[ theme music ] gavin hello, and thanks so much for watching the show. We have an allstar line up for you tonight. All of our guests on this show have one thing in common. They are true change makers from different backgrounds and diverse perspectives. Everyone on this show embody the fundamental belief that Ideas Innovations will improve the way we live our lives. Well visit the brightest minds. We begin with three entrepreneurs with one uniteing quality, innovation. What are you wearing . Whats on your head . The google glass. Its a little project ive been looking at. Its one of the main focuses now that i shift doing more r d. The idea is you want to be free to experience the World Without fussing with a phone. You may not have noticed but i took a picture of you and youre making eye contact with me. If i whipped out the phone, it would be very different. How do i know youre not making that up . I literally can see the image that you photographed . Does it reflect onlets take a look. What is it . Do you have to push anything . What did you do to make that work . Im operating it backwards. Its not somethingdont touch the pad on the side. Gavin there it is. Thats somebodys finger, let me push the money. Gavin thats me, and you zoom right in. Amazing. So this is something you guys have been working on at google for how long . This has been, you know, two or three years now but ive been much more involved just in the past year. Gavin and where did it come from . Is this part of the google x. Google x is my primary focus now with google. There are a couple of other things, but its sort of an advanced project and we try to prototype farout projects. People consider the notion of replacing the phone computer, something that is easy to access but doesnt inhibit you. Its pretty far off. The performance version is faster than the carrera. Full touch screen. You can go full scene. It has offline navigation as well. Gavin the future of electric cars, is it pushing the envelope of imagination and focusing on design focusing on technology that will be key to scale electric vehicles in this country and around the world. Other Car Companies need to make great electric cars that are at a price equal to gas cars and they will sell. Sell. Sell. Sell. Gavin edsell. Gavin as easy at that. Its not easy, but thats what needs to be done. The front part of this projects is started by elon with his own funding. We had a Successful Mission for the space station. It really exceeded our expectation, and now were going to go do more missions like that. Well also be launching satellites weather mapping that kind of thing. And probably in three years or so well be launching astronauts to the space station. Gavin on a capsule, the dragon, to mars when . Well, im hopeful that mars trip could occur sometime in the next 10 to 20 years. 10 is optimistic but i would be surprised if its 20. Gavin youll be leadingly example, i imagine. I would like to go. I would like to go. It would be great to be born on earth and to die on mars. You know, just not at point of impact. The book is about accelerated learning. My regards have been asking me for the fourhour mind. I needed a contact so i thought what better way to show all of these techniques from chess plot gees to memory experts to a skill. The skill that i quit so many times because it was complicated, timeconsuming, whatever. It uses all five senses. The kitchen is a perfect dojo for training and all sorts of other things. Folks like malcolm glad well say all this is true, but to be truly an expert, to be world class, that notion of 10,000 miles, you say what to that . Is that bogus, are you selling snake oil are they selling snake oil. I think we both are selling snake oil. The ten hour rule can be observed. Its important not to confuse causation. I would simple lay say from everything that ive seen and everything that ive demonstrate pretty well, if we define world class with 5 in the world there are very few skills where i think with six concerted effort you cannot reach that point. Using feedback like video, skype training with people across the world which can cost like 20 you can dramatically excel your progress and that will increase with better technology. The 10,000 hour rule may apply to many things but its the exceptions that are worth studying. Gavin personally im constantly looking for new ways to improve efficiency and transparency. Up next the best new ideas in politics and policy. But first a quick greek. Break. All the time now. She gets the comedians laughing. Thats hilarious . And the thinkers thinking. Okay, so theres wiggleroom in the Ten Commandments is what youre telling me. You would rather deal with ahmadinejad then me. Absolutely and so would mitt romeny. Shes joy behar. And the best part is that current will let me say anything. What the hell were they thinking . Only on current tv. Desmond tutu said a quote that is one of my favorite quotes. We are tied together in a web of humanity. I am a person only through you. I can only be a person only through you. That really resonates me and drives my work. The world is becoming an incredibly connected place. Mobile phones are really driving that connection. At kiva, we run an internet marketplace. People can lend to other people for the purpose of starting a small business, going to school or a variety of other good causes. You can go to kiva. Org and you can see pictures and profiles of people from over sixty countries all across the world. You can lend them as little as 25. If they are successful, they will pay you back. Dear rixi, youre a honduran immagrant. Youre coming to the us, you have an idea to start, you know, a womens cosmetics store or a clothing store. Youre going to need a lot of things, ya know, to pay the rent, permits inventory, advertising, marketing so that adds up quite a bit. Youre going to need tens of thousands of dollars to start a small busines. There is ten millionplus people completely left out of the formal finical system. Banks dont lend to people like that at all. There is a lot of opportunity to decrease unemployment, provide employment, provide Economic Opportunity and raise our standard of living by investing in small business. Our hearts are an incredibly powerful thing. Good technology can help amplify this power and create an incredibly powerful force that can spread to every country in the world. [ theme music ] gavin government still lags behind the private sector in implementing technology and innovations. Thats why ive written my book citizenville. Hopefully that is about to change. As youll hear from my next guest. Oh think something essential to democracy. Gavin when we talk about opening transparentcy and accountable the thing to address those key issues is money and political. Transparency of political money is without that we know nothing about what is really going on. The kind of influences that the money might exert on the people who are raising the money the candidates. So you know, since the turn of the century, 1907 weve had a firm rule about clear and complete disclosure of campaign contributions. It is the baseline of what we know. And only in the wake of the recent Citizens United decision and congress failure to pass a piece of legislation that requires disclosure do we have the hundreds of millions of dollars that are going into our political system right now that are undisclosed. So there is one pot that is completely undisclosed. Its dark money. Its a black hole. Thats why corporations, wealthy individuals, both have agenda, are putting a lot of money and we have no idea who they are. Gavin before citizens uniteed you had swift vote. Was that clean open transparent investment money or were they taking advantage of loopholes that were even before Citizens United. To say that it was reported and it was reported. That almost looks like the good ol days. They were independent expenditures but we knew who was financing them and we knew how much they were spending. Now we dont even know where they put it, if its in the right pocket or left pocket of the candidate. Thats the biggest concern. We oh have not only unlimited money, but unlimited undisclosed money. Gavin just so folks know when i ran for Lieutenant Governor i had to put online every dime. It doesnt stop the campaign. Its easy to do and it course occurs during periods of time. What is the argument against the 24 7 early in the cycle who is saying no to that . They all say no, republicans and democrats. Because the less the public knows, the less the opposition knows. Gavin why do we put up with this . Why do we keep electing folks who refuse on both sides of the political aisle to step up and be transparent and more accountable. Are we too focused on others things . Our lives are too complex to get down to this level and granular detail of what is happening and not happening in washington, d. C. . A lot of folks, an extraordinary number of people know what you do but most folks dont know what the Sunlight Foundation does . How do we scale that. Until campaigns become as important as jobs and healthcare and clean air then it will always be a secondary issue and they will vote based on those larger issues. And the Campaign Finance issue has become such a sort of cynical response by the public that theyre not going to vote on that. Theyre going to vote for the politician who is going to help them get their kid a better education or get their mother in a better situation for elder care facility. Gavin the frustration for me is youve got extraordinary people. I really believe this in politics who are trapped by an extraordinarily bad system you saw this with president obama who said i cant stand these super pacs but realized you cannot unilaterally disarm if youre in this game, and he would be crushed and rolled over. How do we reconcile that. Good people trapped in a bad system. How do we ultimately manifest that. Well, i think you need someone who breakaway and who will understand, and i believe this to be true, if they say i will not take super pac money that the people who hate the Campaign Finance system will come to them and say this is a different politician. Gavin yeah. And that is a tough choice. I appreciate that, but i do believe, in fact that in this day and age where the issue of money and politics is just pervasive and ordinary every day conversation that a candidate could be quite successful in this regard. Gavin i mean, what is it about the Political Parties today and Politics Today that that doesnt reward Good Behavior . Well, i think thanks to modern Technology Everything now is a realtime, and everything gets amplified pretty quickly. You publish an article get a letter to the editor, then you get a response. Now its nano seconds, so the intensity rises up. And it means millions of people are involved in a way that they never were before. So the noise level goes up. And the desire of the lines in the ground, all that kind of thing goes up. But eventually im betting that as when through this turmoil and name calling and alike consensus do emerge. We forget how contentious the 30s were. In the 1790s when this nation was starting, i dont think they teach it any more but hamilton versus jefferson and what they wrote about each other was vitriolic but we move forward. Gavin why do you think the bush words from not more successful . The promotion of a lot things, lower tax rates lower regulatory burdens, why didnt the bushwhy didnt the economy take off in the decade of 2009. It gets to this most boring issue in the world back to the monetary and the crazy dollar destroyed nixon destroyed jimmy carter undermined george bush and none of them knew what hit them. President obama has no appreciation that the volatile dollar that the fed has done is making his task infinitely more difficult. They dont understand it. It has not been taught for decades in the schools. The eyes roll over when it comes up. Who shot up lately. So by default bad things happen. Gavin some are concerned about money in politics, and the rise of the super pacs. We always had indulgences with wealthy people on both sides with independent expen expenditures. Is this healthy for our democracy . Are you concerned honestly are you a little bit concerned about what is happening . What should be done is take that 76 law which put caps on giving and then the Supreme Court syd no for individuals and going down this path for 30 years. Just throw the whole thing out. From my own personal experience i can tell you that election laws are in rival of tax laws in complexity. Ive always taken the position open the thing up. If you give somebody something its on the internet. Everyone can see what youre doing. Let there be simplicity and absolute opens and take it from there. Cenk coming up next icons in the world of entertainment from oliver stone to ken burns and several other industry staples. This group of visionaries use storytelling and creativity to make a big difference. Those types are coming on to me all the time now. She gets the comedians laughing. Thats hilarious . And the thinkers thinking. Okay, so theres wiggleroom in the Ten Commandments is what youre telling me. You would rather deal with ahmadinejad then me. Absolutely and so would mitt romeny. Shes joy behar. And the best part is that current will let me say anything. What the hell were they thinking . Only on current tv. Alright, in 15 minutes were going to do the young turks. I think the number one thing that viewers like about the young turks is that were honest. They know that im not bsing them with some hidden agenda, actually supporting one party or the other. When the democrats are wrong, they know that im going to be the first one to call them out. They can question whether im right, but i think that the audience gets that this guy, to the best of his ability, is trying to look out for us. [ theme music ] gavin director oliver stone gave my camera crew tips before this interview. Actor Joseph Gordon levtt, and the grateful dead mickey hart is very much alive. Enjoy our next guests. Gavin savages coming out about the drug war, Mexican Cartel issues. Less of a documentary traffic, i loved it but it told me a lot. This is more about hypothetical fiction. Its based on a novel by don winslow and supposes the area idea because you california has a big growing industry with growing marijuana. We have the best weed in the world. Im telling you from my own experience. Thai weed, jamaican weed. It was all great weed but because americans are so technically minded and mad chemists theyve taken the afghan seeds from the afghan war, thats the hypothesis of our movie brought them to california rededicated themselves and made the finest weed in the world the finest grass you can smoke. And the Mexican Cartel which produces a lot ofbleepweed not good stuff in the past wanted to get in the california business with our young people, three young people, and they offer them a deal thats hard to refuse. But the boys fight back. And the girl fights back, and it turns into quite a debacle. Gavin youve been very political active your entire life. Youve never beenrather youve never shied away from a fight. You leaned in. I admire activists who go out there. It takes hours days, spend time in jail. Youre out there knocking on doors. Im not an activist. Im a dramaist. I may ask to say a few things as a citizen but im not taking the attitude that i make movies and thats all i do and its just a movie no, i dont. Gavin youre a writer and director. Youve written and directed these movies. Did you have bruce willis in mind . No, not at all no. Even when i had joe in mind. The character in the movie thank god has not much to do with joe. Hes a pretty selfish guy who kills people for a living. I try to take something from every character take some virtue or character and steal it for later use. Gavin is that part of acting acting casing other peoples consciousness and per persona and ideas. Yeah, even the character i play in looper. Hes not a good guy. He kills people for a living. He doesnt have any Close Friends or family. Hes a sad, unfortunate soul, but you have to love your character like a mother loves her child even if there is not a lot to admire about them, everyone is themselves. And if youre judging your character from the outside youre not going to be able to play them with much authenticity. Gavin you dont see a lot of movies where you got two actors playing one character. So pressure arguably on you because bruce is not coming back as you. Youre playing the younger bruce. Everyone will say you have to pass the test. Is this believable or not. Are you taking notes, crawling under the table laughing the way he laughs, his breathing. Mental notes, yeah. I wasnt writing thing down, yeah. Gavin what kind of response . I imagine for him hes probably going, that was cute. What kind of feedback did he give you to process it. Hes a very understated guy. Not the type to butter you up or anything which is nice because hes always being honest. I did catch him once or twice giving me a second look, and wow. One time we were doing a scene where we were yelling back at forth at each other and in between takes very casually you sound like me. I had an internal jumping up and down victory but i kept it cool on the outside. Gavin when you look at actors that you admire with that authenticity who can literally lose themselves in the role. You just finished working with Stephen Spielberg and daniel daylewis, he has to be at the top of your list. s a chamaeleon extraordinaire and he never is the same. You can never recognize him. Those are my favorite actors, the ones that you dont see the actor on the screen. You see the chapter in the story. Gavin youre not one of those method actors who become the character off screen, you are . You walk around with the killer attitude . I dont think so, even daniel, who is known for staying in character. Hes not silly about it. Its not that he believes hes Abraham Lincoln when the camera is not rolling. He knows were not on a filming set. I would call it more staying in the mood rather than staying in character. I make the same film over and over again. That asks one deceptively simple question who are we . Who are these strange complicated people who call themselves americans. How the past tells us where weve been thats history. But where who we are and where were going thats the gift of history. The medicine of history. Yo