Speaker 1: You're listening to Comedy Central.
Speaker 2: Damn from the most trusted journalists at Comedy Central and
Speaker 2: actually five special reporter.
Speaker 3: The Daily Show presents Indecision.
Speaker 2: Twenty twenty four, the first presidential debate America watches through
Speaker 2: its fingers with your host John Stewart show.
Speaker 4: My room is John Stewart. Thank you aus so very
Speaker 4: much for joining us. We are coming to you live.
Speaker 1: You may say, we just watched what you watched.
Speaker 4: We just witnessed a debate between President Joseph Robinette Biden
Speaker 4: versus former President Donald Robinette Trump.
Speaker 5: Was a highly anticipated affair, according to the network that
Speaker 5: was running it.
Speaker 6: The first Biden Trump Debate a little over one month away.
Speaker 1: Right here on.
Speaker 5: CNN, we are less than two weeks away from the
Speaker 5: first presidential.
Speaker 1: Debate, just one week from today.
Speaker 3: Welcome to the.
Speaker 7: First work day of the most important week of the
Speaker 7: presidential campaign.
Speaker 1: Three days and counting, just two days now.
Speaker 4: We're about thirty hour, thirty ish hours, just over twenty
Speaker 4: four hours.
Speaker 1: Twelve and a half hours.
Speaker 3: Say the words, It's.
Speaker 8: Debate day in America.
Speaker 4: The candidates must have been so excited to know that
Speaker 4: they haven't missed it. Imagine old man Biden opening his
Speaker 4: window and shouting at the street below.
Speaker 1: You that boy, what day is today? Why it's debate day?
Speaker 5: Then there's still time prepare the debate, goose. Prior to
Speaker 5: the event, what did the political class believe would be
Speaker 5: the criteria for each candidate to be successful in the debate?
Speaker 1: First, Donald Trump?
Speaker 9: Trump has to show that he's not going to end democracy.
Speaker 4: Don't respond in a way that the suburban mothers wouldn't.
Speaker 8: Like, donateterrupt Joe Biden, don't take debate, don't look like
Speaker 8: a bully, don't get angry, portray normalness.
Speaker 4: Can't you just pretend to be normal for ninety minutes?
Speaker 4: How is that advice for a presidential debate?
Speaker 5: And not what you would say to your parents when
Speaker 5: you bring home a date for the first time?
Speaker 1: Can you not talk about January sixth?
Speaker 5: And please don't do your Asian voice.
Speaker 1: I really like this girl. But that's Trump.
Speaker 5: Surely the expectations on President Biden will be higher.
Speaker 7: He absolutely cannot have a senior moment, a physical or
Speaker 7: verbal stumble him forgetting something.
Speaker 4: Any of his kind of freezing moments.
Speaker 5: Stay alert, to stay engaged, and to stay awake.
Speaker 7: President Biden has to show that he can stand there
Speaker 7: for an extended period of time, remain.
Speaker 3: Upright, remain.
Speaker 1: Up right to be president.
Speaker 5: You know, I may be mistaken, but I believe those
Speaker 5: are the same qualifications needed to be scarecrow. Tonight the
Speaker 5: president must show in the country that he can keep
Speaker 5: our corn safe. But then it was time for the
Speaker 5: actual debate. And let's see how it began. Both men
Speaker 5: came out and oh yes, okay, And then of course
Speaker 5: both men are ambulatory.
Speaker 1: They are both upright. Level one cleared.
Speaker 5: It's going to be an important discussion between two important men.
Speaker 3: What are the rules?
Speaker 8: You want to share the rules of the debate with
Speaker 8: the audience at home.
Speaker 7: Each candidate will have two minutes to answer a question
Speaker 7: and one minute each for responses and rebuttals.
Speaker 1: What can you do it? Two minute?
Speaker 5: I can't even articulate. What's wrong with your entire setup
Speaker 5: to this debate? An add break to watch a Hulu
Speaker 5: show is three minutes?
Speaker 1: What can you do in two minutes?
Speaker 5: But all right, that's gonna winno out anything that might
Speaker 5: be interesting or substance.
Speaker 1: But let's begin.
Speaker 5: We know the bar that's been set up for each
Speaker 5: to pass. Biden has to not look old and not
Speaker 5: have a senior moment.
Speaker 9: Making sure that we're able to make every single solitary
Speaker 9: person eligible for what I've been able to do with
Speaker 9: the with the COVID, I excuse me with dealing with
Speaker 9: everything we have to do with what if we finally
Speaker 9: beat medicare?
Speaker 3: Thank you, President Biden.
Speaker 5: I need to call a real estate agent in New Zealand. Okay,
Speaker 5: high pressure situation. A lot of times you can confuse
Speaker 5: saving medicare with beating it. I'm sure it's not something
Speaker 5: that repeated throughout the debate, causing Democrats across the country
Speaker 5: to either jump out of windows or vomited silently into
Speaker 5: the nearest recycling Then anybody can talking.
Speaker 1: How did Biden do? Not talking?
Speaker 6: How close the police are there almost every police group
Speaker 6: in the nation from every state, and everybody wanted.
Speaker 3: To get it back to the States everybody.
Speaker 6: And China nothing, and Russia nothing, and India nothing.
Speaker 1: I will have that reporter out.
Speaker 6: He should have had him out a long time ago,
Speaker 6: because I didn't have legislation.
Speaker 3: I said, close the border.
Speaker 10: We had the safest border in history.
Speaker 1: Not great, but.
Speaker 5: A lot of people have resting twenty fifth Amendment face
Speaker 5: I'm not a political expert, but while Biden was preparing
Speaker 5: at Camp David for a week, did anyone mention he
Speaker 5: would also be on camera on the on the split screen.
Speaker 5: Is there any moment here that can save Biden.
Speaker 6: This is the first presidential election since the Supreme Court
Speaker 6: overturned Rob Wade.
Speaker 3: Oh shit, we're back, baby.
Speaker 1: Abortion ain't to the B to the O, to the AWE,
Speaker 1: to the T to the.
Speaker 5: The repeal of Rov Wade. That is Trump's weakest issue.
Speaker 3: It's been a great thing. Oh he is. It's a
Speaker 3: great thing.
Speaker 11: Hit him, Joey, I'm a terrible thing. What you're doing,
Speaker 11: it's this is awesome. We are done here TK.
Speaker 4: Oh no, no, no, Joe, don't.
Speaker 1: Say anything else.
Speaker 5: Don't.
Speaker 9: The idea that states are able to do this is
Speaker 9: a little like saying we're going to turn civil rights
Speaker 9: back to the states. Let each state have a different rule. Look,
Speaker 9: there's so many young women who have been including a
Speaker 9: young woman who just was murdered and he went to
Speaker 9: the funeral. The idea that she was murdered by an
Speaker 9: immigrant coming in they talk about that.
Speaker 1: Did you just immigration? Abortion?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 5: I know, abortion is one of our strongest issues, but
Speaker 5: let me for a moment talk about immigrant skilling.
Speaker 1: And right big people. It's one of the weakest folks.
Speaker 5: I think sportsmanship would insist that an opponent not sees
Speaker 5: on a opportunities such as this.
Speaker 6: There have been many young women murdered by the same
Speaker 6: people he allows to come across our border.
Speaker 1: So how do we do this? Now?
Speaker 5: Do I take his car back to the White House tonight?
Speaker 5: I mean, come on, we done with this shit? Do
Speaker 5: I use ups his stuff? Let mean, come on, that
Speaker 5: was crazy what he did just now. So Biden perhaps
Speaker 5: not on top of his game. Maybe I will check
Speaker 5: out this young upstart Donald Trump. Obviously, the election is
Speaker 5: a binary choice, so let me see what this Trump
Speaker 5: fella is about. As we learned earlier, he just had
Speaker 5: to come in there and not be an asshole.
Speaker 6: She doesn't care about our veterans.
Speaker 1: He doesn't care.
Speaker 6: He doesn't like the military at all. Probably the worst
Speaker 6: administration in history, the worst presidency in the history of
Speaker 6: our country.
Speaker 3: This shouldn't be a debate.
Speaker 6: He is the worst president. I really don't know what
Speaker 6: he said at the end of this.
Speaker 1: I don't think he knows what he said or either he.
Speaker 6: Challenge me to a golf match.
Speaker 3: He can't hit about fifty yards.
Speaker 5: Does not appear to have passed the asshole test. See
Speaker 5: me after debate. All right, Trumper, what do you got
Speaker 5: on substance?
Speaker 6: We're the greatest economy in the history of our country.
Speaker 6: A lot of credit for the military and no wars
Speaker 6: and so many other things.
Speaker 1: Everything was rock and good.
Speaker 6: But the thing we never got the credit for and
Speaker 6: we should have, is getting us out of that COVID mess.
Speaker 6: He allowed millions of people to come in here from prisons, jails,
Speaker 6: and mental institutions. The only jobs he created are for
Speaker 6: illegal immigrants. We had the lowest taxes ever. I didn't
Speaker 6: have sex.
Speaker 1: With a porn star. She was a porn character actor
Speaker 1: at best. I'm not saying she couldn't open a movie.
Speaker 1: But so, just so we're.
Speaker 5: All clear, everything that Donald Trump said in that clip
Speaker 5: is a lie, blatant and full. And we were tight
Speaker 5: on time putting this together. There's plenty more. It really
Speaker 5: makes you wonder, what's RFK Junior doing tonight. Maybe he's
Speaker 5: got something. Wait, what's up? I'm sorry? Oh, vaccines, No,
Speaker 5: I see that's but yeah, sure, there's side effects to
Speaker 5: all of them.
Speaker 3: Okay, and a wormware.
Speaker 1: Okay, fair enough, he's vice president shill running.
Speaker 5: They donated, okay, anyway, There was, of course a moment
Speaker 5: where I kind of thought we were getting substantive.
Speaker 9: I was recently in France for D Day and I
Speaker 9: spoke all about those heroes that died. I went to
Speaker 9: the World War II cemetery, World War One cemetery.
Speaker 1: He refused to go to.
Speaker 9: He was standing with his four star general and he
Speaker 9: told me, said, I don't want to go in there
Speaker 9: because they are a much of a loser and suckers.
Speaker 9: My son was not a loser, was not a sucker.
Speaker 9: You're the sucker.
Speaker 1: You're the loser. Shit just got real.
Speaker 3: The first of all, that was a made up quote, a.
Speaker 1: Made up quote, which I think a trump land means.
Speaker 1: That's a real quote. That's a quote.
Speaker 5: But there's about our nation's veterans. Foreign policy. This is
Speaker 5: important to Biden.
Speaker 9: Come on, brother, the war star general stand your side,
Speaker 9: was on your staff.
Speaker 3: Who said you said it period.
Speaker 9: We've done more for veterans than any president has in
Speaker 9: American history. The only sacred obligation we have as the
Speaker 9: country is to care for our veterans when they come
Speaker 9: home and their families and equip them when they go
Speaker 9: to war.
Speaker 3: That's what we're doing.
Speaker 9: That's what the VA is doing. Now, they're doing more
Speaker 9: for veterans than ever before in our history.
Speaker 3: All Right, thank you so much for it.
Speaker 4: Let's move to the topic of foreign policy.
Speaker 1: Wait what, move on? No, we don't move stay on
Speaker 1: that topic. Not move on, dot No, don't go moving on.
Speaker 5: Who came up with these dumb ass ules and why
Speaker 5: would any of these people agree to them. The one
Speaker 5: thing that we did prove tonight is that the MAGA
Speaker 5: conspiracy theory about Biden's upcoming debate performance was nonsense.
Speaker 6: A little before debate time, he gets a shot.
Speaker 3: In the ass.
Speaker 8: They are giving the president some sort of a stimulant,
Speaker 8: an add drug adderall riddling.
Speaker 6: New drugs that are out there that are specifically for
Speaker 6: Alzheimer's or Parkinson's, A lot.
Speaker 3: Of caffeine pills E. Twelve debate viagriate.
Speaker 4: Well, certainly there are drugs that can be used to
Speaker 4: energize a person in that state.
Speaker 1: I apologize for how fast I'm talking now.
Speaker 5: I'm on those drugs. Let me just say, after watching
Speaker 5: tonight's debate, both of these men should be using performance
Speaker 5: enhancing drugs. I'm sorry, boy, as much of it as
Speaker 5: they can get, as many times a day as their
Speaker 5: bodies will allow. If performance enhancing drugs will improve their lucidity,
Speaker 5: their ability to solve problems, and, in one of the
Speaker 5: candidate's cases, improve their truthfulness, morality and malignant narcissism.
Speaker 1: Then suppository away. That's what everybody.
Speaker 4: They should be taken whatever magical drugs can kick their
Speaker 4: brains into gear. Because this ain't Olympic swimming, you know
Speaker 4: what I'm saying. Oh, he solved the Middle East, but
Speaker 4: he was doping, so it doesn't doubt there's gonna be
Speaker 4: an asterisk next to his presidency. And by the way,
Speaker 4: if those drugs don't exist, if there aren't actually performance
Speaker 4: enhancing drugs for these candidates, I could sure use some
Speaker 4: recreational ones right now because this cannot be real life.
Speaker 1: It just can't.
Speaker 4: We're America, God, we glory, gott lead.
Speaker 1: We'll be joining us. Don't go away? What about the
Speaker 1: Daily Show? Now?
Speaker 5: Now, My guest tonight, in an incredibly prescient booking by
Speaker 5: our talent people, is a psychotherapist.
Speaker 1: HM fancy that.
Speaker 5: Best selling author of Maybe You Should talk to Someone,
Speaker 5: A dear therapist, columnist for The Atlantic, Please welcome to
Speaker 5: the program.
Speaker 1: Lori Gottlieb, please on the seage dot. You're probably wondering
Speaker 1: why I've called you here tonight.
Speaker 8: Yes, well, my therapist clearly turned off his phone, so
Speaker 8: I'm sure.
Speaker 5: Now are you expecting as a therapist on occasions like this,
Speaker 5: they always say, you know, the Super Bowl, people get
Speaker 5: so angry and they're rooting for their teams and there's
Speaker 5: a huge uptick in arguments and violence and all kinds
Speaker 5: of other things. Do you expect something similar for an
Speaker 5: event like this.
Speaker 8: Well, I think that a lot of people are going
Speaker 8: to be having arguments. They don't know there's going to
Speaker 8: be domestic violence, but I think there's definitely going to
Speaker 8: be a lot of arguments happening with friends, families, workplaces,
Speaker 8: all of it.
Speaker 5: And you think, because this is a time when the
Speaker 5: country is really focused on this and there's really no
Speaker 5: way to escape it, and so whatever schisms are there
Speaker 5: are going to be exacerbated.
Speaker 1: I think they are.
Speaker 8: And also just because we're so polarized, and I think
Speaker 8: that people don't know how to have conversations about the issues.
Speaker 8: It doesn't even become about the issues anymore as we
Speaker 8: just saw.
Speaker 1: But we are siloed.
Speaker 5: Isn't the siloing of the nation and keep us from
Speaker 5: having to have those conversations because you don't really run
Speaker 5: into those people that you disagree with too much except
Speaker 5: on Thanksgiving.
Speaker 8: Well, I think you run into them on social media,
Speaker 8: and I think that that's where a lot of this
Speaker 8: is happening. And then people's people get very upset by
Speaker 8: what they're seeing on social media. And I can understand
Speaker 8: when we look at the rates of anxiety and depression.
Speaker 8: You know, we say in therapy, before diagnosing someone with depression,
Speaker 8: make sure they aren't surrounded by assholes. Right, So I'm
Speaker 8: not going to name who those assholes?
Speaker 1: Is that really a thing? Like I have depression and
Speaker 1: you're like.
Speaker 8: Wow, Well, sometimes like I understand.
Speaker 1: Ook at who drove you here, look at who sent
Speaker 1: you here?
Speaker 8: Because the people who come to therapy are are the
Speaker 8: people who are coming to therapy, because the people who
Speaker 8: should be in therapy are not coming to therapy.
Speaker 1: That just blew my mind.
Speaker 5: So this is people are coming because they feel they
Speaker 5: don't have an outlet for their frustrations and the only
Speaker 5: outlet they might have social media is toxic.
Speaker 8: Well, I think that what you see on social media
Speaker 8: again is a lot of this sort of you know,
Speaker 8: name calling, and and again there's not a lot of nuance,
Speaker 8: there's not a lot of complexity. It's a lot of
Speaker 8: just people fighting. It was like that golf exchange, you know,
Speaker 8: on the debate. It's those kinds of things where people
Speaker 8: are talking about completely irrelevant things or they're just uninformed.
Speaker 8: And I think that people.
Speaker 5: Uninformed and irrelevant a presidential debate. How do you deal
Speaker 5: with there is an existential fear to this. I mean,
Speaker 5: for social media to keep people engaged, for news organizations
Speaker 5: to keep people watching, they have to ramp up the
Speaker 5: urgency and the existential nature of the crisis. So you're
Speaker 5: sort of torn between.
Speaker 1: These two impulses.
Speaker 5: One is to not participate, which would be addocating civic responsibility,
Speaker 5: but the other would be to base yourself in this
Speaker 5: existential crisis.
Speaker 1: What choice do you have?
Speaker 8: Well, we do have a choice because so look at anxiety.
Speaker 8: There's productive anxiety and unproductive anxiety. So well, think about it,
Speaker 8: if you didn't have anxiety, you wouldn't be able to
Speaker 8: be safe. That's why we have anxiety. It was like
Speaker 8: there's a bear. You better have anxiety. Your unproductive anxiety
Speaker 8: is I'm just going to stand here. Productive anxiety is
Speaker 8: I'm going to do something about this.
Speaker 1: See that's so.
Speaker 5: Weird because my anxiety has never saved me from bears,
Speaker 5: but it often convinces me I'm not lovable.
Speaker 3: So how how.
Speaker 1: I shared too much?
Speaker 3: How do you just going to say?
Speaker 1: How do you suffer? I watched it.
Speaker 5: I didn't want to watch the debates tonight, but I
Speaker 5: do work once a week now, so I have to
Speaker 5: because that's it's toxic to me. I know that I
Speaker 5: have to participate. But how does that anxiety of watching it?
Speaker 5: How is that a relic of something.
Speaker 1: That's good for me?
Speaker 8: It's good for you because then you can take action.
Speaker 8: By the way, I hope you're taking action on the
Speaker 8: unlovable thing. I hope you're getting some help.
Speaker 5: With that little thing called mushrooms baby micro dos away.
Speaker 8: Sorry, but it's helpful because you say, Okay, there are
Speaker 8: two ways you can respond to this. You can say
Speaker 8: I'm gonna put my head in the sand and not engage,
Speaker 8: which is I hope not the option that people here
Speaker 8: are taking. And you can also say, oh, I'm just
Speaker 8: spinning an anxiety, I'm doom scrolling, I'm just you know,
Speaker 8: getting all worked up. Yes, that's not helpful, that's unproductive anxiety.
Speaker 8: And then there's productive anxiety where you say what can
Speaker 8: I do well? You can get involved in a campaign,
Speaker 8: you can volunteer, you can please vote, you can get
Speaker 8: the people around you to vote. There are things that
Speaker 8: you can do. The thing that you want to do
Speaker 8: is you want to say what can I control here?
Speaker 8: And that's where you take your anxiety and you say
Speaker 8: it's going to motivate me to do something productive.
Speaker 5: Does sitting in your underwear, screaming at the tea the
Speaker 5: account as action, No.
Speaker 1: Doc, you're losing me here.
Speaker 5: Have you seen an effect of this on relationships, on marriages,
Speaker 5: on families?
Speaker 1: Have you want?
Speaker 5: Is this separating people at a much deeper, more emotional
Speaker 5: level than what we're understanding.
Speaker 1: Yes. Absolutely.
Speaker 8: You know, when I see couples in therapy, often when
Speaker 8: they come in, the person, you know, you say what's
Speaker 8: going on, and the person wants something to change, But
Speaker 8: what they want to change is the other person, the
Speaker 8: person sitting right there. Sure they don't think I want
Speaker 8: to change myself or I have a role in this,
Speaker 8: and I see that in what happens around these political
Speaker 8: conversations is that people don't say, oh, maybe I am
Speaker 8: not being curious about why they think what they think,
Speaker 8: or I'm not really getting to the bottom of it,
Speaker 8: and I'm just you know, we're just yelling at each
Speaker 8: other about this.
Speaker 5: Are you seeing this in couple in married couples where
Speaker 5: paulics has driven a wedge to them that is that
Speaker 5: they can't overcome.
Speaker 1: Or absolutely, how do you traverse a political conversation with
Speaker 1: a couple?
Speaker 8: Yeah, Well, there's this great phrase in therapy. It's saying,
Speaker 8: I wonder. So it starts with I wonder, I got it,
Speaker 8: I wonder you know. It's kind of like, you know,
Speaker 8: I wonder if instead of taking another drink, maybe you
Speaker 8: should take a walk when you're feeling sad right as.
Speaker 5: We unfortunately it's a live show. We're out of time.
Speaker 5: I always say I use that all the time. I
Speaker 5: wonder why you're such an asshole?
Speaker 1: Check out Laurie's book.
Speaker 4: Maybe you just go up to someone for calling in
Speaker 4: the Atlantic, I'm got me.
Speaker 1: That is our shark tonight here it is. The moment
Speaker 1: is that John Berman joins us now from inside the
Speaker 1: debate Hall.
Speaker 3: So, John, how's it working. What's it like?
Speaker 7: Well, twenty four hours from now, in a few minutes, Anderson,
Speaker 7: you're gonna have a president and a former president standing
Speaker 7: on the same stage.
Speaker 3: Pretty close to each other.
Speaker 7: These luck turns are just eight feet apart. I can
Speaker 7: basically touch them at the same time with my arms out.
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