441: Jillian Michaels—Keeping It (Very) Real

Jillian Michaels is a renowned fitness expert, television personality, podcaster, and bestselling author known most for her role on The Biggest Loser. She has built a global brand around health, wellness, and personal empowerment through fitness.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:03Mike Rowe?

  Well, if you want it real, you're in the right place. Uh, this is the way I heard it. My guest is Jillian Michaels. You know her from, well, God knows. I mean, she's been around everywhere.

• 0:11Speaker 01

  The Biggest Loser.

• 0:12Mike Rowe?

  Yeah.

• 0:13Speaker 01

  You know, her podcast, Keeping It Real.

• 0:15Mike Rowe?

  Hmm, so many things.

• 0:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:17Mike Rowe?

  She is a bundle of energy, uh, intelligence, uh, charm and wit. In fact, this episode is called Keeping It Very Real because we kind of go all over the place and we say some things that, well, you know, they're real.

• 0:30Speaker 01

  In her words, uh, she's going to destroy your algorithm.

• 0:33Mike Rowe?

  Yeah.

• 0:33Speaker 01

  On YouTube.

• 0:33Mike Rowe?

  Yeah, yeah. Apparently you say some certain things on YouTube and you get penalized. I don't know about all that, but she warned me and we talked about them anyway, so. Hey, that's gonna happen. Um, you're gonna love her. If you think you know her, maybe you already do. I was so surprised that I hadn't come across her before, you know?

• 0:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:51Mike Rowe?

  She's just, you know, she and I both sort of occupy a lot of the same space and it's just, it was really great to meet her and get to chat.

• 0:58Speaker 01

  Super nice person, too. I just, very cheerful, upbeat and, uh, just full of energy.

• 1:04Mike Rowe?

  And generous.

• 1:04Speaker 01

  And opinionated.

• 1:05Mike Rowe?

  Very opinionated, very generous. You know, she's frustrated with a lot of things, a lot of people are frustrated with. Certainly if you live in California, you're gonna be commiserating with a lot of this. If you're frustrated by not quite knowing which expert to believe when it comes to your cholesterol, or what to eat, what not to eat, or how to feel about the tariffs, or any number of things, you will be commiserating. You might also be wondering how many times I can misspeak. I know Chuck is. You were shaking your head throughout this.

• 1:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was keeping track. Uh, a few things, uh, you know, we settled on, actually, I got this wrong because I said that there were only seven permits in California issued after the wildfires to rebuild. In fact, as of today, there are 12 permits that have been awarded to 155 people who applied.

• 1:52Mike Rowe?

  Okay, boring, nobody cares, next.

• 1:54Speaker 01

  Uh, well, Edward Ring is the Director of Water and Energy Policy at the California Policy Center. I don't know what you said he was.

• 2:01Mike Rowe?

  Okay, boring, nobody cares, except Ed Ring, next.

• 2:04Speaker 01

  Okay, uh, the title of the wildfires in LA documentary that you mentioned from the ...60s was called Design for Disaster.

• 2:12Mike Rowe?

  Right.

• 2:13Speaker 01

  That's coming up.

• 2:14Mike Rowe?

  From the 60s, nobody cares now.

• 2:15Speaker 01

  Okay, one more thing. Mike Albrecht is the president of the American Loggers Council.

• 2:21Mike Rowe?

  What did I say?

• 2:22Speaker 01

  I think you said National Loggers Council, and you know I'm a pedant.

• 2:24Mike Rowe?

  Oh, God, you really are a pedant. All right, well, thankfully Chuck won't be interrupting too much during our conversation. He's got that off his chest, I've got it off mine. Jillian Michaels is here, and she's keeping it very real. You'll see, right after this.

• 2:42Mike Rowe?

  I'd like to talk about initiative, if I could, for just a moment. Here at MicroWorks, we value it a great deal. In fact, it's the most important quality we look for in our work ethic scholarship applicants. But everybody wants it. I'm talking about the quality in a lift driver that inspires him or her to carry your bags to the door without even asking, or the grocery clerk who shows you where an item is on the shelves, or a doctor who personally calls you to explain your test results. If you're hiring, you want to encourage initiative because it's invaluable. And ZipRecruiter has a way to allow a candidate to tell you, in their own words, why they're interested in your job, not just why they're qualified, but why they're interested.

• 3:27Mike Rowe?

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• 4:09Mike Rowe?

  Your match at ZipRecruiter. Try it free.

• 4:21Mike Rowe?

  I'm just thinking, like, if we did the six degrees of separation, or like the Venn diagrams, you and I probably know like a thousand of the same people.

• 4:30Speaker 02

  I would bet, yeah.

• 4:31Mike Rowe?

  We were just saying off air a second ago, it's like, how have we not, like, we've been in this game, in this town, sort of, we're adjacent to it for decades.

• 4:41Speaker 02

  I don't know, but I was so excited when I was, I mentioned to you, when I got the pod request, I thought it was fake. I was like, okay, sure. Why don't you call my publicist?

• 4:53Mike Rowe?

  Yeah.

• 4:55Speaker 02

  I just thought, oh, you know, he would never want me on his show. I was so excited.

• 4:59Mike Rowe?

  Well, look, it's totally rational, because there's so much bull crap going on, like, in general. I mean, we don't even, never mind the deep fakes and all the other things, but there's somebody, Chuck, what's his name, the guy who's impersonating the producer of this podcast?

• 5:14Speaker 01

  Oh, I've already forgotten. It's like two first names, like Daniel, Jason, or something like that. I'm getting it wrong.

• 5:20Mike Rowe?

  Thousands of requests go out.

• 5:22Speaker 02

  Right.

• 5:23Mike Rowe?

  Right? And people, maybe there's a book to sell, or a documentary to hawk, or maybe, I mean, where everybody's involved in something. So like, the cat's out of the bag. If you can get on a podcast with a decent audience, right?

• 5:35Speaker 02

  Yep, 100%.

• 5:36Mike Rowe?

  So, I don't know how the scam really works, but actually, I do. Once people start the conversation, then it's a simple question of, oh, we want to pay to fly you in, right? We'll get your hotel room, just send us your routing information, right?

• 5:51Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 5:52Mike Rowe?

  Like, after three or four back and forth, and then the next thing you know, yeah, you're thanked for 20 or 30 grand. It happens all the time.

• 6:00Speaker 02

  That's crazy.

• 6:01Mike Rowe?

  I know.

• 6:01Speaker 02

  I did get a fake one for Lewis Howes.

• 6:05Mike Rowe?

  Oh, yeah.

• 6:05Speaker 02

  And...

• 6:06Mike Rowe?

  Is that the art of greatness?

• 6:08Speaker 02

  I think Howes, I have frigging, he's got a huge show, I'm ashamed to say.

• 6:13Mike Rowe?

  I know.

• 6:13Speaker 02

  Something like that. And my business partner flushed it out, and he was like, I'm sorry to tell you, Lewis Howes does not want you on his podcast. I was like, oh, okay. But that's why I had thought, I was like, it's not, this can't be real. And so I was quite pleased to find out it was.

• 6:29Mike Rowe?

  To learn that I'm legitimate. That doesn't mean that anything good is going to come of this, but you're here. And we're gonna talk until you can't stand it anymore.

• 6:37Speaker 02

  Perfect.

• 6:38Mike Rowe?

  Full disclosure, my, I don't know what your prep routine is like, or if you even have one. But when I'm down here in LA, normally what'll happen is Chuck will say, okay, so and so's coming in, and I'll get up early and I'll put in my headset and I'll like walk down PCH, which by the way is still closed. What the actual hell is going on there?

• 6:55Speaker 02

  It's gonna be closed for years. I did just have a talk with Corolla, who I'm gonna guess you know.

• 7:01Mike Rowe?

  Oh, yeah.

• 7:01Speaker 02

  Cause you guys have so many similarities and he's

• 7:04Mike Rowe?

  He's pissed.

• 7:04Speaker 02

  He is pissed and he's been doing these vlogs along the PCH, but he says that there are some pretty competent people in there now that are privately contracted, but that are getting some of the cleanup done. I'll be amazed if people can get building permits because

• 7:22Mike Rowe?

  This is the Pacific Coast Highway, for those of you who live in saner parts of the world. This is the beautiful chunk of asphalt that runs up and down through Malibu, where I believe you used to live as well.

• 7:33Speaker 02

  I had two homes in Malibu over the past couple of decades. So one I lost in the Woolsey fire, which was 2018. And that took me a year to get a permit to clean up the catastrophe, just to do the cleanup. And it was so daunting that I couldn't even fathom a rebuild and ended up selling the property, which is what I think the hope is.

• 7:55Mike Rowe?

  Yeah.

• 7:55Speaker 02

  But you know, we don't need to go down this rabbit hole, wrap ourselves in tinfoil at another time. But nevertheless, I can't think of another reason why you would make it so hellish. But nevertheless, the home that I sold in 2021 was on Pacific Coast Highway directly. The other one was across from Zuma Beach, half a mile in from the coast.

• 8:13Mike Rowe?

  First place, first part of the ocean I ever jumped into, first time I ever came to California with that knucklehead who I went to high school with. We went up there to surf, remember? What's his name? Oh, yeah, Matt Walker. Matt Walker. And I just was like, this?

• 8:30Mike Rowe?

  I mean, we're gonna say some hard things about California, I'm sure.

• 8:32Speaker 02

  Oh, I can't wait. Or Newsome. I'll say hard things about Newsome. I love the people. I love the state. I hate the governor and the way that the place is run.

• 8:39Mike Rowe?

  But for so many people, like I, everybody in my life who knows me and understands kind of what I've done and more or less where I'm coming from, when they, here I live in California, they just look at me like a cow.

• 8:50Speaker 02

  You have ten heads.

• 8:50Mike Rowe?

  Looking at a new gate, right? They're just like, why? And then when they learn I'm up in the Bay Area, it's like.

• 8:55Speaker 02

  Even worse.

• 8:56Mike Rowe?

  Right. And so.

• 8:57Speaker 02

  Crazy town.

• 8:58Mike Rowe?

  I just feel, every now and then, I need to say something that is screamingly obvious, which is, this is a geographically magical and unmatched place. Its appeal can't be, can't be understated. In particular, that specific component of its appeal. It is universal, global, far-reaching. Brought you here.

• 9:20Speaker 02

  Well, I grew up here.

• 9:21Mike Rowe?

  Kept you here for a while.

• 9:22Speaker 02

  It surely did, until the politics of the state drove me from my home. And we moved to Miami for three years. It became an issue with family and some work obligations. So we ended up buying in Jackson, Wyoming, because it's an hour and a half out. I can get in and out of LA quickly if I need to. And it was begrudging. I didn't move for years. You're absolutely right. Paying 13.3% state income tax.

• 9:49Mike Rowe?

  Frog in the boiling water. A little more, a little more, a little more, a little more.

• 9:52Speaker 02

  Exactly. And now it's, I think, going up to 14.4. And now you have a mansion tax, highest sales tax in the country. But you suck it up, because it is so beautiful here.

• 10:02Mike Rowe?

  It's a toll, like all the bridges in the state. There's a toll attached to it. But man, oh man, it's gotten high. And I don't want us just to, you know, a couple of people who have done well in their chosen field bitching about the money. No one, deep down, cares about that. What you said before is interesting. Was it really the politics that drove you out, or was it the policies?

• 10:23Speaker 02

  Interesting, both. Make a very good point. It was both. The policies are insane. And it's not that I don't mind paying the money. It's the fact that we pay the most in California and get the least from the state. It's not like education is tremendous. It's not. It's not like healthcare is tremendous. It's not. Try walking into an emergency room. You'll sit there for eight hours unless you've been shot in the temple. I mean, it does not run well. I could be wrong, but the one fell into the ocean a few years back. And I was just up in Napa for my wife's birthday and all the people up there told me that it's still not fixed.

• 10:59Mike Rowe?

  Right.

• 11:00Speaker 02

  So I, you know, I haven't fact-checked this one, but it's not hard to believe. You're like, well, that makes perfect sense. Why would it be fixed? You know, we spent 24 billion on a homelessness crisis to lose the money and have the problem become worse. It's bonkers.

• 11:13Mike Rowe?

  I look at it like misplaced urgency. The things, the policies that seem so rooted in urgency seem so inconsequential in a relative way. The ones that seem like, ball's on fire. Let's fix this now.

• 11:34Mike Rowe?

  What is it? Four permits have been pulled since the fire? This is what's making Corolla go out of his mind.

• 11:39Speaker 01

  I think they're up to seven now.

• 11:41Speaker 02

  Seven? Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. That's helpful. I appreciate that. That does change my perspective quite a bit. I think that's by design. I'm sorry, I can't fathom a level of incompetence.

• 11:53Mike Rowe?

  Well, let me tell you what I mean by it. I was listening to, since you brought him up, our governor. I forget who he was talking to. Maybe, maybe it was Dave Rubin. I don't know. But it was this, uh, he's doing his podcast now, right? And he's bringing on voices from the other side in this kind of, I don't know.

• 12:13Speaker 02

  Aren't I moderate? Look at me wanting to bridge the gap.

• 12:17Mike Rowe?

  Let's have a detente, shall we? Let's just have a little perestroika in our conversation and let's, I'll hear you, you'll hear me. And what struck me was when he said, he was talking about the fact, the undisputable fact that Afghanistan and India and Brazil and down the list of countries who are able to count millions and millions of votes in a day. Right, we can't count. It takes four weeks. And on the one hand, he admits that that is unforgivable. That's a problem. The right has a great point. But nowhere in the conversation is, oh, yeah, right, I'm the governor.

• 12:57Speaker 02

  Nope.

• 12:57Mike Rowe?

  Maybe I'll fix that. It's that's not there. And that's what I mean when I'm like, well, where's the urgency in this? And I can't find it.

• 13:06Speaker 02

  I really do think it's by design, though. When he turns around and says, it's going to be different next time. Next time you have a fire, we have a fire every friggin' six months. I mean, Northern Malibu just burned down. The only thing that stopped it from getting completely wiped out from the Palisades fire was the burn scar from the fire that happened a few months before.

• 13:27Mike Rowe?

  The natural fire road.

• 13:29Speaker 02

  Exactly. Like, this man had a bill on his desk that had passed all the legislative bodies in California. It was called AB 2330 for Forestry Management, and he vetoed it. That's not an accident. That's not a lack of urgency. That's on purpose. You know for a fact that whether or not you have 100 mile an hour winds, you can mitigate what is causing the fire and you can improve how you fight it. So what could be causing it? Well, meth addicts lighting fires, we know that. And 100-year-old equipment from our gas and electric company?

• 14:07Speaker 02

  I mean, my fire was caused due to a $10 hook that was over 100 years old. PG&E broke, started the Wolseley fire. That actually was, I believe, the worst fire in California's history. Nothing changed. He didn't hold PG&E accountable because they were one of the top contributors to his gubernatorial campaign, and in fact, utilized their firm to negotiate a lawsuit, or I'm sorry, to settle a lawsuit with victims of the fire. And their settlement, in order for them to reap any benefit, was tied to the profitability of PG&E. The person who speaks most eloquently about this is actually Anna Kasparian, who is arguably

• 14:52Speaker 02

  More angry than me about it, which I didn't even think would be possible, but

• 14:55Mike Rowe?

  There's a lot of anger.

• 14:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, that's by design. He's paid to do that. It's not a lack of urgency. He's getting paid to not hold them accountable, not make them invest in the infrastructure, to wipe out the bill for forestry management. He is, as Adam puts it, a sociopath. I really believe it. I really believe it, Mike.

• 15:16Mike Rowe?

  There has to be a political reckoning for sure, and these conversations have to happen. But I'll tell you what, I landed here the day the fire started and watched it unfold in slow motion. In fact, I was at the Huntley Hotel upstairs in the penthouse

• 15:31Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 15:32Mike Rowe?

  Looking right

• 15:32Speaker 02

  Bird's eye view.

• 15:33Mike Rowe?

  In your direction, next to people who were watching their homes burn.

• 15:37Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:38Mike Rowe?

  One of whom had their pets still in the house.

• 15:39Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 15:40Mike Rowe?

  Right? And so it was an incredibly long, strange day that got exponentially weirder and weirder and more horrifying

• 15:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 15:49Mike Rowe?

  as it went. I wound up staying down here for three or four days after that, just because, you know, we were adjacent to it. And I just, I was so frustrated, but the first guest that I called, who would be terrific on your pod, was Edward Ring.

• 16:05Speaker 02

  I don't know Edward Ring.

• 16:06Mike Rowe?

  Runs the, was it California Policy?

• 16:08Speaker 01

  California Policy Center. He doesn't run it. He was the first president of it.

• 16:11Mike Rowe?

  He was the first president, yeah. Yeah, Will Swaim's doing it now.

• 16:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:13Mike Rowe?

  And these guys are coming from, sure, there's a political bent, but fundamentally, it's forest management and water management. And 20 years of just a steady, steady, steady, it's coming, it's coming. I don't know if you saw this, but there's a, there's an old black and white documentary that got a lot of

• 16:33Speaker 02

  No, I didn't.

• 16:35Mike Rowe?

  Later, Google, Designed for Disaster, I think it's called, and it's the Beverly Hills Fire back in the early 60s. It's the same thing.

• 16:45Speaker 02

  I don't know anything about it.

• 16:46Mike Rowe?

  That's because you're such a young pup.

• 16:47Speaker 02

  Oh, that would be me, yeah.

• 16:49Mike Rowe?

  And so well-preserved and so youthful.

• 16:51Speaker 02

  Well-preserved, I'll pretend. Young pup, not quite. Maybe just ignorant to this one, which I'm ashamed of. But I appreciate you laying it at the feet of my youthfulness. I'll take it 100%. I knew there was a reason I wanted to meet you, Mike.

• 17:04Mike Rowe?

  There's no new ideas. There's no new tragedies. It's just a wheel. And I feel like, you know, I'm older than I've ever been. And every time I look around, this little doc on YouTube presages this exact event, this exact confluence of circumstances from the wind to the low humidity to the Santa Anas to the time of year. You can almost set your watch by it. And so watching that as this was happening made me call Ed Ring. And he came on and said a lot of smart things. And that, to me, is what we need to hear. Also, Mike Albrecht, the guy runs the National Timber Council. He sat right here. And he blew people's minds with non-political facts. For instance, a third of this country is forest land. A third.

• 17:49Mike Rowe?

  Most people don't know it because the planes really don't fly over it. We fly over the plains. Plains are over the plains. You look out your window, you just see these vast, open spaces. A third of this country is timber. It's rotting and it's burning because it's not being managed properly. Now, that's galling in and of itself. But then you learn that the United States is the leading importer of timber. You learn that California imports 80% of the timber that it needs. And it has more timber than virtually anyplace else. So that's when I come back to the urgent thing. And I'm like, look, like, a fire is a great metaphor. Because when the flames are happening and you're the fire department,

• 18:34Mike Rowe?

  you've got to put the water... Where the heat is, right? And we're not doing that. And I know I'm preaching to the choir, but we can move on. But any final thoughts on like, what has to happen?

• 18:46Speaker 02

  We need new leadership here. I'm sorry, there were a million things that could have been done differently and they weren't. And Mike, I appreciate, you know, we need urgency, but I really do think that it has to do with special interests influencing the people in charge here. I really do.

• 19:05Mike Rowe?

  When did you become, were you always vocal politically? I know you've always been vocal, but like my experience of Jillian Michaels out there in the, in the ether is a category expert with a lot of passion, a big heart and a stubborn streak.

• 19:24Speaker 02

  For sure.

• 19:25Mike Rowe?

  So.

• 19:27Speaker 02

  How did this happen?

• 19:27Mike Rowe?

  I'll ask you the question, I get so, so, so, so much. When did you veer so inexplicably out of your lane, Mrs. Michaels?

• 19:34Speaker 02

  Wow, I love that. You get that question though?

• 19:36Mike Rowe?

  All the time.

• 19:36Speaker 02

  Oh, I'm surprised. I don't, I've always, never mind, I have always seen you in this capacity.

• 19:42Mike Rowe?

  When someone likes you and then hears you say something they disagree with, it's almost impossible for them to not share their disappointment with you.

• 19:51Speaker 02

  Interesting.

• 19:52Mike Rowe?

  I'm so disappointed to learn that.

• 19:54Speaker 02

  I have gotten that some, but I've also conversely gotten, I'm so glad you said something.

• 20:02Mike Rowe?

  Sure.

• 20:02Speaker 02

  Thank you for saying something. No, I was never political because health was never political and the things I cared about, like houses burning down and people not being able to get fire insurance and having their lives decimated by natural disasters weren't political or rather apolitical. I mean, they were like bipartisan, everybody cared, whether it was political, like if it's political, both sides cared, yeah.

• 20:29Mike Rowe?

  Fire doesn't care.

• 20:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, like this is, wouldn't somebody on the right and somebody on the left want to save people's homes and livelihoods? Wouldn't you want your constituents to be healthy? So. Given that, over the course of, honestly, I think the past 10 years, we've seen everything become a political football, in particular, MySpace, which is health. And when we started to have these psy-ops, like, you can be healthy at any size, and there's no such thing as biological sex, and it's perfectly fair for a biological male to compete against a biological female. There's no differences. This is when you just go, hold on.

• 21:15Speaker 02

  There's right and there's wrong. And I have to say something.

• 21:20Mike Rowe?

  Because you feel like those issues are either right down the middle of where you live, or adjacent enough to not be ignored.

• 21:28Speaker 02

  Absolutely, 100%. And somebody has to say something. So, here's another interesting component, is when you are medicalizing gender dysphoria in children, right? I'm gay, so I kind of hold a card in your little acronym that still makes no sense to me.

• 21:49Mike Rowe?

  Well, you can certainly have a seat at the table.

• 21:50Speaker 02

  Right? So, I'm a mom. I also work in the health space. I've spent the last 10 years interviewing MDs and PhDs, so I have some understanding about what would happen if you interrupt puberty, or the side effects of cancer drugs, especially when used off-label in perfectly healthy teenagers. And you can't call me a transphobe, although people are, because I have a record of fighting for rights for this community.

• 22:17Mike Rowe?

  This is my point. Now you're out of your lane. Not because of your opinion, but because your opinion runs counter to another deeply held opinion by somebody who's got, in their minds, a lot more skin in the game.

• 22:33Mike Rowe?

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• 23:15Mike Rowe?

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• 23:59Mike Rowe?

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• 24:15Speaker 02

  I would argue I have far more credentials than the majority of those people. And the experts are not actually experts. And in fact, the biggest...

• 24:27Speaker 02

  The biggest advocates for this is a group called the WPATH. And they're like, we're the world authority on transgender medicine and gender-affirming care. And Mike Schellenberger did an incredible expose called the WPATH files, where he, through FOIA requests and whistleblowers, exposed that these guys knew what they were doing to these kids, that the kids didn't comprehend and the parents didn't comprehend. They would be sterilized forever. They would never have an orgasm, that there were significant risks to bone development and brain development. They couldn't comprehend the choices. And they lied about it.

• 25:10Speaker 02

  It's a billion-dollar business, first of all, and then there is an ideology that people fight for. But now we have pretty good evidence through something called the CAS review, which was a systemic review.

• 25:23Mike Rowe?

  CAS?

• 25:24Speaker 02

  Yes, yes. A pediatrician by the name of Dr. CAS at the United Kingdom, who worked for the Royal Academy of Pediatrics, one of the best pediatricians in Europe, arguably, did an independent, she was tapped by the government to do a meta-analysis, a systemic review of all the different studies on gender-affirming care. It took her four years to do it. The poor woman has subsequently gone into hiding. I can't even get her for an interview because she was so attacked and destroyed. But nevertheless, due to the results of her research, all of Europe was like, hmm, let's, ooh, let's pull back on this. But here in the States, the WPATH argued that she was wrong. And of course, guess who funds them?

• 26:07Speaker 02

  I don't want to say it on your show because I don't want it to get choked out, but, you know, the drug companies fund them.

• 26:14Mike Rowe?

  Okay. Oh, right. And you were saying earlier, it's like, so people's eyes now start to glaze over a little bit.

• 26:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 26:21Mike Rowe?

  When we start talking about Big Pharma.

• 26:22Speaker 02

  And then your algorithm will.

• 26:24Mike Rowe?

  This fascinates me. I don't care.

• 26:27Speaker 02

  It'll get choked out.

• 26:28Mike Rowe?

  I think it's important, though.

• 26:31Mike Rowe?

  I was saying earlier, when I'm walking and I'm listening to you interview Bill O'Reilly, of all people.

• 26:37Speaker 02

  I know.

• 26:37Mike Rowe?

  How the hell are you interviewing Bill O'Reilly, I think? But I listened to it.

• 26:40Speaker 02

  Because I don't understand tariffs and I want to.

• 26:43Mike Rowe?

  Well, it was a great conversation. And the thing that struck me as you were trying to figure out all of the wonky economic stuff. Because, right, most people today, regardless of what lane they're in, are frustrated because our world is populated with experts on a given topic that don't agree with each other.

• 27:07Speaker 02

  I know.

• 27:08Mike Rowe?

  And what does a rational guy do when the experts can't come to a consensus? Now, maybe it's about climate change, maybe it's about conception, life, maybe it's about the ethical treatment of animals, maybe it's, you just go down the list of things. If the experts can't agree, what are the rest of us to do? So Bill O'Reilly comes on your show to try and explain the nature of these tariffs, which is so interesting to me. And you expressed, as an avatar for your audience, the kind of frustration most of us would feel when we run headlong into a buzzsaw full of contradictory facts.

• 27:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, completely.

• 27:46Mike Rowe?

  But as I'm listening to it, I'm thinking, but that's what's happening in health, too.

• 27:52Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 27:53Mike Rowe?

  Most people who are just trying to live, look at the back of a box of cereals and say, what the actual hell does this even mean? I can't pronounce half of the words. And how come this one says statins will save my life and this one says they're gonna kill me? And how come everybody I have now, all my friends over 60, are getting conflicting advice.

• 28:13Speaker 02

  I know.

• 28:14Mike Rowe?

  About what to do. Oh, the HDL, the this, the this. So everywhere I turn, and this is why I thought that conversation on your podcast was important, not because it was about tariffs, because it was about this overwhelming, ongoing talking past each other, because we got no experts to help us anymore, it seems.

• 28:36Speaker 02

  The experts are often conflicted, and I don't mean due to some nefarious corruption, but people do root themselves firmly in their ideological positions, and they, I mean, cholesterol being a big one, obviously, and they hold that ground as tightly as possible. They're not... They're not attached to outcomes. They're attached to being right.

• 29:01Mike Rowe?

  Dogma. They're certain.

• 29:03Speaker 02

  Exactly. So, the first thing I want to know is, what is your dogma? What is your incentive to prove a point? Is it to get to an end result? Is it to truly explain what's going on? Is it to find real answers? Or is it to prove, "See, we told you Trump was a bad guy and you voted for this. Look what you did. Look at the economy." And I'm like, nah, you have Trump arrangement syndrome. I'm not buying it. He's not friggin' deluded. I don't buy it. He's been saying this for decades. We've all seen this clip of him on Oprah explaining...

• 29:32Mike Rowe?

  1988.

• 29:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, explaining the asymmetries in trade and the need to not export our manufacturing and to have national security of being able to produce our own drugs and our own chips and our own technology. Like, there's a reason he's doing it. You'd have to be an idiot to think there wasn't. Now, the question becomes, what's his end goal? Is he going about it the right way? Is there a pain point while he'll reverse course? Or what should we be doing? How should we take this information and make the best choices for ourselves? And you've got to find somebody that isn't fully entrenched in their dogma, that is also an expert, though that does matter. So...

• 30:11Mike Rowe?

  It's why I asked you before, is it politics or policy?

• 30:14Speaker 02

  It's both.

• 30:15Mike Rowe?

  Are we capable of looking at an idea, or a concept, or a claim, separate and apart from the bad orange man, separate and apart from the old man that preceded him, and take our feelings about those people and set them aside? And try and approach it with something like a scientific method? I'm just still stuck with the idea that what's the point in getting a second opinion? If you know for a fact, it's going to gainsay the first opinion. And when you know where the opinions live, what's to stop the average confused person from simply going to get the opinion that they secretly want to hear in the first place?

• 30:49Speaker 02

  You're absolutely right about that.

• 30:50Mike Rowe?

  That's your confirmation bias, right?

• 30:51Speaker 02

  You're absolutely right about that. I've seen it work. For somebody and against them. You know who it worked for? This is interesting and arguably irrelevant to our conversation, but I found it fascinating. It was Tony Robbins had the tumor. I believe it was on his pituitary.

• 31:07Mike Rowe?

  The growth.

• 31:09Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 31:09Mike Rowe?

  The gigantism.

• 31:10Speaker 02

  Exactly. And everybody was like, you're gonna die, you're gonna die, you're gonna die. And he just kept going to doctors until he found one that said, leave it, you'll be fine. And then he was, no, I don't, I don't think that's great advice. I'm not advocating the two eggs, you know, or a tumor in your brain. However, I think it does say something to the effect that you need to defer to your common sense and your gut instincts about something. So there's a PhD who I happen to love in nutrition science by the name of Lane Norton. And he just goes out there and tears into everybody. And the reason that I ended up becoming friendly with him is because he tore into me about protein intake.

• 31:51Speaker 02

  And what I said when we got in our initial fight was you're not really tearing into me, you're tearing into these other five PhDs and the American Medical Association. That's the advice that I'm giving. I love him 90% of the time, but he'll tell you, there's no data that says artificial sweeteners are bad. And this is the part where I, I just think, Lane, you, we gotta default to common sense here. Powders, synthetic powders that are made in these crazy factories. There's no universe where I want to pretend like that's healthy. I just, common sense dictates to me that it's not.

• 32:27Mike Rowe?

  Well, where's the duty of care? Like, why do I have to prove that something that seems so logically nefarious isn't? Why don't you have to prove that something that seems so unproven is actually good? I mean, you could ask the same question about any new medicine, any, any new vaccine. And now here we go.

• 32:47Speaker 02

  Well, because I'm gonna destroy your, I'm going to kill this show right now. And I swore I wouldn't do it.

• 32:53Mike Rowe?

  Don't worry.

• 32:53Speaker 02

  I'm gonna get five views. The, you know, the issue.

• 32:57Mike Rowe?

  I'll take them.

• 32:57Speaker 02

  Is the, is the.

• 32:58Mike Rowe?

  Who specifically are these five?

• 33:00Speaker 02

  Matters.

• 33:01Mike Rowe?

  That's four more than I remember.

• 33:03Speaker 02

  A few really dedicated subscribers that will like seek out the show the day that it drops. But the the algorithm will just push it right off of a cliff. And the truth of the matter is that our the three letter, I'm going to try to word in such a way where hopefully the three letter agencies that are responsible for regulating this are captured. And the chemicals like artificial sweeteners fall under the grass rule, which is the generally recognized as safe rule. And this is a loophole within the FDA that allows food companies to vouch for the safety of the chemicals. And the FDA just goes, yeah, cool. In almost every other country of the developed world,

• 33:49Speaker 02

  9,000 plus of those chemicals of the 10,000 that are in our food are banned. So this is where, you know, you got to say to people, common sense, you know, if it wasn't around 1,000 years ago, 500 years ago, you know, 100 years ago. It's probably not great for you. And what's the downside of you not consuming it like? So if I'm wrong, and let's just say artificial sweeteners are perfectly safe. Is there any downside to you not consuming them if I got it wrong? What's it going to cost you? Nothing. But if I'm right and you're consuming them unknowingly

• 34:31Speaker 02

  and you're drinking five different diet sodas a day and you're putting it in your coffee and it's in your sugar free treats and it could potentially be bad. And the cumulative effect of all these chemicals, it's very difficult to isolate one of these things. You really can't do it. And when I talk to the different doctors and the different PhDs that come on my podcast, why is early onset cancer diagnoses up 79% over the last two decades? You can't answer it because you cannot isolate. Is it the plastics? Is it the 10,000 chemicals in the food? Is it the frigging pesticides, herbicides and fungicides that are being sprayed on the crops? Is it the fact that the crops are genetically engineered? Is it the vaccines? You could look at all of it together. You can't isolate these things.

• 35:16Speaker 02

  It's probably all of them.

• 35:19Mike Rowe?

  Yeah. And just the sheer tonnage of it for the average person. So it's back to my earlier point. The average concerned, responsible person wants.

• 35:29Mike Rowe?

  A workable understanding of tariffs to the point where at a cocktail party, they can form an opinion, articulate it, and then have another hors d'oeuvre and get on with their life. I think the same is true with, should I eat that instead of that? We can't even seem to agree on keto. We can't seem to find a consensus.

• 35:49Speaker 02

  I feel like I can answer that one for you, should you want an answer?

• 35:52Mike Rowe?

  Yeah, of course I do.

• 35:53Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 35:55Mike Rowe?

  Or just high protein, low carbs.

• 35:57Speaker 02

  Honestly, high protein, high fiber is pretty good. As long as you're not overeating your calories, you're not going to get too much protein. And people really aren't. So with that said, the bigger issue is that we're not getting enough protein, especially women. But the thing with keto is it's an elimination diet. In other words, if you can say, well, we've had improvement in autoimmune conditions and we've had improvement in type 2 diabetes and we've seen a lowering of body weight. Well, sure, because we removed all of the garbage that you put in your body. However, we threw the baby out with the bathwater.

• 36:38Mike Rowe?

  What's the baby?

• 36:39Speaker 02

  The baby would be organic blueberries, pomegranate seeds, purple potatoes. There's a great doctor by the name of Dr. William Lee, who is also a scientist and looks at the ways in which food can cure disease. And this man is credentialed to do so. He's brilliant. He's written numerous books. I've had him on my podcast a bunch of times. And he wrote a book called Eat to Beat Disease. And he looks at, for example, the ways in which pomegranates can help grow a microbe in your gut called acromancia. And studies have shown that when your acromancia is completely depleted from, let's say, one Z-Pak and not replenished, it makes you more susceptible to different types of cancer.

• 37:24Speaker 02

  So now you're on keto and you're not eating the frigging purple potatoes that can help fight colon cancer and the pomegranate seeds which can help boost acromancia in the gut. So it really is a continuum. It's an elimination diet that is far better than. You going to the fast food drive through every single day. But there's a robust amount of data for, you know, when you get into carnivore for fiber. There's more data around the health benefits of fiber than saturated fat. There just is. And we know for a fact that fruits and vegetables, unless you have some sort of food allergy, have tons of nutrients in them that boost your overall health and wellness. So we do know these things.

• 38:09Speaker 02

  We do.

• 38:10Mike Rowe?

  Are we going to come back to a balanced diet? Is that basically what you're espousing?

• 38:14Speaker 02

  I would. I always do. There is no Jillian Michaels diet. I don't sell a diet. It really is common sense. Eat whole foods. Don't overeat. Try to remove chemicals as often as possible. Get a frigging water filter. Get an air filter. Focus on getting your sleep and move your body as often as you can. But at the very least, have a step goal. Do a little bit of strength training. That's 90% of it. The rest is baloney. And even if it isn't baloney, like, I'm sorry, I'm watching all of these really, and I don't mean to crap on anybody and I won't say names and they could be right. You know, I like.

• 38:52Mike Rowe?

  Look, you already screwed the algorithm. Crap on them. Nobody's listening.

• 38:55Speaker 02

  Like, you know, methylene blue. Oh, my God, the synthetic dye is God's gift. Yeah. And I'm just thinking, you know, like my grandparents who like that didn't smoke, lived to be quite old and they, it wasn't because, you know, they had a methylene blue. So in other words, like I, at the moment I am 51. I am perfectly healthy.

• 39:21Mike Rowe?

  You look fantastic.

• 39:22Speaker 02

  You're very kind. You're very kind. I do.

• 39:23Mike Rowe?

  I mean, for people who aren't watching, if, if the evidence demands a verdict and if what you're screaming has any efficacy at all, then you got to put yourself out there as some measure of proof.

• 39:33Speaker 02

  I hope so. Honestly, one would hope so. I've said that for years. I'm like, when do I get credit now for being 51? And not saying, oh, menopause has gesticulated me. I couldn't keep the weight off. I, I couldn't, you know, I, mind you, I mean, I'm, I don't know. I, I'm sure I'm experiencing perimenopause on some level, but I haven't knew the symptoms of it.

• 39:52Mike Rowe?

  Well, I didn't want to say anything. No, of course not. Look.

• 39:57Speaker 02

  You know, I would hope that I would be my own testimonial to a certain extent.

• 40:00Mike Rowe?

  And you are. But the reason it's interesting is that we're living in a state now where like, once upon a time, no. No one possessed of rational thought would take health advice from a morbidly obese practitioner. But today we do because something happened in our brains that convinced us it would be rude to hold that person to the very standard that they're suggesting we embrace. Now, that, that's crazy town, but we have entered it. We must be this tall to get on the ride and we are, right?

• 40:39Mike Rowe?

  So it's, the compliment I mean to pay is that it's refreshing to see somebody walk the walk and bring the receipts. What you're doing is clearly working.

• 40:55Mike Rowe?

  Here's a crazy idea. What if there was an academy out there that paid students to learn instead of the other way around? Specifically, men and women who want to work in the skilled trades. And what if this academy not only paid for your training, but also covered all the expenses associated with your training, like travel and food and lodging? And finally, what if this academy guaranteed you a job at the end of the training period? Well, that's exactly what's happening at America's Workforce Academy by Meta. This is a five-week, highly immersive, pre-apprenticeship program that gets you all the necessary certifications you'll need to start a career in the skilled trades immediately.

• 41:37Mike Rowe?

  I'm talking about AI-proof, six-figure jobs, helping to build out the new infrastructure that our economy is depending on. Electricians, plumbers, HVAC techs, welders, fiber optic technicians, these jobs, they are all in demand like never before. And again, every graduate of America's Workforce Academy is guaranteed a job on a Meta website. I first announced this program a few months ago and I have been watching the response ever since. It's extraordinary. A nationwide unprecedented fast track to a long-term career in a skilled trade. If you or your spouse or your kid or your grandkid are looking for a straight path into

• 42:20Mike Rowe?

  a career with no cost at all, check out the opportunities for yourself at meta.com slash America's Workforce Academy. That's meta.com slash America's Workforce Academy.

• 42:32Speaker 02

  There is no dogma. That's why when Layne Norton criticized me about protein, I was like, all right, come on, let's talk. And he convinced me. I ended up subscribing to his position. With that said, though, it was in direct opposition to the American Medical Association. So you but see, Mike, this is where, right?

• 42:54Mike Rowe?

  I know.

• 42:55Speaker 02

  You're like, well, geez, which expert do you trust? And you got to look at, okay, who captured the AMA? How much were they paid for the studies that, you know, gave these mandates, if you will? You got to defer to your common sense. And it was also Layne Norton started to say it. Dr. Rhonda Patrick started to say it. Dr. Peter Attia started to say it. So it was PhDs and MDs.

• 43:18Mike Rowe?

  His book's amazing.

• 43:19Speaker 02

  I love Peter. He's such a good guy and reasonable, you know, he's he's a reasonable guy. I disagree with him on GLP-1s, but...

• 43:29Mike Rowe?

  He had to take 500 pages out of his book because the publisher, it's already as thick as a phone book. And the publisher's like, I can't, I can't publish like 1600 pages on this. Yeah, he was like, you know, I may have overreached on this.

• 43:42Speaker 02

  [laughing]

• 43:44Mike Rowe?

  But it it makes my point in a slightly different way. How much school do I have to go to to arm myself with an effective survival guide? As you formulate an answer, think too about whether or not cookie cutter advice, like to what degree is cookie cutter advice really a problem? I, you know, in my world, like my lanes are education and labor. And I mouth off a lot about the dangers of telling a whole generation of kids that the best path for the most people is a four-year, very expensive path.

• 44:17Speaker 02

  Right.

• 44:18Mike Rowe?

  Even though you can look at the data in all sorts of different ways and conclude that that path does in fact yield fruit for various other reasons. And then we're going to have an argument that's going to get complicated, but I... I just see the same thing in, in your world. Ninety percent, by your own admission, is common sense that can apply universally.

• 44:41Speaker 02

  It really does.

• 44:42Mike Rowe?

  But the other 10%, what if I've got some pre-existing condition? I mean, diet is, is medicine. Food is medicine.

• 44:50Speaker 02

  You'll find it though. So for example, if you're getting your physicals regularly. Example, you brought up cholesterol and this is, man, is this a complicated one. But you can get answers. So I brought Dr. Arthur Agatston on the podcast several years back. And I said, like, okay, I don't understand. Am I eating saturated fat? Am I not eating saturated fat? Can dietary cholesterol become serum cholesterol? Like, my cholesterol's at 200. Am I going to have a heart attack? Do I need statins? And this is why he created the calcium score. So what he ended up explaining is that certain people have a genetic predisposition to be hyper absorbers. And he said, for a small percentage of the population, they are able to, in fact, take

• 45:35Speaker 02

  dietary cholesterol and absorb it into the arteries. It can happen. And there are people that lack an enzyme to clear low-density lipids. They can do a cheek swab to find out if you're one of those people. They can do a calcium score to see if your cholesterol is, in fact, getting into your arteries. It's quantifiable. And then at that point, when you go, okay, I may have a cholesterol of 220, but I have a calcium score of zero. I don't need to worry about this. But if my calcium score is higher, or it's showing plaque in the arteries, then I can have that conversation with my doctor.

• 46:16Speaker 02

  So another example would be, Layne Norton does take statins. And he's like, I've always had high cholesterol. It hasn't infected my testosterone, affected my testosterone levels. So you can take that individual and you can say, oh, I see you've got a genetic predisposition. You do have, you know, cholesterol in the arteries. Let's put you on a low dose of statins and see how your body is responding to the side effects of that. And if you have that information, you can have that conversation with your cardiologist. So if that cardiologist or your internist says,

• 46:52Speaker 02

  Okay, you've got a cholesterol of over 200 and this is bad. We need to put you on statins. Before they do that, ask for the cheek swab and the calcium score. And then see a cardiologist to have a more detailed conversation. So I, and it's annoying.

• 47:10Mike Rowe?

  I have six friends in mind right now. I hope they're listening to this. I hope the algorithm hasn't squashed them.

• 47:15Speaker 02

  I do too.

• 47:15Mike Rowe?

  Because.

• 47:16Speaker 02

  We'll have to send a link.

• 47:18Mike Rowe?

  I will. I mean, Jesus. When, how is the better query? How do we get trust back into your field? Since you mentioned the AMA.

• 47:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:32Mike Rowe?

  Since we're gonna get squashed anyway.

• 47:34Speaker 02

  Subsidiaries of big pharma, basically.

• 47:36Mike Rowe?

  It's the army of angry acronyms.

• 47:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:38Mike Rowe?

  In my people's minds. The CDC, the WHO, the AMA, that in my world, it was OSHA. It was, you know, EPA.

• 47:48Speaker 02

  Of course.

• 47:48Mike Rowe?

  You know, like.

• 47:49Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 47:49Mike Rowe?

  People watch Dirty Jobs through the lens of their own expertise. And when they saw things that ran afoul, you're right. And so we are beset, we're beset with acronyms and experts within those acronyms, some of whom you say are captured.

• 48:06Speaker 02

  I'll give you some examples.

• 48:07Mike Rowe?

  Okay, I'd like to hear about it. And by the way, I'd like to better understand what role of Fanny you've got in Maha and your relationship with Bobby.

• 48:17Speaker 02

  Are you ready for this? I have no relationship with Bobby.

• 48:20Mike Rowe?

  You want one?

• 48:21Speaker 02

  I've met him twice, but that just goes, I have no agenda. I don't work for the administration. I'm not getting paid. He's not a homie of mine. I don't even know his phone number. I've met him twice on a hike, once with my friend Brigham Buehler, who invited me along, who runs a wellness company called Ways to Well.

• 48:39Mike Rowe?

  What's his name?

• 48:39Speaker 02

  Oh, he's.

• 48:40Mike Rowe?

  Brigham Buehler?

• 48:41Speaker 02

  Brigham Buehler. He's just, I, God, he's such a good person. Like that you have to be. He's just such a good guy and all these the landscape of listen, I also like Dr. Mark Hyman, but Brigham has a company called Ways to Well and he also has a compounding pharmacy and the baloney, you've heard about compounding pharmacies is a whole separate and I suggest you interview him. He's brilliant. He's, he's been on Rogan, he's been on Tucker, he's made the rounds in that circle, but he also understands uniquely peptides and exosomes and stem cells and he's working with the administration in reforming the FDA. Brigham had invited me on this hike and then Cali Means

• 49:27Speaker 02

  had invited me to testify in front of Congress and Bobby happened to be there. I'm also very careful, not that I think there's anything wrong with Maha, but I don't, I'm not looking to be captured. I don't want to be Maha because if something goes wrong, I'll say so. Just one more acronym. Yeah, exactly. Kind of the point and, and I don't love, you know, God forbid there should be an attempt to monetize the movement. I want to be careful to make sure that I'm not a part of that if that happens. If something does go wrong, I will call it out completely. You know, when it's like we fired people who inspect food and I called Cali and I was like, I need to know what's going on. You know, I'm hearing this through in the zeitgeist and he's like, Jill, listen, these are all the things we're doing right, which I had been following. You know, we're trying to get rid of

• 50:12Speaker 02

  the grass roll. We're, we're initiating studies to find out the root cause of autism. We are getting all the garbage out of baby formula. We're trying to get soda off of snaps. All this awesome stuff is happening. He's like, but we are moving quick and mistakes are going to happen. And when they do, we're going to fix them, but you can't expect perfection. Mistakes will happen. And I said, I completely hear you, but you better be careful because if there's an outbreak of gonorrhea and we fired the people that are tracking that, you know, that doesn't look good. Not a good look. And they know that. These aren't bad people. If mistakes will happen, there's no intention to fire those people. There's no malicious intent. It is a mistake and mistakes will be corrected,

• 50:53Speaker 02

  but I want to be able to call balls and strikes. I don't want to monetize any of it. I've been a great advocate for Bobby. I think I've evidenced that, but there is no dogma for me. I don't belong to anybody's club. And if something goes sideways, I'll call it out. Period. You know, end of story. What in the hell is your business card?

• 51:13Mike Rowe?

  Even say these days.

• 51:15Speaker 02

  Oh, my gosh, I don't even know if I'm in business these days.

• 51:18Mike Rowe?

  Well, I mean, back to the tariffs. That hurt, right?

• 51:22Speaker 02

  I did.

• 51:23Mike Rowe?

  That hurt your interest.

• 51:24Speaker 02

  It did, actually. We just signed a deal with a treadmill company because I've been talking about walking pads so much because you know, you want to give people something accessible. So it's like, what can we do? I'm like, we'll get a walking pad. So this walking pad company reached out and said, does she want to create her own walking pad? Does she want to work with us and endorse our products? We just got this deal done.

• 51:46Speaker 02

  And we were supposed to do a shoot May 14th and they manufactured the products in China. So they're like, yeah, that's right. And they're like, we're going to need to pause the deal. We've got to figure out what we're doing. If we're going to move manufacturing to Vietnam. And there's very little I can actually do to make money. I'm perfectly comfortable. Don't get me wrong, but I don't work with big food companies. I don't work with big pharma companies.

• 52:11Mike Rowe?

  Eight bestselling books?

• 52:12Speaker 02

  I do have eight bestselling books, but there's no money in that either.

• 52:14Mike Rowe?

  Bestselling video or DVD workout?

• 52:17Speaker 02

  You used to be able to sell content. Now people are conditioned to get content for free. So podcasts are free. I, nobody's paying me any money. If we can like cower together enough through ads, then to cover costs, that's great, but.

• 52:33Mike Rowe?

  Chuck, get her 20 bucks, would you?

• 52:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, we give you 20 bucks. Buy me a coffee at least, man.

• 52:36Mike Rowe?

  Absolutely. I offered you one earlier.

• 52:38Speaker 02

  You did, you did. You're not wrong.

• 52:39Mike Rowe?

  Let the record show. We offered coffee, tea, water, whatever she wants. A nice, a nice soda.

• 52:46Speaker 02

  That'd be great. No artificial sweeteners. I'll take the straight sugar. It just, it's difficult to monetize it because you can no longer charge for content. It's a loss leader, which is fine. And I'm comfortable from the days I did sell content. So that's great. But if you could sell something that you believe in, like a fricking treadmill or, you know, a creatine supplement.

• 53:12Speaker 02

  Cool. That's right in my wheelhouse and I can make money being honest with you and doing what I like to do. But both of those businesses.

• 53:22Speaker 02

  Got smashed by the tariffs because the fricking containers that the supplement company I invested in, they come from China. So a whole shipment got turned around and I was just like, well, you know, it is, it is what it is.

• 53:35Mike Rowe?

  Well, that's kind of what I was. I was muttering to myself as I was listening to you and O'Reilly talk about this. I had a similar conversation yesterday with, um, with Theo Von.

• 53:45Speaker 02

  Oh, I love him.

• 53:46Mike Rowe?

  Have you been on?

• 53:47Speaker 02

  I have not, but I think he's, he seems like a very sweet soul.

• 53:50Mike Rowe?

  He is, I think about, I think he's the most unique person in the space right now.

• 53:56Speaker 02

  Really?

• 53:57Mike Rowe?

  I really do. He's got such a big heart, this kid. He's from Louisiana. On the one hand, he's, there's something almost, this, this is, this is probably the wrong word, but there's, there's a weird mix of, he's wholesome, he's redneck, he's a hillbilly. He's a little feral. There's something feral about him.

• 54:14Speaker 02

  He talks to the president about like doing cocaine.

• 54:17Mike Rowe?

  And he's got, and he's sitting across from the president, but I saw him do something once.

• 54:22Speaker 02

  I love that interview. It was my favorite. Yeah, man, you're shopping in the middle of the night, just like staring at shit.

• 54:29Mike Rowe?

  And the president's like, yeah, so, uh, was it alcohol for you or was it the, uh, you know, it was so great.

• 54:38Speaker 02

  I agree.

• 54:38Mike Rowe?

  To see that level, right? Anyway, Theo, uh, I saw him, I did a show a couple of years ago and I wasn't sure who he was and I came back and I started looking around. And he's very much into the addiction space.

• 54:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:51Mike Rowe?

  Very much. He's recovering and, um, as he says, always will be. But somebody called him and he listened for 15 minutes as this person talked about their struggle with addiction and how the setbacks and the frustration and the fear and the self-loathing. And Theo just sat there looking at the camera, listening, never interrupted him. And after 15 minutes, Theo talked for like five minutes about how he could commiserate and he didn't really offer advice so much as, as encouragement. And I'm like, who does that? So anyway, I'm on Theo's show yesterday and we're kind of complimenting each other.

• 55:32Mike Rowe?

  But we're having this same, this same conversation about trying to understand what the tariff thing means. And Bill just reminded me of it again. And my take real quick is that you're either having a tier two conversation or a tier one. If it's tier two, it's only about the economy, your personal economy or the macro economy. And I don't know any economist right now who's saying the tariffs are a good idea for the economy. But if you're having a tier one conversation,

• 56:00Mike Rowe?

  earlier this week, a guy sat where you're sitting and told us the story and offered the receipts of. The fact that sixty thousand to a hundred thousand organs are being harvested from prisoners in China. The number of.

• 56:15Speaker 02

  Oh, God.

• 56:16Mike Rowe?

  Every year, every year. It's a nine billion dollar business, Jill. And the number of prisons now with hospitals built next to them is shocking.

• 56:25Speaker 02

  Oh, God, that's gruesome.

• 56:27Mike Rowe?

  And the Fulon Gong, who's been persecuted for decades, seventy to a hundred million of them. Many of them are political prisoners. People are scheduling open, uh, heart transplants. You can't schedule a heart transplant. You have to go on a list and you have to wait for somebody.

• 56:45Speaker 02

  To die, get in a car wreck and be in then life support.

• 56:47Mike Rowe?

  To be brain dead.

• 56:48Speaker 02

  Right, of course.

• 56:49Mike Rowe?

  Because you can't take it from a cadaver, right? They're scheduling major organ replacements, and they have been for years. So the thing I wanted you to say to Bill, and the thing I said to Theo that'll probably squash his algorithm, was you're either having a tier two or tier one conversation. And if you just, like me, come right out of a conversation where you're seeing the receipts of organ harvesting happening in this country, or the Uyghurs, or that, go down the list of things and go, look, we just have to decide, are we going to be in business with these cats?

• 57:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 57:20Mike Rowe?

  Under any circumstance. And that's tough, because now you got your treadmill involved and I got interest and everybody's, that global supply chain touches a lot of different things.

• 57:30Speaker 02

  Sure does.

• 57:31Mike Rowe?

  But it's real hard for me to look at that and not think about eighteen sixty in this country. And the conversation about what's going to happen to our economy if we get rid of slavery? What's going to happen? And the arguments were loud and very persuasive. Some even said that the economy could collapse to the point where there'd be a war and tear the country apart. We can't get rid of slavery. But then on tier one, people were like, yeah, you know what? If you're going to wear cotton, you ought to at least visit a plantation. You ought to at least look at how the slaves are treated. In the same way, if you're going to eat a steak, you ought to go to a slaughterhouse.

• 58:09Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 58:10Mike Rowe?

  Right?

• 58:14Mike Rowe?

  Couple of weeks ago, on this very podcast, I talked with. Brooke Rollins, our Secretary of Agriculture, about the incredibly complicated business of delivering affordable beef to our citizens without disadvantaging American ranchers. We also discussed the very controversial decision to import 300,000 metric tons of ground beef from various foreign countries and the maddening policy that allows meatpackers to label imported meat as a product of the USA. Well, shortly after that conversation, one of my sponsors, Good Ranchers, reported an unusually high level of interest in their product. And this is not surprising.

• 58:55Mike Rowe?

  Given a choice, most people would prefer to buy their meat from American ranchers. And Good Ranchers is the number one company in America that delivers 100% American meat straight to your door. They partner with over 100 local farmers and ranchers to deliver pasture-raised meat with no antibiotics and no added hormones. They've got 25,000 five-star reviews on TrustPilot. 25,000, including my own. This month, when you visit GoodRanchers.com/row, you'll get a free Angus ground beef bundle with your first order. Again, that's GoodRanchers.com/row for four bonus pounds of ground beef raised right

• 59:37Mike Rowe?

  here in these United States, and that's guaranteed. Support your local ranchers by insisting on American meat delivered at GoodRanchers.com/row.

• 59:49Speaker 02

  If you could eat a steer, if you could eat a cow, don't take a chance on a foreign ranch, get Good Ranchers now. Hey, Hal! Yes, I've personally been impacted by that one. I know exactly what you're talking about.

• 1:00:04Mike Rowe?

  I have too. And so, look, this is back to policy, not politics. I don't want to make it about Democrat or Republican, but these are hot issues. You could put abortion on the list as well. You could put capital punishment. You're for capital punishment? You ought to see a hanging, and you ought to see the switch flipped. You're for abortion, you ought to see that too. You're for slavery, or you're for wearing goods, right? That's where we are. Now with China, so it's really unpleasant. You want to kill your algorithm fast, say what I just said.

• 1:00:33Speaker 02

  Yes, I get it.

• 1:00:34Mike Rowe?

  It'll walk me right around the barn, shoot in the head, but I'm telling you, we're talking past each other with health issues, with tariff issues, with all the big issues of our day, when we reduce it to nothing, but what's it gonna do to the economy?

• 1:00:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:51Mike Rowe?

  Then we might as well talk about work, like, well, what's it pay? As if there's nothing else to the job.

• 1:00:57Speaker 02

  What's it doing to my friggin' Roth IRA?

• 1:01:00Mike Rowe?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:00Speaker 02

  But when I look down the road, you have to ask that question of, if Trump doesn't deal with this, does Rome fall? It, they're like, oh, no, it's never happened, you know, I'd had that conversation with Bill Maher a year ago, and he's like, no, no, we're like a teenage boy that just gets away with everything. It's like, but forever? So I have to imagine that all the things Trump is concerned about and has been concerned about for decades are very real, and previous administrations have kicked the can because look at the shit show it's created. Who would want to take that on? Bill did make a very good point, though, they're like, couldn't we have gone country by country? I, you know, I can't speak to it, I'm certainly not economist, but I do think something needs to be done.

• 1:01:44Speaker 02

  It's clear that tier one here is, there's bigger problems.

• 1:01:49Mike Rowe?

  That's it.

• 1:01:49Speaker 02

  Without question, so I'm for change. I hope this is the right way we're doing it, I don't know.

• 1:01:55Mike Rowe?

  I'd like to trade with everybody that doesn't offend a tier one sensibility, but not because they have something we need, because they have something we want, and then we can make a reasonable deal. My buddies at American Giant, you know, the CEO comes in here and, and he's, this is a Wall Street guy who started making sweatshirts and hoodies and jeans in America, just to prove it could be done. But he's my age, and he remembers in 1988, 80% of all the clothing we wore in this country was made here. Today, it's 2%. And the argument is, well, you know, these jobs, these factories, it's really better if somebody else makes them for us. And the next thing you know, you're having the same conversation about oil and timber.

• 1:02:41Mike Rowe?

  And medicine.

• 1:02:43Speaker 02

  I just had this conversation about drilling. Like, oh, well, are you hap- I'm like, gas is down. Well, yeah, because we're drilling here. But I was like, but what?

• 1:02:52Mike Rowe?

  Where do you think the gas is?

• 1:02:54Speaker 02

  It's the same planet, so you're okay drilling in somebody else's backyard, but not here. Now you're dependent on Russia or Iran or whatever, in the vague understanding I have of this, because you don't want to pollute our environment. But it's the same planet. It's a closed system ultimately.

• 1:03:13Mike Rowe?

  From what I've read, the planet, well, the planet rotates, you see? And above the planet is the atmosphere. And the degree to which it rotates with the underlying landmass, I'm not sure, but I'm pretty sure that the smoke from over there is eventually gonna get over.

• 1:03:27Speaker 02

  Right. You know, we don't want to cut down the trees here because of the woolly mammoth mole that lives in the bark of the fallen oak, or whatever the heck it is.

• 1:03:38Mike Rowe?

  Well, now you're getting-

• 1:03:39Speaker 02

  But you don't care about them in Canada's forests? Like, what am I missing about that? It is so bizarre.

• 1:03:44Mike Rowe?

  But you're not missing anything. It's NIMBY. You know, it's not in my backyard.

• 1:03:48Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:03:49Mike Rowe?

  And that's what Ed Ring would tell you about the spotted owl, and the tortoise, and the delta smelt. And there's a long list of misplaced priorities and misplaced urgencies. And, look, everybody's got a different dog in the hunt, and everybody cares more about this than that. And that's what I think we've got a front row seat to. You know, throw the internet, throw our devices on top of everything else. And now we can participate in the conversation, if it's even that. We can participate in the miasma, the shit show, as you would say. It's happening all around us, all of the time.

• 1:04:25Speaker 02

  Constantly.

• 1:04:26Mike Rowe?

  And nobody knows who to trust and what to believe, which is why it's a good time to have a podcast, right? Because you can, I mean, who else is going to- Talk about this for this length. I mean, forget the mainstream. They can't do it. It's going to be Theo Von. It's going to be you. It's going to be Rogan, you know, maybe us to some extent. I don't know, but that's.

• 1:04:45Speaker 02

  Of course.

• 1:04:46Mike Rowe?

  Where else are we going to talk it through?

• 1:04:48Speaker 02

  Are you following the criticism that Joe is getting because Douglas Murray said you're platforming people with dangerous ideas? Are you following that at all?

• 1:04:57Mike Rowe?

  I watched the whole thing.

• 1:04:58Speaker 02

  I did too.

• 1:04:59Mike Rowe?

  Fascinating.

• 1:04:59Speaker 02

  I loved every minute of it.

• 1:05:00Mike Rowe?

  It was, it was the best discourse.

• 1:05:04Speaker 02

  I agree.

• 1:05:04Mike Rowe?

  Warts and all, right? Warts and all, but Dave Smith and Douglas Murray with Joe Rogan assuming the role as some kind of de facto moderator. And 12 million people listening.

• 1:05:17Speaker 02

  I took stuff away from both sides, by the way.

• 1:05:19Mike Rowe?

  Absolutely.

• 1:05:20Speaker 02

  I was like, oh, I didn't know that. Oh, I didn't know that. Oh, wow. I didn't know that. And it did shift me a little bit. And I ended up writing Dave and I was like, Dave, I got to be honest. I have always leaned more pro-Israel and I still do. But you made some really good points that have shifted the way that I'm looking at this and at the lens through which I'm viewing the situation. And I appreciate your humbleness, your openness, your intelligence, the fact that you're always out there, you know, doing these things. And I was geared more towards Douglas Murray's position initially.

• 1:05:48Mike Rowe?

  I am too.

• 1:05:49Speaker 02

  And maybe still, still am.

• 1:05:50Mike Rowe?

  And I still am.

• 1:05:51Speaker 02

  But you know, it's still kind of am.

• 1:05:52Mike Rowe?

  I, well, the thing I disagreed with, with Douglas on was the primacy of experts. And the reason I liked your conversation with Bill is that you got a chance to be you, the person we know, but out of your comfort zone and trying to learn and trying to understand something. Douglas was arguing that, look, this is the grown up table and the stakes are very high. And I don't really know that we need a comedian coming in here to mouth off about the geopolitical realities that are liable to either usher us into a third world war or not. Right? And Dave's point is like, well, wait a minute. Have the experts let us down? Yes or no?

• 1:06:30Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:06:30Mike Rowe?

  Is there a consensus anywhere among the experts? And Douglas is like saying, well, look, yeah, there actually is. Winston Churchill was a great man, the right guy at the right time. And to have these other people out there suggesting such and such is, is crazy and irresponsible. And I'm sitting home, listening to that, thinking, yeah, you know what? I do agree with that because I've read everything there is to read, I think, on Churchill. But what do you say to somebody? I mean, what about a flat-earther?

• 1:07:00Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:07:00Mike Rowe?

  What about somebody who wants to say, hey, you know what? That virus, it wasn't from a wet market.

• 1:07:06Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 1:07:07Mike Rowe?

  Right?

• 1:07:08Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:07:08Mike Rowe?

  So now you have to pick. Now you have to decide, you know, which your issue is and when you start to feel uncomfortable. What he should have said was, hey, what do you say to somebody who's pretty sure the moon landing was faked? Now, Joe's had a dozen conversations with people who believe this.

• 1:07:25Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:07:25Mike Rowe?

  Should you be allowed to talk about that possibility?

• 1:07:29Speaker 02

  The alternative is censorship.

• 1:07:31Mike Rowe?

  That's right.

• 1:07:31Speaker 02

  Did you just see that they uncovered some obscene amount of money in grants to, from the Biden administration to combat disinformation? And of course, it was all tied around COVID, which was completely diabolical and nefarious. So you start to see these videos of politicians, whether it's Hillary Clinton or Senator Kerry, guys like Bill Gates. We gotta have AI that filters out this health disinformation. Well, could that be because you have billions invested in the tech and the vaccine? And you realize Bill Gates funded something called the Virality Project. Because I had a woman who was vaccine-injured on my podcast during the AstraZeneca vaccine

• 1:08:16Speaker 02

  trials. He funds this thing called the Virality Project to suss out vaccine hesitancy on the web. This is the brief that lands on Biden's desk that he then utilizes with what was Twitter and is now X and Facebook to have them systematically silence dissenters. You want that? Or are you willing to listen to a guy that says Churchill was the bad guy? I would much prefer to do my own homework on an issue, I'm sorry, than have the alternative. And I don't know where the middle ground would be because which experts can you trust? You only have a choice, in my opinion, to consume all of the information and do your own homework. I'd rather have all the information.

• 1:08:57Mike Rowe?

  And that is chaos. If you're asking 330 million people in this country to do their own homework and arrive at their own conclusion, and we know that the experts that exist We know they're out there to confirm virtually any belief. So all the reasoning can become reductive. And all of the opinions now can be bolstered by the fact that I found an expert. Like you were saying with Tony. Like, look, I found a guy who said, leave it alone, so I'm gonna leave it alone. So, we're not gonna unwrap it. I think it's the most interesting and best time to be alive in the history of the world. If for no other reason, because wow, wow, man. If you're bored right now, then you're, you're never gonna be engaged with frigging anything ever.

• 1:09:42Mike Rowe?

  If you can't find something to just luxuriate in, right? So, I see that as, as good. But the challenge, the challenge is to come to terms with the fact that this thing, my little device here with an internet connection, I could go live right now on Facebook with seven million people watching and say any fool-headed thing I want.

• 1:10:05Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:10:06Mike Rowe?

  This is a gun, this is a weapon.

• 1:10:08Speaker 02

  But Mike, where's the agency and the accountability? To a certain extent...

• 1:10:13Mike Rowe?

  I like when you whisper, by the way, that, that makes it intense.

• 1:10:16Speaker 01

  I'm not crazy about it, but that's okay.

• 1:10:18Mike Rowe?

  He's like, uh-oh.

• 1:10:19Speaker 02

  Mike, where's the agency? People need to take accountability.

• 1:10:24Speaker 01

  Wasn't ready for that, yeah.

• 1:10:26Speaker 02

  Careful what you wish for, buddy. At the end of the day, we do have to take some responsibility. And we love to put people in this victim state. Oh, you can't lose weight because you have a disease called obesity. Oh, no, you can never elevate yourself out of poverty because the world is against people of color. Oh, no, you know, it's this constant, like, you're too stupid to do your own homework. You're not sophisticated enough to figure it out.

• 1:10:52Mike Rowe?

  You're a climate denier.

• 1:10:55Speaker 02

  Honest to God?

• 1:10:56Mike Rowe?

  You're a protein denier. You're a saturated fat denier. That's what you are. Look, on the... On one hand, what we need, I think, more than anything, is to encourage healthy skepticism, because that's the root of science.

• 1:11:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:08Mike Rowe?

  To be willing to be wrong. That requires humility.

• 1:11:13Speaker 02

  You make a great point.

• 1:11:14Mike Rowe?

  But this is my job.

• 1:11:15Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:11:15Mike Rowe?

  This is all I got. I don't really work anymore.

• 1:11:17Speaker 02

  I wish I'd thought of that one, though. I'm like, wait a second.

• 1:11:19Mike Rowe?

  I don't do shows anymore.

• 1:11:21Speaker 02

  Please continue. Sorry.

• 1:11:23Mike Rowe?

  Some smart person should come up with the graph that juxtaposes the relationship between certainty and skepticism. Or humility, you could say. And it seems like the more fraught things become, and the more uncertain things become, the more humble we should be, because surely, no matter what your belief is, a whole lot of people are wrong about everything.

• 1:11:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:50Mike Rowe?

  Now, I don't think that lines up politically. I think my conservative friends are wrong about a certain number of things. And I think my liberal friends have managed to get their heads so far up their butts.

• 1:12:02Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 1:12:03Mike Rowe?

  But, but I don't think we can paint with too broad a brush. And to your point, that requires extraordinary homework. That requires, like, you've got to look at every issue, and you've got to think, what's his name, Ben Shapiro, in the first term with Trump? He used to be like, look, there's nothing left for me to do, except, say, good Trump, bad Trump, and look at every single decision through the eyes of that decision and nothing else. And so he did. And I admired that. I tried to do the same thing. Tried the same thing with the last president. Tried to do the same thing with everything, but it's really hard. I'm finding it difficult.

• 1:12:41Speaker 02

  I know. I see what you're saying. Especially because, you know, when Trump does something that people really don't like, like the Maryland guy that they sent to the El Salvadorian prison, and then Supreme Court said, bring him back, and supposedly they defy the Supreme Court order. And I'm thinking to myself, if all of this is true... I'm against it. And then all my friends on the left are like, you see what a monster. And it's like, so who wants to take that on? So you want to defend it because you don't want to hear that you were wrong and they were right. But I will acquiesce and say, if all this is true, I disagree with it. However, all the things that happened with the Biden administration, letting all of these gang

• 1:13:25Speaker 02

  members in, in the first place, letting the cartels utilize our border as a billion dollar business, trafficking kids, trafficking fentanyl. You know, if 1% of 14 million people are criminals, not good with that either. Like, if I've got to pick an evil, I'm still good with my choice as it stands right now.

• 1:13:44Mike Rowe?

  And if you're not, just check out the news 24 hours from now. Because I got news for you. That Maryland thing is looking a little wobbly.

• 1:13:50Speaker 02

  I saw that today in the Free Press.

• 1:13:52Mike Rowe?

  Really wobbly. So, look, back to the tariffs. The thing that amuses the wrong word, because I got businesses too, and I got a 401k and I'm in the market, and this is not pleasant to watch, you know? But the thing, when it moves this fast, the experts are now confronted with a new challenge, which is your opinion, whatever it is, is now based on data that's irrelevant and obsolete because you're still alive and an hour went by, or a day. So it's like.

• 1:14:29Speaker 02

  An hour went by? So true.

• 1:14:31Mike Rowe?

  I've never seen so many otherwise reasonably intelligent people look so foolish because, I mean, my buddies over at the National Review write these thoughtful, reasoned pieces. I don't always agree, but they come out because it takes time to write 2,000 thoughtful words. It takes time to edit it. It takes time to get it out there.

• 1:14:53Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:14:54Mike Rowe?

  And by the time they get it out there, there's a new headline. And every single thing they wrote about, never mind if it was right or wrong, it's just over.

• 1:15:00Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:15:01Mike Rowe?

  So it's like trying to read a book with no spaces between the words. That's where we are now. It's like trying to read the back of a script or a, you know, a list of ingredients. It's just Greek and a lot of stuff jammed together. And I agree with you, we have to do our homework, but nobody trained us to do this level of analysis.

• 1:15:24Mike Rowe?

  And thought on every freaking topic.

• 1:15:28Speaker 02

  I don't disagree with you. I like your your solution of what is the percentage of skepticism? You need to apply to every scenario. What is the gut check on the issue? Is your expert captured? I mean, we saw that with Burks and Fauci and Collins. I mean, very clearly they were captured and you could tell that's the part where it just, if you didn't see that these guys were captured, if your common sense didn't dictate that it didn't make sense. I am somewhat surprised, even just the concept of the mask, you can get it in your eyeballs. I mean, what it doesn't, you know, where.

• 1:16:09Mike Rowe?

  We can't broadly encourage skepticism if the immediate reaction to someone who's skeptical is to brand them a denier.

• 1:16:19Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:16:19Mike Rowe?

  So you're a vaccine denier, you're a wet market denier, you're a mask denier. I still stand in jetways a couple of times a week and I still see the signs six feet apart. And I'm like to the airlines, you realize none of that is rooted in anything scientific. And the people who ask you to implement that rule have since walked it back.

• 1:16:43Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:16:43Mike Rowe?

  Why are these stickers still here? Why in the world won't you take the stickers away to say maintain social distance? I see it in airports, in jetways today.

• 1:16:54Speaker 02

  What's the answer?

• 1:16:58Mike Rowe?

  I honestly don't know. I mean, it could be Occam's razor, you know, the simplest. It could be, you know what, the maintenance guys.

• 1:17:06Speaker 02

  It's still on my mom's building.

• 1:17:07Mike Rowe?

  We have cuts.

• 1:17:07Speaker 02

  I walk in, it's like masks. I think to this day.

• 1:17:10Mike Rowe?

  Mask up.

• 1:17:11Speaker 02

  But no one just bothered to take it down?

• 1:17:13Mike Rowe?

  I think maybe the act like if the person who put it up believed they were doing a virtuous thing, then the only way they can take it down is to admit they were wrong or lied to by someone they trusted. And that's painful. It's always painful to realize you've been betrayed.

• 1:17:33Speaker 02

  You know, I, I really don't struggle with that, but I, I appreciate like that moment where it's like, oh God, you know, you get attacked by your friends who, who hate Trump. But I had a vaccine scientist that was literally sold to my podcast producer years ago. It's like, oh, you know, this is one of the people that's working on the vaccine tech and they just want to educate your audience. And I was like, awesome. Thanks. Let's do it. And looking back now, oh my God, it's like, oh, it just stays in the shoulder. It's out of the body in 24 hours. We've had this tech for 30 years. Don't be a fool. And all of it was a lie.

• 1:18:14Mike Rowe?

  I know.

• 1:18:15Speaker 02

  But I didn't know at the time. I thought I was a good guy. I thought I was doing the right thing. And that's the part where I'll say like, I'm sorry, I gave you bad information. I did not know. I thought this is an expert. Surely, I think if you can rock it back, at least you're role modeling that for other people and more people can do it because you're only as good as the information you have at the time.

• 1:18:37Mike Rowe?

  Well, look, humility, you know, allows you, when you put bad policy into place and you say, listen, we're doing the best we can. Nobody has a crystal ball, but this is what we think right now. That's different than saying, trust us, we know what we're doing. Now, since we want to, got to land the plane here in a minute, but we'll bring it back to your hero. What did Newsom do? He not only implemented the policies.

• 1:19:06Speaker 02

  He was the most draconian.

• 1:19:06Mike Rowe?

  With certainty. He violated his own policies. And for me, you'll have your list of reasons that everybody will have their hot button. I'll never get over the French laundry.

• 1:19:17Speaker 02

  Oh, I will not either.

• 1:19:17Mike Rowe?

  I will never.

• 1:19:18Speaker 02

  Absolutely not.

• 1:19:19Mike Rowe?

  I will never get over, I'll forgive it because hey, I'd like to be charitable. But that level of hypocrisy in a governor.

• 1:19:28Mike Rowe?

  Should be disqualifying. Period.

• 1:19:32Speaker 02

  I completely agree with you. And he was the last one to reopen the schools. He was the most draconian with his lockdowns.

• 1:19:42Mike Rowe?

  You arrested a guy right out there for surfing.

• 1:19:44Speaker 02

  Yes, I remember that.

• 1:19:46Mike Rowe?

  And basically, in the same week, he was having dinner at the most expensive restaurant in the state. Without a mask. So I can't pretend that didn't happen, like, to the earlier point. That's a thing. I have to look at. If I'm going to consider voting for him, I have to look at that. I don't need to measure it against the other option. I just have to look at that and say, that level of hypocrisy is either tolerable, or it's not. That's a personal decision. Final question. It's not even a question, but I, I want you to talk just a little bit about your philanthropy. Because I don't, I'm endlessly interested in why famous people do nice things. And this is your opportunity, by the way, to make yourself likable to those you've offended in the last hour.

• 1:20:31Speaker 02

  I mean, right. To be totally honest with you, I get involved in different things, but I'm very much against internet philanthropy, like the posts. I hate that stuff. One thing that really impacted me. Many years ago, I had a previous, a client who I had been a personal trainer to. And she was a producer for Maria Shriver at CBS News, and then produced a documentary on refugees, in particular, the crisis that was going on in Syria at the time. You're seeing these disgusting, horrific visuals of little bodies of children and babies washing up on beaches. And my dad is Syrian and Lebanese. So I thought, like, am I even, am I even related to one of these kids?

• 1:21:17Speaker 02

  That could be like my third cousin, this little child on the beach. And the things that you don't work for, that's, I mean, if we were to use, I hate this word so much, but if we were to be honest about things that are called a privilege, I didn't earn being a citizen here. I got lucky. And then you've got the, to whom much is given, much is required. And I wanted to find a way to be helpful for the people that were not advantaged in the way that I was. So we started working with United Nations Refugee Agency, and I went and stayed at a refugee camp in South Sudan. I wanted to go to Syria, I want to be clear. I didn't end up in South Sudan because I'm a white

• 1:22:00Speaker 02

  savior. I ended up there because much bigger celebrities were raising awareness in Syria. So they asked me to go to South Sudan because nobody was. I stayed in a refugee camp there and of course donated and tried to raise awareness and started an online campaign where it's like, okay, get people to sponsor you. Refugees take this many steps over the course of a year. And that's a cause that's really important to me. And I do believe in legal immigration. It's one of the reasons I adopted internationally because I was like, I have this golden ticket. Two kids, right? Two, but my ex had my son. He's a great kid. He's adopted to me, but he was a citizen, obviously, regardless. But I had the ability to give somebody citizenship. I did it legally.

• 1:22:45Speaker 02

  It took me two years. It cost me a heck of a lot of money and I had the means to do it, which is why I didn't adopt in America, why I adopted internationally. So for me, that's a really big deal. And I do think that we have, I know for a fact, we had a very good system in place to vet refugees. There had never been a terrorist attack by a refugee that had been relocated in the States. This is very different than being an economic migrant and it's a separate podcast entirely. But it's something that for some reason has moved me pretty deeply. And animals, the animal stuff's big for me. It's the innocents, man. It's just the ones that can't, cannot, under any circumstance,

• 1:23:29Speaker 02

  pick themselves up by the bootstraps because they literally have no boots. There's no means. No thumbs. Exactly. Yeah. That's the thing about bootstraps. If you don't have a thumb, man. Screwed.

• 1:23:42Mike Rowe?

  Well, look, Matt, that's probably about the smartest place to leave. How long we been talking, Chuck? You're like 90 minutes or so?

• 1:23:47Speaker 01

  Uh, not quite that long.

• 1:23:48Mike Rowe?

  That's long enough.

• 1:23:49Speaker 01

  Hour 20.

• 1:23:50Mike Rowe?

  I mean, I could talk to her forever.

• 1:23:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:51Mike Rowe?

  Probably got a life to do. You got people out there.

• 1:23:53Speaker 02

  This is amazing.

• 1:23:54Mike Rowe?

  Desperate to.

• 1:23:55Speaker 02

  Oh, yes.

• 1:23:56Mike Rowe?

  Take a few pounds off.

• 1:23:56Speaker 02

  That would be it.

• 1:23:57Mike Rowe?

  Live a better life. So forth. Website, anything you would like? Where do people go to get more of your particular brand of authenticity and charm?

• 1:24:07Speaker 02

  GillianMichaels.com and the podcast that you mentioned is everywhere you get friggin' podcasts.

• 1:24:14Speaker 01

  Keeping it real.

• 1:24:14Mike Rowe?

  Keeping it real.

• 1:24:15Speaker 02

  Maybe I could get you on as a guest.

• 1:24:17Mike Rowe?

  Anybody listening? Because my standards are pretty, well, never mind.

• 1:24:20Speaker 02

  Depends. Don't say Big Pharma. I'm gonna get tons of views.

• 1:24:24Mike Rowe?

  I'd be happy to. Where do you podcast from?

• 1:24:27Speaker 02

  Van Nuys. We have a studio in Van Nuys.

• 1:24:29Mike Rowe?

  I thought you were out of the state.

• 1:24:31Speaker 02

  I am, but I joined Bill Maher's network and that friggin' studio is in Van Nuys.

• 1:24:37Mike Rowe?

  I got you.

• 1:24:37Speaker 02

  So I come in and out.

• 1:24:38Mike Rowe?

  Where's the new home gonna be?

• 1:24:40Speaker 02

  Jackson, Wyoming.

• 1:24:41Mike Rowe?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:24:42Speaker 02

  So it's, yeah.

• 1:24:43Mike Rowe?

  That's awfully nice.

• 1:24:45Speaker 02

  It doesn't suck.

• 1:24:46Mike Rowe?

  The Teton, you know what I love about the Tetons? Unlike any other range, these things, they come like right out of the ground, like this.

• 1:24:53Speaker 02

  Dramatic.

• 1:24:53Mike Rowe?

  It's so.

• 1:24:54Speaker 02

  It is.

• 1:24:55Mike Rowe?

  It's great. I'm glad you have a good view and at the risk of sounding sexist, you've certainly provided me with one.

• 1:25:01Speaker 02

  Oh, you're so kind. Thank you.

• 1:25:03Mike Rowe?

  That was nice of me.

• 1:25:04Speaker 02

  I will take it. Thank you so much.

• 1:25:07Mike Rowe?

  Come back anytime and I'd be, I'd be happy to darken your doorstep.

• 1:25:10Speaker 02

  Can I coordinate with you?

• 1:25:11Speaker 01

  Sorry, what's that?

• 1:25:12Speaker 02

  I think we're new.

• 1:25:13Speaker 01

  A hundred percent.

• 1:25:14Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:25:14Mike Rowe?

  That's Chuck. Yeah, well, or who's ever in his position.

• 1:25:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. He threatens to fire me quite a bit.

• 1:25:21Speaker 02

  We're getting rid of him next week.

• 1:25:22Mike Rowe?

  Thanks, everybody. It's Jillian Michaels. I'll talk to you next week.

• 1:25:24Speaker 02

  Thank you. Thank you so much, guys. This was so much fun.

• 1:25:27Mike Rowe?

  Good.

• 1:26:06Speaker 03

  This is Colin Cowherd from the Colin Cowherd Podcast. Buy smart, drive for less, and trade for more. That's Toyota Fordability. All starts with a great deal on an off-road ready-to-coma or a half-ton Tundra. Two of Toyota's most capable and longest-lasting trucks. Built on a reputation for quality and reliability, Toyota trucks are known for holding their value, which could mean big savings when it's time for your next Toyota. For a great deal today to a great value tomorrow, shop toyota.com. Toyota, let's go places.

• 1:26:38Speaker 04

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