Speaker 1: You're listening to Comedy Central.
Speaker 2: From the most trusted journalists at Comedy Central is America's
Speaker 2: only sorts for news. This is The Daily Show with
Speaker 2: your host John Stuart.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much man, Welcome to the Daily Show.
Speaker 1: We got one point tonight. My name is John shirt.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: What a program we have designed for you a la carte.
Speaker 4: It's gonna be fantastic. Our guest tonight, General Stanley McCrystal Webb.
Speaker 4: John wrote a book.
Speaker 1: Chances are I will macrib.
Speaker 4: Him about the McRock war, all right, first.
Speaker 1: President Donald Trump. God, no, no, no respect his Authoritah.
Speaker 4: Honestly, she's so much comes at us every day with him.
Speaker 4: I can't even sleep organized thoughts eat.
Speaker 5: I just.
Speaker 1: And he knows, he knows he's toying with us. Here
Speaker 1: he is. On Tuesday of last week.
Speaker 6: We're gonna have a very very big announcement to make,
Speaker 6: like as big as it gets.
Speaker 1: And I won't tell.
Speaker 7: You on what.
Speaker 8: Oh good, so we won't know how to prepare, should
Speaker 8: we wear our good pants or the ones we piss in?
Speaker 1: But fine, don't tell us this big announcement, just tell
Speaker 1: us when.
Speaker 6: And that announcement will be made either Thursday or Friday
Speaker 6: or Monday before we leave.
Speaker 1: Why are you mentioning it? Is it sweeps week? Is
Speaker 1: that what this is?
Speaker 4: But fine, we will keep our eyes out for any
Speaker 4: announcement bombshells.
Speaker 1: And on Friday, I think we got one.
Speaker 9: The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus can be
Speaker 9: suspended in a time of innovasion.
Speaker 1: So it said, that's an option. We're actively looking at
Speaker 1: a murder as a murderer. The government, the United States government.
Speaker 4: Is actively looking at suspending due process and then the
Speaker 4: rule of law. That's a big announce big enough for
Speaker 4: Stephen Miller to risk bursting into flames because of the
Speaker 4: touch of God sunlight.
Speaker 2: The only time a president has done it unilaterally without
Speaker 2: the without the authorization of Congress was Abraham Lincoln during
Speaker 2: the Civil War.
Speaker 4: That was the less really so back when slavery was
Speaker 4: legal and the treatment for diarrhea was amputation.
Speaker 1: But that being said, this is a big announcement.
Speaker 9: As you know, you know, ability of somebody to challenge
Speaker 9: their rights in courts is a pretty essential part of
Speaker 9: the rule of law. You so certainly raising a lot
Speaker 9: of eyebrows with that comment, just just eyebrows.
Speaker 4: The Truman administration is thinking to tear it up the constitution.
Speaker 4: So here in Washington, we're hearing a lot of huh.
Speaker 4: One legal scholar even said that's weird. So maybe that's
Speaker 4: the announcement suspension of AB's corpus, unless there's something else.
Speaker 10: President Trump is appointing former New York prosecutor Janine Piro
Speaker 10: as interim US Attorney.
Speaker 4: You may say to yourself, well, that can't be the announcement,
Speaker 4: because that's just not that big a deal yet in
Speaker 4: this new world that we live in, this announcement registers
Speaker 4: the same as suspending habeas corpus.
Speaker 1: On the eyebrow metour.
Speaker 11: Jean Pirou of a lot of eyebrows are being raised
Speaker 11: at this pick so far.
Speaker 4: Hey, hey, hey, Jeanine, you're going to be the new
Speaker 4: US attorney in DC.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I know, we're surprised too.
Speaker 1: That is, by the way. The sound. Oh also, they're
Speaker 1: suspending habeas corpus.
Speaker 4: Is a statement, all right, So maybe maybe that's the
Speaker 4: big announcement. But hey, we've got it till today for
Speaker 4: any other announcements, or is there anything else.
Speaker 11: The Trump administration is preparing to accept a super luxury
Speaker 11: Boeing jumbo jet from the royal family of Cutter.
Speaker 12: That luxury jumbo jet, which has a value estimated at
Speaker 12: four hundred million dollars. The aircraft would be used by
Speaker 12: President Trump as a new Air Force one and then
Speaker 12: transferred to the Trump Presidential Library Foundation shortly before he
Speaker 12: leaves office.
Speaker 4: What Cutter is giving us a plane that Trump gets
Speaker 4: to keep.
Speaker 1: Like the reverse Oprah.
Speaker 4: I get a jet and that's it. I get a
Speaker 4: jet for my library. Why does his library need a jet?
Speaker 4: Why would your presidential library? Yeah, hello, I'm calling from
Speaker 4: Europe and I need a book about Trump by morning.
Speaker 4: And the book must travel in the comfort and style
Speaker 4: one can only get from Cutter.
Speaker 11: It's known as the most luxurious private jet in the world.
Speaker 11: Described as a flying palace, it features the biggest master
Speaker 11: bedroom in the sky, as well as some very plush
Speaker 11: living quarters and several private offices. Some of the nine
Speaker 11: bathrooms on board have full showers and even a bidet.
Speaker 1: Wally right, I didn't even know water could go there.
Speaker 4: Okay, holy trap, he's not a plane. That is a
Speaker 4: flying palace. I'm not gonna tell Trump how to run
Speaker 4: his business, but I would steam the shit out of
Speaker 4: those carpets. But Hey, it's a jet from Cutter. We
Speaker 4: can trust them. They're not suspect like Canada or working
Speaker 4: to undermine us like all of our other democratic allies
Speaker 4: in Europe.
Speaker 12: Cutter is considered an American ally, but it is also
Speaker 12: an ally of Iran and China and even Hamas.
Speaker 4: Oh, Trump's going to take a four hundred million dollar
Speaker 4: jet from people he would expel from Columbia University.
Speaker 1: I think you know what this is shocking. This is shocking.
Speaker 4: I think I know what this news might do to
Speaker 4: our ipews. It raises many many eyebrows to have this
Speaker 4: sort of deal at all.
Speaker 1: Actually, that's how the plane flies.
Speaker 4: It overcomes Earth's gravity through the power of.
Speaker 1: The raised eyebrows.
Speaker 4: Look, obviously, the president would understand that a gift of
Speaker 4: this magnitude from a government with questionable ties to terror organizations,
Speaker 4: combined with Article one, Section nine constitutional prohibition against the
Speaker 4: president accepting a foreign flying palace, he would understand that
Speaker 4: that's a legitimate I'm just kidding.
Speaker 1: He was appalled that you'd even ask they're giving us
Speaker 1: a free jet.
Speaker 6: I could say, no, no, no, don't give us. I
Speaker 6: want to pay you a million or four hundred million
Speaker 6: or whatever it is, well, I could say, thank you
Speaker 6: very much.
Speaker 1: It's not a free jet.
Speaker 4: That's the point, you know, the expression there's no such
Speaker 4: thing as a free launch.
Speaker 1: That's about being skeptical.
Speaker 4: The motives of somebody who gives you a sandwich, a
Speaker 4: sandwich a BLT. Now imagine that that BLT has an engine,
Speaker 4: nine bathrooms.
Speaker 1: And funds proxy wars.
Speaker 4: So when the dizzy run up to this big announcement
Speaker 4: of the possible suspension of Habeas Corpus, or maybe the
Speaker 4: appointment of another Fox New star, or the naked bribery
Speaker 4: of our highest elected officials, none of those were Trump's
Speaker 4: big announcement.
Speaker 13: President Trump just announced that prescription drug and pharmaceutical prices
Speaker 13: will be reduced by thirty to eighty percent almost immediately.
Speaker 13: This appears to be the major announcement that the President
Speaker 13: has been teasing for days.
Speaker 4: I am having wanted that for years pharma has exploited
Speaker 4: the American consumer, while we have in turned subsidized their
Speaker 4: whole industry with tax incentives and direct funds. I like this,
Speaker 4: but without getting into the weeds, explain this thing that
Speaker 4: I've wanted for a very long time, Like I'm incredibly dumb.
Speaker 6: Drug prices will come down.
Speaker 1: We're getting them down.
Speaker 6: Sixty seventy eighty ninety percent, but actually more than that
Speaker 6: if you think about it in the way mathematically.
Speaker 1: If you think about it mathematically.
Speaker 4: I don't want to brag. I often think about numbers mathematically.
Speaker 4: How is this going to work?
Speaker 6: The rest of the world's going to have to pay
Speaker 6: a little bit more, in America is going to pay
Speaker 6: a lot less. Basically, what we're doing is equalizing. There's
Speaker 6: a new word that I came up with, which I
Speaker 6: think is probably the best word. We're going to equalize.
Speaker 4: Europe eureka euclid. Yeah, here it is equalized. I thought
Speaker 4: it sounded familiar.
Speaker 14: Fuck, he's trying to kill us all.
Speaker 1: Look.
Speaker 4: I would like to think that the tenacious pleadings of
Speaker 4: progressive leaders like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders helped make
Speaker 4: this possible.
Speaker 15: We are sick and tired of paying, by far, the
Speaker 15: highest prices in the world for prescription drugs.
Speaker 10: I'm going to attack the prices on commonly used drugs.
Speaker 10: Put a cap on the cost of insulin, a cap
Speaker 10: on the cost of prescription drugs.
Speaker 1: Not one of those child caps that you can't and
Speaker 1: I have diar, Really, what's happening?
Speaker 4: Unfortunately, it turns out credit for the biggest, most important
Speaker 4: announcement in the history of this presidency goes to someone else.
Speaker 5: I mean, I'll tell you a story.
Speaker 6: Friend of mine who's a business man, very very, very
Speaker 6: top guy. Most of you would have heard of him,
Speaker 6: a highly neurotic, brilliant businessman, seriously overweight.
Speaker 1: That took a turn.
Speaker 3: Top guy, brilliant, you know him, famous bit of a chubs.
Speaker 4: Anyway, I'm public press covers is a rough way for
Speaker 4: this guy to find out that he is saved in
Speaker 4: Trump's phone as neurotic fat friend. Well, what else can
Speaker 4: you tell us about this friend who's very famous, successful.
Speaker 6: Businessman, highly neurotic, brilliant businessman, seriously overweight, and he takes
Speaker 6: the fat the fat shot, drug, fat shot, the fat shot.
Speaker 1: Do you read any of your briefings.
Speaker 4: The fat He takes the fat shot, you know, the
Speaker 4: fat shot.
Speaker 1: I got another friend, brilliant real estate mobile. He takes
Speaker 1: the dick stiff bills.
Speaker 5: This guy takes the fat shot.
Speaker 1: This guy takes the dick stiff bills.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, continue the story about this fat of a
Speaker 4: friend of yours and he called me.
Speaker 6: Up and he said, uh, President, could I ask you
Speaker 6: a question.
Speaker 4: What.
Speaker 6: I'm in London and I just paid for this damn
Speaker 6: fat drug I take.
Speaker 1: I said, it's not working.
Speaker 5: Yo, Rickles, that is ice cold.
Speaker 4: The friend is like opening up, like, oh, I took
Speaker 4: this bad drug.
Speaker 1: He's like he's not working. He's like, I'm drunk. This
Speaker 1: poor guy, he's just catching strays. In the middle of
Speaker 1: a presidential press.
Speaker 4: College, Trump's talking about drug pricing reform and he's like, hey,
Speaker 4: when this guy goes to the hospital, the nurse gives
Speaker 4: him fifty.
Speaker 1: Ccs a Crisco.
Speaker 5: He's fat.
Speaker 1: Hey, my friend, he's very successful.
Speaker 4: Went to London and when they saw him they changed
Speaker 4: the name of Big Ben to just Ben because this
Speaker 4: guy's fat. He's a fat He's shit this guy.
Speaker 1: Anyway, back to life saving drug pricing.
Speaker 4: Again, President drum What does any of this have to
Speaker 4: do with pricing?
Speaker 6: He said, I just paid eighty eight dollars and in
Speaker 6: New York I paid thirteen hundred dollars.
Speaker 1: What the hell is going on?
Speaker 6: He said, So I checked and it's the same box,
Speaker 6: made in the same plant, by the same company.
Speaker 1: It's the identical pill.
Speaker 6: This is a great businessman, but he's not familiar with
Speaker 6: this crazy situation that we have.
Speaker 1: But he was stunned. He was as stunned as he
Speaker 1: is fat.
Speaker 4: I mean, by the way, I don't know if anybody realized,
Speaker 4: but the fat shot somehow turned into a.
Speaker 1: Fat pill in the middle of the story.
Speaker 4: It's how you know the story is true.
Speaker 1: But you know whether the story sure not.
Speaker 4: Donald Trump's point is, if you find yourself in the
Speaker 4: socialized healthcare systems of London and you want to run
Speaker 4: out and get some mozempic and some vision chips, don't
Speaker 4: bother because his fat fip of.
Speaker 1: A friend.
Speaker 4: Ate them all like a pot of work is on
Speaker 4: a tuna bender. But the point is, right now, his
Speaker 4: poor friend is at home going don't look at me.
Speaker 1: It feels like a decade.
Speaker 4: Ago that they threatened to suspend Avias Corpus. It was Friday,
Speaker 4: that long ago, yesteryear, when the knicks were still.
Speaker 3: Up two oh and since then, we've had the largest
Speaker 3: bribe ever given to an American president, the seeming surrender
Speaker 3: of a trade war we started, and the socializing of
Speaker 3: our pharmaceutical industry.
Speaker 1: What eve it is this country? What operatings?
Speaker 4: Four months ago we were a standard issue democratic, constitutional republic.
Speaker 4: Now we're some kind of a narco klepto socialist, communist Silk.
Speaker 1: Road reality show.
Speaker 4: The only foundational unchanging edict that we can even hang
Speaker 4: our hats on anymore is that whatever we are now
Speaker 4: as a country, that country is closed to any refugees.
Speaker 4: Stephen Miller said, America is now for Americans only, So
Speaker 4: hopefully there will be no more surprise announcements that overturn
Speaker 4: that apple cart.
Speaker 10: After pausing virtually all refugee admissions for those fleeing war
Speaker 10: and famine, the Trump administration is now planning to welcome
Speaker 10: one group, white South Africans.
Speaker 16: What the fuck?
Speaker 1: White South Africans. That's the only group we're opening?
Speaker 4: What you already have one? Why you you know what,
Speaker 4: mister president, You don't need thirty thirty seven South Africans.
Speaker 1: Now you'll make do with just one or two?
Speaker 5: Wait?
Speaker 1: This wouldn't have anything to do with the white thing,
Speaker 1: would it.
Speaker 6: The Orlanda is being confiscated in South Africa.
Speaker 1: I don't care about their race, their color.
Speaker 6: I don't care about their height, their weight.
Speaker 1: Oh you care about their weight? When we come back.
Speaker 17: General Stanley mcrystal'll be joining us.
Speaker 16: Don't go away?
Speaker 5: What about Dallas, My God? Tonight.
Speaker 4: He is a retired four star general served thirty four
Speaker 4: years in the United States Army. His latest book is
Speaker 4: called On Care Character Choices that define a life. Please
Speaker 4: welcome to the.
Speaker 17: Program, General Stanley McCrystal, sir, how you can.
Speaker 5: See you again.
Speaker 7: It's great to see you.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us. The book is called on Character.
Speaker 1: Tell me about this idea character? What is that?
Speaker 4: And how do we get that in public life?
Speaker 7: Well, I'm just going to break out of this and
Speaker 7: start with what I want.
Speaker 1: From you for me?
Speaker 15: I want a movie, all right, to start a national
Speaker 15: conversation on character? Yes, I think we could begin it
Speaker 15: tonight with this group.
Speaker 1: It's a fine group. I think, what's the framing of
Speaker 1: the conversation?
Speaker 7: We turn the lightship, we bring some beer in.
Speaker 1: What kind of character are we looking for?
Speaker 4: Well, how would you what is the framing of the
Speaker 4: national conversation on character?
Speaker 1: In your mind?
Speaker 15: I think first is character is our choice. That's the
Speaker 15: great thing about it. We have agency over who we
Speaker 15: as individuals are. And Heracleidis said an individual's character is
Speaker 15: their fate.
Speaker 1: Character. That's true.
Speaker 15: I also think it's true of a nation. And so
Speaker 15: we get to choose what our character is. Now somebody
Speaker 15: else we get to choose, and it's the didn't we
Speaker 15: just try that?
Speaker 4: Yeah, we chose something some American people went.
Speaker 15: Generally sixty five percent of America voted yes. And the
Speaker 15: reality is we can do better than that, and I
Speaker 15: think we can.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 15: But if character is the essence of who we are,
Speaker 15: Thomas Paine said that reputation is what men think of us.
Speaker 15: Character is what angels know of us. Then I think
Speaker 15: if we look inside and we say what can we
Speaker 15: each of us, as individuals be, we have the opportunity
Speaker 15: to be something different. I mean, none of us is perfect.
Speaker 15: Every one of us makes a mistake every day. I'm
Speaker 15: seventy years old. I make mistakes and it still frustrates me.
Speaker 1: You're seventy What am I doing wrong? What the hell?
Speaker 5: What is that?
Speaker 1: Well? You just choosing good character?
Speaker 16: He just.
Speaker 2: Mean?
Speaker 1: Why I look like I sleep in a meat dehydrator.
Speaker 15: The great thing about character is it is a combination
Speaker 15: of two things. It is our convictions. It's what we
Speaker 15: believe right, and there's no right or wrong to that,
Speaker 15: except we have to have thought about them. We have
Speaker 15: to know what they are. The beauty of the writing
Speaker 15: this book is it forced me to put on paper
Speaker 15: and to really think about what I believe. Then the
Speaker 15: other half of it is our discipline.
Speaker 7: Do we live to them?
Speaker 15: You know, you can have a lot of convictions you
Speaker 15: tell people about, but if you don't live them, there's zero,
Speaker 15: right And so I think our character is the essential
Speaker 15: identity of us as people and us as a nation,
Speaker 15: and we've let it a road.
Speaker 1: Do you view this? So here's what I see with.
Speaker 4: The audience a little bit now, and I come out
Speaker 4: usually in the beginning, and I have a little conversation
Speaker 4: with them, generally beerless.
Speaker 1: Fortunately that's a mistake, and it really is.
Speaker 4: It's okay though, because the log get highest, right.
Speaker 1: I'm noticing a thirst.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Like I've never an anxiety about this idea of control.
Speaker 4: I think people feel they've lost that agency by living
Speaker 4: in a country. And look, people when elections, people lose elections.
Speaker 4: Sometimes you live with a president that doesn't necessarily reflect you.
Speaker 4: This feels different. So how does this conversation around character.
Speaker 4: I've always thought action is the antidote to anxiety. What action, then,
Speaker 4: within this can bring some relief. There's a thirst out
Speaker 4: there for conviction, leadership, discipline that they're not getting.
Speaker 15: Yeah, I think it's got three steps. I think the
Speaker 15: first is we need to think about character more. That's
Speaker 15: largely individual, but you can share.
Speaker 1: It with people. Then we need to talk about it.
Speaker 15: We need to talk about it in small groups, not
Speaker 15: just on TV, but we need to talk about it
Speaker 15: in our schools and our families.
Speaker 4: We need to have those What are the parameters when
Speaker 4: you say we need to think about character? What are
Speaker 4: the parameters that come to your mind when you think
Speaker 4: about that? Is it boy scout pledge, stuff like be courteous,
Speaker 4: kind and forgiving all that sort of thing, or is
Speaker 4: it something different?
Speaker 15: There are certains that I think almost all of us
Speaker 15: should agree on, But as you talked about faith earlier,
Speaker 15: there are parts of faith that we vary on. But
Speaker 15: I think that if we talk about what are the
Speaker 15: things that sort of bound America together?
Speaker 7: What are the things that we all believe?
Speaker 15: How we treat people, be fair to people, have empathy,
Speaker 15: give an opportunity to people.
Speaker 1: So how do you square that?
Speaker 4: It brings up such an interesting conversation because the worlds
Speaker 4: that we might inhabit would have a very different view.
Speaker 4: I might look at the January six ers and go,
Speaker 4: that was a lack of character. You know, one man's terrorists,
Speaker 4: another man's freedom fighter. How do you square that? And
Speaker 4: what do you do with people that you think stepped
Speaker 4: over a red line but in their mind was almost
Speaker 4: a heroic action.
Speaker 7: I think that's right. First you need to listen to them.
Speaker 15: One of the things I learned in the counter terrorist
Speaker 15: fight was we had our forces, which you know, I
Speaker 15: was obviously very close to the most elite people, and
Speaker 15: then we had our enemies, and there was a perception
Speaker 15: that they were two poles different.
Speaker 7: They actually had bent up.
Speaker 15: The personal attributes of the best people that I worked
Speaker 15: with and the best people that we fought. They were courageous,
Speaker 15: they believed in their cause, they were willing to sacrifice.
Speaker 15: There was a different life journey that got them to
Speaker 15: where they were. And if we're willing to listen to
Speaker 15: another person's life journey and admit often that had we
Speaker 15: had that same life journey, we would reach those same conclusions.
Speaker 7: Then you reach it a different point.
Speaker 15: Then they're not suddenly the enemy, they just have a
Speaker 15: different perspective.
Speaker 1: Is the idea.
Speaker 4: If I had just had Fox News on, I would
Speaker 4: have been doing that on Nancy Pelosi's desk, like that
Speaker 4: just doesn't There must be some incontrovertible truth though, is
Speaker 4: there not? We can't be is the idea that we
Speaker 4: are al Qaeda? Al Qaeda is us? That that's hard
Speaker 4: to square.
Speaker 7: Well, it is.
Speaker 15: But if we try to say they're incontrovertible truths to
Speaker 15: many of them, what are they?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 4: We start to say the courteous kind and forgiving.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that's pretty good.
Speaker 15: And those are the things that are common denominator sort
Speaker 15: of things. And that's where we have to connect because
Speaker 15: the reality is we're not going to have the same
Speaker 15: view from different parts of the world, different parts of
Speaker 15: the country, different zip codes, different economic backgrounds, because your
Speaker 15: life journey is just enough different.
Speaker 4: Tell me in practice, so you have to negotiate.
Speaker 1: You're in the war now.
Speaker 4: I refer to either the countersearchs in I Rock or
Speaker 4: in Afghanistan. You are dealing with, on one level, ideological warriors,
Speaker 4: maybe in Afghananistan on another level mercenary to some extent.
Speaker 4: You go in there with a bunch of money and go,
Speaker 4: what are they paying you, I'll pay you this. How
Speaker 4: did you find common ground with them? Did you have to?
Speaker 4: Where does the wisdom of this come from for you?
Speaker 7: Yeah? I think from experience.
Speaker 15: One of the things you learned is you have to
Speaker 15: try to find common ground, and you have to start
Speaker 15: by having enough empathy. And remember it, empathy is not
Speaker 15: Sympathy doesn't mean you're rubbing somebody's belly and you agree
Speaker 15: with them.
Speaker 7: It means that you can.
Speaker 1: Would that have ended the Afghanistan war probably pretty quickly
Speaker 1: bring in.
Speaker 15: The You have to be able to put yourself on
Speaker 15: the other side of the table.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 15: I would talk to Poshtune elders and they had big
Speaker 15: turbans and beards and craggy faces and different lives in mind,
Speaker 15: spoke a different language and had a different religion. But
Speaker 15: reality they were actually pretty good people, and if you
Speaker 15: had their loyalty and their respect, they were as good
Speaker 15: as we are. In fact, they are very similar to
Speaker 15: we to us. So if you stop with if you
Speaker 15: stop assuming that anyone who doesn't share those attributes is
Speaker 15: different and therefore less than you, you have a different
Speaker 15: approach to it, and you have to be of course
Speaker 15: harder yourself as well.
Speaker 1: Because is that. You know, the book starts you famously.
Speaker 4: You did an interview for Rolling Stone during the Obama
Speaker 4: administration and where you were critical of maybe some of
Speaker 4: the tax that we had taken in the war, the
Speaker 4: way it was being prosecuted, not enough to supply things
Speaker 4: like that, and you resigned because of that. That's how
Speaker 4: you open this book, right, is that where you're reflecting
Speaker 4: on yourself very much.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 15: Of course I cancel my Rolling Stone subscription right after that,
Speaker 15: but the.
Speaker 4: Reality everyone else did to don't.
Speaker 7: Even worry about it.
Speaker 15: It's funny now because you know, we've got a little
Speaker 15: time and space. But no, we had an article that
Speaker 15: came out that I didn't think was accurate, but I
Speaker 15: accepted responsibility for it. And the reality was, in that moment,
Speaker 15: I had been I'd been born in an Army hospital,
Speaker 15: I'd lived in an Army family. I'd gone to West
Speaker 15: Point at age seventeen. I was now fifty five, almost
Speaker 15: fifty six, and suddenly, in an instant, I offer when
Speaker 15: I offered my resignation to President.
Speaker 7: Obama, I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm not a commander.
Speaker 7: I'm not a soldier.
Speaker 1: What am I?
Speaker 7: You could say, I'm a failure. I go home.
Speaker 1: Is that how you felt?
Speaker 15: It felt exactly that way. I felt as though a
Speaker 15: bolt of lightning had I'd always thought I could be
Speaker 15: fired for incompetence.
Speaker 7: Who are killed in combat.
Speaker 15: I never thought i'd be accused of something like that.
Speaker 15: And so I offer my resignation to President Obama, who
Speaker 15: was very gracious and but he accepted it. I had
Speaker 15: flown home all night from Afghanistan for this meeting. I
Speaker 15: drive across the city to where my wife was living
Speaker 15: in a set of military quarters, and I tell Annie
Speaker 15: it's over, because she and I had been married for
Speaker 15: thirty four years, and I said, our career's over.
Speaker 7: I'm out.
Speaker 1: Holy.
Speaker 15: She looked at me and she said, good. We've always
Speaker 15: been happy and we always will always be happy. And
Speaker 15: in that moment, what she communicated to me, without being straight,
Speaker 15: she said, can I face forward? And I always describe
Speaker 15: Annie as driving or a living life like she drives
Speaker 15: with no use for the rearview mirror.
Speaker 4: And away, shoot, I don't not say any about she's here.
Speaker 4: She can hear you right now. I see her right
Speaker 4: over there.
Speaker 7: It's gonna be a long night.
Speaker 1: Who's driving known?
Speaker 15: But we've been married forty eight years, and if you
Speaker 15: think about it, you commit to something. And I had
Speaker 15: committed to the military, I had committed to my marriage,
Speaker 15: and I'm committed to my country now. And so when
Speaker 15: I ask you to help lead a national conversation on character,
Speaker 15: you have the stature, you have the reach.
Speaker 1: It's basic cable, sir, it's not you really should have
Speaker 1: gone on, Colbert. I think that if you want stature
Speaker 1: and reach.
Speaker 15: No, I mean, as we say, if people are thirsty
Speaker 15: for something, for what they see, let's encourage them. Not
Speaker 15: that we're going to provide it from the outside, but
Speaker 15: we're going to have them provided to themselves. This needs
Speaker 15: to start with young people.
Speaker 4: So you look at me, Okay, this is but it
Speaker 4: brings up such an interesting thought because so I'm reflecting
Speaker 4: on when this happened to you. It was basically it
Speaker 4: was an article where you said some things that might
Speaker 4: be intemperate for a man in uniform or in command.
Speaker 1: That's really it. There was no secrets divulge.
Speaker 4: Now you're watching the Secretary of Defense snapchatting his wife.
Speaker 1: Hey, we're bombing to day. You know, doesn't resign? Is
Speaker 1: that character?
Speaker 4: Because it's not you resign because your sense of duty
Speaker 4: and character felt that you would let yourself down and
Speaker 4: let the country down. But is there character in the
Speaker 4: reason he's still there? Is loyalty And isn't that a
Speaker 4: character trait that's also valuable? How do you process what's
Speaker 4: happening now?
Speaker 15: Yeah, I certainly think you got a value loyalty. I
Speaker 15: can't put myself in his position. I can put myself
Speaker 15: in the position of an American. I can put myself
Speaker 15: in the position of someone who has both launched and
Speaker 15: been on those missions. And if someone had been you
Speaker 15: using an unsecure mode to communicate about them, I'd have
Speaker 15: been upset about it.
Speaker 1: In fact, I could see that.
Speaker 15: Yeah, I think for the people I worked with that
Speaker 15: had gotten your ass kicked. But the reality is the
Speaker 15: thing that upset me most about that was not the mistake.
Speaker 15: People make mistakes and we'll make them forever. It was
Speaker 15: after the fact, when people went on public news and
Speaker 15: they said the information wasn't classified.
Speaker 7: Of course it was. And I don't like the idea
Speaker 7: that they.
Speaker 15: Would look and say something that I know is not
Speaker 15: true and I think they know is not true.
Speaker 4: And how much of an impediment to a national conversation
Speaker 4: about character. Is the reality distortion field about you know,
Speaker 4: incontrovertible things.
Speaker 1: That are true or not true?
Speaker 4: And how do you have a conversation about character in
Speaker 4: that environment.
Speaker 15: Yeah, it makes it particularly hard because if we start
Speaker 15: to have a conversation on character, now, a certain group
Speaker 15: is always going to feel defensive because they think that.
Speaker 7: You are leveraging the word character against them.
Speaker 15: In fact, they can go both ways. People on both
Speaker 15: ends of the spectrum can feel that. But we've still
Speaker 15: got to have it. And that's why this has got
Speaker 15: to be a conversation that begins in the center. I
Speaker 15: think at pretty low levels, that starts with saying we're
Speaker 15: not going to vote for you, we're not going to
Speaker 15: buy your products, we're not going to like you on
Speaker 15: social media, we're not going to do all of those
Speaker 15: things you want us to do.
Speaker 7: Unless we see.
Speaker 15: Some level of character, not perfect character, we're never going
Speaker 15: to see that. But what we're going to see is
Speaker 15: a set of norms that say we respect the requirement
Speaker 15: that there is character. If you make a mistake admitted.
Speaker 15: What can our kids learn from watching us if they
Speaker 15: are absolutely point every time they see or if they
Speaker 15: just assume that's the way it is, that'll be worse.
Speaker 4: And I do think there is a certain now mindset
Speaker 4: that what is rewarded now is result and not processing character.
Speaker 4: It's you know, we're in a different situation. But I
Speaker 4: would even say expand your aperture on this. It's not
Speaker 4: just about character. I do think there is a certain
Speaker 4: lacking of national conversations on everything, a truth and reconciliation
Speaker 4: for the American people with each other.
Speaker 7: I think it's absolutely right.
Speaker 15: I think it could start with character, but it really
Speaker 15: has got to emanate out from there. We have to
Speaker 15: have a different definition of what we think it means
Speaker 15: to be an American citizen, right because right now, many
Speaker 15: American citizens think that if you pay your taxes and
Speaker 15: you vote, and only about sixty five percent of us vote,
Speaker 15: that you've done your job. In fact, the responsibilities are
Speaker 15: much broader than that it is to every other American
Speaker 15: because the nation is only a cover in it between citizens.
Speaker 7: God did not create the United States.
Speaker 1: What are you saying?
Speaker 4: What you're blowing it?
Speaker 7: It's an agreement, yeah, and we.
Speaker 1: All set to the go, right.
Speaker 7: Sure?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Well, it sounds to me like you have a
Speaker 4: series of books to write on character and other things,
Speaker 4: so I flip it back to you.
Speaker 1: You keep the conversation going about that general.
Speaker 3: It's so good to say all careful deveiled them out
Speaker 3: general than in the personal.
Speaker 1: Kirk break to right out after this such.
Speaker 16: An important.
Speaker 3: Ally.
Speaker 1: Let's not talking tonight.
Speaker 4: Before we go, though, We're gonna check in with your
Speaker 4: hopes for the rest of the week, mister Jordan Clopper, Jorday, Yes,
Speaker 4: what are you?
Speaker 1: What are you covering this week?
Speaker 18: Well, John, Mother's Day is coming up next Sunday, so
Speaker 18: we'll be looking at all the best ways to show
Speaker 18: the mother in your life how much you'll love her.
Speaker 1: So Mother's Day was yesterday?
Speaker 16: Was it?
Speaker 5: Damn it?
Speaker 1: That's okay, that's okay.
Speaker 18: I can make it up to her on her birthday.
Speaker 1: When's your birthday, Jordan may second, Oh boy, it's it's
Speaker 1: May twelfth, Geordie.
Speaker 18: Okay, that's all right. I'll make it up to her
Speaker 18: next week on Cinco de Mayo.
Speaker 4: She loves Cargerina, Jordan Clupper, everybody, Jordan Clopper, you just
Speaker 4: gotta do that your locker. By the way, I'll go, hey,
Speaker 4: before we go, quick announcement here to the Daily Show.
Speaker 4: Starting a little non partisan initiative in partnership with Headcount.
Speaker 1: Which is not what it sounds like. The initiative is
Speaker 1: called Indecision Take a seat.
Speaker 4: Seventy percent of elections last year uncontested completely or open.
Speaker 4: That can change because democracy works better when you got
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Speaker 1: So sign up.
Speaker 4: You'll get information on how to run for school board, braces,
Speaker 4: city council, leagues of extraordinary gentlemen, all the things you
Speaker 4: want to be. So, if you're tired of complaining about
Speaker 4: who's running things and would like other people to complain
Speaker 4: about how you're running things, scan the QR code there
Speaker 4: or go.
Speaker 1: To the link and learn more. Now here it is
Speaker 1: your moment.
Speaker 6: Is that to accelerate these price restrictions and reductions, my
Speaker 6: administration will also cut out the middlemen. We're going to
Speaker 6: totally cut out the famous middlemen. Nobody knows who they are.
Speaker 6: Middleman they I've been hearing the term for twenty five years.
Speaker 1: Middlemen.
Speaker 5: I don't know who they are, but they're rich.
Speaker 1: That I can tell you.
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