How to fail at almost everything review
How to Fail at Almost Everything with Scott Adams
Timecodes:
the Dilbert principle leadership is
Nature's Way of removing morons from the
productive flow with us today the man
behind the Dilbert principle for that
matter the man behind Dilbert itself
cartoonist author and it turns out
political philosopher Scott Adams
uncommon knowledge now
welcome to uncommon knowledge I'm Peter
Robinson raised in a small town in
upstate New York Scott Adams graduated
from Hartwick College in 1979 he worked
for a number of years for the Crocker
National Bank in San Francisco earned an
MBA at the University of California at
Berkeley and then went to work for
another number of years at Pacific Bell
a period during which he began getting
up early each morning to draw cartoon
strips by the middle of the 1990s mr.
Adams had at last become a full-time
cartoonist and the name of that cartoon
strip is Dilbert today Dilbert appears
in thousands of newspapers in more than
50 countries and in more than a dozen
languages mr. Adams is the author of the
best-selling book the Dilbert principle
of many collections of his cartoons and
most recently of how to fail at almost
everything and still win big subtitle
kind of the story of my life recently
mr. Adams has also attracted attention
for his blog where he has been offering
advice to his fellow Americans on how to
think about President Trump and a advice
to President Trump on how to think about
America Scott Adams welcome thank you
thanks for having me let's get this out
of the way right away all right you and
Donald Trump president Trump's approval
ratings are the lowest on record and
among academics and journalists and for
sure professional people here in
Northern California he is almost
universally derided but here's you on
your blog quote Trump doesn't have one
talent that is best in the world but he
does have one of the best talent stacks
I have ever seen close quote okay so
what's a talent stack and then tell us
about Donald Trump
well first of all let me let me clarify
that when I talk about Trump I'm talking
about it through a persuasion filter in
other words I have a background as a
hypnotist I'm a trained tip noticed and
I've been studying eyelids are growing
heavy even now and I have studied
persuasion in all of its forms as part
of what I do as a as a writer a
cartoonist and I noticed in candidate
Trump
first a a type of persuasive skill that
you just don't see yeah he brought the
full package of persuasion and if you're
not if you're not a student of it you
would miss it entirely in other words if
you didn't know anything about the
techniques he was using you would say
what's this crazy random chaotic clown
who keeps doing things hey he won again
he won the primary well that was luck
but he'll never win the Oh what just
happened
so I predicted all of this I think a
year and a half before Election Day and
I predicted that he would win by a lot
now you could argue whether the
electoral college victory was a lot and
you could argue about the you know the
popular vote but the fact is he played a
game they have a set of rules and he won
by a lot on the game he was playing
which was the Electoral College yes he
didn't win the game he wasn't playing
but I kind of assumed that didn't matter
and it didn't so what I talked about his
talent stack that's a little bit of some
some thinking from my book that you just
mentioned and the idea is let's look at
your copies it's a wonderful book thank
you
there are two basic ways to really make
a difference in this world and succeed
and here success is not just financial
but just success in life one way is to
be insanely good at one thing let's say
Tiger Woods you know right is good at
one thing but you really have to be
about one of the best in the world
depending on the thing you're doing to
really make a dent alright but the other
way you can do it is the way that I've
done it which is I've compiled a a set
of complementary skills and I'm not
really the best in the world at anything
right so if you were to go into you know
any crowded room you could find a better
artist than me it would be easy because
I just don't have much artistic but the
think of argument I'll let you be self
denigrating but go ahead well I think
anybody who studies cartoons would look
at the page and say well there's the
worst artist on the page so there's no
no false humility alright maybe then
I've never taken a writing course
but I know how to make short pithy
sentences so I'm good at that I have a
lot of business experience because I for
16 years I worked in the corporate world
so I had something to draw up on which
is you know the fodder for this trip and
you could go down the line of you know
what it takes to be a cartoonist
business skills for example you know I
have my MBA from from Cal and those
things all just work together really
well but I'm not great at any of them
I'm not I'm not Warren Buffett my
business skills but I have enough to do
this thing and they just work together
well know this lovely image of us you
stack this talent on this talent on this
talent on this talent and you end up
with something that's pretty impressive
right and then the trick is that they
have to be complementary skills right so
being able to be as a speaker being
comfortable in this kind of format works
really well with being a writer you know
if yeah if you have only the writing
skills well where are you gonna promote
your book right so they just work well
together
now back to Donald Trump if you look at
the things he can do better than most
people he can definitely give a speech
better than most people but the experts
will say wow look at that he's no John
Kennedy yeah he's no Reagan wears his
where's this soaring rhetoric right and
all that well it doesn't have that but
the crowd loves him he's funny
alright and it's hard to be funny and
funny really helps your popularity helps
your persuasion and again he's not a
stand-up comedian funny but if you put
him in a room it would be one of the top
20 percent funny people in a room right
he's smart not the smartest person in
the world you know he's not he's not the
physicist who's gonna solve a you know
the next great problem in physics well
he's clearly smarter than most people
right unambiguously he's smarter than
most people he knows enough about
government in how it works from the
other side because he dealt with it a
lot right that he was no expert in
government what he knew more than
somebody who wasn't involved in any way
right right
he knew about being a boss he knew about
leadership he knew about he knew about
entering the field that he'd never
entered before because he'd done it a
number
which by the way is usually a tell for
what I call a master persuader so who
knows persuasion and also has built a
talent stack that can take them in a lot
of different directions that's so he
goes from Queens to Manhattan he goes
from building to casinos he goes from
casinos to branding personal branding
various items and entity and then he
goes to becoming a television
personality those are really quite
distinct career patterns and then
President of the United States and
before that candidate a whole different
job right like the job of candidate is
pretty different this guy's done a lot
and not only did he do those things but
he almost entered at the top you know he
was so strong going in that they had
just on the whole package now the other
thing he has which is a big deal is that
he brought the whole Donald Trump
persona all right so that allowed him
for example to be largely immune from
scandals that would pop up because you
knew that at some point during the the
election somebody would say what about
that thing you did with this or that
woman you knew that was going to happen
right and sure enough the you me the
tapes that we the wheel heard showed
that but he was somewhat immune from
that because he he started from the
beginning he said I'm no angel and he's
divorced with I from Ivana was on the
front page of the New York Post day
after day for weeks back in the minute
whatever was early 90s nobody knew he
nobody thought of him as a choirboy you
smart enough never to make a big deal
about you know I'm your family role
model right never sold himself that way
so he was never vulnerable to those
attacks and the way that regular people
would be the other thing he has and and
I think this comes with learning
persuasion is that he has the thickest
skin you know he's accused of being
exactly the opposite because he always
attacks back you know I can talk about
that specifically but imagine the amount
of abuse that he clearly knew was going
to come his way just by robbing and then
by winning you know gets that much worse
so he you signed up for that you know
you don't do that unless you you've got
a thick skin and leave the stuff he's
brushed off you know so far it's
it's really impressive okay now there
you are during the presidential campaign
and you start blogging and I have to say
this gets my attention
why with a guy who's a cartoonist have
such fresh insight okay so I'm looking
at it but you're putting a distance
between yourself often are quite a ride
distance between yourself and Donald
Trump you said his policies weren't
necessarily your policies you've quite
cagey about all the time well let me let
me give you there because I'm trying to
figure out where I want to know where
you stand and you may not let me ask
that but go ahead no I'm gonna volunteer
that socially I call myself an ultra
liberal meaning that I'm more liberal
than liberals all right so you couldn't
give further from you know the
Republican standard I am I'll give you
an example a normal liberal would say
you know drugs should be maybe more
legalized I say that if you're over 50
your doctor should be giving them to you
thank you because really the growing old
sucks and if you if you're 80
you should get LSD you know you should
get you should get mushrooms whatever it
takes you know to make you happy so
wherever the liberal position is I'm
quite often even further to the left
than that I'll give you another example
conservatives might want to ban abortion
liberals might want to say we would like
that option I go further than left and
say men stay out of it right
whatever the women figure out for how
this reproductive rights should be how
about we listen to them who clearly know
everything we know about you know
meaning men
about you know the science and the
details and the politics but they have
the extra appreciation and more
importantly the extra responsibility
they take the responsibility of
reproduction the men can take and in
general when people take on more
responsibility Society often says we'll
give you a little extra rights a little
consideration because you're doing
something that's so important so I say
an abortion men should listen and
whatever women collectively agree with
I'm okay with that
we're
that goes so you can't get more right
less than that right so back to your
point and on stuff like international
relations what do we do with trade deals
and stuff like that my view is always
the same I don't know but this stuff is
way too complicated for an average voter
to figure out you know what to do with
the TPP and you know we don't know so
you did find this quotation because I
thought to myself I've got him let's see
if I have got you
Trump's value proposition is this is you
on your blog quote Trump's value
proposition is that he will make America
great
that concept sounds appealing to me the
nation needs good brand management okay
so whatever else is going on issue by
issue by issue you'll look at this and
guy and say you know he's my guy well
I'm gonna say I'd say my guy I say that
he has a set of skills which are
extraordinary and the thing I was most
interested in was that the country could
see it clearly without the filter put on
it by the opposition right right because
they're both painting at each other
terribly in Hillary Clinton's situation
people know what a standard politician
is right so the you know they could see
through the attacks on the other side we
knew what we were gettin right but with
Trump people didn't know what their
again at least half the country thought
he was crazy Hillier and
I had actually predicted I guess before
he was inaugurated that you would see
the following story arc develop because
it just was obvious if you if you
trained in persuasion it was going to go
this way it would start with oh my god
we've accidentally elected Hitler like
how did this happen how did half the
country or so not know that we've
elected a monster and I figured okay
after a few months of not doing Hitler
stuff it's just gonna sorta dissipate
and it has right right so by summer I
said that the Hitler thing will
dissipate and it did but it would be
replaced with but he's incompetent he's
incompetent he's competent and sure
enough that was the big word of the
summer up to
yeah up till now I didn't see the Russia
thing coming because that you know
that's physic right but I've predicted
that after the he's incompetent phase
will come the well he did get a lot done
but we don't all like that you know he
did things we don't like but he was
awfully effective and he did do the
things he said he was gonna do we just
don't like those things so you're gonna
see that by your end and in fact you're
already seeing that he has a turn it's
it's pretty it's visible now you can see
the turnout right I want to return to
Donald Trump and current politics in a
moment but how to fail at almost
everything and still win big kind of the
story of my life is a book that combines
a fascinating life story with insights
from a fascinating mind and also lovely
light touch with the prose it is so
readable a couple of moments from the
book and I'm just I just want to give a
flavor of Scott Adams and the way his
mind works we have a very young Scott
Adams dressed in a cheap three-piece
suit seated on an airplane to California
next to a businessman and learning I'm
quoting from the book quote goals are
for losers
close quote how do we get to that scene
and how did you learn that lesson in
that moment well let me let me finish
that story of the airplane and then I'll
extend that to systems versus goals so
that the person I chanced upon meeting
struck up a conversation with me and
part of the reason was because I was
wearing a suit on an airplane and I was
21 I guess
and you thought people dressed to go on
airplane I'd never better than an
airplane I've never been on one and
didn't know many people who had been
that's how small my town was and how
small my experience was and I also
didn't know how to pack yet so I thought
well I'll just wear it and this this
gentleman I'm sitting next to started a
conversation and he told me about his
system for life at the moment he would
get a job you know ideally a promotion
he would immediately start looking for
his next job so his concept of what his
career looked like was not a goal as in
I will get this job it was a system
where he never had the job he was gonna
keep you know his system was that you're
always you're always looking for the
next job and it's a better job and I
extended that in the book and it's sort
of my my philosophy of life is is I look
for a system instead of a goal now I
could give would you like to hear the
event I would I would well first of all
I want to make sure that I think I got
it because I read the book but I want to
tease it out a little bit so a goal is
some the goal is the pot of gold at the
end of the rainbow a system is something
you do every day it is a method it is a
means of approach if I got that that's
the basic distinction okay so far so go
ahead so for example getting a specific
job or promotion would be a goal but
going to college would be a system
because you're doing it you know the
whole time you're there you're working
on it but you don't know exactly where
it's gonna go right but you know your
odds just got a lot better right in a
whole bunch of different ways right so
any good system has that quality you're
doing it regularly and it increases your
odds
so I extend that to fitness and and diet
and in jobs as well so the talent stack
is a system so if you say to yourself
well I've got these skills and maybe
you've got some natural ability there's
something about you that it would be
hard for people to equal you're just
born that way you got the gift of gab
you're you're handsome you're whatever
you are and you say well what goes well
with that and then you build a system of
learning those things and adding to the
stack so that would be one system and
they're different systems for exercise
and diet etc okay I just thought this
entered my head coach Belichick coach of
the Patriots execute the plays and the
score will take care of itself
that's exactly the same point you're
making isn't it well to the extent the
trouble is that football is such a
constrained man-made thing right nothing
really translates from right right it's
all okay here's another moment you're
working for years at a bank and then
you're working for years at a telephone
company and then all of a sudden
you're the one of the most famous
cartoonists in America so how did that
happen and the lesson here again I'm
quoting from the book is luck can be
managed
sort of how did you manage those years
this what was it 14 years I think in
corporate America yeah 16 15 well when I
say luck can be managed I mean this if
you wanted to be hit by lightning let's
let's just say that was something you
wanted you know most people would say
well it's very unusual to be hit by
lightning right so it's just luck
there's nothing you can do about it but
I would say they're very much is
something you can do about it you can go
outdoors that would increase your odds
you could go outdoors when it's raining
in a place that has thunderstorms that
would increase your odds and if that's
not enough sell all your possessions
move to the top of a mountain that has
frequent thunderstorms build a network
of connected lightening rods and campout
with your hand on one you're gonna get
hit by some frickin lightning all right
so so when you say you know I don't know
what to do I'm not lucky you know lucky
I find you you can go find luck the
first thing I did when I got at a
college in my you know small upstate New
York life as I said where is all the
luck you know and I was thinking
opportunity but I'll either there's so
correlated and I said I got to get outta
here and I I said California wreath of
three-piece suit in the airplane and
ended up in I actually traded my car to
my sister for a one-way ticket to
California really okay again and this is
going to this is going to leave me from
the book to current politics but I'll
let you I don't want to reveal just how
at the moment I'm quoting from how to
feel that almost everything and still
one big quote I ignored my father's
advice to work for the Postal Service I
got into college without much help from
my guidance counselor and I stayed in
school against my doctor's advice you
had mono and the doctor said you should
drop out you stayed in school this was
about the time that my opinion of
experts and authority figures in general
began a steady descent that continues to
this day I think I see another reason
you like Donald Trump you're subversive
you don't like being told what to do or
looking up to anybody
you know and part of it is life
experience the older you get the more
examples you see of hey you remember
that food pyramid that we're all taught
as a kid turns out there was no science
to that hey what about those vitamins
you take your one-a-day vitamin that's
been tested right not really there's no
reason you take it one once a day all
those vitamins and minerals should be
delivered in different doses in
different ways and by the way we haven't
studied both of them you know how about
those eight eight glasses of water you
were supposed to drink or something
turns out no science to that what about
the don't go swimming you know if any we
have to eat turns out no science of that
so you can go you know the older you are
the more of these you have seen the less
your respect for the experts you know
can be maintained okay so now this takes
us right to the issues of the day and on
your blog you have what are to me at
least completely novel ways of looking
at a number of issues about which I
because of the nature of my work at a
think-tank thought I had read and heard
everything and here's one of them
climate change quote it seems to me that
a majority of experts could be wrong
whenever you have a pattern that looks
like this there's a severe social or
economic penalty for having the wrong a
wrong in quotation marks opinion in the
field I agree with the consensus of
climate scientists because saying
otherwise in public would be social and
career suicide for me even as a
cartoonist imagine how much worse the
pressure would be if science was my
career
close quote yes no it's nothing about
the science you're just looking at the
human psychology of the thing right well
that's that's at least half of it okay
mid psychology of it so a lot of people
who have not studied persuasion for
example have never seen mass delusions
you know explain to them in ways that
just make your head explode for example
a lot of people watching this I've never
heard of the McMartin school case right
where a whole bunch of kids allegedly
said that they'd all been you know
molested I can't 80s as I recall late
80s Early 90s all these people who had
similar stories of molestation and
satanic rituals and stuff apparently and
it turns out that all of it
false because it's easy to manipulate
kids into telling stories because you
act like you want them to and then they
just do so there there are lots of
stories of mass delusion so in my world
it is common and the examples I gave you
the food pyramid etc it's common for all
the experts to be on one side and still
be wrong to the average person that
seems unusual right but it's not unusual
if you've expanded your your scope and
if you just look for these things you
see it everywhere
I just just somebody just send me an
article of 43 peer-reviewed articles
that were just removed from some
publication because it turns out
somebody was gaming the peer-review
system but here's the other part of that
kind of science whenever you see a big
complicated projection model with lots
of variables and by the way there's not
just one of them there are dozens of
them and the ones that didn't work they
throw away and there's lots of judgment
about mmm we're gonna adjust these
numbers we have good reasons we're
telling you everybody you know you can
peer review it right well we're making
some human decisions and in that in that
situation there's a level of complexity
of these models that makes the
likelihood that they're right you start
to approach zero
as the complexity you know increases now
part of my perspective on that is that I
used to do that well not what if you're
the banker well yeah so for the bank I
would do financial projections based on
all these variables and assumptions and
everything and I knew that I could give
you any answer you wanted I would ask my
my boss how do you want this to come out
and then I would just sit there with my
spreadsheet and put in numbers until it
came out and so that's my perspective
but if you haven't been through that
world if you haven't lived in my
corporate world and seeing how many
experts were wrong let me give you that
anecdote that just popped into my head
years ago I worked in a lab in the phone
company where we were testing cell
phones and somebody was trying to test
if they would be dangerous you know with
the EMF or whatever it is I was holding
up to you so the top engineer studies it
he looks at everything and he concludes
no there's no reason to be worried
holding these things up to your head I
talked to him privately and I said do
you believe that like would you would
you hold the phone up to your head for
hours at a time he said no no way
and this was the expert whose report the
entire company made their decision on he
said no I wouldn't do it one more
quotation from your blog or still on
climate science because I think it
illuminates a certain amount about your
approach quote if you believe that
experts are good at predicting future
domme you're probably scared to death
about climate change but any danger we
humans see coming far in the future we
always find a way to fix and then you
know predictions of food scarcity we
haven't run out of food predictions we
run out of oil we have more energy than
we know what to do with quote I refer to
this phenomenon as the atoms law of slow
moving disasters when we see a disaster
coming as we do with climate science we
have an unbroken track record of
avoiding doom if you ask me how scared I
am of climate changes ruining the planet
I have to say it is near the bottom of
my worries close quote now because I'm
humane I'm going to give you a chance to
take that back right now
you live in Northern California Scott
now as most of you have been following
videos and you saw that the Paris
climate agreement the United States back
down Trump takes us out of it right
right and before that happened I have to
say I thought that thing was probably
pretty useful like I thought well it's
probably a bunch of really useful
guidelines that would get us to you know
at least reduce whatever this danger is
and by the way I completely buy the idea
that humans are heating up the earth but
you so so I'm buying that and then the
experts weigh in on how much difference
it would have made if we'd stayed in it
turns out not really much of anything it
just wouldn't make much difference I
didn't know that I actually thought
independent of the science I thought
that that agreement would make us do
things that would change things there's
that not so much what did all the
experts tell us before we actually
looked at that agreement you know in
some detail they all said it's important
it's vital to the earth right vital to
the
survival of the earth all the experts
were lined up on that I mean as much as
they were lined up for climate science
today good luck finding somebody who can
still defend that agreement and I'm not
talking to this decided three weeks or a
month or something like that it's like
been a month and we've completely
redefined what we thought was reasonably
okay so now we have established that
you're a you have a fascinating story
go ahead can I can I just didn't do
anything you want to so my contribution
I think to the conversation of climate
science yes is to break it into three
categories and to and to treat them with
three separate probabilities all right
because we're we're all sort of guessing
what are the odds that this is right
right the basic science part the
chemistry the physics if you had the co2
in a closed system will heat up under
these conditions probably is solid right
I'm not a scientist but I would
definitely believe the experts then
there's the making the models part
scientists are doing it other scientists
are reviewing it they're using science
II things and logic and reason I'm sure
they're doing their best but the odds of
that being accurate are much lower than
indeed there have been lots of climate
models in the past that that we wrong
but the third part that doesn't get
talked about is what I'd like to
contribute to the conversation which is
the economic model right because the
science doesn't tell you what to do how
hard to do it or when to start the
science doesn't do that the economic
model says ok if you're gonna do
something it's gonna cost a lot of money
so you either start now or you you hope
you can wait till later so for example I
added solar panels to my house when I
built it you know tie this to climate
change in a second when I bought them
they said if you get these solar panels
it'll pay itself off in lower lower
expenses in next year's that was true
you know it looks like that that
actually is happening was it a good idea
economically for me to get those solar
panels seems like it right it paid off
just like they said no it was a terrible
economic idea i my background as
economics as well because the cost of
the installation
dropped by probably 50% in a couple
years so if I had simply done nothing
and waited for the technology to improve
I would had a far better economic
outcome
likewise with climate science there's a
lot happening that could be improvements
in you know green this or that I talked
to an expert on nuclear stuff and he
says fusions actually almost solved you
know really yeah apparently we're closer
to just the engineering part than the
science part got it in and these are
enormous civilization changing you know
developments but there also could be
developments in the next say five years
of the scrubbers ways to take things out
of the atmosphere maybe a better
understanding of how it's all happening
which gives us a new clue so waiting is
often the smartest thing you can do take
the year 2000 bug everybody said hey
year 2000 the world's going to fall
apart and it looked like you know a year
before that we didn't really have much
you know of a plan or a mechanism to fix
it but by the last few months
humans stepped up geniuses got involved
I mean I wasn't I wasn't watching it
closely but you know geniuses got
involved right and they that they
probably built tools that allowed them
to do the thing that they couldn't do
quickly quickly right right so so
probably the same thing could happen in
climate change my point is the even if
all the science stuff is exactly what
the scientists say and how would I know
I'm not a scientist the economic part is
just completely unfathomable it's
unpredictable by its nature there has
never been a good long-term economic
model with lots of variables that worked
out it's something that just hasn't been
done right back to the contemporary
political / cultural scene let me ask
you to give some advice to people who
could use it here's a category
republicans and conservatives who are
having trouble with President Trump
here's Bill Kristol
quote the problem isn't Trump's Twitter
the problem is Trump's character close
quote here's George will president Trump
suffers from quote intellectual sloth
and an untrained mind bereft of infor
and married to stratospheric
self-confidence close quote
people who are on his side to the extent
that he lines up ideologically who just
can't just are beside themselves what's
your advice advice for them or yes/no
for them well keep in mind that this is
a an arena in which people take sides
you know and once I joined their team
there isn't much that you can get them
off the team
you you can get them to talk less I
suppose and success would do that so
there's no substitute for winning all
right if if President Trump does well if
things go well the economy does well
Isis stays you know beaten back as they
are if North Korea we find some some
reasonable solution there which would be
hard people are going to forget all that
and they're just going to reinterpret
their their impression of what what they
saw in the past okay Democrats who are
not only uniformed and denouncing
President Trump but seem completely
fixated on getting him out of office
removing him from office and even it
seems to me I could be wrong about this
but it seems to me that there's not much
policy work being done there's not
there's just nothing happening on the
Democratic Party except denunciations of
President Trump your advice for the
Nancy Pelosi's and the Maxine Waters is
of the world so it seems to be true that
whichever party is out of power is the
ridiculous one and but there's a reason
for that
there's a perfectly logical reason when
Obama was in power it seemed like the
right was ridiculous it's like hey you
what about your birth certificate and
you know are you a secret Muslim it just
it look crazy right it just look crazy
and the people and of power the last
thing they want to do is put forward a
positive proposal because first of all
it's not going to happen guys that are
not in power the other side isn't good
thing that was a good idea we're just
glad so it would be a waste of the time
but also it gives targets to the other
side right you know if they want to just
criticize what's happening with the
administration they don't want to
their own target sitting there that they
can fire back so I think that's just the
state of politics is that the the party
out of power is going to look crazy and
you know confirmation bias and cognitive
dissonance and all that stuff is gonna
be swirling around whichever side is out
of power and it's just going to look
crazy okay and the press hears
journalist Carl Bernstein of Watergate
Fame quote we are in the midst of a
malignant presidency it calls on our
journalists to do a different kind of
reporting the close quote and that's you
get a lot of that in the mainstream
media this guy is so bad this is such
uncharted territory for Americans that
we have to be advocate advocate
journalism we've got to let Americans
know how what a catastrophe is your
advice to the press keep in mind that
the advocates are just advocates and
therefore there's nothing that they say
that can be taken with any form of
credibility in other words they don't
even necessarily believe what they're
saying some of them probably do but I
think there as soon as you say I'm on
this team and you know I'm gonna fight
to the death the there's no sense of
credibility with any of those folks okay
and now your advice for Donald J Trump
himself he's got an impressive talent
stack you've convinced me of that but
he's also stuck at 40% in the polls
that's where they've peaked who knows
where he is today maybe thirty six
percent something like that would you
keep him from tweeting if you could no
way
tweeting has won him the presidency it
connects him to the people it makes the
people who love him love him more he is
entertaining he has he has made all of
us learn more about politics the law
really just how the world works we have
learned so much and a lot of it that is
his direct you know contact with the
people unfiltered the warts and all I
would take you back a couple years
during the campaign when people said the
one thing we know for sure about Trump
is that with this low popularity you can
never win the presidency I said
no you're missing the other way you win
the presidency you don't have to outrun
the bear you have to only outrun your
camping buddy so if he can make Hillary
Clinton look worse than he looks doesn't
matter how low his number is he could be
a 10 if she's a 5 what happened he made
her look worse because he is the best
brand or best influencer best persuader
I've ever seen all right you know lyin
Ted low-energy Jeb crooked Hillary these
are not random insults you saw the other
seller and low-energy Jeb and did jeb
Bush's campaign which I predicted the
day the day I heard it I said that
publicly it's the end of him when nobody
was saying that and the reason is the
his linguistic kill shots as I call them
are not random he first of all picked
something that fix fits their
physicality in other words there's a
visual element to right and the visual
is the most persuasive of all right it's
the senses it's the one sense that just
overrides all your other stuff and this
is I heard that I said to myself before
I heard that my impression of Jeb Bush
was this is a cool calm executive you
know this guy is gonna be the perfect
guy in there's war he's not gonna get to
it you know kind of control the moment I
heard low energy I couldn't see him any
other way because and then every time I
saw him he the contrast with Trump's
high energy just made it all the more
damning and by the way contrast is an
enormous thing in persuasion so it's not
enough to say I'm high energy on high
energy you got to say and I'm competing
against low energy Jeb right that's just
deadly he was done in that day it's got
a couple of less questions and one
question is why do you do what you do
you live in Northern California where
your views are intensely unpopular and
so why do you blog the way you blog and
I think I figured it out you write
Dilbert for ordinary Americans you came
from a small town in upstate New York
and yes you got out as fast as you could
you flew to California right away after
graduating from college but
it's still in your mind I think you're a
kid from upstate New York and you don't
like getting pushed around
you don't like deferring to experts or
Authority and so I think that in some
basic way you are as much of a champion
of ordinary overlooked Americans as is
Donald Trump I love your version of it
wait let me put let me put it in my
works I like to describe a perfect life
this way we're born as selfish baby
can't do anything right you have to do
something for it kids still selfish but
they're learning to do a few things
maybe some errands some chores by the
time you've got your own kids
you've changed a little bit you're
you're giving more than you're taking
but you're somewhere in the middle and
by the time you're my age if you've done
everything right you have enough for
yourself you're done what you need to do
and finally you can be mostly a giver
right so that was always the life arc
that I've pursued start perfectly
selfish and on your last day give it all
the way literally you die your state's
gone and by then you should have given
all of your wisdom any any kindness you
had any anything you could contribute so
I'm at that stage in my life where that
means more to me than money because I
have money and I have unusually good
health you know for my age and
everything and this is how I can give
back when when Trump came on the scene
what I wrote long before he made a dent
in the election when people still
thought he was a joke I said not only is
he gonna win at all but he's going to
put a hole in the universe he's going to
change everything about the way you
think of your human condition and the
way you understand your reality and I
thought if I'm not explaining this as it
happens because there weren't too many
people who could sort of see it from
this perspective it could be chaos
it could be there could be a riots in
the streets which there almost were but
when you start seeing this in the
through the filter of persuasion it
makes you feel comfortable that he knows
what he's doing even when he departs
from the fact
checkers you know he says fact-checking
works for you but I can make it work
without that it is completely
intentional here's a last question
President Trump in Warsaw earlier this
month quote the fundamental question of
our time is whether the West has the
will to survive do we have the
confidence in our values to defend them
do we have the desire and the courage to
preserve our civilization in the face of
those who would subvert and destroy it
close quote
you and I grew up a couple of counties
apart in upstate New York we're within a
couple of months of the same age and
what I know about that is it means you
can remember the 80s and you can
remember the Reagan years the economy
revived the recovery recovered its
morale people of our age can actually
remember what that felt like and the
West won the Cold War
well the Trump years represent something
like that some kind of national renewal
as I predicted that he would win when
nobody thought he would I also predict
that he has at least a very high
potential to do things in his term the
likes of which we haven't seen for
example I don't think anybody else could
solve North Korea I think he can't now
I'm gonna stop short of saying he can do
it because it's so monstrously difficult
but I think he has the skill set well
you know you saw the way the way he was
dealing with China because China has to
be part of this he said hey China is
great you know you guys this is your
problem in your boat one backyard see if
you can take care of it well you tried
look at the level of persuasion that is
you know people thought well it's just a
cute tweet he's just being folksy and so
but the way that paints this picture it
makes China kind of need to step up to
the set up to the plate because what he
said is is that you're sort of not the
superpower you want to be right he
basically has challenged them to be the
country that they want to be that's the
key that's how persuasion works don't
tell somebody to be the way you want
them to be saying look if you want to be
the way
you want to be here's how to get there
that's very persuasive Scott Adams
creator of Dilbert author of many books
including how to fail at almost
everything and still win big thank you
thank you
and while the camera is still rolling
you have a new book coming out in
October and deduct over entitled how to
win huge how to win big Lee does just
win big Lee wen Begley when big Lee all
right you've been a simple we'll do a
show on win big Lee love to excellent
for uncommon knowledge and the Hoover
Institution I'm Peter Robinson
[Music]
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