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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Is Trump Losing His Grip on GOP After Multiple Setbacks; History Making Lawmaker, Nancy Pelosi; Scott Galloway Tackles the Male Loneliness Crisis in New Book; Scott Galloway Offers Advice For Young Men In New Memoir; One-On-One With Mentalist Oz Pearlman; "Flying Cars" Now A Reality. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired November 28, 2025 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: ... report, and thanks so much to all of you for joining us. AC360 starts now.
[20:00:07]
JOHN BERMAN, CNN HOST: Tonight on 360, from judges, smacking down his retribution campaign to a key MAGA ally, leaving his side to a string of blue wins at the ballot box, is it too soon to ask? Has President Trump lost his political touch? Three top professionals from across the partisan spectrum tackle that question.
Plus, in her first interview, since announcing she is retiring, Anderson's exclusive conversation with House Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi who has seen more history than many lawmakers ever will and accomplished more than most of her predecessors all men ever did.
And later, Scott Galloway on the crisis he sees facing boys and men today. What's causing it and how to fight it?
Good evening. John Berman here in for Anderson. And we begin tonight with a fact that is no less true now than it was the day last January that Donald Trump took the oath of office. He is, by definition, a lame duck President, just like any other second term President.
That said, for the last nine months or so, he's done better than most in keeping that simple fact from view until now. In just the last few weeks, he's seen every single Republican senator and House member, but one, vote to release the Epstein files, something he had been resisting successfully for two months until a GOP rebellion forced him to get on board.
He watched Democrats romped to victory earlier this month in key races across the country in blue, purple and even red states. He found himself hosting one of those victors, New York Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani at the White House, a man he's often called a communist who often called him a fascist, something the President said was just fine by him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Are you affirming that you think President Trump is a fascist? ZOHRAN MAMDANI, MAYOR-ELECT NEW YORK: I've spoken about --
DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: That's okay. You can just say it.
MAMDANI: Okay.
TRUMP: It's easier. It's easier than explaining it. I don't mind.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: That actually happened, and so did this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-GA): I refuse to be a battered wife, hoping it all goes away and gets better. If I am cast aside by the President and the MAGA political machine and replaced by neocons, big pharma, big tech, military industrial war complex, foreign leaders and the elite donor class that can never, ever relate to real Americans, then many common Americans have been cast aside and replaced as well.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: That's Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene with the "M" in Marjorie standing for MAGA, or at least once did. She announced she is leaving Congress mid-term. Her departure announcement, followed by a new report that other Republicans were considering doing the same, potentially flipping the House even before next year's midterms.
Then came a judge tossing the cases against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, knocking the wind out of the President's retribution campaign against former adversaries. That difficulty is coming up with a replacement for Obamacare subsidies in the face of soaring premiums and more, all of it making a once nearly invincible political juggernaut suddenly seem mortal in raising the question, if it walks like a lame duck. You know the rest.
Joining us now, former special adviser to President Obama, Van Jones, journalist and Lift Our Voices co-founder Gretchen Carlson and Republican strategist and former Trump campaign adviser David Urban. Great to see you all.
So, Van, you know, look, after all these setbacks, to what extent do you think the President's grip on the Republican party is weakening? And is it fair to say that the lame duck is setting in?
VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, look, I don't know about his grip on the Republican Party because they seem to be like, you know, pretty much shellacked in. But you're starting to see the fizz come out of the soda. There was this moment where it seemed like this dude was an unstoppable juggernaut. When they first got in there, they had a playbook. They were running it. They were in full control, full command. It was shock and awe. shock and awe. This Epstein thing seems to have been his waterloo. That's the waterloo. All of a sudden, people are like, hold on a second, guys. I love this President, I don't love pedophiles. What are you asking from me? And once you have a moment where the spell is broken and suddenly people are like, hold on a second. There's certain things I don't want to do. They start thinking about other things they may not want to do. And so, I think the air is starting to come out of the tires.
BERMAN: So, Gretchen, what about that point? Because you've spoken about this, to what extent do you think that the Epstein situation was a waterloo, or is a waterloo for President Trump?
GRETCHEN CARLSON, JOURNALIST AND LIFT OUR VOICES CO-FOUNDER: How ironic that it would be something about sexual misconduct that would be the breaking apart of MAGA. Look, I've said for a long time that he wasn't able to control the influencers out there. But now to Van's point, I do believe that the Epstein file vote will go down in history as the break potentially where Republicans in Congress feel like they don't have to do everything that Trump says. And we're seeing that play out now.
This week we saw the Obamacare subsidy package that Trump tried to propose get shot down and go into some sort of a delay that would have never happened before. We saw Senator Rand Paul say that MAGA will completely dissolve if they continue to fund Ukraine or if they invade Venezuela.
I mean, you've seen these breaks. You're seeing more and more Republicans going secretly to reporters and saying that there are going to be more resignations. I think that this will go down in history as a pivotal moment when potentially, Republicans got their own spines back.
[20:05:41]
BERMAN: So, David, Van did mention that President Trump's grip on the Republican Party writ large might be safe. And, David, I also know you're an avid watcher of CNN News Central, airing Monday through Friday, 7:00 to 10:00 A.M. and you saw a conversation that I had with Harry Enten the other day where harry crunched the numbers and he found that 87 percent of Republicans say they approve of President Trump's job right now, just like they did six months ago, 87 percent, no change, that's pretty stable. And it's pretty high. And it's much higher than it was for George W. Bush or Barack Obama at this stage of their second term in office. So, to what extent --
DAVID URBAN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Exactly, John, exactly.
BERMAN: But is there a difference, is there a difference between the party around the country and maybe some people in Congress?
URBAN: Yes, I do believe that's correct, right. I mean, Harry and you, that was a great segment you guys did, pointing out that George W. Bush, Barack Obama far below Trump, they were at 78 percent at this point in their second terms, Trump is at 87 percent. That's a staggering approval rating amongst the base. And so, you know, we've been here before. Trump's dead, remember, Trump's dead, oh move on. And guess what. You know he rises like a phoenix from the ashes. The Epstein vote was definitely a blackeye for the administration. They didn't they really read the read the room on that one for a long, long time. Can't really understand what the game plan was from jump street on that. But to your point about -- is there little bit of a schism in the House?
I think Marjorie Taylor Greene may have been the canary in the coal mine a bit on that, where she's saying, look, walking the plank for Donald Trump time and time again. But yet, you know, he's not being loyal to us. And you know, I saw the reporting this morning that said some House members were griping about having to walk the plank. And there was going to be, you know, defections. But until their names after those quotes, I don't take them too seriously, right.
If you don't have the guts to put your name in a quote and you're giving to a reporter and you're talking about the administration or about your job, then I think you're not that serious. If you did, you'd put your name behind it and really, you know, make yourself be heard.
So, I do think there's some concern amongst the Congress on these health care subsidies, on affordability and all the things that average Americans care about and talk about. And we'll vote on coming up in the midterms. And so, I do think there's some, you know, some degree of nervousness in the Congress and I think the White House is sensitive to that.
BERMAN: So, Van, David brought up Marjorie Taylor Greene said, maybe a canary in a coal mine. I guess my follow up is, is who are the canaries? You know and what's the gas or the toxic fumes that are killing them? I mean, if they are, if she is sending a message and others may be feeling the same thing, what exactly are they feeling?
JONES: Well, as best I can tell, they're starting to see some disaffection setting in for people who were hoping that Trump was going to give them more economic relief than they're getting. For all the crazy stuff that Trump is doing, seeking the Pentagon on people, the FBI on people running on gallivanting all around the world, people's economic pain hasn't changed at all. In fact, it's gotten worse.
And so, you're talking about farmers who are losing their farms after voting for Donald Trump and the tariffs haven't helped them at all. You're talking about people who are young, people who are enthusiastic for Trump and graduated off a cliff into no jobs, and he's not even talking about their pain, I think there's -- I think the people like her who are very close to the base are starting to sense that there is some real disappointment headed toward disaffection. And that is what I think the gas is now.
I thought what was remarkable about what she did. She didn't just resign. She created a whole video that was eight or nine- minute long kind of discussion of exactly how the MAGA base is feeling divorced from this President. She made it personal to her, but she wasn't speaking just for herself. And so, I would take that very seriously. When you have in the same day, Donald Trump, you know, yukking it up with Zohran Mamdani and Marjorie Taylor Greene calling herself a battered wife. That's a bad sign for a political movement.
BERMAN: Let's listen to a little bit of what she said in that aforementioned video, which was, you know, remarkable, to say the least.
[20:10:09]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GREENE: I raged against my own Speaker and my own party for refusing to proactively work diligently to pass the plan to save Americans' health care and protect Americans from outrageous, overpriced and unaffordable health insurance policies. The House should have been in session, working every day to fix this disaster.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: So, Gretchen, that's a Republican, Marjorie Taylor Greene, I just want to remind people splitting from the President and bringing up health care as the reason. So, what does that mean for the next few months, do you think?
CARLSON: I think she's the new leader of MAGA. I think that this is also going to go down as history in history, as an incredibly important break. I don't think she's changed her policies at all, but she's speaking for the disaffected people that Van just talked about, that potentially don't see Trump as doing what he said he was going to do for them.
This was political genius on her part. Whoever has been advising her over the last month will also go down in history as being a genius. She is far from over. I have no idea what she's going to do next, whether she runs for governor in Georgia or she decides she's running for President, even though she says she's not. She is going to be a huge leader in MAGA moving forward.
BERMAN: Everyone, thank you so much. We've got some time to talk about this going forward.
Next, Anderson's conversation with retiring House Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi on the Washington she is leaving in her hope that the politics she once knew might one day return.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "ANDERSON COOPER: 360": Do you think things will ever return to kind of an era where people do kind of work across the aisles?
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): Yes, I think so. I think so. That's where it was before and we have an obligation to try.
(END VIDEO CLIP) (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:17:01]
BERMAN: Anderson was on Capitol Hill for an exclusive conversation with Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi. This was her first interview since announcing her retirement. She has worked with seven presidents and one historic first. The first, and so far only female Speaker of the House.
Pelosi also gave Anderson a tour of the National Statuary Hall in the Capitol and spoke more about what history she has witnessed beginning with January 6th.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: When you walk through here, how much do you think about January 6th?
PELOSI: Well, I think about January 6th, but here and also in the rotunda. Then that's under the dome that Lincoln built. So this is -- they defecated on the floor. That's what they did, these patriots, hostages, they defecated on the floor. That's what they did here.
COOPER: Do you think history will remember what actually happened here?
PELOSI: I think so, I think so. I think there is going to be a lot of, shall we say, rehabilitation.
Now, when I became Speaker, I want you to know that I wanted to have more women. So we added two -- we have Rosa Parks there. Rosa Parks said she wanted to be seated in her statue as if she were on the bus.
COOPER: Oh, really? She said that?
PELOSI: Yes. She did.
COOPER: Will you miss this?
PELOSI: No, I mean, I was here for almost 39 years. No, I mean, I will still come here and all of that.
COOPER: In terms of presidents you've worked with, who stands out to you?
PELOSI: Well, Barack Obama, that's for sure and Joe Biden was a fabulous, fabulous president. But I had good relationships, passed significant legislation with George W. Bush. I loved his father.
We had our moments, but I loved his father. And with George W. Bush, it was war in Iraq, which I completely opposed. But we got along. We passed one of the biggest energy bills in the history of our country. It was, the Energy Bill of 2007.
COOPER: Do you think things will ever return to kind of an era where people do kind of work across the aisles?
PELOSI: Yes, I think so. I think so. That's where it was before and we have an obligation to try. We just have an obligation to try to be bipartisan, to be transparent so people know what's happening, and also to be accountable to the public. I say those three things go together.
Some of my good friends that I work with even now on human rights around the world are on the Republican side. So we still have some connections on issues.
So when the kids come here, I always say to them, when you see these statues and you see them all around Washington, they are to respect and honor those who have gone before, people whose statues there want us to be looking to the future and working for a better future for our children, for our posterity.
COOPER: So, a lot of history are on us.
[20:20:10]
PELOSI: All right, there she is, Cleo. Cleo is the god of -- the muse of history and she is writing down everything. I keep saying to members, she is writing down everything she hears you say here.
COOPER: What do you think she is recording about the history of our times right now?
PELOSI: What do you think? She was writing on January 6th? I am appalled.
COOPER: She was there on January 6th. She saw it all.
PELOSI: Yes, she saw it all. She was there. She was there.
COOPER: Are you optimistic about America?
PELOSI: You have to be optimistic about America. It is America. It is the United States of America. What did I hear them say yesterday about the American Revolution was the greatest underdog victory of all time, because we were -- who we were against the greatest naval power in the world and they had that optimism to win, the vision of a free country, liberty. It didn't even exist, right, until then?
So that's our heritage and they did what they did for themselves and their posterity and that's what we have to do for our posterity, honoring their vision.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Coming up, next, why are so many young men and boys falling behind? Author and podcast host, Scott Galloway about the biggest dangers facing them? And what can be done about it?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SCOTT GALLOWAY, PROFESSOR OF MARKETING, NYU STERN SCHOOL OF BUSINESS AND COHOST OF "THE PIVOT PODCAST": The right has incorrectly, and I think, stupidly, conflated masculinity with coarseness and cruelty and I don't think that's working.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:26:04]
COOPER: There is a crisis facing boys and young men in this country, and my next guest, author and podcaster, Scott Galloway, says it affects everything from their ability to form friendships, go out on dates, find jobs, find purpose in their lives.
Scott is the host of "Prof G Pod" and co-host of "The Pivot" and "Raging Moderates" podcasts. He is a best-selling author, and his latest book is "Notes on Being a Man." And Scott joins me now.
I want to read to you. You write in this book: Algorithmically generated content on social media contributes to and profits from young men's growing social isolation, boredom and ignorance with the deepest pocketed firms on the planet trying to convince young men that they can have a reasonable facsimile of life on a screen. Many grow up without acquiring the skills to build social capital or create wealth."
The statistics are insane, like 45 percent of men, 18 to 25 have never approached a woman in person.
GALLOWAY: Never asked a woman out in person and what they're up against, think about it, you could largely describe America right now as a giant bet on A.I. Ten companies have driven all the growth and GDP are responsible for 77 percent of the earnings growth.
Our economy literally rests on ten companies now, often referred to as the Magnificent Ten and they do several things, but quite frankly, they are in the business of enragement, polarization and then sequestering young people from all other activities.
COOPER: And that's only getting worse given where A.I. is going. I mean, with like agents and chatbots who are, you know, sexually-clad anime type figures chatting with young men.
GALLOWAY: Well, it starts pretty innocent. When you use A.I., have you noticed the prompts that are almost irresistible at the end? Let me put this into a series of tweets. Before you know it, you're three hours deep.
But effectively these companies have attached the entire economy and literally trillions of dollars to trying to get people to or trying to convince young people, specifically young men who are more susceptible because, quite frankly, their prefrontal cortices isn't as developed to try and convince them they can have a reasonable facsimile of life online. Why go through the hierarchy of trying to make friends? It is not easy, right? Why try to figure out how to navigate a corporate -- you know, all of this when you can go on Reddit or Discord and find friends, or you can trade crypto or stocks on Robinhood or Coinbase? And why, Anderson, would you go through the rejection, the dressing well, the effort, the expense, the humiliation, developing a kindness practice of trying to establish a romantic partnership when you have literally lifelike synthetic porn.
So what are we doing? I think we have our economy is attached to one objective, and that is to evolve a new species of asocial, asexual males. Unintentionally, we have an economic interest, right now. I would argue, in planning our own extinction.
COOPER: So, I mean, what do you do? I mean, because this juggernaut is not about to slow down any time soon, the A.I. juggernaut.
GALLOWAY: I think there is a variety of things you can do, starting very young. I think you need to redshirt boys.
COOPER: You have you have boys. I have two boys.
GALLOWAY: Two boys.
COOPER: It is terrifying when you look at these stats.
GALLOWAY: I think, a couple of things. Education. We need to redshirt young boys. They're just less mature. And you're going to see as you get older. My 15-year-old has a party. The boys are dope. Some of the 15-year-old girls could be the junior senator from Pennsylvania.
COOPER: I see that in four-year-olds.
GALLOWAY: So redshirt start kids in kindergarten at six. Get more men involved in K through 12 where 70 to 80 percent are women who are naturally going to champion people who remind them of themselves. Boys need more male role models.
Immediately have a social zeitgeist where the moment a boy comes off the tracks, which is typically when he loses a male role model. At that point, he is more likely to be incarcerated than graduate from college. Whereas girls in single parent homes have the same outcomes. It ends up that boys, while being physically stronger, are emotionally and neurologically much weaker.
[20:30:10]
COOPER: And yet, also, I mean, at age three and four, I see it already, girls have the vocabulary, or at least the desire, to talk about what they did in school, whereas boys, it's like getting, pulling out teeth.
GALLOWAY: The reality is our brain doesn't catch up until they're 25, goes into college. Any school, any college, in my view, that has over a billion dollar endowment and isn't growing its freshman class faster than population growth should lose its tax-free status because it's not a public servant, it's a hedge fund with classes.
And my industry is so corrupt that we've decided the ultimate way to create artificial scarcity and extract more margin from middle-class homes is to limit our supply. Dartmouth sits on $8 billion endowment, lets in 1,100 people, which is what a good Starbucks serves in a weekend. There's no reason why they couldn't let in 11,000, quite frankly.
More vocational programming, and quite frankly, put more money in their pockets. We've had tax and fiscal policies for the last 40 years that have made my generation, on average, 72 percent wealthier than we were 40 years ago, and people under the age of 40, 24 percent less wealthy. So what do you have? 60 percent of 30-year-olds used to have one child in the house 40 years ago. Now it's 27 percent.
So we have, they're up against technology, trying to separate them from their friends, make them less mammalia. We have fiscal policies, quite frankly, making them less wealthy. And then we have social media reminding them 210 times a day that they're failing. And what do you know, they wake up at 30, they're more obese, anxious, and depressed. And if we don't, my generation has a debt.
We had -- we recognize America from 1955 to 2000 garnered a third of the world's growth with 5 percent of the population. And then within that 5 percent, 30 percent of us who were born white heterosexual males got the majority of that prosperity. So there's a natural gag reflex when I start talking and advocating for young men.
But the reality is, my advantage, my privilege, they should not have to pay the price for it. People in my generation have a debt. When we need to get more emotionally involved in their lives, men aren't stepping up. In this city, there are three times as many women applying to be big sisters as there are men applying to be big brothers.
And then we have figured out, when I say we, my generation, how to vote ourselves more money. And we keep extracting more and more capital from young people to old. The prices of housing have gone absolutely crazy. The price of education has gone crazy because we've realized the way to get our houses more expensive is through a lack of permits, make it more difficult for people to get in college.
And what do you know, the child tax credit gets stripped out of the infrastructure bill, but the $120 billion cost of living adjustment and Social Security flies right through. So they have less money, less opportunity. And we also have to acknowledge a basic reality, 75 percent of women say that economic viability is important in a mate. Only 25 percent of men state that.
Beyonce could work at McDonald's and marry Jay-Z. The other way couldn't -- would not happen. So when you have the pool, men mate socioeconomically horizontally and down, women horizontally and up. And when the pool of horizontal and up, in other words, economically and emotionally viable men, keep shrinking, we have less household formation. And just to finish off this word salad, the cartoon of a woman in her 30s who doesn't find romantic love and what a tragedy she's living alone with her cats. That's not the tragedy. She's fine.
Men need relationships much more than women. A widow is happier after her husband dies. A widower is less happy. Women in relationships live two to four years longer. Men in relationships four to seven years longer. The -- the zone of self-harm and suicide for a man is the year after he gets divorced, when he loses primary relationship.
And what is the reason, the biggest cause for divorce amongst young people? It's financial strain. We need to put more money in their pockets. We need an education system that restores sort of bias or fixes the bias for women. And we basically need to level up all young people, which will disproportionately help young men.
COOPER: Do you see any -- anyone in the political sphere? I mean, we had Wes Moore, governor of Maryland, he has -- has talked about this publicly. He -- he just tried to focus on young men, but you don't hear this conversation very often.
GALLOWAY: I'll tell you Anderson, the -- the conversation has become so much more productive. Five years ago, when I started advocating for men, the immediate gag reflex, and I understand it was your Andrew Tate with an NBA and you got shamed.
And when I went to the Democratic National Convention, they talked about every special interest group on the except for the one that had fallen furthest, fastest young men. And the people who are leading this fight and made the conversation much more productive. Very simple, mothers, who see what's going on.
And the dialogue was something like this. I got three kids, two daughters, one son, one daughter, a pen, one daughter and P.R. And my son is in the basement playing video games and vaping. Mothers see this. Governor Moore, Governor Newsome, a lot of senators are basically talking about for the first time they are coming out and saying there is a problem with our young men.
[20:35:09]
Governor Moore has said he's going to devote is the next year to the struggles facing young men and to boys. This has become a much more productive dialogue.
COOPER: Scott Galloway, thank you. Appreciate it. A lot to learn. The new book is "Notes on Being a Man." And something to make you smile, the end of the broadcast mentalist, Oz Pearlman, who seems to do the impossible.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OZ PEARLMAN, AUTHOR, "READ YOUR MIND": Close your eyes. Don't peek. Close your eyes. I just want to show the viewer at home. Keep your eyes closed for me, Anderson. Open your eyes. That's why you did this. You personally put them together. What's the first letter of this person's name? The first letter.
COOPER: M. PEARLMAN: M, M.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:40:23]
COOPER: Have you ever wished you could read people better? Mentalist Oz Perlman can, and although he's often accused of being a mind reader, he claims that's not how it works. He's the author of the new book, "Read Your Mind: Proven Habits for Success from the World's Greatest Mentalists." We spoke just before airtime.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: So you don't -- you're not a magician, you're a mentalist. What is the difference?
PEARLMAN: What is the difference? So a magician, you can kind of visualize card tricks, sleight of hand, right? I fool your eyes by showing you where to look, right? Misdirection. Mentalism is where -- there's really no props. There are no cards.
I just tell people, think of a card, and I watch you and I observe, and it looks like mind reading, but it is not supernatural. I don't have any psychic powers. I'm not talking to the dead. It's a learnable skill.
COOPER: And you've written this book.
PEARLMAN: Yes.
COOPER: What -- what's the -- the purpose of the book?
PEARLMAN: So the book will not teach you to be a mentalist. Spoiler alert, anyone who buys it and goes, how did throw -- you know which ball Joe Burrow would throw to you? I'm not going to teach you that. I'm sorry, there's other books. I want to teach you the skills from what I do that are transferable, that give you an advantage in your life.
Because being able to read the room effectively and know what people are thinking about you and hopefully influence them, building rapport.
COOPER: Whether you're in the boardroom, classroom, wherever it may be.
PEARLMAN: Anywhere. Think about it. In your relationship with your kids, with your spouse, with somebody you -- you are selling to.
COOPER: You have five kids.
PEARLMAN: Five kids.
COOPER: So do you use -- PEARLMAN: I'm using a little mentalism on them, but they know how it works now. You know, my nine-year-old, he's like, I'm onto you, dad. But yes, there's a little bit of Jedi mind control tactics that I'm sure every parent uses. But what's funny is, in the book where I give you little elements of know how to detect deception, and is someone telling you the truth. Is this person really interested in what you're selling? And make no mistake, selling doesn't mean if you're a salesperson. You right now are selling your viewer on maintaining their eyeballs, right?
We're all selling in life. I'm selling my kids on eating their vegetables every night at dinner. So when I say selling, it's knowing the fact that how you interact with somebody, how you get them to trust you, develop deeper bonds, rapport, how to walk into a room and leave it being the most memorable person someone met that day is a huge skill in life. And it's what's allowed me to achieve success. It's not the tricks.
COOPER: All right. So what are we going to do?
PEARLMAN: What are we going to do? Well, you know what? Let's do this. Anderson Cooper 360, I came prepared. I stayed very much on trend, 360.
COOPER: I'm going to hold this.
PEARLMAN: Look at this. Look at this. You spin it around in your hands and look at various places you have traveled to, which is probably most of the globe at this point. You have really done a number on this. You've been to how many countries if you had to guesstimate? Give me a ballpark.
COOPER: Like been to, worked in --
PEARLMAN: All the above.
COOPER: -- 80 to 90.
PEARLMAN: Eighty to 90. So most of this globe, imagine that as you're looking at this globe and you're looking at different places, bam. I like to jar you out of autopilot. Something unexpected. Your phone, which is here. Imagine that you left the ringer on. You're mortified. You grab it. You're about to silence it. You turn it around. You look and you are looking at the number and the person and it just hits you where you go. I am not expecting a call from this person. I have not thought or spoken to this person in months. Close your eyes.
I'm putting you in the spot. And I want you to visualize as this scenario plays out this person's face. Can you picture their face right now?
COOPER: Yes.
PEARLMAN: Open your eyes. When was the last time you'd even thought of this person?
COOPER: Six months, eight months.
PEARLMAN: Is there any conceivable way I could know who would have popped in your head?
COOPER: No.
PEARLMAN: No way, right?
COOPER: There's no way.
PEARLMAN: Think of the number of letters in this person's first name and try to count it, but try not to show me anything. Just do it in your head. Now notice the struggle in Anderson's eyes. He's either acting very well or it's a longer name. Don't say it. Just look at me when you feel ready.
COOPER: In the full name?
PEARLMAN: First name. First name is good.
COOPER: OK.
PEARLMAN: Look at me.
COOPER: Hold on.
PEARLMAN: No, don't use your fingers. I can see your fingers, Anderson.
COOPER: No, I'm not. OK.
PEARLMAN: Open your eyes. See, I was debating that first name. I watched you and you went like this. You counted twice, so I think you miscounted the first time. You're like, I counted by one too much. You went back down. Six letters, isn't it?
COOPER: It is six letters.
PEARLMAN: It is six letters. And mixed up all the letters and you stop and you grab a letter out. Let's say you just swoop and you grab the first letter and you just focus on that one first letter. Can you do that for me?
COOPER: Yes.
PEARLMAN: It just got cold out. Your lips are a little chapped. Close your eyes. Don't peek. Close your eyes. I just want to show the viewer at home. Keep your eyes closed for me, Anderson. Open your eyes. That's why you did this. You pursed your lips. You put them together. What's the first letter of this person's name?
COOPER: The first letter.
[20:45:01]
PEARLMAN: First letter. COOPER: M.
PEARLMAN: M. M. And then keep going, keep going. It -- it's sound. It's not Michael. This is definitely a guy. Tell me who popped in your head. You imagine this person calling you. You haven't thought of them in months. What's his name?
COOPER: Full name?
PEARLMAN: Full first name.
COOPER: Milton.
PEARLMAN: Milton.
COOPER: Wow. How is that? That's bananas.
PEARLMAN: And you know what?
COOPER: That's bananas.
PEARLMAN: When you were looking at the globe, it's called the power of suggestion. You asked me how I did it. You didn't need a globe in your hands. But as you were looking and telling me I've been to so many countries, I noticed at a certain point when you thought about Milton, you look down at the globe. Not at a place. You were looking for a place, which tells me that I led the witness. You know what I said to you? I said to you, what did I say? I said, you've been to all these places.
You've had an impact on all these places and people had an impact on you. Is there a place that you thought of -- when you thought of Milton and you looked for it, where you met him or you know him from? Does that make sense?
COOPER: Yes.
PEARLMAN: That's why you looked at the globe. Hold it in front of you right here. Pacific Ocean. You can't see anything. Is there any way in the world you've ever discussed where you met Milton before this moment? Anywhere period that anybody could possibly know this?
COOPER: I mean, unlikely.
PEARLMAN: Unlikely, right? Definitely not me. Was it a city? You seem like a specific type of guy. Were you thinking of a specific city?
COOPER: A place, specific. Yes.
PEARLMAN: A city in a country?
COOPER: Yes.
PEARLMAN: You know what? Tell us.
COOPER: Not -- not a big -- not a big place. PEARLMAN: Doesn't matter.
COOPER: Very remote.
PEARLMAN: What's the city? What's the country? Tell us. Where did Milton pop in your mind and you thought of? Tell us, please. Where is it?
COOPER: Maradi, Niger.
PEARLMAN: Maradi, Niger. You know how you shine a light on different places and current events? Look down because I want you to see what I'm shining.
COOPER: I mean, give me a break.
PEARLMAN: Turn it around. If we could turn that around.
COOPER: How? Do you even know where Maradi, Niger is?
PEARLMAN: Of course, I'm in your head. I knew it before you even said it.
COOPER: What? That's crazy.
PEARLMAN: Tell them there is no way we could have known this.
COOPER: There's no way you could have known this. There's no way you could have known this. That is really crazy. That's -- I'm -- I'm a little freaked.
PEARLMAN: A little freaked out.
COOPER: Yes.
PEARLMAN: You know what? End on a high note. End on a high note. Knock this out. Imagine right now, I would like to say this. I disappear. Pow. You've interviewed hundreds of people, maybe even thousands. The number one person, if you could have right now in front of me, instead of me, somebody famous who I've heard of, dead or alive, can you visualize who the number one person you'd want to interview? Right now, can you see them in your mind?
COOPER: Famous.
PEARLMAN: Famous.
COOPER: Yes.
PEARLMAN: So here's the thing. Number one person, I bet you've mentioned before. ChatGPT would know it. So right now, you fool yourself. You don't even know. Boom. You jump. You change your mind. Number two person. So you immediately shift gears so you couldn't have known. Bam, can you picture that person?
COOPER: Sure. PEARLMAN: Look at me. Imagine you're looking at them eye to eye. I know you've met this person before. I see familiarity in your eyes. Imagine we shake hands, and I'm that person. And right now, Barack Obama is who you just thought of.
COOPER: What? Get the fuck out of here. How is that possible? How is that freaking possible? The book is "Read Your Mind." Oz Pearlman, thank you.
PEARLMAN: Thank you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[20:48:31]
COOPER: Coming up next, we'll look into what could be an electrified flying future for almost anyone.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: The concept of having your own personal flying vehicle may now be a reality, or at least a lot closer. CNN's Nick Watt got a chance to check one out. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You are clear for takeoff. Have fun.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Roger that. Clear for takeoff.
NICK WATT, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): You don't need a pilot's license. You don't even need a runway.
WATT: There. Can you see it? This is there.
WATT (voice-over): If you've ever played a video game, you can fly this thing. It's one joystick, seriously. And there's a lever to release a parachute if it all goes horribly wrong.
WATT: It looks awesome from down here. What's the feeling?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Such a great feeling. It's the best view ever. It's -- in normal aviation, you don't get to fly this low to the ground that often. So --
WATT: Oh.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- I'm getting to do it in this point of view, spectacularly.
WATT: I'm going to stop talking to you because I don't want you to crash.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Appreciate that.
WATT (voice-over): Kitty Hawk gave birth to the age of aviation. And all this might be another massive milestone in the history of flight.
WATT: It looks wrong. You know, my brain can't quite get a handle on the movement. I'm used to seeing how cars, motorbikes, airplanes move. This just moves differently. It's disconcerting. It's weird. I mean, it's awesome. It's weird.
What are we calling this? We call it like an aircraft. We call it --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
WATT: -- a flying car?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
WATT: I mean, what is it?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So technically, it's an eVTOL, which stands for Electric Vertical Take-Off and Landing.
WATT: You need a sexier acronym.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
WATT: Or sexier name.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. Exactly.
WATT: And why don't you put some wheels on it and actually make it a flying car?
KEN KARKLIN, CEO, PIVOTAL: We definitely don't have the weight budget for wheels to be taken on the road, unfortunately.
[20:55:03]
WATT: Disappointed again.
WATT (voice-over): They've got to keep it in the FAA's ultra-light category so that you don't need a license to fly. Under 254 pounds before some safety stuff.
But hey, his flying car didn't have wheels either. Listen, we've been dreaming of something like this since "The Jetsons."
Look, there's an old-fashioned land car. Pivotal says they've sold five of their first model BlackFly and trained dozens to fly them.
KARKLIN: One of them is a professional pilot. And he flies it to his airport from home.
WATT: So you do have somebody commuting already?
KARKLIN: We have a couple of people commuting.
WATT (voice-over): There is a catch. You aren't allowed to fly over so-called congested areas with lots of people and buildings. A couple of other downsides, starting price, $190,000.
And for now, the battery life is only around 20 minutes. The range only about 20 miles. Pivotal says that will improve.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got to like it.
WATT: Whoa. Jeez, Luis (ph).
WATT (voice-over): Another issue? They won't let me fly for real because I haven't practiced long enough in the VR simulator.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All the way forward.
WATT: I'll let go. Let go of the trigger?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. There you go.
WATT: Ooh. Wow. That feels great.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's cool, right?
WATT (voice-over): Ignore my histrionics. This is very easy.
WATT: I mean, this feels very cool. And I'm just pretending.
WATT (voice-over): You have to pass a test in the simulation before you can buy a Pivotal personal aircraft. It isn't a legal requirement. They say they're just being responsible.
And also, looking into uses, helpful to humanity, maybe, for getting a smoke jumper into a wildfire or getting a doctor to a hard-to-reach patient. And, of course, there's the military.
WATT: You've given them to the U.S. Air Force already?
KARKLIN: That's correct, for non-developmental testing. And now we're working with other agencies within the DOD. That said, there's, I think, an -- an amazing opportunity in recreation.
WATT (voice-over): And one pilot told me, flying a Cessna is like driving a sedate sedan. Flying this is like riding a motorcycle.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Nick, there are a bunch of companies making eVTOLs. There's a real race to -- to make this go widespread.
WATT: Oh, yes, there are a bunch of players in this space. And actually, you know, Anderson, Elon Musk just a couple of days ago hinted to Joe Rogan that he might have some sort of prototype to demo pretty shortly. Also, there's a market for the bigger vehicles, multiple seats, heavier. Joby Aviation and Archer Aviation got the green light to trial aerial taxis, flying taxis.
COOPER: Yes. WATT: And the hope, Anderson, is that they're going to deploy them here in Los Angeles for the 2028 Olympic Games so that people can fly over that infamously sluggish L.A. traffic. And they're also looking right now for what they're calling vertiports --
COOPER: Yes.
WATT: -- little places for these cabs to land. It's a brave new world, Anderson.
COOPER: Yes. Thanks, Nick. Appreciate it.
My guest in my podcast about loss, all there is, is comedian and writer and cancer survivor, Tig Notaro. I spoke to Tig about her friend, poet Andrea Gibson, who died in July after a four-year battle with ovarian cancer. Tig was at Andrea's bedside at the end.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TIG NOTARO, CANCER SURVIVOR: I don't even know how to explain what I was just a part of and what I just witnessed. It really, really resonated on a very deep level. The humanity was on overdrive.
COOPER: It's beautiful.
NOTARO: It was really beautiful. Really beautiful.
COOPER: I mean, one can't ask for any other way to die.
NOTARO: That's what I want.
COOPER: Yes.
NOTARO: It's really making me rethink a lot of things in my life.
COOPER: You don't want to go back to just normal life.
NOTARO: I think I want a new normal, not holding on to anything that's not real. I don't know if it's right to say make friends with that idea of dying, but it really should be more than conversation. I don't want my death to sneak up on my kids, although I've had a lot of health issues. I don't know if it's going to sneak up on anyone. But I really have such a new, not that I'm going to abandon comedy and become a death doula. But --
COOPER: Oh, my God. Don't -- don't get me started on death doulas. I mean I hear from so many of them. It's an extraordinary thing.
NOTARO: It is extraordinary.
COOPER: Yes.
NOTARO: And I get it.
COOPER: I get it. I seriously consider giving up my job.
NOTARO: Anderson and Tig's, death doula.
COOPER: I would do it. I'll do it if you do it.
NOTARO: Sir, let's do it. I -- it is so --
COOPER: Yes.
NOTARO: -- I mean, hospice, nurses, death doulas.
COOPER: I'm so pale and white, people would think they're already in the afterlife -- afterlife when I walk in. You'd get them laughing, and then I would walk in and freak everybody out.
NOTARO: Yes.
COOPER: Oh, my God.
NOTARO: I think people would freak out if we were who showed up in their final moments of life.
[21:00:03]
COOPER: Ding dong.
NOTARO: We need to get business cards to make.
COOPER: Yes, yes.
NOTARO: But this experience with Andrea really made me understand the importance of really talking about death. Rather than live my life fearing death and trying to kick it away at every possible move I'm making, because it's -- it's coming.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: The news continues right here on CNN.
