Trump Extorts DOJ for $230M While Gov’t Workers Scramble to Make Ends Meet | Ryan Holiday

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You're listening to Comedy Central.

From the most trusted journalists at Comedy Central, it's America's only source for news.

This is The Daily Show with your host, Michael Costa.

What's up, everybody?

Welcome to The Daily Show.

I'm Michael Costa.

We've got so much to talk about tonight.

Trump cuts himself a bonus check.

Lewis Black gets jacked.

And we'll tell you why your DoorDash order just got rerouted to Newark.

But first, let's kick things off with our ongoing coverage of Shutdown Showdown 2025 down.

Locked up, locked down, and closed the business.

The shutdown has lasted for over three weeks now, which you may not have ever noticed because they keep forcing federal employees to come back into work without pay.

People like TSA screeners, veterans doctors, and most importantly, the brave guards who keep the Epstein files from being released.

Thank you, heroes.

But other federal workers have been furloughed, which means they don't go to work at all.

These jobs are less essential, and we probably won't even notice they're gone.

And remind me,

which kind of jobs are furloughed?

roughly 1400 employees of the National Nuclear Security Administration which safeguards the country's nuclear stockpile now on unpaid leave only 400 workers remain on the job

great

America's nuclear weapons are now unguarded that may sound dangerous but don't be nervous the nukes have air tags on them so it's

also just to be safe they put up a sign outside the nuclear stockpile so no one's gonna go in there

And for those folks,

and then for those folks who do have to work without pay, well, they have to get creative to pay the bills.

The shutdown is also putting a strain on the people who make sure we get to our destination safely.

Air traffic controllers have been working without pay since October 1st.

Some TSA officers and air traffic controllers are even taking Uber and DoorDash jobs just to make ends meet.

Okay,

that's not ideal.

On one hand, you don't want air traffic controllers staying up all night working a second job, but on the other hand, the sky is like really big, you know, and the planes probably won't bump into each other.

What's the worst that could happen?

A lost plane crashes into our unguarded nuclear weapons?

I mean, it's not that bad.

But look, I hate that this is happening.

I don't want to get into an Uber and feel bad when my driver tells me he's an out-of-work air traffic controller.

I want to get in an Uber and feel bad when my driver tells me he was an oncologist in Armenia.

But

if seeing all these hardworking people getting screwed over is hurting your little feelings,

don't worry.

There is one federal employee who do be getting that Monet.

This morning, sources tell ABC News that President Trump is pushing for a personal $230 million payout from the Justice Department as compensation for the federal investigations he's faced.

He is demanding $230 million because he faced special counsel investigations over his campaign's contacts with Russia and his removal of classified documents from the White House to his home in Mar-a-Lago.

$230 million.

And look, I know it's not exactly what black people wanted, but the American government is finally paying reparations.

And

well, it is to an old white billionaire president, but that's why you need to be more specific when you're manifesting.

Of course, a lawsuit, a lawsuit isn't anything new.

Trump sues people more often than Barron gets hit by a seagull.

That kid is huge.

So I don't mean to sound like your nephew at the Seder, but why is this lawsuit different from the other lawsuits?

The Justice Department officials who would likely sign off on the payment were once President Trump's own personal lawyers, Attorney General Pam Bondi and her deputy, Todd Blanche.

Now, now, now, now, now,

Trump's own former lawyers are the ones who get to decide if Trump gets this giant payout from the government that Trump is in charge of.

So if you can't believe how good Trump's luck is, he also can't seem to believe it.

It's interesting because I'm the one that makes a decision, right?

And, you know, that decision would have to go across my desk.

And it's awfully strange to make a decision where I'm paying myself.

In other words, did you ever have one of those cases where you have to decide how much you're paying yourself in damages?

No, no, they haven't.

No one's ever done this before.

It seems like even Trump is suspicious of how easy this is.

This must be how those thieves at the Louvre felt.

So all I need is a ladder?

I thought this would be way more complicated.

I all steal these invaluable jewels, I guess.

Also, keep in mind that this is all happening at a White House Diwali celebration.

Which, for those of you who don't know, Diwali is the traditional Hindu festival celebrating the day that the deity Rama extorted his own government for $230 million.

Trump's office always has a lot going on.

It's like one of those Dunkin' Donuts with the Baskin Robbins in it.

I came here for a mint chip, but I might as well get a sausage egg while I'm here.

I cannot believe how nakedly corrupt this is.

In fact, it can't be.

I assume this is a more nuanced situation than it appears.

And I'm sure there's some law professor out there who can explain it.

One ethics professor telling the New York Times: the ethical conflict is just so basic and fundamental, you don't need a law professor to explain it.

Wow.

Wow.

That's incredible.

And what I'm taking away from all this is that I'm as smart as a law professor.

But he's right.

This isn't a law professor question.

This is more of an Elmo question.

Even he understands how f up this is, and he can't even read.

But also, Elmo, it's been 45 years.

Okay, less tickling, more studying, maybe.

And if you're wondering what Trump is going to do with the windfall from the government, well, we don't know.

But we know what he's pretending he's going to do with it.

Any money that I would get, I would give to charity.

Okay, all right.

I know what you're thinking.

I know what you're thinking.

Trump is just going to donate the money to his own charity.

Well, jokes on you, because that charity was dissolved by court order in 2018 after misusing money for his personal benefit.

I bet you feel like an asshole.

Now, it's important to keep in mind.

that even if Trump does donate this money to charity, that's taxpayer money.

That's us.

I mean, not me.

I don't recognize the authority of the IRS, but the rest of you.

That's your money.

The American people did not give their hard-earned tax dollars to the government so it can be handed over to Donald Trump as compensation for the crimes that he was legitimately investigated for.

And,

yeah.

And if you think

Like I do that the furloughed government workers deserve better than this, then join me by tipping them one extra dollar on DoorDash.

Thank you, me.

For more on Trump pressuring the Justice Department, let's go live to the White House with Troy Iwata.

Troy!

Troy!

230 million.

This is madness.

Yeah, Michael, beautiful madness.

If this doesn't make you both scared and horny, you're dead inside.

Trump is achieving an unprecedented level of corruption, and we here at the lab are just getting started.

The lab?

What lab?

The White House Laboratorium for Grifting, obviously.

You think this kind of political corruption just happens?

No, you fool!

It requires research, experimentation, and an eye watch station for safety purposes!

What?

Wait,

what the hell?

That's how Trump came up with this insane grift?

Oh, well, we have way many more groundbreaking grifts in store.

You You know how Trump suddenly sprouted fat ass ankles over the summer?

That was us.

We gave those to him.

Now he can slip and fall and sue his own White House for discriminating against cankel Americans.

Now that's crazy.

You think that's crazy?

Next week, Trump's going to order a drone strike on a Venezuelan boat while he's on the boat, so he'll be eligible for workers' comp.

But Troy, that's insanity!

Insanity!

We have not even begun to grift!

Next week, we're gonna have Trump go to the White House cafeteria and ask for a water cup, but you said water cup to get a soda instead!

That's not cutting edge.

I used to do that in middle school all the time.

It's cutting edge for a president to do it, you peasant.

You ever see a president steal a sun kissed?

It's crazy.

Okay, but what's the point of all this research?

How much money does Trump need?

It's not about the money, you rube.

It's about the science and pushing the boundaries of what grifts humankind thought was possible.

Soon President Trump will touch the very face of God and sell God essential oils that God can resell to his neighbors.

He'll finally be his own boss.

Troy, when will all this end?

Never!

Never.

Because at this moment, we're working on the most elaborate scam of all.

Donald Trump sues himself for the emotional distress caused by getting sued by himself, which will trigger an infinite loop of emotional distress, causing lawsuits, causing distress, causing lawsuits, causing distress, causing lawsuits, causing distress.

Oh God, it's happening.

Oh my god, it's happening.

Troy, get out of there.

That's too much corruption.

I'm so hardy and scared.

Troy Ilana, everybody.

I'm sure he's fine.

When we come back, we find out if we get enough protein, so don't go away.

Troy!

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Welcome back to the Dale Show.

When a news story falls through the cracks, Lewis Black catches it for a segment we call Back in Black.

It seems every couple of years, there's a new weight loss trend that sweeps the nation.

Atkins, South Beach, Paleo, and of course taking Ozempic while swearing that you're not taking Ozempic.

I've just been walking more.

Straight into a needle.

But these days it's not about what you're taking out of your diet.

It's about what you're adding in.

The American diet that has entered the protein boom.

Just about every food product has added protein from pancakes to popcorn, from crackers to pasta.

Pop-tarts and Doritos bulking up with added protein.

Move over crack.

There's a new epidemic in town.

Do you people really think you can get healthy by eating protein Doritos?

Well sure they have protein, but they're also fing Doritos.

How much more unhealthy can you get?

It's created opportunity for things like this, protein-packed ice cream.

There's companies like us when we're bringing ice cream to the table and people can actually enjoy it.

Hear that?

We can finally enjoy ice cream.

I hope orgasms are next.

That's what I love about this country.

We'll eat something healthy, but only if we can lick it off a cone.

And not only can you eat your protein while watching Project Runway with your girlies, you can also sip it on your morning commute.

Starbucks entering the protein wars.

The coffee giant is trying out a new protein cold foam.

You can get up to 36 grams of protein in a grande.

The new menu features flavors like banana, vanilla, pumpkin, and pecan.

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F you.

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Seriously, what the f ⁇ is Vector?

Cereals are supposed to have cute names like Trix and Cookie Crisp, not Vector.

Vector sounds like a CIA program to kill Putin with a poison dildo.

Now, as you can probably guess, this protein craze is being driven by everyone's favorite parasites, social media influencers.

Oh my god, I found a high-protein dinner that's under 500 calories, 60 grams of protein.

If you want to be jacked, you need to make these high-protein burritos.

This is the fastest way to get over 100 grams of protein in one meal the fastest way to get protein why is time an issue

you're shirtless in your apartment drinking a gallon of milk it doesn't seem like you have to be anywhere

I mean, how many hours a day can you spend waxing your chest?

I knock it out in 45 minutes.

I'm smooth as a dolphin under here.

But of course, every diet bed has a catch.

Can you eat too much protein?

Oh, 100%.

And then what happens?

So it can be like a real stress on your kidneys.

You can have a risk for cardiovascular disease.

You can actually have higher cholesterol.

It really is not fantastic when you go above what your body needs.

The thing that I worry about the most with too much protein is it can put stress on the liver and the kidneys and cause digestive issues.

Wait, what?

Eating seven T-bone steaks a day might cause digestive issues?

So that's why I haven't shit in five years.

Apparently, protein gives you

all the liver damage of drinking with none of the therapeutic shower crying.

That would have worked if I got it out of my mouth.

But

it turns out the protein craze isn't just for divorced dads.

It's fun for the whole broken family.

This toddler's chomping down on a tomahawk steak.

Across social media, parents are proudly showing off their so-called carnivore babies, infants and toddlers who eat a primarily animal-based, protein-rich diet clear of processed foods.

You want like fatty red meat,

lots of butter.

The kids will just come up and eat like chunks of butter.

How's it going with Rory?

She seems to be loving that steak.

Oh, yeah.

She doesn't have any teeth yet, but she loves to chew on things.

Yeah, she just kind of gums the meat and sucks all the nutrients out.

Oh,

what a great idea!

Giving babies animal protein.

You know what else babies like that has a lot of animal protein?

Milk, you fing idiots!

I tell these parents to go to hell, but they're already there changing your baby's beef tartare diapers.

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Michael.

Where's Black, everyone?

We come back.

Ryan Holliday will be joining me.

Don't go away.

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Welcome back to another show.

My guest tonight is the creator of Daily Stoic and a best-selling author whose latest book is called Wisdom Takes Work: Learn, Apply, Repeat.

Please welcome Ryan Holliday.

Yes.

Okay, thank you for coming.

Of course.

Through the Daily Stoic, you have brought the philosophy of Stoicism to millions.

But it's a little bit easier to read about it than actually do it.

I was biking my kids through Prospect Park, trying to get to the zoo.

There was a farmer's market.

Took a couple wrong turns.

Now we're lost.

Yes.

Now the five-year-old's saying, Dad, you always get lost.

Now the two-year-old's crying.

And I literally said, you you know what?

F you, Ryan Hollywood.

Because it's easy when I'm reading it, but in action, it can be trickier.

How do you manage that?

Well, nothing tests your stoicism quite like having little kids.

I have two little ones myself.

And actually, my oldest hit my youngest the other day, and then he hit him back.

And I said, hey, you guys can't do that.

And the oldest said to the youngest, you know, you don't control what happens.

You only control how you respond to what happens.

Yes.

And I said, that's not how this stoicism thing actually works.

So, yeah, look, it's a constant challenge.

But that is what philosophy is.

It's not supposed to be this abstract theoretical thing that you do on college campuses.

You do it when your kid wakes up in the middle of the night.

You do it when your kid is sick and your mind is immediately extrapolating that this is the worst thing that could ever happen and what does it mean?

And it's supposed to stop the anxiety spiral.

It's for the practical problems of life of which our kids are the cause of many of them.

It's something very comforting and knowing that

people 2,000 years ago experienced the same thing but not only experienced it, wrote guidelines on how to help us with that.

Yeah, I mean look, Mark Siriles' son is Comodus, so if you've seen the movie Gladiator, Joaquin Phoenix's character gets it pretty close.

So

he knew about the challenges of parenting people too also.

Yes, yes, and in the arena.

um

i mean that deserved a little more than what i

no uh there's a passage in marketius's meditations where he talks about not wanting to get up early in the morning right and he says you know but it's warmer here under the covers and then he says to himself you know is this what you were put here to do right to huddle under the covers and stay warm and so so these

although they wore togas and sometimes had names that we can't pronounce they were dealing with the same problems that we are and always will be dealing with, you know,

annoying and obnoxious people.

He opens meditations with that.

The people you will meet today will be obnoxious and annoying and difficult and problematic.

And it's true, and they will be like that.

But what the philosophy is about is how do you respond to that?

How do you not let it suck you in?

How do you not let it make you angry and bitter and annoying yourself?

Yeah.

How do you let it not own you?

Yes.

Yeah.

In the book, Wisdom Takes Work, there's four cardinal virtues of stoicism.

Courage, discipline, justice, wisdom.

Look, I'm busy.

If I just have to do one of these,

courage, discipline, justice, wisdom.

I'm hoping, I don't know how I could do justice, but

yeah.

What's your thoughts?

Well, they're all inseparable.

They're distinct yet inseparable from each other.

Believe me, when I sat down to tackle this series of books, if I could have gotten away with only writing one,

I would have done it.

I think it's hard to subtract justice from any of the other virtues.

And at the same time, wisdom is the most essential in that it tells us what is or isn't just, how to bring that justice into the world, what to be courageous about, what is the moderate, the temperate, or the disciplined amount of something.

What's too much, what's too little.

So they're very difficult to separate from each other.

I tried, believe me.

But they all inform and shape each other.

But I think it is very hard to be a stupid person in the world, right?

No one has it harder than the unwise person, right?

You need wisdom.

Life is a thinking person's game.

And it will eat you up and tear you apart if you don't have the ability to make sense of things, to discern.

This skill of discernment is sort of the ultimate life skill.

So that's the most important.

You know, we use the word calibration around the Daily Show a lot.

Because this is a machine that keeps going every day, you have to constantly tinker and calibrate.

And I was reading your book, and there's so many fun pages and great anecdotes and quotes, but I was thinking wisdom to me in so many ways is calibrating our life with, I've done too much of this, now we move over here.

And I really enjoyed that.

You did mention at the end of the book, that you dropped out of college.

I thought that was interesting that you did the end of the book with it because

the beginning of the book, I might have been like, well, am I reading this?

Sure, sure.

But

you talk about schooling versus education.

Yes.

What does that mean to you?

You know, I'm actually lucky I got into college at all because I wrote my college admissions essay on the distinction between schooling and education.

Yes.

And needless to say, the acceptance letters did not come rolling in.

I'm sure they thought you were ballsy.

That was a funny thing that you shared.

Yeah, I mean, look, social intelligence is a form of wisdom, which I was clearly lacking at 17 years old.

You got to know your audience.

But there is a difference between schooling and education.

You can have all the degrees in the world and not be a particularly wise or intelligent person.

At the same time, you can skip school or you can drop out of school provided that you go and you make yourself a student of wise people and the collective wisdom of humanity.

You talk about being a disciple of experience.

Sure.

Which means.

Well, there's this dichotomy between.

Yes, you say yes to everything.

Is that what that means?

Well, I mean,

even just scrolling through your social media, you know, you're doing a lot of stuff.

I try.

Like, the Greek word for idiot meant a person who did not participate in public affairs.

Wow.

So if you are only reading or you're only staying in the classroom, you're going to have obviously a stunted view of things.

You have to have experiences.

At the same time, there's a lot of people who've been alive for a long time that clearly didn't pick up much wisdom along the way either.

So what I'm saying, it's learn, apply, repeat.

That is sort of the cycle.

Wisdom is the byproduct of that cycle.

You learn, you're taught, you read, then you try to apply it in the real world, and then you've got to reflect on that and try to get a little bit better next time.

And if you believe you've arrived at wisdom,

probably don't have it.

You're dumb.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But the people that believe they're certain

won't even take the steps necessary to learn wisdom.

This is the conundrum of life.

And, you know, I think so many men in particular are drawn to Daily Stoic.

As a man myself who really enjoys

your books and your YouTube and your Instagram, I see men in leadership positions now and I don't connect.

I see our current administration.

I see a lot of the podcasters and I think it's hard for me to connect with them.

I don't feel like those are the men I want to be.

It doesn't seem like a healthy balance.

Elon Musk, this brilliant, brilliant man, and now it seems like he's a cautionary tale to men.

How do you feel that so many men are, you know, you are their stoic?

Or how would the Stoics advise you to be in this position?

Yeah, I feel like I'm one of the few

male influencer types that did not become radicalized or red-pilled.

So,

like, stoicism is not supposed to make you a better sociopath or a bigger asshole.

That's not what this is.

That's the ethical component.

Yeah, right?

I think Elon Musk was on Joe Rogan and he said, you know, empathy is going to cause the destruction of Western civilization.

That is a profoundly stupid thing to say and think.

Well, you talk about him a lot.

You talk about him a lot in the book, and it seems like part of the point you're making is maybe here's a brilliant man who's done a lot of amazing things but wasn't on this path to wisdom.

I mean, to say that Elon Musk is not smart is like saying he's not rich.

He's clearly very smart.

But that is what is so scary about it, that you could be so brilliant, so gifted, so informed,

you could have been so successful, and then social media can still break your brain.

Right.

And it did.

It did.

This is a guy who went from reading Soviet rocket manuals to figure out the aeronautics business to following like Cat Turd 7 on Twitter

and Russian bots from whom he now gets his information and his worldview.

And that is, I think, a tale as old as time.

You become successful, you think that you're smart, and that is when you start to get real dumb.

Because, as the Stoics say, it's impossible to learn that which you think you already know.

I know.

I read that in here, and I had to kind of stop and walk around and ruminate on that.

And then I said, am I a dumbass that I can't even figure out that sentence?

But it starts to make sense.

Well, you know, the Athenians send someone to the Temple of Apollo to ask the Oracle of Delphi, you know, is there anyone wiser than Socrates?

And the answer comes back, there's no one wiser than Socrates.

Now, this is baffling to Socrates himself.

He says, because I don't feel wiser than anyone else.

And that was precisely the point.

From the humility,

he is wise.

You know, the Socratic method is him walking around Athens, asking questions, not lecturing them on what he knows.

He's genuinely curious.

And from that curiosity and from that humility, it becomes possible to learn.

Like the thing about being a know-it-all is it is a self-fulfilling prophecy because it becomes impossible for you to know anything more than you currently know.

I feel in general as a society, we have...

We're asking so many less questions.

Sure.

And you talk a little bit about two ears, one mouth.

I just feel like like if we asked more questions, if those in power asked more questions, we might be better off.

Yeah, and of course.

And those in power need to be challenged and asked questions also.

Yeah, correct.

Correct.

Thank you for talking with me.

I kind of am forgetting about the audience and just trying to bleed your brain for as much knowledge.

But with kids, I mean, how can I help instill stoicism in these young, annoying brats when

it's a now culture.

It is a TikTok.

It is, you know, when the internet came out, never make a video over three minutes.

Now it's like, don't make a video over 35 seconds.

I want my kids to take a deep breath and read books and calm down, but what are some tricks I can use?

Yeah, I mean, look, you're not going to teach them stoicism unless you're modeling stoicism.

Well, I'm not going to do that.

Okay.

So I got to do it too.

Yes, you've got to do it.

And I think

that is the mess that we're in, which is that

we were taught values as a society and then our leaders don't embody them in any way shape or form right right

but yes yes but we can improve that by doing it ourselves yeah so like look you were you and I are not president we don't run the world we don't control so much of what's happening but we control how we act like we might want to see less cruelty more decency more honesty more kindness

you know more competence.

Well, let's start at home, right?

Like, how are you doing those things?

It's so easy to despair about what's happening in Washington or Brussels,

but we all have our own domains,

what the Stokes would call our circles of control.

And that's a lot.

And it's a lot, and it makes a difference.

If we all do our thing well, and we do it with courage and discipline and justice and wisdom, it makes a huge difference.

And yeah, our kids are, people think about multi-generational impact.

Well there it is at your house and you're neglecting it to you know yell at someone on social media.

I want to briefly just talk to you about how much research you did on Abraham Lincoln.

Abraham Lincoln comes up a lot in this church.

It was fascinating to hear more about him, but you really dove in.

Why is Abraham Lincoln so important?

In a way, he's the complete man that embodies all of these virtues.

Tolstoy was in this remote part of Russia, and he's talking to these tribesmen, and he's telling them these stories of history.

And they said, but you haven't told us about the greatest man of them all.

They go, who are you talking about?

Abraham Lincoln.

And he's blown away, but he thinks, he goes, yeah, this is actually the kind of man that a nation can be proud of.

You know, Lincoln famously has his little engine that knows no rest.

That's his ambition.

But what does he use that ambition for?

It's not for his own gain, right?

It's to free a people, not to enslave a people.

And that is what greatness is.

That's what virtue is.

Like, how do you leave this place better than you found it?

And I've always been a Civil War nerd.

I've always loved Abraham Lincoln.

But you sit down to write.

I think people think there's such a thing as writer's block.

There isn't.

Writer's block is you haven't done the work, you don't have the material.

And so

I thought I'd read enough about Lincoln, and there was about another 5,000 pages left for me to read.

But that's what books are: the distillation of other books and other people's experiences.

And

I love what I get to do because I get to nerd out about stuff.

Can you imagine how many Instagram followers Abraham Lincoln would have if he was alive today?

This book sits next to my bed because I can grab any page and read it and feel like I'm feeding my brain.

Thank you for writing it.

Thank you for being here.

Wisdom Takes Work is available now.

Be sure to check out his Gaily Stoic podcast, Ryan Holiday.

We'll take a quick break.

We'll be right back after this.

Thank you, man.

Thank you for all the time.

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That's our show for tonight.

Now here it is, your moment of Zen.

What do you think is going to happen?

Does Donald Trump get the check for $230?

If I had to guess, I would guess that they'll give him a check and he'll be happy and the Democrats will complain and some Republicans will complain and the page will turn and we'll move on to the next controversy.

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