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- [00:02]
Ro Khanna
Lemonade.
- [00:14]
Steve Burns
Alive with Steve Burns. Hey, there you are. It's great to see you. Come on in. Welcome to Alive. Okay, so I grew up with this idea. It was kind of a cliche, but also kind of, I don't know, sacred. It was called the American Dream. You've heard of it, right? What is the American Dream to you? Right, exactly. Yeah, you work really hard and you go to college, and then you get a degree, and then you get a job, and then you get a house, and then you get a pension, and then you get a labradoodle, and then you have some relative sense of enduring peace. Except it hasn't really work out like that, has it? I'm making tea. You want tea? Because I feel like a lot of people did exactly that. They went to college, they worked hard, they got a degree. They took on unimaginable, ungodly, legally sanctioned debt that they then carry around for the rest of the their lives. And there are no jobs or no careers anyway, just sort of unending hustle culture, which is really just a. A knife fight for side gigs. Right? That really don't add up to much. And housing is like a fantasy, and renting is like medieval. Here you go. And the thing is, there was supposed to be an answer, though, right? Technology was supposed to save us. The singularity was nigh and abundance would be ours and. But just when we thought we were going to catch up, kapow. AI shows up and takes those jobs, too. And then we're supposed to, what, be happy about that? Like that's somehow a good thing? Like we're supposed to be grateful to our new robot overlords? I don't know. It seems like a lot. And I guess my question is, is the American Dream still a. Come on. Okay, so our guest today is Congressman Ro Khanna. He's the U.S. representative from California's 17th congressional district. That's Silicon Valley to you and me. He's held that seat since his upset victory in 2016. He is one of only six members of the House that does not accept campaign contributions from PACs or corporations. He's a member of the Committee on Oversight and Account. He's got a couple of books, Dignity in the Digital Age, which I love, and also Progressive Capitalism, how to Make Tech Work for All of Us. And he is, perhaps most importantly, like myself, from southeastern Pennsylvania. He's from Philadelphia. Go Birds. And he's here. He's here. Okay, here we go. Hello. Hello. Congressman Ro Khanna. It's a pleasure to see you.
- [04:03]
Ro Khanna
Great to be on. And it's good to be a Phillies fan these days. So I don't know if you've still follow them with Schwarber and Bohm, and they've got a good season a bit.
- [04:14]
Steve Burns
I'm much, much, much more of a football fan. And, boy, has this been fun.
- [04:21]
Ro Khanna
Yeah, well, that. That was a health zoom. Now, I got to be honest. I'm more. I root for the 49ers. They're in my district, but I kept my allegiance to the Phillies.
- [04:29]
Steve Burns
I knew. I know. I told myself not to ask you about Philadelphia sports because you know that that's putting you in an unfair position. But now, did you grow up outside of Philly?
- [04:39]
Ro Khanna
I did. I grew up in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. My dad would go to work at Bristol or sometimes into the city. I went to Council Rock High School there.
- [04:49]
Steve Burns
Oh, yeah, Right on. I'm from Pottstown, Pennsylvania. So that's not far. That's like Berks county right next door. It's a beautiful part of the world. But anyway, we really appreciate your time. I see you on tv, I hear you on podcasts, and I have to say what I hear is a very thoughtful and completely reasonable person. And I'm very glad that you are in American politics. That seems to be a missing thing sometimes.
- [05:19]
Ro Khanna
Well, you're very kind. I'll try not to disappoint.
- [05:22]
Steve Burns
All right, so we'll dive into it. So what we're talking about, what we've been talking about a lot, is the concept of the American dream, Right. Versus the concept of the current American reality, right? Because it seems to a lot of people that they did all the stuff they did, they followed the script, they got the job, they went to college, they got the debt, and now the jobs aren't there, and inequality is. Is only growing. And I guess my question is, is the American Dream still something you believe in?
- [06:01]
Ro Khanna
I do, but I think it is available to some and not to many. And the nation can't survive where you have $14 trillion in my district in Silicon Valley, five companies over a trillion dollars, and half the other country de industrialized or dependent on federal government. That is just not viable. The reality is that it's not just the people. People feel that the American dream is slipping away. It's that their feelings are justified. You have, let me give you three statistics for college graduates between the ages of 21 to 29. The unemployment rate is 15%. 15%. Second, the reality is income inequality is sore. And if you're a person who is trying to get A rent. You're often paying 40% of your income just in rent for housing. You can't afford it. You got loans from college or law school. I had over a hundred thousand dollars of loans. You can't get a high paying job if you haven't gone to college. Because our factory towns got decimated. I can't afford child care. So the situation is great for some people in some cities who've built a lot of wealth, but not for ordinary people who are struggling.
- [07:22]
Steve Burns
Yeah, right. That's how it feels. What changed?
- [07:28]
Ro Khanna
Well, that's a big question. Several things changed. One, we hollowed out our factory towns, our industry across this country. That was because of nafta. It was because of letting China in the World Trade Organization. It was deregulation, deregulation of trucking, but then deregulation of finance that had a lot of capital start to accumulate in Wall street, accumulate in certain centers and town after town lost any industry. And then America didn't do anything. Like Pennsylvania, western Pennsylvania produced all this steel. Johnstown, Farrell, you go there. I mean, I'm sure you have in those towns.
- [08:10]
Steve Burns
Bethlehem. Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Yeah.
- [08:14]
Ro Khanna
And the question is, why did we bring new economic prosperity there? Whether it was new manufacturing, whether it was new technology, jobs, whether it was new federal investment, private sector investment. Ike said we need a 21st century Marshall Plan. Not for Europe, not for Asia, for America, For America. And we just abandoned these communities.
- [08:36]
Steve Burns
It seems on one hand we're generating wealth faster than we've ever generated wealth in human history. But the gaps. Right, but the gaps are growing and widening and widening and widening. And I worry, I worry because it kind of sometimes feels like there's about three dudes who own the entire Internet and they live in your district. You talk to them all the time. Do they have our best interests at heart?
- [09:11]
Ro Khanna
Well, look, I think your identification of the problem is exactly correct. And maybe not three folks, but 50 or 100 folks, they have way too much power. And, and, and you can't have all of the concentration economic wealth in places like Silicon Valley. You're right. We're producing more wealth than ever in human history. I don't think we can just rely on the benevolence of tech leaders to have Western Pennsylvania in their hearts and to care about the heartland. I think what we need is a federal policy, economic policy, to say, okay look, we need some of the technology leaders because you want to create new jobs, places, new industry, new technology, then you need their leadership. But either you're going to be on Team America Working for the country or you're going to face consequences and what I call a new economic patriotism. I've, I've said that we need Silicon Valley to be in service of America, not America to be in service of Silicon Valley. What does that mean concretely? First, we need to tax them more, tax these billionaires, multimillionaires more so people can have health care, child care, housing assistance, rent assistance. We have so much wealth we can afford to have people be able to go to college for free or trade schools for free in this country. Second, we need to be financing new industry in places across America. And if technology leaders want to help build those factories with robotics, with AI, and if they're investing, they're great, but we should be taxing the offshoring of jobs and saying, look, partner with us to build industry here. Third, we need to be setting up AI academies everywhere. You've got to. China is racing to, to have a literacy. I mean, we need, we need to make sure our young folks understand the technology. Not because you have to be a coder, you don't. Just because you have to understand the technology to be a plumber, an electrician, machinist, a nurse. And that's something the private sector can, can cooperate with. But, but the bottom line is I think we've got a common demand to have these technology leaders that you need to be focused on serving this country and building for the country. And if you don't, then you're going to have higher taxes and more regulation.
- [11:36]
Steve Burns
Well, you talk about, you were talking about an AI academy and people sort of having more than an ambient knowledge of, of, of this technology. But at the same time, bro, it seems to me it feels like that's just not a thing. Like AI is an exponential curve, right? It's like trying to catch a rocket with a butterfly net. At this point, I'm not going to understand AI. It just feels like all of this technology that is generating new wealth, that is the future, will be sort of necessarily out of reach just by the nature of the kind of technology it is. I hope that makes sense. You know, it's different than plumbing, right? It's, it's, it's different than learning to work on a car. This is technology that is growing at an exponential pace, right?
- [12:32]
Ro Khanna
It is. And, and, and a couple points to it. One, to be able to use the AI, to be able to use chat GPT is probably not much harder than to be able to learn how to use Google or to learn how to use a smartphone. I Do think people can learn that? And the more they learn how to use these tools, the better they can be in the skilled trades in, as a nurse, as a home care worker. Right. I mean, you got a device, you go to someone's home, you're taking care of someone who's elderly, and the device reminds you about giving them medicine to tell you, hey, check their blood pressure, take their temperature. Those are all things that can make us better. But we also need regulation because what scares people about AI is, is it just going to eliminate my jobs? Is it going to get my kids addicted to. To social media? We've got to have regulations to make sure that people make decisions, not. Not machines. But I think, I don't know if you've got kids, Steve, but, you know, for the younger generation, they're going to need to understand, just have a familiarity with it. They don't have to understand calculus and complex math. They just need to understand this technology so they know they can be the people asking questions saying, you know, how do I use AI to get Steve from a million followers on Instagram to 5 million followers on Instagram because he has important things to say.
- [13:55]
Steve Burns
That'd be great.
- [13:56]
Ro Khanna
Those are things you could, you could use it for, Right?
- [13:58]
Steve Burns
Right. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. So when life gets a little too heavy, as it does sometimes, where do you go? Who do you talk to? Do you talk to your friends? Do you talk to your family? Do you talk to your dog? I know I did. That can be really helpful, right? But sometimes you need a different kind of help. I know in my lived experience, I did. And it was ironic because way back when, when I was on tv, I used to sit in a chair and look at someone right in the face and ask, will you help me? But it wasn't until I did exactly that in my real life that my life started to change because the person I was talking to was a licensed therapist trained to be clinically objective and to provide the kind of help that I needed. And that's where BetterHelp comes in. They really can be that first step. They've been helping people find their online match for, like, 10 years, and they've got a 4.9 rating out of a 1.7 million client session reviews, which is not bad. And as the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise. You can find the one with better help. And our listeners get 10% off their first month@betterhelp.com Steve Alive. That's better. H E L P so a couple of years ago, I got signed up for like a million Comic Cons and I didn't really know what to expect. I just kind of imagined an endless sea of funko pops and like a line of stormtroopers waiting to go to the bathroom. Which, okay, isn't wrong. But what I didn't expect was this warm, supportive community full of people just getting deeply, unapologetically weird. And no one drags you for it. In fact, everyone is is celebrating you for it. These places are really special and really, really, really cool. Now imagine that on a boat. Yes, I'm talking about Comic Con the cruise. From January 30 to February 3, 2026, sail from Tampa to Nassau on the Celebrity Constellation. It's four days at sea. You can meet and hang out with fan favorite celebs, enjoy one of a kind, intimate experiences you can't find at other conventions. And you can see skip all the lines that the landlubbers have to deal with. There's theme nights, cosplay, artist alley, which is always my favorite. Panels, workshops, late night conversations, parties. It's a big floating community where you can totally be yourself. Food, accommodation, entertainment are included. The only thing you have to do is show up, have fun, and be yourself with your people. Check out the 2026 talent lineup, including host Felicia Day and a slew of creators celebrating fantasy, sci fi and more. Head to ComicCon the Cruise.com Alive to learn more and book your cabin. And don't forget to use code alive for 250 off per cabin on new reservations. Comic Con the cruise. The ultimate fan adventure. Now you, you talk about regulation, right? And that sounds like a great idea, you know, and I. And. But this feels so unregulated. It feels so unregulated. Perplexingly, flabbergastingly unregulated for the degree of power that it represents. And you would think that if, you know, if you created a technology that literally changed the way billions of people process information and think, you'd lose some sleep over it. You know, like you would want it to be regulated. You wouldn't want to just monetize it, you know, so that really worries me. And it also makes me think of crypto, because crypto feels to me like a technology that I don't understand. And crypto was supposed to sort of democratize all of this. At least that was sort of the idea as I remember it. But it feels like it's just kind of creating a whole new set of overlords who understand this technology and can benefit from it while the rest of us can't. Do you think that crypto has the power to sort of democratize finance or is it just going to further siphon wealth into people who understand technology?
- [18:43]
Ro Khanna
Well, I think crypto can make payments faster and more efficient if it's properly regulated. But do I think that's going to create wealth and Ohio and western Pennsylvania are people who are left out? No, I think that would be a false promise. And I think part of the challenge has been that people have bitcoin and crypto because they don't get a friends and family round for the next AI company. So it's the closest they can come to saying I want a piece of technology. But a lot of it is just speculation and genuine, just gambling on some of it. Now that do I believe crypto has a use? Yes, I do. I think that if you want to transfer money to Nigeria, you can use a stablecoin. If you want to have a quick transaction without wiring fees, you can use a stablecoin. It's just a faster way of transactions. But I don't think that that's going to solve wealth inequality in America. I don't think that solves the fundamental challenge that you have identified that for so many people the American dream seems lost. But what I do think will solve that is if we provided everyone with health care, Medicare for all, we provided people with free trade schools and free colleges. If we had child care at $10 a day and paid people child care $20 an hour, if we brought new factories, finance new industries in these communities because of technology, right. You're going to need the racks that are on the data servers. Why can't that be built in America? If we are creating the new modern steel and if we're creating some of the new technology jobs, you know, now you don't, you could be anywhere and you have a little bit of understanding of this technology and you can get a good paying job anywhere in the country. And so we have to figure out like we can't stop the digital revolution, right? It's just not a politician saying that we can regulate it, we should, but we can't stop it. So the question is, if your family, you're in Bucks county, you're in western Pennsylvania, how do you, how do your kids, how do you make sense of this so you can have some economic security? And that's, that's really, I think, our challenge.
- [20:47]
Steve Burns
You said that, you know, crypto is not going to solve wealth inequality. But you may have noticed I'm pretty anxious about all this stuff and I worry. I guess my worry is will it increase wealth inequality? To me, Ro, it feels nefarious and I don't know why, but it just feels secret and it feels like something I don't understand. And people, there are people in the know that do understand and they're going to do all these crypto things and they're going to make all this money and the rest of us won't. Right. So there's a fear that I have that it's actually something that's going to increase wealth inequality. Do you think that's justified?
- [21:27]
Ro Khanna
I think if it's speculation takes place in some places, some people will make out money from it and other people may lose and that that is a valid fear, which is why it needs to be be regulated. But there are a lot of people who have bitcoin and millions and millions of young folks, probably a lot of people watching your podcast, especially if they're in their 20s and 30s, have Bitcoin or have a wallet. And for that matter, any young people, it's like the new digital gold. I mean it's just a store of value that they have. I think they need to be protected, but I, I'm not, I don't believe that, that somehow nefarious. What I think is a bigger concern is just that they're not able to buy a house, that they're not able to get a high paying job, that they have too much medical debt.
- [22:17]
Steve Burns
Yeah, for sure. I think, I think maybe with crypto I'm just kind of shaking my fist. These, this new rock and roll. What is this new stuff? It might just feel beyond me. Not everyone is as tech savvy as you, Ronna.
- [22:33]
Ro Khanna
You're pretty tech savvy, right? You got, you're on Instagram, you got all these followers, you're doing this podcast. I think, I think the question is just to also demystify some attack, which is to say right now, if I'm growing up in, in a community that hasn't had a lot of wealth, that has had factories leave, I look at the paper, I say Rose District's got five companies over a trillion dollars, $14 trillion. They're like, this stuff isn't for me. My life isn't improving. And I'm skeptical of tech, I'm skeptical about how do I participate. And if I'm 45, 50 years old, what's upsetting to me is not okay. I may not have a job, my Kids may not have that kind of job. And so I think what we need to do is figure out how do we democratize this wealth generation engine. But if you don't, if you just kind of say, well, let's just not care about this tech revolution and not pay attention to it, you're going to leave out a whole group of Americans from the next greatest wealth generation engine perhaps in human history. It's like leaving people out of the industrial revolution.
- [23:36]
Steve Burns
Yeah.
- [23:37]
Ro Khanna
And so I think the entire platform should be how do we get people participating in it and making sure people are building wealth and it's not all accruing in the hands of a few.
- [23:47]
Steve Burns
Yeah. Tech, tech skepticism is, is, that is how I feel. You know, and probably because now that I'm talking to you, it's probably based in the fact that it is so unregulated and as tech grows more and more, you, you said something that I couldn't agree with more, which is that we're not gonna stop the digital age. Right. We're, we're here. And you talk a lot about dignity in the face of, of what I consider a technology that is about to swallow us whole. Right. And just tell me a little bit about what you think that dignity looks like. What does dignity mean to you as it relates to emergent technology?
- [24:33]
Ro Khanna
It means you have control over your data. People can't just take everything about Steve and build a profile on you and try to predict what you're going to do and try to manipulate you based on your information. You get to control your data.
- [24:51]
Steve Burns
Yeah.
- [24:52]
Ro Khanna
It means that you should have the opportunity to be productive and contribute to society. It can't just be that there's no meaningful work in your community and that all the wealth is being built in other parts of the country. And it means that you should have a say in your workplace about your safety, your pride, your use of technology. You can't just be surveilled on it with having machines tell you when you're checking out, when you're leaving. You should have some ownership, some sense of equity in what you're producing. But I think that what's, what people are losing in dignity in America is one, a loss of control over our own information and secondly, a loss of control when we go into the workplace. People feel they, they aren't, they don't have a fair say. They may have a fair say at a town hall, even though that's questionable with all the millions in super PACs, but they don't have it in the workplace. And I guess those are the places I define dignity.
- [25:59]
Steve Burns
Right, the Bill of Rights. Yeah. Like we need, we need to include our basic human rights in this digital sphere. Right. And I'm, I'm very concerned with how we show up, right. How we show up on a screen, essentially. How more and more as we sort of brand ourselves on social media especially, and more and more as we sort of create versions of ourselves that we disseminate through the Internet, those count more and more. They matter more and more. They have consequence. And my question is always like, how do we do that and preserve our soul? How do we jump full steam into the global interweb and still have a human soul there? How can we stay human in an Internet that is optimized for conflict?
- [26:52]
Ro Khanna
Well, I think it's a profound question. I mean, it's the same question they had in the Industrial Revolution. Right. How can we stay human when we've got all this automation, when people are being displaced and now the table that's being made is no longer an artisan with a particular skill, but it's being mass produced and human beings are just going to be on an assembly line. How do we stay human and still have art and value and not just become commoditized for capital owners? And I think that the answer with the Industrial Revolution was that we needed laws to protect people. We needed minimum wage laws, we need collective bargaining in unions, we needed child labor laws. We needed to make sure that workers had a say in how they use technology. I think the answer in the digital age is similar in that we have to prioritize ultimately the human being over the technology. That means making sure that human beings have a say in how to adopt technology so their jobs aren't just eliminated. Means having clear laws against surveillance, clear laws against taking your, your data and the ethical use of it, clear laws against getting you addicted to algorithms online. I mean, I've been pushing for the Kids Online Safety Act. We can't even get that passed in Congress. We've got social media that's basically getting kids hooked on, on these platforms and pushing to them things that are dangerous for their mental, mental health. And then, you know, this I think, is an important and perhaps the most challenging that. I wrote a lot about indignity in a digital age. You know, Erasmus had talked about the printing press and everyone thought printing press great, but it led to 100 years of war in Europe because of conflict, because people printed some of the most vile stuff. You want to make Facebook look tame? Go read some of the pamphlets that Came out right after the printing press. I mean, people literally were dying about killing each other. And Erasmus regrets championing the printing press. It took 100 years to build the institutions of liberal democracy. What does that look like in the digital age? Well, this conversation, I think, I mean, is more constructive than just tweeting out. I'm sure I had angry tweets yesterday where I bashed some other politician. This is probably more constructive. How do we get more conversations in spaces like this on the Internet? How do we get more conversations like this in town halls? How do we build the modern architecture of the Internet to elevate human values right now? And this is. This is the last point, and I want to get your thoughts. The biggest naivete of the tech class, of the tech billionaires is we'll just put up these platforms, everyone can say whatever they want, and there's going to be global peace and everyone is going to be happy. And it turns out, you know what? There wouldn't be any philosophy if it was that easy. It turns out that when you just put out unregulated platforms where everyone can say anything and then you juice them to amplify those that are the most sensational and have the most emotional impact, it turns out you don't get the best of humanity. You often get the worst of humanity. And right now we've got the unregulated, unthought Internet. And what we've got to do is be intentional about how we shape the Internet to have more elevated conversations and in our. In our lives.
- [30:24]
Steve Burns
Boom. I agree with everything you just said. You know, I mean, it, it's, it's, it's. Some of it's on us. I mean, I agree with you about the regulation. I agree with you about creating an Internet that is concerned with. With human dignity, right? I, I agree that, that structurally we have to do something, but some of it's also on us, right? Some of it is on how we show up to the Internet, to an Internet that is, as I said before, obviously not just maximized for attention, but. But optimized for conflict, right? How we show up matters. I think in some way we need to show up in this space, this digital space, in. With enough vulnerability that it ceases to be fun to be such a dick to each other all the time. You know what I mean? Like, it seems like we need to show up with a version of ourselves that is prepared to accept flaws in someone else, that's prepared to accommodate a respectful conversation like the one that we're having. And I don't think people go to the Internet necessarily for that reason. I think they go to the Internet to have a conversation that upsets them. Does that make sense?
- [31:48]
Ro Khanna
I agree with you. I think right now people are mad at something and, and they go and they, you know, spout off on, on, on the Internet. But you know what's sad about it? And I, I, I don't want to get too philosophical, but, but I'll try it, try this, because it's your podcast. You know, there was, there's a guy, Jurgen Habermas, who's a famous philosopher. He came up with this idea called the Public Sphere.
- [32:14]
Steve Burns
Yeah.
- [32:14]
Ro Khanna
And Habermas basically says that, you know, if you have town halls, if you have salons, and you have conversation, that conversation can, is good when it impacts policy, and that is necessary for a healthy democracy. Part of the reason I think we don't see that on the Internet is because people don't believe that healthy conversation on the Internet is actually going to influence policymakers. They're so angry, they're so resigned, they're so frustrated. They see a guy putting $250 million in to win a presidential election. So they're on these sites not because they're thinking, okay, let's uplift democracy and let's have an impact. They're on these sites just to say, life sucks, our democracy sucks, I'm angry. And it's just an expression of anger and hate and often and frustration, justified frustration. And so the challenge is, how do we not just, okay, have more thoughtful conversations and reasonable exchange, but convince people that that actually is going to matter, that we could build a better, more hopeful politics. And at the end of it, it's not just, okay, we'll have these better conversations, and then some guy is going to put in $250 million, then someone will get elected, and nothing's going to change. And I'm better off just cursing at the world. And I think really that's partly what's going on right now.
- [33:33]
Steve Burns
Yeah, you know, I, you know, that is the question, right? How do we especially, especially as we talk about, you know, politics. I don't want to be a political podcast. That's the last needs is another, is another partisan, you know, podcast. But it's impossible not to talk about because our politics have sort of transcended politics. You know what I mean? Like, that's right. We're often not discussing politics when we discuss politics anymore. So I have a friend who's a professional hair and makeup artist, and she once told me that I have very nice skin and asked me what I do to take care of it. And I said, literally, what do you mean? It's soap. I use one bar of soap for everything. And she was horrified to say the least and mentioned that I'm not getting any younger and that I am trying to be all over the Internet right now and that I should maybe pay more attention to my skin care. I was like, maybe you're right. And I keep hearing about One Skin from women, from men. It's known for cult favorites like os1 body, os1 face, os1 eye. OneSkin stands out for their science first approach, delivering hydration barrier support and powerful longevity benefits in a single step. Which is great because I'm not trying to do all that stuff. And at the core is their patented OS1 peptide, the first ingredient proven to target senescent cells, the root cause of wrinkles and loss of elasticity. Now all of Oneskin's products are designed to layer seamless, seamlessly or replace multiple steps in your routine, making skin health easier. Good for me. And smarter at every age. Also good for me. One Skin is the world's first skin longevity company targeting cellular aging to keep your skin and scalp looking and acting younger for longer. For a limited time, you can try one skin with 15 off using code alive at oneskin co. That's 15 off oneskin co with Code Alive. And they might ask you where you heard him. Please support our show. Tell them we sent you. Try One Skin today. I mean, hey, we look great. Let's keep it that way. Something I wanted to ask you is do you think in the United States or just in general, we've sort of utterly confused politics and entertainment at this point? In a sense, in, in, in the sense that our, our politics have to satisfy us almost on an entertainment level, maybe on the level of like MMA or on the level of almost sports, right? In that unless, unless someone, unless you bloody someone, you didn't make a point. And how do we get from a political discussion that is a circus to political substance online specifically?
- [36:46]
Ro Khanna
That's a, it's a brilliant question. And you know, it's always amazes me that the, the biggest criteria people say is, well, can you be more funny? A lot of people say I voted for Donald Trump because he was funny. The biggest political commentators often have a following because of their humor. That's almost, you know, the best path to being a modern politician is not to get a boring law degree. It's go do stand up comedy and then go into, into Politics. Part of it is a humor because of utter cynicism, right? It's, it's that we don't believe that government is working. When John F. Kennedy was president, 60% approval in government, 60% faith in. And so you could have some sense of earnestness. And now earnestness is kind of seen as passe. Be edgy, be funny because everyone is corrupt because nothing works. And so ridicule feels liberating. And we enjoy the conflict because we see things as, as bad and we've seen things as needing to be smashed up. I don't know how we rebuild a sense of common purpose, of hope. All I can say is we may be so exhausted and embarrassed by the end of our current era. And that's not a partisan comment. That's not, hey, go, you know, there's another politician bashing the current president. That's, that's all of us. That maybe, maybe something more hopeful comes out of it. Maybe there's, there are multiple registers of the human being. It's not all cynical humor. There's, there are other registers to us which we have in our families, right? We're not always like in a family. It's not always the guy who's got the slapstick humor who dominates Thanksgiving, he's got like the five minute part. But they also have like the, the profound grandparent who's, who's got wisdom and you've got the kid who's got idealism and you got, you know, people who are just of goodwill. And it's sort of like our politics are missing the multi dimension register of human experience.
- [39:01]
Steve Burns
Wow. I absolutely, I absolutely agree. You know, I, I don't need my politician necessarily to be funny. I like, that's great if they are, you know, but that's, that's not a requisite for me. You know, I'd rather hear reason and thoughtfulness and compassion and all sorts of other things before I need them to be funny or to entertain me in some way. You know, governance and entertainment aren't necessarily. They don't need to be the same thing. I sometimes wonder if, if we're just not used to it yet. We're just not used to the fact that a screen doesn't denote entertainment, right? So maybe we are just so conditioned to look at a screen for something that is of small consequence and is of inherent entertainment value. Does that make sense that we almost don't take it as seriously as we need to? We almost always forget, we tend to forget that when you say something crappy about someone online in the comments section, in aggregate, you're part of harm. Right? There's. There's a person on the other end of that, and it's very easy to forget that. I think by nature of the fact that it's on a screen and it's on a screen in an environment that, as I said before, is just so obviously optimized to make us really mad at each other, to keep that engagement going and going and going and going. And I wanted to ask you, is it possible that we are too politically engaged at this moment? And because it seems to me that we. It seems to me that sometimes I am. Right. Like, I. Sometimes I feel like I'm too politically engaged at exactly the wrong levels. Like, I could tell you exactly a way that some pundit made Ted Cruz feel bad or something like that, but. But I can't tell you who's on my local school board, and I can't tell you who's on my town council. Right? So that's make. That makes me think that's not political engagement. I'm engaging on some emotional level that makes me feel good or bad. Do you see what I'm saying? Are we too politically engaged?
- [41:22]
Ro Khanna
I think we're too engaged to the national theater. I think it's a brilliant point. I never thought of that before, that the idea of being on. On a screen makes it more performative from television at first, with, of course, famously Kennedy, where looks and charm and performance starts to matter. And then social media just takes it to the next level where now everyone is kind of performing and, you know, we think kind of there's an authenticity to just speaking. But then if that was the case, why is it that, you know, when you're in school that people say, write an essay. Right. Why don't we just do everything orally? It's because when you write, you sometimes say, okay, that's a little bit sloppy. No, I don't just speak my mind. Sometimes when I speak my mind, I say stupid things and maybe I should think about it and deepen the thought and look at something. Counter argument. One of the saddest things in our country is we become a country that reads and writes less.
- [42:18]
Steve Burns
Yeah.
- [42:19]
Ro Khanna
That it's all on screen. It's all in. In sound bites. That there's no long form of. Of argument. And you know, I think to your point also about engagement, like politically, the engagement. My engagement started going to my school board and speaking out against the. The cuts to funding. And when I was in 10th grade and was started by meeting my Local member of Congress and asking him about the Iraq war back then and now. People's engagement doesn't start in their school, in their community. It's sort of the. It starts on this national, global way. And I do think that that's. That's. There's something not rooted about it that makes it. It makes it so much easier for me to hurl an insult at Ted Cruz and. And laugh at him than it would be for me to hurl an insult against a Republican state senator who I'm going to see at church or on a barbecue every other weekend, right? And I. And so there's. There's just becoming a lack of rootedness in our. In our politics.
- [43:31]
Steve Burns
You know, that's interesting, Rome, because it would be hard. It would be hard to insult someone that you're going to see at the barbecue, right? But wasn't this. Wasn't the Internet supposed to be the barbecue? Wasn't that the idea? Wasn't this supposed to be community? Wasn't this supposed to bring us together in precisely that way? Wasn't that the promise of the Internet was that it would bring us together, but instead it has pushed us apart? This was supposed to be some kind of neutral town square, right, where we could all meet and share ideas. It could be a barbecue. Like, how do we make this a barbecue where I have enough skin in the game and I feel enough like a human being in this moment that I can treat you like a human being in this moment that I'm not just going to throw my plate of barbecue at, you know, you don't have to have an answer for that. I'm just. You're just making me think, like, how can we humanize this space, you know, in such a way that allows for dignity, as you say?
- [44:39]
Ro Khanna
No, I think that's one of the biggest questions of our time. Look, what made the town halls work wasn't just that there were rules of engagement, okay? You can't just interrupt speakers. You can be disruptive. We're all going to listen. It was also that there was a common culture. I mean, a common sense of a belief in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and the American story, the American myth and the actual American narrative. And I think that this is partly what we forgot about the Internet. It's like, you can't just say, okay, all these people go in a room and now. Now talk, and something magical is going to happen, especially when you're, as you pointed out, maximizing attention and conflict. But I think one way to do it and this is not my idea, this is someone else's idea. They said, what? Have you had living room conversations online? 15, 20 people, different parts of the country, different backgrounds. They start out sharing something about themselves, about their story, and then they're having a conversation about, about just the country, about things that we're talking about. And is there an appetite for that? Is that, is there a space for that? How do you create an interest in that? And I guess we need more imaginative founders and thinkers about what does the digital space look like. I can't admit I don't think it has to look just like the platforms we currently have, because we can do better, we can be more creative.
- [46:15]
Steve Burns
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. One of my favorite things about, about you is your willingness to talk to literally anyone, right. Even if you are more or less certain they're going to disagree with you. I, I don't want to misquote you. You said some, I heard you say something once about, well, okay, I spoke to that person and I might not have persuaded them, but that's okay, right? I didn't, I didn't persuade them to my view, but I presented a reasonable human being and I presented a rational, respectful conversation. And I think that's great and I think that is a missing vibe. Right. And I appreciate that. But what does that look like in practice? You know, how do you do that when the other side is maybe not playing by the same rules? You know, how, how can you be persuasive when perhaps the person you're talking to considers it a virtue almost to be unpersuaded by anything you're about to say, by any new information you might have? How do you do that? Because you're good at it.
- [47:37]
Ro Khanna
I appreciate, look, I. Even in this conversation, I feel like we got to the interesting stuff the first 10 minutes. I'm sure it's fine, but it's sort of in 15 minutes on where you're challenging me to think about things that I haven't talked about. Right. And you're, and I'm thinking, oh, how would I really approach that? And I just think we need more free flowing conversation.
- [47:57]
Steve Burns
Right.
- [47:57]
Ro Khanna
It starts out we're so guarded. We have our, it's not just we have our talking points, we have our approach to the world and we start with our approach to the world and then it sort of breaks down once you're having real conversation and you start to think, you know what, my approach to the world may not be perfect or, you know, I didn't really think about that. And here's where I come in. And I think good persuasion has to be good listening. It has to. My willingness to talk to almost anyone is that I genuinely believe I can learn from almost anyone. That I genuinely believe that I don't have some monopoly on the truth, that I'm 1 out of 9 billion people trying to make sense of a very complicated reality and certainly one out of 330 million Americans trying to make sense of a very, very deep and profound American story. And I think it's the arrogance that makes us not, not listen. Now if you, if someone else comes with, well, we don't want to ever admit we're wrong. We're right, we're. We're just going to own the libs. Or, you know, we're, you know, we don't want to engage in this rational conversation. I guess there are two ways of going about it. One, we could say, well, we want our own version. Who's going to fight and punch back and, and, and, and then we're just going to go have a politics that's further and further polarized and maybe that's the way the country is going to end up. I guess I'm fundamentally influenced by my grandfather who believed in satyagraha, was part of Gandhi's independence movement, which was a moment of truth force in resistance to British colonialism. And they said ultimately, if you stick to reason and truth and articulating truth as best you see it, that it'll strike at the emotional chord of people and then that will inspire people and then eventually you will get people to open their hearts and minds that I believe the greatest leaders are far greater than politicians. Gandhi, Mandela, King John Lewis, though he did become a politician, have that approach. And I think for those of us who are politicians who are inherently compromised because we're participating in a system that, where you got to raise money, where you got to beg for votes, we should, we can't ever be them, but we should try to model some of them, especially at this time.
- [50:07]
Steve Burns
What advice do you have for those of us who are anxious? What advice do you have? You're an optimist, by the way, and I love that. Right. So. So, because so am I. You know, like, at least I try. I try to be an optimist. Do you have optimistic words for the immediate future of the American dream?
- [50:28]
Ro Khanna
I think if the country keeps going in this direction. By that, I don't mean the current parties and people in office. I mean the last 40 years.
- [50:37]
Steve Burns
Yeah.
- [50:38]
Ro Khanna
Watching wealth pile up in the Hands of a few in a few geographies and basically telling most Americans, deal with it, figure it out, then I'm not optimistic. I believe the American dream is going to shrink and be available to fewer and fewer people, and many other people are going to be struggling to get by. But I, but I think that that's also what's going to trigger this anger in the American people, because we're a proud people. We fought a revolution, we overcame the Civil War, we overcame World War II, Nazism, communism. And I think they're saying, look, this is not. We're going to keep throwing you guys out. We don't like any of you on Capitol Hill. We're going to keep throwing you out. We want something to change. And I think as that movement grows, that anger grows. People are going to come to a few key points. I think both parties, hopefully. You got to tax the people who are rich more. You got to get people basic, guaranteed health care. We've got to make sure people get, aren't going into debt to get education, and we've got to really figure out how we're creating jobs in places that haven't had them. And I think if we don't get that politics, then this place, this country, is going to see even worse than what we see today. I think you're going to see a, just a anger at wealth and anger at people who've done well. And you see it, you see it boiling up. You see it boiling up and in anger towards institutions and anger towards politicians, anger towards executives. And at its worst, it'll manifest in the most ugly phases of violence. And that's why the, the democratic process has to, has to listen. And that's on the most deeper level. I don't know. It's not a politics podcast, but I think the lesson of Trump is it's easy to just talk about the politics. It's sort of like, what are people trying to tell us? What are, what are they're trying to tell us? They're really angry, they're really hurt, they're really frustrated. And, and are we registering that?
- [52:47]
Steve Burns
Yeah, I, I love what you said. The democratic process has to listen. You know, we, we talk so much about technology and we talk so much about how it shouts stuff at us.
- [53:02]
Ro Khanna
Yeah.
- [53:02]
Steve Burns
And maybe that's what we need more of. Maybe we need a technology that listens, or maybe we need to bring listening to technology as we navigate the sort of fraught future of the American dream. You know, I love the idea of a democracy that listens. A Democratic process that listens. It's been a pleasure listening to you, Ro Khanna. As I said before, you know, I am a fan, you know, and I'm not just speaking about politics. I'm speaking about the fact that you are a reasoned and thoughtful individual and it's refreshing and a relief to see.
- [53:47]
Ro Khanna
And I, I appreciate what you're doing and I appreciate that you managed to build such a, a following talking about deeper things. I mean, talking about your own challenges with fame and your own emotional estate and having that kind of conversation publicly. And I guess one of the questions I'd have for you and is often when I have these kind of conversations. We'll see how this podcast does. You know, I'll get a 50, 100 text saying, oh, he's really thoughtful. He's, you know, and, but, but the vast majority of people won't see it. And then I'll say something which I thought was profoundly uninteresting, but it had a little bit of an edge to it and was attacking someone and, you know, 100,000 people will see it. And so the incentives are so skewed in our conversational space. How do we change that? How do we. And that, to me is, I think, one of the biggest challenges, not just for politicians, but for people who are in any way in the public space.
- [54:53]
Steve Burns
Well, you know, I think this is where I'm an optimist, Ro, and I think it's about representation, said Steve to a House representative. I think it is about. I, I did a thing a couple of years ago where it was like a, a shout out to my old fans from Blue's Clues or whatever. I just said, hey, how are you? How have you been? I never forgot you. Um, boy, life is pretty hard right now. And it was, the tone of it was not much different than what I just did right now. And it cut through because a respectful, care driven conversation is a missing thing on the Internet. I also do a thing on TikTok where I do nothing but listen. I just say, hey, how you doing? And I listen for one minute. It's what people are bringing to that moment. So just as it's possible to insult someone in a comment section and have 6,000 people like that insult and add to it and do grievous harm to a human soul on the other end of that screen, I have to believe the opposite is also possible. And I have to believe that the opposite is also sticky and will get clicks and we'll get likes. I think that if we, as we were talking about before. If we bring our full selves to this kind of conversation, I think that will also get views. I'm sure hoping. At least, you know, that's what the podcast. I'm sure hoping. But you're.
- [56:31]
Ro Khanna
You're going to be our test case or test model. I'm rooting for you. I'm rooting for you because the cut of the world needs it. And. And we got to certainly reverse the sensationalism and the anger now. And so I appreciate what you're. What you're doing, and hopefully it's sort of like therapy for politicians coming on your podcast.
- [56:55]
Steve Burns
Oh, no, that's actually. That's actually awesome listen. From one dude from southeast Pennsylvania to another, it is a pleasure to speak to you. And again, I know there's a lot going on right now, and we really appreciate you stopping by, so I appreciate you.
- [57:15]
Ro Khanna
Go, Council Rock.
- [57:16]
Steve Burns
All right, man. Take care. Bye.
- [57:18]
Ro Khanna
Take care.
- [57:21]
Steve Burns
Whoa. All right. That went a whole bunch of places I didn't think it was going to go, what I wrote down. Yeah. So he said the American Dream is about more than wealth, Right. It's about the opportunity to contribute, to have meaningful work, and to build a secure future. But that's also exactly what we're currently losing. Right. And then we kind of went off and just had this really awesome conversation about what. What it means to stay human in a world, in a digital world, essentially. And I think what we arrived at is that the future of the American Dream will certainly be digitized in some way. And then he said that the American Dream is dwindling and that people are not wrong to feel that way. But the good news is that in a democratic process that truly listens to those who are dreaming the dream, it's not too late. The future is still up to us.
- [58:42]
Ro Khanna
Hmm.
- [58:44]
Steve Burns
Let's go. Okay. So we know that this is a time of unprecedented technological advancement, and we know that we're generating wealth faster than any time in human history. Right. But at the same time, we are also generating gaps between rich and poor, obviously, between people who feel connected to all of this technology and people who don't, people who feel like they're going to benefit from the future it brings and people who don't. So I'm wondering, what would it look like if we pursued fairness with all that same energy, all of that same genius that we're currently using to pursue profit? What would that look like? What do you think? Yeah. Yeah, maybe. Maybe. Well, listen, thank you so much for stopping by today. It is great to see you? Oh, always. You look great. You do. Alive with Steve Burns is a Lemonada Media original. If you haven't subscribed to Lemonada Premium yet, now's the perfect time. You can listen to the show completely ad free, plus you'll unlock exclusive bonus content from me as I reflect on this episode. Just press subscribe on Apple podcasts, head to lemonadapremium.com to subscribe on any other app, or listen ad free on Amazon Music with your prime membership. That's lemonadapremium.com Alive is hosted by me, Steve Burns, and produced by Jeremy Slutskin. Our editor is Christopher Champion Morgan. Our associate producer is Akshay Tharabailu. Audio engineering by James Sparber. Lemonada's SVP of weekly programming is Steve Nelson. Executive producers are Jessica Cordover Kramer, Stephanie Whittles, Wax, and me. We'll see you next week. And you look great, by the way.