Joe Rogan Podcast #2458: with Matt McCusker (Transcript)

I was like, “This can’t be good for me.” JOE ROGAN: Well, you don’t poop much because there’s no fiber. So when you do poop, it’s just. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I remember. JOE ROGAN: Just rabbit pellets and you’re like, “Where’s the rest?” But I mean, isn’t that a good thing? Doesn’t it mean your body absorbed all of the food, instead of having all this undigestible stuff go through your digestive tract? This is the argument that the carnivore people make. I don’t want any nutritionist right now pulling their hair out. I’m just asking. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s a solid question. Because it’s like, does meat get stuck in your body and you need plants to push it out? Or will meat come out just like plants will? The John Wayne Myth and Nuclear Testing JOE ROGAN: Well, that was the thing they would always say, that every man, when he dies, has a pound of undigested meat in his stomach. Apparently, that’s not true. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that was the old thing about John Wayne. Like, John Wayne had 50 pounds of beef jerky in his colon. I thought about that since I was a little boy. I’ve been wondering, “How much are they going to find in me?” JOE ROGAN: Yeah. So it’s not the case. MATT MCCUSKER: So it’s not the case. JOE ROGAN: No. John Wayne just had a gut from probably beer. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Beer and pasta and bread. Normal American food. MATT MCCUSKER: Also, when was his heyday? Like the 50s, 60s? 60s, 70s, maybe? JOE ROGAN: When did he do that Genghis Khan movie? That’s what killed him. What year was that? 50s, I think. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, because those dudes weren’t. JOE ROGAN: Like True Grit. Yeah, those days. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, they weren’t being like, “Oh, how much fiber have I had?” JOE ROGAN: No, no. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Even in the 90s, dudes didn’t think about what they were eating. JOE ROGAN: 1956. Wow. This is one of the worst movies of all time. You ever see it? MATT MCCUSKER: No. This Genghis Khan movie, how did it kill him? JOE ROGAN: He filmed it in the same area where Nevada was doing their nuclear tests. Everybody got cancer. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. JOE ROGAN: Like the whole crew. A giant number of people got cancer. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And that, I’m telling you, that was back when guys would be like, “Nuclear bomb? I don’t care about that.” Like, I used to work with guys that dealt with asbestos back in the 90s when I was little. My dad, my uncles, all in construction. So we were taking this barn down and I was like a little boy just hammering nails into an A-frame. And they shut it down because there was asbestos in there. And there’s this guy who was like, “Dude, your uncle’s a p. I’d eat that sh for breakfast. I don’t care about asbestos.” And it’s like, I don’t know. Now I grew up and I’m like, “Damn, thank God they shut that down.” JOE ROGAN: Well, there were so many things that caused cancer that no one knew about at the time. Like, how about baby powder? Baby Powder, Talc, and Hidden Dangers MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, dude, I didn’t know about that either. JOE ROGAN: Well, the thing is, I think the story is that where they mine the talc, it’s not always pure and it has other stuff mixed in it, and they don’t filter that stuff out. Is it asbestos that it’s mixed with? MATT MCCUSKER: I thought that stuff was cornstarch. JOE ROGAN: Let me check Perplexity. MATT MCCUSKER: I thought it was cornstarch. JOE ROGAN: What? MATT MCCUSKER: Baby powder? JOE ROGAN: Baby powder? MATT MCCUSKER: No. So it’s talc. JOE ROGAN: Talc, I believe. “Evidence of a small but real cancer risk with some talc-based baby powders, mainly due to genital use and possible asbestos contamination. The data are mixed and the absolute risk for any one person is low. Talc itself as a mineral can be mined near asbestos, so contamination is the main worry. Asbestos is a known cause of mesothelioma and other cancers.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Quite a few women. I think there was a lawsuit. MATT MCCUSKER: I remember hearing that. I remember I was dismayed because I had a weird thing when I was younger. I used to use baby powder to masturbate, because it just makes everything feel so nice. And the smell. If I smell baby powder to this day, it’s like a trigger. If I smell it, I’m like, “God damn, bro. Get that away from me.” JOE ROGAN: Well, I used to use it a lot to play pool. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, yeah? JOE ROGAN: Everybody used baby powder on your fingers. It makes the shaft slide through your fingers. But then they invented gloves, so that keeps the table clean. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: They’re made out of some kind of nylon. A very thin nylon so it’s not getting caught. Slick. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: But baby powder, no bueno. What else? LED Lights, the News Cycle, and Information Overload MATT MCCUSKER: They’re saying LED lights now. JOE ROGAN: That’s what I keep hearing. MATT MCCUSKER: LED. They’re saying it kills your mitochondria. JOE ROGAN: Are these LED lights? Do we have to change our lights? Are we dying in here? MATT MCCUSKER: I think they crush your mitochondria. JOE ROGAN: Oh, geez. MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know if I just get scared by AI clips on Instagram. I’m scared of everything. JOE ROGAN: I have to stay offline. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. JOE ROGAN: I’m reading too much of the news, and it’s overwhelming me. Sometimes at nighttime I can’t wind down. There’s too much news, too much fing madness. We’re about to go to war with Iran, and everyone’s eating beef jerky and pizza. What the f is happening? How far does this go? How come this never got released before? The Epstein Rabbit Hole MATT MCCUSKER: I mean, my thing is, I’m not. First of all, the news for me is, aside from all the disastrous wars, it’s just so negative. When you read the news, it’s mostly people being like, “Guess who’s a giant piece of sh*t?” JOE ROGAN: Right? MATT MCCUSKER: You read that over and over, and you get addicted to being like, “Yeah, that guy sucks. I’m good.” JOE ROGAN: Well, there was an article that I read recently about people being addicted to outrage. It’s a real thing. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, for sure. JOE ROGAN: Being addicted to being upset about stuff and addicted to outrage, where you go search for it. Which is why your algorithm shows you all that sh*t. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I don’t know if this is true, but I feel like they watch your facial expression through your phone camera and feed you stuff if you’re making an interested or outraged face, or whatever. JOE ROGAN: I wouldn’t be shocked. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard they track your eyeball movement, and they’re like, “Okay, this is holding his eyes.” And they just keep feeding you. JOE ROGAN: Really? MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard that. JOE ROGAN: Probably put a piece of tape over that bitch. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. JOE ROGAN: I wonder if you did, how much would change? That’d be an interesting experiment. MATT MCCUSKER: Well, they got your mic too, so they got your audio. JOE ROGAN: That’s true. Prince Andrew and the Epstein Files MATT MCCUSKER: But yeah, all that Epstein sh*t is like, I can’t follow it. It’s too much. It’s too many names. I don’t know. State representatives, they’re naming all these people. It’s like, damn, I wish I knew who that was. JOE ROGAN: And it’s dark too. It’s horrible. And it goes so high. There’s so many levels to it. Sagar and Yeti was just on Flagrant, and they were reading off files and talking about it. It’s just like, what the man. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, you need to study all day to follow it. Prince Andrew’s crazy, him getting arrested. He’s the first who — what other prince has gotten arrested? It must have been like, not since 500 years ago. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. When was the last time a prince was arrested? MATT MCCUSKER: I have no idea. And also, if he goes to real jail, he’s getting clapped. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: He’s a known — it’s very likely he was a pedophile. If pedophiles go to jail… JOE ROGAN: Well, what do they know? Because they did a bunch of things, right? The first thing they did was strip him of his princehood. And then they banished him to some estate in the country, and then they removed him from the estate. So it’s been like, levels upon levels. So what do they know? MATT MCCUSKER: I think the Royal Family gets to see the real deal. So they probably saw the real deal and were like, “Bro, you’re fried. You’re going to jail.” He might be the first to get clapped in jail. JOE ROGAN: Jesus. MATT MCCUSKER: Someone might get royal — JOE ROGAN: Royal asshole. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. He’s my royal f*ing pussy. JOE ROGAN: Don’t you think they have him in protective custody? MATT MCCUSKER: He’ll be in protective custody for sure. JOE ROGAN: They have that over there? MATT MCCUSKER: They’ll probably make a jail just for him. I would imagine they do. Because if people even think you’re a pedophile in jail, they’re going to — JOE ROGAN: Do you think that starts a whole cascade and then a bunch of other people start getting arrested? MATT MCCUSKER: No, I think they’re going to hang him up and be like, “We got him.” I don’t believe that all these billionaires are going to let themselves get arrested. They have billions of dollars. Paris Reopens Epstein-Linked Investigations JOE ROGAN: Paris prosecutors opened two new Epstein-linked investigations. There was the Jean-Luc guy — who was that co-conspirator? He also died in custody, so they’ve reopened the investigation on that. And somebody else, I think, that they just found out was high up. How did he die? In jail. Officially, he was just found dead. MATT MCCUSKER: Okay, so — JOE ROGAN: Just found dead. How old was he? MATT MCCUSKER: 76. JOE ROGAN: Oh, that’s about the time dudes like that die. But they didn’t ever — there’s a probe, and I think they’ve reopened the probe on how he died. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s going to be a tough one to solve. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, you’re going to hit some roadblocks. I wouldn’t be surprised if somebody whacked him. Epstein’s Cellmate: The Contract Killer Cop JOE ROGAN: We were just talking about the guy that Epstein was in jail with, which is crazy. Some people think Epstein is alive, some people think they scooted him out of his cell and switched a body double. But why would they put him in jail with that gigantic cop who was a contract killer? Look at the size of that guy. This guy was a dirty cop who was killing drug dealers. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Maybe that was the plan — be like, “All right, we’ll put him in here. If this guy kills him, oh man.” JOE ROGAN: And then 18 days before he died, he complained that his cellmate tried to kill him. Yeah, see, we can find the article. MATT MCCUSKER: A different guy? JOE ROGAN: No, Epstein did. MATT MCCUSKER: I’m saying, was he complaining about the murderous cop, or is this a different guy? That’s crazy, dude. Also, how did he try to kill him and not kill him? JOE ROGAN: That’s what I was just going to say. MATT MCCUSKER: What the f* are you talking about? Epstein slipped away and just sat in the corner? JOE ROGAN: Maybe he screamed loud enough and the guards came. The Night Epstein Was Found Unresponsive JOE ROGAN: The night Jeffrey Epstein claimed his cellmate tried to kill him — so he laid in a fetal position on the floor of his jail cell, unresponsive, with an orange fabric. This is when they found him, 18 days before Epstein’s death. He wasn’t breathing. His eyes were opening. So they found him in the fetal position with an orange noose tied around his neck, 18 days before he died. MATT MCCUSKER: What the f*? Why? JOE ROGAN: July 23, 2019. 18 days before Epstein’s death. He wasn’t breathing, his eyes opening and shutting occasionally, but he wouldn’t or couldn’t respond to officers’ questions and commands. According to a confidential corrections officer’s memo obtained by CBS News, they hoisted inmate 763-18-054 onto a stretcher. Officials have repeatedly said Epstein’s eventual death by suicide was foreshadowed by this earlier alleged attempt. Former Attorney General Bill Barr reiterated that claim in an August closed-door deposition before the House Oversight Committee, which released the interview transcript. Barr said in his testimony he knew about the July 23 incident, which he viewed as an attempted suicide, and considered it indicative of Epstein’s state of mind. But jail staff memos and other never-before-reported documents obtained by CBS News, as well as interviews with more than a dozen people who interacted with Epstein before and after the incident, reveal a murkier picture. The new documents have surfaced amid persistent speculation over Epstein’s death, despite official conclusions that he died by suicide. So he’s laying on the floor and his cellmate is screaming, “I did nothing. I banged on my door to get him out of my cell.” Corrections officers carried Epstein to a cell on a different floor as he remained unresponsive. Was it the same cop? The contract killer cop? He told officers he thought he’d been attacked by his cellmate — an ex-cop who was awaiting trial on four murders. MATT MCCUSKER: But they’re saying that was an attempted suicide. JOE ROGAN: Well, they tried to frame it as an attempted suicide. I would imagine he doesn’t have a way to contact the outside world and just tweet about this. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, right. JOE ROGAN: He can’t make an Instagram video — “Hey guys, this guy’s trying to f*ing kill me.” He sat up on the bed and began telling officers that he thinks his cellmate tried to kill him, a responding officer wrote in one memo. A senior officer wrote in a separate incident report that Epstein initially implicated his cellmate in the incident, claiming he had previously said things that made Epstein feel threatened. Nicholas Tartaglione, his cellmate, repeatedly disputed the initial allegation, saying “I did nothing,” and claimed he tried to revive him. As with Epstein’s eventual death, any camera footage of the incident was either mislaid, lost, or never captured due to the facility’s faulty system. Tartaglione has not responded to questions from CBS News. His lawyer said Epstein’s initial claim that Tartaglione tried to kill him was “flatly not true.” MATT MCCUSKER: Well, okay, so maybe he did try to kill himself and was like, “Sh*t, I don’t want to get —” JOE ROGAN: And then his cellmate saved him. It says right here — Tartaglione said in a recent interview that Epstein also left a suicide note and even offered Tartaglione money to kill him. Neither of those details, if true, are referenced in any of the Bureau of Prisons records reviewed by CBS News. It says he saved his life the first time. MATT MCCUSKER: He’s saying he tried to kill himself once. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, but that’s just his attorney saying that. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, for sure. Extortion, Murder, and Missing Money JOE ROGAN: Epstein claimed to both corrections officers and a source that he felt threatened by Tartaglione — a hulking retired cop turned drug dealer who was charged and later convicted for four murders. Just how could you take the most high-profile defendant ever and put him in a cage with a murderer? His cellmate told him that if he beat him up because of Epstein’s child sex trafficking charges, the officers would not report it. The wealthy former financier told jail officers that he believed Tartaglione was trying to extort money from him, and stated that if he didn’t pay him, he was going to beat him up. He stated that this had been going on for a week. MATT MCCUSKER: Then that guy saying Epstein was trying to pay him to kill himself — you would think they could find a middle ground, man. JOE ROGAN: Well, someone’s lying. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. There are too many plot holes. There’s no way. JOE ROGAN: Imagine — “I’ll pay you to kill me.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Also, it’s like, wait, how are we going to work this all out? JOE ROGAN: Yeah, the guy’s already — and then what’s he going to do with the money? MATT MCCUSKER: Exactly. JOE ROGAN: How’s he going to get the money? MATT MCCUSKER: I guess you can give it to someone you love, but — JOE ROGAN: Does he even have money, or does all of his money go to the victims’ families? Like, he killed four people. MATT MCCUSKER: Sh*t. He might be right. Yeah. JOE ROGAN: So it’d have to be like an offshore account that gets slipped over to the prison so he could buy cigarettes. MATT MCCUSKER: If anyone can do it, it’s Jeffrey Epstein, man. JOE ROGAN: But it would have to be worked out in advance. Like, you would have to have the cigarettes in the commissary. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Okay. Time to kill you, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: I think it’s just one of those things, and I don’t know if people can want to wrap their heads around it, but there’s just people who do things in this world on behalf of uber billionaires that we’re just never going to know what’s going on for sure. They do horrible, terrible, secret stuff, and they always have. The Epstein Conspiracy JOE ROGAN: This is the thing. If you go throughout history, there’s always been secret societies and people that get together with creepy meetings. All that Eyes Wide Shut sh*t that Kubrick put in his film — he’s not imagining that. That’s always been a thing. The officer that discovered his body dead in August was originally charged with falsifying documents related to his death, but those charges were dropped. I wonder what the falsifying of the documents was. MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know. Who knows? Maybe people charged it to try to open up the paperwork or whatever. JOE ROGAN: Here it is. Because Epstein was on suicide watch after the July 23 incident, Thomas was required by law to record a log of observations about Epstein in 15-minute increments. Those notations were released by the Bureau of Prisons in 2023, along with just one entry he made in the log — a note made at 2:15am, 45 minutes after the incident. Fifteen minutes later, at 2:30, Thomas wrote, “Inmate sitting on bed, trying to remember what happened.” Huh? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, man. JOE ROGAN: So this is when he got attacked the first time that he survived. They claim that once he got into the separate cell, he was trying to fall forward on his head or something. He sat on the edge of the bed and began moving forward as if he was attempting to fall over head first. He was told to stop, don’t do it again, and he gave a thumbs up. That’s how they confirmed he was trying to commit suicide. So he’s going to try to commit suicide by falling straight on his head? MATT MCCUSKER: That’s impossible. That’s literally impossible. JOE ROGAN: You might be able to pull it off. MATT MCCUSKER: You would block for sure. JOE ROGAN: Right? MATT MCCUSKER: There’s no way you can just do a swan dive. I was thinking about this the other day. I was walking off my steps and I was like, even if I tried, I couldn’t do a swan dive onto the cement. Your body wouldn’t let you do it. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. You would resist just enough to be paralyzed for the rest of your life. MATT MCCUSKER: You would get f*ed up for sure. I don’t know. I think you would just kind of flatten out and flail. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Because guys die all the time in street fights when they get knocked out and they fall and they hit their head on the concrete. They die all the time. Street Violence and Random Danger MATT MCCUSKER: That happened before I left Philly a year or so ago. There’s a guy just walking his dog off leash, and this other guy was like, “Put your dog on a leash.” They got into it, started arguing, and the guy punched him, and he hit his head and died. And then my brother went on an online date with the fiancée of the guy who died and, throughout the date, put it together — like, “Oh sh*t, your guy died.” JOE ROGAN: Bummer of a date. MATT MCCUSKER: It was pretty fing sad, actually. He put it together and was like, “Oh f, he died.” JOE ROGAN: That sucks. How long after that was the date? MATT MCCUSKER: I think it was maybe a year and a half. It’d been some time. JOE ROGAN: Enough to stop the crying. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I mean, you’ve got to pick it up at one point, especially when someone dies like that. That man got punched on a dog walk and died. JOE ROGAN: Walk with a helmet. MATT MCCUSKER: If I was a lady, I’d be like, “Oh, I dodged a bullet. My husband could have just died.” JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s scary, though, man. The whole thing of altercations and people popping off to each other anymore is just — I was walking down the street recently, and I had the right of way. I walked, and I didn’t even rush in front of the car. The car pulled up and the guy was like, “Get the f out!” He’s threatening to shoot me in the face. I was just like, “What the hell, man?” He had pulled off far enough and was like, “I’ll shoot you in your fing face.” And I was just like, “Please don’t. What are you doing, bro?” JOE ROGAN: You never know who’s unhinged. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. JOE ROGAN: You never know what’s going on in that person’s life — the divorce, just got fired, about to go to jail. Who knows? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Best friend was f*ing your wife. MATT MCCUSKER: Could be literally anything. Yeah, anything. JOE ROGAN: So many people are barely hanging on out there, doing something all day they hate. Just f*ing tired. Life’s in a shambles. MATT MCCUSKER: And especially people who just talk sht to strangers — you have no idea who that person is. My dad was telling me about some guy he knows. His friend’s mom was at the grocery store, and they were both going for a parking spot. The guy was like, “Fing b, get the hell out!” Started cursing her out. Her son had just come out of jail — he was like a biker — and they all knew each other in the neighborhood. Apparently, the guy who had cursed out the mom — nobody ever saw him again. So if that’s true, I always think about that. You just can’t — you shouldn’t yell at an old lady anyway, but you just have no idea who you’re dealing with. JOE ROGAN: Right. MATT MCCUSKER: Just might as well chill. Epstein’s Sulfuric Acid Order JOE ROGAN: That was one of the creepier things about the Epstein files — the data was that he ordered 330 gallons of sulfuric acid after he’d been indicted. MATT MCCUSKER: What does that do? JOE ROGAN: Dissolves bodies. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, no. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. They were trying to speculate that maybe it was for his desalination system — he had a water system that needs some sulfuric acid to clean it out. But then Jamie looked into it, and he had only ever ordered it in small amounts before, never that much. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s terrible. Also, he lives near the ocean. Why don’t you just go in the ocean? If you’ve got to get rid of bodies and you live on an island, just go out to the water. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, but they could find it. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I guess so. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, they might find it. You can’t have that. MATT MCCUSKER: True. Especially if there’s enough — they’d need a bunch of acid. JOE ROGAN: Do they have a lot of sharks down there? MATT MCCUSKER: I would think, yeah. JOE ROGAN: Like the Bahamas area, right? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I would think so. There are sharks in Florida. I was just in — JOE ROGAN: Florida’s got a lot of sharks. Especially bull sharks. Sharks and Ocean Dangers MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, exactly. I was swimming — I brought my friend with me to do shows, and he was like, “I’m worried about sharks.” I was like, “There’s no fing sharks out here.” And we got back and the Uber driver was like, “Yeah, this is shark season right now.” I was like, “Oh f, my bad.” JOE ROGAN: Shark season. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I think it’s the bull sharks. They see them all the time down there. JOE ROGAN: Bull sharks are scary. They’re the ones they think are responsible for the murders in New Jersey that inspired Jaws. Really? Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: How big do they get? JOE ROGAN: They don’t get as big as great whites, but the thing about them is they can swim in fresh water. Those deaths by shark in New Jersey in the early 1900s — they were in a river. MATT MCCUSKER: What? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. These people were swimming in a river and they got killed by sharks. MATT MCCUSKER: You would never expect it either. JOE ROGAN: Bull sharks are very aggressive too. There’s a Florida Keys thing where guys fish off the piers down there — it’s really great fishing — but if you catch a big fish and you’re struggling to get it on the line, most likely a shark’s going to kill it. MATT MCCUSKER: Really? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Most likely you’re going to get it bitten in half. There are tons of videos of guys pulling in fish and the shark just snaps it in half while they’re reeling it in. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s terrifying. JOE ROGAN: They’re all over the place down there. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude. I went to Turks and Caicos with my family — me, my kids. We went snorkeling. The guy takes us out and as we get to the area where we’re going to jump in, he goes, “Hey, there are some baby sharks out there, but they’re not going to bother you.” JOE ROGAN: I’m like, f*. MATT MCCUSKER: Exactly. And I had a 2-year-old and a 4-year-old with me. I jumped in to suss it out first. Dude, these things — they weren’t 18-foot sharks, but they were like five or six feet. Big enough. And they were about 40 feet deep, another 50 feet away. I was like, “Bro, I’m not bringing my kids in here.” JOE ROGAN: Yeah. I’m trying to find this video my friend Adam sent me of sharks in Florida. I always give him sht — he lives in Australia and I always say, “Bro, you live in a place filled with monsters. What the f are you doing?” Florida has a lot, but Australia has more. Australia has saltwater crocodiles, great whites. But he sent me this video and goes, “This is in America, mate.” These guys are throwing fish scraps into the water right next to the shore, and it’s just sharks — like piranhas — just smashing. They’re off a dock, just throwing fish scraps in, and the sharks are apparently used to it. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s terrifying. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, dude. Oh, here it is. I found it. Hold on, I’ll send it to you. MATT MCCUSKER: Jamie — dude, dolphins. You ever see a dolphin in real life? JOE ROGAN: Yes. MATT MCCUSKER: They’re scary as hell. Those things are huge. JOE ROGAN: Swam with them. MATT MCCUSKER: I did too. I was in Mexico, and I thought I was going to be gliding on two of them. I was barely wanting to touch the thing. JOE ROGAN: I did it in Hawaii. You jump off the boat and snorkel, and you get to see them swimming underneath. It’s really wild. Check this out. So this guy throws these scraps in the water. Look at these. MATT MCCUSKER: God damn. JOE ROGAN: How crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: Look at these things fight for it. JOE ROGAN: Look how many of them there are. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s — JOE ROGAN: Bro. That’s crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: Look how big they are. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. More than big enough to take your legs off. Florida’s Wildlife and the Harshness of Nature MATT MCCUSKER: Why I’d be so mad if I was his neighbor. I’d be like, “Dude, I’m trying to paddle board, man.” JOE ROGAN: Well, I think this is just what they do every day, which is why the sharks are there in the first place. I think when these guys get there, when they fillet the fish, they just suck the body overboard, and these sharks just destroy it. How spooky is that? MATT MCCUSKER: It’s terrifying, dude. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, that’s crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: Where’s Marco Island? JOE ROGAN: I don’t know. Where is that? Where’s Marco Island? MATT MCCUSKER: It’s probably the keys. JOE ROGAN: Probably. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s f*ing awful. JOE ROGAN: Florida’s filled with monsters. Like that whole thing that they’re doing with ICE where they’ve got that alligator Guantanamo. They built a Guantanamo for detainees, and then they surrounded it with alligator country. MATT MCCUSKER: Like a cartoon moat. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Check this out. Okay, so where is it? It’s like, opposite of Miami on the… MATT MCCUSKER: Okay. JOE ROGAN: So it’s not the keys. It’s just Florida. Crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. So they have a classical moat with alligators around it. JOE ROGAN: It’s essentially a moat — it was an island, I guess. How did they do it? Did they build an island down there? Somebody got a sweet contract to put that in there. Alligator Halliburton. They call it Alligator Alcatraz. What does it look like? Can you show us? MATT MCCUSKER: Damn, dude. JOE ROGAN: Alligators in Florida are everywhere. They say there’s not a standing body of water that doesn’t have one. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. My friends were just at Disney World and they said they asked, “Is there alligators around here?” And they were like, “Yeah, we flush them out all the time.” JOE ROGAN: One killed a kid a few years back. MATT MCCUSKER: I heard about that. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: Reached up and just snagged him, bro. JOE ROGAN: Imagine your little toddler at Disney World just saw Cinderella, having a good time… MATT MCCUSKER: That’s got to be a fast pass for life, though. Here is a family. The Everglades: Pythons, Iguanas, and Invasive Species JOE ROGAN: So that is all the Everglades. And the Everglades is just filled — like, if you go walking in there, something’s probably going to get you. Because it’s not just the alligators. It’s also the pythons. There’s giant pythons. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, the pythons are another thing. Because they catch you while you’re sleeping. So you lay down to sleep and you just wake up and you’re just… JOE ROGAN: Are there more pythons in the Everglades than there are anywhere in the world? There’s a half a million of them. They think… MATT MCCUSKER: Have you heard about Snake Island in Brazil? No, dude, there’s an island in Brazil that, whatever, tectonic plates or whatever moved — it used to be connected to the mainland. It went out and all the snakes just got stuck on there with no natural predators. So they just fight and eat each other. And there’s apparently a snake every meter you move. The images — they’re just piled on top of each other. JOE ROGAN: There are not more pythons in the Everglades than anywhere else. The Burmese python’s native range in Southeast Asia, from India to Indonesia, supports far larger wild populations, though exact numbers are hard to quantify due to their vast habitat. In the Everglades context, Burmese pythons are an invasive species in the Florida Everglades, with estimates ranging from tens of thousands to 300,000 individuals across southern Florida, concentrated in Everglades National Park, where their density is notably high. The population exploded from a few snakes in the 90s to enveloping much of the region by the 2020s, driven by releases from the pet trade and events like Hurricane Andrew. Hurricane Andrew apparently blew down a facility where they were studying pythons. MATT MCCUSKER: No way. And that’s how they got out. JOE ROGAN: A bunch of them got out. And then there’s also people with pets — just assholes and death metal bands. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, they just dropped them. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, they just dropped them. MATT MCCUSKER: Well, that’s how — there’s what you call parakeets here. They’re an invasive species, and they think that happened because someone just let their parakeet go. JOE ROGAN: Sure. MATT MCCUSKER: Now they’re a problem here. JOE ROGAN: That’s iguanas in Florida too. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: You know, they sell iguana meat in Florida now. MATT MCCUSKER: Really? JOE ROGAN: Yeah, buddy. A friend of mine lives in Florida. He just sent me this — he was at the supermarket and they have iguana meat. MATT MCCUSKER: Probably not bad. Dude, I’m telling you, the Snake Island thing — I thought it was fake. My wife was telling me about it and I’m like, “Dude, you got tricked. This has to be fake.” I looked it up and it’s a real thing. I would eat iguana. It would probably be good. I’ve eaten gator before. Gator’s not bad. JOE ROGAN: This might be fake. I think it is. I’m googling it. There’s a pizza restaurant that got in trouble for serving it. But nothing else is popping up about it. Did they tell people they were serving it? People eat them — they hunt them and eat them all the time. I was watching a YouTube video the other day where this guy was making stir-fried iguana meat. MATT MCCUSKER: Well, they get massive. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. And they apparently taste good. MATT MCCUSKER: They’re aggressive too. If you see them in the wild, they’ll charge after you. They’re nasty, man. They’re big — like four or five feet long. They’re huge. JOE ROGAN: Nuts. MATT MCCUSKER: That was another animal I encountered in Turks and Caicos. We did the shark swimming, and that was like, alright. And then we went to this island that was just full of iguanas, and they’ll just run up on you. JOE ROGAN: Do you know in Florida when it gets really cold, they just fall out of trees? Because sometimes Florida will dip into the 30s. These f*ers just fall from the trees — they just freeze, and then they thaw out and come back to life. MATT MCCUSKER: What? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: F*. JOE ROGAN: That’s an ancient species. These are ancient creatures. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. So I thought they were cold-blooded and they die. So they can just chill and… JOE ROGAN: Well, so are alligators. And alligators freeze in lakes sometimes with their mouths above the water — their nose and their eyes above the water — and they’re just frozen. There’s a bunch of images of these guys frozen in lakes. MATT MCCUSKER: I guess everything just slows down and they just chill. JOE ROGAN: They don’t have to eat for a year. MATT MCCUSKER: What? JOE ROGAN: Yeah, they can go without eating for a whole year. How Much Do We Really Need to Eat? MATT MCCUSKER: So how much do you think we really have to eat? If alligators — bears don’t have to eat all winter, alligators can go one year — do you think we have to eat every day? JOE ROGAN: Well, we definitely eat more than any people ever have. Except like royals. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: That’s why people were so tiny. Like, you go back to the Civil War, the average man was like 130 pounds. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that makes sense. JOE ROGAN: Because nobody had any food, nobody had any protein. But if you think about how much we eat — morning, noon, and evening — hunter-gatherers got a meal a day. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Like, if you got lucky, you had a meal and you ate as much as you could because there’s no way to preserve it. And then you went out the next day and hoped you got another animal. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s kind of wild. You must have spent like 6,000 calories a day just trying to get one meal. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. And other than drying your meat out, there’s no way to preserve it. So they would make jerky. I know in Mexico, some friends of mine went down there and they have this traditional way of taking buffalo — they slice it really, really thin and then they hang it on like a clothes hanger and dry it out. MATT MCCUSKER: Really? That’s all we need to do. JOE ROGAN: Well, that’s what they had to do. They had to figure out how to dry stuff because there’s no refrigeration. How hard life must have been with no refrigeration. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, it sucked so bad. JOE ROGAN: Sucks so bad, man. I mean, when you go back to the turn of the century, all the diseases were happening in America. Just think about it — no running water, everybody’s in holes in the ground outside the houses, no ventilation, no air conditioning, no vitamins. MATT MCCUSKER: Especially here. How did people live in Texas? I’ve been reading — it must have been crazy. JOE ROGAN: Hard people. Yeah, hard people. Life on the Frontier: Lonesome Dove and the Comanche MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve been reading Lonesome Dove right now. It’s an old classic western. JOE ROGAN: And? MATT MCCUSKER: They just talk about how hot they are all day long. It’s just dust in their face. Dude, that would suck. JOE ROGAN: Especially if you don’t live near a lake so you can cool off a little. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. They have like a spring house, and every time they go to get water, there’s just rattlesnakes everywhere near the spring house. It’s like, dude, that sucks so bad. JOE ROGAN: There’s a great book about Texas called Empire of the Summer Moon. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, I’ve heard of that before. JOE ROGAN: About the settlers encountering the Comanche. You got to think — if the Comanche lived here year round, they had to be the hardest f*ing people in the world. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, dude, that would be brutal. JOE ROGAN: Just had to be f*ing tough as nails. MATT MCCUSKER: Especially when it gets freezing too. They have like that two weeks where it’s super cold. Yeah, that would be rough. JOE ROGAN: You never know when it’s coming back then either. You couldn’t prepare. Like Texas right now, it’s 80. Two weeks ago, it was 30. Before that, it was 20. Before that, it was 70. You don’t know when it’s coming. MATT MCCUSKER: No. I’ve been here for two years, and I know we’re going to get like a solid collective week of real winter. And the rest of it’s just like 50, 60, 70, 80, 20, 40. It’s kind of all over the place. JOE ROGAN: It’s worth it. I think it’s perfect because it gives you just enough cold so you appreciate the warm, but nothing like where you want to kill yourself. Nothing like Montana winters and Wyoming winters where they last like seven months. You’re like, “I don’t know if I want to do this.” MATT MCCUSKER: Even regular East Coast winter — I couldn’t handle it. By the time I had left, you don’t feel the sun for at least three months. And I remember spring would finally come out and it just messes me up. I’d rather it be super hot and sunny than be cold. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: Because you can just figure it out — jump in a lake, jump in a pool. JOE ROGAN: You can. You know, that’s what flu season’s all about too. MATT MCCUSKER: What? JOE ROGAN: It’s not like the flu… MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, yeah. Vitamin D, Supplements, and Health JOE ROGAN: Emerges in the winter. It’s just everybody’s immune system’s low. No one has any vitamin D. A buddy of mine who was a doctor said that he would do tests on people in New York City, and he said so many people would come into his practice that had undetectable levels of vitamin D. What? Yeah, because they weren’t supplementing at all. And they were wearing winter clothes and they were never outside. And everybody’s sick and they don’t know why. Well, you’re vitamin D depleted. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: That’s why. In Seattle, they have a lot of people go in tanning beds and they try to do something. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, just get people. JOE ROGAN: Because tanning beds will give you a natural dose of vitamin D. That’s kind of nice. Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: Apparently, isn’t it like a hormone more than a vitamin? So yeah, I heard it’s not even just like vitamin A or B. It’s like something you absolutely need, big time. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. A lot of people are saying you should hyper dose it too. Because the USDA recommended is like 5,000 milligrams. A lot of people are saying like, 30,000 is what they take every day. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I had to do that for a while because I had low vitamin D. And they were like, “You can take as much of this as you want.” I’m like, such a baby with medicine. I’m super sensitive to it. It did absolutely no side effects at all. JOE ROGAN: No, it doesn’t. But for full absorption, I think you’re supposed to take it with a bunch of other stuff. Like, I think the recommended is, I take it with K2, vitamin K2, and magnesium. I think there might be one other thing that also helps absorption. But Dr. Rhonda Patrick was on a podcast recently, and she was talking about how vitamin D — someone was taking vitamin D, but they weren’t showing any improvement. She’s like, “Are you taking it with magnesium?” So magnesium apparently helps vitamin D get absorbed. There’s a bunch of those things that work. Like, if you take them without any fat or any food, they’re not good. But then like amino acids, you have to take them on an empty stomach. It’s like you’ve got to know what you’re doing. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s true. Yeah. JOE ROGAN: I have like a paste, it’s like — MATT MCCUSKER: — a goop that’s like fatty and I just put it on a spoon. JOE ROGAN: What is it? MATT MCCUSKER: Just vitamin D. It’s like a liposomal thing. JOE ROGAN: Oh, you put it on a spoon. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I just eyeball it. I’m like, “That’s probably about right.” JOE ROGAN: I wonder if liposomal absorbs easier. Isn’t that the whole idea about it? MATT MCCUSKER: It’s paired to a fat and it kind of — JOE ROGAN: Right. I wonder if that means you don’t need as much, or you don’t need vitamin K2 rather. MATT MCCUSKER: Well, I don’t know. But I was low and then I’m not now. So I’m like, maybe it worked. Maybe as a fact I was outside. I don’t know. JOE ROGAN: I’m sure it works. Yeah, it’s just like — does it work optimally? That’s the thing. Just taking it alone is definitely going to be better than not taking it at all. But they think that for maximum absorption — what are the things that you should take with vitamin D? Put that in perpetually. It’s hard to remember all this stuff too. That’s part of the problem. Like, I’ll hear it on a podcast and I’m like, “Yeah, yeah,” go back home — “What the f* did Andrew Huberman say?” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I remember Huberman had this thing about cortisol and he’s like, “You need to spike your cortisol early in the morning.” Which, if I get up and exercise in the morning, yeah, that seems true because I feel good. But then I was like, I can’t have caffeine anymore. I had to get off completely. Really, dude, I can’t have it. I’m super sensitive to it. If I had a cup of coffee — what time is it right now? If I had a cup of coffee now at 2 o’clock, I would not sleep till midnight. JOE ROGAN: Is that because you don’t drink much of it, or is it — MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t metabolize it. That’s my mom. My dad can drink coffee and fall asleep. If my mom has coffee, she’s — it just, like, you have it. I can feel it just in my body for hours and it’s just like a non-stop — I love caffeine, the mental effects. My body just can’t stand it. Caffeine Sensitivity and Nootropics JOE ROGAN: Have you ever tried nootropics like theanine? MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve done it all. JOE ROGAN: Acetylcholine? MATT MCCUSKER: Not acetylcholine, but I’ve taken L-Theanine with it, which helped a little bit. But then I’ll just drink more coffee because — JOE ROGAN: No, I don’t mean with coffee. I mean by itself as like a little bit of a pick me up. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh yeah, I take L-Theanine before I go to sleep. I think it kind of helps me sleep. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, I hear that too. Which is interesting because it helps with your memory. Like, how does it help with your memory and also help you go to sleep? MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know. JOE ROGAN: Here it says vitamin D is a fat soluble nutrient. So pairing it with dietary fat maximizes its absorption in the gut. Take vitamin D supplements with a meal containing fats for optimal uptake. Studies show you can boost serum levels by about 50%. Foods like fatty fish, avocados, olive oil, nuts, seeds, or full fat yogurt provide these fats effectively. Supportive nutrients — magnesium aids in converting vitamin D to its active form and transporting it in the body. Vitamin K2 works synergistically to direct calcium to bones, enhancing benefits for bone health. Omega-3 fatty acids from fish oil also improve absorption alongside fats. Alright, so that’s it. So vitamin D you should take with magnesium and K2, and probably some fish oil. MATT MCCUSKER: Nice. JOE ROGAN: There you go. MATT MCCUSKER: I was eating it after breakfast, so there we go, getting my fats. Yeah, but the caffeine for me, I can’t have it. Everyone’s different, but I can’t have it. JOE ROGAN: I could drink two double espressos and go to sleep. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s crazy. So here’s my thing too. I didn’t start really drinking caffeine all the time until I had kids. But I don’t have dreams at night if I drink even coffee during the day. No dreams at night. JOE ROGAN: Really? MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know what it is, man. I’m super, super sensitive to it. JOE ROGAN: Well, a lot of people that stop smoking weed say that they get weird, wild, crazy dreams. MATT MCCUSKER: That happens too. That kind of blocks your dreams too. Yeah, but even that — I smoked weed forever and I would still kind of have dreams, but it’s the caffeine that just completely neutralizes them. And then they say that it’s anecdotal, but there’s anecdotal evidence that caffeine kind of discourages divergent thinking. It’s more like convergent where, like, if you need to get a task done — like, “All right, I need to edit something” — caffeine’s great. If you’re like, “I need to come up with a story idea,” there’s anecdotal evidence that says people who are on caffeine report that it messes up their ability to just come up with new or novel ideas. JOE ROGAN: That makes sense. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Because you just hyper focus on the one thing that you’re doing. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Like a low dose meth. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, pretty much. Amphetamines, Crack, and Hyper Focus JOE ROGAN: My friends that have dated girls that have had problems with amphetamines — one of the things they say is they know when they’re on it because they start cleaning the house. They start cleaning everything. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: They start getting hyper focused on organizing and cleaning. Like, that sounds like a good drug. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. What’s the bad? It’s probably a spaz, though. That’s probably the backlash. JOE ROGAN: They’re doing it for 12 hours while they’re listening to Slayer. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. You’re not even talking about Adderall. This is them doing like crystal meth or something. JOE ROGAN: I don’t know. Amphetamine? I assume it’s like meth. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, amphetamine, babe, would be not ideal, I don’t think. JOE ROGAN: Well, I’ve talked to people that have done meth. They tell you feel like you’re f*ing Superman, but you also want to get things done. MATT MCCUSKER: Really? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard a similar thing about crack where you feel like a genius. You smoke crack, apparently you’re just like, “Dude, why would I have a refrigerator? I can sell it right now and I can order out.” And apparently you’re just like the smartest person in the world in your head. JOE ROGAN: Right. MATT MCCUSKER: And then it all crashes every 30 minutes. JOE ROGAN: It’s just free based cocaine is all it is. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Like what Richard Pryor was doing back in the day. That was just before crack. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: It was free basing cocaine. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And it’s weird too, because I think coke just floods your brain. A lot of things just flood your brain with dopamine. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. But the delivery method apparently of crack is superior. Like, there’s something about smoking it where it just goes right to your head. Well, I know this from Hunter Biden, because Hunter Biden was on that Channel 5 show when he was talking about it. And he was so descriptive of it, it almost made you want to try crack. It was almost like a romantic tale of a bad romance that he had to get out of. MATT MCCUSKER: It is a very gentlemanly way to say it’s his “superior delivery mechanism.” JOE ROGAN: Well, he’s very smart, right? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: So he’s very articulate, and he’s talking about what it was like to smoke crack. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: It’s like, holy man. MATT MCCUSKER: And I wonder — I guess he’s off of it because, you know, if you started again, it’s probably just another — JOE ROGAN: Well, there was that baggie they found at the White House. But first of all, it might have been his, but also — you think he’s the only one of those people doing coke? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I was about to say that could be anybody. JOE ROGAN: Listen, there’s probably a lot of those folks that need a little pick me up sometimes before a meeting, before they have to do a press thing. Dude, you’re working 16 hours a day. A little tired. Adderall in the Workplace MATT MCCUSKER: Big time. Let’s go. I used to work at a real estate company when I was in college. They would buy apartment buildings. And dude, all the senior management — they used to buy Adderalls off me. They would just chomp Adderall, come in, and they would do sales meetings and just be like — JOE ROGAN: A friend of mine who’s a journalist says that all these journalists are on Adderall. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I believe it. JOE ROGAN: Says it makes you productive. Yeah, they’re all doing it. Some of them are super open about it. Like, Dave Portnoy, when he was in here, he was telling us — what did he say? He took 30 milligrams. I don’t remember. But yeah, it was enough that I was like, “Yo.” And then I had to go to Jamie. “How much is that?” And Jamie was like, “A lot.” 30s. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. 30 is the — that would get you. JOE ROGAN: But not a lot if you do it a lot. MATT MCCUSKER: Right. Yeah, you get it. JOE ROGAN: That’s the thing. It’s like, if you’re doing edibles with Joey Diaz, like, “How much should I take?” MATT MCCUSKER: “Take two.” Edibles, Adderall, and the Dangers of Fentanyl-Laced Pills JOE ROGAN: Take two. How much do you take? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that would definitely. I mean, I feel like I can’t get a tolerance to eat edibles. They just knock me out every time. JOE ROGAN: Jamie can just eat them and they don’t do anything. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s crazy. I know people like that, too. Like, I need 200 milligrams to feel it. I’m like, I’m psychotic at 200 milligrams, I’m fried. JOE ROGAN: It’s a lot. Yeah, 200 is a lot. MATT MCCUSKER: I had these lollipops that were 200 milligrams. So I would try to gauge it. Like, I don’t want to eat too much of it. And I would just get whacked all the time. JOE ROGAN: So we went over how many people are on Adderall once. Like, the number of Adderall prescriptions in a year was something bonkers. It was like 39 million Adderall prescriptions in this country. But then you have to go, like, how many people is that, right? Because you refill your prescription. So how often do you refill it? How many times a year? You know what I mean? MATT MCCUSKER: I think it’s more than 39. If that’s the case, I feel like there’s 39 million subscribers to Adderall. JOE ROGAN: Well, there’s definitely people that are getting it other ways. MATT MCCUSKER: For sure. JOE ROGAN: For sure. You get your script and you sell it, but it’s like — MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Not that you’re getting it illegally. You’re getting illegal goods. And good and bad, you know, getting cartel stuff, like, pressed and stuff. They can make a Valium that looks just like a Valium and there’s f*ing fentanyl in it. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, true. That’s the pill world — they’re completely riddled with that right now. JOE ROGAN: Oh, it’s scary, man, because kids are taking these. Like, there was a kid from a local high school around here that I read a story about. He took an Adderall — he thought it was an Adderall — and it had fentanyl in it. He died. Got it from one of his friends. He was just trying to cram for studies. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s why I always tell people — anyone I know who does coke — I’m always like, “You’ve got to stop, man.” They’re like, “No, we’ll test it.” It’s like, no, you’re not. You’re going to be at a bar, you’re going to be hammered, you’re going to buy coke and shove it up your nose. I’ve never stopped and been like, “Let me see.” JOE ROGAN: I’ve never done it. But all my friends who have done it have all said the same thing — don’t do it. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve never done it either. I’ve never had any interest. But every time I’m around people on it, I’m just like, “Dude, this sucks.” Maybe they’re having fun, but it’s — JOE ROGAN: Like, they want to sell you Bitcoin. MATT MCCUSKER: They want to go into business now. Everybody does. JOE ROGAN: They get super hyped about a project they want to bring you in on. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, that’s what I think. I guess that’s the way it was explained to me — you just feel like you accomplished something major. So you just snort coke and you’re like, “I am the best ever.” It’s like, why? I don’t know. Comedy, Substances, and Performing on Stage JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Joey Diaz used to say that you can’t go on stage with that. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I can see that. JOE ROGAN: The worst. He goes, “You know, no feeling — you don’t feel for the crowd.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s how I feel about drinking. I can’t drink and go on stage because I’m way too confident. If something doesn’t land, I’m like, “F* whatever, pussy.” I just don’t care, and I just do so bad. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, it’s a weird, fine dance that people do with substances and performing. Especially if you’re doing something like a speed or something. You can get it wrong, I would imagine. You can get your balance wrong. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard that Adderall does not mix with comedy at all. JOE ROGAN: That’s what I’ve heard. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard people say it’s like a weird part of your brain where you’re just too lasered in. JOE ROGAN: I’ve heard people like to use it for writing, though, which I think is weird. MATT MCCUSKER: I guess. Yeah. I don’t know. JOE ROGAN: I know they use it for writing books. I don’t know if it would be the same for writing comedy because you’re talking about coming up with ideas. You’d imagine that would be the coffee thing on steroids. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, right. For me, for writing — I like to write, I write books, I like to do other stuff — writing stand-up is more like it has to just pop into my head. Then I go, “Oh, that would be funny.” And then, if I start fleshing it out, new ideas come. But I’ve tried to, like, write stand-up, and it very rarely gives me anything that works when I do that. Writing Process and Finding New Material JOE ROGAN: Yeah, me too. But what I do is I write essays — just essays on a subject. And then from that I’ll extract little things. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s a good idea. JOE ROGAN: And then I take that little thing and I say, “How do I introduce this thing? What would be funny about this thing? How would I lead into this? And what are the other surrounding things that would go with this?” MATT MCCUSKER: No, that’s a good way to do it. I have to trick myself into it. I’m like, “I’m memorizing my material,” so I just bullet point it, and then I get bored and my mind wanders. I’m like, “That would actually be pretty funny.” JOE ROGAN: Right. And then you start rambling. Yeah, that’s the thing about the essay — if you just sit down and write about a subject, whatever that subject is, you just start thinking about all the different aspects of that subject instead of thinking about how to write in comedy form. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, no, that’s a smart idea. Because if I try to write it, then you try to repeat it, but you wrote it down so it sounds like a written thing. JOE ROGAN: But even that, in the essay way, it’s a brutal process. Because then you have to take that one sentence or that one paragraph in a thousand words and figure out a way to introduce it where it’s not clunky. And then figure out what’s the funniest part about it. And it’s like, you have to always know that the first time you bring it out there, it’s going to suck. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And you have to just slowly but surely trust it to get better and just throw it into the fire every night. You know, you have your bits that you know are going to kill, and you’re like, “I don’t want to trot that one out here.” MATT MCCUSKER: I know. That is kind of the funnest part, though, to me. Like, when I moved here, I think I had just put out an hour or recorded one. So I had to start with new material, which sucks. You move somewhere, you have new stuff, you’re like, “Dude, I have only new sh*t.” It’s a bad feeling, but it’s exciting because you don’t know how it’s going to go every night. I like that. The Value of Bombing and Failure JOE ROGAN: I think it’s good. I think it’s like we were talking the other day about loss, about failure. I was talking with Michael Malice about bombing on stage. I think bombing is good. Because when you bomb, that feeling — you feel terrible that night, you feel terrible the next day — and then you’re like, “I’ve got to get back on stage and really tighten up my sh*t.” I always have, in the past, made big leaps after I bombed. I think it’s important. Failure is important. It sucks, you don’t like it, but you’ve got to go through that. Maybe you got overconfident, or maybe you were in a bad mood, or whatever. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, no, it helps. That’s what motivates me to write stand-up. If I bomb, I’m like, “All right, now let me dial it in.” Because I’m always doing a bunch of stuff and I’m like, “Oh, I got a show,” and I kind of organize against the gun. But yeah, a good bomb really is clarifying. It’s good for you, honestly. JOE ROGAN: Yes. Well, I used to say that to fighters, too. You lose a fight, it’s good — as long as you don’t get really hurt, it’s good — because you take that feeling home and think about all the stones that you left unturned. All the times you skipped road work, all the times you skipped strength and conditioning, all the times you were half-assing it in the gym. That guy didn’t do that. He just beat you. Now you know. You have to understand that there are levels to dedication, there are levels to competency. And a good loss is good for you. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it kind of — if you have your tried and true and you’re just going on stage and it’s working night after night, you just go home like, “Oh, whatever.” But yeah, when you bomb, it does something in my brain where my thoughts start flying, and whatever that is just helps me get stuff out there. Boston Comedy Scene and Headliners Who Never Evolved JOE ROGAN: Well, when I lived in Boston, one of the things that was a real problem was there were these local headliners that had these acts, man — they had 45 minutes of, like, hammered samurai sword. It was so good because they had been doing that 45 minutes for a decade and a half. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude. JOE ROGAN: It was so good. Their timing was so good, the pacing was so good, they would crush every night. But after a while, they never added anything new to it. And these guys just — a buddy of mine, Fitzsimmons, went to see a Boston headliner that we knew from the 80s, and he goes, “Dude, he was doing the same material.” He goes, “It was so sad.” He was just phoning it in. It was barely getting a response from the audience. It was dated references because this guy just had an act, and like a guy who shows up at the office, he would open up his suitcase, pull his act out. That was his act. MATT MCCUSKER: Those guys are always fascinating. When I started in Philly, the only first paid gigs you get as an open mic-er are, like, Moose Lodges for 50 bucks. And it’s always one of those wacko headliners. JOE ROGAN: Has been around for 30 years. MATT MCCUSKER: Doing it forever. Giving you the career talk in between the show. I would get comedy magicians all the time. Oh yeah, and those guys would always kind of freak me out. I would open for guys that would talk about floppy discs in the 2000s. What are you doing, man? We don’t even have CDs anymore. This guy talked about porn on a floppy disk on stage. Dude, it was Screech — RIP. I opened for Screech back in the day, and I was like, “Yes, this is going to be awesome.” He was — JOE ROGAN: He was killing it in the comedy clubs. He was like one of the first people to go from being on a sitcom to touring on the road. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I caught late Screech, though. Skippy. JOE ROGAN: Remember Skippy from Family Ties? What was the show? He was another guy who was on a sitcom. MATT MCCUSKER: Was he on — not Step by Step? JOE ROGAN: I don’t remember. Hollywood didn’t work out for him. Family Ties. Family Ties. MATT MCCUSKER: Family Ties with Michael J. The Screech Experience JOE ROGAN: Fox. Yeah. So that guy was headlining comedy clubs, yeah, all over the place. MATT MCCUSKER: This was like a bar in Delaware. This was not a glamorous gig. JOE ROGAN: Whoa. MATT MCCUSKER: It was bad. I graduated college in 2009. It would have been like 2012, maybe. So this was like late Screech. And the whole time he’s on stage, people going, “Screech.” And it just made him so bad. I remember it was a funny show because a lady was supposed to host, I was going to feature, and Screech was going to be the headliner. And the guy who owned the venue just wanted to impress this lady so bad that he was like, “Hey, I’m letting that lady feature. You’re going to host.” And he was like, “I’ll pay you the same price.” I was like, “Yeah, whatever.” So he paid me. And I had been doing stand up for a couple years, so I was kind of sharp, especially for that bar show. And this lady — she had never done stand up before. This was her first time. This guy f*ed her over. He thought he was doing something nice for her. She sat there for all 20 minutes and read out of a giant notebook — just completely horrific. Like a first time stand up doing 20 minutes, completely bombed. Screech was in the back with me and he’s like, “The f is this?” I remember he was bragging, being like, “Dude, they gave me eight grand. I don’t give a f about this show.” JOE ROGAN: I knew a few guys whose girlfriends started doing comedy, and then the girlfriend started opening for them, and it was just wild — for her sake. MATT MCCUSKER: You can’t do that. That’s such a bad idea. JOE ROGAN: It’s so crazy. And these guys were like competent headliners. So the people were coming to see them, they’re excited — “Hey, we’re going to go laugh, have a good time.” Nope. You’re going to get tortured for 20 minutes before you get to laugh. MATT MCCUSKER: Also, that’s not going to help him either. She’s going to be furious. I don’t know why people do that. JOE ROGAN: They want to help. That’s one thing that happens a lot with comedy couples — one of them will help the other one. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Writing is one thing, but— JOE ROGAN: That’s why they want to do it. It’s like they want to hook up with a headliner, whether it’s a guy or a girl. You hook up with a headliner, he or she helps you with your act, and then you go back and— MATT MCCUSKER: It’s also impossible, though, because if you’re dating a comic and then you book your own opener, you can’t be like, “Ah, next time. I got you next time.” You just have to flat out be like, “No, you’re not doing this.” JOE ROGAN: And then you break up. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. But if you really care about their comedy, you’ve got to go to the open mics, you know. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Doing it in front of a sold out show when you’re just starting out is a crazy idea. MATT MCCUSKER: I couldn’t imagine. It would have messed me up. First Timers at Madison Square Garden JOE ROGAN: Well, that’s why Kill Tony is so nuts. There are people who have gone on for their first time ever at Madison Square Garden to a sold out arena of 16,000 people. MATT MCCUSKER: And then it’s filmed for a couple million people. JOE ROGAN: Millions of people. You’re out there eating d*. MATT MCCUSKER: That must feel crazy waking up the next morning. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Just like — if you can even go to sleep. If I flub a word, I don’t go to sleep. And they can go to sleep after that? MATT MCCUSKER: You’re essentially filming a one-minute special for the first time. JOE ROGAN: The first time you do it on Netflix. God damn. Or on YouTube. Both of them are getting f*ing millions of views. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. I’d be so scared to do that. People who can do that — that’s amazing. Going out there and doing that is actually crazy. JOE ROGAN: Some of the people, when you’re interviewing them after they do the set, I’m like, “Has this guy been screened? Do we need to make sure he doesn’t have a knife on him?” MATT MCCUSKER: They do need that airport security thing. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, 100%. Some of these people are out of their mind. MATT MCCUSKER: I always want to hang in the bar — the holding tank where everyone is. That’s got to be the craziest vibe in there. JOE ROGAN: Well, you remember open mic nights. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, true. The Open Mic Lunatic Asylum JOE ROGAN: Open mic night at the Comedy Store in particular was always so nuts. It was just a complete lunatic asylum. There’s this one guy, Robert William Apavaya, and he would come there all the time. He was a really nice guy, and all of his act was about marijuana. At one point in time he was a lawyer, and then I guess he blew a fuse and just started doing comedy. He would walk from downtown — he lived in a flop house downtown — and it would take him hours to walk to the Comedy Store. And when it rained, the way he would deal with the rain is he would take plastic grocery bags and tuck them inside of all of his clothing, so he’d wrap them around his body. He had his clothing on the outside and these plastic bags all over his body. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s so f*ing funny. The clothes are on the outside. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: So he let his clothes get wet, but his body would be— JOE ROGAN: Well, he couldn’t figure out how to put it all outside of him. So his solution was just to cover his skin and keep from getting wet and cold, which I guess would work. It’d probably keep you sweaty, too. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, you’d sweat. JOE ROGAN: So he was like a staple. He would go there every night, late at night, and he would be one of the last guys up at open mic night every week. And he was just insane. You couldn’t shake his hand, couldn’t touch him. He was always nervous that everybody hated him, so he’d be scared. I became friends with him, so he was cool with me. I’d talk to him. But one time I tried to give him knuckles — I forgot. MATT MCCUSKER: He just wouldn’t. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, he would mumble and look at the ground, like, “Sorry.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: He was legitimately cooked. Whatever was going on — he was a lawyer, and he just blew a fuse. MATT MCCUSKER: Jesus Christ. JOE ROGAN: It happens. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it does. You forget — well, at least I did — because doing the open mics, it is like a complete freak factory. JOE ROGAN: A freak factory. MATT MCCUSKER: You’re steeped in that so much for years. And then I remember when I finally stopped going to open mics all the time — I was still in Philly — I took a break from the open mics. I would go do shows, and then I was like, “Let me go to the open mic.” It had been like six months, and I was like, “I’ll go to one, try stuff out.” I got in, sitting behind the area — I was at Philly Helium, just sitting there at the open mic — and right away, guys are like, “Dude, look at me.” It was just all these people, like, this was the worst environment you can possibly be in. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: Everyone was like, “This guy’s a piece of s*. I hate this guy.” Everyone’s so angry and charged on adrenaline all the time. JOE ROGAN: They’re also on the outside of this thing that they want to do — this dream — and they get to try it like a regular person with no training, no schooling, no nothing. You get to stand on that stage with a microphone. I went down a rabbit hole the other night and I was watching open mic nights from Long Island. It was so crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: That would be fun. JOE ROGAN: It’s so crazy watching someone that definitely shouldn’t be doing comedy trying comedy for the first time. It was one of those dumb things — it was like midnight and I was like, “Well, let me see.” MATT MCCUSKER: And they have— JOE ROGAN: All kinds of stuff. You can find anything online. I started watching, and I can only watch for so long, and then I get anxiety and I have to shut it off. Inviting Family to Open Mics MATT MCCUSKER: That was like when you do open mics and you finally do a showcase, you invite your friends or your family to watch, and they’re just like, “The f* are you doing? Who are these people?” And you’re like, “They’re my friends.” JOE ROGAN: I brought some of my friends. The first time I ever went on stage, I didn’t want to do it by myself. MATT MCCUSKER: I was the opposite. I didn’t want anyone to see me for a long time. I did a show one time — I have a big family — at this place called Raven Lounge in Philly. It was awesome when we started. Tiny little black box thing at the top of a bar, fit maybe like 25 people. I finally was like, “All right, I’ll invite my family out.” I remember I was on stage and I knew like 17 out of the 25 people. I was like, “Dude, kill me right now. This sucks.” JOE ROGAN: And they’re staring at you like this. MATT MCCUSKER: I saw my aunt in the front just looking at me, and I was like, “No.” JOE ROGAN: Watching you choke. Watching you bomb. MATT MCCUSKER: They were the audience. It’s just— JOE ROGAN: But that’s the only way. I know some people that have taken comedy classes, and that has kind of got them into stand up. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s— JOE ROGAN: This is a function of comedy classes, and that function is it gets you to try it. I don’t think anybody — maybe there are a few people out there that are legit comics teaching them — but for the most part, that’s not how it works. The Comedy Class Hustle MATT MCCUSKER: So we had a comedy class at Helium, and the thing was, if you took the comedy class, it would get you into the comedy class contest, then you could compete with the other people in the class. And if you won that, you got the hosting gig at Helium. It was a sweet deal, but it was so hard to get into Helium. So I had done stand up for a while, took time off, and when I got back into it, I was like, I’m taking that comedy class. I’m going to try to fast track myself into hosting. So I won the comedy class contest, and then I got into Philly’s Funniest. When I won Philly’s Funniest, the improv theater across the street was like, “We’ll let you host a comedy class, and we’ll give you, like, 35 bucks an hour.” Dude, I had no healthcare, I had nothing. I was like, “Absolutely, let’s do it.” So I had a comedy class, and they showed up, and I was like, “All right, never take a comedy class ever again. Don’t ever do this ever again. This is so dumb. You guys did this, but we’re just going to run this as an open mic.” And I had them all go up and just do, like, five minutes. It was just an open mic. JOE ROGAN: Well, that will work. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s what I try to tell people. But the one I was at was, like, real sketchy, man. It was very much like, “I’m about to blow up. I’m taking you guys with me. This is how it’s done.” And you get out of it and you go, “Bro, I got deals in development,” blah, blah, blah. JOE ROGAN: There’s so many of those guys. MATT MCCUSKER: I got blacklisted from Helium because they found out I had a comedy class, which was even a fake comedy class. I just wanted the money for it. JOE ROGAN: And did you try to tell them? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I told the owner. I was like, “Bro, what are you doing?” He’s like, “Look, man, just chill.” And I was like, “Can I do the open mic still?” He’s like, “You can do the open mic.” And the guy found out I was on the open mic, and they booted me off that for, like, a month. JOE ROGAN: Oh, my God. MATT MCCUSKER: He was out for blood. And I called him like, “What the f?” Because I knew this guy. I’m like, “What the f are you doing?” He said, “Well, I didn’t call them.” I’m like, okay. It was a big thing, but. JOE ROGAN: Well, there was talk — the same people own Cap City here now — there was talk that if you headline there, you couldn’t do my club for three months. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s crazy. JOE ROGAN: And I was like, “Come on, guys. Why?” I said to him, “If one of my friends is at your club, I’ll tweet about it.” I don’t want this to be competition. There’s plenty of comedians, there’s plenty of audience members for everybody. That’s silly. MATT MCCUSKER: Also, everyone’s a big fan. JOE ROGAN: I just — that’s insane. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s insane. JOE ROGAN: Crazy. I don’t like that — a young guy coming up, you’re banning him from the club because he’s hosting a comedy class for money. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it was nonsense. Now, the comedy class — JOE ROGAN: — is probably going to lead more people to your club. Like, it all feeds off of itself. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. And it was literally like, well, maybe the word got out that I was like, “Never take a comedy class ever again.” JOE ROGAN: Why did Helium have a class? MATT MCCUSKER: That was the class I took. I took a class at Helium because I wanted to fast track myself to the hosting gig. Otherwise, you had to do Philly’s Funniest. JOE ROGAN: And then — MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. So I completely gamed it. Because these were people who had never done it before. I’d done it for years. So I just went and did the class so I could do the contest. Comics Who Never Made It JOE ROGAN: Do you ever go back and think about people that you knew in the early days and think, “I thought they were going to make it”? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, there’s a couple of people that I was like, “This guy’s like a celebrity. He’s got it.” And it’s just like — I don’t know what happened. They just kind of faded. JOE ROGAN: It’s weird. MATT MCCUSKER: It is weird. JOE ROGAN: There’s a few people that I started out with. I’m like, “Damn, this dude’s talented. There’s something there.” MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, no, yeah. It’s funny you said that. There was definitely at least one, if not two or three. They would come, they would do this, but this guy was always on his own time. He would, like, show up late, just walk on. I think there are some people you just can’t keep locked into a thing at all, but their personalities are, like, magnetic. JOE ROGAN: There are some people that, for whatever reason, they never figure out how to make a living at it. They never — and then they get bored with it, or they get frustrated or something. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I couldn’t imagine — there were people I’d see who, you know, everyone bombs when you’re starting out at open mics, but there are people that bomb every time for, like, years, and they keep doing it. And you’re like, “Bro, how are you —” JOE ROGAN: How do you live? How are you doing this? MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t have one bad set and I’m like, “I’m going to kill myself, dude.” JOE ROGAN: Some people just don’t see it, and they don’t address it. That’s also where they don’t get any better. They don’t have any self-awareness. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that could be it. JOE ROGAN: And their perception of how people see them is distorted. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s kind of scary, actually. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. You want to put blinders up. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s pretty cut and dry, though, when people are silent in front of you. Like, “Damn, I suck right now. I should change something.” JOE ROGAN: But in the beginning, it’s just such a weird thing. You’re basically running a marathon blindfolded — MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: — through trees. The Grind of Building an Hour MATT MCCUSKER: Finally, when I did a special, I was like, “Oh, this is the point of it.” You have to come up with an hour of stand up. Before, I was just like, “I need to have a good five minutes for tonight.” And I would just go up and do it and be like, “Great,” and go back home with no plan or anything. JOE ROGAN: Well, that’s a lot of guys who live in cities where you do short sets all the time. We were talking about that the other night in the green room. Some guys who do a lot of New York City clubs, they have a really good 15 minutes. They f*ing crush for 15 minutes. But when they have to do an hour, things get weird because they can’t keep the same energy for an hour. You have to pace it. It has to be hills and valleys. You have to kind of structure it. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, yeah. JOE ROGAN: And then they also don’t really have the material, because they’re basically just doing their best 15 minutes all the time. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, true. I wasn’t even really doing stand up. Me and Shane were doing the podcast, and I was like, “I don’t even want to do stand up anymore.” And then he — it was pretty funny — behind my back, went to the manager at Helium and was like, “Dude, have Matt headline.” And I was like, “F*ing dick.” The guy hit me up, so I started doing that. So I had been, like, not doing — JOE ROGAN: Stand up for how long? MATT MCCUSKER: For, like, months and months. Maybe a year off. And I had — you know, I would go and try stuff. So then when I first started headlining, I would do an hour, have off for like two months, do an hour somewhere else. It was the most insane thing. It really started f*ing with me. JOE ROGAN: Did you have recordings to listen to? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I would record the audio and listen to it, and then jot down notes. It was the most insane way to get back into it. Stand Up After COVID JOE ROGAN: That was the thing we experienced after COVID. There was a moment where I hadn’t done stand up in, like, four or five months. It felt so weird. And then Houston had stand up — they had clubs open and they’d space people out and put masks on them. Like, this is so ridiculous. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: We were doing shows inside, and I only did one weekend. And then I got super paranoid. I’m like, “What if I give it to someone and then they die? I’m being so selfish that I want to do these shows.” I had to stop. So I had this old lady on the podcast, and my first thought was, “What if I have it and I give it to her?” MATT MCCUSKER: Damn, that would suck. JOE ROGAN: I was so freaked out. I wasn’t even remotely sick. That was what was crazy. It was just a boogeyman, man. It wasn’t like, “I’m coughing, maybe I shouldn’t come into work.” No, it was like, “I feel great, but what if I have it? What if I give it to this lady?” MATT MCCUSKER: I know. Dude, I had my first kid right in March 2020. We got out of the hospital, and like a week later I was holding my face in a grocery store like, “What?” JOE ROGAN: Well, at least you could be with her when she gave birth. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that was cool. JOE ROGAN: That was what was crazy. People were dying alone because you couldn’t visit them while they were dying. MATT MCCUSKER: It was insane. And luckily, when we went in for our second kid, it was still kind of in the mix. We were able to go in together, but our nurse — if we didn’t have our mask on, she was like, “I don’t care.” JOE ROGAN: Whatever. MATT MCCUSKER: People were getting — just like, two weeks after we had our kid, people were in there like, “I got to stay home. My wife’s in there by herself,” blah, blah. It was a disaster. But even navigating that was crazy, because I’d tell my wife, “I want to go do this,” and she’s like, “What if you bring it home to all of us?” And I remember just at one point being like, “Then we’re all going to get it, dude. I don’t know. I did the numbers. I think this affects older people more.” You know, what — JOE ROGAN: What time was this? MATT MCCUSKER: This would have been March 2020. And then, like, the next six months, because I would, like, go try to do stuff, she’s like, “If you go outside, we’re all going to get sick.” JOE ROGAN: I was worried about it. I wasn’t really confident that people weren’t going to get really hit by it until, like, a few of my friends got it and got over it. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. COVID, Health, and Life on the Road JOE ROGAN: And then my family got it, and I didn’t get it. And I thought that was crazy because I tried to get it. I hugged my kids. They were laughing, “You’re going to get COVID.” I was like, “I’m not going to get it.” And part of my head was like, boy, I hope I don’t get it. I never got it. I worked out, and I didn’t feel so good. And I said, let me just go through the paces today. And then I worked out the next day, same thing. I’m like, I don’t feel so good. I feel weak. So I just did my kettlebell routine with like 35 pounds. Just easy. Don’t push. Just sets. And so I did that two days in a row. And then the third day, I went to the gym. I’m like, how do I feel? And I’m like, I feel good. I feel great. Nothing feels wrong at all. And I had a full workout, and I felt fine. So I said, all right, I guess I didn’t get it. And I went and got tested to see if I had antibodies, like if I had recovered from it. Nope, never got it. I had sex with my wife. She was coughing and everything. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s such a f*ing beast move, dude. JOE ROGAN: She was like, “You’re going to get it.” I’m like, “Let’s find out.” MATT MCCUSKER: That is a beast move. I’m terrible at math, but I remember looking up how likely is it to die from this, and it was like 0.00001 something. I was like, fine, man. JOE ROGAN: There was so much propaganda. The thing was, we were in the middle of doing podcasts, and we tested everybody when they showed up, to make sure that nobody had it. Tested all the employees, security guys, everybody that works for me. Everybody got tested every day. We’d show up, we’d be separated. A nurse would come with a mask on, test everybody. And then once we had the results, we would allow the show to go on. So I was like, I can’t f this up, because if I f this up, I f* it up for everybody. I’ve got to be careful. And I still had guests flying in. They were taking a chance. A lot of them were older, like a lot of professors flying in to do this podcast, and I had to make sure. And then someone ratted us out. So the health department showed up at the studio, and they wanted us to have a bag of masks right when you walk in. So we had to put a bag of masks right there, a hand sanitizer thing right there, and a sign that says what you’re supposed to do. Six foot distancing, all that stuff. I was like, all right. But they were saying that we weren’t socially distancing. “We saw him hug people outside the front door.” MATT MCCUSKER: That’s completely dystopian, man. That’s crazy. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know why. You know what? It was because my parents were just like — the first time we all hung out outside, both my parents were like, “Bro, this sucks. Just come inside. We’re not doing this.” And that was like, oh. JOE ROGAN: My parents were terrified. MATT MCCUSKER: My parents didn’t give a f*. JOE ROGAN: My parents didn’t want to hang out with anybody until they got vaccinated. They were real nervous about it. They’re older. And when you get older, that’s why a lot of these people, like the Neil Youngs and Howard Sterns and all those people that really freaked out about it — they’re older people. So to them, they’re looking at it like they might be that 1% that dies. Whereas if you’re young and healthy, you work out, you’ll probably be fine. Your wife’s healthy, you’ll be fine. But when you’re an old person, you smell death in the air already. Every day you wake up, your back hurts, you can barely get out of bed, your feet are swollen. It could get you. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it’s crazy. My parents are going to be 70 soon. They were just kind of like, “We don’t give a damn.” JOE ROGAN: Depends on where you grew up. MATT MCCUSKER: I think that’s what it was, man. No matter what it was, it was just like that. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. If you grow up hard, you’re not worried about a cough. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, they weren’t. I finally got it, and it actually kind of rocked me the first day. I talked so much, and I got it. I was like, “Bro, if I die, this is going to suck so bad.” But then my wife got it two days later. We had a little kid, so we just switched off. I was recovered enough, and our kid never got it even though they were around us. JOE ROGAN: Kids can go right through it. Both of my kids got it, and they just burned through it. One of them had it more, but she’s a little more sensitive. She was pretty sick for a couple of days — not scary sick, she just didn’t feel good for a couple of days. The other one barely had it. Went right through her. MATT MCCUSKER: One didn’t get it at all, just a runny nose. I was in bed for three straight days. Just hurt, super fever, hurting. JOE ROGAN: Were you taking any vitamins at the time? MATT MCCUSKER: No, at the time I wasn’t living very well. JOE ROGAN: See, that’s the thing. I’m all over the vitamins, and I was all over the vitamins then. My wife back then, not so much. So when I was around everybody that got it, it just never got to me. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I was run down, and we had a relative newborn kind of situation going on. JOE ROGAN: That’s a hard one. Your immune system is going to be crushed anyway because you’re getting zero sleep. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Everybody’s just ready to fall asleep at any given time watching TV. Naps, Travel, and Staying Sharp on the Road MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve never recovered. I’m still ready to pass out. I go home and I’m fried. I take naps. That was a big thing for me with coffee — now I can take naps during the day. I can’t take naps when I drink coffee. JOE ROGAN: Oh, I never take naps. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, I love them, man. A little siesta. JOE ROGAN: The only time I ever take a nap is if I have to do something really early in the morning. Like if I do a set at night and I’m not home until 12:30, and maybe I have to get up at 6 or something, I’ll take a little nap. But for me there’s a balance of what’s more important — getting things done and working out, or not getting into a deficit. And for me, it’s not getting into a deficit. Because if I do a podcast and I’m sleepy, I get so mad at myself. I’m like, “What are you doing? This is your one job. Be awake and talk to people.” MATT MCCUSKER: Sleeping like a toddler. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. So how long were you in Indonesia for? MATT MCCUSKER: It is embarrassing. JOE ROGAN: It’s the worst. And then I’m just drinking coffee and energy drinks and taking nicotine pouches and just trying to fire the brain up. MATT MCCUSKER: When I do that, my face just gets hot and I’m just anxious. That’s why, especially for shows, I try to leave on an early flight, get where I’m going, and just take a big nap. Then I wake up and go do the show. JOE ROGAN: One thing I started doing when I was on the road a lot was going in on Thursday if I had a show on Friday. I would get in Thursday night, sleep, and then instead of flying in the day of the show — because you’re always a little foggy. Back then I wasn’t on the nootropics as much. I wasn’t taking them with me on the road, the brain vitamins and Alpha Brain. But now I don’t travel without that stuff. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, you do need it. I do the day-of thing. I can’t help it. I just go early and nap. I did a show in Vegas last weekend that didn’t start till 10pm Vegas time. I got there, took a nap, woke up at like 9pm Vegas time. I just felt like a bug. JOE ROGAN: You know what my trick for that is? The moment you land, put your stuff in your hotel room, go straight to the gym. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. You’ve got to get a workout in and you’ve got to sweat — like really sweat. Just really get it going. Do some push-ups, whatever you want to do, but just really sweat. It feels like it resets your system. MATT MCCUSKER: I can see that. That would wake you up and kind of calm you down. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, it resets your system. Whatever the f* happens when you’re on a plane, when you get off, you just feel off. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, I feel like I’ve been microwaved. JOE ROGAN: You kind of have been. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, pretty much. I smell weird. JOE ROGAN: It’s like an X-ray. You’re getting X-rayed. MATT MCCUSKER: The other day I was like, “Maybe it’s like good for me somehow.” It’s just constricting my blood vessels and I’m turning into a superhero. I was in Denver recently, running and working out, and I was like, “I’m probably totally different now.” I did like a 30-minute workout. I’m like, “I’m probably totally altered now.” Training at Altitude JOE ROGAN: Well, I lived above Boulder for a while. I had a gig in Philadelphia, so I was living up there for a couple of months. I was living at 8,500 feet above sea level and I’d work out up there. And then when I’d go down to Boulder at 5,500 feet, I had all this endurance. I was like, “This is crazy.” MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, from Boulder to Denver, you’re saying? JOE ROGAN: No, from where I was — I was in the mountains above Boulder. So I’d go down to Boulder. Boulder’s like 5,500, 5,700 feet, whatever it is. But I was at 8,500. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. That’s a lot. JOE ROGAN: So then I did a gig in Philly and I went to the gym. I remember I called my friend and I’m like, “Dude, I feel like I could run through a wall.” MATT MCCUSKER: Damn, I want that so bad. JOE ROGAN: That’s why a lot of athletes train at altitude. They go to Big Bear in California and train up there. MATT MCCUSKER: I got to do it for like just once, and I was like, “Dude, this is awesome.” Training, Sprinting, and Getting in Shape JOE ROGAN: Yeah. If you can live at altitude and train at altitude and then go down to sea level, you feel like you have superpowers. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s awesome. JOE ROGAN: So a lot of endurance athletes, that’s why they put the Olympic training center in Colorado Springs. MATT MCCUSKER: That makes sense. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Training at altitude is a legit hack. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I didn’t realize, because I’ve always wondered why it’s so hard. And it’s literally just the air thins and there’s less oxygen. JOE ROGAN: And then your body has to adapt, so you get more red blood cells. That’s why they take EPO. That’s what EPO does for you. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, you don’t have to go to altitude. JOE ROGAN: Well, I think a lot of them do both. They just push it to that limit of, like, how much before I get a stroke. MATT MCCUSKER: True. JOE ROGAN: I’m trying to win a gold medal. I’m trying to win the Tour de France. Sprinting and Circulation MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, I just started sprinting again. Like, sprinting, sprinting. Just all out total sprints, just to see where I was at. Because I feel like if you just stop, you can feel that age creep in a little bit. And there’s a lot of mental stuff to it, like, “Ah, it just goes.” But if you’re not testing it, how do you know you’re not just letting yourself go? Anyway, I was doing it. I haven’t been running like that in forever. And dude, my fingertips would be numb. I would do 100 meter sprints and I couldn’t feel my hands. Now I can. I fixed it. Because you literally grow new veins, and I swear to God it’s true. JOE ROGAN: Are you a doctor? MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know. But yeah, I remember thinking, “Let me see where I’m at.” And I was like, “Bro, you really do use it or lose it.” And I can run now. I did it this morning. I can sprint now and I don’t get numb. It’s pretty awesome. JOE ROGAN: How do you do it? Do you go to a track? MATT MCCUSKER: At the track, yeah. The track near my house. I just bolt out there early. Super early in the morning. You feel amazing. JOE ROGAN: Wow. MATT MCCUSKER: All day. JOE ROGAN: And so you just pick a certain distance you’re going to run? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Like today I did two 300s, two 200s, and then we were supposed to do four 150s. I got two in and I was like, “I’m tapped.” JOE ROGAN: So you’re done in like 15, 20 minutes. MATT MCCUSKER: You’re done. I’m there at like six o’clock and I’m done in 20 minutes. And you feel like — you were talking about running to a city and just getting an all out workout. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: You feel like you’re walking on air for the rest of the day. JOE ROGAN: That makes sense. There was a study recently about explosive exercise, and that’s one of the things that’s lacking in older people. As they get older, they stop doing any kind of explosive exercise, like sprinting. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And how beneficial that is for maintaining your health and your ability to move around. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, I’m telling you. That was such a drastic thing. I was like, “Damn, my circulation is shot. I can’t run without my hands feeling all pins and needles.” JOE ROGAN: That’s so weird. MATT MCCUSKER: And they just came back. Now I can do it. My fingers feel fine. JOE ROGAN: Getting in shape. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s pretty nuts. Because cardio is always like, “Cardio’s dumb, who cares?” And then you learn. I think you just secrete growth hormone and then your veins and capillaries start — you literally get new and wider veins. JOE ROGAN: That makes sense. I mean, your heart is pounding out of your chest. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: You’re hitting 180 beats per minute. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s like forcing all that through, just clearing it out. Like, “All right, what are we holding on to right now?” Jelly Roll’s Incredible Weight Loss JOE ROGAN: You never got fat or really badly out of shape. When you see a guy like Jelly Roll — I have so much respect for that man. That dude lost 300 pounds. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude. JOE ROGAN: How did he lose 300 pounds? No Ozempic. Just stopped eating sugar. MATT MCCUSKER: That was no Ozempic? JOE ROGAN: No Ozempic. He took testosterone replacement. That’s it. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s f*ing sick. JOE ROGAN: Sick. MATT MCCUSKER: I just assumed he had to be on Ozempic. JOE ROGAN: He started off just walking, man. That’s all. Just trying to walk. When he came here last time we did a podcast, he had run — I think he ran 6.2 miles the day before. He was deer hunting down in South Texas with my friend Cam Hanes, and they went on a run. They did 6.2 miles, hills and everything. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And then he came in here before the podcast and ran 2.6 on the treadmill. I was working out and he was over there running and talking and laughing. Look how good he looks. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: How crazy is that? MATT MCCUSKER: Nuts. JOE ROGAN: It’s amazing. We did the whole deal. We did the sauna afterwards. It was awesome. MATT MCCUSKER: How long did it take him to lose it? Three years? JOE ROGAN: Three years. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. That’s crazy. JOE ROGAN: And he did it the right way. The hard way. Just working out and eating right. No sugar, clean food. And just slowly let his body drop. MATT MCCUSKER: I mean, he’s got to feel awesome. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. It’s got to be amazing. Jelly Roll’s Voice and Career MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. How’s that doing for him career-wise? Like, he had a persona and now he’s changed. I guess his fans — JOE ROGAN: He’s got an amazing voice. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: The amazing voice is still amazing. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Well, your voice changes a little bit with weight. JOE ROGAN: I’m sure it changed. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard that if you’re an alto or something and you’re at a certain weight, it can change. Something to do with your diaphragm and your stomach. JOE ROGAN: I know some dudes who lost a lot of weight and they didn’t like the way they looked when they were thin because their head was too big. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Isn’t that weird? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Like, your head looks big when you get heavier. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. It just grows with your body. JOE ROGAN: “Significant weight loss can change a person’s voice, often making it sound higher pitched, lighter, or clearer, due to reduced fat accumulation around the larynx, throat, and chest. These physical changes decrease pressure on the vocal cords, improving breathing, resonance, and reducing the effort required to produce sound.” MATT MCCUSKER: So it makes you a better singer. JOE ROGAN: But does it though? Because opera singers — aren’t they all fat? MATT MCCUSKER: I think so. I wonder if you have to be. JOE ROGAN: Are there any really thin, handsome opera singers? MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know about all fat. JOE ROGAN: I think I just like to generalize. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s a cartoon version in my head. I’ve seen that in cartoons. JOE ROGAN: Big fat jolly guys. MATT MCCUSKER: Fat lady with a Viking helmet. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, it’s always that. MATT MCCUSKER: But that sounds good though. So your voice gets clearer, higher pitched — JOE ROGAN: And it’s not as much effort. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Sounds like that’s R&B legend status. JOE ROGAN: And you can hit notes. With the cardio, your heart won’t beat as fast. You’ll have more oxygen to sing. It’s all good. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. That’s awesome. JOE ROGAN: I mean, his voice is amazing. And it’s his songwriting too. It’s not just the voice. It’s what he’s singing about. That’s not going to change. MATT MCCUSKER: And his fans — I have this weird thing in my head where, for comedy, I’m like, “If I get in too good of shape, people are going to be like, ‘This guy.'” Which, that’s not what’s stopping me. But you always wonder about that. Like, would they be like, “Damn.” Getting Jacked and Going on Stage JOE ROGAN: Well, that is a weird thing. I don’t think it matters with a T-shirt on. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. If you’re too jacked. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Like, I would never go on stage with a tank top on. MATT MCCUSKER: A tank top might be kind of funny though. JOE ROGAN: Crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: That would be crazy. JOE ROGAN: Rich Voss used to do that all the time. MATT MCCUSKER: That makes perfect sense. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Character. Like Kid Rock style. MATT MCCUSKER: I just saw — did you see the workout? JOE ROGAN: No. MATT MCCUSKER: What do you mean you didn’t see the Kid Rock and Robert Kennedy workout? JOE ROGAN: Shut up. MATT MCCUSKER: You didn’t see this? JOE ROGAN: No, bro. You said you got off social media, so you must have really gotten off social media. I’m off social media, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: It is very funny. JOE ROGAN: I’m off social media, but apparently I’m not off the f*ing news. Which I think I have to be off now. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Because I haven’t been on social media. But I’ll read the Apple News feed and the Google News feed and I’m like, “F*.” MATT MCCUSKER: That’s basically scrolling too. I tried the same thing. JOE ROGAN: I was reading about B-52s headed to some Air Force base. Nuclear equipped B-52s. I’m like, “What are we doing?” Yeah, so let me see this workout video. It’s Kid Rock and — oh, Jesus Christ. This must be Kid Rock’s house. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I think so. JOE ROGAN: “Rock Out Workout.” RFK Jr. works out in jeans. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, he’s — look, he — JOE ROGAN: He always works out in jeans, which is so crazy. This is Kid Rock’s house. Kid Rock has an insane house that looks like the White House on the outside, but the inside has two bedrooms and it’s like 25,000 square feet. It’s an enormous house with two bedrooms. It’s all just party. He’s got a huge hot tub room. Look at RFK Jr. He’s jacked. MATT MCCUSKER: Jacked, dude. JOE ROGAN: Awesome for 70. On the Airdyne. Look at him doing push-ups. These guys are doing the Airdyne in the sauna. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. JOE ROGAN: Wild. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I think they go to his like — JOE ROGAN: cold plunge with jeans on. MATT MCCUSKER: Crazy. JOE ROGAN: What the f* are you doing? That is ridiculous. What’s wrong with your legs? Now I need to know, where’s the kid? So this is his crazy room that looks like a mining cavern. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard of a secret, he’s got like this. JOE ROGAN: It’s really cool. He’s really into pickleball too. He plays pickleball every morning. Yeah, that’s what you tell me. He goes, “I get up and play pickleball. 7:00am, everybody. Pickleball.” He’s like, “Dude, I fing love…” That’s what it looks like. Look at how dope that is. His house is so dope. It’s the fing dopest house I’ve ever seen in my life. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s awesome. JOE ROGAN: And it’s such a Kid Rock house. Like, the outside of it looks exactly like the White House. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s incredible. JOE ROGAN: Just larger. I want you to be distracted from the whole milk they’re drinking in the hot tub. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s raw, bro. Trump on Obama and the Aliens JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Can I bring your attention to something that’s been happening on the Internet since we’ve been live? President Trump was asked about Obama talking about the aliens. I got a video on the screen. MATT MCCUSKER: Perfect. I want to hear it myself. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. VIDEO CLIP BEGINS: UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Barack Obama said that aliens are real. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Have you seen any evidence of non-human visitors to Earth? DONALD TRUMP: Well, he ain’t… classified information. He’s not supposed to be doing that, you know. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: So aliens are real? DONALD TRUMP: Well, I don’t know if they’re real or not. I can tell you, he gave out classified information. He’s not supposed to be doing that. He made a big mistake. He took it out of classified information. No, I don’t have an opinion on it. I never talk about it. A lot of people do. A lot of people believe it. Do you believe it, Peter? UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I do now. DONALD TRUMP: I may get him out of trouble by declassifying. Illegal aliens. VIDEO CLIP ENDS: JOE ROGAN: “I may get him out of trouble by declassifying.” That’s hilarious. MATT MCCUSKER: What else? JOE ROGAN: “I may get him out of trouble by declassifying.” Geez, I hope he does. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, really? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Imagine you can get in trouble as a president for saying aliens are real. MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t think so, man. I don’t think he’s going to get in trouble for that. JOE ROGAN: Well, what did he say then? What was that? MATT MCCUSKER: They’ve been saying there’s aliens. JOE ROGAN: But what did he just say? MATT MCCUSKER: He was just… he just hates Obama. He’s going like, “Oh, he’s going to jail. I’m getting Hillary and I’m getting Obama for aliens.” JOE ROGAN: They all hate each other and they all hang out and shake hands. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, yeah. Whose funeral was that when, like, George Bush and them were handing out candy to each other? JOE ROGAN: Well, George Bush and Michelle Obama are apparently friends. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, they’re buddies. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Which everybody thought. But George Bush never engaged in this insult kind of thing that Trump does. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s true. JOE ROGAN: It’s a different thing. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it’s totally. JOE ROGAN: No, he was always very classy. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And especially when you see the videos of him back in the day, like now, you’re like, “Man, this guy’s lovable.” JOE ROGAN: Oh, dude. In comparison to the politicians today. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: He was like, “Oh, when is he running again?” MATT MCCUSKER: Class. The guy’s a complete class act. And then you’re like, “Oh, yeah, f* the Middle East. Forgot about that.” JOE ROGAN: Well, he had Satan on his side. Dick Cheney was running around shooting his friends in the face on hunting trips. Obama’s Classified Slip and What It Means MATT MCCUSKER: That’s true. I don’t know. I mean, that thing is like, was it classified? Because now, if Trump’s going to be like, “He gave out classified information,” then he’s letting you know it’s classified. He’s telling you the cat’s out of the bag. JOE ROGAN: Well, he’s saying, “I may declassify it.” I hope he does. I hope this gets him, because that is a weird, weird thing to say. “He’s not supposed to be saying that.” Well, that means it’s real. He gave out classified information — that means there’s real data that aliens are real. That’s the only conclusion you could draw from that statement. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, right. Yeah, you would think. JOE ROGAN: I don’t think… try to come up with another reasonable way he would say, “Aliens are real, you shouldn’t say that because it’s classified.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: That means it’s real. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it is. But that’s such a crazy thing. If Trump was trying to keep it classified, you think he’d be like, “I don’t know…” JOE ROGAN: He’s talking about… MATT MCCUSKER: Being like, “Well, yeah, they are, but I can’t say they are. And he’s in trouble now.” Bob Lazar and Area 51 JOE ROGAN: I’ve talked to Bob Lazar many times. I had him on the podcast. I had dinner with him and Andrew Schulz. Schulz was in town in LA and I go, “What are you doing tonight?” And he goes, “What’s up?” I go, “You want to go have dinner with Bob Lazar? He’s the guy that used to back-engineer UFOs at Area 51.” He goes, “Yes.” All right. So we went to Fogo de Chão in LA and sat down with Bob Lazar and just got to ask him all these questions. I’ve known him for years now. I did the podcast with him in 2019, so I’ve known him for six, seven years now. MATT MCCUSKER: Okay. JOE ROGAN: He’s always had the same story. He’s a very reasonable guy to hang out with. I’ve had dinner with him a couple of times. Super normal guy. Doesn’t seem like a big fat liar. Obviously a scientist. Obviously a very brilliant guy. I don’t know what to think. I keep searching for some bullshit. I keep searching for something. He never saw any aliens. He never saw anything. He was just back-engineering these crafts that didn’t make any sense. He got there, he saw it. The moment he saw it, it looked like that thing. That’s what it’s based on. That’s the sport model on the desk. MATT MCCUSKER: Jesus Christ. JOE ROGAN: There’s a guy named Designs by Perry — the E in Perry is a three — and he makes these. You could buy them on the Internet. He makes a desk lamp, rather. MATT MCCUSKER: So he’d have to examine the mechanisms? JOE ROGAN: Well, they didn’t even tell him what he was doing. So this is what it was. He worked at Los Alamos Labs in New Mexico, and he was a propulsions expert. He had famously put a jet engine on the back of a Honda. He built a Honda with a jet engine on it, just for fun. Just a genius. He just loved engineering and doing things. He had contacted this guy about getting some work in laboratories or whatever. And the guy said, “I might have something for you that is more along the lines of your capabilities. I’m going to set up a meeting for you.” So he sets up this meeting. Bob has no idea what the meeting is about. They don’t tell him. They just start asking him about his background, what he did at Los Alamos, what he’s interested in. He just tells his whole story of science and this and that. They had already heard about him. So they go, “Okay, show up at this place. There are airplanes that are going to fly you out to where you’re going.” Nobody even knew about these airplanes back then. Now it’s been confirmed that there’s a bunch of airplanes right outside of Mandalay Bay — they fly the employees that work in Area 51 out there, and they live in Las Vegas. But nobody knew about this in 1989 when he was talking about it, when he blew the whistle on it. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, yeah. JOE ROGAN: So they fly him out there, show him how everything works for a couple of days — how the base works, where you have access, what you don’t have access to. They bring him a co-worker who had been there before to show him the ropes. And then a couple of days in, they bring him into a hangar, and there’s that thing, with American flag stickers on it. He goes, “Oh, these are ours.” He’s like, “Oh my God. No wonder why people are seeing these things. This is something that we have.” So then they tell him, essentially, “Tell us how it works.” He’s like, “What is this, a test?” They’re very vague about everything. No one’s telling him where it came from. No one’s telling him anything. And then he realizes the whole thing doesn’t make sense because there are no welds, there are no seams. It’s like it’s 3D printed, and you have to crawl in it because it’s designed for people that are like three feet tall. MATT MCCUSKER: Whoa. JOE ROGAN: And there are no controls in it. It’s like, “What is this?” And there’s this generator in the center of it that has this triangular piece of an element that doesn’t even exist on Earth — Element 115. He’s like, “Wait, what the f* is going on?” They explained to him: you bombard this element with radiation, and that causes this field around the craft that allows it to move around. So they do a demonstration for him. He goes outside, they fly this thing. When he’s under it, he can’t see it. He has to step away to see it again. He’s like, “What the f* is this thing?” It’s not making any noise. It moves around. It gives off this glowing light — when whatever this generator inside of it is operational, it gives off this blue glowing light. This thing was silently flying around, and occasionally it would go from one point to another very quickly. Like, it could go from this part of the mountain to that part of the mountain and just appear there. It would look like it just disappeared because it would move so fast — it would just appear in a new place. MATT MCCUSKER: It seemed like… what was steering the thing? JOE ROGAN: I don’t understand it. And he didn’t understand it either. He knows how supposedly this generator works — there are these gravity beam projectors on the bottom of it. The way you get it to fly fast, it would turn sideways and then point these gravity projectors into a certain direction. It would create this void around the craft, and it would just instantaneously go to wherever it was supposed to go. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s crazy, right? JOE ROGAN: And so he’s working on this for months and months, and then his wife starts having an affair because he doesn’t tell her what he’s doing. It’s super top secret. When you have that level of clearance, you can’t tell anybody what you’re doing. So he’s like, “I gotta go to work.” She’s like, “It’s 11 o’clock at night. Where are you going?” He’s like, “I have to go to work.” So he would just jet off. And she was like, “Well, I’m going to…” My flight attendant. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Bob Lazar, UFOs, and Government Secrets JOE ROGAN: Or my flight instructor. So this is all recorded because they’re tapping his phones, and so they suspend him because they’re wondering if he’s going to be emotionally unstable. So while he’s suspended, he takes his friends. He’s like, “I got to tell people about this. Like, I can’t even work. Something’s going on. I got to tell these people, like, hey, every Wednesday, I have the schedule. Every Wednesday, they fly these things.” And the reason why they do it on Wednesday is because that’s when there’s the least amount of traffic on the roads. So he takes his wife, and he takes a couple of friends, and he takes them up to see this thing, and they go once, and then they go twice, and then they get caught. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. JOE ROGAN: And then when they get caught, they grill him. They scare him. They’re poking him in the chest with a gun, and they’re freaking him out. And then they tell him about his wife and all this. And so then he goes public. He gets hold of this guy, George Knapp, who’s a news reporter in Las Vegas, and he tells him the story. At first, initially, they black his face out so he could remain anonymous. He’s like, “Look, the only way I could stay alive — you have to show my face.” Because they’re threatening him. They broke into his house. He goes outside, goes to the gym, goes outside — his trunk is open, his hood is open, all his doors are open. The car was locked. No one broke into it. So he has no idea they’re with him. And he’s really worried. Someone shoots his tire out on the highway. MATT MCCUSKER: Where is he now? He’s just chilling? JOE ROGAN: Well, I don’t know if I’m supposed to say where he lives. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, whatever. But he’s, like, around. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, no, he’s around. I mean, this was a long time ago. And they tried to discredit him. They said he never worked at Los Alamos Labs. But then someone got hold of the employee roster from the time that he was working there, and his name’s listed there. Someone who worked there at the time said, “I have the employee roster from 1985 or whatever it was,” and he says, “Here, right here.” And they go through the roster and it says right there — Robert Lazar. And there’s also a newspaper article that was printed about him being a physicist at Los Alamos Labs and that he had made this crazy jet engine powered Honda. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: So there’s him with the Honda, and he’s listed in this lab as a physicist at the lab. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, that shit’s so weird. JOE ROGAN: And then what Trump just said — he’s not supposed to say that. It’s classified. MATT MCCUSKER: Like, yeah, what? JOE ROGAN: Why don’t you tell us? The Government’s Alien Agenda MATT MCCUSKER: Well, I always wonder if they’re going to try to do a Space Force thing where it’s like WMDs in the Middle East. We go to the Middle East. Now they’re going like, “Yeah, I think there are aliens.” And it’s like, now we get to do Space Force. JOE ROGAN: I think if they’re aliens, you can’t do anything to them. MATT MCCUSKER: I know, but it’s also like, if you want to erect some weird defense thing in outer space so we can spy on China, that’s the other thing. I think there probably are aliens, by the way. I would imagine there’s something. Because the government, whenever they start floating things out, I always assume there’s an agenda. I’m like, “All right, what are they doing?” JOE ROGAN: 100%. MATT MCCUSKER: Because they just dropped aliens on us out of nowhere, and everyone was kind of like, “Okay.” JOE ROGAN: Well, it really started around 2017. That’s when it started to become legitimized, because that was when the New York Times printed this article about it. They talked about these pilots and their experiences and these videos that they couldn’t explain, because these crafts had no heat signature and they were flying at ridiculous speeds over the ocean. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I remember them just coming out with it, and then they start doing the UAP thing and all that stuff. They’re like, “Yeah, there are unidentified crafts,” blah, blah, blah. So I’m always kind of like, what are they up to? JOE ROGAN: Yeah, it’s weird. MATT MCCUSKER: What the hell are these guys up to? JOE ROGAN: It’s hard to know what’s real and what’s not real. But when you start talking to pilots and people that have experienced certain things, you just go, “Wow, what is this guy saying?” MATT MCCUSKER: And again, I don’t deny it. I’m always kind of like, “Yeah, he probably did see that stuff.” But it’s like, I don’t know. JOE ROGAN: Why is it classified? MATT MCCUSKER: It’s got to be military. I would imagine it’s military stuff where they’re like, “We want to reverse engineer and use it for our military. If this gets into another military’s hands, blah, blah, blah.” But then they’re all spying on each other, so I would imagine they would know too. JOE ROGAN: Well, the people that I’ve talked to said that Russia and China both have retrieved crash sites. MATT MCCUSKER: Really? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. It’s not just America that has them. Other countries have them too. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. The UFO Hidden in Plain Sight JOE ROGAN: Supposedly this is the big story — there’s one that’s so big that they can’t move it, so they built a building around it. That’s supposed to be in Korea. Supposedly that’s why it’s in Korea. But yeah, this is the lore — that this thing is so big that they couldn’t move it, that they had to put a building around it. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, that’s wild. That’ll be the thing I always think about — if they come out and say, “Yeah, there’s definitely aliens,” what do people do? JOE ROGAN: Yeah, this is the building. Supposedly a giant building in South Korea is often cited as a potential UFO storage facility. You imagine if they just built it the shape of a UFO — that kind of looks like it. MATT MCCUSKER: Kind of looks like it. JOE ROGAN: It’s so crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, do a square building. JOE ROGAN: What’s in that building? MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know. JOE ROGAN: Imagine that’s real. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. What is this? JOE ROGAN: Why. MATT MCCUSKER: Why do they think this? JOE ROGAN: Well, I would imagine that place would have to be heavily guarded. Yeah, there’s just a gate. Who’s that guy? Eric Burleson insisted on the existence of aliens, but admitted he has no definitive proof. Okay. That video I showed you the other day — who said he was going to go look at these places? He was going to go look in Korea. He mentioned he was going to go look at the underground one. He didn’t say where it was. Oh, this is the congressman. A congressman’s claim. Yeah. Scroll down there a little lower. So here it is. A US Congressman has claimed a classified facility housing a UFO is hiding in plain sight. Well, that’s kind of hiding in plain sight. They literally made a little antenna on the top, just like this sport model. Look at this sport model — it has that antenna on the top. I don’t know what to believe, man, but I know I want to believe. 270 feet in diameter. Holy f*. Deep Fakes and the Epstein List MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it’s f*ing insane. Especially now with all the deep fake stuff that’s going to come out. The next election will be in deep fake territory. Everyone will be like, “You were on the Epstein list. You were on it. No, you were.” I’m just— JOE ROGAN: You could have people saying all kinds of things that they’ve never said. MATT MCCUSKER: Or being like, “I didn’t do that.” JOE ROGAN: Hanging out with people they never hung out with. I mean, there were all these photos that were fake of Epstein with a bunch of different people. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, yeah, no, there were completely fake videos people were sharing. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: So I don’t know. By that time, I’ve been trying to just pull back completely from the news. The Colbert-Talarico Controversy JOE ROGAN: Hey, what is the official story of the Colbert show where they had to air that Talarico interview on YouTube? Because I’m hearing two versions. I’m hearing one version is that CBS wouldn’t let them air it because Trump was involved and the government was involved somehow, because they’re worried about this Talarico guy — this very charismatic guy in Texas that I really like, very nice guy. I’m on the show. Brian Simpson told me about him. And then the other thing I’m hearing is no, with FCC equal time rules, if he had Talarico on, he would also have to have Talarico’s opponent, which I think is Jasmine Crockett. Is that true? I didn’t even know whoever his opponent is. So I think there are rules like that for the FCC that don’t exist for podcasts. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, yeah. They have to balance it. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Like if you have this person on that’s running for office, you also have to have someone that is opposing them. MATT MCCUSKER: Okay. JOE ROGAN: They have to have equal time. MATT MCCUSKER: I didn’t know they had that. JOE ROGAN: Is that true? So he was on — was he on Colbert? Whose show was he on? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, Stephen Colbert’s show. JOE ROGAN: Okay. And so they were framing it like the government was censoring this guy because they’re worried they’re going to flip Texas. That’s what he’s saying. I don’t know if that’s true though. So honestly, this sounds like it’s Colbert saying one thing and CBS lawyers saying a different thing. Okay, what are CBS lawyers saying? They’re saying it’s the FCC thing. Colbert says, quote, “They know damn well every word of my script was approved by CBS lawyers who, for the record, approve every script that goes on.” Yeah, but it’s not about the script. It’s about the humans, the people that are on. Yeah, here it is. “The show provided legal guidance that the broadcast could trigger the FCC equal time rule for two other candidates, including Rep. Jasmine Crockett, and presented options for how equal time for other candidates could be fulfilled.” So you would have to have equal time. Colbert scoffed at the statement during Tuesday’s show. “They know damn well every word of my script last night was approved by CBS lawyers who, for the record, approved every script that goes on the air.” Well, that’s just diverting, because that’s not what the subject is. “I got called backstage to get more notes from these lawyers, something that had never ever happened before. They told us the language they wanted me to use to describe that equal time exception. And I used that language,” Colbert said. “So I don’t know what this is about.” He went on to say he wasn’t mad at the network and does not want an adversarial relationship. Well, he’s on his way out anyway. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I thought — I didn’t know he was still doing a show. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, he’s doing it. I think it’s until like April or May or something. “Come on, you’re Paramount. No, no, no, you’re more than that. You’re Paramount Plus,” he cracked. “And for the lawyers to release this statement without even talking to me is really surprising.” The host also noted there’s been a long, very famous exception to the equal time rule, and that exception included talk shows and interviews with politicians. Oh, interesting. So that makes it interesting. “We looked, we couldn’t find one example of this rule being enforced for any talk show interview, not only for my entire career, but for anyone’s late night career going back to the 1960s,” he said. Colbert said that Carr has not gotten rid of that exception for talk show hosts yet. Maybe CBS was worried that this is a rule and that the government could crack down on them, although no one has ever done that in the past. So this is a different kind of government. MATT MCCUSKER: Right. JOE ROGAN: Obviously. A very adversarial relationship — CBS, or at least the Colbert show, already has with Trump. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, well, what are they worried about? Who is Talarico? What party is Talarico? JOE ROGAN: He’s a Democrat. Talarico, Counseling, and Social Work School MATT MCCUSKER: Democrat. JOE ROGAN: And Crockett? MATT MCCUSKER: What’s Crockett? JOE ROGAN: She’s a Democrat as well. MATT MCCUSKER: She’s a Democrat too. What is like, oh, they’re running against each other. JOE ROGAN: Exactly. Exactly. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Okay. Talarico is the white guy. JOE ROGAN: He’s a guy. His story’s very interesting. He was a schoolteacher and his story was that he had this kid that was very troubled in his class, but the kid was receiving counsel and it was starting to get better. Then budgets got cut, and when budgets got cut, they cut off the counseling. And this kid started f*ing off and acting out and really falling apart. And he wound up getting kicked out of school. And it really hurt him because he was like, this kid had real potential and he is a teacher. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And so then he decided to run for office and to try to remedy these problems. MATT MCCUSKER: Got you. So didn’t he just get jammed up with something now? Like, someone claimed they were in his office and that he said something kind of disparaging about a black guy. JOE ROGAN: Talarico. MATT MCCUSKER: He’s a very mild-mannered looking guy, right? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: There was — I don’t know if I’m getting my politicians mixed up, but when people are running against each other, stories start flying. JOE ROGAN: But there was one about another politician. All he said was like, “I didn’t know I was going up against this electrifying black” — I don’t know, whatever word he used. I thought I was going up against a mediocre black guy. Apparently some lady claimed that he called Colin Allred a mediocre black man. MATT MCCUSKER: Faced allegations that he referred to his opponent, Colin Allred, as “a mediocre black man” during a private conversation with an influencer. An influencer? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: A comment Talarico has denied. The allegation caused significant backlash, with Allred calling for supporters to vote for another candidate, Jasmine Crockett. JOE ROGAN: Oh, yeah. So it’s like, yeah, that’s a way to get people to not vote for that guy. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Kind of sucks. JOE ROGAN: An influencer said it. MATT MCCUSKER: An influencer was like, “I worked in his campaign and he said, ‘If I’d known I was going up against this strong black woman, I wouldn’t have — I thought I was running against a mediocre black man.'” And then the guy responded being like, “Nothing about me is mediocre.” They kind of had it out. JOE ROGAN: All you’d have to do is just not say the black part, and he’d be like, “Oh, he’s just talking about a politician. Guy’s mediocre.” Happens to be black, but he’s mediocre. But as soon as you describe him that accurately — MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, you’re just fried. Especially if you’re a Democrat. You cannot be going there. JOE ROGAN: No, he’s a religious guy too, which is interesting, but he also opposes putting the Ten Commandments in schools. MATT MCCUSKER: Okay. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, he said he thinks it’s going to push people away from Christianity. He had a very well-thought-out point about it. We had a really good conversation. MATT MCCUSKER: Also, you don’t need to be in school and be like, “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” It’s like, yeah, dude, they’re not going to your wife. JOE ROGAN: Well, it’s not that. You’re pushing these religious rules on people. It’s one religion. What about people that are Buddhists? What about people that are Muslims? What about people that are Mormons? What about Hindus? You can go down the list forever and ever. Matt’s Time as a School Counselor MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, and it’s also — you can kind of summarize it all up and just be nice. I worked in a high school for a while. I was a counselor. JOE ROGAN: Oh, really? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I went to school for social work for a while. JOE ROGAN: So what kind of counseling would you do? MATT MCCUSKER: Just therapy. It was a really cool setup. It was a charter school and I was there as an intern because I was getting my master’s in social work. They would have interns there as therapists for the school kids, so that the kids could get free therapy at school if they were exhibiting problems or whatever. I worked at an inner city school in Philly. I would just go there and chill in an office, and they would send kids from class. We’d talk a couple times a week. And then you could bring their family in if they had problems at home — you could be like, “All right, let’s call the mom and dad.” JOE ROGAN: This is what Talarico was talking about. This is what he was talking about when they cut funding for. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it’s a shame because this school kind of ran it themselves. I guess they were getting funded by the state, but the way they got around it was just using interns. So it wasn’t like you’re getting the most experienced people in the world, but you’re getting some help, getting something, you know? JOE ROGAN: Well, this kid that he was talking about — he had this very detailed story about this kid who was a good kid, just came from a messed-up house. And the people around him were the only positive influences he had ever had. And he was starting to get better. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And then they took it away and he starts falling apart. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And dude, it’s also like — you forget, because for kids, especially when you’re in a city and kids are telling you about their lives, it’s heartbreaking. Their day-to-day setup — you’re like, “Christ, man.” And they’re looking at you like, “What do I do?” And I’m like, “You’ve got to hang in there.” There’s literally nothing I can tell you to do. You’ve just got to hang in there. JOE ROGAN: Right. MATT MCCUSKER: It was sad, but it was one of my favorite experiences. If I didn’t do stand-up, I would probably do that for a job. I loved it. It was fun. JOE ROGAN: That’s great. It sounds very rewarding, right? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: You’re actually helping people. Social Work School and the Ideological Takeover MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And it’s just intense. You’re sitting there in a room with someone and everything they’re saying — there’s no real guidance. You just have to be like, “All right, well, maybe this, maybe that.” I always liked it a lot. It was pretty cool. But then — it’s so funny. I went to social work school just because I was doing stand-up and kind of kicking around. I was doing the podcast, but it was slow going. And I remember watching Jordan Peterson talking about how crazy the schools are right now. Part of me was curious — I always wanted to be a therapist, but I wondered how bad they really were. And I went to my master’s program in social work, which was ground zero for all the stuff he was talking about. And dude, it was literally worse than he made it out to be. JOE ROGAN: What was it like? MATT MCCUSKER: It was insane, dude. I went to school to be a therapist. Social work lets you become a therapist faster than if you go to school for psychology, because you don’t need any of the science, really. You just study the theory and whatever. So you can be a therapist quicker — it’s kind of a shortcut. But it would be like — you’d be in a room with 13 other people, talking about clinical approaches, and it would just immediately turn into race, gender, who’s the most oppressed. People would tell stories — like, “One time this guy said this to me,” and everyone would be like, “I can’t believe he said that.” And it was literally nothing. You paid 60 grand for this. I would be terrified if I was getting therapy from some of these people. And again, it’s not everybody, but there were a lot of very unhealthy people. People would cry in class. You’d be talking and someone would just burst out in tears going, “I don’t feel safe.” It was insane. And I’m like, “Dude, you’re going to be talking to people who are homeless. How are you going to help them?” JOE ROGAN: Oh, my God. MATT MCCUSKER: And it was almost all female. It was mostly female-dominated — it was me and three or four other guys. And then people would bring their case files in and be like, “Here’s something I’m dealing with. What do you think about this?” I remember this one guy was dealing with a Vietnam vet who had lived in Philly his whole life. And he was like, “I was just shocked by the way he talked about women.” I’m like, “Bro, you’re throwing your client under the bus for these chicks.” It was just kind of weird. I’m like, “Dude, he’s a 70-year-old man. He’s lived in Philly his whole life.” JOE ROGAN: He probably stabbed Charlie in a tunnel somewhere. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And he was just very crude about women. I’m like, “Come on, man. Of course this guy is.” Don’t throw him under the bus — you’re supposed to be helping him. That was my whole point. It was like, if you’re doing therapy with people, life is just so hard and so complex. And if you’re going to let your party politics get in the way, you’ve got to drop that, man, and just meet these people where they’re at. JOE ROGAN: Well, there are so many guys out there that just want brownie points. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s exactly what it was. I was like, “Dude, I know what you’re doing right now.” I couldn’t stand it at all. JOE ROGAN: Those guys are the worst. Social Work School and Academia MATT MCCUSKER: Then they try to kick me out of the school because when Shane got in trouble for SNL, my name popped up in the byline. They had no clue. It was like a double life. I would go to social work school because I just took out loans. I’m like, “We’ll just see what happens. If the podcast works, I’ll just pay off the loans.” JOE ROGAN: You. MATT MCCUSKER: If it doesn’t, I’ll have a degree. And so it had been pretty contentious because my plan was like, “Dude, just go, keep it cool, don’t say anything.” And then you’d be in these classrooms. I remember one time this lady — they’re all young, right out of college — she said, completely unprompted, “I would never personally call the cops on a black person, ever.” And I’m just sitting in the back of the room thinking, no one’s going to say this is the craziest thing? And I’m like, “What if he was beating a woman?” And she was just like… it was just that non-stop. I couldn’t help it. So I would start saying stuff, the room would go into chaos. I literally couldn’t bite my tongue. And then eventually, once that news came out about the podcast, they already kind of had it out for me. They were like, “We got him dead to rights.” So the student council — they didn’t like me at all — they all did a motion to get me kicked out. The dean came in, who actually was nice. I liked her a lot. I had a meeting with her and she was like, “Yeah, these people feel unsafe,” blah, blah, blah. Unsafe? Or they just don’t like what they’re hearing? But I had a meeting with the board basically, which — you ever fantasize about defending yourself in court? I got to do that. We got to debate about whether or not I actually violated the code of ethics. It was kind of a gray area. It was awesome. I recorded it on my phone. JOE ROGAN: Wow. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s like an hour long. I never listened to it again, but I was like, just in case they jam me up. The lady was like, “What would you do if we kicked you out?” And I was like, “Dude, I’ll make the most of that for sure. Like, I wouldn’t want to do it, but I would just see you guys, man. You can’t kick me out. I’m already invested.” And then COVID happened, so they just hushed it all. I just got to finish online class. Yeah, they tried to give me the boot. JOE ROGAN: Did they have a specific thing that they were upset about? Was it your association with Shane? MATT MCCUSKER: It was just that Chinatown clip that came out. They saw us and I’m sure they looked into other stuff, but they were like, “He’s making this place unsafe. We’re not safe here.” JOE ROGAN: Yeah, podcasters and academia. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, it was academia. JOE ROGAN: That does not go together. The Reality of Higher Education MATT MCCUSKER: Also, dude, I thought having a master’s meant I was going to be around geniuses. They’re not that smart. You go to a place of masters and PhDs, half of them don’t even read anything. You talk about a book and they’re like, “I never heard of that.” And then they’d show you Netflix. I’m like, “Bro, I’m paying 60 grand for this and you’re hitting me with a Netflix doc? This is eight bucks a month.” JOE ROGAN: They were showing you Netflix docs in class? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, we watched a Netflix doc in one of the classes — we watched The 13th — and I was like, “I saw this already. What the f*, man?” I remember thinking, damn, everyone was on Peterson’s ass about this. He was totally right. Liberal arts colleges — I couldn’t have thought of a bigger waste of money in terms of bang for buck. What did I actually learn? JOE ROGAN: Well, I remember when we were talking about all the madness going on in schools and people were like, “Why do you care about this? This is happening in college.” I’m like, they’re going to eventually graduate and they’re going to have this ideology, and they’re going to get into corporations, into business. They’re going to carry this with them and try to enforce these crazy rules. MATT MCCUSKER: Or your kid’s having problems and you go to a therapist and they’re just psycho. We would talk about modalities of therapy, and one of them someone floated — and the teacher was like, “Oh yeah, for sure” — it was called something like activism therapy, where you get people politically active in order to motivate them and enrich their lives. And I was like, “You can’t do that. You can’t take a confused, existentially adrift person and be like, this is what you need to do.” JOE ROGAN: Go political. MATT MCCUSKER: I swear to God, dude, there was really creepy stuff going on there, and it was all just complete groupthink. If you said anything outside of what was acceptable, you would get punished. The teachers would try to scold you or brush you off. And I could see why it would just break people, because my heart would be beating — I don’t really like conflict like that. But some of the stuff, you’re like, “I can’t not say anything. This is insane.” JOE ROGAN: Do you ever talk about this on stage? MATT MCCUSKER: No, I’ve never really talked about being in social work school. JOE ROGAN: Oh my God. There’s gold in them dark hills. MATT MCCUSKER: It was fun. At that time, I would leave school and come back to the podcast like, “Bro, you won’t believe what the f* these people are saying.” JOE ROGAN: Did you say it on the podcast? Oh, that’s awesome. It just seems like a great gold mine for standup. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Because you have a very unique experience as a window into how crazy people are in school. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, it was terrifying, man. And then the weirdest part is, after years went by, they were like, “Do you want to get your PhD here?” I was like, no. JOE ROGAN: After COVID, after all that? MATT MCCUSKER: After all of it. They just wanted my money. That’s what I saw. I was like, “Man, get the hell out of here.” JOE ROGAN: It would be nice to be calling yourself Dr. Matt, though, bro. MATT MCCUSKER: Don’t think I didn’t think about it. JOE ROGAN: Come on, dog. MATT MCCUSKER: Come on, dog. JOE ROGAN: That just shows you how many kooky doctors there are out there. MATT MCCUSKER: That really opened my eyes. I thought doctors were the smartest people in the world, and then I went to higher education and I’m like, “This is f*ing insane.” JOE ROGAN: Yeah, anyone can. MATT MCCUSKER: You could be a doctor, dude. Anyone could be. JOE ROGAN: F*ing doctor, especially on some subjects. MATT MCCUSKER: Exactly. Not hard sciences — if you want to be a doctor in, like, anthropology or whatever, yeah, no problem, dude. JOE ROGAN: No. MATT MCCUSKER: And they can’t say anything. You can make up your thesis on anything and be like, “Excuse me.” Fake Academic Papers and Critical Theory JOE ROGAN: Did you ever see what Peter Boghossian, James Lindsay, and Helen Pluckrose did? MATT MCCUSKER: No. JOE ROGAN: They made these fake academic papers. There was one about heteronormativity in dog parks — talking about gay experiences with dogs — and it was a peer-reviewed paper. Fat bodybuilding was another one. And these papers were celebrated, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: That tracks 100%. When you get into critical race theory and all that stuff, you’re like… I remember saying this — it reminded me of when I was outside of Walmart and someone handed me a pamphlet of white supremacy literature. When you read that stuff, you read the first two sentences and go, “Okay, that sounds legit.” And then there’s this huge quantum leap in reasoning and you’re like, “Whoa, how the f* did we get here?” A lot of that critical theory stuff is very similar. It’ll start with something no one can disagree with, and then it jumps real quick and — JOE ROGAN: Just complete groupthink. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And that was scary, because these people are going to be therapists working with kids, older people, and it’s like — how are these the people supposedly guiding people through life, taking people who are lost or suffering? The animus against a person who thought differently was palpable and very severe. And the funniest part was, I was working in that high school in the inner city — the school was like 97% black, the rest Latino. And they were like, “How would your students feel about your podcast material?” I’m like, “They don’t give a f*. They would laugh. They have bigger fish to fry. They’re high schoolers in Philly fighting for their lives.” That was the big disconnect. And they would even teach you — this would crack me up — they would tell you that if you had a client who was black and you’re a white guy, you should lead by saying, “How do you feel about the fact that I’m white and you’re black?” I was like, “Dude, you guys realize you’re in a classroom studying how to talk to a black person? That’s f*ing weird. Just talk to the man. If that comes up, you can tackle it. But you’re uncomfortable, and then you’re going, ‘So, black person, how do you feel that I’m white?'” And they would push back against me. I’m like, “No, no, you guys can’t do that. That’s crazy.” JOE ROGAN: Well, you were actually applying it in the real world. They were just hanging out in these circle jerks. MATT MCCUSKER: Exactly. And a lot of them would be like, “I’m all about social justice,” blah, blah, blah. And where’s your field placement — your internship? “Oh, I’m out in the Main Line,” like a really nice area in Philly. “I’m doing a high school in the Main Line.” Okay, dude. Take that act somewhere else. Those kids don’t want to hear any of this. And if race comes up, I would talk to them. But to take a black 8th grader and say, “I’m white. How do you feel about that?” That would be so creepy weird. JOE ROGAN: Isn’t it crazy that they think you’re obligated to bring that up? That you have an obligation to discuss it? Therapy, Free Will, and Determinism MATT MCCUSKER: It’s like, they f*ing know they can see me. I’m clearly white. They know I’m white. And it’s like, exactly. It’s like, and if that. You talk, talk, talk, talk. And then you can, like, bring it up because it’s a thing, but it’s like, leading with that. JOE ROGAN: I always feel like least of their problems. MATT MCCUSKER: Exactly. JOE ROGAN: They’re just probably happy someone takes an interest in them and is kind to them. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude. And that was a big thing too, because they’d be like, I’m fing talking to this guy. So, like, whatever. And I would just chill and be like, you can just do your homework. And then you just start helping them with their homework, like, “What are you doing?” And then you eventually build rapport. But it was just like, you know, I’m like, these are the teachers telling you this? And you’re like, f, dude. You guys are guiding people into this. Dude, I walked away from that being like, “God damn.” JOE ROGAN: Well, there are a lot of people that think that a lot of psychology and a lot of therapy is just complete horseshit. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And the argument about therapy being complete horseshit, in terms of the academic study of it and applying it to people, is that very few people get better. I think it does help a lot of people, though. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And I think it really helps a lot of people if they’re in a really bad place. I think some people just want to talk to somebody. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And that can help too. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: But it’s like, what can you actually do for them in terms of the tools and the techniques of therapy versus just being a human and talking to a human, seeing their side of things, trying to tell them your perspective, trying to give them a rational point of view, and giving them some things to work on? It’s not a science. MATT MCCUSKER: Not at all. JOE ROGAN: And it varies so much between individuals. MATT MCCUSKER: Well, yeah, there’s the individuals, then there are 40 million modalities of therapy. So it’s like, you could be doing CBT, which is supposedly the most scientific, where there’s a system, it’s kind of rigorous. You can have Jungian stuff where you’re like, “Let’s draw a mandala based on your dreams.” Or you can just be like, “Let me just be nice to this person who’s never had anyone be nice to them,” and then let them kind of open up. Yeah, it’s… I think they did a study one time where they took people who weren’t trained therapists and let them be therapists, and they didn’t find a giant difference in terms of who was getting what result. But it is a skill, though. That’s the other thing. It’s a skill. It’s a horror job. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: But I think you’re totally right where it all depends on the person. Is the therapist in touch with what’s going on with them? JOE ROGAN: Right. MATT MCCUSKER: Because it’s such a crapshoot. I think it can be beneficial, but being stuck in it your whole life — I don’t know about that. Because it just becomes a thing where you start performing. JOE ROGAN: Well, a lot of people feel like you have to be in therapy, and everybody should be in therapy. MATT MCCUSKER: I’m like, yeah, I don’t know. I remember I didn’t do it ever. And then when I went to school for therapy, they’re like, “You’ve got to go to therapy so that you can know what it’s like.” Fair enough. And I genuinely walked in there being like, “I’m about to blow this lady’s mind. She’s going to be like, ‘I’ve never met a guy so put together.'” And then I went in there and she kind of picked me apart. And I was like, “I’m kind of messed up. I didn’t know that.” JOE ROGAN: That’s funny. MATT MCCUSKER: But I for real was like, “This lady is about to be blown away.” I thought I was a chosen one. It was good though, because the one thing therapy can do is, if you’re in a family system and you have no other available world views, you’re locked in that. So a therapist can be somebody outside of a system you would never otherwise have access to, who can let you run things through your head in a way you would never think of. That I think is good. But then at a certain point, I feel like you should get in, get out. Like, “All right, here are some things.” There’s acceptance and commitment therapy — that’s good. They teach you how to be mindful, how to monitor your thoughts without having them completely take over. There are skills you can learn. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: But dude, the money of it is crazy. That’s the other thing. It’s so expensive. JOE ROGAN: Right. And does insurance pay for it for most people? MATT MCCUSKER: It depends. It’ll cover it for some. You have to get a therapist in that network, and then they have to diagnose you. If you want your insurance to cover you, that therapist has to diagnose you with a mental disorder or some sort of mental condition. JOE ROGAN: Do they have to prescribe something for you? MATT MCCUSKER: They don’t have to prescribe, no. But they do have to give you a diagnosis, like, “You’re bipolar.” Adjustment disorder is one where it’s like… JOE ROGAN: But with psychiatrists, I wonder how many of them are just incentivized to put you on something. MATT MCCUSKER: Probably a ton. They’re just like doctors. JOE ROGAN: Right? MATT MCCUSKER: And then some of them just swear by it. They’re like, “Just take this, take that, take this.” JOE ROGAN: Yeah. I have a friend who went to a psychiatrist, and he said that immediately, like, first meeting, this guy was trying to put him on antidepressants. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And he’s like, “Well, I don’t think I need that. I’m not that messed up. I’m just not happy.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: I’m sad. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s also crazy that it’s the first meeting, because it’s like, “Let’s see what your life’s about.” JOE ROGAN: No, he’s like, “Let’s get you on this, and it’ll make you feel better. We’ll work from there.” MATT MCCUSKER: Well, some of those guys are, like, ruthless materialists, where you’re like, “Yeah, your brain’s just messed up, dude.” Did you ever see the Sapolsky guy? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Robert Sapolsky. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I think he’s great. I loved his lectures. But his last book — and again, this was from him promoting it, I didn’t read it — his argument was like, “Yeah, we just all have different brains. And if you’re a home invader or a burglar, it’s just your genes. We should never punish anybody. We should just keep people aside and rehabilitate.” Basically saying you have no choice over what you do at all. Free will is a complete illusion. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, the determinism argument. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Free Will vs. Determinism JOE ROGAN: I don’t know about that argument. I mean, obviously free will is real, but obviously you are affected by your genes, your life circumstances, your past behavior, all the experiences that you’ve had. There are a lot of factors. But to say that will doesn’t mean anything — well, then why is inspiration so important? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Why do people love inspiration? Why do people love a good pep talk? Why do people love a good motivational video that gets you out of the house? Obviously, there’s will involved. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And will is the thing that turns Jelly Roll at 500 pounds into Jelly Roll at 200 pounds. That’s what will does. That’s a real thing, man. That’s not a fake thing. This idea of free will — it’s not determinism that led Jelly Roll to decide to start walking. That was hardcore will. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. No, I agree. That argument always bothers me because it’s like, okay, you’re taking the idea of will and just switching it with this nebulous… like, what? There’s some isotope in your brain that gets switched on and then you’re able to act? To me, it’s just a weird point to try to push across. “There was no free will. It’s just your genes activate and then you do the thing.” And it’s like, I guess, man. But then you can apparently change your genes by acting a certain way. So I just never like that stuff, man. JOE ROGAN: It’s a weird argument, but there’s validity to both perspectives. There’s validity to the perspective that free will is a real thing. But also, determinism is a giant factor in how many people live their lives the way they live them. If you’re in a terrible, gang-ridden community, you get beaten in your house, your mom’s on crack, there’s chaos everywhere — the idea that you’re going to come out of this writing vegan poetry is insane. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s true. JOE ROGAN: That’s insane. You’re a product of your environment, at least to a certain extent. And usually someone finds something that they love that gives them an outlet, and then they get out of there. MATT MCCUSKER: The problem with the determinism stuff for me is — I get it. It’s like, yeah, if you have a horrible upbringing, you can end up doing horrible things. I get it. Like, if I had been raised differently, maybe I could do that. And he’s like, “Maybe we should treat everyone a lot more kindly and not punish people.” And it’s like, I’m on board with that. It all stops for me at pedophiles. Like, what? We’re supposed to just feel sorry for a pedophile? Part of me is like, we should probably fry those guys. JOE ROGAN: Well, that’s one of the craziest things about what’s going on in academia. They’re starting to call them “minor attracted persons.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: So there are legitimate academics describing pedophiles as “minor attracted persons” and saying that it doesn’t mean they’re evil. It’s like, what? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I know. And that’s the problem. JOE ROGAN: Okay, you have kids. I don’t know anybody who has kids who has that perspective. If you did, you’d have to be sick. Like, to think, “Oh, it’s just a minor attracted person near my kid.” Like, what? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, well, that’s the whole thing too. It’s like, “We’re all just bags of genes, this material goo that just does things sometimes.” It’s like, all right, well, let me squash this pedophile then. But it’s like, right, it’s okay to— JOE ROGAN: Abort a child, but it’s not okay to kill a pedophile. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. JOE ROGAN: Explain. Help me. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, that’s where all that determinism stuff — “We should just be kind and have a more rational approach to criminal justice” — it’s like, for sure. And then it gets to pedophiles, and it’s like, yeah, you can’t. JOE ROGAN: Pedophiles, serial killers. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Toxoplasmosis and Cat Parasites JOE ROGAN: There’s a lot of rapists. There’s a lot of different people you could throw into that. One of the interesting things about Sapolsky is he did some crazy work on toxoplasmosis. That’s how I really got into him. MATT MCCUSKER: Really? Yeah. JOE ROGAN: He was the guy that we first started reading about that was saying that a disproportionate amount of motorcycle victims — when he was doing his residency, the guy who he was working with, one of the surgeons, would test the motorcycle victims for toxoplasmosis, and he said a giant percentage of them have this cat parasite. MATT MCCUSKER: Oh, yeah, I’ve heard about this. JOE ROGAN: Cat parasite alters behavior. It makes you more reckless. It makes you more prone to erratic mood swings. It makes you more aggressive. It’s interesting. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Disproportionate amount of successful soccer teams have high levels of toxoplasmosis. Countries with higher toxoplasmosis — it could also be that countries with higher toxoplasmosis don’t have any money. It’s easier to get a soccer ball. People get good at soccer. It’s the way out of bad neighborhoods. But the motorcycle victim thing is nuts because we know it affects human behavior, and we also know that it affects animal behavior. It makes cats — it grows inside cats’ guts. It’s the only way that it reproduces. So what it does is it rewires the sexual reward system of rodents. Mice and rats get turned on by the smell of cat piss. So they go to seek out cat piss with, like, a boner, literally. And they lose all their fear of cats so that the cats devour them. And so when the cats devour them, then that parasite is now inside the cat’s gut, which is where it reproduces. So that’s why they tell pregnant women you should never touch cat litter. MATT MCCUSKER: Really? JOE ROGAN: Yeah, it’s toxoplasmosis. MATT MCCUSKER: And they think it does the same thing in humans, where it just makes you kind of amplify your drives? JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. You know what else is nuts, too? Because you were saying that’s more in certain countries that are developing. JOE ROGAN: Well, it’s in rural areas. Any places where people have outdoor cats. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: But there was one point where in France, it was like 50% of the people had toxo. MATT MCCUSKER: Jesus Christ. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. Because there were wild cats everywhere. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And you’ve got to think — cats are on your countertop. Their sh is on their paws. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s the one thing — I have dogs. Cats are fine. If I see a cat, I’ll pet it. But when I see people’s cats on their countertop, and I don’t get squeamish easily, I’m just kind of like, “Ew, dude. It’s kind of gross.” JOE ROGAN: Well, they sh in a box, paw around in that box of sh and piss, and then they hop on your couch. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Sh and piss on their paws. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: Dogs go outside, they take a sh, they come inside, they’re good. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: So your dog doesn’t rub his asshole on your dinner plates. You’re probably okay. But I’ve had cats walk on your plates. They don’t give a sh. They’ll take a seat on your plate. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: You’re like, “I have to get a new plate now. You f*. What are you doing? Get off of that.” MATT MCCUSKER: They’re funny, but every time I see them get out of the litter box and walk across people’s countertops, I’m like, “Dude.” JOE ROGAN: I’ve always had them, though. Well, I don’t have them now because my kids are allergic, but when I was younger, I had them. And they are fun. I like them. They’re fun pets. They’re cool, they’re cute. They come over to you and purr. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: But it is weird that you have a box of sh in your house. And there are a lot of people — like, they’re lazy — and you go over to their house and they have a cat and they’re not cleaning that litter box enough. And as soon as you walk in, the waft of piss hits you. Like, “Bro, you’re just smelling this all day?” So bad. The Stray Cat Eye Infection Story MATT MCCUSKER: I would need an outdoor cat. I used to let stray cats come in my house. After college, I lived in a house by myself in Philly. It was a small house. A lot of the houses on the street had been knocked down. So there were only, like, row homes, but I had a standalone row home. There was a lady across the street with a standalone row home. They just knocked all the houses next to us down. And I would let the stray cat into my house. Like, “You can come stay in here.” But I’d be like, “This thing can’t get in my bed.” And by like three days, that thing was curled up next to my face. I got an eye infection. It was called epidemic keratoconjunctivitis. JOE ROGAN: It’s called “in your eye.” MATT MCCUSKER: Literally. The eye doctor said, “I have only seen this in third world countries.” And dude, for six months afterwards, after it got cleared up — they had to shut the whole eye practice down and clean it afterwards. My eye at 10 o’clock would start to droop. JOE ROGAN: Whoa. MATT MCCUSKER: Because the white blood cells would rush to my eye. So for six months after this thing finally cleared up — because it was viral, they said there’s nothing you can do for it — I would go out and my eye would just start drooping. I’d be like, “I’ve got to go home.” It was like an alarm. I would feel like I had f*ing sand in my eye. JOE ROGAN: “Highly contagious severe eye infection caused by adenovirus, typically Types A8, 19, and 37. Causes rapid onset of red, painful, watery eyes, often with light sensitivity, blurred vision, and swollen eyelids.” Whoa, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: I would wake up in the morning and my eyelid was stuck together. I’d have to pull it open. And then I saw the movie Ray — remember the beginning of Ray when his eyes get all globbed up? I was like, “Dude, am I going blind? This would suck.” JOE ROGAN: That would suck if you went blind from a cat. MATT MCCUSKER: Dude, bro. Yeah. Shingles, Staph, and MRSA JOE ROGAN: A friend of mine has shingles on his face. It’s crazy. His whole face is all swollen up and he’s worried he might go blind. MATT MCCUSKER: He has it now? JOE ROGAN: Yeah, he just got it. He’s an older guy. MATT MCCUSKER: What is shingles? Like, when you don’t get chickenpox and it comes and gets you afterwards? JOE ROGAN: I don’t think so. I think it’s a form of the herpes virus that affects older people in particular. Older people are terrified of it. They get shingles vaccinations. Is that what it is? I thought chickenpox was herpes too. Oh, really? MATT MCCUSKER: I always heard that if you don’t get chickenpox as a kid, you might get shingles as an adult. My uncle got shingles and it sucked. JOE ROGAN: “Known as herpes zoster, a viral infection that causes a painful rash. It stems from the reactivation of the varicella-zoster virus, the same one responsible for chickenpox, which lies dormant in nerve tissues after the initial infection. After chickenpox resolves, the virus remains inactive in the body’s nerve cells. Factors like aging, weakened immunity, or stress can trigger reactivation, leading to shingles, most commonly in adults over 50.” MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: My friend is in his 60s. MATT MCCUSKER: That sucks, dude. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, that’s rough. A lot of older people are scared of shingles. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I remember my uncle got it and he was — JOE ROGAN: “Is the shingles vaccine effective? Does it prevent shingles? Is that one of the legit ones?” This says vaccines like Shingrix reduce risk significantly. Antiviral drugs shorten outbreaks if started early. You’ve got to get on it right when you see the first bump. MATT MCCUSKER: Somebody I know — their kids got MRSA from swimming. Dude, it was scary. We got the pictures. It was just like a bubble. It looked crazy. JOE ROGAN: MRSA is terrifying. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: That’s all from people taking antibiotics — or staph. MATT MCCUSKER: Staph. Yeah. JOE ROGAN: MRSA is the more dangerous one because MRSA is medicine-resistant. MATT MCCUSKER: So this was just staph. It was like a giant bubble on their hand. It looked crazy. JOE ROGAN: I bet. Staph. MATT MCCUSKER: Did you really? I’ve had it a couple of times. Gordon Ryan and the Dangers of Staph in Jiu-Jitsu JOE ROGAN: Yeah, I got it from Jiu-Jitsu. A lot of people get it. It’s real common. A lot of people get it and they don’t even realize they have it until it’s too late. Ari had it and he didn’t even know he had it. We were playing pool once and he was limping. He was walking around and I said, “Why are you limping?” And he said, “I got a spider bite.” And he was doing Jiu-Jitsu — I bought him a year of Jiu-Jitsu for Christmas. I forced him to celebrate Christmas. I didn’t say it’s Hanukkah. But I said, “Let me see.” And he rolls his pants up, and I see this bubble on his knee with a pus center. And I said, “We’re going to the hospital right now.” He said, “Are you serious?” And I unscrewed my cue and said, “You have to go to the hospital right now. That’s a staph infection.” And he was like, “Why don’t they tell us about this? Why aren’t there signs at the gym warning you?” That’s a good point. You kind of have to hear about it from somebody. I found out about it from my friend Tate. Shout out to Tate Fletcher, my homie. We were at the airport once and I had shorts on, and I had my foot sitting up. He said, “What’s on your calf?” I had little pimples on my calf. I said, “Oh, nothing.” And he said, “Dude, I think that’s staph.” I said, “What? These are little zits. You think that’s staph?” And he said, “Yeah, you should go get that checked out.” And I went to the doctor, and he said, “Yeah, that looks like staph. I’m going to put you on antibiotics right away. We’re going to swab it and send it in, but I don’t want to wait.” And I got on it right away and killed it quick. But the antibiotics — dude, you feel so weird. You’re just so tired. MATT MCCUSKER: I hate taking them. JOE ROGAN: Some guys fight on them. I know guys that have got staph infections in the UFC, fought off the staph infection with antibiotics, and then fought on the antibiotics, which is crazy. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: I don’t know how you’d have any endurance on antibiotics. MATT MCCUSKER: No. They mess my stomach up so bad. JOE ROGAN: Oh, yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: My stomach’s just fried. JOE ROGAN: Well, my friend Gordon Ryan — that’s his belt up there — he’s the greatest Jiu-Jitsu grappler of all time. He has to retire because he got staph so many times that he was taking antibiotics so often that it nuked his gut bacteria. He can’t hold food down. He throws up all the time. MATT MCCUSKER: That sucks. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, it’s crazy. He’s been dealing with it for years, and he just announced on Instagram, really recently, that he has to retire. He can’t train. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s f*ing blowing. JOE ROGAN: And he’s the greatest of all time. MATT MCCUSKER: And he’s done. JOE ROGAN: He’s 30. Yeah, that sucks. Unanimously regarded as the greatest grappler of all time, and he’s gone. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s it. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. He’s gone 10 years undefeated, beating the best fighters in the world. Gluten, Eczema, and Health Struggles MATT MCCUSKER: Time off. Can he just take, like, five years? JOE ROGAN: He’s trying. He’s done that. He hasn’t competed in a couple of years. He can’t do it. He can’t train. MATT MCCUSKER: That sucks. JOE ROGAN: It keeps coming back, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: I had eczema one time, and it came up on my legs, and it was on my dick, and I thought it was ringworm because it was like a perfect circle. So I go to urgent care, and I’m like, “Yeah, I got ringworm.” And they’re like, “That’s weird. Usually doesn’t go on there.” But they’re like, just put Lotrimin on it. JOE ROGAN: I’m a sil. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, like Lotrimin. So I put Lotrimin on my dick, and it just dried the whole thing out. It was disgusting. So then I had to go back to another urgent care, and it was like the second or third time, I just show, like, a shriveled, flaccid, chapped red penis. I showed this one nurse who calls in another nurse, and I’m like, “F*.” She comes in, goes, “I don’t know what that is.” They call in someone else. Third nurse — giant black guy comes in. JOE ROGAN: No, no, no, no. He’s going to laugh as soon as he leaves, bro. MATT MCCUSKER: He was probably. Yeah, it was bad. And then finally I went to a dermatologist. Dude, you can look it up — Center City Dermatology, run by just like a babe. It’s on the website. Everyone who’s ever gone there knows this. My friend, I was talking about it one time, and I was like, “Bro, I know exactly who you’re talking about.” She comes in, checks it out, and she’s like, “Dude, that wasn’t even ringworm.” And then she gave me this cream and it cleared it right up. So I just show, like, my chapped — it was like leprosy, bro. JOE ROGAN: Whoa. Yeah, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: She saw me at my worst. JOE ROGAN: Hilarious. MATT MCCUSKER: So I had to show it to like four people. It was like a leprosy penis. And then eventually she was like, “Oh, no, dude, take like a quarter corticosteroid.” Cleared it right up. JOE ROGAN: I know people that have had eczema that went on a carnivore diet and it went away. MATT MCCUSKER: I can’t have gluten. That’s the thing. I’ve been allergic to gluten for a while, and if I kind of backslide on that, I’ll get little eczema flare-ups. Gluten Intolerance and Glyphosate JOE ROGAN: A lot of people are allergic to it, and a lot of people don’t think it’s actually the gluten. They think it’s actually how they finish the crops with glyphosate. MATT MCCUSKER: I’ve heard about that. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, it kind of makes sense. Like, why are all these people gluten intolerant? Nobody heard about that in the 70s. There was no one gluten intolerant. MATT MCCUSKER: No, it was weird. The weird thing is my mom — she’s always been a health person. She had health problems, and my aunt, who was a nurse, gave her this book. My mom self-diagnosed a gluten allergy in like the 80s, and everyone was like, “You’re out of your mind. Nobody has this.” And then when I was in college, I was like, “Dude, every time I swallow food, it feels stuck in my throat. I have gas, I’m burping, my stomach’s upset, I’m not sleeping, I’m having racing thoughts.” And she was like, “Oh, try not eating gluten for a while.” Dude, it cleared it up big time. It was insane. JOE ROGAN: I wonder if that’s the same with gluten that you get in Europe, where they’re not using any glyphosate. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s what I heard. Apparently you can go eat it in Europe and it’s fine. I remember I took a test finally — one of those internet blood tests — and I came up allergic to not even the gluten. It’s like gliadin, which is like another protein inside of wheat. I don’t know if it’s the same thing or what. It’s just like an allergy to it. I showed it to Shane. It was moderate. And he goes, “Moderate?” JOE ROGAN: Have a pizza. MATT MCCUSKER: I was like, “Why did I show you?” Everyone’s like, “It’s fake. It’s in your head. You’re full of it.” So I finally have proof, and I’m like, “What are you going to do about it now?” He goes, “Moderate pussy.” JOE ROGAN: It’s one of the worst intolerances to have because the food is so delicious. Like, think about it — spaghetti, lasagna, bread, sandwiches. MATT MCCUSKER: And eating the gluten-free bread is just not it. At that point you just go, “I’m not eating bread.” It’s not really good. In order to make it good, you have to put so much stuff in it that you’re like, “I might as well not eat it.” I’ve been off gluten since I was like 21. JOE ROGAN: Wow. MATT MCCUSKER: And then anytime I would backslide at a restaurant where they cook with it, it would mess me up. Weirdly enough, though, if I get enough sunlight, I can tolerate a lot more stuff. JOE ROGAN: I guarantee that’s a vitamin D thing. MATT MCCUSKER: I don’t know. It’s weird, man. Every time I go to a doctor, they’re just like, “Bro, I don’t know what to tell you.” JOE ROGAN: Well, vitamin D is good for your immune system, and these are autoimmune issues. It makes sense that they would kind of be connected somehow or another. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Because after the gluten, I couldn’t eat dairy either. And then every time I’d get sunlight, I could eat the dairy. It’s f*ing weird. Sunlight, the Food Pyramid, and RFK Jr. JOE ROGAN: How nuts is the sunlight thing? For so long people were saying, “Stay out of the sun. The sun’s going to kill you.” And now they’re going, “No, no, no. You need to get in the sun or you’re going to die.” MATT MCCUSKER: I know. What’s the new food pyramid now? JOE ROGAN: A lot of people are so angry at RFK Jr. for flipping the food pyramid. But there’s so much evidence that this is the accurate way to eat. This is the way people are supposed to be eating — whole foods, actual food, vegetables, meat, fish. That’s what you’re supposed to eat. Actual food that people have been eating for thousands of years. That’s how you’re supposed to eat, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s the stuff. The backlash against them that I’m like, “I don’t get it, man.” It’s like getting the weird stuff out of foods — stuff they don’t even have in Europe — for schools and stuff. JOE ROGAN: And it’s like, that was always the left wing’s position. It was like, “No preservatives, no additives, natural foods.” MATT MCCUSKER: I know. And that’s the thing too. Because I have all these food allergies, I have to go to, like, a hipster, rainbow flag restaurant. That’s the only place I can eat. So I’m like, “I know you guys like this. Why are you pretending not to like getting rid of Red 40 and all that?” JOE ROGAN: Because it’s connected with Trump. Because RFK Jr. is a part of this administration, and so it became a political thing. People are just so silly. They’d rather commit suicide. They’d rather poison themselves than admit that he’s right. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s insane. Just like, dude, just give him one and be like, “All right, that’s actually a good one.” JOE ROGAN: But it’s that resistance to recognizing — maybe this person that I don’t agree with, because he’s connected to this other person I don’t agree with, maybe he’s got some good points. Maybe if someone that I aligned with ideologically had the same points, I would be like, “Yes, thank you. Yes, these preservatives are terrible. Yes, these dyes are terrible. Yes, this is bad for you. Yes, you should have warning labels. Yes, other countries have banned these products. Why do we have them?” Yes, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: And especially if you have kids, it’s like, dude, you worry more about that than your kids eating a bunch of crazy stuff. JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s just weird. Let it go. You can be like, “All right, I don’t like this, but that’s right. I like that. Let’s let them cook on that.” Science, Groupthink, and Pharmaceutical Corruption JOE ROGAN: So many people that don’t have religion in their life worship science. They treat it as if it’s a doctrine and a dogma, and if you don’t support it, you’re a heretic. There’s something wrong with you. It’s like, well, do you know these scientists? A lot of them are severely compromised. They’re compromised by financial incentives, they’re compromised by academic incentives. They’re trapped in these systems where you’re forced to have groupthink. You have this top-down control. The people at the top are controlled and connected to these pharmaceutical drug companies. They’re pushing these ideas — this isn’t all clean. MATT MCCUSKER: They’re hanging with Epstein too. And I know you love scientists, man. Thank God I wasn’t a scientist. JOE ROGAN: So weird. MATT MCCUSKER: So f*ing creepy. Yeah. And the science thing — I do know this from going to grad school — you need to understand statistics. You need a very serious understanding of statistics to actually make sense of those studies. I was never able to do that. But it’s like you can read those studies and go, “Oh, look at this graph, everything’s going up.” And it’s like, “Yeah, but what was the percentage?” Statistics is, for real, like magic to me. It’s so slippery and weird. You can make one thing look this way, and then arrange the data differently and you’re like, “Oh, the thing went up and now this is better.” JOE ROGAN: That’s what pharmaceutical drug companies do for sure. They’ll run multiple studies and then throw out all the ones that show no efficacy, and even hide dangerous side effects. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, I think they’re allowed to do as many studies as it takes to basically show what they want to say — which wasn’t even good. It was like 50%. I remember reading a book on antidepressants years and years ago. JOE ROGAN: We had a lawyer in here who had worked on cases with pharmaceutical drug companies. One of the things he said that was really crazy was that he found out pharmaceutical drug companies, when their papers get peer reviewed, don’t have to give the actual data to the scientists. They give their review of the data to the scientists, and then it gets peer reviewed. MATT MCCUSKER: Damn. Yeah, it’s like rigged. JOE ROGAN: So rigged. MATT MCCUSKER: Remember the study that was like, “If you drink one glass of wine, you’re going to be healthy?” JOE ROGAN: Yeah. MATT MCCUSKER: That was complete bullshit. That was made by a body of science that was promoted by the big alcohol companies. It was completely false. I know so many people who were like, “Dude, it’s good for me. I need alcohol every day.” JOE ROGAN: They were also saying resveratrol. That was one. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. And it’s like, just eat a grape then. JOE ROGAN: Well, also take resveratrol as a supplement. The amount you get in supplements far exceeds a glass of wine. You’d have to drink the whole bottle. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: And then you’re hammered and your liver is destroyed. MATT MCCUSKER: That stuff always threw me off. And I remember at the time being like, “There’s no f*ing way that’s true.” JOE ROGAN: Yeah, no. MATT MCCUSKER: You hang out more and you’re less lonely. Wrapping Up JOE ROGAN: I think there’s something to the relaxation of alcohol that at least it makes you feel better. And I think feeling better is a part of having a better life and a healthier mind. Because there’s something about people that are just riddled with anxiety and thinking about things all the time. There’s a lot of people out there that just don’t have the tools to navigate this f*ed up world, and so they’re always a little drinky poo every now and then. Maybe not bad for them. Maybe a little just it juice. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, true. If you drop the cortisol at night JOE ROGAN: a little bit, a little relaxation. There’s a lot of people that, like, one of the only things keeping them hanging on is a drink at night. Just a little drink, nothing crazy. Not killing yourself. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I wouldn’t want to take that from somebody either. JOE ROGAN: Yeah, I don’t want to take that from people. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s true. I wouldn’t want to take that. But it is just nuts to be like, “This is actually really good for you.” It’s like, well, it’s the lesser of two evils for sure. JOE ROGAN: Or what they tried to say, that Fruit Loops were healthier for you than ground beef. Wasn’t that one of the studies? They had comparisons, like a chart where things fit on the healthy versus not healthy scale. MATT MCCUSKER: Was it really? That’s f*ing insane. Well, the old food pyramid was the best. It was like cereal, bread, and pasta. That was what you were supposed to eat as your base. JOE ROGAN: Most of your food, you were supposed to MATT MCCUSKER: be charged on just elbow macaroni. That was for real growing up. That’s what it was. I remember. JOE ROGAN: Meanwhile, people in France, they’re eating loaves of bread and they don’t get fat. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. JOE ROGAN: And they’re healthy. MATT MCCUSKER: I know. It is weird. JOE ROGAN: We’re getting poisoned. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Everyone who comes here from another country is like, “I feel horrible.” JOE ROGAN: They have a hot dog and they’re vomiting in the trash can. All right, let’s wrap this up. MATT MCCUSKER: All right. Wexner’s Deposition JOE ROGAN: One more thing. Wexner’s deposition from the oversight committee came out — the full video dropped today. And there’s this clip going around. I don’t know what the context is. I’ll show you, it’s on the screen right now. It says, “I’ll kill you if you answer another question with more than five words.” MATT MCCUSKER: Okay. JOE ROGAN: He seems like he’s joking. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: But he wants him to answer questions with very short answers. I keep seeing people saying you’re not allowed to be coached in a deposition. That makes sense. “I’ll kill you if you answer another question with more than five words.” That’s hilarious that he thought he could whisper that. MATT MCCUSKER: That’s crazy. That’s so f*ed up. JOE ROGAN: What is their relationship like? They’re around like that? MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. JOE ROGAN: It’s hard to say what that is. MATT MCCUSKER: That almost was kind of charming. That was kind of sweet, actually, in some weird way. JOE ROGAN: His answers in this are pretty tough already. I can see he’s like, “I had no idea.” They’re like, “You’re stealing money from every apartment.” ABC reported this five years ago. And he’s like, “That’s news to me.” He didn’t know that Epstein was stealing money — that’s what he’s saying in some of these clips. We’ll see where this goes. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah, true. JOE ROGAN: If nothing ever happens, people are going to lose all faith in everything. If Prince Andrew is the only one who goes down — what if he just gets a slap on the wrist? MATT MCCUSKER: He’s completely going to get a slap on the wrist. He’s not going to maximum security. He’s not going to be in there like Oz, doing burpees. He’s going to be in protective custody. JOE ROGAN: He’s only in jail for 11 hours — he’s technically out now. But he’s going to be tried, right? We’ll see. The thing is, I never thought he’d be arrested. I never thought that was going to happen. I thought they’d strip him of his princehood or whatever it is. That’s it. Banish him. And then they kicked him out of the estate. I was like, whoa, things are getting serious. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. I think they saw — I think they JOE ROGAN: must have seen the stuff, bro. They must have. MATT MCCUSKER: Yeah. Signing Off JOE ROGAN: All right, let’s wrap this up. It’s been a lot of fun. It’s been good times, dude. MATT MCCUSKER: It’s been awesome, dude. JOE ROGAN: It’s fun watching your act grow too. It’s really funny, man. MATT MCCUSKER: Thank you. JOE ROGAN: Really great. And where are you this weekend? MATT MCCUSKER: Salt Lake City and Boise, Idaho. JOE ROGAN: Go get some tickets, folks. Go see him — Matt McCusker. Hilarious. MATT MCCUSKER: Appreciate you, brother. Thank you. JOE ROGAN: Great stuff. Funny. Bye, everybody. Related Posts

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