Joe Rogan Experience #1170 - Tulsi Gabbard

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   ... thank you. …

   1. TGTulsi Gabbard0:00

      ... thank you.

   2. JRJoe Rogan0:01

      Okay. Five, four, three, two, one. Boom! And we're live. Hawaii in the house.

   3. TGTulsi Gabbard0:10

      Aloha.

   4. JRJoe Rogan0:11

      Good to see you.

   5. TGTulsi Gabbard0:11

      Nice to see you.

   6. JRJoe Rogan0:12

      Thanks for doing this.

   7. TGTulsi Gabbard0:12

      Thanks for having me.

   8. JRJoe Rogan0:13

      What a great place to be a congressperson.

   9. TGTulsi Gabbard0:15

      The best.

   10. JRJoe Rogan0:16

       Ho- You're in paradise.

   11. TGTulsi Gabbard0:17

       Yeah. It's, it's hard to leave to go to Washington, I tell you what.

   12. JRJoe Rogan0:21

       That's one place, if it wasn't for the storms and the fact that it's really a volcano... (laughs)

   13. TGTulsi Gabbard0:26

       Yeah. (laughs) As we've seen all too evident just recently.

   14. JRJoe Rogan0:29

       Yeah. I have a friend who goes to the Big Island every year for Thanksgiving, and he convinced me to go, uh, two years in a row. It was awesome. I loved it, but then this year, I'm like, "Uh, I don't know, bro."

   15. TGTulsi Gabbard0:39

       (laughs)

   16. JRJoe Rogan0:40

       It seems like it's shooting rocks into the sky-

   17. TGTulsi Gabbard0:42

       Yeah.

   18. JRJoe Rogan0:42

       ... and, uh, half of it's on fire.

   19. TGTulsi Gabbard0:43

       Yeah. That, that's been, uh, that's in- So, that's my district. My district in Hawaii covers basically the whole state, except for the, the densely populated urban corridor of Honolulu.

   20. JRJoe Rogan0:54

       Oh, so you're lucky.

   21. TGTulsi Gabbard0:55

       Yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan0:55

       You, you c- you cover everything except the problem spot. (laughs)

   23. TGTulsi Gabbard0:58

       (laughs) The city. The city. So, um, no, it's, it's been tough. It's been a tough year because of those folks in the, the District of Puna with the volcano.

   24. JRJoe Rogan1:06

       Yeah.

   25. TGTulsi Gabbard1:07

       Um, we have gone through a few near misses with hurricanes, some big flooding on Kauai, and now we've got another one that's, uh, knocking on our door.

   26. JRJoe Rogan1:15

       Yeah. You guys just, uh, uh, s- What was it? A level four just passed.

   27. TGTulsi Gabbard1:19

       It was five. It was five. They were expecting-

   28. JRJoe Rogan1:21

       And then it got knocked down.

   29. TGTulsi Gabbard1:22

       ... it to be kind of the same intensity that Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands saw. So, we were really, like, encouraging everyone to get prepared, getting prepared ourselves, like boarding up all the doors and windows. And then, thank God, it turned into a tropical storm at the end and we had some, a lot of rain. We still had some flooding, but w- compared to what it could have been, we're fortunate.

   30. JRJoe Rogan1:41

       And then on top of that, you guys had a false alarm-
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   Do you think a…

   1. TGTulsi Gabbard15:00

      the family members and the loved ones, moms, dads, kids at home who were, you know, stressed out every day, fearing getting that phone call that their loved one had been hurt or worse, um, killed in action. And I wondered then, you know, how many of these politicians who, who make these votes and who make these decisions actually think about this or who lose sleep on this.

   2. JRJoe Rogan15:28

      Do you think a solution to that would be mandatory military service for people who are in those positions?

   3. TGTulsi Gabbard15:34

      I don't.

   4. JRJoe Rogan15:35

      You don't?

   5. TGTulsi Gabbard15:36

      No.

   6. JRJoe Rogan15:36

      What do you think the solution is?

   7. TGTulsi Gabbard15:37

      Because as a soldier, I don't, you know, I don't want somebody in my foxhole who doesn't wanna be there-

   8. JRJoe Rogan15:41

      Right.

   9. TGTulsi Gabbard15:41

      ... first of all. I think it's im- you know, having an all volunteer force, which we have, um, is a positive thing. I think that the American people need to impress upon their leaders, um, the importance of taking these decisions very seriously, that if they want to represent and make, represent the American people and make these decisions for our troops and for our country, they need to understand who pays that price for the cost of war. And yes, it is every single one of our service members, both those who pay the ultimate price as well as those who come home with both visible and invisible wounds, um, and who will continue paying that price for a very long time to come, but also every one of our communities filled with people who may not have worn the uniform, but who've had trillions of dollars taken out of their wallet to pay for these counterproductive interventionist wars as we, in Hawaii, for example, struggle to put air conditioners in schools where kids are trying to study in over 100 degree heat, as we deal with massive infrastructure problems, people in Michigan, they just shut down the water system in a bunch of schools in Detroit because they have lead poison in the water for the kids. So, the kids are not able to use the water fountains at school. So, we have major infrastructure, major ch- challenges and issues, and so making sure that leaders are held accountable for the decisions that they're making is ultimately what needs to happen.

   10. JRJoe Rogan17:13

       One of the things I like about you and one of the things I've liked about a lot of your interviews is you're of an obvious genuine person. Like, if you're not genuine, I'd be very shocked. Um, that's very rare. So, when you're talking about these politicians and having these people being held accountable, it's a real problem, but one of the problems with politics and one of the problems with public speaking and being charismatic is a lot of these people are just really good at being full of shit, and because they're really good at being full of shit, a lot of slack-jawed dumb-dumbs out there buy into it hook, line, and sinker-

   11. TGTulsi Gabbard17:45

       Mm-hmm.

   12. JRJoe Rogan17:45

       ... wave that flag and kiss those babies, and they vote these dummies into office. And this happens time and time again.

   13. TGTulsi Gabbard17:51

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan17:51

       So, saying you n- these people need to be aware of the consequences-

   15. TGTulsi Gabbard17:57

       Yeah.

   16. JRJoe Rogan17:57

       ... or they need to be he- held accountable, I firmly believe there's more sociopaths than we really think. I really do.

   17. TGTulsi Gabbard18:04

       Mm-hmm.

   18. JRJoe Rogan18:04

       I think if you look at the general consensus, it's something like, what is it, one out of 100 or something like that? What do they think it is? Maybe more?I think it might be 10%.

   19. TGTulsi Gabbard18:14

       Mm.

   20. JRJoe Rogan18:14

       I think there's a lot of people that get through l- life doing things and getting away with things and not doing things that are gonna cause them either danger or social consequences. But they, but they manage to get through life with a song and a dance.

   21. TGTulsi Gabbard18:30

       Yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan18:30

       But they're not genuine.

   23. TGTulsi Gabbard18:31

       Mm-hmm.

   24. JRJoe Rogan18:31

       And I think this is a giant problem with people that want to be in a position of power in the first place.

   25. TGTulsi Gabbard18:37

       Yes.

   26. JRJoe Rogan18:38

       Like, why would they ... Like, why does a guy like Donald Trump want to be the fucking president?

   27. TGTulsi Gabbard18:42

       Mm-hmm.

   28. JRJoe Rogan18:42

       When you have billions of dollars in the bank, like, what are you doing?

   29. TGTulsi Gabbard18:45

       Yeah.

   30. JRJoe Rogan18:45

       Why are you doing that?
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   Yeah. …

   1. JRJoe Rogan30:00

      guarded in that as well-

   2. TGTulsi Gabbard30:01

      Yeah.

   3. JRJoe Rogan30:02

      ... that I'm- I'm ... I- I almost wanted to go, "Hey, stop."

   4. TGTulsi Gabbard30:04

      Yeah.

   5. JRJoe Rogan30:04

      "This is not you, man."

   6. TGTulsi Gabbard30:06

      Yeah.

   7. JRJoe Rogan30:06

      "Where's the real you?"

   8. TGTulsi Gabbard30:07

      Yeah.

   9. JRJoe Rogan30:07

      "This is weird, the way you're sipping water and you're ... Th- th- the ... just the way you're talking to people is so odd."

   10. TGTulsi Gabbard30:13

       Yeah.

   11. JRJoe Rogan30:13

       It's-

   12. TGTulsi Gabbard30:13

       Some of my f-

   13. JRJoe Rogan30:14

       The formality of it all.

   14. TGTulsi Gabbard30:15

       Yeah. Some of my friends on that committee, who actually are, uh, under 40 years old, who are members of Congress and who prepared and- and-

   15. JRJoe Rogan30:22

       Mm-hmm.

   16. TGTulsi Gabbard30:22

       ... you know, went in and were asking some tough questions, um-... were very frustrated, just 'cause they didn't feel like they were getting ... They were actually getting, um, many answers, first of all.

   17. JRJoe Rogan30:34

       Mm-hmm.

   18. TGTulsi Gabbard30:34

       A lot of, a lot of kind of legally speaking circles-

   19. JRJoe Rogan30:37

       Yes.

   20. TGTulsi Gabbard30:37

       ... and that kind of thing, and, um ... I think when you're, when you're talking about ... And, and there's so many ... I don't know. I'm kind of going in a few different directions here with, with, uh, these social media giants, how they're being misused, um, to further certain agendas in different ways. But when you're talking about, like, these Russian troll farms that you're, um, that you mentioned, what is missing from all of the news coverage around this and all of the outrage about how this foreign country is trying to influence our elections, which is wrong and which the American people need to be aware of where this information is coming from, is the fact that we ... And you're saying, "Why, why does somebody do that?" Well, because this country does want to, um, influence who we're electing, right?

   21. JRJoe Rogan31:26

       Yes.

   22. TGTulsi Gabbard31:27

       They're like, "Oh, we'd rather work with this person. We know that person's not gonna be nice to us." The United States has been doing this for a very long time-

   23. JRJoe Rogan31:33

       Sure.

   24. TGTulsi Gabbard31:34

       ... in countries around the world, both overtly and covertly, through, through these kinds of disinformation campaigns, not, not even counting, like, the outright regime change wars, "We're gonna physically take you out." And, um, I think it is, um, very hypocritical for us to be discussing this issue as a country without actually being honest about how this goes both ways. So yes, we need to stop these other foreign countries, and, and Russia's not the only one, there are others, from, uh, trying to influence the American people in our elections. We also need to stop doing the same thing in other countries.

   25. JRJoe Rogan32:15

       Yeah, without doubt. Um, but there's also the, the question is what is Russia trying to achieve? Like, who ... Why do they want someone like Donald Trump in office versus someone like Hillary Clinton? Like, what is to be gained? And, and how much, uh, you know ... I mean, how much do they benefit from that?

   26. TGTulsi Gabbard32:34

       Yeah.

   27. JRJoe Rogan32:34

       This is what's really ... one of the big questions that's going on right now.

   28. TGTulsi Gabbard32:38

       Yeah.

   29. JRJoe Rogan32:38

       With all the Russia hearings and the Mueller investigation-

   30. TGTulsi Gabbard32:41

       Mm-hmm.
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   Yeah, and y- that's…

   1. TGTulsi Gabbard45:00

      house, educa- like the things that really do take up most of people's time and consciousness and care on a, on a daily basis.

   2. JRJoe Rogan45:09

      Yeah, and y- that's one of the more dangerous things, I think, about having a person like Trump as president, is that it's eroding people's confidence in the person that runs the big show.

   3. TGTulsi Gabbard45:21

      Mm-hmm.

   4. JRJoe Rogan45:22

      Is that y- you're- you're-

   5. TGTulsi Gabbard45:24

      That's one of, that's one of a number of things that have eroded people's confidence. I think if you, if you take that one step further and look at how people's confidence in our entire election system has been eroded, uh, when you look at all of the vulnerabilities that exist, a lot of the stuff that's being talked about now-

   6. JRJoe Rogan45:43

      Do you mean in terms of electronic voting, like the machines?

   7. TGTulsi Gabbard45:45

      Yes.

   8. JRJoe Rogan45:46

      Or ... Yeah.

   9. TGTulsi Gabbard45:46

      Yes. I think, overall, people doubt whether or not their votes matter, first of all.

   10. JRJoe Rogan45:50

       Did you see the documentary, Hacking Democracy?

   11. TGTulsi Gabbard45:53

       No, I didn't.

   12. JRJoe Rogan45:54

       It's fascinating, and it was in regards to ... What, what year was that? I wanna say it's 2008. Was it eight? Six. Six. So, it was about Bush and Kerry, right? Wasn't that-

   13. TGTulsi Gabbard46:10

       Was it Bush and Gore?

   14. JRJoe Rogan46:13

       Was it Bush and Gore? Whatever it was. Yeah, yeah, both. Both, both elections, actually.

   15. TGTulsi Gabbard46:17

       Oh, yeah.

   16. JRJoe Rogan46:18

       Okay. But it showed how there is built-in third-party access. So, it's literally built-

   17. TGTulsi Gabbard46:25

       Yeah.

   18. JRJoe Rogan46:26

       ... into-

   19. TGTulsi Gabbard46:26

       Right.

   20. JRJoe Rogan46:26

       ... the system-

   21. TGTulsi Gabbard46:27

       Right.

   22. JRJoe Rogan46:27

       ... that a third party can influence the count.

   23. TGTulsi Gabbard46:30

       Yeah.

   24. JRJoe Rogan46:30

       And they showed how they did it on the, um, in the actual documentary. They used these machines and influenced the results.

   25. TGTulsi Gabbard46:39

       Yeah.

   26. JRJoe Rogan46:40

       Yeah, I mean, it's-

   27. TGTulsi Gabbard46:40

       Yeah, what, what to speak of the, uh, the, the DEF CON hacking conference that just happened, or happens annually in Vegas, but they just had one this year a couple of months ago, maybe a few weeks ago, where an eleven, 11-year-old girl hacked into a replica of Florida's, uh, election system and changed the outcome of their election in less than 15 minutes.

   28. JRJoe Rogan47:03

       There it is. An 11-year-old hacked into US voting system-

   29. TGTulsi Gabbard47:05

       There you go.

   30. JRJoe Rogan47:06

       ... replica in 10 minutes this weekend. (laughs) Wow. Lizards.
5. 1:00:00 – 1:15:00

   Yeah. …

   1. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:00

      Yeah.

   2. JRJoe Rogan1:00:00

      You must be super smart.

   3. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:01

      Yeah.

   4. JRJoe Rogan1:00:01

      What kind of test do you have to take-

   5. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:02

      Yeah. (laughs)

   6. JRJoe Rogan1:00:02

      ... to take a superdelegate? To become a superdelegate, what do you have to do?

   7. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:07

      Yeah. It, it's certainly not a written test.

   8. JRJoe Rogan1:00:08

      You should-

   9. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:09

      No, it's, it's really, I mean, again, you're either, you're either an elected member of Congress or you're somebody who the party chooses.

   10. JRJoe Rogan1:00:16

       Wow. The idea that the reason to keep that is because you know better.

   11. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:19

       Mm-hmm.

   12. JRJoe Rogan1:00:20

       I mean, that's essentially what they're saying.

   13. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:21

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan1:00:21

       You know better than all the people that voted.

   15. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:22

       Yeah. It's so disrespectful to-

   16. JRJoe Rogan1:00:24

       It's crazy.

   17. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:25

       ... to people.

   18. JRJoe Rogan1:00:25

       It's really crazy.

   19. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:26

       Yeah.

   20. JRJoe Rogan1:00:28

       Mm.

   21. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:29

       So, I mean, that, that's been, I think, a positive thing that has come through all of this, is, is more people are sa- Like, uh, you know, I, I honestly wasn't paying a bunch of attention to superdelegates before all of this, and, and a lot of people had their eyes opened up to say, "Okay, this is clearly wrong."

   22. JRJoe Rogan1:00:43

       Yeah.

   23. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:43

       "Why was it there in the first place? Let's do something to fix..."... the process.

   24. JRJoe Rogan1:00:48

       Well, most people, I don't think, until this election, the general public wasn't even aware that that was, that that was the case.

   25. TGTulsi Gabbard1:00:54

       Yeah.

   26. JRJoe Rogan1:00:55

       And then when, uh, you know, people find out about it, they go, "Wait, wait, wait. Wha- what?"

   27. TGTulsi Gabbard1:01:00

       Yeah. Exactly.

   28. JRJoe Rogan1:01:01

       "They can just decide to not vote the same way the people voted?"

   29. TGTulsi Gabbard1:01:04

       Yeah.

   30. JRJoe Rogan1:01:04

       "And then they could, the state can lose?"
6. 1:15:00 – 1:18:09

   Yeah. …

   1. JRJoe Rogan1:15:00

      they've talked someone into passing these laws that make these kids stuck-

   2. TGTulsi Gabbard1:15:07

      Yeah.

   3. JRJoe Rogan1:15:07

      ... with this bill, no matter what happens in their life.

   4. TGTulsi Gabbard1:15:10

      Yeah.

   5. JRJoe Rogan1:15:11

      You know, get in a car accident, n- no longer can take care of yourself, tough shit.

   6. TGTulsi Gabbard1:15:14

      Mm-hmm.

   7. JRJoe Rogan1:15:14

      Pay that bill.

   8. TGTulsi Gabbard1:15:15

      Mm-hmm.

   9. JRJoe Rogan1:15:15

      I mean, it's really mafia-like.

   10. TGTulsi Gabbard1:15:17

       Yeah, back into the financial industry.

   11. JRJoe Rogan1:15:20

       Yeah.

   12. TGTulsi Gabbard1:15:20

       It's so, it's, it's really, um, w- when you pull the veil back on kind of the crony capitalism that exists in this country, then you start to see and connect how it really impacts people's lives in so many different ways, and how it affects the policies in our country.

   13. JRJoe Rogan1:15:37

       What was Bernie's solution for that? When he wanted to institute some sort of a free education system for higher education, what, what did he, how did he envision that?

   14. TGTulsi Gabbard1:15:48

       I, and I don't know his bill chapter and verse, but I believe it was, uh, focused on public colleges, not private institutions, and that it was by levying some sort of tax on Wall Street to pay for it.

   15. JRJoe Rogan1:16:02

       Yeah, that was the big criticism, that everything was gonna be tax, tax, tax, tax, tax.

   16. TGTulsi Gabbard1:16:06

       Yeah.

   17. JRJoe Rogan1:16:06

       But an inefficient system is gonna chew up a lot of your tax dollars, so people were, were thinking their hard-earned dollars were gonna go to some bureaucracy and a bunch of red tape and horseshit, and too many people that are working doing too many different things just to try to keep jobs going.

   18. TGTulsi Gabbard1:16:20

       Yeah.

   19. JRJoe Rogan1:16:21

       That's the fear,-

   20. TGTulsi Gabbard1:16:22

       Yeah.

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:16:22

       ... right?

   22. TGTulsi Gabbard1:16:22

       Yeah.

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:16:22

       That's the big-

   24. TGTulsi Gabbard1:16:24

       Yeah.

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:16:24

       ... Republican fear-

   26. TGTulsi Gabbard1:16:25

       Yeah. The, the,-

   27. JRJoe Rogan1:16:26

       ... in particular.

   28. TGTulsi Gabbard1:16:27

       I mean, you know, uh, I think the, the focus on, um, on Wall Street, I think, is, is a very specific one, however, as you're looking at possible funding and tax sources. Um, but again, I mean, I just point to sound bites can, can be, catch fire easily. But, um, getting to the root cause of how we solve some of these problems is really what we need to do. Uh, how are we delivering education to people? Why is it that these colleges, why is it the cost of education has gone so far up and really in an, in an uncontrolled manner? Um, we look at healthcare. Why is it that, uh, you know, these prescription drug companies can raise their prices hundreds if not thousands of percent on life-saving medication for people? Um, why is it that doctors are not required to go through any kind of nutrition training as they get their, um, certification, they go through their, their medical school? When you look at how closely connected diet is and what people put into their bodies to the kinds of major sicknesses that are rampant in our communities, like diabetes, for example, um, you're not seeing that connection where you have doctors who are trained even a little bit in nutrition, and how connecting that kind of preventive medicine and using food, um, food as medicine, uh, is not, does not even play a, a partial role in a lot of the medicine, the Western medicine, that's delivered today.

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:17:59

       It is strange, but is this, is this the business of the federal government to get involved in how doctors are educated? I mean, how do you fix that-

Episode duration: 1:43:41