Sean Penn | Club Random with Bill Maher
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Did I tell you it's the last year for Hawaii? You did. And I just didn't want to either encourage that or embrace it or not embrace it because, you know, there's room for change. Look at you, Mr. Sensitivity. Oh, my gosh. Well, I hope that's an endorsement of Hawaii.

how much fun we had all the years. It's so, yeah. And you were so amazing. That thing you did this year, that little bit, that, I mean, was, that, yeah. I love the outdoor show. I hated it. Yeah. That's one reason. It's not, outdoor and comedy is not my thing. I sensed that, especially once you wrote the thing. But it was, there was something about,

You know, you knew that most of the crowd was hip and getting it all and really, but they were looking for what each other was gonna do a little bit. - You know what, it's so funny because first 10 minutes of my act is about the subject you and I are inevitably going to talk about. - Yeah. - Okay, which is health in general and vaccines and COVID and stuff like that. And in Maui, it went over huge.

And in Honolulu, it was much more of your crowd. Yes, yes, I felt that, but they... MSNBC watching indoctrinated... But you also transcend that. So they are looking at it and they're saying, this is the smart version of the comedy against us. Right. Well, I hope. That's great. I think they were patiently waited that part out. Exactly. Yeah. And then it got great. And that's what I...

That's the issue I have with liberals in general these days and have for some years is not just on that issue, but it's emblematic of just that attitude of we will not be challenged on things we don't already believe. Now, of course, the right does this absolutely also. Right.

And so we'll just wait it out. There's no more open mind. Are we on a podcast now, or are we just talking? Yes. We are in it. We're in it. We're done. I saw the scissors. I wondered if you were a moil.

No, these are for guests who fuck up. No, yes, I love that you asked that. Everybody asks that, not everybody, but like even seasoned pros who don't realize there's cameras all around. I want it to be like we're, you know, nobody else in the room, just us doing what we, you've been in this room many times. You gave me an amazing birthday tribute here when I was 60. That's a long, long time. I can't believe. Oh my God.

You know, I was just thinking you, I was reading about the new James Bond. I was thinking you could have been James Bond. I think it takes a different architecture of a face to be James Bond. Not when you were 40. Not now. I'm not saying you'd be James Bond now. No. I wouldn't have looked like the James Bond I wanted to see. You've got to do more comedy now.

Well, you know, the funny thing about it is, like, on a serious note about that, I have never been resistant to comedy. No, you started out as the guy, the Macaulay. But it's interesting because there becomes a perception, and I got offered very few comedies. You're going to do The Three Stooges.

Well, there was a moment I was considering that. My mouth was watering for that one. Yeah, it was a different approach than the one they ultimately took. It was a different cast. And I thought, well... And you were Larry? Yeah, and Jim Carrey was going to do Moe at the time. And those guys have stumbled on some fantastic comedy at times. It's outrageous at times. And so I thought that would be...

Well, I remember about it was thinking, you know, like, because even before I knew you, I was an admirer of your acting skills. And like, to pick Larry. Well, I didn't get to pick. But even to take on Larry. Because he was the one student that had no...

You know, a Larry episode was, you know... It was also a hairdo that was going to make me more unpopular than already I sometimes am during the period of shooting. Curly Moe, yes, I see those as rich, syrupy parts. Yeah. But Larry... I think they were smart. I think they were... If I was going to do it, I think it was Larry. Yeah.

Yeah. Anyway. Let's go right to this thing on vaccination. Let's do it. So here's what I, because, you know, we've had conversations about it and I've heard you in conversation with others and then, of course, publicly. Let's agree that neither of us are scientists or doctors. Correct. Okay. So one is each of us are, as we grow through life, become observers of certain things.

And there are more what become those that we take the kind of risk with. So you say, okay, I trust this attitude more than I do this one. And my feeling about vaccination was always that knowing that there's a statistical possibility on either side, more than a little one on either side, that this could do more harm than good to a human body.

We knew that while there was 20 years of development of the mRNA technology, and I shouldn't even say those letters, because if you ask me to put on the board the way the cell structures and the spike proteins work, I might have had retention for two seconds of that, you know, two years. Yeah, we're not scientists. Right. So what happens is that you have what I observed.

was that the scientists who I was going to commit to, because I felt it was a decisive time, and I still feel that it was a decisive time at best, I believed them in ways that those who were considered on the fringes, I didn't believe, not because they were on the fringes, not because they were being silenced or not given enough voice, but as I explored them,

I, as an actor who have a level of trained observation, I like to believe, I saw people who were identity-seeking in terms of their position on it. Then you weren't reading the right people. No, but I was reading a lot of people. And the key here, and we talked about this, just going to overwhelm you for a second. The key here, and we had talked about this,

is that we have an independence and interdependence reality as a country and as humankind. So every time this conversation is had, one forgets one significant element of it, whether that one significant element was what are our hospital resources? And no matter what it does or doesn't do to our body, does it make us safer to the people who are going to be more significantly affected?

I mean, I wouldn't argue with almost any of these points. You just leave out the other half, you know, a lot. The people on the fringes, they're less and less on the fringe. And what was on the fringe at the time, sometimes it's not the fringe anymore. Where was the fringe on masks? You know, at first it was, don't bother, which...

I understood because masks are for surgeons and they, you know, generally the virus is like many, many times smaller than the smallest hole in the mask. And at first they said, just wear anything, just put an old bandana on your face. Yeah. Okay. So, you know, and then the vaccine will prevent

you getting it, but it doesn't, and prevent you giving it, and it doesn't. I mean, these are significant. I understand that. But I would say there's another half to that, which is that the N95 mask was in such short supply and in such need in the hospitals that the original public health message was, let's protect our front liners.

And let's get these N95s to doubt. There's even a study now that doubts the N95. Yes, but- But I'm sure it's better than the other one. But again, there's a whole other school of thought about fighting things with your natural immune system. Not all of them, but it should be my choice whether I fight it in your manner or the way I- It's a medical decision.

I find it incredibly arrogant to put this kind of coercion on people about what goes on in their own bodies, especially since all of our bodies are different or independent. If I went to a doctor tomorrow and he didn't ask to know my history and like study it before he

He advised me to do anything. I would think that doctor is an idiot. And by the way, there are many doctors who are idiots and ones who you call the fringe who are actually more mainstream now and always were mainstream, but they were cowed into silence. So it didn't seem like there was a lot, but actually 16,000 doctors and scientists signed something called the Barrington letter. Have you heard about that? Okay. Okay.

Well, they all dissented with the basic ways we were handling this. $16,000 is not enough for me. And when I go back to... It's significant. And that's just who signed. But then you have another philosophical question. A lot of this stuff is going to prove itself in one direction or another over a lot of time. I'm always willing to be wrong on any issue.

But there are moments where I believe, and I think we've all faced these moments, whether as individuals or as a society, where there has to be an immediate reaction. When we talk about public health and we talk about leadership in public health, if we get hit by the equivalent of Ebola, which melts our vital organs- Then I'll fight you for the vaccine. My point is we didn't know all of what this was.

But it was a test of two things. It was a test of how fast could science move in making adjustments in the technology that would make us safer. And that's an argument we can have. And at first, I remember when it was 5,000 dead Americans. And one thought, oh, my God. But we got to well over a million. And that's with something that you and I both know. But again- Mostly affected elderly people.

People with obesity, people with other issues, diabetes. Those are the big two. Right. But we didn't know if that might, that strain may ultimately become something much more virulent. And so at some point, the leadership has to say- Although viruses usually don't, although they usually become less virulent. They usually become less virulent. That's right.

But we, again, can you say you knew? I didn't know. Again, none of these choices are 99 to 1. They're all like 60, 40 choices. But look, we come down differently on these matters of medical autonomy and also how bad this pathogen was.

Free speech. I mean, it's just it's so funny to find. Let me set myself up for a fall because I think that you have an intellect that operates in most ways on a higher level than mine. However, and therefore, no, but let me just say, because humor, I think, is the only genius communication.

And it's really more than anything, the only thing that's going to get us to talk to each other again as a country, as a culture, it's the thing that we all look to for our sanity. When I saw you in Hawaii doing the vaccine skepticism section of your show, I was very open to the humor of it. Yeah.

But having said that, I would say where is this? Because you're talking about the independence of your body. I know my body. I'm Djokovic, and I know my body so well. Or I'm Laird Hamilton. I know my body so well. I believe in herd immunity, and so on and so forth. Believe in herd immunity. I think it just is a thing. I don't think you can believe in it.

Just like natural immunity. No, but there are angles with which herd immunity attacks on public health approaches to that. Yes, it's a complicated subject, but it's a real thing. You can't believe in it or not. It just is, as is natural immunity. So one knows their own body.

What if one knows their own driving skills and therefore says, I should be allowed to drive 125 miles an hour through a small town with my lights off? It's a terrible analogy. Except for those who died in COVID-19. Oh, for fuck's sake. That's a complicated amalgam of reasons why people died. They didn't really make a big distinction between...

died with COVID or died from COVID. I understand that conversation. I'm sorry, but in my worldview, which is a lot of people's worldviews, and it's not just 16,000, it's not a fringe, believe in much more terrain theory, which means it's about, it's not about the pathogen so much, although of course there are those that are virulent to everyone. It's about the

terrain that the pathogen is invading. And if that terrain is not healthy, yes, you will die. We're hearing a lot about long COVID. I'm not a doctor. You're right. And by the way, just because you're a doctor doesn't mean you can't be a fucking idiot. That's correct. Okay. So, uh, that's why they say get a second opinion. But, um,

Oh, fuck, no, I forget what we were. That's okay. I think that's good. No, you're talking about what I wanted to say. This will get you back on track. Define fringe. 5%, you know, 5% to 10% is fringe. I would say, you know, I don't know.

If this is true now, maybe it's more, but like I would say woke people were, I still think they're actually a fringe. I mean, like most of the people, like 80% of the tweets are from like 10% of the people who tweet, you know, that's a fringe, but the fringe is going to be very powerful. But fringe has a kind of demeaning connotation. Which is why I don't like it when you used it because it doesn't accurately describe. Let me tell you what I mean by fringe then. Okay.

Fringe can be an absence of consciousness of interdependence. Fringe can be those who are misinformed or those who, for reasons beyond their control. For example, it is a fringe that...

does not have a world perspective in terms of having traveled. Sometimes for social economic reasons, others for a lack of curiosity. So you only have about 28% of Americans who have a fucking passport.

What does that have to do? Well, you've traveled the world. Does it not give you a different view, a larger view of perspective? I'm so glad you brought that up because a lot of the people who were saying that we shouldn't allow other points of view on Twitter and so forth were against points of view that were used in European countries. Sweden did better, they're saying, than any other European country, even Norway, and they followed...

Less stringent guidelines than we did by far. They kept the schools open. They weren't masking children. They didn't buy. They initially isolated the elderly. Yes, exactly. Which is what you should do. And it ended up in calamity. Now, in Sweden, it did not. This just came out. It did. Should I get my phone out and Google it? No, no. I'm sure you. But here's but it's a good example of look.

Again, circling back to the beginning, because I have so much respect for you that every time I hear you talk about it, I do question my own position. Good, and that's why we're here. And that's what I think we do need more of. I pursue, I have great friends who are militantly on the other side of the political spectrum.

And I've been able to keep those friendships and nurture, in fact, nurture them to a kind of higher level during this chaotic time, let's say the Trump time, let's say since 2016, where I just made a decision that, you know, if I'm, if that 1% chance that I'm wrong is the reality,

I want to keep challenging it. Well, I hate to break it to you, and I love you too, and I have a tremendous respect for your intellect and everything, but there's a much greater chance of 1% that you're wrong. You seem to think that because it seems, and I'm not even going to admit that it is the truth, but it seems that a majority of voices are with your side,

You know, no one thought Hillary Clinton could win because, you know, the poll said it was like 80 percent chance. Well, it's still 20 percent chance that it wasn't going to be Trump. It wasn't going to be Hillary. And that's what happened. And I think it's even more with medical. Yeah.

So, you know, you use the term misinformation. Whose misinformation? The misinformation that I got from the United States government? I seem to remember six months when we were just all leaving our packages outside and rubbing it like it was a, you know, a fucking stool sample or something. The natural immunity. You talk about other countries. Other countries have much more faith in natural immunity, which this country did up until this disease.

Why are these opinions, which are shared by many millions of people, both laymen, who, by the way, a smart layman can know more than someone who, yes, did go to school. You could have graduated medical school in 1972 and not learned a thing since. There's no law that you have to keep up. And could have learned a lot of wrong-minded things along the way. And I think we were told a lot of wrong-minded. But it goes to a bigger question, because I'm looking at this guy over your shoulder.

In terms of leadership, in terms of governance, in terms of media communication, what do we do next time where there is a threat? First of all- And we've got to get on the same team about something that nobody can know completely. First of all, have the guts to tell the American people there's something bad going around. Here's what you can do. Here's how you can protect yourself.

Don't stay home day drinking and overeating. That's going to have the reverse effect. The first thing I said in March of 2020, our last show on the air, I said... You just picked two things that I did during the COVID. I said, sugar, stress, sleep. Stop eating sugar. Stress. Don't stress about it more than we have to. Get sleep. And of course...

people got unhealthier. So when you say a million Americans, yes, of course, but it's always, it's such a blinkered way of looking at health because there are so many factors that go into whether you're healthy or not, or whether you were going to get felled by that disease. Millions of people never even knew they had it. Everyone has had it by now. It's a virus. It's everywhere. You're soaking in it. We're breathing it right now. Okay. So

Well, now I forgot. That's okay, but what I can say is, for whatever reason, I never had it. I know, that was one of my points. I never had it. And I was, you know, working in the space. But you were so exposed to it. You didn't have it because you've spent your life swimming through sewage in Bolivia or something to free a poet or some shit. You know, I mean, I always say, John Penn, of all the celebrities, this guy walks, you know this, but this is you.

This guy walks the walk. There's so much talk and so brave. And you're the one guy who actually-- Here's what we agree on in terms of this public health thing.

I think we're completely in sync. When you and I asked you about what does leadership look like when the next pandemic comes, and I know you would like to say this wasn't a pandemic. No, it's a pandemic. I get it. When a pandemic comes, which scientists at large are telling us it will. Having gone through this exercise, yes, I wish that leadership had coalesced an opinion

That we're which was we don't know to begin with. We don't know our best understanding of it as scientists today is this our demand on, you know, when it came to things like mandate mandating, whether it was masking or distancing or testing or vaccination.

That can be an endless conversation just about COVID, but as a future conversation about how we are going to be a team. We've studied the other team's movements. Other team being? The other team being the virus. Okay. When a virus approaches, how do we function as a team? And I would just argue that

that whatever is the consensus science of the time, which could be wrong, we give it 10 weeks and we find ways, in some cases that will require subsidies for people, not endless unemployment benefits and all of this kind of crazy. And it will say, okay, what we know is we know how to test for this.

But we don't have enough fucking Q-tips to put up people's noses. So you have defense production and you have leadership and you give you we should know for the American people, the world. What is our what is our will be our joint defense when we get to the next? Well, it's not a fucking Q-tip up my nose. I've had enough Q-tips up my nose and I'm sorry, I don't want any more.

Yes, I want my freedom in my nose. And it's unnecessary. You think it's still necessary? I got tested this week so I could do real time on Friday. I think that one of the midline things that we could consider is that there should be very affordable...

home tests for several things. No, I don't want to do that either. I've had to do that for probably... I said available. You can't... I didn't say I'm shoving it in your mailbox and up your nose. Okay, thank you. But, you know, a lot of things turn into mandatory quickly. But when people have the opportunity... For example, have you ever done this ancestry thing, this 23andMe thing or whatever? Yes, I'm a Zulu warrior. I knew that. So I think that if it's available and easy...

people's curiosity will win the day. I think more people will say,

I wonder, I feel like I have a flu. I've got the test here. Yes, okay, if you feel sick, sure, that's different. That's not what they're doing. It's like if you want to go to a party, you know, you have to, it's like for fuck's sake, we're past this. Trust your immune system. You're going to have to at some point in life develop your immune system. And if you can't, yes, you should be protected. Yeah, but understand, I agree with you. I felt very early on

that the horse got out of the gate before the buzzer. And there were those of us that said, okay, we're gonna invest in this sense of how to attack it. But it was very clear, just like, for example, in a conflict zone. In Baghdad, 2003,

And I had been there in 2002 and 2003. Who signed? Bad question. Ours. Yes! But in that situation, you saw very early after the Chakanal campaign, of course people, like would be here, are hiding in whatever they can call a bomb shelter.

I've just seen it, the same thing in Ukraine. Originally, that's what happens. We get, as human beings, we want to protect our children, protect, this is, at a certain point, this is part of our life and you got to learn how to dance with it. And the shops begin to open in war zones, in active war zones. We have still not had in leadership or in media communication, a sensitization to this so that we recognize, can we, I said 10 weeks, let's call it three.

If consensus science, which is not perfect, gives us a red light warning,

We should say, okay, we'll do this for this long. But there's a mental health issue that comes on after that. We've been doing consensus science. And it's funny because the country now has revolted against some of this stuff, almost like they did during prohibition, when they said, we just don't believe in these policies. There are policies with masking and stuff. And of course, you notice we still make the help wear the mask because the germs know who the celebrities are, wherever you go.

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I just, just because you mentioned Iraq and Ukraine, and I know, you know, if it was one of those old movies where they have the stamps on the luggage, yours would have like so many stamps on it. Like, what is it when like, I mean, you're like, you know, you seem to be attracted to the fire. Maybe. I think there was a very famous French volcanologist named

Volcano study. Oh, sure. Of course. Named Maurice Kraft. And I saw a documentary on he and his wife. They were a team. And he struggled a lot with his feelings about mankind, about human beings. And he felt that the more time he spent with volcanoes, the more he loved humankind. Oh, yeah.

Now, I've tried to deep dive from ego to adrenaline junkie to, you know, I've heard all the criticisms that are, you know, I'm grandstanding. You know, you've got to consider it all. Right. And I think the one that hit me the most was that, was that there was something in Ukraine in particular where everything that we were wired to believe was exceptional about America. Right.

I realized I'd never smelled it in the air. And then I got to Ukraine and I smelled exactly that dream. And with a resilience that's extraordinary. And by the way, if you're being just pragmatic and recognizing the obstacles, an obstacle is racism. And with Ukraine, you have a Trojan horse

who can get through and show that what we share is dreaming because we will fight harder as a country for white faces. There's no question about that. I've worked in Haiti for 12, 13 years. That country has suffered from its color. And people of heart have given a lot to it, but none never has the- Well, we gave an awful lot of blood and treasure to save the people of Vietnam from Ho Chi Minh.

We'll see, but this is what I think. That war is still to me a memory as a child of the stupidity of adults. Whether it's John F. Kennedy, our hero, or Lyndon Johnson, or Richard Nixon,

They were all telling us that communism was going to spread throughout if we let this, and it was not the case. And it was also not the case that it could be won. Okay. Communism was intent on spreading. You can't- No, no, no. I wasn't saying that. I'm saying that Vietnam was not going to be the deciding factor. Well, we don't know because we can't go back in time and rewrite history. Well, we know because we lost. I know, but we lost over like 15 years.

That's right. But if America had not been in Vietnam in the early 60s, or if Kennedy hadn't got shot and say he pulled the troops out and we had no troops there and Lyndon Johnson's attitude was, well, I'm from Texas. What am I fighting for a yellow man in Asia for? You know, I could see that scenario playing out. Or if there was a different president who thought that way at the time, we might not have gone into Vietnam. And

The all of Indochina probably would have gone communist. I mean in Cambodia did Laos did I think for a time it could really they would have stopped at Burma Really and then not India. Yeah, there was a legitimate fear I'm not saying the Vietnam War was where we should have been but there was a legitimate fear that Stalin and Mao there's also a legitimate lesson a legitimate lesson and this is not a

giving a moral equivalency to the struggle of the Vietnamese on either side. But there's a lesson in it. How in the world could we lose that war? How in the world could Russia lose the war in Afghanistan, followed by us losing the war in Afghanistan? Right. So now we have a democratic system

dreaming, a Western European dreaming country. Right. Occupying all of our values. And we have to understand. And I think the thing that needs to be understood most about Ukraine, because I think it will be the most motivating thing to let it. There are only two ways that Ukraine ends up. One is victory on its own terms. Right. With or without support.

and a lot more dead and a lot more tragedy. And with the United States going, we gave them one patriot system. When I was there on one of the trips, when we were going to the east, to the front line, before we went all the way to the front line, we first went to a Highmark charging station.

And it was world news that the United States had given them a HIMARS system. Now, the HIMARS system, unlike the Patriot system I came to learn, is very quick to train on. And they were extremely effective with them. And this was world news. HIMARS coming in from the U.S. The biggest border in Europe, we gave them four.

but we've given them a lot. We're going to give them more. The question is the expediency. Okay. You can't say we've been exactly holding back. By U.S. standards, we're doing pretty good with them. Yeah. I mean, there's only a...

Well, I mean, America can't do anything quickly, but I'm guessing just because you say, oh, we're going to give you that, it doesn't happen. They have to like put them on trucks. I don't know what the fuck they have to do. But I know that I don't feel like we're abandoning Ukraine and we shouldn't abandon Ukraine. Do you think that this Congress?

will abandon Ukraine now that we're in a new day? I think they will try because it's anything the Democrats want, they will be against. So, you know, Fox News is already kind of pro-Russia.

- Kind of, a lot broader. - Sure, sure. - So I think that's been going on for, I mean, there's a lot of, and this is not just coming out of me, but out of reading, you know, for 30 years, we've been, we have been wanting to comfort ourselves that the Russian threat is over for a long time. - No, Mitt Romney was-- - Mitt Romney was dead on. - Dead on, and everybody made fun of him when he said the biggest threat is Russia. But what do you make of your boyfriend Oliver Stone like being so,

down with Putin and Russia. Where does that come from, from an old lefty, went to Vietnam? - Mm-hmm, fought in Vietnam. Here's what I would say about Oliver Stone, and just to make it a bigger picture, the parts of Oliver Stone that I think should be embraced. Oliver Stone is an iconoclast by nature. One looks into his background and there's a kind of won't be fooled again

Right. Anger in there. Yes. He owns that. He did put out a public statement separating himself from Putin after the invasion of Ukraine. His fascination with Putin, I think, was to challenge America's sense of exceptionalism.

I think that he needs to be... It's a silly way to do it. Well, you know, I don't know if it's just silly. I think his provocateurism will ultimately have a productive legacy. We used to have a contest when we first started Politically Incorrect called Politically Incorrect or Just Stupid. Because people would do things that were just stupid. And there's a line, you know, I could see how the untrained mind could not get where that line was, but...

That was the point of the ad. Some things are politically incorrect because they're true, but I'm saying them out loud. And some things are just fucking stupid. Yes, I can get a rise out of you by saying, I think we should legalize cannibalism. It's just stupid. And backing Putin is just stupid. It's not provocatorial. It's just not looking at the reality. I challenge the phrase backing Putin.

I think what he did... He was licking his ass in documentaries. And I like Oliver Stone. I think he's a genius filmmaker. One of my favorites. The one you did with him. All of them. All of them. Here's what the other side of that is. Because I would challenge the idea that Oliver is stupid. I didn't say stupid. I said this is stupid. He's not stupid. But I think that he finds himself...

quite authentically as a vessel of skepticism specific to his own patriotism, that he is an American and he an individualist. And I don't think that Oliver Stone feels and I'm not going to argue on his behalf or against him that he that here's what he's not. He's not a people pleaser.

Great. Who's he going to back next? Hitler? Hey, I'm provocateuring. Hitler, great orator. He was. Well, I mean, you know, the Trump-Hitler analogy, of course, like anything, is an eye roll for many reasons why he doesn't deserve to be

Compared to Hitler, no, he's not a mass murderer. He doesn't even hate the Jews. But who are we talking about now? Trump. Oh, no, he's self-absorbed. But where the Hitler analogy completely works for me is Hitler in the conference room where they're pushing things on the map of, you know, and the generals are telling him like rational things.

And he is saying, "No, I don't care that we need to retreat.

All the German soldiers will stay on the line into the West. That's where Putin is right now. And that's where, yes, that's where Putin is now. It's the same mentality of Trump. The people around him are like, this guy's nuts. I can't work with him. Well, in one case with Hitler, he was evidently shooting methamphetamine the whole time. And with Trump, he was shooting McDonald's the whole time. But, you know, that's a joke, but it's not a joke. It's, you know...

You know, this goes back to a conversation you had with your previous guest. We're all learning exponentially now in our lifetime about mental health. We're all thinking about it. And it was not a great big topic of conversation in the 30s and 40s. We're always swept under the rug. Look at the Kennedy kid. So you would look at the nuances of a character and it would create charisma because it was different. You wouldn't recognize it as sickness.

Now we're in a time where some of us believe that we very early on recognize the sickness in Donald Trump. Oh, I never didn't see him as a guy four blocks off the Vegas strip selling cars or a failed magician with this blondie hair and his tan. Right. And, and,

So you will, again, it goes back to the responsibility of us, which goes back to the public health issue, not past, not COVID, but future. And how are we going to, how do we prepare trust? How do we demand of leaders an authenticity that says, I don't know sometimes? Well, that bus has sailed, pal. I don't know what world you're living in, but that's gone. The people, the...

What they know about what they would have to know to make those kind of decisions, that's gone with the wind. So, you know. Again, however, it goes back to consensus science. Consensus science, if you take it off of COVID-19 and you put it on to climate change. Science lives on the lifeblood is dissent. Science means I say this and then you get to challenge it.

This idea that we don't get to challenge it because there's a consensus about something completely new, using a completely new on people vaccine. I understand they've been working on it for a while. Yes. I'm not. Look, I went to your fucking parking lot and got it. Yeah. OK. I'm very proud of that. And I think we had dinner that night. I think we did. OK. So look.

Yes. And trust me, I don't like to argue with my friends about anything. I was like, why can't you? Because I'm not unreasonable about it. It's not like I'm an anti-vax. This is what's important. Forgive me if I advertise you. Here's what's important about you. You have always, you've shown respect to people you've interviewed on your shows. People who I don't want to be in the same room with. They seem so venal to me.

And yet you are no small part of my pursuits that I mentioned earlier of nurturing certain relationships and finding the common ground.

and say, where do we go from here? In fact, I'm considering myself, and maybe I shouldn't say his name now, but someone who was in the Trump administration, who was a friend of mine before he was in the administration and during, who I would send texts, please resign now. Resign. California misses you. And he said, trust me, your people want me here.

And I understand his position. This is a guy who's very different than he has. He's diligent in his religion, and he served a very high office in the administration. And he and I are talking about putting a podcast together. Oh. Simply because what I would do is I would get someone I considered

my political pundit, somebody who I feel has the skill set to argue with him on the facts beyond mine. And he would get someone as a cultural person, a non-political person,

who is on, for the most part, his side of the tracks. And that that could create a conversation we need because if we don't start talking to each other, we're a flop. It's funny you mention that because Club Random is thinking about forming a network and having an umbrella of other podcasts that we endorse. And maybe you'd like to be part of the Club Random family. We'll talk offline.

Let me get you to sign here and here. I had a waiver up there. He came to me. But my publicist doesn't know I'm here. Oh, your publicist gave up years ago. She went out a window. She's actually, if I think about what would have been without her, it's a bad story. I have to tell you, knowing you as long as I do,

I have seen you. You became such a mensch. Not that you weren't always. I mean, you were always Superman flying off to save the world. And sometimes for real with real people. I could cite chapter and verse. But, you know, there was also this kind of like side of you that reminded me of what Jimmy Van Heusen said about Frank Sinatra.

He said, "He's one of the most interesting people you'll ever meet, but don't stick your hand in the cage." Well, there are a lot of women that'll tell you the same. That's how I thought of you. In the last 10 years, that's just not you. You're just a cuddly teddy bear. I realized something. Whether we're talking about the fucking diabolical pandemic or the wars of this place and the horror that's happening,

Our, we got to be 90, 10. We got to be, I think we can talk and chew gum at the same time. I don't believe in this idea of joy without pain or pain without joy. But at the end of the day, we have an obligation to keep happiness available to people. A human obligation, a parental obligation. And that will create its own hope. And for me, at 62 years old,

I wake up in the morning and I'm determined I'm going to live the fuck out of this life. Good for you. And I'm going to be kinder than I was yesterday. I'm going to hear my kids better than I did yesterday. And, you know, there's no perfection to this science either. Right.

but there was a turning point for him. I mean, it's, yeah. And it also shows that people are not done living at 50. You know, this country is so ageist.

And because most people, because of ill health, let's not get back on that. But, you know, when you say a million died of COVID, again, health is very complicated. There's so many factors that go into it. So many things are going on in your body. Genetics and what you eat and how many metals are in your body. I could name a thousand things. Industrial pollution, pollution, what you did in your 20s. You know, all these things, how many antibiotics you've had. All these things go into it.

So, you know, when anybody says this caused a million deaths, that was a factor. It's like when people said, here's an analogy you'll appreciate for this. Let me just finish this. When people said Reagan won the Cold War, Reagan didn't win the Cold War any more than COVID killed a million people. Any more than he pulled trickle down works. It's played its part.

But it was a coalition. Kennedy won the Cold War. Going into Vietnam, I know it was a horrible war, I agree. But it did stop the communists in their tracks. Okay, so lots of people won the Cold War. Reagan came in and he played his part in the final battle.

episode, you know, I'm going to raise the defense budget and I'm going to, these people are too poor to keep up with this. He was right about that. And he was right that it was an evil empire, nothing more evil than communism. You know, there's two points that come to my mind that I'm reading. You're going to finish, go ahead and finish. But that's my analogy to COVID. It's like, yeah, COVID did play a significant part, but it's more complicated than that. Yes. And

The two things I'll mention are Diane Sawyer. In fact, I forgot the second one, so I'll go to Diane Sawyer. Many years ago, you know, we all loved Diane Sawyer. Sure. We don't still? I mean, you know, I still have a crush. Really? Diane Sawyer? Oh, come on. Don't lie. Absolutely. Don't lie to me. Oh, stop it. But hear this out.

She was doing a side job. Like, I don't know, she was working for two networks or whatever she was doing. She had one thing where she was doing just human interest stuff. She was a dominatrix. Yeah. I wish I knew the truth behind that. So she wanted to meet because she wanted to sell me the idea of putting a hidden... This is when I was at the epicenter of the beginning of the paparazzi phenomenon. Oh, way back. Yeah.

And I was getting problems and arrested. The epicenter. I love the way you dress up punching photographers. Well, no, but I mean, because of the person I was married to at the time. I know. You were punching photographers. Come on. And so she, we met in New York in a hotel, in a hotel bar. Oh. Not room, not a Weinstein type. Was she married? Isn't she married to? She was Mike Nichols. Mike Nichols. Hey. Brilliant.

No, I wasn't going to win. No, I didn't. Well, I mean, I could have won, but just out of respect to his body of work, don't fuck his wife. But I did accept the meeting. Just for the graduate. Because what she wanted to do was ask me to put a hidden camera on in one of those kinds of situations where you're coming out of a restaurant and the paparazzi are hounding you. She wanted me to participate in this story that way. Wow.

And I was interested in my head of being an actor. I didn't see it coming. I overreacted to certain things. I should have avoided other things. There were all those things that I take. You were young, dumb, and full of comedy. We all were. You don't have to apologize. Correct. And it wasn't anybody I hit that I regret. Exactly. But I regret hitting.

There you go. We can do both. Exactly. And regrets are good. So we sat there and very quickly I told her, just as fair play, I don't want to do this. But that was early in the conversation and we continued the conversation.

And she said something that I never forgot because we were right at the moment that the wall had come down. And I had spent time in West Berlin. That's the Berlin Wall for you kids. Yeah. I had spent time in both the West and the East going through Checkpoint Charlie in the early 80s. Of course you did. Of course I did. And this kind of ominous thing that happened when you crossed through Checkpoint Charlie from this...

alive culture of West Berlin into the East, where it was so depressed, so austere. And she said, you know, it wasn't primarily Perestroika. It wasn't Gorbachev. It wasn't Reagan. It wasn't Solidarity in Poland. It was Black Market Beatles records, Levi's 501. Sure. It was the human connection to dreaming and having and

And freedom. And I mean, there was nothing. I'm sure you've seen that awesome German movie, The Lives of Others. No. Oh, you owe me a blowjob. I just did you such a mitzvah. Really? Again? Because you're going to love this movie.

As a director. I mean, it's so perfect. Well, my assistant's watching in the other room up there. No, no, I'll text you tomorrow. The lives of others. It won the best foreign language movie. I miss a lot of movies. You probably gave the award out at the show anyway. But it's about East Germany under Berlin.

Where Eric Honecker and the Stasi and wherever, where literally every third citizen is spying on the other two. It's just no way, psychologically, it would be almost worse to starve or have some physical pain, what they put these people through. This is one reason why the Russians are so fucked up.

The old joke, which is just the beginning of the problem, they pretend to pay us and we pretend to work. When your whole society is based on something that is not real,

And it reminds me of some things the woke do today where they just declare that it's a new day and there's a revolution and things are completely different now. That's what communism was. People are not selfish anymore. People are always selfish. And the reason why capitalism is a superior system with all its flaws is because it takes advantage of human nature as it is, not as we wish it were to be. Right.

I guess what I'm saying is why are you boyfriends with Castro and Cesar Chavez and every fucking asshole with a beard and a banana tree out his window? By that, you mean Hugo Chavez, not Cesar Chavez. Hugo Chavez. Okay. Did I say Cesar? I have things to say about that.

So what? Listen, he knew before he died, not significantly because I didn't I don't claim a significant position. Hugo Chavez. He knew very clearly when he put up the referendum to be able to be president for life and all this kind of stuff. I immediately attacked that. I knew he'd gone off. But what what he was originally and this is not about him, but about the Venezuelans.

What he started with in leadership, I think we actually talked about this on one of your other shows at one point, is you had literally 80% of the country had no national identity at all. No access to healthcare, no access to education, none, not bad education, no education. And so a person, call him Hugo Chavez,

with a movement and a prison time for a coup attempt where he was nearly killed. This is not just some...

I hate America. I'm going to control my country like with an iron thumb guy. This is a guy who was himself a dreamer and he gave people an identity. I was there and not with a minder. But what he didn't give them was food. What he didn't give them, ultimately, ultimately, you're going, you're going, the food crisis happened later under Maduro.

What, what, what in Maduro can be accused of being a dictator. It can be accused of being a bad manager. He's certainly the inflation rate under your boyfriend Chavez was something like 27,000%. This, this, this say, I will tell you very clearly that Hugo Chavez was my friend. However,

Your boyfriend, Hugo Chavez, is not an applicable term. He was my friend and he was in a position, fortunately, neither of us have to be in, that he found himself in, that he pursued.

Any head of state is a bad job to me. You got to decide if I'm going to put U.S. troops on the ground and sacrifice them or use a drone that maybe kills extra babies. Your friend ran a country that had enormous oil revenues that somehow never got to the people because socialism is the economic program where the money does get to the people, except, of course, when it doesn't. But that isn't exactly what happened. Well, what exactly happened to all the oil money? Why was it? Well, here's one thing.

I can give you cash. Thank you. Here's for more. Okay. Right. Or I can make it cost a dollar and a half for you to fill your tank. The traffic in, I'm not, I'm not celebrating this as a good policy, but the, but he was giving away.

Oil to the people. They owned it just like he did. That's a fact. You mean the actual oil? So they all have to fucking sell the oil? No, you had, they were working with the Iranians for infrastructure, all kinds of things we can take pause on. You can't really be defending him from being corrupt with the oil money. I mean, really? Because...

And by the way, he's hardly alone in the world. There are many dictatorial countries where the top guy, there's a number, Gabon, I think, is one in Africa, Equatorial Guinea, where you find it. And of course, they always have a son who's like 28 and he's on Instagram, like doing crazy things with money that they got from stealing the oil revenue from the people. I'm not going to speak for or against him on his personal corruption in terms of that

But certainly we know that's the case with Putin. But what I can speak for is that my job there in Venezuela was not as an advocate for Chavez. It was to create the thing that you celebrate with skepticism about the way in which the U.S. demonizes. What do you mean your job there? My job as an American citizen, I felt it was my job to...

to get across this reality, which was that here, if you have, and South America is strewn with these socialist leaderships that have been intervened upon by American policy and by American intelligence agencies in such an aggressive way that, wait, let me make the point. I'm not arguing that's a true thing. Wait.

an aggressive way to the point where we were supporting dictators in Chile who were electrocuting the genitals of people. And another true thing is that other people in the world have the same thing happen to them and get over it at some point. Or more quickly. Maybe some people just do things more quickly. Again, this is not as an apologist for Chavez's policies this way or his, rather, his decision-making process. But his decision-making process is one we should study.

because when you have no trust and when you feel, and you have good reason to believe that the U.S. is trying to kill you because we had done it before with Pinochet,

And so he was a bad dude. He was a bad dude. And we supported him with Kissinger's money. Che Guevara was a bad dude. Well, again, I wasn't there. I think there are things about Che Guevara that are to me quite alluring. I'm not a sadistic. He's not Elvis Presley. He's definitely not. But I think he's unbelievable. But he's on his many t-shirts. But again, for example, let's go to Giuliani. Giuliani. Can we agree that there was 10 minutes?

where Giuliani represented more leadership than the White House did. When he did 9/11. There were 10 minutes where you and I said, "Oh, wow." So what I'm saying about Chavez is his original 10 minutes meant something that we've not been willing to look back on. Here's what I would say about Giuliani. He did certainly, when he was mayor of New York during that crisis,

Did a fine job. And I would always give him credit for that. But my question about that is sort of the same thing I have always thought about Captain Sullenberger. Remember? Sully Sullenberger, yeah. Again, did a fine job. My question- As opposed to what?

I hit the Empire State Building or, you know, you tell me that the World Trade Center's been hit and I say I've got a meeting in the other room. No, two completely different things. No, they did well, but they were like... No, no, you can't compare. Of course they're different. No, but let me look.

What is the significant difference that makes me moved by Sully Sullenberg? I'm moved too. Is that he put in the 10,000 hours on a skill set, not on a vanity set. Okay. Not on a blusterous leadership set. And I'm going to take on the mafia because I need your attention. All right.

No, he put it on the middle with the other one. He put in the fucking hours and you hear it. You hear it when he's on the radio. And that's that he did that for us. Hey, you straw man isn't here. I don't hate Sully Sullenberger. I'm just I'm saying he did a great thing. He did it great. He like threw a fucking 40 yard pass, zinged it right in there and they got the score. And but, you know, it was fourth and 18. What else would he?

He kind of had to do that. He did it good. We would agree that charisma, arrogance is charisma in America.

And when it's in harmony with America at the moment, like Giuliani was, he's going to have a high point despite himself. Sully Sullenberg is going to have a high point no matter what. I'll be at the Kiva Auditorium in Albuquerque. I'm not even ending the show. I'm going to be at the Kiva Auditorium in Albuquerque on January 28th. And I'll be heckling.

And the, oh, I'm starting at a new theater and I've been at the, what's the city with all the gambling? Las Vegas. Las Vegas. Gambling and the strippers. Don't forget the strippers. Right. It was either that or I've been in Macau the last six years. No, I've been at the Mirage and had a great time there. They were so great.

But they're changing the showroom and I'm going to one of their sister hotels, the MGM Grand. This is my first time there at the David Copperfield Theater, February 17th and 18th. And my puppeteer, Sean, will be there working the DJ booth. And February 25th, the Hard Rock in Sacramento, Wheatland, California, actually.

I hope he didn't. I thought I'd just do that and maybe he wouldn't notice. I'm like, he's had enough drinks now. Maybe he wouldn't even notice that I'm doing this. I'm still not sure the show started. Yeah. Oh, that's good, Corinne. Yeah, I got to say, comedy is king. I'm telling you, you should do... You're at the perfect age now and...

you know it's interesting the way you see when we look at de niro like he went into comedy and he killed it it's not like you can't still do serious stuff but like at a certain point we it's almost like what you were saying before about eliminating the the riffraff in your mind like um when i watch something i just want to be entertained you know you mentioned robert de niro

There's a thing about actors that I think is just always true. It ends up being the truth is that the career, the life, the work of an actor, I think of anybody creatively, comedians as well. It's the body of work gets absorbed no matter what the chronology is. In his case, he did very few comedies and then he, you know, after Midnight Run,

everybody said, oh, wait a minute. And nobody at that time, nobody thought that America's most gifted dramatic actor was going to become its biggest comedy star. I mean, it was just, it was not. And he had that in there the whole time. You think that started with Midnight Run? I think Midnight Run is when

the money of movies. Because I love that movie. Charles Grodin. I did too. Here's a sad thing about the times we live in. Almost any movie you mention, not any, but so many, the immediate reaction from someone you're talking to, if it's a private conversation and it can be real, is, oh, they couldn't make that today.

If I had a nickel for every fucking time I heard, and I concur, they couldn't make that. I was watching Rain Man the other day. I hadn't seen it. It was so great. Such a great movie. Couldn't make it. I use the example all the time of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I can tell you exactly the conversation that would happen. Right. If we've got whoever the equivalent star of Jack Nicholson, which by the way, there isn't one. Right.

How's he doing? I think he's doing fine. He's just, you know, invested in his private life. I remember you once took me to his house. Yeah, he's a force of nature and somebody who's always an angel on my shoulder creatively and then

No, I know. He thinks of you as like a son. So he's OK. And he-- yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, he has such a facile mind. He's such an-- he's Joyce-ian. And sometimes you have to just go on melody. That's such a great way to put it, because I never knew what he was talking about. That's when you have to go melody instead of lyrics. It's so--

Sometimes the best brains you just gotta get in there. But I used to be at dinner parties at Sue Menger's house. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, I would sometimes be seated next to Jack or talk to him and like, I just kind of went with it because like he would laugh at me. I was like, what the? Curtains should be washed. What does that mean? He would sometimes start conversations in the middle.

And he's, it's like, well, you know, old red. And already you're off center because you don't know old red. Exactly. And no, but he, if you went, if you had, whenever you shifted and you went melody, you just had a genius. He's Jack fucking Nicholson. He can be a mental case in his private life. If he wants to all day long. I can tell you literally what the conversation would be. Yeah.

Yes, we want to make this film. Yes to the budget, but he can't die in the end. And also it stars Amy Schumer.

I'll take Amy Schumer any day. Oh, I love Amy Schumer. She's fantastic. Yeah, she is. Over a lot of what ends up happening. Have you ever seen a 30-minute long sketch she once did in black and white filmed like a movie called 12 Angry Men Inside Amy Schumer?

Okay, please. Now you owe me two blowjobs because you are so gonna love this. It's a parody of "12 Angry Men" and it's all, and then the cast is like amazing. Like, I'm surprised you're not in it. Like all these like named people are the angry men and they're deciding whether she's hot enough to be on TV.

And instead of a knife on the table, remember Henry Fonda with the knife? It's a dildo. It's the best sort of parody thing I've ever seen on television. Well, you know, it's interesting because I don't know her well. I know her a little bit. And I do have a sense of her. And I've seen her where she had me completely hysterical. I've seen things where I wasn't sure I was following it.

But I get a sense, you know, if there's if you got a group, get a group of soldiers, you know, culture soldiers together of 10, she'd be in them. She's got something. She's gotten something special. And you think we need culture soldiers? Well, an interesting phrase. I think we do. I think we I feel like when I hear it sounds to me like social justice warrior.

And no, you know what it is? It's what my version of it. It's Bill Maher, who says things I agree with, because these things I don't agree with. But where I feel I'm getting the that I'm being recognized as authentic because this person accepts themselves as authentic. And it's I look at comedy like for throughout the COVID period. It's it was this it was a sanity keeper to the degree I could keep sanity. It was.

You. It was Dave Chappelle. It was, you know, a handful of others who Bill Burr, you know, where you sat there and you say, I'm not even in a world where I have to agree or disagree. I just have to see authenticity. Well, the three of us that you mentioned there, we're all people who call out the woke a lot.

So I feel like that is a little bit of a contradiction in you. I feel like you instinctively want to go toward that direction because you have that tingling feeling in your balls for any sort of thing that says there's social justice. But at some point, that movement veered into authoritarianism. And that's why the word woke, which originally was fine, alert to injustice, I'm down, always have been. But it became an eye roll.

because I got news for the woke. Yeah. You can't find that thought when you're 150 meters from the Russians, when you're seeing the devastation and the vaporization of human beings. Now I owe you a blow job. You are not going to remember all the pronouns. So that I've been preaching that. See there, there we can like,

And you're the one guy who can say it because, again, you walk the walk. But, Sean, I mean, you said you're 62. How long can you, I mean, when I think about traveling to Ukraine, like the first thing that would cross my mind is peeing. I will not have enough opportunities to be able to do this trip to the front lines. No, let me tell you. The front lines? That was an eight-hour drive.

And you're not going to piss in the trench. I can't even. And...

I don't know about you, but as an older gentleman, I get bottled up. In fact, I think I'm going to rely on Depends here. Mrs. Robinson, this conversation is getting a little awkward. No, this really has to end that part of this discussion there on urinary issues. But what I'm just saying is like, I really think

I mean, I'm five years older than you, but I'm telling you, yes, am I a million times more of a coward than you are? Yes, I'm Bob Hope. You're Bing Crosby, okay? That's my character. I'm sorry. I just don't like pain or like discomfort if I can avoid it. Shoot me. Anyway...

But you, you know, you walk that walk. So you are almost uniquely qualified to call out the woke. It's almost a responsibility. I quoted you here last week when Bryan Cranston was here and he was saying,

He did The Upside, which I thought was a fantastic movie. He's in a wheelchair. Kevin Hart is the guy who takes care of him. And he said, you know, he got a lot of shit from people who thought the part should have gone to someone in a wheelchair. And I said, Sean Penn had the great line, which is, in the future, the only people who can play Hamlet are actual princes of Denmark. Danish princes, yeah. Yeah, it's true. Listen, I went to University at Albany and

I had just put out the book that you were kind enough to put a quote to, Bob Honey, who just did stuff, my first novel. And I was traveling with the book, doing readings and discussions with moderators and other writers at bookstores and so on, trying to hustle the thing. And I went up to the University in Albany, where Harvey Milk had gone to school.

And the book was being taught by one of the literary professors there. Wow. And that meant that I had a lot of people in that audience when I came out who actually had read it. Wow. And where I felt when I read criticisms of it, which were most, I could tell that most of them had not actually read it through. And fair enough.

But what happened is that because I had mentioned the Me Too movement in a skeptical way, as a movement at large, and what was happening in terms of the trending movement of it, I questioned that in the book. And so I had protesters outside the auditorium at the university. And some of those protesters found their way into the auditorium. Most of them were outside with the banners, you know, fuck Sean Penn or whatever it was. And

I was in the wings and they had told me, you know, there's so-and-so as the head of the university department here is going to introduce you and then moderate the conversation. And I'm waiting in the wings in this auditorium and I'm hearing the introduction. And at some point close to saying, and now ladies and gentlemen, Sean Penn and I come out, they mentioned the movie Milk.

Wow. Got a big applause. And I was listening to that applause and I was realizing the contradiction in what was happening outside with the protesters and a few inside. And when I came out, I think the first thing I said, which was, I think, a fair observation is, were that film made today, I couldn't play that part. Right. And the same people who two minutes before they were applauding Milk were thinking, fuck him about Me Too.

Suddenly we're hardwired into an acceptance. And also institutions are becoming the opposite of what they're supposed to be. Colleges are supposed to be about scholars. Yeah.

you know, and free speech and opening your mind. And now it's about you can't say this. How dare you? Not only that, worse than that, it's you can't teach at this higher level. How dare you? Hence the NYU organic science professor who was fired because too many of the kids' parents wrote complaining letters, you're making a course too hard.

And these are people who are going to be our health professionals. Oh, no. I mean, colleges have been taken over by ideologues. I mean, there is something going on here to come full circle here that is very reminiscent of Mao's Cultural Revolution in 1966 with DEI officers as the Red Guard and people like that. Now, of course, there is a place

for DEI officers, and there should be some. I think Michigan State has 140. That's a lot of witches to be hunting. Yeah, it's a lot of witches to be hunting. It's a big investment in the hunting of witches. Well said. Exactly. So that doesn't make me a conservative to point that out. I just always want to keep it real. That's

And we've talked about this before. Whenever people applaud their socialism and they use that word, I want to fight them because we know from every experiment around the world of socialism, it doesn't work. Capitalism is not sustainable. If your grandmother...

is alone at home and someone breaks in, she calls 911. She doesn't have to put her credit card down when the police show up. That's socialism also. Yeah. But don't call it that. Well, shut the fuck up and just talk, communicate policies to people without relying on the trending titles and all the bullshit that so many of the, yes, there, there is a perfectly rational, uh,

It would take two seconds to explain socialism in the rational way, which is America is already quasi-socialist as it should be. As it should be. As every Western democracy is and most other countries in the world that know how to do it right. It's not just Western countries now. But yes, there is places where social... I mean, the military is socialism. This is going to be the battle of the next month with the debt ceiling. Yeah, of course. This is going to be the battle. What is bigger socialism than socialism?

making tanks we don't need. It's because it's a jobs program in districts that make tanks and they want to keep making them even if the Pentagon says we have enough already. That could not be more socialistic. So and then we have a lot of excess social. I mean, what was the bailout of the pandemic? Six trillion dollars really just and most of it was stolen. We know that that's a little hard to take. So, yeah, we have socialism already that, you know, I've always thought we should have socialism.

Socialized medicine. More along the... There are areas that we can... By the way, these are sellable stories if you don't call them socialism. Or at least a public option. It's just... I mean, how the Republicans fought that one, I never understood because you're supposed to be for freedom. Options. We're not even... It's not mandatory. No, just an option. It's in the word. Public option. It's just an option. And, of course, they won that battle. But... Look, to be in a time...

Where Adam Kinzinger, Liz Cheney are an anchor into civility. Yeah, well, you know, come on. See, that I think is the wrong fucking attitude. We admire them because there was a bridge too far for them, which was, no, you can do everything but...

You can't try to say an election didn't happen the way it did. You can't. That's the way to banana republic. Those are what I call good as it gets Republicans. I have Bill Barr on the show Friday night. He's my lead guest. A lot of people won't like me just even platforming him. But like, what fucking good does it do to just...

Say that these people are irredeemable or deplorable or they can't be reached. I mean, I could argue with Bill Barr about a million things, and I'm going to hold this feed to the fire about one thing that always...

fucking stuck in my craw. What is that? That is when the Mueller report came out, he gave a summary, which was unnecessary because he was provided one by Mueller, didn't want to use that, provided his own and said Trump was cleared of obstruction of justice when Mueller plainly said, we're not clearing him.

We're just saying he's not guilty. He made an informational mistake for sure there. An informational mistake, a purpose, anyway. But the thing that people don't talk about enough when it comes to the Mueller report and Mueller is I clearly, and I understand this, most people don't understand the culture of service oriented people, especially when it comes to military chain of command.

Those are things that we are benefiting from in a great way as a better way to organize it than other ways that we've come up with so far. So you have a guy like Robert Mueller, who is an extraordinary civil servant, both in his military history and his post-military history.

who recognizes the chain of command, and most people, I'm sure as we sit here tonight, still don't understand probably what I think is the most important thing that Mueller was never going to tell us. He said from his level that there was no way to indict a sitting president. That was not law.

That was Justice Department policy. I know. I know. I made the same point. I know. Yeah. Right. But Bill Barr, anyway, the point is, I could argue about a million things. Yes, I'm going to bring this up because I'm sorry, but he's got to answer for Santino on the causeway. Other than that, what point is there to just get into like,

this, I hate you. I can mention all these things I hate about you. Versus like, he came to do the show. He, you know,

In other words, I have to accept that there is a certain conservative personality. I think it has. I think the personality comes before the politics. You're just born with a certain chip or it has to do with where you're from. But sometimes it's just a chip in your brain and you're a conservative. He's Bill Barr. He's a conservative. That's him. Pipe and slippers, turkey dinner. Come on. It's just a type. Stop.

being angry that that's the type. And of course, a certain sort of politics comes out of that type. Also, if your agenda goes into the abstract and rather than the tangible, literal, obvious, if it's I want tomorrow better for everybody. I don't know how we get there.

Then they do. The starting point. They would say they do. But the starting point is the same starting point in a relationship between two people. Interesting. Yeah. Being right is overrated. Right. Well, it's like, how do we move the ball forward enough to get a first down? OK, that's what we should be doing in everything that we're doing. We do the investment of citizens politically. You're a marrier.

So you think being right is overrated because when you're married, you have to give up? I've earned that view. I've earned that view because I've always been right, Bill. I know. I'm not arguing that point. I'm just saying when you're in a marriage, you have to pretend that you're not right.

Even when you think you're right, because it's about keeping the peace. Am I right? When you're on planet Earth, you've got to at least accept that you might not be right.

Oh, and you have to also couldn't agree. Also consider the possibility that everybody else is wrong. You've got to do both. That's what makes us human. OK, that's our thumbs. OK, so you just made my case for me about the thousands and thousands and thousands of doctors who dissent from your point of view about the vaccines. But I really didn't mean to bring it back to that. OK, can I rub your back? Yeah.

Well, but I mean, I've always thought that that was your romantic Irish soul, that you like you are a soulmate finder. You want to, you know, the problem is we all evolve so much in life that the soulmate changes. Yeah. And.

I feel a certain, on our level, a certain soul-mateness that we saw the first time we met each other. It's been consistent. And I look back on relationships. There's a lot of ego that gets in the way of things and all of that. But there is a lesson to be seen if one looks for it, which is that whether we're talking about our worst enemies or our best friends,

The best thing we can do for our children is finding commonality. And every time we try to do that, every time we do that aggressively, we get such a reward. I'm so glad to hear you say that. Because I don't always think of you that way. Because, you know...

Maybe it's from Team America World Police. You know, which, by the way, I never saw that. It's the best. But it's my son's favorite movie. It's almost my favorite movie. And I don't, those guys, the South Park guys, I don't really know them. I didn't, I don't, I met those guys and I,

I ended up writing a letter to one of them that he exploited. He used it publicly when they were putting out Team America. But my problem was something he had said. One of the two of them had said something to discourage voting if you were not informed. And I thought, you know, people are informed in different ways. And you get...

I don't like the idea of discouraging voting. And I went against him in that, wrote him this letter. And it timed out with his release of this film. I didn't even know that I was a part of the subject matter. Boy, that was stupid. But what I will say is that I never got Still Don't Give South Park, but... I don't either.

I don't either. But what I will say. Many people love it. Is that. Smart people. Those guys who created the Book of Mormon. Yes, that's great too. Are fucking genius. Well, if you like that. I went twice. I went twice. Team America. Talk about you couldn't make it today. No.

I mean, and that's why it's so great. And, you know, it's post 9-11, so it's about, you know, I won't spoil it, but that's another movie to put on your list. I can't believe you don't watch every movie. I guess movie stars don't watch movies. You know, I've gotten... You know, it's like me listening to comedy. It's like a busman's holiday. No, I think you originally fall in love with movies and you go and like...

I loved the period that I had where I loved every movie, in one way or another. Like, a movie was always exciting to me. Yeah. And, you know, over time, you accumulate a taste of certain kinds of things that you particularly celebrate, but, you know, you'll take the guilty pleasures. I think, for me, going to a movie theater is...

a public place that represents my professional life. So I'm going to go somewhere where there are likely people who are going to recognize me because they're interested in movies. Right. And that's its own downside. Right.

I think Bob Dylan said the greatest thing about, I think the worst thing about fame is people reminding you of who you are. And so you become allergic to that. And then when certain genres take over the space of what, like I always refer to it as the girl I fell in love with, was mostly alone, not on a date, not with a buddy, but when I would go in the afternoon to Westwood,

and go into one of those theaters and see the movie i wanted to see those those it's like the first time you tasted something you just go alone jake did the same thing in new york it was the best when i lived when i first moved in there right out of college and my first apartment was on 8th avenue above a bus stop probably made me very sick later in life 8th avenue bus stop and i would wake up at like

1:30 in the afternoon, take a piss. I'd walk down Broadway. Every theater was playing in Times Square. This was like 1980. I didn't have to look in the paper. Anything I wanted to see was-- I was at that-- in 1980, I was living at 48th between 8th and 9th, right there. And I tell this story sometimes. I remember that it was the first time I ever lived in a storied building.

because I had been running around as an acting student and couch surfing and doing what you do. Because L.A. is better. But I couldn't get a job in L.A., so I went to New York to try to work in the theater there. I was doing equity waiver theater stuff. I went to New York with a buddy of mine,

We paid $375 down, which included the security deposit on an apartment. It was a one room thing. I remember one night he called me from a pay phone because that's how you called somebody. And we had put in a hard line in our, you know, with our two mattresses on the floor in this apartment. And I was going to bed because I didn't have the money to do anything else. And I knew how to go to sleep at that time, a little bit at night. And,

The phone rang and it was him and he was coming in from Queens on the E train. And he was a little drunk and he was trying to get his old girlfriend back and heartbroken and he begged me to rally and meet him at this bar two blocks away from the hotel. We'd been living in the apartment for about five, six days at that point. And we had not taken the garbage out. And I didn't know where you take the garbage out in a high rise building.

And so I get dressed and rally to go meet him. He's dealing with his heartbreak. And it was always interesting at that time to walk down because it's like all the prostitutes want to date, want to date. And you felt like you were a living taxi driver or something. Right. Yes. And we had this outward actor bar down the road. We'll meet you there. And so I got dressed and I get in the elevator.

And next to me is the most exotic, beautiful woman I've ever seen. I'm growing up as a surfer in Malibu, and I'm looking at a woman who doesn't look like the Barbies I'm used to. She looks like when I went to the dentist's office and saw the cover of Vogue. And I'm thinking, okay, wow, this is New York, and I've got to figure out a line. And I'm shy, but I won't forgive myself to not try.

And I said to her, I pressed, she had pressed the lobby and we were coming down. We had another 12 floors to go down. And the elevator starts going down and I got to come up with something. And my line was, do you know where the garbage goes in this building? Did you have it with you? And her response was, yeah, you take it right down to... It was a man. And then...

And I'm hearing Lou Reed in my head take a walk on the wild side. I take that story to mean a long overdue celebration of us being whatever we want to be. A woman, a man, a man looks like a woman, a fish, a tree. You know that the kids in school can now identify as a tree?

I'm not kidding. I'm not joking. Listen, I identify as a person who calls Donald Trump she or her. I identify as a hot dog bun who wants its own bathrooms. We've got to get a hold of... There's a silliness to the woke culture that's gotten out of hand. Not to load a burden on your shoulders, but honestly, sweetheart, it is really...

More in common on someone like you, all the liberals who are privately tell me we agree on all this stuff, who are known liberals. The reason why you're in Team America, World Police, is because you're a big star. It was Alec Baldwin was head of the Film Actors Guild or FAG.

That's what I'm just quoting the movie. Well, they're pretty irreverent. That's okay. But like the reason it was you and, you know, Matt Damon, it was the stars of the day, just like it was the stars of the day in 1985. It was very low hanging fruit is the argument I'd made while I was punching Matt in the face. What I'm saying is you have the cachet and the credibility to,

as such a revolutionary that, you know, when you say it, it means a lot more than when I say it because like, they know I don't,

pull those punches on either side but yeah it's you know a lot of this nonsense will only stop when the enablers allow it to stop and well listen i remember when you and i had dinner that night at the at that tower you know and then and the ladies from the magazine came by and we're talking you know you know you've been yeah yeah i don't want to name people on a thing but it was a big magazine edit publisher editor fashion involved person oh

uh and they came to the table briefly and and it was at the moment that um a young woman i can't remember what that thing was but she had been cancelled

for texts or high school that she yeah in high school is probably Alexi McCammons right? Yeah, she was a rising star on MSNBC and then slaughtered and you sit there so listen I mean it's flattering when you say, you know someone like you can say that I don't know that I don't have any grasp of a credibility I know that I have people who Alternately, well, I'll give you an analogous example. I think Woody Allen. I

Almost everybody turned their back because he is accused, although not proven to be, and many of us think it's ludicrous that he actually is this thing, a pedophile who started at the age of 57. Okay. But most actors just completely caved. They caved. Scarlett Johansson, God bless her, was like, fuck you all. But wait, but wait.

I'll work with him whenever I want to. And, you know, we live. She, Scarlett Johansson. So. Uniquely. Love her for that. Is intuitively on the right side of almost everything. She's a very unique character. Oh, good. And someone I have. That certainly would indicate that to me. I have deep respect for her.

And she also took very strong positions during the Me Too period. I think she alone bridged reality. If she alone was the voice, we would have been in a better position. Yeah, she sounds like this. But this whole...

well i'm look we we all we all use the word pendulum the words pendulum swing and you know we're hopeful that there's a and i'm certain that there's a pendulum swing i don't know i don't know when it's everybody i know like in your age range is constantly complaining to me like i'm the confessor

about how much they can't stand their uber-woke children, who are like teenagers or early 20s, and they're like, they just want to slap them. And to that I say, deep breath. Yeah. Because they'll get over it. You think? Well, here's what I used to say to myself, is take some stride and some fundamentalist militant

you know, person in that period where there were the real things, like the Harvey thing and this thing and that thing.

The Woody thing never made sense to me because I've never heard watching forensic files of a pedophile who only did it once. So it just never made any sense to me. Really? In a house full of adults? Yeah, it was. In the middle of a custody fight? In the middle of a custody fight with somebody who adopted every child they could find and whose brother was doing time for a pedophile. Whose brother? Exactly. Exactly.

And from a woman who had a giant motivation to be revengeful. Vengeful? Yes. Beyond comprehension. And exonerated by two different investigations. That's all I'm saying is Hollywood is a bunch of fucking cowards. And I'll tell you something else because I do have to wrap this up. Because I have to pee. And I have to pee too. But I am telling you, Sean, I swear to God,

My belief about people in show business, I love them, I love show business. I'm so glad I got to be in show business. But most, when people ask me, I'll say straight up, the default setting for anyone in show business is a complete idiot. Most people are complete idiots. Especially actors. Since you have the ability to cut, you can edit this and put it in this one, I'll just share this with you before we go pee. We'll cross swords. No, no. So, I...

there was a meeting i was driving to the mojave desert from northern california with my son we had our our dirt bikes strapped in the back of my el camino we stopped we were going to stop for the evening in la at the four seasons he was going to go with a friend of mine to a movie i was going to go to a meeting down the street from the four seasons at lambertage hotel

And the meeting were the people who were being called traitors at the time, those who were very vocal about the invasion of Iraq on the basis of weapons of mass destruction and all that. And I don't know who's comfortable with me naming them, so it doesn't matter. But you can go back and Google the group who were on the billboards on Sunset as traitors and so on. And Gore Vidal...

was going to hold court with that group and have a little group think. And I got my son with my buddy, and they were about to go off to the movies. I came downstairs at the Four Seasons, and I ran into Michael Moore. And I was going to this thing, and I thought, are you going to this? He didn't know about it. I said, what are you doing? He said, I was going to take a walk. I said, have you ever met Gore Vidal? I had not met Gore Vidal at that point, but I wanted to. He said, no. I said, come with me.

And we went, it was a group of about 15 who were just sharing their positions and their experience and their thoughts on where we were headed. I don't know that it had a particular agenda. It was more of a commiseration that somebody had organized because you could count on your fingers who the people were that were standing up. And

Michael, as a late comer, stood quiet for most of it. At the end of it, because he was at the Four Seasons, because the next night was the Academy Awards, and everyone knew, Vegas knew, he was going to win for the Columbine movie. But having made the Columbine movie, having that as a focal point of his public discourse, things had accelerated in Iraq, and he had shit to say about that. I remember. Yeah.

So he came to this thing and he said, and he opened it up at the end of the conversation. He said, I have a speech written if I win for tomorrow, which people say I'm going to, but does anybody have any input as to anything I might add to it? And I will say my idea, and Michael can confirm this, and I think we both wish he'd done it, was to just thank the Academy,

Acknowledge those who had suffered in Columbine and were suffering and those that were lost. And be grateful that this group was going to add impact to that conversation. Well, one last thing. Could everyone in this room for time and perpetuity who believes the U.S. should invade Iraq, please stand up for the cameras for the 300 million viewers. I mean, they booed him as it was. Yeah.

That would have been an indictment that would have done us a lot of good. Well, he's the last guy you can say he doesn't have enough balls because that guy's got huge balls. He's fantastic. That's an intimidating room. But you remember when you were with him in Hawaii? When I brought Michael to Hawaii? Yeah, when we did the totem, yeah. And he was also on stage with you. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, he's a hero. I know you've got to pee. I just want to tell you, like...

I started to say this, like most people, a showbiz is an idiot. But there is, you know, also I would also say about showbiz is,

The creme de la creme is creme. Like the directors who last and, you know, the Spielbergs, they're there for a reason. It wasn't, anybody can get lucky for two years or five years. But the careers that last, like yours, that have this kind of endurance over decades, it's because the cream does rise to the top. I mean, this town is full of bullshit, but it adores talent and it does elevate it, usually correctly. You know, I mean, I can certainly find some casting...

choices I didn't agree with, but mostly they find, you know, that's their job to find the good people, which is why it's a shame. I couldn't see Dustin Hoffman equivalent in Rain Man today. But I'm just want to wrap up by saying like this, you know, yes, it's mostly idiots, but the people who are smart in this business like you, you know, and you, you could be not the a listing swashbuckler that you are, and you would be just as interesting to talk to.

you know, your head is just a font of knowledge. I'm just not going to interrupt that thought and say thank you. All right. Well, I thank you. And I thank you for doing this on like short notice. And good luck with your career. Thank you very much. Back to you.