Every issue is like that. Take drugs. I know I do. (audience laughing) Well, I've never hidden the fact that I like drugs and I've smoked my share of wheat. And your share. (audience laughing and clapping) And your. (audience laughing) And I will admit, the weed is stronger these days. I just found out, the new TV show I've been enjoying lately is actually Roku City. (audience laughing) (audience clapping) But here's what's crazy. The progress we've made in the last few years in both street drugs and prescription drugs is truly phenomenal and no one's talking about it. Deaths involving fentanyl are down 55% from their peak. Cocaine down 37%. Heroin 89%. It has been a 34% decrease in meth-related deaths, which has led to a 64% increase in teeth. (audience laughing and clapping) What happened? It's not like Americans suddenly became a people who make good decisions. Well, part of it is reasons beyond politics. That's true. Heroin, for example, lost a lot of its appeal. Now, the people can shoot ozempic to get skinny. (audience laughing) But mostly it's because Democrats did some things and Republicans did other things. And by not actually ever working together, they stumbled upon positive change. Or as Trump put it, it was all me. (audience laughing) That's what he said. (audience clapping) He said Biden did absolutely nothing. Well, actually, Biden did do something. He had great success with his issue because he made Narcan more easily obtainable. What is Narcan? I don't know. (audience laughing) What I do know is when a person used to be overdosing and about to croak and had like a minute to live before they died, the way we used to handle it was John Travolta would stick a needle in your tail. (audience laughing) But we found something better. And Narcan and Democrats fast-tracked it. That contributed a lot to the huge decrease in drug deaths. But so did closing the border and deporting gang banger and disrupting supply. Narcan worked and law enforcement worked. You see, mommy and daddy, for the sake of the kids, worked together even though they hate each other. (audience clapping) Just like in a real family. (audience laughing) Welcome to the era of accidental bipartisan truth. (audience laughing) And it's not just drug crime that's way down. It's all crime. And again, probably much of it is not political. It's because you can't move two inches in America without being tracked, photographed, and followed by a flock camera. But it's also because when Democrats expand the safety net, there are less desperate people. And because Trump is a badass. No, I don't agree with many of his methods, like how they sometimes just deport people to countries where they have absolutely no connection, like Megan and Harry. (audience laughing) (audience clapping) Is doing it this way, the right thing, no. But it's just childish to pretend that when you elect a fuck around and find out president, no more Mr. Nice Guy, booting your ass, V for vendetta, kick ass and take names, say hello to my little friend, president. That's not gonna have some effect on crime. He has a UFC fights on the lawn. I think the bad guys got the message. (audience laughing) But maybe the place where accidental bipartisanship has worked best is with prescription drugs, where we have seen the steepest annual decline in prices since 1963, 1963. That's when the most prescribed drug in America was the speed they gave to housewives so they could clean the oven faster. (audience laughing) (audience clapping) How did that happen? Well, of course, if you listen to the Trump people, it's totally all them. And yes, the Trump RX discount side did work. Democrats say no, it was actually all Biden's inflation reduction act that did the trick. It's both, because they both independently and totally not working with each other, figured out that when it comes to drugs, you can really save a lot of money by buying in bulk, something I figured out when I was a pot dealer in college. (audience laughing) All right, thank you very much. That's our show. I wanna thank Jonathan Swan, James Kirkchick, and Andrew Hiliman. Club random is every Monday on YouTube or listen, remember, you get your podcast. Now go watch it over time on YouTube. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. (audience cheering) Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Marr every Friday night at 10, or watch him anytime on HBO On Demand. For more information, log on to HBO.com. Larry David is back in their new HBO original limited series. What a pleasure to be a part of such a historic occasion. Life, Larry, and the pursuit of unhappiness at almost history of America. This is a declaration of common sense. Those who don't know history. You are the world's worst butter channel. Our doom to watch Larry David repeat it. What the hell is going on here? Watch Life Larry in the pursuit of unhappiness, now streaming on HBO Max. Subscription required, visit hblemax.com for details.