Joe Rogan Experience #1706 - Billy Corben

Billy Corben 0:00 (drum roll) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience. (music plays)

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. Hello, Billy.

Billy Corben 0:13 Hello, Joe.

Joe Rogan 0:14 Always good to see you, my friend.

Billy Corben 0:15 I'm just here so you can give COVID back to Florida.

Joe Rogan 0:18 (laughs) I wonder if it works like that.

Billy Corben 0:21 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:21 Florida gave it to me. I've got something for it. I'll f- I'll have to figure out how to pay Florida back.

Billy Corben 0:25 Don't say Florida never gave you anything.

Joe Rogan 0:27 Listen, man. I had a good time down there.

Billy Corben 0:29 Okay.

Joe Rogan 0:30 It was a rough few days.

Billy Corben 0:31 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:31 But I had a good time. (laughs)

Billy Corben 0:34 (laughs) I feel like everybody has the same Florida story and it's just that.

Joe Rogan 0:37 Well, Florida is just Florida, you know? I mean, one of the things that Florida's gotten a lot of, uh, positive, uh, reviews since the pandemic, you know, Florida's... Florida came up during the pandemic, right? I mean, a lot of people were negative on it. They thought that the restrictions were terrible. And, you know, he needs to do more and DeSantis is killing people. But a lot of people are like, "You know what? At least I can go to restaurants." Florida lets you go out. Florida doesn't want to have you have mandates and... the tax situation. Florida came up. You gotta admit-

Billy Corben 1:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09 ... Florida, Florida became a more attractive place during the pandemic.

Billy Corben 1:13 August was the deadliest month in Florida in the history of the, the pandemic.

Joe Rogan 1:18 Of the pandemic.

Billy Corben 1:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:19 This past August?

Billy Corben 1:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:20 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:20 One in five-

Joe Rogan 1:21 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:21 ... COVID deaths in the United States occurred in Florida. Now, it's almost as many as one in four COVID deaths in the United States are occurring in Florida. We've had 13 Miami-Dade County Public Schools employees die of COVID. That includes teachers, bus drivers, people die of COVID since mid-August.

Joe Rogan 1:38 Jesus.

Billy Corben 1:39 Last month, we had, I think, no less than 20 police officers in the state of Florida die. We had a 10-day period in which n- we had a police officer a day dying of COVID. If you go to the Officer Down Memorial Page, uh, they, the executive director there, a sergeant from Fairfax, Virginia, says that, "We, uh, by the end of the pandemic, the, uh, it will overtake the terror attacks of September 11th, 2001, as the single deadliest incident in the history of United States law enforcement." I mean, if I told you that there's a killer out there in Florida killing a cop a day, there'd be fucking martial law. There'd be tanks in the streets. There'd be guys in tactical gear and, and, and assault rifles, rightfully so. And there is. And it's- it's, it's COVID-19. And these people are interacting with the public, of course, to boot. And it's a, it's a tragedy.

Joe Rogan 2:31 So-

Billy Corben 2:31 It's a human tragedy.

Joe Rogan 2:32 ... what is the difference between the way Florida is treating it and the way other states are treating it? So, Florida-

Billy Corben 2:37 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 2:38 ... is having these in, like, so many cops, in particular-

Billy Corben 2:41 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:41 ... dying in Florida. Is that the case everywhere? Is that the case with all first responders that they're all at risk? Or is it just, is Florida uniquely dangerous?

Billy Corben 2:51 (laughs) The short answer is yes. Uh...

Joe Rogan 2:53 (laughs)

Billy Corben 2:53 (laughs) And by the way, what the fuck is happening in Florida is an evergreen question.

Joe Rogan 2:58 Right.

Billy Corben 2:58 But, um-

Joe Rogan 2:58 That is the question.

Billy Corben 2:59 Yeah. But the answer, uh, you know, the... COVID-19, for the last two years, is the single largest cause of death for law enforcement officers, more so than all other causes combined.

Joe Rogan 3:13 That's crazy when you think about-

Billy Corben 3:15 Combined.

Joe Rogan 3:15 ... the amount of violence-

Billy Corben 3:16 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:16 ... and the amount of crime that takes place.

Billy Corben 3:18 Yeah. COVID-19, number one cop killer for two years, uh, running and, and, and counting.

Joe Rogan 3:24 And this is true-

Billy Corben 3:24 So that's true everywhere.

Joe Rogan 3:25 ... just, just in everywhere-

Billy Corben 3:26 No, no, that's-

Joe Rogan 3:26 ... or just in Florida?

Billy Corben 3:27 That's true nationally. But Florida is uniquely because we're open for business-

Joe Rogan 3:32 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 3:32 ... that kind of pro-business, pro-freedom, uh, attitude. You know, listen, Florida has no indigenous industry, okay? We don't, we don't n- produce anything but oranges and machine guns. That's what Florida makes. We sell the sunshine.

Joe Rogan 3:48 Do you guys make machine guns?

Billy Corben 3:49 Yeah. We have g- we have gun manufacturers in Florida, yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:51 Oh, it's like a...

Billy Corben 3:52 We sell the sunshine. Okay? And that just means we have to... What we sell, w- we're all just tourism people, right? We, we, we, we knock down the old shit. We build new shit. We build it taller. We build it bigger, so we can attract a thousand newcomers tomorrow. It's a Ponzi scheme. The economy is a Ponzi scheme. It relies... It's not self-sufficient. It relies solely on new outside money and investors coming in the next day. So we subsist from hustle to hustle. So our pandemic hustle was, "Come here. Everybody else is on lockdown. Come to Florida."

Joe Rogan 4:25 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 4:25 And a lot of people did and a lot of people died as a consequence of that. So, some businesses did, did better and people died. I mean, that's the reality.

Joe Rogan 4:34 I was looking at something today that was showing the deaths in Florida per capita versus the deaths in California per capital, per capita when it was age adjusted. And Florida had less deaths when it was age adjusted, when, when they, when they looked at it in comparative to, like, how old people die normally anyway. And Florida has a much older population.

Billy Corben 4:56 We do.

Joe Rogan 4:56 It was showing that, per capita, more people are dying in a very locked down state like California.

Billy Corben 5:04 Well, I think that... I don't know that that's entirely... Age adjusted it may be, but-

Joe Rogan 5:07 Yeah, it's age adjusted.

Billy Corben 5:08 But I, I... There's a 27-year-old police officer, a mother of a two-year-old, five-month-old, I mean-

Joe Rogan 5:14 She died from COVID.

Billy Corben 5:15 ... who are, died from COVID. So, like, and these are-

Joe Rogan 5:17 Are they getting bad treatment?

Billy Corben 5:19 I think there are... (sighs) I think it's several things. Listen. Treatment is no substitute for the vaccine. It's just not. Okay? People... Uh, the, uh, the vaccine is helping people. It is helping people to... It's less likely they'll get infected. It's more likely they will survive. Th- that just bears out. I think it's the vaccine hesitation is what I think it is. I think that that's the major cause. And it's particularly problematic when you have public-facing people, like law enforcement officers, who are interacting-

Joe Rogan 5:50 Yeah.

Billy Corben 5:50 ... they could come to your window to write a, a par- uh, write a traffic ticket. And that could be a death sentence.

Joe Rogan 5:55 But that is, it's very unusual for a 27-year-old person with good healthcare, someone who's been taken care of, to die from COVID.

Billy Corben 6:03 Yes.

Joe Rogan 6:03 It's very, very statistically-

Billy Corben 6:05 Yes.

Joe Rogan 6:06 ... unusual.

Billy Corben 6:07 And that is anecdotal. That's one example. So I'm not saying that-

Joe Rogan 6:09 Yes.

Billy Corben 6:09 ... that is, is the rule in Florida.

Joe Rogan 6:11 Whi- did she have preexisting medical conditions and comorbidities?

Billy Corben 6:15 I have no idea, but let's be, let's be honest, Americans by and large are not in as good a shape as you're, (laughs) as you're in. Like, that's just, you know, we, we all, we're all, we're walking, talking comorbidities. That's, that's just, you know-

Joe Rogan 6:26 Yeah.

Billy Corben 6:26 ... the reality. But, you know, the, the, the truth is is that there is a safe and effective, and in fact, free way to ... 'Cause that's the thing too, is, is the treatment is not a, a pre-infection prophylaxis, you know? It's something you, it's something you do later, you know? It's not something you do to avoid getting the, uh, getting the virus. And here's the thing, once you have the virus, for some people that's a death sentence. It doesn't matter how you treat it. Um-

Joe Rogan 6:55 Wait, but wait a minute. Stop.

Billy Corben 6:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:56 I don't know if that's true. I don't know if that's true, because we don't know what they're doing. When you say it doesn't matter how you treat 'em, if you treat 'em with monoclonal antibodies-

Billy Corben 7:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:04 ... in particular early on in their infection-

Billy Corben 7:06 Which are available in Florida.

Joe Rogan 7:07 Yeah, they're available everywhere.

Billy Corben 7:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:09 It's shown to have an incredible rate of ... There was like, there was a recent study that Fauci actually talked about it. That 85%, uh, i- it keeps people from being hospitalized.

Billy Corben 7:18 Absolutely. And every- And I don't begrudge anyone a cocktail or a kitchen sink approach once you get infected. You should try everything that you and your doctor-

Joe Rogan 7:27 Right, but-

Billy Corben 7:28 ... want to do, you should do.

Joe Rogan 7:28 ... but you were saying for some people if they get infected-

Billy Corben 7:30 Yes.

Joe Rogan 7:30 ... there's nothing they can do. And I'm saying, I don't know if that's the case.

Billy Corben 7:33 I-

Joe Rogan 7:34 I don't know if they're doing that. I think some people don't know what to do, and they're basically sent home and told to take Tylenol. If they have poor healthcare, they're getting bad advice, and they're getting bad healthcare once they're infected.

Billy Corben 7:46 I think there's a lot of people who don't have access to quality healthcare. There's a lot of people who don't have access to healthcare, period, and there's a lot of people-

Joe Rogan 7:52 If you're a cop-

Billy Corben 7:52 Yes.

Joe Rogan 7:52 ... I mean, that i- that should be paramount.

Billy Corben 7:55 Yes.

Joe Rogan 7:55 I mean, if you are interacting with the general public the way police officers are-

Billy Corben 8:00 Yes.

Joe Rogan 8:00 ... during a pandemic, they should have access to the best healthcare possible, especially if they're infected. I mean, if you're gonna ask these people to protect you, you should absolutely protect them.

Billy Corben 8:12 Absolutely.

Joe Rogan 8:13 Yeah.

Billy Corben 8:13 I mean, I, I-

Joe Rogan 8:14 So this-

Billy Corben 8:15 ... that's why I said it's a human tragedy-

Joe Rogan 8:16 Yeah.

Billy Corben 8:16 ... wa- you know, what's happening. Uh, but I th- I think that it starts with ... Listen, I'm a, I'm a documentarian, so I'm a natural born skeptic. But I'm also pro-fact, 'cause what we do as cul- cultural anthropologists, which is effectively what documentarians are, is we apply the scientific method, right? We make observations. We ask questions. We develop hypotheses. We collect data. You know, we experiment. We analyze that data, and we draw conclusions with the best information we have at the time. I don't know how all of these police officers were, were treated. I know they died, and I know that many of them were not, were not ... In fact, statistically most of them were not vaccinated. I don't have access to their, you know, to their private health information. I just know that the, the treatment is not a replacement for, uh, your ability to prophylactically prevent either being infected or being severely infected.

Joe Rogan 9:44 Okay, listen, CNN knows that.

Billy Corben 12:07 Yes.

Joe Rogan 12:07 They know that the man who created it won the Nobel Prize for its use in humans in 2015. They know that it's used for yellow fever and dengue fever and has antiviral properties. They know that. They know that it's used for river blindness. They know that it's been used for over 40 years.

Billy Corben 12:20 Yes.

Joe Rogan 12:20 They know that. So when they say horse paste and horse dewormer, they're not saying it-... because they want people to not take horse dewormer. They're saying it to ridicule this particular medication.

Billy Corben 12:31 I think they have an obligation to inform people that aren't informed that, or be, that are literally going down to feed stores, which, by the way is anecdotal.

Joe Rogan 12:37 But that's not what they're doing.

Billy Corben 12:38 Yeah. I-

Joe Rogan 12:38 That's not what they're doing.

Billy Corben 12:40 I, I don't-

Joe Rogan 12:40 They're talking about people who are taking the human drug, and they're pretending they're taking horse dewormer.

Billy Corben 12:45 Here's the thing. It is not approved. And even the, even the big pharma company, Merck, made $46 billion last year, who manufactures and, you know, uh, uh, ivermectin, even they say this is not a proven treatment for-

Joe Rogan 13:00 Right.

Billy Corben 13:00 ... either to avoid the virus or to, to treat the virus. Whereas, uh, uh, a mono- monoclonal antibodies, Regeneron-

Joe Rogan 13:08 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 13:08 ... has emergency use authorization. But the reality is, first and foremost-

Joe Rogan 13:12 You and I are not doctors. So if we're gonna get real specific about this-

Billy Corben 13:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:15 ... and we start pulling up links, this is gonna be a long conversation about-

Billy Corben 13:18 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 13:18 ... COVID and ivermectin-

Billy Corben 13:19 Yes.

Joe Rogan 13:19 ... and, and, uh-

Billy Corben 13:20 I'm uniquely unqualified-

Joe Rogan 13:21 Yeah.

Billy Corben 13:21 ... to opine on, on this. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 13:23 I, I know a little bit about it because of my experiences with it-

Billy Corben 13:26 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 13:26 ... di- discussing with doctors. But it's not as cut and dry as anybody wants to pretend it is. And one of the reasons why Merck is d- talking about it is they're developing their own antiviral medication, and it's a generic now, which means anybody can make it. So ivermectin can be literally be made by any pharmaceutical company. There's a lot of complicated shit behind the scenes. And as a skeptic, maybe you should look at it from that perspective as well because the... What was it? The J- Japanese, the Tokyo... W- What was that c- Tokyo. The Tokyo Medical-

Billy Corben 13:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:56 ... Organization that is traditionally very conservative just adopted ivermectin use last week and just talked about the efficacy of it. There's studies of it that have come out of India. There's studies of it that, that have come out of other places. There's the, the frontline critical COVID care workers who have been administering it before there was a vaccine and had very positive effects using it.

Billy Corben 14:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:17 It's very complicated. And I don't think we should just diminis- dismiss their work, particularly when we don't know that much about it.

Billy Corben 14:24 I'm... Last thing I am is, is, is dismissive. I think it, it's, though it's important to deal in facts, it's important to say that, that there's a lot that we don't know. I think that is (laughs) we've learned that a lot over the last two years.

Joe Rogan 14:33 There's a lot that we don't know-

Billy Corben 14:34 (laughs) Over the last two years.

Joe Rogan 14:34 ... and there's a lot of bullshit going around.

Billy Corben 14:35 Yeah. And, but I think that it's, uh... We do know that there is a safe, effective, free FDA approved vaccine. We do know that. We know, uh, that in the event that you get the virus, which m- m- may be a breakthrough case, it might happen even if you have the vaccine, that there are monoclonal antibodies. There are good treatments that are also FDA emergency use, uh, authorized that, that you can, you can get. I think that, you know, we know that two of the biggest studies on ivermectin have been withdrawn for all sorts of, you know, reasons and potential-

Joe Rogan 15:08 I don't know if that's true.

Billy Corben 15:09 ... potential fuckery that-

Joe Rogan 15:09 There's a lot of studies on ivermectin. If you go to the Critical Care COVID Workers' w- website, they detail or there's a long list of studies that they've shown ivermectin to be effective in preventing death and preventing hospitalization.

Billy Corben 15:24 And-

Joe Rogan 15:24 See, I... This is the thing where, like, you and I are arguing about some shit we don't really have expertise in.

Billy Corben 15:28 I think that that's absolutely true.

Joe Rogan 15:30 Yeah.

Billy Corben 15:30 It's why, it's why Netflix publicist didn't want me to talk about it.

Joe Rogan 15:32 Ah, too late.

Billy Corben 15:33 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 15:33 But you went right into it, motherfucker. Look at you.

Billy Corben 15:35 Did I go right into it? No, you asked about Florida.

Joe Rogan 15:36 You went right into it.

Billy Corben 15:37 I didn't go right into it. I went into a whole, um...

Joe Rogan 15:38 Oh, yeah, I asked you about Florida, and you went right into COVID deaths.

Billy Corben 15:42 Di- is that what happened?

Joe Rogan 15:42 Yeah, you went into police officers and more people dying of COVID and...

Billy Corben 15:46 Well, you asked me about the, the state's response to this pandemic.

Joe Rogan 15:48 I was just gonna talk to you about the preposterous nature of your state that you love so much.

Billy Corben 15:52 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 15:53 You're a defender of s- Florida in its most ridiculousness. And one of the things that I wanted to talk to you, 'cause I haven't talked to you since the pandemic started. Last time I talked to you was Screwball, right? Like, how long ago was that?

Billy Corben 16:04 Oh, yeah. What? 2019?

Joe Rogan 16:06 Yeah, it was 2019.

Billy Corben 16:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:07 Right before the shit hit the fan. That was the last time we talked.

Billy Corben 16:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:10 We were talking about that documentary. And then when all this happened and so much of the wackiness and the, you know, the, the controversies coming out of Florida, like, you embrace the chaos of Florida.

Billy Corben 16:21 Yeah, Florida fuckery is our genre. And it's our, also our-

Joe Rogan 16:24 Yeah.

Billy Corben 16:24 ... our top export-

Joe Rogan 16:25 Right.

Billy Corben 16:25 ... I think, is, is well. It's really what we provide the rest of the-

Joe Rogan 16:28 But for you-

Billy Corben 16:29 And COVID.

Joe Rogan 16:29 And, and COVID, yeah.

Billy Corben 16:30 You, I mean, look about how much your work is about Florida, the Cocaine Cowboy series, you know, all the stuff on A-Rod, like all the- Yeah.

Joe Rogan 16:38 There's, there's so much of your, your work...

Billy Corben 16:42 The petrifying th- I'm a Florida native-

Joe Rogan 16:44 Yeah.

Billy Corben 16:44 ... you know, and a lifelong Miamian. And, and I think the petrifying thing that I've learned through the years, and it's not my theory, uh, T.D. Allman called Miami the city of the future. And effectively, the Florida of today is the America of tomorrow. And e- more importantly, the Miami of today, more specifically, the Miami of today is the America of tomorrow. So if you want to know what, uh, challenges we'll face or calamities will befall us as a nation in the years or even decades to come, you need only look at the canary in the coal mine, which is, which is South Florida.

Joe Rogan 17:15 Do you think that's because of it's very vulnerable to climate change, first of all, right?

Billy Corben 17:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:19 Like, there's, there's estimates about how long Miami can last.

Billy Corben 17:23 Yeah. They're not good.

Joe Rogan 17:24 Like... Yeah, they don't think-

Billy Corben 17:25 Grim.

Joe Rogan 17:25 They think you got about two decades, right?

Billy Corben 17:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 17:28 Isn't that the, the current thought?

Billy Corben 17:30 I'm a renter.

Joe Rogan 17:31 (laughs)

Billy Corben 17:31 Let me put it to you that way. I've lived there my whole life. I don't own any property-

Joe Rogan 17:36 Really?

Billy Corben 17:36 ... in Miami.

Joe Rogan 17:36 It's probably a good move.

Billy Corben 17:37 I'm not bullish on it.

Joe Rogan 17:38 It does... It seems-

Billy Corben 17:39 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 17:39 ... like it's gonna go underwater, right?

Billy Corben 17:42 Yeah, it'll definitely be underwater. It's just a question of when-

Joe Rogan 17:44 'Cause it's all-

Billy Corben 17:45 ... just a question of when.

Joe Rogan 17:46 ... like, ver- like, the, the ground itself is very porous. Is that correct?

Billy Corben 17:50 Yeah, I mean, you know, we have, uh, uh, reclaimed wetlands.

Joe Rogan 17:54 Mm.

Billy Corben 17:54 That's Miami Beach. That's where Champlain Towers is. Reclaimed wetlands. What does that mean? It was fucking mangroves.

Joe Rogan 17:59 Swamps.

Billy Corben 18:00 Yeah, swamp.

Joe Rogan 18:00 Yeah.

Billy Corben 18:00 And that we reclaimed, which means we filled it in, and there's still porous limestone underneath that. Champlain Towers only had water coming at it from the front, the back, above, and below. But other than that, it was totally dry. I mean-

Joe Rogan 18:11 This is the tower that collapsed.

Billy Corben 18:12 Collapsed. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:13 Yeah, so-

Billy Corben 18:13 I mean, just battered. We're getting battered there.

Joe Rogan 18:14 They were on that porous limestone?

Billy Corben 18:16 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:16 That was... Oh, yeah.

Billy Corben 18:17 Yeah, built on reclaimed wetlands.

Joe Rogan 18:19 God.

Billy Corben 18:19 And so I'll tell you right now as we speak, this is the, um, the king tides. You know what the king tides are?

Joe Rogan 18:25 No.

Billy Corben 18:25 They happen every September, October, and November, not the entire time, but there's like a week here, a weekend there for those three months. It is what we call sunny day flooding.So it has to do with the tides. It has to do with the, the s- the distance between the sun and the moon and the earth. And it floods in the sunlight. It, we can get as much as 12 inches, 12 inches above the highest high tide of the year. Uh-

Joe Rogan 18:53 So it just, it's not from rain?

Billy Corben 18:55 It's not... Now here's the problem. We're still in hurricane season, which means rain exacerbates it. Inclement weather can... We're totally fucked when it rains on top of the king tides. But this is just like a day, like you just wa- uh, if you were in a low-lying area or waterfront or oceanfront, bay front, that's just what, sunny day. Per- it's perfectly, it could be perfectly beautiful and you could have as much as 12 inches, uh, above the highest high tide.

Joe Rogan 19:18 So it's just an unusual level of the ocean.

Billy Corben 19:21 Yeah, it's just a quirk of, of the tides. It happens every year f- uh, o- uh, off and on for three months. Yeah. That's in, in the day, s- we call it sunny day flooding.

Joe Rogan 19:30 Jesus.

Billy Corben 19:30 That's a thing that we have there. I mean, you know Miami we make it rain.

Joe Rogan 19:33 Yeah. (laughs)

Billy Corben 19:33 But we now, we have sunny, sunny day flooding is a thing. Uh-

Joe Rogan 19:37 And there's nothing they can do, like New Orleans, like put up some sort of a, some sort of a wall-

Billy Corben 19:44 A dam or...

Joe Rogan 19:44 ... a dam.

Billy Corben 19:44 So the, the Army Corps of Engineers proposed a kind of futuristic post-apocalyptic, you know, after the flood, well pre-flood kind of a wall. And Miami said, "No gracias. No thank you. We don't want that. We'll, we'll, we'll, we'll fend for ourselves." And-

Joe Rogan 20:00 Did they say no because it was too expensive?

Billy Corben 20:02 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 20:02 Or did they say no because-

Billy Corben 20:03 No, the Army Corps of Engineers I think was gonna, everything was gonna be federally funded. They just didn't want this unsightly, unseemly kind of a wall in our beautiful town.

Joe Rogan 20:12 (laughs)

Billy Corben 20:12 And, but what they did want-

Joe Rogan 20:13 (sighs)

Billy Corben 20:13 ... is they wanted a signature bridge. We're building like this $800 million bridge that we don't need that's, but it's, it's super, it's super pretty as we say in Miami.

Joe Rogan 20:21 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 20:21 It's super pretty.

Joe Rogan 20:22 And somebody probably got a good deal.

Billy Corben 20:24 Oh, yeah. Oh, you-

Joe Rogan 20:25 To put it together.

Billy Corben 20:25 ... you better believe the contractors, th-

Joe Rogan 20:26 Yeah.

Billy Corben 20:26 That's the thing. That's why the Miami of today is the America of tomorrow. It's really the corruption, dysfunction, and nonstop construction. That's really what it is. It's this anything goes, Wild West kind of mentality because, you know, I, I said this before on the show, you know, LA is where you go when you wanna be somebody, New York is where you go when you are somebody, and Miami is where you go when you wanna be somebody else.

Joe Rogan 20:47 Yeah.

Billy Corben 20:47 It's always been a sunny place for shady people. F- the Florida man phenomenon, it's just like, you know, w- we, it just, w- if you have... It's not New England. It's not, "What's your name? Who's your daddy?" Everyone's nouveau riche in Miami. So no one cares where your money came from as long as the booze is flowing and everybody's dancing, the music's going, nobody gives a shit.

Joe Rogan 21:10 And it's always been that place. It's always been that party place. You were, you were-

Billy Corben 21:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 21:13 ... telling me before about how during, uh, w- was it, was it the '70s or the '80s these recording artists would go-

Billy Corben 21:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 21:19 ... down to Miami?

Billy Corben 21:20 Mi, yeah, like listen, uh, M- Miami is just, it's America's Casablanca. You know? And so some of the biggest records of all time, um, I mean, back when that was a business, like you could sell tens of millions of albums, uh, everybody went to Miami. Eric Clapton was one of the first, Jimmy Buffet, The Bee Gees, The Eagles, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, um, The Allman Brothers, Fleetwood Mac. And they were doing all those records that we all still know today from the '70s. They recorded, uh, mixed or mastered at least in part. Um, uh, uh, uh, Glenn Frey and Don Henley wrote the lyrics to Hotel California in a rented mansion on Miami Beach-

Joe Rogan 22:00 (laughs)

Billy Corben 22:00 ... uh, where it, it had, that had been the love nest, um, of Howard Hughes and Ava Gardner. Uh, uh, Winston Churchill used it as a, a winter home. Uh, and, um, the Watergate burglars and Howard Hunt used it as well. And then, um, Stephen Stills used it. He was hanging out there with like Shel Silverstein. They were, it was like a weird scene. (laughs) And then, uh, eventually The Eagles came down to do Hotel California and wrote the lyrics. They locked themselves, these two guys, in a fucking room. And they w- they just, uh, the housekeeper left sandwiches and, and drinks-

Joe Rogan 22:33 Wow.

Billy Corben 22:33 ... at the door 'cause the door was closed. And they came down in bathrobes one day with, with legal pads, yellow legal pads and said, "We have it."

Joe Rogan 22:42 Wow.

Billy Corben 22:42 "We have, we have, we have the lyrics." And so everybody, everybo- and it was a, a communal scene too. It's kinda like your place with the, you know, (laughs) everybody just sort of like stops by.

Joe Rogan 22:50 Oh, people come in and get tested? (laughs)

Billy Corben 22:52 Yeah. (laughs) Yeah. People stop by to ge- It wa- It was like that because you had all these artists in every room. Like, so there was pickup basketball games outside. You'd drive up and there'd be The Bee Gees playing The Allman Brothers playing Eric Clapton in a pickup basketball game. And they, they, to this day, Criteria Studios, they have an, a wooden upright piano. And the, rumor has it one day there was an artist, I won't mention the name, was playing and had a baggie of cocaine on the top of the piano. And he was playing. And the baggie fell open, fell, boom, puff of smoke on the keys of the piano, uh, appropriately. And he grabbed the bag and salvaged what he could. And then for the next several months, the people at the studio who worked at the, would stick a straw between the keys (laughs) on the, on the piano and try to s- mostly dust they were probably snorting.

Joe Rogan 23:37 (coughs)

Billy Corben 23:37 But like would just try to salvage whatever they could from there. So the, the, the, the joke was that, um, they had, uh, a line item on the, uh, the bills that, 'cause that's the thing. They were away from the watchful eyes and ears of the labels, which were all based in New York and LA. So they would go to Miami and no one knew what the fuck was going. I didn't have publicists or producers from, or executives rather, from, from the recording studios. So they would send them bills to pay for the studio time. There'd be a line item for cocaine, but you couldn't say "cocaine". Um, and I think, by the way, cocaine was, at that time, was probably part of the appeal of bringing the artists to Miami, to be fair. Uh-

Joe Rogan 24:13 Probably, right?

Billy Corben 24:14 But it was under the, the category of piano tuning-

Joe Rogan 24:18 (laughs)

Billy Corben 24:19 ... was, was the cocaine. So you get, uh, like some, you know, someone at, you know, accounts in, at a record label would call up and say, "Hey, I have a question about this, this invoice. Um, it's, it's, there's $5,000 here for piano tuning, but there's only one ballad on the album."

Joe Rogan 24:32 (laughs)

Billy Corben 24:32 "So what's with all this fucking piano tuning you had here?" There's, there was an act, oh, God, I C- I'm not gonna say it. But there was a band who came down in the '80s to record at Criteria.... and then they came down again in the '90s. And the guy who runs the studio, Trevor, his mom was the manager before him. So he was a little kid running around this scene, if you can imagine a little kid in Miami in the '70s running around this scene. This is an incredible place. Aretha Franklin did the Respect record at Criteria. James Brown did I Feel Good, recorded that song at Criteria. It's a really historic place. And so he... This band comes in and he says to the lead singer, he says, "Hey, listen. I don't know if you remember, you were down here 15 years ago, whatever, back in the 8-, late '70s, early '80s doing this, this record." And the singer says, "I have no memory of that whatsoever, except for one thing." He said, "One night apparently, we were done recording here and someone took us into the neighborhood." It's like in a residential kind of area. "Into the neighborhood, to this woman's house, and she brought out a brick of cocaine, an entire kilo of cocaine." He said, "I'd never seen that before. She put it down on the coffee ta-... We're sitting on the couch, she put it down on the... Like, this is a big band. Uh, they put it, she put it down on the coffee table. She cut it open and all I remember from my entire experience in Miami is the smell of that entire kilo of cocaine." Like just-

Joe Rogan 25:53 (laughs)

Billy Corben 25:53 ... what it feels like when an enti- the... Like an entire kilo of cocaine is opened up before you and it hits, and it hits you.

Joe Rogan 26:01 Have you ever done coke?

Billy Corben 26:02 Never.

Joe Rogan 26:03 Me neither.

Billy Corben 26:04 Never.

Joe Rogan 26:04 But hearing that, I wanna sniff.

Billy Corben 26:07 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 26:08 (laughs) I just wanna know-

Billy Corben 26:09 That's- that is the takeaway for the- (laughs)

Joe Rogan 26:10 I wanna know what that's like.

Billy Corben 26:13 Can you imagine you or I doing cocaine?

Joe Rogan 26:15 Oh, my God. Both of us wouldn't shut the fuck up.

Billy Corben 26:16 Could you fucking imagine?

Joe Rogan 26:17 We'd be... Two of us together in a room with coke.

Billy Corben 26:19 They'd scrape us off the ceiling-

Joe Rogan 26:20 (laughs)

Billy Corben 26:20 ... with a fucking shovel. They'd be like, "Hey, what's that up there?"

Joe Rogan 26:23 (laughs)

Billy Corben 26:23 "That's fucking... That's, that's Joe and Bill up there. No shit."

Joe Rogan 26:26 It's kind of amazing that you've managed to go through high school-

Billy Corben 26:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 26:29 ... college, the whole deal, and not-

Billy Corben 26:31 Oh.

Joe Rogan 26:31 ... and, and live this whole time in Miami.

Billy Corben 26:33 But I went, I went to an arts high school in the '90s, so cocaine... You know, drug trends tend to be kind of cyclical. You know?

Joe Rogan 26:40 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 26:40 Um, they run in the... Like nostalgia cycles.

Joe Rogan 26:42 Yeah.

Billy Corben 26:42 They kind of run in 20-year kind of things. Oh, this decade is defined by this. You know, um, so, you know, you had psychedelics in the '60s. Cocaine, uh, uh, cocaine kind of comes in vogue in the '70s and the... Obviously, there's some overlap, you know. Um, beginning of the '70s is like the end of the '60s, et cetera, so-

Joe Rogan 26:59 But in the '90s it kind of died away.

Billy Corben 27:01 Totally. And of course pot's a perennial.

Joe Rogan 27:03 Yeah.

Billy Corben 27:03 Pot is always hot. But by the '90s what happens is, yeah, cocaine kind of fell out of favor. Um, also I went to i- arts high school. No one could afford cocaine. But the psych- the '60s drugs kind of came around again.

Joe Rogan 27:15 Right.

Billy Corben 27:15 People were doing mushrooms, acid, MDMA became... You know, ecstasy became a thing. So that trend kind of came around again and people weren't really doing cocaine when I was in, in high school.

Joe Rogan 27:25 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 27:25 They were doing a lot of other shit, uh, though.

Joe Rogan 27:27 When, when I was in high school people were doing coke, but in the '90s after that I remember someone saying something about coke and someone was like, "You do coke still?"

Billy Corben 27:37 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 27:37 Like, in the '90s people had stopped, but then somewhere in the 2000s it seemed to kick up again, and it's all... It's like people forget. It's like a group of people ruin their entire lives with coke and then... I don't know if you know about this, what's going on right now in LA, but there was a terrible tragedy amongst these comedians where four comedians at a party overdosed.

Billy Corben 27:57 The lace gang.

Joe Rogan 27:57 Yeah, and they're, they're getting cocaine that's, that's laced with fentanyl. And, uh, one of them survived and she's in the ICU now, and she started to talk again and text people and stuff, so she seems like she's gonna make it. But three people died.

Billy Corben 28:11 Legalize it, regulate it.

Joe Rogan 28:13 Yes. Yes.

Billy Corben 28:14 I mean, who the fuck knows what you're getting?

Joe Rogan 28:15 Exactly.

Billy Corben 28:15 You could get a pill or a pow-, a bag, a baggy of powder from somebody in a club or whatever.

Joe Rogan 28:19 Yeah.

Billy Corben 28:19 I mean...

Joe Rogan 28:20 Stan Hope wrote about it on his Instagram, was getting into it with people. But it's 100% true, because if... then you would get actual cocaine. And actual cocaine, you'd probably feel like shit in the morning, but you'd survive.

Billy Corben 28:30 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 28:30 And you would, it would... You would at least know, like, you know, if we had this whiskey. You have a shot of whiskey, you know what it is. It's a shot of whiskey. We all know what it means. We know, we know what that dose is.

Billy Corben 28:39 Right.

Joe Rogan 28:40 We know what that's gonna do to us. And you can overdose on whiskey. Anyone can. We... You can all go to the store and buy enough alcohol to drink yourself to death on a daily basis. But at least you know what it is. With these, these cocaine laced with fentanyl products that people are getting or heroin laced with fentanyl, you have no idea. You're, you're just rolling the dice that the cartel didn't fuck up in this mix.

Billy Corben 29:05 Forget the cartel. Once it gets to retail-

Joe Rogan 29:07 Sure.

Billy Corben 29:07 ... that's where they really step on it and cut it up.

Joe Rogan 29:09 Uh, yeah, all kinds of people are stepping on it.

Billy Corben 29:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:10 All over the place.

Billy Corben 29:11 It's crazy.

Joe Rogan 29:11 Yeah. It's, it's a scary thing, and it's unnecessary. But it's a thing where it's political suicide, I think, if someone came along and said... Like, if DeSantis said, "Legalize all drugs," people would be like, "You're out of your fucking mind. You can't do that." Because it's-

Billy Corben 29:24 He's still blocking the legalization of medical marijuana which 70%+ of Floridians voted in favor of, so...

Joe Rogan 29:30 Yeah, that's a silly thing.

Billy Corben 29:31 Silly.

Joe Rogan 29:31 Because people with nausea, people with, uh, anything, any kind of wasting disease, any cancer, people that are dealing with chemotherapy, it is a godsend. There's a thing called NAD, uh, we, we tried to come up with it, how you say it the other day. But it's... What it does is, is actually lengthens your telomeres. It's something that you take in an intravenous form and it's, uh, super good for your body. It's, it's, uh, it's one of the rare things that you take that you do it in IV form and, like, almost immediately afterwards you feel great. Um, but this stuff is brutal to take. And it usually takes about two hours in a drip because you wanna take it very slowly, 'cause when you take it fast, it just kill... It's, it's the most unpleasant, uncomfortable feeling in your stomach, unless you're high. When you smoke weed, I turn that thing up full crank-

Billy Corben 30:25 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 30:25 ... and I go through a full bag in 10 minutes, and I'm telling you, I barely feel it. And I was... When I was doing that I was like, "Oh, well this is probably the nausea preventing aspect that chemo patients enjoy and people that... you know, people with AIDS, people that have a really hard time eating food." And the, the, the... Something about marijuana and nausea-

Billy Corben 30:45 Honestly-... I, I know that it's a medicine. You know that it's a medicine. I think most people even who participate in the prohibition, uh, which has been the, incidentally the deadliest thing about marijuana has been the prohibition.

Joe Rogan 30:58 Of course. It's-

Billy Corben 30:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 30:59 ... with every drug.

Billy Corben 31:00 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:00 You're, you're boosting up organized crime.

Billy Corben 31:02 And I just, so but, the point is, I also, when it comes to the legalization, I don't care that it has a medicinal purpose.

Joe Rogan 31:11 Right.

Billy Corben 31:11 That whiskey does not have a medicinal... Well, a hot toddy when you have a little cold maybe.

Joe Rogan 31:14 Yeah.

Billy Corben 31:14 There's no medicinal purpose. You do it for fu- And I don't give a shit, you know? That's, that's, that's, that's the autonomy, you know? (laughs)

Joe Rogan 31:21 Right. Of course.

Billy Corben 31:21 That you, it's your body. It's not affecting other people.

Joe Rogan 31:24 Right. Of course.

Billy Corben 31:24 And you wanna, you wanna enter into some sort of, you know, deal or contract with a, with a certified, (laughs) you know, marijuana dealer or, or a dispensary or cocaine dealer for that matter.

Joe Rogan 31:34 Yeah.

Billy Corben 31:34 What do I care about that?

Joe Rogan 31:36 I feel the same way about everything. I feel the same way about cigarettes, motorcycle racing. Like you do whatever the fuck you want, man. As lo- as long as it's not hurting me-

Billy Corben 31:44 Right.

Joe Rogan 31:45 ... I am, uh, 100% for you making your own choices.

Billy Corben 31:48 Your right to wave your hands-

Joe Rogan 31:50 Yes.

Billy Corben 31:50 ... ends, ends where my nose begins.

Joe Rogan 31:52 Yes.

Billy Corben 31:52 Bottom line. If you're over there-

Joe Rogan 31:54 There, yeah.

Billy Corben 31:54 ... what the fuck do I care?

Joe Rogan 31:55 Yeah.

Billy Corben 31:55 (laughs) You know?

Joe Rogan 31:55 100%.

Billy Corben 31:56 It's like- (laughs)

Joe Rogan 31:56 But we have this attitude in this country that drugs are bad, right? We all grew up in the '80s. The Just Say No, all that nonsense that got into people's heads while people all around you are doing sanctioned government approved drugs-

Billy Corben 32:11 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:12 ... that are killing people.

Billy Corben 32:12 Drug dealers in lab coats.

Joe Rogan 32:14 Yeah.

Billy Corben 32:14 Yeah, absolutely. But I, you know, I, I, we did a documentary called Limelight about the, um, the disco turned nightclub. It was in-

Joe Rogan 32:23 I didn't see that one.

Billy Corben 32:24 It was a deconsecrated historic church, a cathedral in Chelsea.

Joe Rogan 32:29 In New York City?

Billy Corben 32:30 This is-

Joe Rogan 32:30 I remember that.

Billy Corben 32:31 Yeah, pre-gentrification. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:32 Yeah.

Billy Corben 32:32 And, uh-

Joe Rogan 32:33 I wasn't around back then.

Billy Corben 32:34 It was fun.

Joe Rogan 32:34 Yeah.

Billy Corben 32:34 Peter Deshin bought this, this Canadian guy, bought this place and turned it into a, a nightclub. And it was the club kid scene.

Joe Rogan 32:41 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 32:41 Um, it was, it was all that. And of course, it then, the rise of, of ecstasy. Um, and then wha- what, uh, in this doc, we talk about how MDMA was a useful and effective tool that therapists were using, um, to, uh, particularly in like marriage therapy. People opened up. They got more honest. They got more-

Joe Rogan 33:07 Right.

Billy Corben 33:07 You know, they told, you know, it was like a truth serum, you know, and like, and got in touch with their feelings. And, and it was a, it was a vi- Not only was it a viable medicine, but it was something that, that doctors were availing themselves of in treatment. And then the DEA suddenly and unilaterally classifies it as a, as a, as a controlled substance. And all of a sudden, it went from potentially viable... So this wasn't an act of Congress. This was a, a bureau- an unelected bureaucratic organization who said, "Well, you know, the war on drugs is kind of winding down. We need a new line item, right? We need a new budget."

Joe Rogan 33:43 Oh.

Billy Corben 33:43 "We need hundreds of millions of dollars to fight the scourge of, of this new party drug. The kids and the discos. It's killing the kids." The, you know, the, and so they, they just suddenly created a new villain overnight, which costs us billions and ultimately trillions of dollars to fight, which was a, a very real drug. And when doctors are controlling it and administering it at a medical level, it's one thing. You got a bunch of guys making pills in their condos, (laughs) you know?

Joe Rogan 34:09 Right, of course.

Billy Corben 34:09 Like with the, the synthetic drugs and the... Who knows what the fuck-

Joe Rogan 34:13 Yeah.

Billy Corben 34:13 ... is in, is in that. You're paying somebody $20 for a pill on a dance floor.

Joe Rogan 34:16 Well, at least MAPS has started to use MDMA therapy to help people with PTS- PTSD and traumatic brain injuries, and this is something that's going on right now. And there's federally approved studies. So (clears throat) because the good work that MAPS has done in showing that, um, a lot of these people with these traumatic experiences, um, people that have been assaulted, abused, sexual assault, they, they can have um, an amazing relief from MDMA therapy. And so because of that, we have a real good chance of reintroducing MDMA because of MAPS as a therapeutic use, um, m- medicine really.

Billy Corben 34:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 34:58 Which is really what it... I mean, obviously it's a party drug. Obviously, it's great. It makes people feel good. But there's some amazing therapeutic uses for it, particularly for soldiers, and again, people with traumatic experiences.

Billy Corben 35:08 Litany of drugs-

Joe Rogan 35:09 Yeah.

Billy Corben 35:09 ... that you can abuse, but-

Joe Rogan 35:10 Right.

Billy Corben 35:11 ... legalize it, regulate it, tax it.

Joe Rogan 35:13 Yes.

Billy Corben 35:13 I mean, it's the only, it's, it-

Joe Rogan 35:14 Yes.

Billy Corben 35:14 It's what's, it's what's been so frustrating about the, the medical marijuana, uh, uh, fucking, uh, uh, uh, sh- just like, mm, uh, trek. It's just like, it's this never-ending saga in Florida is that like, I remember when I went... So I didn't smoke pot until I was, when I tried, I was like 37 years old, 35 years old.

Joe Rogan 35:32 How old are you now?

Billy Corben 35:33 I'm 43.

Joe Rogan 35:34 Oh.

Billy Corben 35:34 So I tried pot very-

Joe Rogan 35:35 So when I met you-

Billy Corben 35:36 ... very late.

Joe Rogan 35:36 ... you had just started.

Billy Corben 35:39 I just... Well, I, I don't smoke it reg- I tried it.

Joe Rogan 35:41 When do you smoke it? Like how often?

Billy Corben 35:43 Never.

Joe Rogan 35:44 Never?

Billy Corben 35:44 I just tr- I was in, I was in Colorado, and that's like, you know, it's like going to Italy and not eating pasta.

Joe Rogan 35:48 So you rarely smoke pot is what you're saying?

Billy Corben 35:51 Yeah, I never, I almost never smoke pot and I, I, I-

Joe Rogan 35:54 But you do smoke pot sometimes?

Billy Corben 35:56 I do take, uh, like a gummy sometimes.

Joe Rogan 35:58 Oh.

Billy Corben 35:58 I don't smoke it. Yeah. But that time-

Joe Rogan 36:00 Like a 10 milligram? Like a little one?

Billy Corben 36:01 I'm a lightweight. Yeah. I mean-

Joe Rogan 36:02 Listen-

Billy Corben 36:03 ... I don't-

Joe Rogan 36:03 ... 10 milligrams is, it's nice.

Billy Corben 36:05 It's-

Joe Rogan 36:05 It's a nice feeling.

Billy Corben 36:06 (laughs) I, I didn't... I don't know. I didn't care for it. I, I said to my... I remember I was in this pot smoking, I was in this pot church in Den-

Joe Rogan 36:16 Whoa.

Billy Corben 36:16 ... in Denver.

Joe Rogan 36:17 That's always a bad place to be.

Billy Corben 36:18 Yeah. Well, you don't wanna be in public, dude. Yeah. It's like-

Joe Rogan 36:20 And well, anytime someone-

Billy Corben 36:20 It's not social.

Joe Rogan 36:21 ... sets up a pot church, you're like-

Billy Corben 36:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:22 ... "Who am I associating with?"

Billy Corben 36:23 (laughs) I knew the guy. He was okay people, you know, so-

Joe Rogan 36:27 Did he have wooden beads?

Billy Corben 36:28 (laughs) He might have, he might have, but we were, we're... And like, I don't know. I'm, I'm like, I'm high and I'm sitting in these pews.

Joe Rogan 36:35 Right.

Billy Corben 36:36 You know, and it's dark and people are... And I'm just like, I'm like, "I don't like this." I said, I said to my girlfriend, I said, "I wish I was drunk. I wish I was drunk." And then, and she's like, and we didn't... Uh, what I said... Oh, she never let me forget this. I said, I said-... this will never catch on.

Joe Rogan 36:54 (laughs)

Billy Corben 36:54 (laughs) She goes, "This will never..." I didn't remember saying that, but she said that's what I... "This will never catch on." And then we went to Chick-fil-A.

Joe Rogan 37:01 Ooh, game changer.

Billy Corben 37:03 'Cause hate tastes great. And, uh, we went to-

Joe Rogan 37:05 (laughs) Hate tastes great.

Billy Corben 37:06 So we, we went, we went to Chick-fil-A and I gotta tell you, I'm like, "Oh, I get it."

Joe Rogan 37:11 Yeah.

Billy Corben 37:11 Listen, Chick-fil-A is good without pot, but I was like, "Oh," I was like, "I get it." Even just the crunch of the chicken in my ears. Ah.

Joe Rogan 37:18 For me, it was an ice cream sundae.

Billy Corben 37:20 Oh.

Joe Rogan 37:21 I had an ice cream sundae. I was 30 years old. I, I'd not been a pot smoker my whole life. I'd maybe smoked pot a handful of times. And then when I was 30 years old, a buddy of mine sa- he was a musician. My friend, Eddie Bravo, who's a musician, jujitsu guy. And he's like, "Dude, it helps me creatively. I love it." And I was like, "Really? I just thought it made you stupid."

Billy Corben 37:40 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 37:41 I thought it was just a thing that made people dumb. So we, we smoked pot and went to Dairy Queen.

Billy Corben 37:45 (sighs)

Joe Rogan 37:45 And like, oh my God. Baskin-Robbins, that's where we went. Baskin-Robbins. I remember I had a hot fudge sundae. And I remember eating the hot fudge with the nuts and the vanilla ice cream. I was like, "This is sensational. I've never tasted food like this." And I was like, "I get it now. I get it."

Billy Corben 38:02 I get it. Yeah. It was the Chick-fil-A that, that made me, that was like a...

Joe Rogan 38:04 Oh.

Billy Corben 38:04 I was like, "I understand it."

Joe Rogan 38:06 Crunch.

Billy Corben 38:06 But it kind of like, it's weird, it like, it makes me feel like my, my head is kind of like closing in around my brain. I get this weird, like pressure in my-

Joe Rogan 38:14 Yeah, you get scared too.

Billy Corben 38:15 ... in my head from it. I, I didn't get scared, but it's like, I found it kind of like uncomfortable and annoying. I didn't like... I love to, uh, like, I like to drink.

Joe Rogan 38:21 Did you try sex on it?

Billy Corben 38:23 No.

Joe Rogan 38:23 That's the move.

Billy Corben 38:24 Really?

Joe Rogan 38:25 Oh my God.

Billy Corben 38:26 It's pot. You don't know what a move really is.

Joe Rogan 38:27 Oh my God. Sex on marijuana-

Billy Corben 38:28 Someone else could... On the bottom, maybe.

Joe Rogan 38:30 It feels so different. It feels so, uh, like everything... It's like you can feel the person's soul. It's wild.

Billy Corben 38:37 Really?

Joe Rogan 38:38 Yeah. It's a complete game changer.

Billy Corben 38:40 So the gummies, will that work with the gumming?

Joe Rogan 38:41 Yeah. Yeah, the gummies work.

Billy Corben 38:42 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 38:43 You have to realize that gummies is a different thing, because, uh, THC is what happens when you smoke it. But when you eat it, it's processed by your liver and it produces 11-hydroxy metabolite. It's much more psychoactive. It's like four to five times more psychoactive than THC. So it's way more powerful. That's why a lot of people when they eat marijuana, they think they got dosed.

Billy Corben 39:03 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 39:03 'Cause it is essentially a psychedelic. And when you take high-dose, um, edibles, high-dose edibles with a isolation tank is as wild as any mushroom trip I've ever done. It's really cray. Like you see crazy visuals, like fucking pyramids and UFOs and like these, these, like cartoonish neon figures that are mating. I remember I took a really strong edible once and got on a flight, and it was one of the craziest experiences of my life. All I did was close my eyes and curl up in a position. I had a window seat, so it was like my head was up-

Billy Corben 39:36 (laughs) .

Joe Rogan 39:36 ... against the window, and my eyes were closed. And the whole flight, I was watching these animated neon characters breed. They were like having sex and making all these other animated characters, and then it was like this weird sort of fractal effect. And it was, it, it was hypnotic. And it, it was, it, it was insane. And it lasted for a good solid hour.

Billy Corben 40:00 Pass.

Joe Rogan 40:01 Yeah, man.

Billy Corben 40:01 I'm gonna pass. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 40:01 It'll freak you the fuck out.

Billy Corben 40:02 D- do you write when you're high? Like-

Joe Rogan 40:04 Yes.

Billy Corben 40:04 ... you write jokes and you, uh, when you-

Joe Rogan 40:06 Yeah. George Carlin's, I think had the best idea. What George Carlin would do is he would write sober, and then he would smoke pot and punch it up. So he'd have concepts-

Billy Corben 40:17 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 40:17 So he'd have these concepts and just figure out, you know, where the humor is, where the irony is, and then he would get high.

Billy Corben 40:24 That's like the exact opposite of the adage, which is write drunk, edit sober.

Joe Rogan 40:28 Mm-hmm. Right, right, right.

Billy Corben 40:28 That's like the exact... Uh, that's, that's like write sober, edit high.

Joe Rogan 40:32 But you're trying for funny, right? Like, the, like write drunk, edit sober is great, because you can take out the self-indulgent stuff and the chaos and, and sort of whittle it into, uh, uh, more conducive form for human consumption. But there's something about writing high where you find the funny. You, it's, it's not as, it's not like write so, you know, write drunk, edit sober. It's when you edit high, you're l- literally editing for giggles. You're, you're looking for... And you'll find pathways that are funny. I think George had it... Well, obviously George is one of the all-time greats. And he had it, uh, he had a great method. I've used that method, but I also use the get high as fuck method in write.

Billy Corben 41:13 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 41:13 That's a great method too. I like to do that late at night, 'cause it... You know, I have family, I have children. It's, it's... I can't be getting high during the day when my kids are in the house. So what I do is I wait until everyone's asleep, then I get barbecued. And then usually after a show, like I'll come home from a show at like 12:30 at night, and I'll just sit in front of the keyboard and just start, start mashing ideas.

Billy Corben 41:33 That's great. I've never, I've never... I mean, I've written work drunk before, but I just like... I don't know, it's kind of, uh, in my line of work, I guess a little more important to have your, your wits about you. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 41:43 Yeah, but it's, it is... There's a... It's a tool, you know. It's, it's... You can use it correctly, and you can get a lot out of it, or you can start abusing it, you know. It's... I'm a giant fan of Stephen King. And Stephen King's book on writing is one of my favorite books on the creative process. It's a great book. But one of the things that comes out of that book is, first of all, his, his thankfulness of his sobriety, his love for his family and how he realized he could have lost it all, 'cause he was really like off the rails crazy and doing pounds of blow and fucking drinking cases of beer every night while he was writing.

Billy Corben 42:15 Couldn't tell that from his books.

Joe Rogan 42:16 (laughs)

Billy Corben 42:16 Interesting.

Joe Rogan 42:17 Well, the thing is, that's my point, is those are the best books.

Billy Corben 42:20 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:21 They really are.

Billy Corben 42:22 The best albums, yeah. No, I mean...

Joe Rogan 42:23 Yeah, dude, that... You go back and you read Carrie, you read The Shining, you read Cujo, like that was his wildest shit, man. And he was out of his mind. He was out of his mind. And he just reached... It's not that he can't write without it. He've... Absolutely, he's one of the greats. But, uh, the, the stuff that he wrote when he was fucked up was magic. Like, magically horrific scenarios.

Billy Corben 42:50 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:50 You know, because he was battling these like real-time demons in his head while he's mashing those keyboards.

Billy Corben 42:57 ... I'm gonna read that b- I haven't read the book, his book about writing.

Joe Rogan 42:59 Oh, it's really good.

Billy Corben 43:00 I love, I love... You know, sometimes, like, writing about writing is like dancing about architecture-

Joe Rogan 43:05 Yeah.

Billy Corben 43:05 ... talking about love. But like, it's like, it's, I, I, I'm, I'm, uh, I'm endlessly fascinated by writers writing about writing.

Joe Rogan 43:12 Yes. Me too.

Billy Corben 43:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:13 And he, uh, his... I think his memo- that is a memoir, and it's, it's... I think it's one of the best because it's, it's about many things. It's about his life. It's about how incredible he found his early success and how rewarding it was and how chaotic it was and o- overwhelming, and how he couldn't believe it was real. O- and, and then it's also about his demons and struggles, and then it's also about recovery from getting hit by a fucking bus or a van rather, you know? Like, th- that's what he got hit by, right? Some shit like that.

Billy Corben 43:43 His accident, yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:43 Yeah. And his, his body got destroyed, you know, and then trying to pick up the pieces and start writing again. It's great. It's a fantastic book. It's really good. But the things that struck me is like, man, when he was off the rails, he wrote some good shit.

Billy Corben 43:56 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 43:56 That's the... It's like that kind of stuff, like when you go back and you read The Shining. I mean, The Shining was about an author that was losing his fucking mind in a haunted house, and in a lot of ways, that was probably what was happening to Stephen King with the cocaine and the alcohol and, uh, you know. And he's writing this c- crazy shit while he's battling his, uh, own literal demons.

Billy Corben 44:22 The alienation from your family and your, to that and your friends and doing-

Joe Rogan 44:24 Yeah. Yeah. All of that. Yeah. The fucking chaos in his head.

Billy Corben 44:27 A lot of that is w- you know, I had to... When I was (laughs) here last time, I had written a play for some reason, and so, um, like, writing is the hardest thing. It's the hardest thing. It's very isolating. I literally went into hotels. I got hotel rooms just by myself just to, to sit and write. And it's so... And writing on command, it's like standup com- like, I think standup comedy is like one of the bravest, (laughs) one of the bravest professions 'cause it's like, "Go be funny now. Be funny now." It's like you have a date and a time when you have to go and be funny.

Joe Rogan 44:57 Right.

Billy Corben 44:57 And it's just like, I think... And it's, and it's fucking stressful, and it doesn't matter how good the material may be in advance. Sometimes it's not gonna work, you know? I've seen like... My appreciation for, for standup comedy came from watching legends bomb.

Joe Rogan 45:11 Mm.

Billy Corben 45:11 I've been in a room where, like, I'm the only motherfucker laughing at Gilbert Gottfried. I've been in a room-

Joe Rogan 45:17 Where, where have you been? Where was that?

Billy Corben 45:18 That was at, that was at the old Miami Improv. Remember the one at the, uh, the Seminole-

Joe Rogan 45:21 Coconut Grove?

Billy Corben 45:21 The... No, that was at... No. Well, the o- not the oldest Miami Improv but the Miami Improv before the la- now it's in Doral. Uh, it was at, uh, uh, Hollywood, the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel.

Joe Rogan 45:31 Oh, okay.

Billy Corben 45:31 That one.

Joe Rogan 45:31 Yeah. Yeah.

Billy Corben 45:32 I saw him bomb there. I went to Vegas in like 2000-ish, and I got to town on my girl's time, and I saw Carlin's name on a marquee. And I was like, "Well, that settles that." Like-

Joe Rogan 45:45 Right.

Billy Corben 45:45 ... I got on the phone, and I was like, "Carlin tickets." And my grandpa knew some high roller at that hotel. I forget which hotel it was. And they got us front row, and so-

Joe Rogan 45:54 Ooh.

Billy Corben 45:54 ... it was like a comedy club. It's a cabaret, like, you know, like style room, but like, um, it was w- you know, with the table, you know, perpendicular to the stage, you know, and we were sitting... Like, the fucking stage was right here, and then Carlin was like right up here. And so he was doing that bit about... 'cause he was, he was actually obviously trying out material for his, his HBO next stage, which, which, which was the, the God bit, the "I don't believe in God. I believe in Joe Pesci. I believe in the sun."

Joe Rogan 46:20 Mm. Yeah.

Billy Corben 46:20 That whole God bit, he's doing this whole God riff, which he was clearly still, I think, working on at the time. And so I'm hysterically laughing, and I'm realizing that o- other than Carlin's voice, the only thing I'm hearing is my laughter-

Joe Rogan 46:39 Oh, God.

Billy Corben 46:39 ... in an empty, sold-out fucking showroom. And I, I literally turned 'cause it... I became self-conscious about it, and I turn around. As you imagine the shot from my POV. I kind of pan the room, and I look at these people, these just good God-fearing 'mericans who just-

Joe Rogan 46:59 (laughs)

Billy Corben 46:59 ... were not about Carlin dissing the, the, the, the big guy or the big girl. And h- and they're just like stone f- It's like the audience of The Producers watching Springtime for Hitler.

Joe Rogan 47:09 Right.

Billy Corben 47:10 They're just like fucking appalled. And so I, I sweep the room. I come back, and I look up here, and George Carlin's nose is right here, and he's bending down off the stage at me.

Joe Rogan 47:24 (laughs)

Billy Corben 47:24 And we're practically nose to... And he goes, "Thank you, sir."

Joe Rogan 47:28 (laughs)

Billy Corben 47:28 And then, and then walk- 'cause I'm the only motherfucker laughing in the room. He goes, "Thank you, sir." And then wa-

Joe Rogan 47:33 (laughs)

Billy Corben 47:33 And then stalks off back off the stage. And I was just like-

Joe Rogan 47:36 Wow.

Billy Corben 47:36 ... "Oh my God." And I watched George Carlin bomb and one of the funniest human beings to ever exist in this universe and, and well probably one of the smartest human beings as well I'd say. And, uh, just was an added bonus that he was so fucking funny and-

Joe Rogan 47:51 I saw Carlin barm- bomb in New Hampshire in 1988 or '89, somewhere around then. He had went through a rough patch-

Billy Corben 48:00 Hm.

Joe Rogan 48:01 ... where, um, I don't know what was going on, but I was a big fan of his before this. And then during this, there was a few albums I remember 'cause George would put out a c- he would put out an HBO special every year. And what he would do differently than other comedians is he would write it all out, and then he would bring, uh, legal paper on stage.

Billy Corben 48:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:23 And he would have the script for what he was doing, and he had no problem, like, having the notes on a, a stool, and he would go over it. And he had this one routine that he was trying to close with, and it just was bombing. And it was fuck... It was basically fuck everything.

Billy Corben 48:40 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 48:40 It was fuck Israel, fuck comedy clubs, fuck God, fuck the church. It was like he was going through this whole thing, and it just wasn't working. It just didn't resonate. And I remember thinking, "Wow, that's... This is weird." Like, "I'm watching..." 'Cause I, I, I brought my roommates, and my roommates were kinda unsophisticated at the time, uh, to put it mildly.

Billy Corben 49:00 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 49:01 ... and, and they're like, "What is this? This is fucking terrible." And, w- we know, we drove all the way to New Hampshire to watch George Carlin bomb.

Billy Corben 49:08 (laughs) I f- feel like that's always the way, when you recommend somebody, like, to watch something or see a show-

Joe Rogan 49:12 Yeah.

Billy Corben 49:12 ... it's- it's always the worst episode that's gonna be on ne- 'cause th- they're like, they're like, "You have no taste." Like, you-

Joe Rogan 49:16 Well, this is when I was just either thinking about doing standup or starting to do standup. It was in that range. So I was a- an evangelist. I was like, "You gotta see this guy. Oh my God, Dom Irrera is the funniest guy that's ever lived. Come see this guy with me." So I was dragging my friends with me to these comedy clubs, and some of them were brutes.

Billy Corben 49:34 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 49:34 Some of my friends that I knew at the time from my martial arts days were crazy people.

Billy Corben 49:40 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 49:40 And they- they had, you know, no artistic sophistication whatsoever. You had to beat them over the head with the jokes or they weren't gonna get it. And-

Billy Corben 49:48 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 49:48 ... th- there was a lot of, uh, value in that too 'cause you get to watch comedy from people that- w- with people, rather, that were not comedy fans. I got to see, like, how, like, sort of subtle stuff just didn't hit them at all. Ironic stuff, you know, it- it was interesting to see. But I'd taken them to see everybody and when w- I took 'em all the way to fucking New Hampshire to see George Carlin, he bombed.

Billy Corben 50:11 Dom Irrera requires a sophisticated palate, I think.

Joe Rogan 50:13 Dom Irrera's-

Billy Corben 50:14 I love Dom Irrera. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 50:15 ... w- he's one of the all-time greats. He's such a gr- have you ever met him?

Billy Corben 50:19 I have.

Joe Rogan 50:19 He's awesome.

Billy Corben 50:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 50:20 He's such a great guy. He's so fucking funny too and he's a guy that, like, never stopped working on his act. And as opposed to, like, some comics got to this point where as they got older, they just never wrote anymore, th- then they-

Billy Corben 50:35 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 50:35 ... sort of relied on their old material or they relied on their reputation. Dom Irrera was always in the trenches. Still is.

Billy Corben 50:42 I was really lucky. For a while, I was- I was- I would appear, whenever I was in Miami in town, at home, I would go on this show, um, th- Paul and Young Ron Show on-

Joe Rogan 50:50 Yeah, I know those guys.

Billy Corben 50:52 ... on the radio. Yeah. I, and so Ron's gone. He- he retired. Uh, but Paul Castronova's still there, and he would have me on the show every Friday to talk about whatever movies were coming out that weekend or just talk shit. And that was, of course, the day when the standups were promoting their weekends-

Joe Rogan 51:05 Right, right.

Billy Corben 51:06 ... at- at The Improv.

Joe Rogan 51:07 Of course.

Billy Corben 51:07 And so I'd wind up with just the coolest people in- in the studio, and what I found, which was really cool, is that, 'cause that was, time-wise, that was like the dawn, like, of Netflix streaming.

Joe Rogan 51:19 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 51:19 And so all these comics on the road were like, "All I do is sit in the hotel or in the apartment and I watch Netflix streaming." And so a lot of them had been exposed to my work and it turned out, like, I'm big fans of theirs and they're big f- it's kinda the fun thing about this business, like the entertain- it's like, you know, you don't know who your fans are.

Joe Rogan 51:37 Right.

Billy Corben 51:37 And some of them are much cool, me rest assured, much cooler than I am. Um, I had w- uh, wound up, I wound up at Janet Jackson's mansion one- one time in Miami Beach-

Joe Rogan 51:46 Whoa.

Billy Corben 51:46 ... 'cause she like summoned us to the mansion.

Joe Rogan 51:49 Summoned?

Billy Corben 51:50 She-

Joe Rogan 51:50 How does she do that? Does she have a horn?

Billy Corben 51:51 Through an agent.

Joe Rogan 51:51 Ho ho!

Billy Corben 51:54 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 51:54 (laughs)

Billy Corben 51:54 Yes, like the- it's a shofar really, and so we got a- a call from, uh, an agent who was a mutual friend and he said, "Janet is in town. She's renting a mansion on La Gorce Island."

Joe Rogan 52:05 God, that's so wild.

Billy Corben 52:06 La Gorce Island is where Sal Magluta from Cocaine Cowboys: The Kings of Miami-

Joe Rogan 52:09 No!

Billy Corben 52:09 ... rented a mansion as well. So that's how I knew La Gorce. I'm like, "Fucking Sal Magluta's mansion, rental mansion?"

Joe Rogan 52:14 (laughs)

Billy Corben 52:14 So she says, "She's here recording an album. She wants to meet you. She's a huge fan." And I was like, "She- who?"

Joe Rogan 52:23 Did she think you were the guy from The Smashing Pumpkins?

Billy Corben 52:24 Yeah, I was like, "Who does she-"

Joe Rogan 52:25 (laughs)

Billy Corben 52:26 What the fuck? I'm the guy, I'm the one with the hair.

Joe Rogan 52:28 (laughs)

Billy Corben 52:28 Does she know that? I'm like, not Billy Corgan. And who incidentally has @billy on Twitter? Was he like a fucking investor in Twitter? Like, how did he got @billy? So-

Joe Rogan 52:37 I don't know. Billy's smart.

Billy Corben 52:39 So what happens is when people go, wanna- wanna tweet at him, they go @billycor and my name I get's like autofills-

Joe Rogan 52:47 Oh.

Billy Corben 52:47 ... because they go right past @billy which he has @billy and so I get all kinds of-

Joe Rogan 52:52 (laughs)

Billy Corben 52:52 ... like when they're like upset at how he treated Daisy on wrestling on Sunday or we're-

Joe Rogan 52:56 (laughs)

Billy Corben 52:56 I'm like, "What the fuck is going on?" Like, "You're so mean to Daisy." I'm like, "What the fuck is happening?"

Joe Rogan 53:00 (screams)

Billy Corben 53:00 Like, "Why- who- who do you think I am?"

Joe Rogan 53:03 That's hilarious.

Billy Corben 53:03 But like, um, but like, uh, we get, so Janet wants to- to meet you. And so we come to this mansion. We're sitting with her manager at the time, who was this great big hilarious dude, and we're just chilling on the couch. And all of a sudden- he looks up and all of a sudden at the top of the stairway, a vision. Janet Jackson, she's like in this beautiful like muumuu. It was like, I don't know, it was just like seeing like a- like Nefertiti, like- like fucking, uh-

Joe Rogan 53:29 Royalty.

Billy Corben 53:29 ... like Cleopatra appear at the... We're just all just like, uh, there's like, you know, angels are singing and she's beautiful and so like, and she like descends the staircase (laughs) you know, we're just like, "This is incredible." And she sits down and she is just like the sweetest, like, most casual, down to earth person. And she goes into this story. She's like, "One morning, my phone rings. It's like 4:00 in the morning and it's Jermaine..." Dupri, not Jackson, her brother. She was dating Jermaine Dupri at the time. And she sa- and I said, "Baby, is everything okay?" He says, "Yes. I'm coming over right now. There's something you need to see." And she goes, "Okay. It's 4:00 in the morning." Shows up at the door. She's like, "Are you sure everything's okay?" "Yes, everything's fine, baby. You gotta watch this." And he hands me a DVD-R. Written in Sharpie it says, "Cocaine Cowboys."

Joe Rogan 54:25 (laughs)

Billy Corben 54:29 And I'm like- I'm like- I'm like- I'm with her, my producing partner, Alfred Spellman, I'm just like, "What the fuck is happening right now?"

Joe Rogan 54:36 No.

Billy Corben 54:36 "What the fuck is happening?" And she said, "And I watched it twice." She put the DVD, the bootleg into the DVD player at 4:00 in the morning and she watched Cocaine Cowboys twice. And she's like, "You know, when we were growing up, my sister, she was interested in love story and romance novels." And I was like, "She's talking about La Toya right now."

Joe Rogan 54:57 Right.

Billy Corben 54:58 Like, we know too much about this family, right? You know, so like, she's like, "She l-" and she goes, "I loved..."... you know, mafia stories, crime stories, Scarface, Crime Incorporated, Al Capone. That was my thing, and so I loved that. And she had, wanted to talk about Griselda Blanco-

Joe Rogan 55:14 Ah.

Billy Corben 55:14 ... The Godmother. And I'm like, "This is batshit crazy." So, uh, she says, "Do you guys like sushi?" Alfred hates sushi. He says, "Yeah!"

Joe Rogan 55:26 (laughs)

Billy Corben 55:26 "I like sushi." She says, "We should go to Nobu-

Joe Rogan 55:30 (laughs)

Billy Corben 55:30 ... and have sushi next week." He's like, "Ah, absolutely! Love sushi." And we went out with Janet Jackson-

Joe Rogan 55:39 Oh, my God.

Billy Corben 55:39 ... to Nobu, and she's like... And we shared su- it was, it was surreal. It was just a, it was a weird, wild experience. That, that's what happened with, with, uh, with Tony Bourdain is, I don't drink beer. I drink whiskey or gin. And so we get a call from Tony-

Joe Rogan 55:53 Why? It's so specific.

Billy Corben 55:55 That's just what I like. I like, uh, I'm not... I'm agnostic when it comes to whiskey. I'll drink, I feel like any whiskey will, I like good whiskey, but any whiskey will do. When it comes to gin, I got, I'm a little bit more of a stickler 'cause you can't... Bad gin is a bad night and a worse morning.

Joe Rogan 56:11 Oh, yeah?

Billy Corben 56:11 But like, but whiskey I don't like, I can just, I can drink all kinds o' whiskey. But like gin, I'm very, I'm very picky about. But I don't drink beer. And so Tony's producer calls and says, "Tony would like to have a beer and stone crabs with you for the show." I said, "Yes."

Joe Rogan 56:29 (laughs)

Billy Corben 56:29 I said, "Yes."

Joe Rogan 56:30 (laughs)

Billy Corben 56:30 You better believe I'm, I'm drinking beer. And we did.

Joe Rogan 56:33 Stone crabs go with beer though.

Billy Corben 56:34 Stone cr- yeah, and we had like a local brewed. We, Miami, we don't make a lot of shit. You know, like we don't have... Like, if you go to Colorado, like, and I'm like, "Oh, I wanna try some local whiskey," right? Or some local bour- but, you know. And I'm like, "Which one of those is like a Colorado?" And they're like, "All of them. They're all made..." Miami, we don't have, like we make a rum. We, and now we have some microbreweries. We don't, we don't manu-, we don't make a lot of shit.

Joe Rogan 56:54 Right, right.

Billy Corben 56:54 You know? So, um, so, uh, we, we had a, a locally brewed beer and stone crabs at Cap' N Jim's for the show, and talked, and then the sh- they stopped shooting, and we just sat there for like another hour just chilling and, 'cause we didn't do much eating on camera. And then just eating and talking, and it was unforgettable.

Joe Rogan 57:14 You have to know that Cocaine Cowboys is without doubt one of the top five greatest documentaries of all time. There's no doubt. It's-

Billy Corben 57:23 That's very nice of you. Thank you.

Joe Rogan 57:25 I've seen hundreds of documentaries. I've never, I've never seen a documentary as many times in a row as I've seen Cocaine Cowboys.

Billy Corben 57:32 (laughs) You and Janet Jackson, yeah. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 57:33 So many times I've had people over the house, and I was like, "Dude, you gotta fucking watch this." And just looking over at my friends 20 minutes in where they're like...

Billy Corben 57:40 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 57:41 I'm like, "Bro, it gets crazier."

Billy Corben 57:43 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 57:43 "It gets crazier. And there's a part two."

Billy Corben 57:44 It does. You're right. It does get crazier actually, yeah. It really does.

Joe Rogan 57:47 And now-

Billy Corben 57:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:48 ... I guess we should talk about this. We have a fucking whole series on Netflix now. How many episodes is this?

Billy Corben 57:52 Six.

Joe Rogan 57:53 I'm only two in. I'm two in now.

Billy Corben 57:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:55 But goddamn, it's good. It's like all your shit, man.

Billy Corben 57:57 It gets better.

Joe Rogan 57:58 Ah-

Billy Corben 57:59 It does.

Joe Rogan 57:59 ... I can only imagine. It's, it is a m- fucking amazing how many insane stories have come out of this one part of the country. And, you know-

Billy Corben 58:10 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 58:10 ... I had a buddy of mine, I think I told you this, my good friend Steve Graham did his residency, he's an ophthalmologist, he did his residency in Miami during the '80s.

Billy Corben 58:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:20 During the chaos days, and he would like save Polaroids-

Billy Corben 58:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:23 ... of like just some of the craziest shit that, that they saw.

Billy Corben 58:27 Best place to ply your trade.

Joe Rogan 58:29 Oh, yeah.

Billy Corben 58:29 I mean, really whatever business you were in, especially in those days. You were in law enforcement, you were a lawyer-

Joe Rogan 58:34 Yeah.

Billy Corben 58:34 ... a prosecutor, a doctor.

Joe Rogan 58:37 Yeah.

Billy Corben 58:37 And you name it, that was the place that you wanted... A journalist.

Joe Rogan 58:40 Yes.

Billy Corben 58:40 God knows.

Joe Rogan 58:41 Oh, yeah.

Billy Corben 58:41 That was where you wanted to ply your trade. I know a, pardon me, a guy was working as an ER doctor, uh, at Jackson at the trauma center, uh, d- in 1980. The Mariel boatlift had just happened. You remember, this is how Scarface opens.

Joe Rogan 58:54 Oh, okay.

Billy Corben 58:55 Um, Castro opens up the Mariel Harbor and sends, allows people to leave-

Joe Rogan 58:59 All these criminals.

Billy Corben 59:00 And he empties the prisons-

Joe Rogan 59:01 Yeah.

Billy Corben 59:01 ... the mental institutions, the hospitals, and just, he said, "I flushed the toilet of Cuba-"

Joe Rogan 59:05 Right.

Billy Corben 59:05 "... onto the United States." And it created a real crisis. I mean, four counties in South Florida nearly got bankrupt because you're absorbing 150 refugees, some small percentage of which are, you know, dangerous people, and you don't know who they are.

Joe Rogan 59:19 True, right.

Billy Corben 59:19 How, yeah, you can't weed them out. And so, but then you have to absorb the infirm and the sick and the young and people who don't have, you know, healthcare or housing or, or food. And so, um, Miami Beach looks a lot like, like Havana, like the sea wall, you know, like the, the sea wall and the Malecón. It's like, it's so, a lot of... And at that time, it was just like it was in Scarface. It was like, it was like 75% plus Jewish, a lot of Holocaust survivors, literally just God's waiting room they called it-

Joe Rogan 59:47 Hmm.

Billy Corben 59:47 ... just playing out the rest of their lives. In efficiencies on Ocean Drive, flop houses that would like, $125 a week maybe. That was high. Like, that's what you could live in Miami Beach for. So people on fixed incomes, you know, Social Security, elderly, retired. And then it attracted a lot of the, the, the Mariel, Marielitos, particularly the criminal element. And there were places where like the Miami Beach Police Department would just literally just drive around the block 'cause they'd keep getting calls to go to this, "Oh, this guy just got shot. This guy just got stabbed. This guy..." And it was over dumb shit. It was Wild West shit. It was like over a dominoes game, you know? And so one day, this trauma, uh, surgeon is working at the ER, and in comes a Mariel refugee with a gunshot wound. And he says to the guy, who's bilingual, he says, tells him something, he says, "Listen, you're very lucky." He said, "If you had been shot, you know, just millimeters this way, it would've hit a vital organ. You would've bled out. You would've been dead before you even got here." Saves the guy, guy goes on his way. Days later, he gets another guy, another patient, a Mariel refugee, with a gunshot wound in exactly the same place he told the other guy that, "If you shot..."... he got shot there, he would die. And this guy died. And he could never prove it, but he always believed that that was a retaliation shooting-

Joe Rogan 1:01:01 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 1:01:02 ... for the first guy that he had in there. But like that happened, like sto- people have like stories like that for fucking days. It was the number one, uh, Mayor's Jewelers in South Florida, number one seller of Rolex watches. The Mutiny Hotel, which is, we talk about in the doc, in, in actually several docs, which was the inspiration for the Babylon Club in Scarface. They were the number one seller of Dom Perignon. They had to like convert hotel rooms into refrigerated walk-in units for the Dom Perignon because they could not keep it, uh, in stock. They al-

Joe Rogan 1:01:28 Whew.

Billy Corben 1:01:28 ... they also filled the tubs, the Mutiny Girls would fill the tubs in the, in the, in the rooms with the, with the Dom Perignon as well so they could bill the customers. But, so that was part of where the, (laughs) where the supply was, uh, going. But that was a different kind of party depending on what you were willing to pay. But Miami is just one of those pla- in that era, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:01:43 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:01:43 When it became America's Casablanca. I mean, look, the, the, our number one and two industries at that time, still today, um, early 1980s Miami, uh, number two was tourism, generating upwards of about seven billion dollars a year into the Miami-Dade economy. Number one, I should say legitimate industry, uh, was real estate, generating about nine billion dollars a year into the economy in Miami. The drug trade at the time was estimated to bring in upwards of 12 billion dollars a year into our local economy. (whoosh sound) So what you're saying is our number one business was an illicit trade, was the illegal drug trade, the money laundering. And I will tell you, I believe it to be the only case study, I should say the only successful case study of Ronald Reagan's trickle down economics. It's the only time it worked was in the drug boom in Miami because bandidos rob a bank and they ride on into the next to- town, right? And they spend their ill-gotten gains. They stayed in Miami. They kept that money in Miami. So that trickled down from the kingpins to banks into real estate, into people who were not in the illicit trade, but just... You know, I'll give you an example. Somebody, um... Let's do the bottom of the food chain in the drug industry. If you were a weekend warrior, you would want to show up and maybe do some grunt work, do some, you knew a drug smuggler, which was not uncommon in Miami. Everybody knew a drug smuggler. Marco Rubio spent a summer living in a cocaine stash house that belonged to his, to his, uh, brother-in-law.

Joe Rogan 1:03:06 Really?

Billy Corben 1:03:06 In Miami, we're all guilty by geography, you know? (laughs) Like we're all complicit by just virtue of proximity to c- colorful characters. Yeah, he, Marco Rubio was like 14. He wasn't in the drug trade, but his brother-in-law was a major cocaine trafficker and they lived in, uh, West Kendall in Miami-Dade, Southwest Miami-Dade in a cocaine stash house for a summer. That's like a rite of passage, like a quinceañera or bar mitzvah (laughs) in Miami. Like, "I spent the summer in my brother-in-law's cocaine stash house" by Marco Rubio. Uh, must have made a really interesting paper for, uh, (laughs) for high school, what I did with my, with my summer vacation. Um, but that's just like, that's Miami. We're all touched by this. And so let's say you say to your buddy, "Hey, listen, I want to come out and just help you unload a plane." Right? Grunt work, physical labor. What do you get? The guy says, "I'll give you $10,000 to come out, cash, tax-free. Come on." So here's a guy not really in the drug business, just comes out to do some manual labor, gets $10,000 cash. This is a guy probably making in those days about $15,000 a year on the books, taxable income. But he's getting $10,000, let's say once a month, cash, in Miami. So he's got $120,000 cash where? Stashed somewhere. Where do you even put it? Cash became like a real liability because it was just, it's so bulky and annoying. People are putting it in walls and burying it and, uh, banks are charging you a vig to deposit cash 'cause they had no fucking place to put it. And so, but you have $120,000, so people spent it. It went into everything. And that was the thing. If you weren't ad- addicted to cocaine in Miami, you were addicted to that, that money. And that's, that's the legacy too, is that hust- is, is, you know, the tech hub hustle, it's just the new cocaine.

Joe Rogan 1:04:43 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 1:04:43 It's just the new Hollywood East, never happened. It's just the new modern art hub, never happened. It's just, it's a hustle. We just, we have to subsist that way 'cause we don't have any other, any other industry.

Joe Rogan 1:04:55 Well, it also, it, it, it's the center of flossing in the country. Right? If you think about people that are just driving Lamborghinis and wearing giant rope chains, you think about Miami. Like, the, the, the culture is so flashy.

Billy Corben 1:05:10 Fake it to make it.

Joe Rogan 1:05:11 But it's, it's fake it to make it, but it's also people that have it and want you, want you to know. It's all those things, right?

Billy Corben 1:05:17 Yeah, but that's like some nouveau riche business. That's what I said.

Joe Rogan 1:05:19 Yeah. Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:05:19 People from money don't necessarily-

Joe Rogan 1:05:22 Right. No.

Billy Corben 1:05:22 ... behave. They usually don't want you to know-

Joe Rogan 1:05:24 Right.

Billy Corben 1:05:25 ... that they have money. It makes them vulnerable. It makes them targets, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:05:27 Right.

Billy Corben 1:05:27 And so they're, you know, if you're rich, you don't tell people you're rich.

Joe Rogan 1:05:30 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:05:30 If you're smart, you don't tell people you're smart.

Joe Rogan 1:05:32 I knew this guy who was, his family was ex- insanely wealth- like generational wealth, and they got mad at him when he bought a Porsche. They got mad at him. They're like, "What are you driving? What are you doing with this fucking thing?" He's like, "It's a nice car." They're like, "You fucking idiot." Like they wanted like everybody to shut the fuck up 'cause they were billionaires. They were like, "Shut the fuck up."

Billy Corben 1:05:51 I think about De Niro in Goodfellas when you say that.

Joe Rogan 1:05:53 Right.

Billy Corben 1:05:54 The cast, the woman with the-

Joe Rogan 1:05:54 The guy with the cat-

Billy Corben 1:05:55 ... the wife with the-

Joe Rogan 1:05:55 With the fucking-

Billy Corben 1:05:56 Yes, the fur coat.

Joe Rogan 1:05:56 "Get that fucking, uh, fucking take that back." (laughs)

Billy Corben 1:05:58 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:05:59 Yes, exactly. Like keep it on the DL, man. But Miami is like just universally known for being like the flashiest place in the country. I, I don't think there's a flashier place. Hollywood is not as flashy as Miami. Not even close.

Billy Corben 1:06:14 No, and it's like where people come from Hollywood also to be that ostentatious.

Joe Rogan 1:06:17 Right. Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:06:17 It's that, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:18 To get crazy.

Billy Corben 1:06:19 Yeah, it's a baller economy. It's like that's-

Joe Rogan 1:06:21 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:06:21 ... you know, that's what it is, I mean.

Joe Rogan 1:06:22 Someone told me there's more banks per capita in Miami than any other major metropolitan city.

Billy Corben 1:06:27 That was definitely true at one time, and we had probably more international branches, you know, like branches of foreign banks as well.

Joe Rogan 1:06:33 And that it was all about processing cocaine money. That was the reason why there were so many banks there.

Billy Corben 1:06:38 Yeah, I mean, listen, it's, it's not a coincidence that we're now like a, a, a Bitcoin hub, you know? Like, I mean, it's like-

Joe Rogan 1:06:43 Right.

Billy Corben 1:06:43 ... I mean, crypto cowboys will probably be my next documentary at this rate.

Joe Rogan 1:06:47 (laughs)

Billy Corben 1:06:47 I mean, like ser- like, listen, we... (laughs) It's, I'm not saying people use Bitcoin to money launder. I'm just saying-... they may use bitcoin to money launder.

Joe Rogan 1:06:55 People use bitcoin to money launder, yeah.

Billy Corben 1:06:57 Yeah. And so, first of all, I don't even know why a decentralized currency needs a hub. Isn't that the whole point, is that it's a decentralized-

Joe Rogan 1:07:02 Right.

Billy Corben 1:07:02 ... way? Why does Miami have to be a crypto hub? First of all, we don't have the electricity. We don't have the power. I guess you could use the nuclear power plant, which one of these days is gonna melt down. We have like more incidents and like-

Joe Rogan 1:07:12 Oh, is it a bad power plant?

Billy Corben 1:07:13 It's not. It... And they f- and they, like, they forge documents. We had like alarms-

Joe Rogan 1:07:17 Oh, Jesus Christ.

Billy Corben 1:07:17 ... and they... Yeah. I mean, it's... Talk about fa- fa- if- if you're, if you're gonna fake it till you make it at Turkey Point, at the fucking power, at the nuclear power plant, you got, you've got problems.

Joe Rogan 1:07:24 Are you gonna make nuclear cowboys?

Billy Corben 1:07:26 I, I... Listen-

Joe Rogan 1:07:27 (laughs)

Billy Corben 1:07:27 ... I, I hope, I hope to live long enough to make... Yeah. Like, I'm gonna start growing a tail and the, uh, the alligators don't start, you know, turning into Godzilla or whatever, but, uh...

Joe Rogan 1:07:35 Well, a lot of these older power plants, apparently... Now, th- I'm not very knowledgeable about this. But when I talk to people that are physicists, they've said that nuclear power plants can be made today and be made far more efficiently. And they're actually like very good for the environment in terms of like what you put in versus what gets out. But the older ones, like when they made them in the '60s and the '70s, he's like, "They're a real problem." And y- we saw it with Fukushima because when the backup generator went down and they, they realized, "Oh, we're fucked, like this thing's gonna melt down and there's no way to stop it." And now we have a perpetually contaminated area that will be like this way for eons. Like...

Billy Corben 1:08:18 Yeah. And ours is on the water-

Joe Rogan 1:08:20 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:08:20 ... and it's like-

Joe Rogan 1:08:21 So is Fukushima.

Billy Corben 1:08:21 Yeah. It's like dr-

Joe Rogan 1:08:22 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:08:22 Like, it, it is like Godzilla shit.

Joe Rogan 1:08:24 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:08:24 You know, there's actually, there's ac- actually this hilarious, terrible, like... I can't even call it a B movie. It's like a Z movie. It was executive produced by some Colombian drug traffickers becau- to launder their money through this movie.

Joe Rogan 1:08:34 (laughs)

Billy Corben 1:08:34 It's called Island Clause and it's about a nuclear incident that creates these aggressive, gigantic crabs that are like attacking-

Joe Rogan 1:08:43 (laughs)

Billy Corben 1:08:44 ... attacking m- like South Florida and like... And they shot it in Virginia. They shot it all over Miami. And, and that's the thing too, is like I'm not saying that everything in Miami is money laundering, but everything in Miami is, is basically money laundering. I mean, that's, that's... I mean, what else, what else do we do there? I mean, Willy and Sal, uh, Los Muchachos, the boys from Cocaine Cowboys: The Kings of Miami, they helped to start a bank with some of their high school buddies from Miami High, appropriately, Miami High. Um, they helped start a bank expressly for the purpose of drug money laundering, Sunshine State Bank. It was a drug money laundering bank. Everybody knew it. It was founded by... It was for... Expressly for that purpose.

Joe Rogan 1:09:25 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 1:09:26 And... Yeah. And they had a guy... This is funny. This is from a deleted scene. Um, they had a guy, an attorney, um, named Juan Acosta. He was very popular, let's say among Miami's nouveau riche of the late '70s and early '80s. The sudden, sudden millionaires and billionaires that we had cropping up. I mean, Willy and Sal were accused by the government of smuggling over 75 tons of cocaine worth over $2 billion with a B. And that was only what the government thought they knew about. So you can imagine. Their co-conspirators said... One of them says in the documentary, "I think it was more like 175 tons." These guys spent $25 million on their defense in their first, in their first trial. So-

Joe Rogan 1:10:04 Holy shit.

Billy Corben 1:10:05 These... Yeah. Talk about a dream team. They, they had, they had, they put OJ to shame.

Joe Rogan 1:10:08 Did they get off?

Billy Corben 1:10:10 I mean, well, you have to... It's epi- you're on episode-

Joe Rogan 1:10:12 Okay.

Billy Corben 1:10:12 ... episode three. You gotta, you gotta (laughs) -

Joe Rogan 1:10:13 (laughs)

Billy Corben 1:10:14 ... you gotta get through episode three.

Joe Rogan 1:10:15 Okay. Okay.

Billy Corben 1:10:15 But these guys had this lawyer to set up their offshore companies, you know, to kind of conceal their ill-gotten gains. Money laundering. You know, he would set up these foreign companies, particularly in Panama, which was a, at the time, a, you know, drug, uh, trafficking and laundering friendly, uh, state. In fact, we raided it bec- you know, because of that. And so, uh, they needed a man on the ground, in country to be on the corporate documents, right? As an officer, as their treasurer. So this guy, Guillermo Endara, appears on all of these, uh, corporate documents as an officer in these shell companies for drug money laundering. Then the United States of America goes and invades Panama under the guise of the war on drugs, ostensibly because Manuel Noriega, the president, was an enabler of drug trafficking, was a, you know, drug money launderer, and so we had to take him out. We brought him actually to Miami, to the Southern District of Florida to be... to go on trial for this, right? And then they... We install a new president in Panama. Who do we install? Guillermo Endara, the drug money launderer-

Joe Rogan 1:11:17 Oh my God.

Billy Corben 1:11:18 ... who is on, listed in the documents of all these cocaine traffickers-

Joe Rogan 1:11:21 Oh my God.

Billy Corben 1:11:22 ... who was their... was, was their, uh, their money launderer in Panama. The United States makes him the president of Panama.

Joe Rogan 1:11:28 Jesus Christ.

Billy Corben 1:11:29 That's a deleted scene, by the way, from our documentary.

Joe Rogan 1:11:31 Why?

Billy Corben 1:11:32 Yeah. Like, if you-

Joe Rogan 1:11:32 Why do you... Why'd you delete that?

Billy Corben 1:11:33 If you go to, to Netflix's YouTube page, you can, uh, you can see it there, but, um-

Joe Rogan 1:11:37 But why'd you take that out?

Billy Corben 1:11:38 Listen, like I, I should have called, I should have called this... Instead of Kings of Miami, we could call it like Cocaine Cowboys. We've got hours of this shit.

Joe Rogan 1:11:45 (laughs)

Billy Corben 1:11:45 I mean, 'cause like there's no... And, and you... All the crazy shit that's in the movie. And some people... Listen, I, I say that's tantamount to malpractice, cutting, cutting that out of the documentary, but you just have to... It's just time. You just have to... And you're crafting a thing. Listen, the pressure of building a six-part thing, you need... Listen, I'm always looking for the button, right? I'm doing an interview with someone. What's the last line, right?

Joe Rogan 1:12:08 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 1:12:08 You wanna leave them on a high.

Joe Rogan 1:12:09 Right.

Billy Corben 1:12:09 You know, what's the... I'm always, "What's the last line? What's the last line?" Here, I need fucking... I need six of them.

Joe Rogan 1:12:15 Right.

Billy Corben 1:12:15 Buttons. Cliffhangers. Some way to get people... I take that seriously, but... I think we've all seen documentary series that were eight hours or 10 hours and should have been three-

Joe Rogan 1:12:25 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:12:25 ... or four.

Joe Rogan 1:12:26 For sure.

Billy Corben 1:12:27 Like, we were just like-

Joe Rogan 1:12:27 The Cecil Hotel one that they did-

Billy Corben 1:12:29 It's like... I'm not gonna name names, but you know.

Joe Rogan 1:12:30 Yeah. There's been a few of those-

Billy Corben 1:12:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:12:32 ... where they, they... You go, "Oh, I see what you're doing here."

Billy Corben 1:12:33 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:12:33 "You just... You got contracted to do four of these and you really-

Billy Corben 1:12:36 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:12:36 ... should have done one."

Billy Corben 1:12:36 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:12:37 Yeah.

Billy Corben 1:12:37 And so they're being a little bit more... The buyers are being more vigilant about that.

Joe Rogan 1:12:41 Mm-hmm.

Billy Corben 1:12:41 Because there was a mo- there was a moment where it was like... 'Cause the first Cocaine Cowboys documentary was four hours long and then I had to cut it down-

Joe Rogan 1:12:47 Gosh.

Billy Corben 1:12:47 ... because there was no market.

Joe Rogan 1:12:48 You should go back to-

Billy Corben 1:12:48 But there was-

Joe Rogan 1:12:49 ... make it four hours again.

Billy Corben 1:12:50 Well, I gen- I did Cocaine Cowboys Reloaded in 2014, which is two and a half hours, if you've