Tulsi Gabbard on How Congress is Like High School

Was it disappointing being in Congress and seeing that kind of behavior? Like if you have this ideal of what a representative of our democracy is supposed to be, and then seeing people that are petty and that are sneaky and doing little... Wasn't it? This was my first impression, getting elected. Got elected 2012, got there and sworn in in January of 2013. And I remember calling home, I think I was talking to my family, my parents or somebody, and I was like, this place is like high school. Even on the House floor, that's the only time we're all together, usually for votes. When you've got everybody, all 435 members there, and you see the little cliques gathering in their designated corners, like the cafeteria tables and one clique is giving the mean girl's side eye to the other clique. And like, oh, if you're hanging out on that side of the room with those people, what's wrong with you? Really? Yeah, man. It's funny, but it's so terrible when you understand that this is the power base for decision making in our country. And you're like, how is this even possible? It's possible because so often people will vote for a candidate because they have a really cool ad on TV or... Yeah, that person is a good looking guy or a good looking girl or they talk good, they talk nice. Sounds smart. Yeah, all right, check. Rather than like, all right, what are your capabilities? What are your qualifications? What kind of judgment will you exercise in making decisions that affect literally every single aspect of our lives as Americans in this country? And so it's terrible that we have this kind of makeup in our government, but also like we as voters have to do a much... The power is in our hands, ultimately, in how we're making decisions in choosing who gets to work for us and not forgetting that, not forgetting that those people who work in the United States Capitol, they work for us when it comes right down to it. And so we have the power to hire and fire. I think that people have developed such a sophisticated way of manipulating folks that the thing about running for office, particularly running for president, it's one of the weirdest things where the most important job ever, you don't have to be qualified, you just have to be chosen. So you don't have to have any experience in government. You don't even really have to know how government works. All you have to do is get enough people that are willing to give you a try and you can have the nuclear football. Like not saying Trump, I'm not saying Biden, but if someone comes along, some ridiculously popular person that knows absolutely nothing about government, but they're like, Justin Bieber, he wants to be president? I fucking love that guy. Like that is not outside of the realm of possibility. All you if you have some incredibly charismatic person and you you like them over Marco Rubio or whoever the fuck it is, Ted Cruz, you're like, well, that guy sucks. This guy can sing his ass off. Let's go with him. Like, but you're literally giving someone the power to run the greatest army the world has ever known. The most insanely technologically advanced civilization on Earth and the one with the most weapons. You're going to let a person who wins a popularity contest, they can run this. Yeah, man. I mean, I live through this. I literally just lived through this. But what's the alternative? Well, people, first of all, need to kind of have the veil lifted. Yes. On on on what this is and how both political parties play into this and the media plays into this. You know, I saw from from the very day that I announced my candidacy for president, you know, I ran for president on out of concern of some very real issues that our country is facing, wanting to bring voice to those issues and actually do something about it. The the rise of North Korea's nuclear capabilities, for example, and how we in Hawaii lived through the reality of that threat when we got that that missile alert that came through that caused, you know, families to go and like tell people that real quick. If they forgot about it, this was January 2019. Early one Saturday morning, the Civil Defense alert system on our state sent out a text message to every cell phone in the state, blared warnings on the radios, the sirens on television saying missile incoming to Hawaii. This is not a drill. Take shelter. This is not a drill. And so the response to that was like, holy shit, this could be the end. An incoming missile to Hawaii from North Korea would literally mean the destruction not only of Hawaii, but the aftermath and everything else would have a much, much bigger impact. So that's how people responded, you know, grabbing their little kids and running in like, where do you take shelter? Like going into the bathtub and hunkering down. There was a father's a video of a father who got his like little eight year old daughter and lowered her down a manhole and was was I think he said something in the video. Like, if we survive this, try to come find me. And there are countless other stories of I heard from from a father who he had one child who was in. On a little. The other was on the west side of Oahu, which is a good 45 minute drive. And he was physically in the middle. And and in those moments, he was sitting there knowing he had minutes to live, trying to decide which child he was going to go and drive to and spend those last minutes of life with. The seriousness of this is something that has and continues to be lost on the leaders of our country. And this was one of the main reasons that I ran for president so that I could do something to make sure that no other American, no other family went through what we went through in Hawaii on that day. I announced my candidacy for president. So that we can talk about these very serious issues. And on day one, immediately, literally that very day, within minutes, mainstream media starts attacking. That's when the whole Russian asset thing began. These seeds were planted to say, oh, she's some kind of suspicious candidate. You better watch out. The smears started the building of this caricature of of me as something that has nothing to do with who I am, my experience, my background, my capabilities, what I'm advocating for. No, the media didn't want to talk about that. The other candidates didn't want to talk about it. Going on the debate stage. OK, I'm going to. This is a national stage to be able to raise these very serious issues about the nuclear threat that our country faces, this new Cold War and what we need to do to walk back away from the brink of nuclear catastrophe. Nobody wants to talk about it. They want to go towards the the superficial attacks. They want to go towards the he said versus she said and ultimately the things that will cause ratings to go up and that will further this this popularity contest that you're talking about, which ultimately all of this is the ultimate disservice to voters because it takes away their ability to make this informed decision about who should hold the nuclear football and what experience they bring. What kind of judgment they would bring, what kind of foresight they bring to this most powerful and important job and responsibility. Download episodes to save on data cost all for free. Spotify is absolutely free. You don't have to have a premium account to watch new JRE episodes. You just need to search for the Jerry on your Spotify app. Go to Spotify now to get this full episode of the Joe Rogan experience.