Joe Rogan Experience #2341 - Bernie Sanders

Joe Rogan podcast. Check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day. Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day, Mr. Sanders. Great to see you. Good to be with you, Joe. Great to be You've got a bunch of notes. Not all that much. Have you prepared for this? I am all prepared. Well, it's a good time for you to be in here cuz the the world's gone haywire. Yes. Yeah. What are your thoughts on this? I think I start off with Joe trying to take a deep breath and doing what is not often done. Where are we as a country today? What's going well? What's not going well? And I don't think we don't we don't have that kind of basic discussion. And to my mind, I think in America today, we are facing more serious crises than we have in the modern history of our country. This is a pivotal moment in American history. and what happens now will depend determine the lives of our kids and future generations. What specifically concerns you? I'll tell you what concerns me. The issue of wealth and power. All right. I'm kind of oldfashioned and I believe in democracy and I believe that everybody should have a a good shot at living a decent life. And what I worry about right now, and this is an issue, Joe, and it's part of the problem that just ain't talked about very much. And I and I applaud, by the way, you and the other podcasters who give people the time to really seriously discuss things rather than 7-second sound bites, you know, but if you take a look at where we are as a nation today, this system is not working. It's broken. It ain't working for ordinary human beings. So, you have an America today where we have more income and wealth inequality than we've ever had in the history of this country. That's just a fact. Uh you have um one man uh Mr. Musk uh owning more wealth than the bottom 52% of American families. One man 52% of the American families. You got the top 1% owning more wealth than the bottom 93%. You got CEOs of large corporations making 350 times what their workers make. And meanwhile, in this richest country in the history of the world, workingclass people are getting decimated today. And again, we don't talk about it in Congress for reasons that I'm hope I can get into. Yeah. We don't talk about it in the corporate media. 60% 60% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck. Now, I grew up in a family I don't know your background, but I grew up in a family live paycheck to paycheck. And anyone who lives paycheck to paycheck understands that every single day is a struggle. You know, you got to figure out how you feed the kids. Rents, cost of housing in America off the charts, healthcare off the charts. So, right now, as we talk, there are people worrying, my landlord, you know, is going to raise my rent by 20%. What the hell do I do? Where do I go? How do what schools do my kid go to? How do I buy decent food for my kids? My mother is ill. How do I afford prescription drugs for my mother? Uh my car breaks down. You know, so you you know, if you have money, no one thinks of it. Your car breaks down. Go to the mechanic, you get it fixed. You know what? A lot of people don't have a,000 bucks in the bank right now. So you don't have a thousand bucks, your car breaks down. How do you get to work? If you don't get to work, you get fired. If you get fired, your whole life is disrupted. 60% of American How much different is that than past generations? It's that we've always had rich and poor. No question about it. It's worse now. Joe, uh, what do you attribute that to? I attribute it to decades old attacks on the working class of this country. I attribute it to horrific trade agreements which have allowed corporate America to throw millions of workers out on the street and move to China, Mexico, and other low-wage countries. I attribute it to a corrupt political system in which billionaires have significant control over both political parties. So that for example, right now in Washington, the national minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. So you got millions of workers today, you know, making 10, 12, 13 bucks an hour. You tell me how do people survive on 13 bucks an hour? When we were kids, or at least when I was a kid, you worked for a large company. you had something called a defined benefit pension plan. You know that means it means you work for me for 30 years. When you retire, you're going to get x hundreds of dollars a week. That's long gone. Corporations have gotten rid of that. So you got something like half of older workers in America have nothing in the bank when they face a retirement. I think to answer your question, I think he got a rigged system controlled economically and politically by very very wealthy and powerful people who could care less for working families. Now, I don't want to romanticize the old days because that would not be true, but there used to be a kind of a culture. If I was a boss and I ran a factory, I had a little bit of concern for you, right? You know, in general, I would say, I know your wife, how's the how's your mom doing? And all that stuff that's gone. You got these companies that are owned by other companies that are owned by super national I, you know, we got involved in my office. I used to be the chairman of the labor committee, health, education, labor. So, I got involved in a lot of stuff. And when workers were out on strike, we would call up and see what was going on, see how we can help. So, we'd call up to the company and we'd say, you know, why are you cutting back on healthcare for your workers? Well, we don't make that decision. It's owned by somebody else. Call up somebody else. Well, we're owned by somebody. You know how it is. It's just huge. These huge conglomerates own the bloody world. And these guys don't give a damn about the needs of working people. So I would say that the economy becomes less and less personal. I have no You're my worker. I have no care about you because right now I'm owned by an international who doesn't know that you exist. And there's also a diffusion of responsibility. Absolutely. It's not even in your hands. Exactly. So the local boss might say, "Hey, listen. I'm really sorry, but I didn't have any decision in here." Right. Right. Right. There's nothing I can do. Nothing I can do. Um, so I add all of that up and you have a and then just look at other things. I mean, you tell me tell me about the health care system. Does anybody in America think this healthare system is working? Well, you could tell by the assassination when the assassination of the United Healthcare guy when that when that happened there there was people celebrating. When is there ever someone gets assassinated on the streets of New York City and people celebrate, right? That's terrible. It's terrible. But it does speak to how people feel about insurance companies, right? Well, and I think rightly so because it's not what you're paying for. What you're paying for is you're hoping that you never get sick, but if you pay your insurance, you will be covered. What they're trying to do is make it as difficult as possible for you to get money from it. You got it. That's the more money the more I can deny you, the more money I make. Right. And that's the bottom line. And when you're dealing with these enormous corporations like we're talking about this diffusion of responsibility, the people that are doing it, it's like this is what I have to do. This is my job. They don't even think about it. Right. Exactly. And this all started when like when So Michael Moore had that brilliant documentary, Roger and Me. Yeah. Yeah. Michael's a good friend. Yeah. Uh he's a great guy. That that documentary is fantastic and it it shows the impact of a corporation taking all their factories, moving them away like that with no warning, no recourse, nothing anybody can do. Decimates the the basically all of Detroit. That's right. People don't know this. Yeah. But if my memory is correct, Detroit used to be in the 50s third richest city in the world. You got it. Yes. Yeah. We've talked about it multiple times. It's disgusting. And especially me as someone who loves American automobiles, I'm a big fan of what Detroit made during that time. And to see what happened to Detroit now. The last time I was in Detroit, it's actually seems to be picking up. There's a lot of uh small businesses and a lot of artists and a lot of people that are proud to like Shyola, companies like that. Proud to be in Detroit, but there's just so many abandoned buildings. It's It's insane. You could buy a house there for 500 bucks. It's really crazy. Like giant factories where every window smashed, all the pipes have been torn out, and it's just this hulking. And it's not just Detroit, right? I mean, there other communities, corporations say, "Hey, I mean, and that path is unsustainable, right?" I think so. Yeah. I mean, and look, if we are, and again, gets back to what we want as a nation, but you had corporations saying, "Hey, back then, not now, I could pay workers in China 25 cents an hour. Why the hell do I want to hire you for what it was that five bucks an hour, whatever it was, right?" And I'll never forget, Joe, uh, early on when I was elected to Congress, this was when we had the NAFTA agreement, I went to, uh, the Mackiladora area. You know what that is? And uh it's a special zone in northern Mexico near the near the border uh where uh the government there, this is back decades ago, allowed American and other European corporations to settle and got tax breaks there. So it was attracted all these corporations. So I went there with a congressional delegation and this is what I saw. You saw these beautiful new factories. Now this is 25, 30 years ago. And then we said, "All right, I want to see where the workers live." And I'll never forget this. As long as I live, we do. You know those large cardboard boxes that refrigerators come into and stoves those big? It's where people were living. They were living literally in cardboard boxes making I think at that point, now this is a long time ago, 25 cents an hour. So workers in America were thrown out on the street and people in Mexico exploited in a horrible way and these big shiny new factories at the time. So what you got and I believe this strongly you asked me you know how does it happen why does it happen I think especially right now and and for many decades you have the prevailing religion of the oligarchs and the corporate world is greed that's all I want it all and I don't give a [ __ ] if I have to step all over you throw you out on the street take away your social security I want it and to hell with you and that's why you end up with a situation in America America where you know the top 1% now owns more wealth than the bottom 93% and millions of people struggle. It's also a corporate culture of competitiveness, right? So they're competing with all the other corporations and you have to keep up and there's no way other than to increase your profits every quarter. That's right. That's right. That is exactly you do the right thing by workers. All right. That's a perfect example. So you know you got Wall Street. Here's here's a fact. When we talk about it, it's not only income and wealth inequality that bothers me. It's concentration of ownership. So, right now in America, in virtually every sector of our economy, whether it's agriculture, transportation, financial services, whatever, you got a handful of giant multinationals controlling that sector. But here's another amazing fact. Who do you think owns these corporations? You know, you remember there was a day where somebody actually owned General Motors or owned Ford. They're now owned by Wall Street firms. You got three Wall Street investment firms. Black Rockck, you're familiar with Black Rockck. They're char street. Exactly. Yeah. Check it out on Google. They are combined, the three of them combined are the major stockholders of 95% of American corporations. How's that? That's not good. That's power, right? How did that start and what could have been done to stop that from happening? Well, I think it's it's again it's greed. These guys are smart. They're hardworking. They're motivated. They want more and more. So, if I can buy this, I can buy this. I can sell this. Right. But they're all doing it within the law, right? Yeah. Yeah. Right. But which is is that the problem? Yeah. But who makes that law? They do. Now, I want to go to another issue. Yeah. Which is very rarely discussed. All right. You ready for it? I'm ready. All right. Hang on. Here we go. and is the the problem I think that we face as a country is not just economic disparities and all the stuff that we're talking about the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer. It is political power right now. And I doubt that there are many Americans, whether you're a progressive as I am or a right-wing Republican, I don't think people can disagree that we have a corrupt campaign finance system. Argue with me? You agree? No, I agree with you. Yeah. All right. So, let me talk about what it means. Okay. As a result of the Citizens United Supreme Court decision, I think it's 15, 16 years old. What it says is you're a billionaire, you have now the constitutional right because your money is your freedom of expression, right? So you don't like Bernie Sanders, you can put millions or hundreds of millions of dollars into a campaign and express your view about how terrible Bernie Sanders is and you can buy that election. Right? Constitution, right? I think that's probably the worst decision that the Supreme Court has ever made. So, what is the result of that decision? The result of that decision, let's take us to where we are today, is that Elon Musk, and I know Alain was on your show and he's here in Austin, huh? Yeah. Okay. And I've we could talk about Alain, but he spent $270 million to elect Trump as president. Okay. I think that's absurd that any one person What's the most someone donated towards the Harris campaign? They spent a lot of money on Harris as well. They spent $ 1.5 billion just over the course of a couple of months. You got it. All right. Let me talk about it. So, I'm not here just to say it's a Republican. That's my point here, right? Okay. So, M spends that money and what's his reward? He becomes the most powerful person in government for three or four months. Okay, fine. But what you have right now, and I just saw this the other day, you are a Republican member of Congress, okay? And you say, you know, there's a reconciliation bill, which we can talk about in a minute, that this is Trump's big bad big beautiful bill that's coming up literally on the floor of the Senate very shortly. So, let's say you're a Republican representing a low income district. and you say, you know, you know, I I got a lot of people on Medicaid in my district and kids can't get to college and I worry about food programs. I don't think it's a good idea to give tax breaks to billionaires and cut back on Medicaid. You make that announcement today. What happens to you? It's over. You get attacked. You're finished. The swarm comes for you. You got it. Yeah. It's not a swarm. It's It's the problem is it's already been established, right? That these laws have been established. The power has been given to these people. The money has started flowing and it's been flowing for a long time now. And this is the the issue with starting something that you can't stop. Well, you can stop it. You can stop and you got to stop it. Okay. But if you do stop it, all these people are going to throw all their money at stopping you from stopping it. Correct. Right. Exactly. They're going to come up with the best commercials with American flags. This country is all about competition and freedom. You got it. the freedom to donate to the party of your choice. You got it. Good. Stop these comments. Stop. You're writing their ass for them. They're gonna they're gonna pick it up with the American. Yeah, I can write them. Yeah, we could all right, but but then we got to take a deep breath and and figure out where do we go from there. Now, I wanted to in my I you know, as you know, I am the longest serving independent in American history. Yes, I caucus with the Democrats. I always have. But y'all can't hear me defending the Democratic party on this issue because you're right. Uh during the election, it wasn't just Musk and Republicans putting a lot of money into Trump. It was Democratic billionaires putting a lot of money into compl and into other candidates as well. And let me I mentioned there's a guy named um I don't even know his first name. Mr. Massie, does that name ring a bell? Thomas Massie. Thomas from Kentucky. Yeah. And this guy as I am is opposed to this war in in Iran. Just yesterday, Trump gave a long post about how they're going to primary this guy. And it what bothers me is you would hope that there would be respect enough for members of Congress that you could vote your own conscience. You could, you know, represent your constituency. Every district is different in America. But right now, anybody stands up and say, well, you know, I disagree with President Trump. Bam. You are finished. We're going to primary you. We got all kinds of money. You're out of there. That happened to Massie yesterday. But let me go back to the Democrats and tell you where the problem. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. If you've got a skill, there's no reason you can't build a business around it. Squarespace gives you everything you need to offer services and get paid all in one place. Whether you're running consultations, events, or custom experiences, you can build a site that looks professional, add videos, and even put premium content behind a payw wall. And the best part, it's all in one place. From invoicing to SEO tools that help people actually find your site. Go to squarespace.com/rogan for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use the code roen to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Can I point something out? Don't you think that there's a striand effect to that? Don't you think that there's a blowback for for that kind of thing when people recognize that this guy should be allowed to have his own opinions and should be and make some reasonable points and that people are going to reject this idea maybe and that it's it's not as simple as I think the whole uh MAGA thing right now is very divided particularly because one of the things they voted for was no war well now it seems like we're in a war right so that and it's quick. We're 6 months in and that's already popped off. And then people are very concerned with now what happens to our troops overseas that are in these bases that are in vulnerable positions and what happens with I mean there's supposedly documented terror cells that got in through the open border over the last four years. So what happens now in America? What happens on American soil? Right. No, I mean I agree with those. When a guy like Thomas Massie steps up and says something, you're he's going to have a lot more support as well. The answer is yes. And my only point is he has a right. Yes. You know, somebody else says, "Hey, I think the war is a great idea." Fine. That's your view. You got to go back. But what bothers me is that if anybody stands up the next day, we're going to primary. You're out of here, man. And that's the Republicans. Let me talk about the Democrats for a moment, okay? And I I don't even know your views on this, so you may disagree with me. You know, Israel was attacked by Hamas, and Hamas is a terrible terrorist organization. They killed 1,200 people, which in a small country like Israel is a lot of people. Terrible, terrible attack. It's a war crime. Israel had a right, in my view, to defend itself. But the Netanyahu government did not have a right to kill 52,000 people in Gaza. wound over uh well over a hundred thousand. And right now, as we speak, Joe, children are starving to death because of Israel's blockades. Yeah. Yeah. Starving to death. And I brought forth uh two resolutions uh which basically were very simple and it said uh no more US military aid uh to uh Israel under these conditions. One vote got 15 votes in the Senate. The other one got 16. Do you think that members of the Senate do not know what's going on in Gaza? The kids are starving to death. The innocent people are being shot down right and left. They know it. Why do you think I couldn't get more votes? They wouldn't vote against Israel. Right. It's political suicide. Ah, now you're talking, right? All right. So, in the Republican side, you have moneyed insurance saying, you speak up against Trump, you're out of here. In the democratic side, you speak up against the Netanyahu government, you're out of here as well. And they have been successful. You have super PACs like Apac spending a fortune. You stand and they have already knocked off a number of members of Cong good members of Congress and they will do it again. So all I'm saying is you got a corrupt campaign finance system on both sides which is rejecting the will of the American people and end up supporting powerful special interests. And if we do not get a handle on that issue, I worry very much about the future of American democracy. Are you going to run for president again? I am 83 years of age. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Well, you know, I'm not sure the American people will be enthusiastic on somebody's still very with it. Thank you. You are. Well, you know, I mean, you're a couple years older than Biden. Yeah. Right. Think of that. Yeah. You could be off a lot worse. Yes. Yes. Yeah. All right. Um, so, uh, we have been running around the country doing what we call a fighting oligarchy tour, which is take why I'm here in Texas. We were in Fort Worth last night. Had a good turnout. And I think, interestingly enough, Joe, it's not most of the people. We know the people who come out to our rallies. You know, we have a big list of millions of people, but a lot of people are coming to our rallies that we don't know. And I think we know that some of them are Republicans and some of them are independents. Many of them are independents because I think across the board uh there is growing dissatisfaction with the current politics in America both parties and people want a new vision for America which is also something we don't talk a whole lot about. So you know the issues that we talk about is in the richest country on earth why don't we have the best health care system in the world why do we have 85 million people who are uninsured or uninsured and as you were mentioning a moment ago I mean he deals with the insurance companies and the drug companies and the function of the current health care system is to make these guys very rich and and it works they make zillions of dollars and every place you go in my state the cost of healthcare has gone up this year like 1015 15% people can't afford it. Uh and we lose thousands of people every year. People get sick, they can't afford to go to the doctor, they die. Uh so, you know, one of the fights that I hope we can win is to have the United States join every other major country on earth and guarantee healthcare to all people uh as a human right. Well, we've talked about that a lot on this show that if you view this country as a community, the most important thing is to protect the most vulnerable members of your community. Period. Right. I agree. And if we we spend insane amounts of money on all sorts of things that people don't agree with, and I think generally most people would agree on some sort of a national healthare system. They do. Most people like there there's there's concepts of socialism that everyone agrees with. One of them is the fire department. Right. Right. Everyone thinks that everyone, every citizen should have access, the same equal access to the fire department. And we all pay into that. That's right. And we all believe in education. We all believe that there should be free public education. And most people believe that the university system should also be funded. It would be benefit everyone. You got it. It would benefit everyone to have more educated people that are doing better in the world. You'd have better GDP. you'd have more more successful people. Absolutely right. If you want to make America great again, less losers. How do you make less losers? Don't stack the deck against them. You know, one of the first things that you'd have to do is figure out why these communities and these cities have been the exact same way for decade after decade. Back to Jim Crow and the red line laws and all these why is nothing being done to fix that or to to correct that problem. And it becomes this political beach ball that they just bounce around the air at a concert, you know, and everybody, it's like there's certain things that just keep coming up that make you just just go, how are we still talking about gay marriage? How how is that still coming up? And it's like poof, throw it up in the air. All right, let me get back to that. But I want to say there's a bunch of these things, right? All right. The first point you made, you want to make America great, right? Have the best losers have have the best educated workforce in the world. How's that radical idea? I don't think so. Right. You're absolutely right. better education. You live longer when you have better education, etc., etc., right? All right. So, what does that mean? It means right now, you know, I talk to psychologists all the time because you do. Yeah, I do. Because I am uh I was the chairman now what call the ranking member of the health education labor committee. So, you know, we deal with medical people all the time. Uhhuh. Wasn't me personally that. No, that I may need also, but no, I was talking in a more general sense. Look, what are the most important years of human development? You're a human being. What are the most important? You're a child. That's right. Yeah. Zero to four. How's our child care system doing? Yeah. Not so good. It's a disaster. So, you got a rational society says, okay, the kids are the future of America. Right. You talked about the sense of being a community. All right. So, if I love this country and I want this country to do well into the future, I have to worry about the children. Correct. Right. Absolutely. right now for economic reasons. When I was a kid, by the way, and this shock some of your younger listeners here, there was one worker in a family could actually bring home the bacon and pay the bills. Yeah. Back in the old days. Back in the old days. Yeah, man. So, I grew up in a workingass family. We didn't have any money. My dad went out to work. Mom stayed home and that was it. Yeah. Um made healthier people too that way. Yeah, it did. I think in many respects it did. Well, something happened where they sort of devalued uh the woman's role as a mother and by convincing them that they have to be a part of the workforce. I think that's part of it. I think the other half is women legitimately wanted, you know, careers as well. And the other thing that happened maybe most significantly is you needed to stay alive, two breadwinners to stay alive. Yeah, that's the problem. The real problem was financially it just seemed so difficult for one person to pay for everything. The only way to do it was to have both parents working. You know, I was thinking I grew up in Brooklyn uh before I moved to Vermont and uh we lived in a rent control apartment and I was doing the arithmetic. My dad didn't make much money, but we didn't pay much in rent. And I I couldn't quite remember, you know, his what his salary was and all that, but my guess is we paid, is I recall, talk to my brother about this, about 18% of my dad's salary for rent. 18%. Ain't nobody in America today who's paid 18%. You know what I mean, right? That's why you need two bread wins because you're paying 40% 50%. Right. Yeah. But getting back to this issue of education, which I think is key, if you were rationally thinking about the future of America, if you loved America, as we all do, you're going to have the best child care system in the world, so the kids will do well in school. Right now in child care, you got workers out there making 15 bucks an hour. And you have families that cannot afford childare. My state, I don't know, it's about $20,000 a year to send your kid to ch childare. So you're making 50,000 a year. How do you pay that? 60, you can do that. And then education. You got kids who want an education. They want to go to college. They want to go to trade school. We desperately need. Here's something that really drives me a little bit nuts. In America today, Joe, not only is our health care system failing because it's based on greed, not on need, but we need more doctors. All right. All over the country, people have to wait, you know, sometimes months to get to a doctor's office. We have a massive nursing shortage. We need more dentists. Big problem in dentistry. We need more mental health counselors. We need more pharmacists. How come in the richest country in the world, we don't have enough doctors and nurses? Because it's very difficult to do. It's very difficult to become a doctor and the the bills that you have from education are overwhelming. All right. You want to go to, let's just say tomorrow you announce to the world, you give it up this podcast, you want to go to medical school. All right. You got it? Yeah. You know how much if you don't have any money, do you know how much you're going to graduate medical school in debt? Probably quarter million dollars easy. Double that. Really? Yeah. I I'm not Yeah. Obviously, it varies per person. But it is not unusual for guys, you know, people workingass homes go to medicals come out $500,000 in debt. nurses. I don't know$1 $150,000 a day. That is insane. It's insane. All right. Yeah. We need more doctors. So, I should I want to encourage you, Joe. I want you to go to medical school. Hey, good news. We're paying your tuition. Da da da. And we need you out there as soon as we can get you. Why wouldn't that be subsidized? Of course, you should subsidize it, right? Of course. Yeah. But there's there's there's so many different What would you have done? Like imagine if you hadn't gotten derailed and they hadn't uh conspired against you and you actually became the Democratic candidate for president and you won. What would you have done differently? Okay. How many hours we have? Look at all the time in the world. Bernie, I know. What would you have done first day in office? Well, it's not just the first day in office. I would have dealt with this campaign finance reform issue. Uh, and there are ways that you can get around that Supreme Court decision. How do you do that? Uh, you move toward public funding of elections, which says that Joe, you want to run against me? That's great. Uh, but you're not going to get super PAC money. Uh, we're going to publicly fund you. You know, you you uh get 1500 signatures that says you're a serious candidate. You'll get a certain amount of money to run for office. So you funded by the government. Yes. Absolutely. Rather than so someone running for president funded by the current president well not the current president and people say oh taxpayer dollars are going to but that makes a lot more sense than having billionaires fund elections which is what you got right now. So that's number one. So you think there should be when you get a certain number you just get a certain allotted amount of money that you could use for your campaign and everybody gets the same amount that exists in some places right now. Does it where? Yeah. In New York City right now. Oh, in New York City and other places as well. So, if you agree, you know, you're gonna raise you you're not going to raise private money. You go the public route. Uh it exists in a number of communities and I think that is Did you watch the New York City uh debates, the mayor? I heard I'm in I got involved and I'm supporting uh Mr. um Menani. A lot of people are well, especially after that debate, right? It seems like everybody else was essentially saying, "Ah, I've been to Israel more than you've been to Israel. I'm going to go to Israel before you do. Right. They think they're campaigning to be foreign, you know, minister for Israel or something. Uh but talk about money and politics. Yes. Just look at New York City right now. There's the election tomorrow, I think. Right. I think it's tomorrow. What's Monday? Today, tomorrow's Tuesday, right? Yes. That's the election. They're spending a huge amount of money. You know, the dem these are Democratic or some cases. Who's in the lead right now? Uh polls say Cuomo by a little bit, but I think uh Zoron has a lot of momentum. We'll see. Polls are weird in a race like that. Yes. Well, they're weird in every race. They were wrong with Hillary in 2020 or uh in uh 2016 rather. They were wrong in 2024 with Harris and Trump. Like I don't understand polls cuz I just I don't I have a feeling that the majority of them are inaccurate. Well, I think they are increasing I I don't know the answer to your question. The pollsters would argue that's not the case, but I think you got a lot of folks who are not all that enthusiastic about honestly giving honest answers to a pollster. Absolutely. Yeah, that's true, too. Yeah. And that's part of the problem, right? All right. But you ask me on my first day as president. Well, they have you drop in, say hello. Hi, have a cup of coffee. All right. All right. Good. And and then I I think we'd declare something like our health care system is an emergency and figure out ways that we can do what every other major country on earth does, and that is guarantee healthcare to all people. So, one of the things you do, you say, "Okay, we need tens of thousands of more doctors and hundreds of thousands of more nurses and dentists and so forth and so on, and we're going to move aggressively to make sure that in America, everybody in this country has healthcare as a human right." So, I think that's number one. Number two, uh, at a time of massive income and wealth inequality, uh, you don't give tax breaks to billionaires. You demand that they start paying their fair share of taxes. And one of the problems that we have, it's not just an American issue, it's a global issue. A lot of these zillionaires are hiding their money in tax havens in the Cayman Islands and elsewhere. And that's an international issue. But I think we have to have a fair tax tax system which says that individuals and wealthy and and corporations that are making a whole lot of money are start paying their fair share of taxes. What is their fair share? I don't know. I mean, you know, is under Eisenhower, the very rich paid at their upper levels 90%, you know, but let me be very honest with you, Joe, on this one. 90% is kind of crazy, though, right? No, not that's not across that's just for the, you know, your billionth dollar. You know what I mean? It's not your your first dollar. It's not. So, if you make a billion, you pay 900 million. No, no, no, no, no. That's not what it means. It means on your $900 million, you're going to pay 90%. Okay. All right. But you know the other thing that uh I would do and you look uh you got to deal with this climate change issue and I know that you know there are some people who think climate change is a hoax. It ain't a hoax. Uh, I think the last 10 years have been the warmest on record and we can create millions of goodaying jobs transforming our energy system away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency to solar to wind and other sustainable energies. This episode is brought to you by Paleo Valley. 100% grass-fed beef sticks. I live a super busy lifestyle. I'm always running from one thing to the next, and Paleo Valley is the perfect onthe-go snack. These beef sticks are legit. No junk, no garbage ingredients, just pure clean protein fermented the old school way. So, they're shelf stable without chemicals. That is huge. And the fermentation part, it's actually good for your gut. Most people don't even think about that, but if you care about performance, you have to care about your gut health. And tastewise, they're awesome. They've sold over 55 million of these things. That's not just hype. That's people coming back again and again because it works. Go to paleo valley.com and use the code roan to get 20% off or find them on Amazon. I think the climate change issue is very complicated and I think uh did you see the Washington Post uh piece that they wrote where they did this long-term view. First of all, the the reality is that the Earth's temperature has never been static, right? We could both agree on that. It's always been up and down. There's been ice ages and heat waves. And then the Washington Post looked at it. What was the time period that they looked at that essentially they found that we're in a cooling period that the Earth over the past X amount of years and this was like a very inconvenient discovery but they had to report the data and kudos to them for doing that. Scientists have captured the Earth's climate change over the last 485 million years. Here's a surprising place we stand now. So look at the far end of that graph and you see we're in a cooling period. Well, I'm not sure. No, I didn't read that article, but I, you know, the scientists who are out there, I think I know, but there's a lot of money involved in that, too, Bernie. That's part of the problem. There's a lot of money involved in this this whole climate change emergency issue, and there's a lot of control, and that's uh that's a big part of this problem. Not only that, if we're just talking about primarily carbon and carbon footprint, what are we going to do about China? Because China and Absolutely. China is like what percentage of they are the major they are the major uh poller right now in terms of carbon we're number two we used to be one they are number one right now I think they have an enormous percent of global I think it's they're number one I don't know what the percent this is it's not an American issue it is a global issue and all I can tell you is that we are in my view going to see more extreme weather disturbances uh in in the coming years than we have ever and we're seeing them right now. We are seeing right but scientists don't agree. Well, this is where it gets confusing because scientists that are in agreement there's all these entanglements. Whenever someone's discussing something, whether it's economics or whether it's health issues or pharmaceutical drugs, there's financial entanglements. I think we both agree with that, right? Yep. And I think this is part of the issue with this whole climate change emergency as well because it's not just that we could all agree pollution is a major factor. It's a huge issue in the world today. We could all agree with that, right? I think one of the things that we have to rec recognize is that there's whenever there's an issue that everyone can agree on, you're going to have a bunch of people that capitalize on that issue and they look to gain more money. they they they have financial issues that they they push forward in order to to capitalize on this issue, but then also power and control. These things like they're trying to institute in the UK where they have these 15-minute cities this concept where you're not allowed to travel. They'll be able to look at your carbon footprint. It's Yeah. See, that's the problem that that the problem is giving people that are in power, these people that we've all discussed that have so much money and so much control over our societies, multinational corporations, giving them more control over citizens. And this is a vehicle for that. And this is what's dangerous about this whole climate change emergency because it allows these [ __ ] creeps that have been controlling people and controlling what you do and what you say and how you spend your money when with people that are already living checkto check. and you put additional constraints on them and you make them even more scared. And then you put additional measures where you can look at their carbon footprint. You can look at the amount they travel. What do you know put a carbon tax on these people? Let's figure out how to extract more money from them. That's what bothers me about this climate change emergency. Not not that we we can all agree pollution is a terrible thing. Everyone should agree to that. the the beautiful earth that sustains us and all life on this planet is being poisoned as we speak. We're killing all the fish in the ocean and sucking them out in giant numbers. 94% of all the big fish that are in the ocean are gone over the last, you know, whatever it is. When you go to war against nature, you lose. Yeah. Cuz you're part of nature. Exactly. Right. But we're worshiping the almighty dollar above the mother. You know, you asked me when I ran for president. One of the interest it's, you know, it's something else to run for president because you get around, you meet all kinds of people and you learn all kinds of things. And one of the things that I did, we went to a lot of uh we met with a lot of Native Americans. And one of the reasons is, you know, their tradition was going from way back, respect for nature. That they understood back way back when that you kill off all of the buffalo, you ain't going to have nothing to eat. Right. Right. They understood that. And you understand that you live in harmony with nature, which is I think what you're talking about. Absolutely. And if you lose that harmony, I worry about the future of humanity in in which is the problem with financial competitiveness. When you put the almighty dollar above all else, that's right. Then all you think about and you're only alive for a hundred years. So it's just hit the gas. Hit the gas for a hundred years. And who gives a [ __ ] what happens after I'm gone? I'm gonna die with the most toys. Yay. I win in the dirt. That's exactly right. Yeah. And that is which takes us to another issue. Okay. And that is artificial intelligence and robotics. Automation. Automation. Yeah. Okay. So giant issue, huge issue. All right. So let's back it up. Um, Americans are angry and one of the reasons they are angry is that over the last uh, just give you one fact here. Last 52 years, you and I understand, everybody in the world understands there've been a huge explosion in technology. Correct? What we're doing today never could have happened 50 years ago. Factories far more automated, offices far more automated. I became mayor of Burlington, Vermont in 1981. There was not a computer in the building. Okay, so that's by the way, great town. It is a great town. Uh, in any case, an explosion of technology, significant increase in worker productivity, right? We're talking to millions of people now. Never could have happened before, right? That's true. Workers are producing a lot more. Tell me, how are real inflation accounted for wages been over the last 52 years with all of that increase in worker productivity? Workers doing a lot better? Not so good. Not so good. No. In fact, there are studies out there that suggest in real inflation accounted for dollars, wages are actually lower now than they were 52 years ago. Okay? And during that same period is a massive transfer of wealth from the bottom 90% to the top 1%. So that's what technology has done over the last 50 years. That is not I there was a study I don't know if you saw this blew me away. I can't remember who did it. Kaiser some reputable guy people did it. This is what they said. They do a poll to the American people and they say uh Americans do you think you are better off today than somebody in your situation you know middle class up whatever you may be was uh 40 years ago. Okay. Are you better off today than somebody in your circumstance would have been 40 years ago? What was the answer? What do you think? Yeah. And what the answer was, and this is, and we got to deal with this one. This is big. The answer was, you know, there were a number of people say, "Hey, look, I got a cell phone. It's great. I got a big screen TV. It's great. I can fly all over the world. It's great. A lot. I get sick. I get treatment now that I never could have had 40 years ago." Right? Those are facts. All really positive developments. But on average, most people said, I I I think the situation is worse today than it was 40 years ago. And that is what we got to deal with. So you can have all the technology in the world. What the hell does it mean if your life is not improving? In fact, in many ways getting worse. Yeah. Well, I again, we'll go back to polls again because I I don't necessarily believe that polls are totally accurate. But I I do think that the the the issue with it being virtually impossible for one person to sustain the entire family these days, one worker, the father or the mother, whoever it is to sustain the entire that's a that's a giant issue. All these issues uh when it comes to labor, when it comes to uh minimum wage, I think you and I are in agreement of all the on all these. I think uh the minimum wage in this country is ridiculous. I mean to $7. What? It's insane. It's insane. How do you live off $7? You go to Jimmy John's, you get a sub. How much is a sub? How much is a sub like a big sub at Jimmy John's? Some guy was just uh did a Tik Tok video where he's like they're trying to say that minimum wage $15 is too much. I think he had a sub that he bought for 25 bucks. So imagine that's your lunch. So imagine you have to work three and a half hours just to pay for a sandwich. Imagine how insane that is. It's insane. That's insane. Like how do you eat? How do you how do you eat dinner? How do you eat lunch? How do you eat breakfast? I have talked to people who make 10 12 bucks an hour trying to raise a kid. Jesus. That's right. Yeah. Well, the the argument against that is, hey, these are entrylevel jobs that are supposed to be for kids. No, it's and that's factually incorrect. Yeah, of course. It's true to some degree. To some degree, but if you have grown adults that are working those jobs now, it becomes disgusting. That's right. That's exactly right. Especially when you're dealing with an enormous corporation. You got it right. So, we put a lot of pressure. You know, we, you know, are trying to raise the minimum wage, federal minimum wage to 17 bucks an hour. That's that's a reasonable amount of money. You know, I mean, it's still it's not it's going to be real difficult to live off of 17 bucks an hour, but at least That's right. At least you get a sandwich in under two hours worth of work. There you go. All right. But I want to get back to this issue because it's one that we don't talk about and it gets to AI. Why do why do we have what you know some of these people call an epidemic of loneliness in America? All right. Yes. All right. Why are we mental illness rates are pretty high? Suicide rates are too high. Too much God drug addiction, right? Horrible problem all over the country. Why? Well, there's a lot of factors. Um, first of all, there is a there are a lot of people that are very unhealthy, physically unhealthy. I think metabolic health is a gigantic issue in this country. Yep. Um, there's a a lot of people in this country that feel completely disenfranchised and so they turn inward. Y and then technology invites them to do that. You get online and you spend your time staring at a screen, having communications with people, arguing on Twitter all day, you know, changing the flag in your bio from Ukraine to Palestine, and now you got an Iranian. You're just like in a constant state of anxiety and chaos. You're dealing with the entire problem, the the problems of the entire world. You're dealing with 8 billion people's worth of problems every day. Um, I think that's unsustainable. And then that's also a function of technology because this interaction that we have is unprecedented. The interaction with the news, with each other, all this stuff we're not designed to handle. And it it gives you massive anxiety particularly for young people. Uh particularly you Jonathan Hates written about this with young girls who have the biggest problem with social media comparing themselves to other people. massive increase in self harm, suicide, suicidal ideiology, depression, anxiety, all this stuff accentuated by technology and our unchecked use of it. I think you hit the nail on that. And so I think we got to take a deep breath and understand that we got to figure out how we make technology work to improve human life, right? Not to hurt. Don't you think this is the 11th hour? I think it is. Yeah. This is the the problem with it is like it's already the the genie out. The genie's out of the box. There's no question about it. But, you know, we can't sit around and just do nothing. Um, but when it this is the real issue when it becomes a problem where you have massive automation of almost all jobs, which is uh something that especially when you deal with a corporation that is entirely based around making the most amount of money possible. Well, what better way when you don't have to pay them anything? You got it. You are. There are signs. I don't know if you've seen them. Signs advertising from from AI companies. What was they saying? Don't hire humans. Something like that. Did you see post it? That's adorable. Don't hire humans. That's demonic. It is. Yeah. But also from the perspective of a corporation where you deal with human issues, problems, mistakes, people showing up late. Why do I need you when I can get a robot? Exactly. Right. You're not going to get sick. You know, I can fix you a lot easier than paying for your healthcare and so forth and so, right? So, what do you do? What do you do about that? So, if you're the president and President Sanders, we have this issue. The whole country is going to go automation. What do we do? All right. First of all, we make the determination that we are not going to let a handful of CEOs make these decisions, that they're going to be made by the American people. What does that mean? Bottom line, it means that technology is going to work to improve us, not just the people who own the technology and the CEOs of large corporations. What does that mean? All right, for a start, you are a worker. your worker your productivity is increasing because we give you AI. Right. Right. All right. Instead of throwing you out on the street, I'm going to reduce your work week to 32 hours. All right. So, you're going to have 4 day work week. Exactly. And by the way, not a radical idea. Not a radical idea at all. There are companies around the world that are doing it with some success. The UAW, the United Automobile Workers, uh they had a big strike a year ago, you remember, against the big three. You remember that? Mhm. and they won a very good contract and I'm a big fan of the trade union movement. I think workers need that. Um, and one of their demands, interesting enough, and people thought that Sean Feain, who's the president of the union, was crazy, but Sean said, you know what, we want a 32-hour work week because our people are producing more. People thought he was crazy, but the idea is catching on. So, first thing to say is, let's use technology to benefit workers. That means give you more time with your family, with your friends, you know, for education, whatever the hell you want to do. You don't have to work 40 hours a week anymore. The second thing I think we have got to do is take a look, as you just said, you said it, you know, better than I said it, is what does it mean that we have so many young kids living on the internet, right? All right. Uh there are schools all over the country now who are getting cell phones out of schools. I talk to teachers in Vermont and they say, you know, kids attention spans now have been greatly diminished. Yes. You know, uh how do we deal with that? This in Vermont again, there was a somebody told me that there's a teacher now who does he he demands that the his students write with a pen in blue books now because he doesn't trust what they're sending in that it's not artificial intelligence. All right. So if I say to you, all right, Joe, give me tell me what happened to the American Revolution. You go to the chat box, you give me a wonderful essay that you know nothing about. Right. Right. What does that mean for your intellectual development, but all you can do is press a button and give me an answer. Right. Unless you've absorbed that information, unless you have but many kids are not, and we got to worry about that as well. So I think we have to take a deep breath and many of the things what has been the impact of all this stuff. How do we stop the negative impacts? How do we go forward with what is positive? And it is not easy stuff to be sure. But I just don't what I worry about right now is I think artificial intelligence is going to displace millions and millions of workers. People are going to be thrown out on the street. I think the corporate guys who are running these companies could care less about these workers. Uh I think robotics is going to be running a lot of the factories in America. And I think these are issues we just have got to address in a bold way. Yes. But how do you do that? And like you're balancing it out in in one way if you are a corporation. Like imagine you're um an automobile manufacturing corporation. You're Ford. What? And Ford is struggling right now. There's a a giant issue with Ford, right? So what does Ford do if all of a sudden something comes along that allows them to be more productive? They more they're more profitable that these machines can work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. They don't need time off and you're going to make a better product. You're going to make more money for your shareholders. The corporation succeeds, but you don't need X amount of workers anymore, right? What how do you how do you mitigate this? I mean, that's the right question. And what do you do? All right. Nobody asked a simple answer. That's just talking. Does Ford simply does corporate America have the right to say to workers throughout this country, hey, sorry guys, we don't need you anymore. Have a nice life. You're out on the streets. Instead of thinking them as workers, should we think of them as look, there are people that make the decisions. There's the executives. There's the the corporation itself, but without the people that worked on those assembly lines, you have nothing. That's right. You have nothing. You couldn't have done any of the things you've done without those people. But those people are replaceable because it's skilled labor that you could teach another person to do and they're replaceable because there's plenty of people that want those jobs and there's a demand. So you file them in, you file them out, which is why they developed unions, right? So they developed unions to keep people from being exploited, right? And then the problem becomes the unions get exploited and then the the unions have a lot of money and then there's a lot of influ and then then they decide okay [ __ ] these unions let's go to Mexico and these laws that Ross Perau famously talked about the giant sucking sound headed south remember that oh I remember him well boy was he right boy was he right all right let's get back to this issue of which what do you do like if you're you're the president ain't no easy answers let me let me throw that out to you I don't have a magical solution I wish I did. I don't. I think the first thing you you say, "All right, I'm Ford. I'm General Motors. I got all this technology. I can produce my products much more efficiently. I don't need workers anymore." Right. Right. Well, I'm sorry, Mr. GM, and I'm sorry, Mr. Ford, because this country is more than just your profits. We are human beings, and you're not going to throw people out on the street, many of whom will have a hard time getting healthcare, etc., etc. So the let me reframe the question again of which admittedly it is complicated. I don't have the magic answer. How as a nation, forget Ford, forget General Motors. How as a nation do we deal with this exploding technology so that it benefits all of us and not just Mr. Ford and Mr. General Motors? That's the question I think. All right. And it's going to require radical solutions. So for a start, it gets back to something we talked about a little while ago. If you had health care is a human right, right? All right. As people in almost every other wealthy country have and not attached to your job, that would be a major step forward, right? Yes. Absolutely. All right, Joe, you lost your job, but you know what? Your family still has healthare. Imagine if you were a diabetic and now you don't have access to insulin because now you no longer Right. Okay. So, this is the way I frame it. We are the wealthiest country in the history of the world right now with all of this artificial intelligence and robotics. We are going to be wealthier. Correct. Correct. All right. So, we're not in the 1820s where people had to work 100 hours a week to grow food to eat. Right. Right. You're not in the 1920s. You're in 2025. You have all of this productivity out there. How do we utilize it to create a decent standard of living for all people? Let me ask you this. With all of this technology, can we wipe out poverty in America? Well, we should be able to, right? You should be. Well, we should have been able to do that a long time ago if that was something that was politically motivated, right? If you wanted to do, but it's easy enough. Profitable. Pardon me. If it was profitable to wipe out poverty, which it should be like overall as a community, like I said, less losers, higher GP. If we love the country. Yeah. If you really love America, you want more people to have a chance. All right. So, what kind that All right. Good. I mean I I so the the and again please this is these are complicated issues. I surely don't have all the answers but I think we throw on the table you got all of this technology. What is our goal? So all right our goal is if we're going to create all of this wealth that we have a health care system that guarantees healthcare to all people. And by the way, we have drug companies whose function is to come up with cures to diabetes and dementia and Alzheimer's and other terrible illnesses rather than just make huge profits for themselves. All right. You have a publicly funded health care system guarantees healthcare to all people. Just doing that would lower the stress rate in this country enormously. Enormously. Okay. Sure. Okay. You got that? We talked a moment ago about education. I think you and I agreed. Yes. We want the best educational system in the world. What does it mean that all that you don't have to worry? You're a working dad out there. You're worried that your kid may have a lower standard of living than your kid can't afford to go to college. You don't want your kid leaving school $50,000 a day. We say education is a human right. God, you know, you mentioned public education a while ago. That didn't happen by accident. You know, back in the early 20th century, a lot of people, working-class people, fought and said, you know what, we don't only want, you know, the rich kids to get a decent education, we want our kids. And that's how public education began. Right. Right. So, it said, okay, everybody in America, you know, state by state, started in Wisconsin actually, is going to have public education from first grade kindergarten to 12th grade. God didn't create 12th grade as the limit. Right. Right. All right. You go to Scandinavia, you go to Germany right now, you know how much it cost to get a higher education? How much? Zero. That's great. Of course it's great because they make such good cars. Well, it could be. You know, they want and engineers. That's right. But the bottom line is what you said. Yeah. If I want this country to be productive, right, I want the best educated workforce. That's not a debate, right? Unquestionably. All right. That's how you want your family. And if the country is a community, the country is your family. Exactly. Yes. All right. So, that's what we got to start thinking about. It's not just what Mr. Ford and Mr. General Motors and Mr. Apple want, right? You're right in saying they're motivated by making zillions, right? All right. Their motivation is throw the workers out on the street, bring in the technology, and screw the workers. That is not what we should be doing as a nation. You got to tell them that. All right. All right. So, we got to sit there and say, "All right, all this technology, all right, we talk about healthcare as a human right. I think we're talking about education uh as a human right, right? I think we should be saying with all of this technology, we got to be thinking seriously about lowering the number of hours that people work. Yes. You know, do you know how many people there zillions of people in this country don't work 40 hours a week? They're working 50, 60 hours a week. That's insane. So, we can say all of this increased worker productivity. Guess what? You know, I don't know what the number is. to be able to work on a 34 hour work 4 day work week with no loss of pay. Uh I introduced a bill to do that. I got to tell you I you know I go to airports I go around people came up to me people are stressed out by the amount of hours they have to work. Absolutely. All right. So what I'm saying here is let's take a hard look about how we utilize this technology to improve life for all people. Our goal should be, yeah, instead of bombing Iran, our goal should be right now, Joe, uh, our life expectancy in America is lower than it is in other major countries. You know that? Yes. Four years younger than four years shorter lifespans than other wealthy countries. If you're working class in America, you live seven years shorter life than the 1%, which is to me just outrageous. All right, so here's the here's the thing. Instead of bombing Iran, how do we increase life expectancy so that we're living the longest lives of many people on Earth? How's that for a goal? Well, that's a great goal. And how do you go about achieving that goal? Well, healthcare is one. Reducing the work week is another. Education is all the things that we've talked about, all the things we talked about, right? Right. Will increase life expectancy. But have a goal out there. Also, taking toxic food. Exactly. Exactly. You know, I don't I you know, I don't I've known uh uh Bobby Kennedy for a long time and you know, he and I have gone uh in different directions politically, but his the point about health, food, food, we spend the most and we're the sickest. Absolutely. Absolutely. And food is one of I when I was chairman of the committee, we worked very hard to get serious labeling. You know, some kid drinks a mom buys a bottle of Coca-Cola for the kid. There's like what 10 teaspoons of sugar in that that product. Yeah. You know, I don't think people know that and we try to get labeling. Maybe that will happen now. Uh but people also weren't aware until like the last 20 years what the consequences of that sugar is. That's right. Absolutely. Also because of money. You got it. I mean you Yeah. Don't get me going on that one. I mean I'll get you going. Come on. All right. You know, you would think, how hard is it to say if you have a bottle of soda or you have a food product, tell people in English what is in the damn product, right? Right. Do you think anyone there right now they have any grams? Do you think anybody in America knows what the hell a gram is? I mean, it just that's how ridiculous it is. So, I want parents to know that if you know the food that they're serving their kid could lead to obesity, which is an epidemic in America, could lead to diabetes, which is an epidemic, a terrible illness, costing us hundreds of billions of dollars. So, you're absolutely right. Right. All right. And and then that ties into rebuilding family-based agriculture in America. Wouldn't it be nice? Yes. in my state of Vermont, all over this country, family farmers are, you know, they're just being driven off of the land. And that to me is a real tragedy because, and again, Vermont is one of the most rural states in America. Growing up, if you talk to people who grew up on farms, they say, you know, Bernie, that was a pretty good way of life and we're losing that. So how do you create an economy in which we once again put an emphasis on familybased agriculture not corporate agriculture family farmers who are growing good in many cases organic food for our kids rather than corporate regenerative regenerative agriculture like true like white oaks pastures the way they run it farms a bunch would that be great? Yes. All right. Well we'd be a lot healthier if we ate that food that's for sure but the problem is people are already addicted to that other food and this is the problem with money. These corporations have engineered these products and this is these are the same corporations unfo