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- [00:00]
A
Hey, it's Jonathan Cohn of the Bulwark here with my colleague and friend and expert on the right and Dilbert, which we'll get to in a second. Will Sommer. We are here in fact to talk about Scott Adams, author of Dilbert, a very controversial character on the right. Will, who is he and why is he in the news right now?
- [00:20]
B
So we all know Dilbert, the pointy haired boss, the comic strip folks in the 90s and the aughts if you're too young to have really experienced Dilbert's heyday, it's about a comic strip, about, about office culture and we got Dilbert. I was, I say this as someone who as a young boy I was a huge Dilbert fan and like the, the late Clinton administration, there were dinosaurs in it. What was there not to like? But now Scott Adams has set the creator who is appears to be mega wealthy from all the mouse pads and post it notes or whatever with Dilbert branding that he sold. He is, has rebranded himself for the past decade as like a maga guy kind of. He's almost like an esoteric maga guy. Like he has sort of his own theories. You, he's like a persuasion expert, quote, unquote, quote. And so he'll say things like, like people like people on the right like him because he's not like a traditional like right wing looking guy from his politics. But you know, I was just watching his show and he'll say like persuasion tip and he kind of does a long wind up and the, the lesson is it's better to compliment people than to criticize them in terms of getting what you want. And they act like he's kind of this like fourth dimensional chess genius for coming up with ideas like this.
- [01:32]
A
Yeah, I mean he's been a very controversial figure. At the same time over the summer he revealed that he had prostate cancer. Advanced, a very aggressive form. And that's how he got into the news this week was a, you know, where he pops up with a on social media and said he was having trouble getting the medication Pluvicto, it's called, which is advanced treatment for advanced prostate cancer. And he tweeted at the President saying help. Which is, you know, I guess he has a relationship with President Trump. Is that right or is he just known to President Trump?
- [02:07]
B
I don't know that he's ever been to the White House or anything like that, but certainly he's someone I think a lot of these right wing media people read and I'm sure a lot of People in the administration are tuning into his rumble chat or what have you. And so, you know, he again, you know, back in May, he said he had a month to live from prostate cancer. He, he's lasted longer than that, fortunately. But over the weekend, he said, tomorrow I'm going to call on President Trump to hook me up with Pluvicto, this specific treatment I want. Basically, he said his insurer, Kaiser of Northern California had, it gets a little strange here, but basically he says they had dropped the ball somehow in the paperwork. He said he had been approved and was supposed to get it, and then he didn't get it. And obviously the time was kind of counting down as he saw it. And so he needed to get this treatment really quickly. And then you saw the Trump administration swing into action in a way we see on basically nothing else that isn't some sort of malevolent goal. They instantly, people like RFK Jr. The Secretary of Health and Human Services, Don Jr. Were all tweeting, you know, stand by, you know, we're coming. And then Trump himself ultimately acknowledged this as well.
- [03:18]
A
So Scott Adams, he tweets at the president, President tweets back. Have we heard from Kaiser Permanente? What did they say about all of this?
- [03:25]
B
Yeah, so they've said that he's going to receive the treatment. Now, they haven't really address, addressed what this supposed drop ball was, whether that's true or not. I mean, typically when it comes to these kind of right wing media figures, I, I feel like there's often more to the story than perhaps we're getting. We don't know here. I mean, ultimately what, you know, Scott Adams is going to get the treatment, which is great. The, they, they said that, you know, this is a treatment they provide. This isn't like a Ivermectin situation where this is some just totally off the wall treatment, you know, that he's seeking. So it's, that's sort of where it stands there. I mean, the Trump administration somehow seemingly broke this impasse and obviously this is being treated as kind of a big victory on the right.
- [04:02]
A
Yeah, yeah. And I will say, I mean, I, you know, I follow health policy. It's what I do. And it is, you know, it's hard to know what's going on in this situation. You know, was, as you said, this isn't like a case of a drug that wasn't available or was approved. It sounded like some kind of holdup somewhere. You know, whether it had been. He sounded like he was approved for it even. So it Sounded like some kind of bureaucratic issue which happens all the time in American health care. And, you know, I think I certainly, I begrudge nobody using what influence they have to break through one of those bureaucracies, those big organizations, insurers, health systems, you name it. They, sometimes they just get stuck and you gotta, you just gotta make a lot of noise and break through them any way you can. Anyone who's ever had to deal with serious treatment for any condition would attest to this, I think. So nobody, I think, begrudges him getting the treatment that would help him. Of course. Hard not to notice, though, at least for me. I'm curious if anyone on the right has noticed this, that the sort of enthusiasm, energy, being put in to help this person get health care is not something the administration does for everybody at the moment. Is that getting any attention at all? And in this contrast, No.
- [05:23]
B
I mean, I think I, I think this is really fitting again. I mean, we're, we're glad this has happened. But I think it's also sort of emblematic of the way this administration approaches a lot of stuff, which is sort of, you know, everything for my friends and, you know, punishment for, or the withholding from the average person or certainly people perceived as foes of the administration. So, you know, I think about these cases where, you know, January, six people went to prison and suddenly the right. So, oh, my gosh, you know how bad prison conditions are, this issue that they had previously ignored, or Trump's Trump allies went to prison, or, you know, in cases where we see these sort of politicized prosecutions of people like James Comey, while on the other hand, you know, people on the right are just shocked that, or, excuse me, pardons are sort of handed out to anyone who says something nice about Trump or commits a white collar crime. So this sort of, for me, fits into that whole world. And, you know, as you're very familiar, this comes at a time where the administration is just totally cutting and pillaging health care budgets.
- [06:20]
A
Yeah, yeah. I mean, that was the thing that sort of struck me where we, you know, we've just come off the debate over the one big beautiful bill which, you know, takes a trillion dollars out of Medicaid. You know, we're estimating 10 million people are going to lose health insurance from that. And that is not that. That's separate from the debate front right now with the government shutdown over these extra subsidies for the Affordable Care act, which if they don't get renewed, you're looking at another 4 million people not getting insurance. So that's 14 million people could lose health insurance and then millions beyond that who are going to see their insurance costs go up. They'll have higher deductibles, they'll have higher co pays and you know, this is actually something we've studied a lot. What happens to people when they lose their health insurance or their out of pocket costs go up. And you know what happens? They don't get treatment, they don't get screenings, they don't get follow up care. And when you're talking about cancer that could literally be lethal, you know, it can mean missing a cancer that you could have caught early, can mean not getting, being able to take your cancer drugs. And you know, there have been totally legitimate estimates out there that tens of thousands of people a year are going to die prematurely because of these healthcare cuts. Some of them are going to die because of cancer. And it's just, it's hard not to notice that on the one hand all this energy, all this effort to help someone. And again, I'm super glad, I'm glad I would want anybody to get the cancer treatment that, you know, if it's available that could help them. But you know, what about all these other people? Why is the effort not being made there now? I guess he's made some enemies on the right who have some mixed feelings about him getting this cancer treatment. What's that all about?
- [08:06]
B
Yeah, so this is sort of a weird subplot that's been running back since May when Scott Adams announced his cancer diagnosis. Basically there are in the world of kind of like MAHA alternative health, there is this cancer treatment that I would describe as unproven, generously, that is very popular whenever sort of some right wing figure gets cancer and everyone says, oh, you got to try it. It's kind of in this kind of the ivermectin zone. And so of course Scott Adams, when he made this announcement, he said, and don't even mention this treatment because I tried it already. I did it for a month and it didn't work. And so now I'm trying to get sort of a more traditional treatment as we obviously see him seeking now. And then the guy who created that treatment got really mad and all of his fans were saying, you messed it up. You didn't do the ivermectin schedule. Right. You know, and then now with, with Scott Adams seeking this plu victo, the guy kind of came out and said, you know, Scott, you know, chickens coming home to roost, buddy, you should have done my wacky treatment. So this is sort of the Scott Adams, I would say, is like kind of in this weird position where he's like, slightly more rational and skeptical than a lot of other right wing media figures. He kind of has his own, his own lane. And so the idea that he was seeking any kind of, like, realistic traditional medicine has really infuriated a lot of his fans.
- [09:24]
A
Well, thank you for clarifying that, Will. And we wish, you know, we send the best to Scott Adams, his treatment, and everybody who is getting cancer treatment. My need, we hope they can get it. And thanks for listening to us at the Bulwark, and we'll check you out next time.