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- [00:01]
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- [00:49]
Dave Smith
What's up everybody? Welcome to a brand new episode of Part of the Problem. I am Dave Smith. He is Robbie the Fire Bernstein. How are you today, sir?
- [00:58]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
I'm getting ready for some boozman action, my friend. I was squatting heavy in the living room, doing some getting my living room lifts in. Last heavy lift before I ski. And I'm excited to be out there. First show of the year, my friend.
- [01:11]
Dave Smith
So you're testing, you're testing your legs to see if they're ready to ski, is that the idea? Or are you actually trying to like get prepared for skiing?
- [01:19]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
A little bit of both. And you know, you lift heavy, you can offset some of the cake you consume so that, try to keep some balance here.
- [01:26]
Dave Smith
That is true. That is true. Make room for more cake. Yeah, I'm excited. It's, it's, you know, I, I love taking December off and there are, as I've been quite clear in the past, I don't love traveling these days. I don't like being away from my family. But I love doing standup comedy. I love going out and, and you know, performing for our, our fans at live shows. And I am pretty excited to get to get back on the road. And yeah, here we are, we got a, a busy year coming up and this is the first stop. Bozeman, Montana. I, I know I keep got to.
- [02:00]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Get, but I'm, I'm committed to Bozeman at this point particularly I think as people get more annoyed by this, I might just more drastically mess up city names.
- [02:07]
Dave Smith
Yeah, I know it does seem it is a good marketing tool, but yeah, and then we're, we're all over the.
- [02:13]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Place at some point, like just things that don't even make sense.
- [02:18]
Dave Smith
And then of course after that, Bozeman, Montana is coming up on January 18th. And then the following weekend, January 30th, one night only in Louisville, Kentucky. Then Fort Wayne, Indiana, key West, Houston, Buffalo, Boston, Chicago, Rosemont, Denver, Cleveland, Tacoma, Spokane, Tampa. A lot of stuff coming up this year, so a lot to be excited about. What missing from our list of places so far is Los Angeles. We have no dates there. I'm gonna. I think we want to figure out what's going on with this situation before we go back. You know, I was saying, I don't know. Did I talk about this on the Members Only episode? A little bit possibly, but so I do, weirdly, because, you know, LA and New York were always, for many years, like the two centers of stand up comedy. Those, those were the capitals of, of stand up comedy, with everything else being like, it was always like UFC and Pride back in the day or something like that. It's. There's these two, you know, it was like the LA comedy scene. In the New York comedy scene, they could debate which one was the best, but everything else was objectively the second tier. Right? There's comedy scenes around the country, but it was always New York and LA were the top two ones. Now that's changed a little bit post pandemic and rise of the Internet and Austin became like a major one. So it's a little different now. But just because of that, like, I know a lot of people in la. I just know a lot of people who live out there. I know a lot of people who have been affected by these fires. The thing is that all of the comedians in L A got so goddamn successful that everyone I know who's been affected by this is like a multimillionaire. And like, that still sucks. It sucks to have your house burned down or to have to evacuate your house. It's just, it's really hard to sell to the general public that you better feel bad for this person worth $50 million. That just kind of sucks. All the people in LA with the biggest microphones are worth tens of millions of dollars. And so all anyone's seeing is a bunch of rich people crying about their stuff, which is sad, but it doesn't move the needle. You need poor people crying. You want to really get. You want to really move the needle here. You need, we need to see some pores, which there are plenty of, but nobody wants to hear from them anyway. I don't, I mean, I don't know if you have any hot takes on the L A fires. I will say, look, I have zero, like, deep knowledge about any of the underlying issues of what led to these fires. Like, I know about as much as Donald Trump knows, and I don't want to sound like him, they go, rob, there's all these leaves. And they got to rake them. They got to rake the leaves, but they didn't rake the leaves because they're a bunch of Democrats and Democrats don't rake leaves. Um, but it. It does seem like a pretty blatant, enormous failure of government. We could get into some of this stuff a little bit. I. I will say it is. I was laying the other night, I was putting my son to bed. He's three. And he makes me lay on the floor just like my daughter did at that age. Makes me lay on the floor next to him, like he's in his bed and I have to lay down on the floor until he falls asleep, and then I can crawl out of a room in my own house. Is that's what it is to be a. A grown man with children. But. So I'm sitting there on the floor and I just, like, have one earbud in. So I can't really do nothing but, like, listen to something on my phone, you know? But. So I was just going through the. The clips of all the different, like, officials in California, and I understand there's a tragic situation. I feel. I know. I'm sure we have listeners who are out in la. If anybody's affected by this, I'm sorry you have to go through that. It's horrible. But listening to. First of all, everyone's a lesbian. It's like, lesbian. All the way up to Gavin Newsome. I have nothing against lesbians. Our producer Natalie here dabbles. I have no problem with them. I don't know if fire safety is necessarily their calling, but whatever. But it's just every. And every one of them is just scrambling to throw the other one under the bus. It's truly unbelievable. Like, they talked to one, this one woman who's, like, on the fire department, and they're kind of like, what are you doing? These fires are engulfing everything. And she's like, like, hey, listen, if we get to the fire hydrant and there's no water there, that's not our problem. We don't do the water. You got to talk to the water department about that. And then the water department's like, you got to talk to the Indians about that. I mean, we had all the water, but the Indians did that. And it all makes its way up to Gavin Newsom, where he's finally just like, I think it's climate change and Donald Trump's misinformation or something like that. It's just. They're all Struggling to blame everything they can when the basic reality seems pretty clear. Rob, which is like, that the biggest state government in the United States of America. You know, so, like, the United States of America's federal government is the biggest government in the history of the world. California has the biggest state government within the United States. Los Angeles is the biggest city within that state. Right. And so even when you have a government, I mean, the government of. Of California spends more than many nations do every single year, and yet still they can't complete the most basic services. And I think there actually seems to be a relationship there where the larger government grows, the more. The most basic services that we would all assume would just be the things government would take care of, like, say, a fire, you know, the fire department or something like that. Their services, like, just fall off a cliff. Anyway, I want to play this clip from Gavin Newsom, but any thoughts on. On any of this stuff, Rob?
- [08:18]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Yeah, the government, they're the abusive boyfriend. And part of their pitch is, hey, baby, in an emergency, I'm gonna be here for you.
- [08:25]
Dave Smith
Yeah.
- [08:26]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
And you're not good for planning for yourself, so let me have all the money, because I'm better at preparing for emergencies, and I'm gonna take care of you, baby. And then the second emergency, the abusive.
- [08:38]
Dave Smith
Boyfriend who doesn't have a job.
- [08:39]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Yeah.
- [08:40]
Dave Smith
You know, doesn't. Doesn't actually produce any.
- [08:42]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Let me manage the finances. I'm better with the money than you are. And if I have the money, then I'll make sure that you got the healthcare. And if there's ever an emergency, I'm gonna stash this, that we're ready for an emergency. And, I mean, if you're a person who was living in a $30 million house and you didn't trust the government to build your kitchen, you didn't trust the government to do your plumbing, you didn't trust the government to have the water in your sinks. And now all of a sudden, you're dealing with rationing because government doesn't actually have the resources for the fire department. You must start rethinking. Hey, why was I relying on government for that one? Why was one of the most important things in this area of fire prevention something that I was relying on the government for? And the big storyline of which I also don't have this fully validated, but it's been reported in the New York Post and elsewhere, is that a lot of water gets flushed into the ocean, and that's apparently to save some little, teeny, tiny fish. I don't know why that's important. It's been. Even Gavin Newsom has admitted to the fact that there isn't enough fire. I mean, not enough water available for the people that are trying to fight the fires. And yes, they've put a lot of money into apparently refilling the reservoirs or whatever supposed to exist for that. That would speak to mismanagement. Whatever money's been spent, not helping the homeless. I mean, California, huge money.
- [10:05]
Dave Smith
Huge, huge money spent on the homeless. I mean, like, it. And without solving the problem, you know, like, without, like, huge money spent. And yet still, if you go to San Francisco or you go to Los Angeles or you go to San Diego or any of these times, the homeless are all over the place. And so it's. And of course, it's become this, like, crazy racket where there's all these people making like 500 grand, 600 grand a year because they're managing the oversight of the homeless, you know, plant and nothing, you know. And I. I will say I do just like, as I mentioned before, I do just find this to be a major theme that is, in many ways it. It's fascinating, and I think it's. It's a human characteristic because all of this is the work of human beings, after all. But, like, we talk about it all the time, generally speaking, with the United States of America. But when you have this, you know, you have this gigantic government that's spending well over $6 trillion a year, just the biggest organization in the history of the world. And they're doing all of these things. Like, you know, they're under Joe Biden, you know, they're trying to set up a Ministry of Truth in the Department of Homeland Security, and they're, you know, they're. They're regulating what big tech companies can say, and they're. They're micromanaging colored revolutions in the furthest corners of Eastern Europe, and they're deciding whether the regime in Somalia is fit to rule or whether we have to overthrow that regime and whether, you know, just taking on the world. And then meanwhile, the most basic functions of government, you know, we can't protect our borders, win our wars, balance our budgets. You know, like, the simple things that you would immediately. Any, like, Joe Six Pack would be like, well, what does government do? It'd be like, well, I don't know. They do the roads and the courts and the cops. You know, like the most basic things. You're failing on all of those while you're trying to, like, you know, put a man on the moon. You know, in. I don't mean that literally, but either way, in California, you have this situation where, you know, the government is demanding that we switch to electric cars and we build high speed rail and they're. You know what I mean? It's like the biggest government that wants to micromanage every single issue. And then when it comes down to the most basic functions of government, like, are your streets clean? Are there people defecating in your streets? Are there. You know what I mean? In. Again, to your point, in Los Angeles, it's not as if these fires were like something that came out of the blue that nobody could have foreseen. This was the problem that you would be concerned with. You know, like this, this should have been at the top of Gavin Newsom's list every single day when he gets to his desk. Like, this is the dynamic here. You're in a desert, it's incredibly dry. When fires start, they're very difficult to contain. Um, and, and you know, obviously it's, it's, it's just one of those examples where much like with a lot of these things, it's like you just, I mean, this is obviously the most like, blatant example, but you can propagandize people and fool them and stuff, but you can't convince them their city's not on fire when their city's on fire. That's just. Even, even regular people can figure that shit out. And they certainly seem to have figured this out. People are furious. Go ahead.
- [13:36]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
That's a level of extreme negligence that you don't have the water. I mean, if I owned a building that had sprinklers for a fire in what's an industrial plant that could very easily set fire, and I had advanced sprinkler system and I just didn't attach the water line to it, or I skipped on the water line bill or whatever, or I was so stupid that if I had to turn off the electricity in the building that's not on another power source, that's negligence.
- [14:03]
Dave Smith
Yeah, it sure does seem like a whoopsie. Seems like something you might want to. Might want to figure out here. Let's play this clip of Gavin Newsom here. Because I, I do. Perhaps one doesn't want to engage in.
- [14:17]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Politics that now is not the time to point out my failures.
- [14:20]
Dave Smith
It never, it's. It never is this. It's so funny, man. It's always. That's. Isn't that always the case, though? Right now is never the time to think about how I failed all of you. Guys. And then later also won't be the time, but let's get to later and then we'll discuss it. I do think one of the most interesting angles on this is, like, what this ultimately is going to mean. I mean, look, you, you can't ignore the fact that this comes here. Let me sound like Kamala Harris for a second. These fires happened in context. And what is that context? But it is, it is hard to ignore the context of which this is all happening. Okay, you have had obviously the, you know, Trump winning the election, the just crashing and burning of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. You have the corporate media in shambles. You have wokeism kind of on the retreat in a way that even just a couple of years ago would have seemed like very, you know, it would have seemed crazy, you know, for this to be happening in this short a timeline. You have Trudeau stepping down now. You know, there's just, it's like blow after blow after blow. And California is just, there's. Politically speaking, there's almost no way to spin this. I mean, yes, Donald Trump just won the election, but Joe Biden is President of the United States of America. Gavin Newsom is the, you know, it's the president, the governor, the mayor, the, the head of the fire department. I mean, it's Democrats all the way up and down. Like, there are no Republican fingerprints on this. That's not at all to say that Republicans, if in power, may not have mismanaged things in a, in a similar fashion. And there have been Republican areas where things were very mismanaged. You know, you can think of Texas and the, the ice storm thing that they had there, but that was a little bit different because it's like, well, Texas never gets weather like this. Fires in California aren't some crazy thing that this never happens. But regardless, in this example, it's just Democrats all the way up and down. And the incompetence just like, is so obvious. The optics of this are just all so terrible. I do wonder if Gavin Newsom can survive this. I'm not, I'm not sure about that. So we will see. Anyway, let's. Did you want to add something or you want to go to the.
- [16:49]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
I'm going to guess that this has to be the end of his career. I think that this is just that there's nothing hidden. It's not happening underground. It's not a fiscal policy that will result in failure down the line. It's not a couple people that aren't getting the health care that they need.
- [17:05]
Dave Smith
You're Your example in the example that you just used, right? It's like, if some. Some chick has, like, an abusive boyfriend who doesn't work and just kind of lives off of her, but, like, the promise is, oh, but I'll protect you, or something like that. And then some other guy comes up and just mugs her right in front of this boyfriend, and he does nothing. You're like, oh, but, dude, that was your claim. Like, you had to do that. You bring nothing else to the table. You know, like, for. For government to not be able to do the most basic, fundamental duty of. Of government, or what's viewed as the most basic, fundamental duty of government. It's a very tough thing to survive for. Like, you can't protect me from fires that might come. Jesus. You can't make sure that the fire department has water. That's tough. All right, let's. Let's play the interview, and then I think there'll be some stuff here to. To discuss.
- [18:00]
Gavin Newsom
I want to know the answers. So I'm the governor of California. I want to know the answer. I've got that question. I can't tell you about how many people. What happened on my own team saying what happened. And I want to get the answers. And wasn't going to be candid with it. Wasn't getting straight answers. Yeah, I watched the press conference. I met with some of those leaders. We had my team start talking to local leaders, saying what's going on. Our state.
- [18:19]
Dave Smith
Weren't getting straight answers.
- [18:20]
Gavin Newsom
I was getting different answers. When you start getting different answers, then I'm not getting the actual story. And they're assessing it, and I get that as well. You have to have a little bit of grace. Back to the point. We're in this emergency environment and everything else.
- [18:32]
Dave Smith
Yeah, he's cooked.
- [18:34]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
What I love about this is that he's basically describing is I have to go talk to these other politicians, and it's like talking to myself.
- [18:41]
Dave Smith
Yep.
- [18:42]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
And so what do you know? I can't get an actual answer. Nobody's at fault. This guy's saying it's that guy's fault. This guy's saying it's that guy's fault. And, yeah, he's got no way to sell this because he's on top. He's in charge. And there was missing water from hoses.
- [18:57]
Dave Smith
Yeah, there are. Look, man, there is something about. It's like that old phrase, the buck stops here. There is just something about being a leader where in the time of a crisis to come out and go, I Want to know, too, man. You know, just like all you guys want to know, do I want to know, too? It's like, dude, people are looking at you. They want to know, and so they're looking at you to give them the answer. And for you to say, oh, I'm going around and asking my team, and they're telling me a whole lot of is. That is just devastating. I mean, that is just not good enough. You gotta have something better than that. And this is, you know, imagine, like, you're in this situation where you have to, like, evacuate your home with the things you have on your back because there's no time to even, you know, even think about bringing more stuff or packing a bag. And this is what your governor's telling you. Like, don't. Don't worry. He wants to know, too. That is rough. Also. It's like, you can't. There is something about, like, throwing your team under the bus that is always. I mean, this is like the. This is the telltale sign of failed leadership. I mean, when you start throwing your own team under the bus and then saying, oh, I'm hearing all these different, you know, contradictory things from them, it's like, okay, well, first of all, you hired your team. That's on you. You were supposed to put the people in place who would give you the answers, you know, that. You can't just sit there and say, oh, I mean, look, it's these guys. Look at these clowns. Don't seem to know what's going on. That is a reflection of you and your leadership and your decision making.
- [20:41]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
So be honest, come forward and go, hey, we messed up. We invested in lesbians, and it turns out that there are gender roles and certain jobs are just better done by other groups of people. We've seen it in professional sports, and we made an error over here. So I promise we will clear all the lesbians out of the manly jobs in California.
- [21:00]
Dave Smith
Well, look, to be clear, right, it's like, look, and this is the problem with affirmative action or dei, any of this type of stuff. When you start making the emphasis that we're going to hire, you know, people from different racial. Racial groups or different sexes or whatever. It's like, okay, so they wanted to get a lot of women into firefighting, but what women are you going to get, right? Like, so. So this is where you're getting, like, you know, you're going to get the most masculine women in the same way that, like, if you were. If your goal was to get a lot of men to be nurses and preschool teachers, you're going to get the most feminine men. I mean, that just typically speak. I'm not saying in every single case, but broadly, that's what's going to happen. Now, that isn't in itself necessarily a problem. I, I don't think, like, dude, if there, if there's some lesbian out there who is just like the best candidate for any position, then put them in that position, and that's great. The problem is that when you prioritize diversity over job performance, like one of the, when those things butt heads, the question is, which one are you going to go with? Right? So if, if you want, like, if you want to get more of a demographic that are, that are unlikely to go into that field, the, the practical way to do that is always going to be to lower standards. And so that's what ends up happening, that you pass over people who would have been better for this job because your priority is diversity rather than simply who's the best for this job.
- [22:43]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
I swear, if you saw what some of these dikes look like, thought they were qualified, too.
- [22:47]
Dave Smith
Yeah, yeah, right. Well, maybe. But look, I mean, as anyone knows, I mean, you can, you know, there's lots of examples that people like to go to, like, like surgeons and pilots, you know, are always the good ones. But listen, if you, if you or somebody you love has to have, you know, a risky surgery, believe me, you'll find out very quickly that you do not care. And even, like, the most racist, like, even the member of the Klu Klux Klan in that moment does not care what race or gender their, their surgeon is. You want the best. You want the person with the best track record. You know, the bet, like, that's it. That's who you want. And anytime that you start putting other criteria in, you muddy those waters to some degree. And that, that's really what's so devastating about the DEI stuff, is that, like, positions like these, like, until. And it's different than being like, a surgeon or a pilot, where it's so obviously in front of your face every single time you do your job, like, people will die if you fail at this job. But positions like this, that maybe just seem like political appointments when the emergency strikes become every bit as important as, as those, maybe even more so. Anyway, let's, let's keep playing with Gavin Newsom.
- [24:16]
Gavin Newsom
So I just want to determine the facts, but no one has any patience anymore in this weaponized back to the grievance of Trump. Everyone else, there's immediacy and lies, travel the proverbial world. And it's hard states, literally. Unless you have.
- [24:30]
Dave Smith
I mean, it's literally.
- [24:31]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
And then now is not the time for urgency. It's on fire, dude. When is the time for it?
- [24:36]
Dave Smith
And. And to try to tie it back to, like, Trump or the misinformation or something out there. I mean, I've seen this, by the way. It's. It's like. And again, this is. It's. It's. It's funny because the Internet has become, like, a convenient distraction for so many of these people. It's like, when, you know, I see, like, there was this video. I don't know if you saw, but there was a. Like a. I mean, I don't know if it's AI or how you do this stuff, but there's a video of the Hollywood Hill sign burning. It's not real. That wasn't on fire, but they put a video out of it, and it got shared a bunch of times. It's like, okay, yeah, there's misinformation out there, but, like, what? The city is on fire. Like, that's the real crisis here. So what are we talking about with all of this? Like. Like, you're starting to blame people. Like, is that really the problem? Is that really the problem we need to focus on here? There's misinformation or whatever. It's like they're always just trying to divert from their own responsibility, and it's a pathetic attempt to do so. Yeah, let's. Let's finish it.
- [25:40]
Gavin Newsom
Those facts, and you can communicate them soberly. And so that's what we're trying to achieve as well as this. But I have 10 other things we're doing concurrently as well. I mean, across the board on recovery, disaster assistance, getting the major disaster declaration, and maybe the first one in US History over a text with the White house within literally 36 hours to get 100% reimbursement for folks out here. We've been working concurrently in all of these areas. We're doing executive orders as I speak, as it relates to recovery and land use, dealing with speculation and fraud, and trying to address issues of coastal commission here and address the issue of planning permits and how we address all of the myriad of needs for small businesses. All of this in real time, again, as the state, even though this is not a state responsibility, or to support the city and the county that are overwhelmed at this moment.
- [26:31]
Dave Smith
There you go, Rob. Doesn't that make you feel better?
- [26:35]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Just charity from him. Hey, baby. I don't. I don't this isn't my responsibility, and I don't even need to work on this. But out of the goodness of my heart, even though it's not a state responsibility, we're going to do our best to pitch in and figure out who to. Who's to blame. That's not me.
- [26:49]
Dave Smith
Foreign. I'm on the phone, I'm writing executive orders. I'm. I'm juggling a lot of things right now. I mean, just. This is really bad, dude. And, yeah, I gotta say, I. I don't think he survives this. I mean, I don't know, man. We'll see. But, I mean, you know, it is California, and California is as solidly blue as any part of the United States of America. But this has got to be a bridge too far. I mean, you got to have something better to say than that during this situation. And the kind of like, the. Really. And it's not just Gavin Newsom. I've seen do it a couple times, but I've seen several other people in the media and other Democrats in California the attempt to, like, blame Donald Trump, which they've done a couple times, like Gavin Newsom saying, you know, like, he wanted Trump to come out there because he's worried he'll withhold aid or something like that. And you're like, dude, this is just. I know you guys like to blame Trump for everything, but this is like, this one that is a real stretch. It is a real stretch to try to somehow say it's his fault or whatever, shift the focus onto what he's done wrong. Good luck. Good luck with that. Anyway, hope any part of the problem listeners out in Los Angeles are doing okay, and, yeah, we'll see. We'll see how long this goes and how much devastation there is. Doesn't look good from what I've been reading. All right, let's switch gears, because I did want to talk a bit about the. The continued rebranding of the Zuck, which, of course, we. We discussed this on our last episode, and. And Mark Zuckerberg's announcement that Twitter would now include being able to say stuff, which is a nice feature for a social media platform. Of course, Zuckerberg followed this up by going on the Joe Rogan Experience, which was, I thought, a very interesting interview that a lot of some interesting details came out of. We're gonna play one of the clips in a second here. I watched most of it. I did not finish the entire thing. What did you think of. Of what you watched of it, or did you watch the whole thing? Rob or did you watch part of it?
- [29:09]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Well, I love Joe Rogan.
- [29:11]
Dave Smith
What's that smile? What's your evil smile about?
- [29:14]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
I love Joe Rogan. I love the Joe Rogan podcast. But that's correct.
- [29:18]
Dave Smith
That is the correct answer.
- [29:20]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
When Zuckerberg said the first time, whatever his new canon answer of I built, the only reason you build these companies is not for money, but to give everybody a voice, I was like, I cannot listen to this horseshit. And so I caught a couple of the clips later in which he does admit to the extent that he felt threatened by the Biden administration. I don't give the guy a pass. I mean, you know, listen, you're out. You're trying to save your business, and you're a bitch. And you fell for the last administration. You tried to play ball with them as they removed our freedoms, and everyone was worse off for it. And we all know what you did. And now you're trying to rebrand, and I guess good for you, trying to run your business and trying to rebrand, but I'm on the sidelines going, hey, you're a fucking bitch, dude. And not just that. You'll sell us out the next time if you can as well. You don't stand for anything, and your product sucks.
- [30:12]
Dave Smith
Can I, if, if I could first listen, first of all, I do tend to agree with you. And as I mentioned in the last episode, I struggle with this one, this a little bit because I want to. I want to be able to take the win, you know, And I don't want to be like, I, I never want to be pessimistic. I don't like cynicism and pessimism. And I, I, I, you know, so, like, when a good thing happens, it's like, okay, this is good. But it's impossible to not point out that every time this guy addresses his conversion, it's never even presented as a conversion or even presented like he never acknowledges his part in any of it. And that really bothers me and rubs me the wrong way. Okay, I do want to make this point by. Because I think I found a way to make this all about me, and I always like to do that if I can. No, I'm, I'm, I'm speaking tongue in cheek, obviously, but this is. I doubt I had anything to do with this at all. But I will say there was a little bit of an interesting dynamic that I was thinking about, which I did not think about on the last episode when we were talking about this. But so it was asked, Donald, it was asked to Donald Trump if his threats to Facebook, if he thought had anything to do with this. And Donald Trump said probably. And then Stephen Miller in an interview recently talked about how Zuckerberg came to Mar A Lago and how he talked to him and, like, all of this stuff. And it did. I just literally remembering this. But if you recall, when I went on Tucker's show the last time, I did a whole thing of, like, giving advice to Donald Trump about what I think he should do. And this was one of my top pieces of advice, that Donald Trump should be threatening the shit out of Google. Now, I didn't say Facebook. I believe I said Google, but, you know, that's close enough. But that now I will say, because I've seen this, by the way. I'm not saying Trump took my advice on that. I mean, I'm sure I'm not the only person who thought of this, but I did think that that was his best way to play it was to be like, hey, look, you were in a situation there where it was a coin flip according to the polls of who was going to win the election. Donald Trump, what are you going to do? You know, Google's doing all this funny business. Facebook did all this stuff last time. Your only game here is to threaten them that, like, if I get back in there, I'm going to ruin you if you interfere in this election at all and then make them too scared of that. And it does seem like there's at least a reasonable chance that that had a real impact. I, I think Zuckerberg clearly is courting favor with the new administration the same way he was courting favor with the old administration. Now, you could certainly point out that in 2020, Trump was president and he was still willing to go to bat for the other side. So who exactly knows? But I did see some people on, on social media and stuff saying, like, oh, like, kind of calling out hypocrisy here, I guess. Like saying, like, oh, you guys had such a problem with the government bullying social media platforms in the past, but now when it's Donald Trump doing it, you seem to be happy about it or whatever. I would just say that, you know, look like from my point of view as a, you know, as a radical libertarian, I would say, yeah, the government shouldn't be involved in any of this stuff. There should be no government involvement in, in big tech or any private business or anything that's like, communications and stuff like that. The government should have no role in this whatsoever. However, given that the first intervention happened already, and if the threat is if you censor people, we're going to do this, I would see that being much preferable to a government threatening big tech companies to get them to censor people. You know, it's kind of like when, when people used to say, like, oh, you know, Gavin or not, Kevin Ron DeSantis, banning private businesses from having vaccine mandates isn't libertarian. It's like, yeah, that's true. But this whole thing was, you know what I mean? Like, the, the entire thing was created by the government to begin with. So, like, I'd rather a government intervention that's at least like cleaning up the last government intervention, or in this case, just the threat of a government intervention to get you to stop interfering in elections. And more importantly, even than that to me is just to stop interfering with Americans being able to communicate with one another. So, anyway, I 100% support, in the context of time, which is always continuing. I do in this context, absolutely support Donald Trump, support threatening big tech companies that if they get in bed with the government to interfere in elections, there will be consequences for that. If that's what brought Zuckerberg to this moment, well played.
- [35:16]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
I say, all right, it's in part that. And I think we're also, we're done with the whole ESG Score thing. The payday that was supposed to come isn't. Isn't coming. We didn't revolutionize to full socialism. You are going to have to somewhat contend in the market and actually offer people free speech that they want to be on your platforms. And so some of these businesses are having to re pivot because the Biden administration and all that didn't win and it's washing away. It's over.
- [35:46]
Dave Smith
Yeah, I mean, it does seem to be the case here. Let's go. Let's play this clip, which I did think was the most interesting one of the Mark Zuckerberg on the Joe Rogan experience.
- [36:00]
Mark Zuckerberg
These people from the Biden administration would call up our team and like, scream at them and curse. And it's like these documents are. It's all kind of out there.
- [36:10]
Dave Smith
Do you record any of those phone calls?
- [36:12]
Mark Zuckerberg
I don't know. I don't think. I don't think we. But, but I think I want to listen. I mean, there are emails. The emails are published. It's all. It's all kind of out there. And, and they're like. And basically it just got to this point where we were like, no, we're not gonna, we're not gonna take down things that are true. That's ridiculous. They want us to take down this meme of Leonardo DiCaprio looking at a TV talking about how 10 years from now or something, you know, you're going to see an ad that says, okay, if you took a COVID vaccine, you're eligible for, you know, like, for, for this kind of payment, like this sort of like class action lawsuit type meme. And they're like, no, you have to take that down. We just said, no, we're not, we're not going to take down humor and satire. We're not going to take down things that are, that are true. And then at some point, I guess, I don't know, it flipped a bit. I mean, Biden, when he was, he gave some statement at some point, I don't know if it was a press conference or to some journalists where he basically was like, these guys are killing people. And.
- [37:16]
Dave Smith
I don't know.
- [37:16]
Mark Zuckerberg
Then like all these different agencies and branches of government basically just like started investigating coming after our company. It was brutal. It was brutal.
- [37:25]
Dave Smith
Wow. All right, so look, to say here, I thought this really summed it up. It was interesting to hear Zuckerberg say that. The thing, and I know you're going to agree with me already on this, Rob, but the thing that's infuriating about this and the reason why it is, again, I, I'm always a big believer. Okay, let me, I'll put it this way. Okay, so Daryl Cooper, who is the, as Tucker Carlson called him, the most important historian in America today. He's, if. Daryl, of course was, is a friend of mine and was a guest on this show. And what I always kept recommending to people to check out is he made this amazing series on the history of Israel and Palestine before the creation of the state of Israel, which it's called the Fear and Loathing in the New Jerusalem. And it's on the Martyr Maid podcast. It is so good. I cannot recommend it highly enough. It's like 26 hours long. It's essentially a book on tape. But it's so captivating and it's just filled with great history. And it's a really interesting story by the way, for most people. Just a little aside note, but it actually, it most. It made me more sympathetic to the Israelis than I was coming into it or Zionist settlers because this is before the creation of, of Israel. It's, it's not like a one sided story. It's just, it's, it's a retelling of the very interesting and complex history of the region. Anyway, at the end of the. This. This series. So you're 26 hours into it now, and he's gone deep from the very beginning of Zionism all the way till, I think it ends in 1947. Like, you know, World War II is over and the. The creation of the. I think it. I think. Think it takes you through the UN Partition recommendation. So. But at the end of it, so you've. You've gone through 26 hours of this guy giving you, like, this in depth, very interesting and very brutal and bloody history of the region. And what he talks about at the end is how in order for peace, you know, to ever be achieved there, there has to be a recognition and an apology for some of the things that have happened in the past kind of on both sides. And he goes, look like you could. You could say that this is overly, you know, I don't know, like naive or pie in the sky or something. But he gets into this story about how there were. There are these guys he knows. He was a military guy. And how there are these guys who would go essentially on, like, these missions to pay off people who we killed or family members of people who we killed. So, like, when there's, like, you know, some, you know, we. We, you know, drone bomb some village in Iraq or Yemen or wherever, and a few, you know, 13 innocent people get killed, well, the military will send some people there with a check and an apology, which is very, like, crude in a way. You have to put a price on someone's nephew that you just killed. And he was like, so he's talking to his buddy who did that, and he was like, jesus, that must be tough because, like, people must be so insulted and infuriated that you did this to the. You know, you're coming, like, you just like, oh, sorry we killed your kid. Anyway, here's a check. And he said that his friend told him that that very rarely happens. They were very rarely, very upset. Usually they were just. And even. Even more so than the check, usually. They really appreciated that someone was acknowledging that what happened to them happened and it was wrong. And anyway, the point I'm making here is just that the apologies are powerful things. And if Zuckerberg were to get on here and just kind of admit to his role in it and be like, I just really feel bad that I played this role in it. You know, I think it would be much easier for someone like you, Rob, to hear it and go, like, all right, good for this guy. You know, I gave the example on the last show. We were Talking about it. If there was like, you know, like, you know, you found out your wife or your husband was, like, having an affair for years, and, like, in like, maybe they're in, like, for this analogy to fit this part. Like, they're having an affair for years, and then the person's like, I want you to leave your. Your husband and come run away with me. And they say, no, they're not going to do that. And they come back, but then as they're telling the story, they were like. And then he was like, come run away with me. And I was just like, I'm not going to do that. That's crazy. You're like, yeah, but what about the years before that? You know, it's like Zuckerberg is telling this story and he's going, the government asked us to censor the truth. And we were just like, no, we're not going to do that. You're like, yeah, after years of doing it, like, no, sorry, that's not the story. The story isn't that the government asked you to censor the truth, but you refused because you're committed to free speech. The story is the government asked you to censor the truth. You said, yes, sir, Daddy. Government. And proceeded to do it for eight years. For eight years. I mean, don't get me wrong, the worst of it was in 2020, and it continued all the way. He just changed the policy last week, Rob. Last week. Okay, the worst of it started in 2020, but it really started in 2017. He was doing it all through that time. 2017-2018-2019-2020 21, 22, 23, 24. Going into 2025, he stopped. So, sorry, you can't tell that story. And the story be. The government asked us to censor the truth, and we were like, what? No, we're not going to do that. No, no. What happened was that the government asked you to censor the truth. You said, yes, sir. You did it for eight straight years. Then that was soundly rejected by the American people, and Donald Trump is now on his way to return into the White House. And then you said, all right, we're going to let people tell the truth again. Let's just. Let's just get it straight. Right? You know what I mean, Rob? Like, this is just like, what actually happened here. And at least from my perspective, if the goal is to, like, rehabilitate Mark Zuckerberg's image, or if the goal is to rehabilitate the image of Instagram and Facebook, that isn't doing it for Me, because it's just you're. You're shirking all responsibility. You know what I mean? And, like, you. You do have at least some. And by the way, I think there's also a way that Zuckerberg could have said this to me and you particularly. That would have gotten us to go, like, okay, fine. Like, if you've been like, listen, man, you don't understand the enormous pressure. And I didn't really wake up to this myself until kind of recently, and I feel bad about what I participated in, but, like, the government was telling me this, and I just kind of, you know, like, there's a way to say it, but this is just a. Like, this is bad history. You know what I mean? It's not true that if this had happened, let's say, by the way, he never engaged in the censorship. The government came to him and said, we want you to censor the truth. And he said, no, like, exactly. But we were having this conversation in 2016, and he was just blowing the whistle, being like, just so you guys know, this is what the government's telling me. But I said, no, we'd be lauding this guy as a hero. Okay? The problem is he's yada, yada, yada over the eight years where he did censor the American people. And I don't feel like the right thing to do is to just let that slide. I don't know names. Yes.
- [45:15]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
I said on the last episode, it's the same as the Cuomo thing when you lose cnn, and then all of a sudden you're like, oh, now I'm doing real journalism. Well, then you gotta let us know what was keeping you from doing it the last time. You gotta name some names, admit that.
- [45:26]
Dave Smith
You weren't doing it.
- [45:27]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Yeah. And tell us the mechanisms and the pay and all the reasons that you weren't so that maybe we can cleanse whatever systems are in place that are keeping people from doing real journalism. Or in this case, if government came around and they intimidated you into taking over your business, that you were no longer Nona's business. Name names.
- [45:48]
Gavin Newsom
Yes.
- [45:48]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
And that's the only way to cleanse it and do something brave.
- [45:52]
Dave Smith
100%. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Sheath Underwear, the best pair of boxer briefs you will ever own. I love sheath underwear. The only underwear that I ever wear. The. I threw out all my other pairs of boxer briefs because these are the best. They're made with moisture wicking technology. You Feel these things. But even before you put them on, just feel them in your hands and you're like, oh, yeah, that's a nice pair of boxer briefs. And let me tell you something, you feel like a million bucks when you got a pair of sheath underwear on. Also, they've been a long time sponsor of this show, so make sure you support the sponsors who support this show. And while you're at it, get the best pair of boxer briefs you're ever gonna own. And if you use promo code problem20 when you go to sheathunderwear.com you will get your underwear for 20 off. Get the best pair of boxer briefs you will ever wear for 20 off at sheathunderwear. When you use the promo code problem20. All right, let's get back into the show. 100. That's exactly right. And then again, you could. You'd be a real hero if you were to do that now. Okay, leaving that aside, and even though I don't know, like, I don't know about the, the Leonardo DiCaprio meme, what.
- [47:05]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
It'S with the one meme that floated by that for some reason, probably, it probably, by the way, did get shadow ban censor just not completely removed. And the idea that they weren't censoring when the fact checkers or whatever, the Covid team was included, Peter De Sac, who bought the. Bought the virus itself. The CIA cleanup team that had to go oversee Facebook and to make sure that none of the true information was going to be available on the platform. Yeah, the real story here, by the way, goes all the way back to Cambridge Analytica and Donald Trump winning the first time and him being called in front of Congress. And that's why actually tell the story. You can, we can showcase what the deep state did to the Internet and educate the public to. To the degree of censorship and socialism that we actually have here.
- [47:54]
Dave Smith
And this story is really fascinating. It's like, oh, the guy who wasn't supposed to win won. And he leveraged social media in order to do it. And the government decided, well, we got to plug up that hole. And then for eight years, you helped them plug up that hole. I mean, like, honestly, you can't, you kind of can't overstate how consequential that was. We have no idea what this country would look like if we had maintained freedom on the Internet for those eight years. It's like a different. For sure. Okay, that being said, look, a lot of the stuff that he just said there, I'm not sure if all of it, but A lot of it certainly was in the emails that, that Jim Jordan, you know, was able to get that have all been. Are all part of the public record now. It still really is remarkable to hear the head of two of the biggest social media sites blatantly say this. And I gotta say, I do. As was, you know, as we've said for a while. I do think it's like, you know, like we, we have this dynamic all the time on the show. Rob. It's really unbelievable. It's unbelievable how many times the, the, the establishment or just the. The truth comes out. A year, A year and a half. Two and a half years, three years after we were talking about it on this show. You know, like, now it's just the thing that you're allowed to talk about. And now it's just the thing that we all admit is true that we were talking about. When we were talking about it, it was like, oh, this is a conspiracy theory or something like that. Yeah, I was mentioning on the. The Members Only episode when they were trashing me on the Reason Round Table. This is two years ago now, or I guess more than two years ago because I wasn't in this house yet. So two and a half, three years ago, something like that. They were trashing me when I was saying. When I was saying that libertarians who go, oh, it's a private company, they can censor people if they want to. We're idiots. And we're completely missing the point because I was like, this is clearly the government who's doing this. It's not Facebook who's censoring people, it's the government censoring people. And then they were trashing me on the Reason Round Table. And Cath. Catherine Ward or whatever her name is, was like, oh, I guess Dave can't tell the difference between the government and Twitter. Dave doesn't know the difference between Facebook and the government. It's like, I think you don't know the difference, actually. But so anyway, it's nice to hear this, like, officially admitted and officially said. I will say this in the spirit of not wanting to be pessimistic. As I mentioned earlier, I think here's a white pill for you. Okay, here's the case for optimism. How crazy is it that as I said before, this most powerful of governments, the most powerful government in the history of the world, you know, who's involved in just wars and, you know, regime changes and covert operations and all of this, they really cared that much about a meme. See, that to me is actually really encouraging. Like they were worried about a meme that was talking about how there's going to be a future class action lawsuit against the COVID vaccine and they couldn't allow that to happen. That I think there's actually something really encouraging about the fact that they see satire as being such a threat to them. It's like. Like they know their policy is so ridiculous. They know their propaganda is so thin that they can't even allow for people to be able to mock it. And the reason why that's so encouraging is because it kind of. Look, it seems to indicate that they believe we have a real fighting chance. You know what I mean? Like, they believe that if we're allowed to do that, it's a threat to their ability to rule. That I just find tremendously encouraging. You get what I'm saying?
- [51:52]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
Yep. I mean, we've said the example a million times, but it's the emperor with no clothes. So they can't have anyone possibly pointing out, hey, that's a fumbling. Oh, man, that guy has dementia. Hey, this new vaccine hasn't been tested. Hey, I don't. I don't understand why I need it if it's supposed to protect you. So then why am I danger from leaving? Yeah, Their lies are so big and so bold, they can't have any criticism. And that's why Elon Musk, though I don't have a full picture of him. At least the Twitter restored freedom of speech to the Internet and completely eroded their game plan. Because what they're doing only works if they have full scale censorship. It's like truth is like a leak in a building or something. You know, if there's. If you don't plug the hole, the water's coming through 100%.
- [52:37]
Dave Smith
That's exactly right. And I find that very encouraging, especially seeing as how they. These holes are now unplugged. And it seems like we at least have some freedom of speech on the Internet. Some not perfect, but a lot more than we had before. And I think that gives us a fighting shot to really counter the propaganda and deprogram as many people as we can. Okay, I did. I wanted to play one more clip before we get out of here, which is this one has been going super viral over the last few days. Here is Barack Obama and Donald Trump hanging out at Jimmy Carter's funeral. Let's roll that. President Obama there elected in 2008, served two terms and then yielded there to President Donald Trump. All right? I mean, that's all that it is now. People are making a lot out of this. But it is. I suppose it does kind of say something, right, that it's like one more example of, like, you know, you guys told us he was Hitler. You told us democracy was on the ballot. It sure does seem like you didn't really believe any of that. Sure does seem like George Carlin said, it's a big club and you ain't in it. And there is such a. There is such a WWF quality to politics where you really do have these guys who, like, when the cameras come on, they act like they're mortal enemies, but then they're having dinner together, their kids are hanging out, they're friends. This is kind of just one more reminder of that. But I don't know. I mean, I don't want to make anything more out of it than that. It was pretty goddamn hilarious to just watch the dynamics between the, like. Look, I'm not trying to read too much into these little bits of video that we get, but if you see the full thing, it's like you just see, like, Trump and Obama are like dudes, and they're just, like, hanging out, and they're like, yeah, we're, you know, we're in a laugh a little bit. Bill Clinton is sitting right next to Hillary Clinton, and you could just see all over his face. He wishes he could be a dude. So much. Like, he's like, man, if I could just shake this one, I could go be a dude. I'd be over there laughing with these guys. And Kamala Harris is just furious. And she's. There's one point where they actually get her looking over her shoulder and she just sees Obama and Trump laughing with each other, and it was just. I mean, it was just perfection. I don't know. Rob, any thoughts on any of this stuff?
- [55:16]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
I don't know that I have much to add to that one. It's. But I did notice Bill in the background reading his pamphlet, just being like, look normal, look normal. Just. You read pamphlets at these things.
- [55:27]
Dave Smith
Okay, so I did want to say.
- [55:28]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
That footage, do you remember, from the Bush senior, I think, when he died, and there was the spooky envelopes that they all got.
- [55:36]
Dave Smith
Yeah, yeah, that's right. I forgot about that. Well, I did want to mention this. So I was. So I was on Piers Morgan show a few days ago, and they never. Or they shouldn't say never, but they almost never do this. But they. They sent me the topics that we're going to talk about on the show. Usually they don't. They usually they don't send me who's on the panel, what the topics are. You don't know. You just show up and you're in the middle of, like, a thing. But so I. One of the topics was the legacy of Jimmy Carter. And I was like, oh, yes, I love this topic because I actually have something to say about this, and not too many people do. And like, I. So anyway, so I'm sitting there now. If you go watch this appearance, this most recent appearance and this toward the end of it, I'm kind of quiet, like they're. They're talking about Tommy Robinson and the, The. The, like, Muslim gang rapes in the UK that I guess were covered up for many years. It's just not a topic I know that much about. And I don't really know anything about Tommy Robinson. And then like, you know, they're arguing over whether he's a good guy or a bad guy. And I don't know, but I'm just sitting there in my mind because I'm like, well, next topic is Jimmy Carter. Now I'm really excited to talk about that. And then they just never came to Jimmy Carter. And Pierce just ended the show, and I was like, oh, man, that sucks. I thought that was a way more interesting topic. So anyway, let me just say this here. And of course, this is nothing like this. You know, it's like our camp, the. The libertarian guys, particularly led by the great Scott Horton and his book Enough Already. The first chapter is about Jimmy Carter. I highly recommend people read chapter one of Enough Already and then the rest of the book, for that matter. But it has been interesting to me in. In since Jimmy Carter's funeral that whenever anybody brings him up, nobody seems to actually talk about what was really impactful and lasting about his presidency, which was an enormously consequential presidency, even though he only had four years. Everybody, when they talk about Jimmy Carter, they just tend to kind of say, like, it's like, I don't know, Rob, what's the Jimmy Carter thing? Well, he was like a really decent, honest guy. He was a peanut farmer, you know, and then he became president. And like, really sweet guy, maybe a little bit too liberal and ineffective. And that's why he only got four years, then went on to be a real critic of Israel for the years after he was president. That's a. That's basically what said what Jimmy Carter. Okay, so Jimmy Carter was president until Ronald Reagan took office in 1981. January 20th of 1981. So Jimmy Carter was president during 1979 and 1980, these were two enormously important years and really laid the groundwork for all of the disaster in the Middle east since then. So in 1979, you had a revolution in Iran and a coup in Iraq. So the, the Iranian regime that we know today, they, they came into power in 1979 and Saddam Hussein came into power in, in Iraq. And then this same year was the policy of luring the Soviets into Afghanistan by building up, supporting the Mujahideen in Afghanistan. And of course, as most people know at this point, this didn't mean just supporting the Afghan mujahideen. This included the foreign Arab fighters coming in, including Osama bin Laden and many of the people who were involved in Al Qaeda. So this was really a Jimmy Carter policy to teach Osama bin Laden how to lure a superpower into an unwinnable war in Afghanistan in order to bankrupt them. He was also the one who essentially greenlit Saddam Hussein to go to war with Iran. This brutal war that broke out in 1980, something like 500,000 people on both sides died. Now in the, in this war, as this war breaks out in 1980, right. So this is the dynamic. You also, you have the Soviet Union fighting a war in Afghanistan and you have Iraq and Iran fighting war with each other. And this is. It was Jimmy Carter, under the advice of Zabignu Brzezinski, who. Yeah, the dad of that chick on Morning Joe who we like to make fun of all the time. Remember that? Okay, well, her dad wasn't a, her dad was a very smart, evil guy. But under his advice, they are the ones who set up what they called the Carter Doctrine. So after think about how crazy this is. You know, when you hear about, like in Syria, how we're like, you know, we're, we're arming Al Qaeda in Syria while we're fighting Al Qaeda in Iraq. You remember how we were doing that for years. Ok, well, this is how crazy this is. After they lure the Soviets into Afghanistan, then they all start getting worried that they're going to take Iran next and then the Soviet Union is going to control the Middle east oil supply. So Jimmy Carter is the one who decides to push the Carter Doctrine, which he, he first brought up. It was early 1980, so it was his State of the Union in 1980. And essentially what this doctrine was was to say that the Persian Gulf is America and if anyone moves on the Persian Gulf, we will take that as an attack on America. Now, in order to do this, of course, we're going to have to start building up our bases around the Arabian Peninsula. And so it was actually Jimmy Corder who put us on this path that ultimately led to the disastrous terror wars. Now, obviously, I'm not putting all of the blame on Jimmy Carter. There were a lot of people who came in after him and didn't have to make the decisions they made. But that is the real legacy of the Carter administration that he started us on this path that ended in all of these disastrous wars. So, no, Jimmy Carter was not a good man or a good president. And the fact that he said some nice things about the Palestinian people in the years afterward doesn't undo all of that. Okay. Anyway, just wanted to end on that. All right, thank you guys very much for listening. Go check out Rob's other show, Run your Mouth. Go check us out on the road comicdavesmith.com for all those ticket links and and support the show@partoftheproblem.com if you can. We very much appreciate that. Any final things check out, even if.
- [62:23]
Robbie the Fire Bernstein
You don't want to check out the full run your mouth podcast. I'm doing about two episodes a week. The first five minutes are kind of a spoof news intro. A lot of sketches in there, so go check them out. Up give him watch Robbie the fire.
- [62:33]
Dave Smith
All Robbie the fire all one word. Thank you guys for listening. Catch you next time.