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Most trusted journalists at Comedy Central. It's America's only source for news. This is the Daily show with your host, Jon Stewart, everybody. Boom, boom, boom. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Daily show. My name is Jon Stewart and I am risen from COVID hell. First timer. First timer did not care for it. We also want to welcome in all of our viewers who are probably joining us from X after watching an amazing and surprisingly life affirming conversation between Donald Trump and Elon Musk. You know, when they started quoting their favorite Maya Angelou passages to each other. My interpretation, the caged bird is singing for bitcoin. We do have a great show for you tonight. Mark Cuban is going to be joining us later. And, you know, we mentioned earlier on this program, occasionally we do make fun of Donald Trump. Occasionally. And with the ribbing and the joshing and the pulling the pants down and the pointing, but he is in pain right now.

Multiple sources tell the Washington Post Trump.

Has grown increasingly upset about Harris surging poll numbers. Trump is, quote, complaining relentlessly, posting multiple times on social media, clearly frustrated with Biden's decision to step aside, saying, quote, now we have to start all over again. Not fair. Jesus. A month ago, he was basically already the president. He had cheated death, started a new ear accessory trend. Back then, people thought his VP selection was a smart choice. He had it all in the bag and it was taken away. It was perfect on the beam. He nailed the dismount. He was walking to the podium to get his medal. Romania files an inquiry at the last minute, right at the last minute, and they're just stealing it from him. And by the way, Romania file all you want. You're not getting that medal back. Huh? You got the other back. Oh, I'm sorry. Oh, we have an inquiry. Yeah, good luck. But now, instead of enjoying the fruit of six years of Biden attacks, Trump's gotta start all over again. And the audience has to literally sit through him getting up to speed.

There are numerous ways of saying her name. You can say Kamala. You can say Kamala. Kamala. Kamala. Hey, Kamala.

Trump misspelled Harris first name as Kamabla.

I get Kamala. I get Kamala. Kamabla. Judges, are we taking Kamabla? Hope the Romanians don't have a problem with that. But you know what? I guess what Trump calls her isn't as important as figuring out what she is.

I don't know.

Is she indian or is she black?

She is.

She was indian all the way. And then all of a sudden, she made a turn and she went, she became a black person.

Just to be clear, what am I gonna do with all my indian ethnic slurs I was gonna use? It mostly involved turmeric and cumin. And she made a turn into black. He talks about it like she wandered into the wrong neighborhood. She was driving to the Upper west side and then, boom, she's in Harlem. Boom, with a turn. You know what, Donald? You're clearly struggling. Let's get some issue oriented ideas flowing here. You know what we're gonna do? Come on, my brother, I'm gonna help you out. Here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna do, we're gonna do some. Apparently, I'm in a musical about gambling all of a sudden. All right, here we go. I got my pen. I got my pet, I got my visor. Forget the biographical stuff for now. Let's focus on the issues.

I saw it yesterday on ABC, which they said, oh, the crowd was so big. And I've spoken to the biggest crowds. Nobody's spoken to crowds bigger than me.

Okay. Okay. That's one of those mom and pop issues. For the single issue, crowd size voter, I'd move on, but, oh, you've got more.

I had 107,000 people in New Jersey. You didn't report it. I'm so glad you asked. What did she have yesterday? 2000 people. We had in Harrisburg, 2020, 5000 people. And 20,000 people couldn't get in. We had so many. Nobody ever mentions that when she gets 1500 people. They said, oh, the crowd was so big. I have ten times, 20 times, 30 times the crowd size.

I had an infinite crowd. One guy. She had one guy named Jeff. All right, it's very clear. You have everybody. She has nobody. Can we move on? He wrote, has anyone noticed that Kamala cheated at the airport? There was nobody at the plane and she aied it and showed a massive crowd of so called followers, but they didn't exist. He goes on to say, she's a cheater. She had nobody waiting and the crowd looked like 10,000 people. Oh, my God. Now, all right, for those of you at home are saying, like, oh, it sounds like he's losing his mind. Just because there's video and photographic evidence that Kamala Harris crowd was real doesn't mean that it was real. And then you might say, oh, well, John, I was actually there. I was in the crowd. And have you considered you're not real? Have you considered that? The point is, Donald Trump doesn't need the fake news media and their AI crowd shots to win this thing because he's got inside information on Kamala Harris from someone she used to date.

Well, I know Willie Brown very well. In fact, I went down in a helicopter with him. We thought maybe this is the end. We were in a helicopter going to a certain location together, and there was an emergency landing. But he told me terrible things about her.

You were in a helicopter with former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown, who famously dated Kamala Harris. And while the helicopter was going down, as you were plunging to your imminent debt, former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown turns to you and says, this might not mean anything to you now, but do you, do you remember that lady I was going out with? The prosecutor? Well, before we die, I just want you to know she's worst. I do not want to meet my maker without giving you that piece of information. If you survive, you may need it. Oh, my God. I gotta tell you, I'm sure a moment like that was seared not only into the memory of Donald Trump, but also into the memory of former mayor Willie Brown.

To be clear, you have never been.

On a helicopter with Donald Trump. No, I have not. Are you kidding me?

I just assumed that he was on.

The helicopter ride with somebody black and he made a mistake and thought it was me. What? What? That is so up that I'm sure that is not what happened. What are the chances Trump is just mixing up his black people?

It seems that the african american politician in question was not Kamala Harris, ex.

Former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown, but.

Rather this man, Nate Holden, a former Los Angeles city council member who says he had a bumpy ride with Trump in 1990.

Oh, my God. Do you know what this means? Nate Holden, former Los Angeles city council member, told Donald Trump, as their helicopter was going down, bad things about Kamala Harris that I guess Willie Brown had told him. If they knew each other, that is the only explanation, right? Holden saying, quote, willie is the short black guy living in San Francisco. I'm a tall black guy living in Los Angeles. I guess we all look alike. Hey, Donald Trump is not racist. He just meets a lot of people on death helicopters, and he needs some mnemonic device, help if the chopper goes down. That's not Willie Brown. A little, little mnemonic device. Here's one. If the flight's not going great, you're probably riding with Nate. Look, people, they pulled the candidate Trump was crushing. It's hard. You think you could write a new hour in a month? It's not easy. He's trying he's trying out some good catastrophizing on Harris.

If Harris wins this election, you will quickly have a crash like in 1929. We could end up in World War three. The suburbs will be overrun.

Boom. That's what I'm talking about. Stock market crash, World War three, suburbs destroyed. It's fresh, it's new. We haven't heard. What was that? I'm sorry.

If Biden got in, you'll have a stock market crash. The likes of 1929 are worse. A very real risk of world War three. They're going to, in my opinion, destroy suburbia.

This is just a remix, dude. You can't just find and replace Biden with Kamala. That's lazy. Apocalypsing. Look, man, if you want us to genuinely fear your opponent as the existential threat you'd like to make them out to be, you're gonna have to do better than boilerplate cut and paste shit. You're better than this, Donald.

Joe Biden is a failed president. She was a failed vice president. The worst president in the history. The worst vice president in history. He is incompetent. She's incompetent. Everything he's touched has been bad. Everything she's touched has turned to bad things. She can't talk. She can't talk. In many ways, he's worse than Bernie. She's worse than Bernie.

Lower IQ.

She's a low IQ individual. She happens to be really a low IQ individual. She really does. She has a very low iq.

This is bullshit, man. This is like when Elton John changed, like, three words and then pretended candle in the wind was always about Diana. It wasn't very disrespectful to Marilyn. Too soon. Here's the problem. Even when Trump does figure out how to come at Kamala, it's not really landing, because most of the time, the bad stuff he's saying about her applies even more to him.

If Kamala will lie to you so brazenly about Joe Biden's mental incapacity, then she will lie to you about anything. She can never, ever be trusted.

Yes. Donald Trump is telling America not to elect a liar. Donald Trump is saying that not to elect a liar. I mean, for God's sakes, he's like the Michael Jordan of Lyon, or as Trump would say it, the willie Brown of Lyon. It confused me. Look, I hate to say it. I don't think Trump has gotten in him to go after Kamala Harris. He's been fighting Joe Biden for six years. It's all he knows. He misses the fight so much, he was still workshopping nicknames for Joe Biden this weekend.

What do you like better? It doesn't matter anymore. But what do you like better, crooked Joe or sleepy Joe? Sleepy Joe. Crooked Joe.

This is sad. It's like seeing an old man talking to an empty spot on the bench. And then you realize that's where his wife used to sit. He would give her everything for just one more moment. We crooked Joe.

I hear he's gonna make a comeback at the Democrat convention. He's gonna walk into the room and he's going to say, I want my presidency back. I want another chance to debate Trump. I want another chance.

He's not coming back. He's not coming back, Donald. Hey, you know how I know he's not coming back? We have a camera on him. That's him. He's just sitting there at the beach having an Arnold Palmer. You can hear him sighing over the waves. Does this look like a man marshaling his forces to take back the nomination or filming a corona commercial? He's finding his beach. It's over. There's only one way. Donald, meet me at camera one. Hello, friend. May I call you Donald? I get it. You wanted to run against Joe Biden. Two old dudes going toe to toe fungus. Last hurrah. Rocky twelve. It's not fair. Now you've got to run against someone who appears healthy and youthful and happy, her vigor standing as a stark counterpoint to whatever front butt thing you have going on. And it's pretty clear that Biden isn't gonna do what needs to be done to stop this steal. But someone I know loves stopping steals, right? Feeling me? Kamala Harris accepts the nomination next Thursday night, which means it may be time to get the gang together. Storm the convention pulling August 22. This time on behalf of Joe Biden.

All you need is thousands of supporters who have not yet been sent to jail yet for being part of the last mob or got sent to jail so early in the process. They're already out. If only there was a sign of the righteousness of this cause. A federal judge ruling the Department of.

Justice must return the spear and fur helmet belonging to QAnon Shaman Jacob Chancely.

Shaman, don thy fur helmet. We ride on for Bidon. When we come back, Mark Cuban is here. Don't go away. We'll be right back. Welcome back to the Daily show. My guest tonight, an entrepreneur and already owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks, co founder of cost plus drug company. Please welcome Mark Cuban. Sir, welcome. Thank you. You are. Yes, sir. Security.

I didn't hear you. What did you say?

This is a. No, this is a Knicks town frame. They love that. Now, are people in New York, are they because of the history between the mavericks and the Knicks, generally with the trades, where you fleeced us to a certain extent, do you find there's a kindness that is.

Yeah, I. Yeah.

Extended to you.

Yeah.

Nick fans.

Literally, if I like to walk in New York. Right. And just today, walking down the street.

Yeah. Cuban, we love you.

And it's crazy. Literally. Great basketball fans here. I get all kinds of love, and.

That'S what you get in New York. That's what they shout at you.

Yeah, but now that's what I get. And now it's more. Thanks for JB. Right. But, yeah, that's what I get.

Right. Well, Jalen Brunson. Now, did you have any idea when Jalen Brunson was there? And I'm sorry to go down this road, but I'm a Nick fan, and this is just. You're gonna have to sit through it. Jalen Brunson was not. He started in the playoffs when.

Yeah. When Luca got hurt.

Did you have any idea that he would become this all NBA phenomenon? He's undersized. He doesn't. His footwork is so phenomenal.

No, no idea. I mean. I mean, he was talented, but he was picked in the second round. If everybody knew, he would have been a top five pick. I mean, if you redraft that draft, other than Luca, he is a top three or five pick.

That's amazing.

It's crazy. Yeah. But more credit to him. He worked on it.

Yeah. And he's. And just seems like a phenomenal guy and then decided to take a contract for less money than he could have made.

So let's talk politics.

Farther away. Now, you are in this interesting position in your career where you've sort of a bump. You are now, even though I think your leanings are probably, you consider more independent, more libertarian, you are the left's favorite billionaire. You've become. Because. And I can't. I don't know if it's because there's a certain mellowing that occurs as you get older or if this new sort of tech bro phenomenon is so dystopian in its formulation.

Yeah, this is who I've always been. I haven't been like the rich guy trying to act like a rich guy. My friends are still my high school buddies, my college buddies, my rugby buddies, but watching what's happened in Silicon Valley is insane. It's not so much a support thing, it's more like a takeover thing, trying to put themselves in a position to have as much control as possible. They want Trump to be the CEO of the United States of America, and they want to be the board of directors that makes him listen to them.

What is the ethos? Because it seems like in the old days of innovation, there was a certain amount of, we're innovating the Internet, we're taking things. Now it seems much more about sort of this social engineering and transhumanism, and we are going to join with computers, and together, eight of us are going to run everything. Dominate. Right? Is that the ethos you see?

Yeah, I think I'm gonna go with yeah.

You just said yeah.

Yeah.

You know, they've gotten to the point now where they feel like they should control the world, right? And that there should be a CEO in charge of everything, but because they.

Have a good photo app, because they're rich as.

Right. You know, it's just like, you get to that point sometimes where I think they've lost the connection to real world.

Is it boredom? Like, is there a certain extent, like, if you're, like a Bezos or one of those guys, you just. You've sold so many books that you're just like, I'm gonna live on Mars.

Like, it's just. I think it's more of what's their next act, right? We've like, we invented this, we did this, we created that. What can we do next? Somebody wants to go to Mars. Well, what can we do here, back on earth? Well, let's. I mean, look at Elon, right? Elon, in being one of those powerful people, he's trying to be the most influential man in the world. It sounds like a commercial, but literally, that's what Twitter has given us.

I've got to say, I think he might be that. I don't even think he's trying to be. When you talk about somebody who is setting up satellite links for war zones and also controlling discourse in the most important media platform. That's right. I would think he's the most powerful.

Because Twitter is in almost every country. Right? And so Twitter gives him the ability to connect to the prime minister, the head of every country in the world.

That's right.

And that person, whoever's in charge of that country, has an interest in what happens on Twitter. And what happens on Twitter because of the control of the algorithms, being the biggest user is all dependent on Elon Musk. He literally, wherever his thumb wants to go. He gets to push as hard as he does.

And he certainly, I mean, he's transparent about where he wants things to go. I think he's very clear that civil war is inevitable and that white people are under the gun concerning. Right. Civil war is inevitable. And then he'll ride underneath there. Hmm. You know, kind of an understatement on there. But I can't, I can't decide whether or not it's better to know exactly where he stands and know where he's going to be put the thumb on, because he's not. He's clearly a very bright guy.

Yeah, for sure.

And he has a media empire that has the largest reach and most influence of anything on the face of the earth. And there's no question he's going to leverage it in this election. No question.

But the crazy part is he has more impact globally than he does domestically, in my opinion. Right. Because when you go on x, you see a preponderance of right leaning people. You don't see a lot.

They're all over my. For you. I've never clicked on any of these.

That's the whole thing. That's the way algorithms work. Right?

What? Yes. They do the opposite of what I want.

Yes. When somebody tells them, when you write an algorithm, I haven't written a lot. It's been a while, but when you write one, get to set the parameters of what you want to see happen. And he certainly has done that to the things he likes, but it's different in other platforms. And the good news is, what, 20% of adults in the United States are on Twitter. So, I mean, there's 80% who aren't there.

But isn't this a certain amount of tech, bro, malpractice, that there is this incredible need in the marketplace of something that is slightly less biased or, you know, toxic when it comes to there. And they came out with threads, and you're on it for 2 seconds, and you're like, I think I need an app.

No, I like threads. Threads is getting better. Try it.

Here's something that doesn't sell online. No, it's getting better. That may be the worst, worst sales pitch ever.

Okay.

For any of these. But see, you, you do disrupt industries.

I try.

Like, there is, see, that's why I would have thought, and I think you've said this, that Trump appealed to you at first because there is a certain outsider, and look, we both know our government, there is a status quo, and there is a capture by lobbies and by big businesses that write this legislation and end up gaining advantage that needs to be disrupted.

Correct.

When did it occur to you that he didn't necessarily want to free it? He wanted to have the deed to the swamp signed over to him.

About the third time I talked to him, right. It was, he wasn't about changing. I mean, the conversations I would have with him, I'm like, what? There was a time when are these phone conversations? Conversations, yes.

Is it Zoom?

No, it wasn't Zoom. Right. That was pre zoom, actually.

Does he facetime?

No, that didn't FaceTime. Right. But like, we were talking about this one debate for CNBC that he wasn't going to be at. And I'm like, Donald going, Mark, not going.

Not happening.

I'm like, Donald, why don't you go to a local small business and sit there at the table and just show off your business chops, right, and show people your business. He goes, Mark, Donald Trump and Mark Cuban don't go to people's houses and have dinner. Are you kidding me? That's who he is, right? When we talked about what's he going to do with the ground game out, I got all these religious people who are going to do the work for me. Jesus.

So he, in his mind. So I think this is very interesting because, and maybe you know this too, he runs a family business, so he is in essence a monarch. It's a dictatorship. And maybe there's not as much malevolence to his actions as, oh, this America can be a subsidiary of the Trump Organization, the Trump Organization, because this is how I run it. And they might say, well, we have checks and balances and division of government. And he just thinks to himself, yeah, no, we're going to get rid of that.

Yeah, that's the sense I get.

That's what it is.

Yeah, this is my country, right? Everybody else is bad. Donald good.

Okay. And so Donald Good. So whoever thinks Donald good, also good.

Come along for the ride. Right? I mean, he just brought hate and anger to politics. And that is his sales pitch.

When you talk to him, is that a part of his general conversation or do you think that is a strategic demagoguing of, he wants to get that emotion?

That wasn't what we talked about, but I think that's, Donald is a sales rep. He's a salesperson. He's going to follow what works and whatever. He's going to try all kinds of different things. He's going to talk to all kinds of different people and he'll try things out. And if it works, he's going to do more of it.

Do you see him on his heels now? When was the last time that you sort of had these counseling sessions?

No, there were. I talked to him probably 2019. No, I talked to him during the pandemic because I was trying to help him with different. Look, he's still the president of the United States, still our country, right. So I tried to help him with PPE and a lot of different things, a lot of medical care type stuff.

Sure. Are you the guy who suggested the bleach? Is that you? Is that. Everything's going great. Everything's working. Cuban comes up and says, have you tried drinking liquid plumber? I did not say drink.

I said inject.

All right, fair enough. Fair enough. So all this is going on. You've sour. So what is your relationship now with this tech world, and how does AI fit into that? And how do you remain bullish on those innovations when they so clearly are working to avoid any kind of regulation of these new innovations?

Okay, two things. One, they're there because they're rich, not because they're tech bros or because they just happen to make their money in tech. I don't think that's really applicable, the AI side. You know, I've been in technology for a long time, and you can always look at a new tech, PCs, networks, the Internet, streaming, whatever, and say, okay, in five years, this is what's going to happen. Right. And have a good sense with AI. You can't do that with large language models. We have no idea whether it's going to zig or zag or what the impact is going to be. And that's the good news. And the bad news? The good news is we're dominating right now, globally, the United States. The bad news is, in terms of the quality and the impact of the AI and the advancements that we're introducing in AI, the research that we're doing, we are without question, the leader. And that's really important from a defense perspective, military, et cetera. And also from a business perspective, it's going to have a big impact on this country. I personally think it's generally positive, but there's a lot of uncertainty to come.

And so when you, what gives you.

The hope that it's generally positive? Because I, as a counterpoint, we heard the same thing about social media and we heard the same thing about all these different innovations of the connectivity. And yet every time I turn on Congress, Zuckerberg is up there like, look, I'm really sorry. I didn't know it was gonna kill all your daughters? Like, no.

Remember, it's still just, just a short window. Social media has really only been prominent last six years. And I think we'll learn and we'll evolve, and the same thing will happen with AI. There's going to be points in time where it's up and people are using it. But I think over time, particularly with Gen Z, right, Gen Z is a different beast. Boomers are idiots. We went from sex, drugs, and rock and roll to Fox News. It doesn't get any worse than that.

Right?

And they're trying to. No. And they're trying to define regulations. Right? And that's hard. Right? That's really, really hard.

That's true.

And so I think Gen Z has a better understanding, a better feel for AI and where it's going and would be able to come up with better uses, better implementations and better regulations.

Does it concern you that the implementation timeframe, so when you think about the industrial revolution, right, and you think about the disruption or globalization, the disruption to the workforce, the way that labor can travel and labor cannot travel, but capital can. And all these different things that were kind of a race to the bottom for american workers to a large extent, but all those changes took place over sometimes a century, sometimes decades, the changes in AI, the disrupt, right? So when you've got something that disrupts to maybe even a larger extent than globalization did, to maybe a larger extent than the industrial revolution did, and it's going to happen by Thursday, in what world are humans in any way capable and set to withstand that disruption?

I think we'll be able to withstand it, but I think it's going to be very disruptive. And the problem is it's going to happen anyways. Somebody here, your son at Duke, right, can say, I've got this great idea. I'm going to implement it with an open source, large language model, and I'm going to take it in this.

He did say that to me.

Right. But Gen Z is different. Right. Gen Z, I think, looks at humanity differently, is kinder. Like, I've got three kids, 1518 and 21.

Right, right.

And they're just nicer. Right. They're not like we were.

So are you trying to say, like, are we weathering what is the last gasp of this kind of more misanthropic moment in history? So in your mind, whatever happens, this is going to be a more misanthropic decade that will be ameliorated by this younger generation, right?

I hope so, because the regulatory cap, the way we've always done politics. Right now is everybody's chasing power, and nothing will give you more power than military and AI. And I think the algorithm, I mean, we talked going back to algorithms again, right? Driven by AI. That's the most powerful element in the world right now, because everybody just gets whatever they're seeing reinforced. And if you want to influence somebody, just manipulate the algorithm and you'll get their attention. And so, but I think.

So what's the remedy on that? If there's no one working a pushback, if pushing back on that is considered.

You just gotta go. Censorship, it's just one of those things where you've got to go through it.

It's an evolution of a new media.

Model, just an evolution of technology, media, right? Because if we don't do it, the Chinese and the Russians will. Because the only thing that holds AI back is processing power, electricity, and ingenuity, right? And I think our ingenuity wins. I'm still a big believer in american exceptionalism. I still believe that we've got the best technologists in the world, and I think that's why we have to open that door for AI.

So ultimately it becomes a question of the world is going to be carved up in the way that it's always been somewhat carved up in terms of its resources. The question is, is it carved up by the western world or is it.

Carved, carved up by somebody else?

A different world? And do they set up a different system? And I'm assuming that Russia and China see a unique vulnerability in the West's ascension in this moment. That's been the world order since 1945.

Everybody looks at it, right? And looks at it and says, AI, if I can, he who controls AI, right? And so. But we've done a good job of limiting processors. The new semiconductor act will help us quite a bit, and we'll bring things. You know, we're already doing most of those things here, right?

So how do you resist the ring? Right? So, like Lord of the Rings, the ring of power. Like it's the one thing, boy, when you get the ring, you just don't want to let it go. How do you resist that? Because you've got the money, you've got the influence. You could be that guy. You could be setting those things up and doing all that, but you're just trying to get us, like, better generic aspirin, like, what is happening? What makes no, but I'm saying, I know what I know and I know.

What I can do. I know what I'm good at. Okay?

And you're not tempted by the ring that's in front of you.

Because I think there's a different ring. Right. Because, yeah, AI could be the end all, be all technologically, but that doesn't play to my strengths. And the ups and downs and ins and outs are just not me. But you want to talk about pharmacy. What could be better than up the healthcare system in the United States of America and about making sure it's affordable. That's interesting. Yeah, that's. There's a path there.

There is. I imagine when you get in that position, at that height, you can't help but hear the siren call of. You could run this whole thing. Cuban.

Maybe a little bit. Maybe a little bit. But, you know, just. I hate to use the cliches, but the way I was raised, I've got three kids, right? And I don't want to miss that. You know, I don't want to be 95 and look back and say, I was president, but I didn't get to know my kids at all.

Right?

You know, I'd rather say I. Healthcare and everybody's healthier and everybody's got a better world to live in. And my kids and I are friends. We're close. You know, they bring over the grandkids and the kids kids, and that's just more important to me.

Right. And do you have your eye on other industries right now where you can do sort of the same kinds of things?

There's pharmacy and we're, you know, costbustdrugs.com saying, I'm gonna get that sales pitch in there. Costlustrugs.com is literally in process of having a significant impact on the drug market. Right. We are pushing generic drugs down now. We're right around the corner from.

But you're negotiating prices in a way that hasn't been done prior.

Right. But prior to us, there was no transparency whatsoever. Right. And so nobody knew what the price of any medication was, whether you're an employer playing for your.

And it's just run by these boards.

Yeah. These pharmacy benefit managers are dictating prices left and right. They're basically stealing money from employers and employees. And so we walked in there and said, what's the one missing piece? Transparency. So when you go to costplusdrugs.com, comma, you put in the name of the medication you might take. Let's just say tadilafil, right? I know you don't know what that is.

Sure. Tadilafil.

Yeah.

I'm so hopped up on dot, right now, you have no idea.

Do you know what it is?

I don't.

Generic Cialis.

As I said before, I am so hopped up on stool.

So when you go to costlessdrugs.com and you put into dillafil or whatever, first thing we do is we show you our cost. Then we show you our markup, which is always 15%, and everybody gets the same price because we're mail order to start. We're starting to partner with pharmacies now. There's a shipping fee, and then there's a fee for the pharmacist to review everything. And when you do it that way.

And this is legal?

Of course it's legal.

Yeah.

It's good old american capitalism. But let me just tell you the impact. There are drugs that. There's a drug called a. For chemotherapy that when we started, the price of imatinib, if you just walked into a big pharmacy, a big chain pharmacy, was gonna be $2,000. You go to costplusdrugs.com, comma, it's under 30. There's a drug, Droxidopa, right? That's just insane. I had a friend. I had a friend, Landon, who was in a terrific car crash, and he needed this drug, Droxydopa, and lost his insurance. It was gonna be $30,000 every three months. I'm like, let me just check to see if we can get it. $64 a month. And the price has gone down since, all because we were transparent.

But, like, weren't there dudes like Martin Shkreli in jail for shit like that? Like, when you jack prices up like that? And why can't the United States government negotiate in terms of, if you're the largest customer to any industry, it's criminal that you wouldn't use any leverage to make those things more available to people.

The problem was there's this thing called pharmacy benefit managers, right? And they're basically responsible for doing the negotiating with, to a certain extent, Medicare, but with all the large employers. If you're one of those big companies that cover 150 million employees across the country, that's who you negotiate with. And the first rule when they negotiate, they say, is you can't talk about this. It's like fight club. You cannot say what your price is. You can't say what we're doing in our negotiation. And they got so big doing that that nobody ever questioned them. We come along and actually, Martin Shkreli plays a little part in this whole thing, because when he got thrown in jail, I was talking to Alex Mayanski, my partner. And it's like, if this dude can just jack up the price, it is not an efficient market. That means nobody knows what the real cost is. If we publish our price, boom, the whole world's going to change it. As it turns out, the FTC just came out with this report criticizing the pbms. They used our pricing data. The smartest thing we did was.

So now, so this brings up. So FTC is the Federal Trade Commission. And, boy, there's nothing the tech world hates more than the FTC. Than the FTC. So how does that square?

Well, you know, like any agency, they do something's right and some things wrong. So. But in this case, with the pbms, they're crushing them and it's justified.

Now, is it something that can't be done throughout the health care? Because one of the difficulties with healthcare is the contingencies of you can't really comparison chop. When you have a heart attack, you're basically saying, drive me to the closest.

Hospital and take care of it.

But those prices you're talking about, you could get heart attack treatment at this hospital, it's $150,000. But you go up the street and it's $12,000 and it's all about.

And nobody knows. And what happens is who's paying? When you, God forbid, have a heart attack and you go there and let's just say it's going through your employer, your employer has no idea what they're paying. And so what we're saying is on drugs first, and now we're just getting it approved. Today we're going to publish all contracts. Never before has it been done where for my companies, we're saying, if you want to do business with us, if this hospital system wants to work with my companies, whatever it may be, we're going to publish them and put them online for anybody to see all of our pricing.

But so then why? I think that's fantastic, but I'm curious then why is there such pushback on this idea of applying those same kinds of competition and things to our healthcare system? You know, we talk about we have got a privatized healthcare system and it's the best in the world, but very clearly, it doesn't function like a free market.

No, it's not in any way at all.

So what is so terrible about getting everybody healthcare? Like, why is that?

So these companies, these PBMs and the big insurance companies, they call them the Buccas, the largest insurance companies, right? They are so big. Like like I keep on saying, big employers cover 150 million people, right? And the CEO of this big company doesn't know much about healthcare and their health care costs. And so they just say to them, okay, we're gonna write you a check for a rebate, even though it's your sickest employees that are paying for that rebate, right? They just don't know. And the.

It's so interesting because it's such a non villainous, you know, nobody ever talks about, like, big prescription benefit manager, right? Like that's a good thing. It's always like, big oil is gonna come down or big tobacco or big pharma. And it's really like the pbMs. Big middle manager.

Yeah. That's what it is. Right? And you cut them out, right? There's no reason for the big ones that control 90% of the prescriptions that are filled. There's no reason for them to exist. There are others that are called pass through pbms, right? That show you all your claims, show you all your data, show you all your pricing that do it for a fraction of the price.

Right?

So there's an opportunity.

Disruption, baby, disruption. That's what I like to see. What's that now? What's that? What else do you have your eye.

On as far as health care? Healthcare.

It's going to be healthcare.

Healthcare.

Yeah, I'm with that.

I'm with that, too.

And it might be, you know, with that money, if you could help the nix. Okay, forget it. No, it's all fine.

Let's go, mavs.

No, it's not. Thank you very much for coming by. It was always a fascinating conversation. Check out costplusdrugs.com. mark Cuban. We're going to take this break. That's our show for tonight. Before we go, we're going to check in with your host for the rest of the week. Desi Lydic is going to be joining Desi Ladick. What are you covering this week? Oh, John, I'll be recapping all. All the inspiring athletes of the Olympics. Simone Biles, Katie Ledecky, and of course, of course, that australian breakdancing lady. You know, the thing about her is her dancing didn't seem. And I say this. Good. It didn't seem so good. Oh, John, she was insane. Inspiringly terrible. Inspiringly terrible. Cause I can never do what Simone Biles does. But this, this. All this. Yep. I can do this. Yep, this. And quite well, I might add. Yeah. All this stuff, John, I can do this. All right. All this. What? Wait, what? Wait, how is that even happening? John, I can do this all day. I can. All day. I could have done it all day before, but now I'm tired. You got it.

You can do it.

All right. LA 2028, here I come. All right, dad. You like it? Explore more shows from the Daily show podcast universe by searching the Daily show wherever you get your podcasts. Watch the Daily show weeknights at 1110 Central on Comedy Central and stream full episodes anytime on Paramount plus paramount podcasts.