00:13:48 · Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang, Aditya Agarwal
[00:13:48] S2: It's pretty fancy. [00:13:50] S0: Yeah. It's like, I am around these people and I just think to myself, like, you know, these people are a slice of a slice of a slice very often. And like, I don't think it defines reality. That's And the main so then when I try and figure out what defines reality, I just look for numbers and I'm like, okay, this is the closest thing I can find to it. And then I try and follow those. I took a test a little while ago trying to identify my political alignment by personality, and I came up completely neutral. Like, was, you know, I'm just pretty much... [00:14:30] S2: You can feel that in in I think in very in very good ways. [00:14:33] S1: In that case, Andrew, you strike me as one of the people who maybe I've met who has the highest score on agency. Because most people have all these provocative ideas, but they don't act upon it. They just have theories. But you actually have the remarkable tendency to go and actually do something about it. And you've done this multiple times. That's very rare, even in Silicon Valley, which I think is probably the best crucible for high agency in the world, in my opinion. But you having done so in multiple domains, that's very rare. Yeah. [00:15:04] S0: Well, thank you. I mean, certainly see Silicon Valley as the crucible. And when I spend time there, I get invigorated. I feel like, oh yeah, these are people who are doing things. I just think I've picked different domains that a smart person would avoid, like the plague, like politics.
00:15:04 · Andrew Yang, Mark Jacobstein, Mark Jacobstein
[00:15:04] S0: Well, thank you. I mean, certainly see Silicon Valley as the crucible. And when I spend time there, I get invigorated. I feel like, oh yeah, these are people who are doing things. I just think I've picked different domains that a smart person would avoid, like the plague, like politics. [00:15:24] S2: It's a tough lifestyle. I still give, you know, your wife a lot of credit for sort of letting you go do that, I I gotta say. [00:15:30] S0: Yeah. I mean, I I visited Iowa 25 times and Italy zero times in my life. So [00:15:37] S3: I know. That's a problem.
00:15:37 · Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang
[00:15:37] S3: I know. That's a problem. [00:15:39] S0: And some distinct travel itineraries. But I felt, by the way, you'll appreciate this, Aditya, from that comment. If someone starts a business and you ask them how much time are you going to put into this? They'll be like, I have no idea, but it's probably at least a minimum of five years because companies take a while. And so when I decided to run for president, I said, I just need to do everything perfectly in my power for realistically was only like two years and three months. I declared in February 2018, and also not being diluted, I thought it was probably going to end before the end of the nomination process. So I was like, okay, I just need to be awesome and nearly superhuman for two years. Which if you were to say to an entrepreneur, can you do that? They'd be like, I can do two years. I can do two years of just about anything, you know? Whereas starting a company like I am doing now with Noble Mobile, it's like, if you said, Hey, I'm gonna do this for two years, you're a fucking terrible entrepreneur because you're like, What the fuck are gonna get done in two years? So in a way, I tried to frame it as like running for president was actually easier than some other
00:16:58 · Mark Jacobstein
[00:16:58] S2: undertakings. And more highly leveraged. I mean, is one of these things, you live in Silicon Valley for long enough and we like to think we're sort of the center of the universe and the companies that we build are going to change the most impactful thing you can do in human society. And I don't wanna underestimate the importance of technological advancement, but president of The United States runs a pretty... Has a pretty big budget and a pretty big finger on the lever as we know for good or for bad. And so I I do think it's it's interesting. Sometimes you get people from DC out here and they're like, you know, people in Silicon Valley are kind of full of themselves. I think it's a it's a useful perspective and reminder every once in a while.
00:17:37 · Andrew Yang, Mark Jacobstein, Mark Jacobstein
[00:17:37] S0: Well, this is a frustration I'm going to express to you guys. I I just wanna share this with you too. So I can prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that I had no intention of running for president as late as 2017 because Venture for America operated in 12 cities, and none of them were in Iowa or New Hampshire. I could easily have been like, hey, we're gonna roll out in Iowa City and Manchester, New Hampshire, and I never did because I had no intention of running for that office. One of the things that moved me was watching the Republican presidential primary debates in 2016 and thinking, these people are fucking terrible. Like, you know, you watch them. And some of them, I'm sure, like maybe some of you know and worked with Carly Fiorina as an example. But like, I watched a bunch of these others and I was like, these guys, man, like, I'm like... I mean, I didn't... I even... Then at that point, I did not think like, oh, I'm gonna do this myself. But I thought, I'm at least as smart as these guys, and I'm pretty sure I have better ideas and better intentions. And I'm sure there are a lot of folks in Silicon Valley to that point, Mark, who are like, hey, I'm smarter than these people. Like, I think I can do a better job. But then they don't actually run [00:18:50] S3: They don't [00:18:50] S2: actually do it.
00:18:50 · Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang
[00:18:50] S2: actually do it. [00:18:51] S0: You know? Unless the name is Tom Steyer or like a couple of people that have gone down this past. And so that step... Look, I don't think everyone should run for president, though I do think more people should run for president. I think that would be better, interesting, more dynamic. There's that sense that so many folks I know from some of these elite circles look and say, like, I could do better, but then they... Their life is too good, you know, and then they stop there. [00:19:20] S2: So it's interesting. I I haven't thought about this as to whether or not it is that their life is too good or that even for the folks who are entrepreneurs, like, I'm gonna change the world and make a business and it's super hard to do, think, like, running for president, that's crazy. I mean, like, who am I to run for president? I I still... I mean, I do remember the day you... We we met at Guardant Health, you were like, I'm running for president. And I literally thought to myself, president of what? Because it is such a... Like, the idea is you do it from the establishment. You you weren't already a congressman or a senator or like it's it's it's just a very odd idea, and it shouldn't be. Like, we're a democracy. Like, our our original framers, like, they were [00:19:56] S0: two rules. It's just natural born citizen and 35 years of age. There's not like, and you have to be an office holder, and you have to do this. Like, no. No. [00:20:03] S2: And very importantly, you can only have done it for a total of eight years.