Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO Late night series "Real Time with Bill
Mom."
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“only hope for a listen, thanks, work, Ryan, how are they?”
The former Democratic Governor of America, and to a croma when she's a state and contributor in posthood, echelon, and side-piston's office, Anderson. OK. First one is from the people for you, Ryan, which book do you think
should every American read? Good question. I heard Obama is going to have a podcast just about books. He's, you know, upper, upper thing. Book, book, club. I think it's people reading books.
I think books are like a dinosaurs now. What is that? What is that? What book do you think every-- I mean, I-- it's an obvious picture. I think Gatsby is the greatest American novel. Maybe the greatest one in English.
I don't know. I could not disagree more. What? It's a-- it's a-- OK, it's a pretty good book.
They've made it into a movie.
I've heard so many times and it always sucks.
And the last time-- and the last time I watched it and it sucked, I went, "Maybe it's the book." [ Laughter ] Well, why do you think it's so great? To me, Gatsby is the American dream, and it's also, you know,
the careless people smashing things up. The careless thing, yeah. The-- the-- the green light is the aspiration. I like that. Trying to get back to a simpler time. And at the same time, we also have the carelessness
of the rich, the indifference of the rich, the ridiculousness of the rich. And then, you know, speaking of books, you know, my favorite scene is they walk into the library, and, you know, if you have this enormous display of books, and then, care away finds out none of them have ever actually been open.
The pages haven't been cut, which is how books were. You know, we talk a lot about books. People have opinions about books. People have opinions about the Odyssey, but if people actually read them, they actually read them more than once.
“You know, I think there's something there, too.”
I have a lot of books in the house I've been, right? [ Laughter ] I just love the way books look. I have a hole. I do. They do. Do you work at books?
I've read books. I've read plenty of books. Like a lot of books that I've read. Do you work at nothing by color? How do you organize them? I organize them by color.
Wow, I'm anal, I'm not that bad. [ Laughter ] No, I like it the fact that there's all different colors. It makes for a wall, that's it. Nothing else makes a wall, I think.
It's a great look, but that's me. Book, what do you -- what book would you recommend? I would recommend CS Lewis, the screw tape letters. And while it is a Christian book, it's not a like, prostalizing book.
It's a book about what goes on in the mind when you are being tempted away from your values. And how we think somebody's temptation to do something bad is like, it's obvious. And instead, it's about how, like, the little voice inside your head,
just tiny little things, little annoyances.
“Like, can we do down a path away from what you truly believe is important?”
I always thought CS Lewis was Christian, prostalizing.
Well, it -- it's -- it is a Christian book. And I don't think it's -- it's not -- it's not hiding it whatsoever. But it's not a book that is intended to be about here's why Christianity is great. It's a book that's like, here's why the devil is --
So if I read it on which page would I throw it against the wall? I don't think I can do it. Let's read how you see it. Let's read how you see it. I'm here. Andrew, what's your favorite book? I have a book just for Democrats.
[ Laughter ] Well, you are true, blue. Reason -- even blue. Reason to believe by Mario Cuomo, God rest his soul. I'll change my father.
And I think it was -- it is a very succinct read of what the Democratic Party is supposed to be about with the heart and soul and a mission of the Democratic Party was supposed to be about. And we've lost that. Reason to believe Mario Cuomo.
He was a great voice for it, but he was a better writer about it. Okay. That's your dad. Yep. [ Applause ] Pamela, what are your thoughts on Trump saying he will declare the straight of her
moves a territory of the United States? [ Laughter ] I cannot keep up with this guy. I mean, this -- every day, there's a new version of the straight or her moves. It's like Mary Hartman. I just --
[ Laughter ] Now it's going to be a territory of the United States, wow. Okay. But it looks like we don't even control it. I mean -- It's nothing. It means nothing. Like every other statement.
It means nothing. We have peace, we have war. I'm going to bomb. I'm not going to bomb. We have a deal. We don't have a deal. What does the panel think of reports that sellers aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln have tried to jump overboard amid terrible conditions.
And a record 250 consecutive days that makes my blood boil. Didn't Trump say today that it hasn't been out long enough? That's what he said. His response was that it hasn't been out at sea long enough. So this is a guy that supposedly supports the troops.
It's like, this is to be away from your family that long for a war we
shouldn't be in at all. [ Applause ]
But by the way, we're losing.
[ Applause ] It's two hundred and fifty days. They haven't gotten used to it yet. That's what he's thinking. I mean, his bizarre.
It -- I've used this phrase before, but, you know, Republicans, they have this patriotic immunity. Like they can do things that are so unpatriotic. And they don't seem to pay a price for it the way a Democrat would. When I hear about troops being on a ship with the toilets aren't working
and there's not enough food and they're so morose about this, at least one of them jumped off the ship. It just makes my blood boil.
“Well, this is also why it's so important that if you are going to do”
something like commit American troops to a war where war is hell. Is it has to be for a reason that's a very good reason that you've communicated very well to everybody who's involved. And for these soldiers to feel on the ship not only are they being let down by the actual conditions that they are in, but also not
feel like they're there for any kind of mission that is worth fighting. I mean, I just agree with that. There was a mission worth fighting. We fucked it up, how we did it, a ran having a nuclear weapon, a ran being the actor in the Middle East that has fucked everything up in that
region for the last 50 years. Changing that dynamic was not a unreasonable thing to try. They did it at the wrong time. They fucked it up. They should have done it when the people were in the streets.
They didn't. And now we're here with you. We're here with you that the world is better off with a ran not having a nuclear program that we are better off that we have gotten rid of an enormous amount of their capabilities.
But we've gotten ourselves into a situation now where folks are deployed in the Middle East who, you know, there are, it's thankfully not nearly as many as used to be coming home on a regular basis during Iraq and Afghanistan, but we're still losing American lives. We're drifting away from the point, which is that we's a trillion
dollars, a trillion dollar defense budget, and you can't put food on a aircraft carrier. I mean, it's just some of it speaks to just competence. And that should go down the chain, as they say in the military. Well, that was unbelievable.
You know, the first that he didn't lay out the case to the American
“people before he started, I think it was a big mistake.”
Because you're right, there was a case to lay out. He just didn't do it. It was just Venezuela yesterday and now we're going to do this. Well, he did. Yeah, he did.
Once he started, and then we weren't prepared. We're just military on the globe. How old are you running out of weapons? I mean, it's incredible. Andrew, is there a legitimate, I know why this is for you?
Is there a, because you're in this business now? You're in the crypto businesses. Is there a legitimate real world use for cryptocurrency? Or is it just an avenue for criminals and corrupt politicians? I don't think they mean you by that.
But I mean, but you are in, you, you, this, it's so interesting to me what politicians do like John Bainer, left politics and he went into the pot business. He and I are in the same business now. [ Laughter ]
We are. I have the, the woods, the best pot scorters on Santa Monica, both of us. John Bainer. John Bainer went into psychedelic. I mean, no, Rick Perry went into psychedelics.
That's his business now. Rick Perry, former governor of Texas. You went to crypto.
“Why would you want to get into such a dirty business?”
Yeah. Well, dirty business in the broad seven. 2014, I became interested in the industry. I was governor of New York with the first to regulate it.
Because the technology, the financial technology is revolutionary.
And can do great, great things if properly used. This blockchain technology and these smart contracts. It can make transactions faster, cheaper, more accessible for people. I work with a company called OKX. We just did a partnership with ICE, which owns the New York Stock Exchange,
which I believe is the most, the best exchange on the globe. He says it's an arrogant New Yorker. [ Laughter ] But you will be able to buy tokenized stock 24/7 globally, with tokenized secureization.
I mean, it's going to change the whole industry. But it has to be done right. And it has to be regulated and it has to be -- Because the whole point of it is that it's not regulated. That's the whole reason they started it.
Because they don't want regulation in this country. Only in this country. Europe, 30 countries agreed on a common regulatory scheme. Have a common regulator. We can't get the Senate and House to agree for our own regulations in this country.
That's what happened here.
We still don't have regulations in place. That's the controversy about the Clarity Act that was supposed to pass
and finally put in regulations.
Well, whatever it is here, I know it's used by hackers and sex traffickers and kidnapper, what? Am I wrong? What is the stoic view on crypto? What is the stoic standing? It's okay to be rich as long as your money is not stained-in blood.
It matters what industry you're in. It matters how you make your money. It matters who you're in business with. So I do think there's some sketchy things about the industry. And there's probably a reason that our president likes it so much.
Well, I mean, that's... That's the thing. That's why it has to be done right. That's why it has to be regulated.
“That's why it has to be cleaned. That's why it has to be compliant.”
Look, before I was in the governor's room.
We have that. Like money itself. It doesn't exist either. It's all about we just believe it. We just believe the bank has the money. They don't really have the money.
Right? So what's the point of just having this new thing that's just in the air and in our minds? You're focusing on the coins. I'm focusing on the technology.
The technology is different. It's digital ledger technology. It is instantaneous. It is faster. It is cheaper.
And it will allow financial transactions disruptive
because it's going to reduce the cost by reducing the intermediaries. But literally 24/7 stock market trading, bringing trillions of dollars. But nothing correctly couldn't that also be a bad thing. Because I seem to remember when there's sort of a run on the market.
What they have to do is freeze it because otherwise we're going. The exchange was still have checks. They'll still have checks on it. So we just do that. We can stop the trading.
It will go through ice, which is the largest exchange globally. In the different nights, different nights. Intercontinental exchange. Which fools the New York Stock Exchange.
All right. We'll wind up with this one. Are there any modern leaders who you think are doing a good job modeling stoic virtues? Good question.
“Well, I think these days we obviously see more people”
modeling the opposite of stoicism. You know, you have your Elon Musk's of the world. Like every day freaking out about things that are not in his control. One of my stoic here is modern stoic. Here's most of the people I write about our dad.
But I think general Madness is not just a embodiment of the idea. But he famously carries the stoics with him on his deployments. And certainly in watching this situation unfold now, we miss that kind of adult supervision in the Pentagon these days. Yeah.
I mean, Elon, a lot of people say, well, it's the kind of me in talking when he does crazy stuff. It's also this social media. You know, he's been-- he's not out of school. He's talked about his drug use.
Did-- is there a place within stoicism for doing drugs? Well, I'm asking for a friend. Yes. [ Laughter ] [ Cheers and applause ]
“I might point you to a philosophy called Epicureanism.”
That's why he's more in your style. But they have more income and then they do differences. All right, well, thank you very much. You're all very energy. Thank you.
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