Matt Drudge, the pioneering editor of the Drudge Report, warned Tuesday that the American public is “sick” and easily exploited by homogeneous corporate media–which could allow Hillary Clinton to win the White House, no matter her age or health.
In a rare and wide-ranging interview with Alex Jones of InfoWars, Drudge kept away from Jones’ cameras but got behind a live microphone to share his thoughts on the state of the Internet, the political world, and the culture at large. The following is a partial transcript of Drudge’s appearance.
On Internet platforms: “I need no traffic from Google. I don’t care if I get one traffic referral from Google or Bing or Yahoo or any of these others… Everybody’s so hungry for referrals, for likes. I don’t need to be liked.”
On Hillary Clinton: “Where I’ve had a lot of success is I’m getting people from both sides of the aisle. They’ve always said, ‘oh, he’s a right-wing gossip monger,’ mainly because of Lewinsky and those years–which, by the way, are back. Why aren’t we seeing Hillary’s lovers? … Where’s the coverup on this? So many issues that are suppressed on a daily basis.”
On social media: “This whole social media stuff is bogus. Facebook: ‘we have 2 billion users’? This is garbage. This is designed to demoralize the individual. ‘I’ll never have 2 billion followers.’ The Internet is what you make of it. It’s the same battle as it was in the beginning. I remember having this argument with Brit Hume once live on C-SPAN. He goes, ‘the Internet’s all UFOs and all this crap.’ And I said, ‘no, the Internet is what you make of it.’ In the beginning, they were dismissing the Internet. They were pooh-poohing it… Now they make it over in their image. Now it’s these endless, monotonous tweets–meaningless, meaningless! To me. It’s just a lot of gnats. A lot of confusion. The reality of the situation is life on Earth has not changed. We need facts; we need events; we need specifics on things. Not all this confusion. It’s almost, they’ve made the Internet over in their image, these corporations–and I think they’re failing.”
On the American public: “How sick are the American people right now? I’ve been saying that they could put Hillary Clinton’s brain in a jar in the Oval Office and she would be elected. People are really sick… People are willing to be made over in the image of these corporations.”
On relying on others’ online platforms: “The reason there’s so much anger online, also, is a newspaper like the Washington Post will leave a comment section. They don’t care what you’re saying. They don’t care what you’re thinking. That’s why you get this anger, that, ‘oh, I’m out here as a citizen and I’m operating in their playground.’ Make your own playground! The reason I’m here, Alex, is you’ve made your own playground.”
“You get famous on YouTube… you’re playing in Google’s hell pit. Make your own place. The Internet allows you to make your own dynamic, your own universe. Why are you gravitating toward somebody else’s universe? And this is kind of, again, where Drudge, to me, when I look at it right now, is a correction to this groupthink that has–there’s no difference from any of these websites. You go up and down, we talk about this. What’s the difference between the websites? Between a Slate or a Salon or a BuzzFeed or a HuffPo–what is the difference? There isn’t any. And this is a travesty. It’s almost like a weird conglomerate of groupthink that has developed in a dynamic era that should be vibrating. It should be vibrating, it should be controversial.”
On the future of digital copyright: “I had a Supreme Court justice tell me to my face it’s over for me. Said, ‘Matt, it’s over for you. They’ve got the votes now to enforce copyright law. You’re out of there. They’re gonna make it so headlines–you can’t even use headlines.'”
“You thought Obamacare was shocking… wait until these copyright laws work their way up, and the Supreme Court decides you cannot have a website with news headlines linking across the board. Then that will end for me. Fine, I’ve had a hell of a run. It’s 20 years next year or 20 years about now. Hell of a run. I couldn’t have gone any farther. I feel completely–I have gone as far out of the galaxy as I can on this. I still wanna stay out here. But I have gone pretty damn far for what one individual can do in this culture. But I’m talking about the future. So I don’t know why they’ve been successful in pushing everybody into these little ghettos of these these Facebooks and these Tweets and these Instagrams–these Instas. This is ghetto. This is corporate. They’re taking your energy. They’re taking your energy and you’re getting nothing in return. Nothing… Ultimately, it’s boring, and the kids are always off to something new. Except for the something new is owned by the same freaking company or financed by the same banking system.”
On the media’s treatment of Hillary: “You’ve got to be the greatest you can be now–now. Before this country is so completely altered and we’re left with Hillary’s brain in the Oval Office in a jar. Cuz that’s what we’re getting. She is old and she’s sick. She is not a contender. They’re making her a contender with these propped up Saturday Night Live things; it’s like a head on a stick. And then on the Today show with [Savannah Guthrie]–a head on a stick. She is not a viable, vibrant leader for this country of 300–including the illegals, 380 million–Americans. So the media is trying to put us to sleep.”
On the Establishment and the 2016 presidential field: “It’s trying to consolidate control, yes, and there is a sense of panic about it. You look at Telemundo or Univision, they’re kinda panicked… Trump comes along, says a few things–just a few things–and soars to the top of the list. That’s profound. Imagine if we actually had a good selection of candidates who were saying a lot. And I know Cruz and Rand and all the rest. However, you’ve got to be dynamic in this atmosphere, and it’s a media country. You’ve got to be dynamic in media. That’s the only thing that’s gonna work.”
On robots: “There’s already automated news sites–Google News, hello anybody? They actually, the idiots reading that crap think there’s actually a human there. There is no human there. You are being programmed to being automated even up to your news. And Apple News? I don’t know what that’s about. That was also creepy. A same corporate glaze over everything. I don’t see the world that way. I live in a world that’s free, colorful, vibrant, takes chances, bold, stands up to power–and that’s where I’ve made my success.”
On threats to free speech: “If they get enough sick people to elect it, the demographics will take care of themselves… so it’s already happening. I’m just warning this country that, yes, don’t get into this false sense that you are an individual when you’re on Facebook. No you’re not. You’re a pawn in their scheme.”
On Clinton-style retribution: “Look at anybody who has any form of success in the polls, is because they rumble… I’m very pessimistic on this race, because I’m just not so sure it’s not gonna end up with the dreaded brain in the jar in the Oval Office once known as Hillary Clinton, who is hypothyroid–anybody who is 70 years old who is hypothyroid, you do not elect President, ladies and gentlemen. You don’t do it… [I’m] just shaking now after seeing NBC giving her endless hours of airtime, over the past 72 hours, that Hillary’s back and that she’s back for real. Now what that means to you or me–what it means to me, I’ve got a long history with these people. They’re ugly; they play dirty. They sued me for 30 million dollars last time around–with the approval of the President, announced by the Press Secretary of the White House. A civil action. These people–and they didn’t have the NSA then… Hillary Clinton with the NSA? Good luck if you dissent. Good luck if you dissent. Snowden, I’ll switch places with you. You can come over here and rot in hell, cuz that’s what it’s gonna be.”
On Bernie Sanders: “Yeah, maybe. Also old. Old! Can the Democrats find anybody under the age of 70? What is this oldness in a vibrant country that needs to go forward to a new century?”
On gun control: “They’re all armed themselves, or they all have that security around them themselves. They don’t have to worry about [danger.] I challenge Hillary, take away your Secret Service. Take it away now. Take away your Secret Service; dismiss them. Have no security around you; have no guns around you, Hillary. I dare you. I dare you. Obama, same thing. Drop your guns, Obama. Take your Secret Service away, Obama. Take it all away. Leave the White House unguarded, Obama. Let everybody know there’s no guns on the White House grounds, Obama. You know what would happen in 30 seconds? Both of those people would no longer be on Planet Earth. So they’re asking us to drop our guns and to drop our security measures, or–or what? So, this thing is very real, and I don’t see how it’s being taken seriously, except for the sick voter. You can’t underestimate the sickness of the American people right now. They’re really sick. I’m more angry at the sick Americans than I am at Obama or Hillary. I’m really angry at the sick Americans.”
On media voices he admires: “You’re a romantic figure, Alex, in Americana. It’s romantic what you do here every day. It just is. This is romance. Because you’re an American standing up, tough, facing these headwinds–wow, are they blowing. But you’re there. And you’re not alone. Limbaugh, Savage, Hannity, Levin. There’s a lot of people on the airwaves who are as brave. They are brave, and they are living it. I’ve met ’em all; I’m friends with ’em all. They are also operating against the grain in an America that needs to go back to that.”
On whether humanity will survive the next 100 years: “There’s just a law to the universe. We could have the San Andreas rip tonight. You have nothing to do with that. We could have had that super hurricane, that–look what they did to South Carolina 2 to 3 hundred miles offshore–imagine if a Category 5 I-wall went right up the Chesapeake Bay. They could say, ‘well, mankind did that.’ No, Mother Nature decides. So will we survive? I’m sure we will. Will we be not allowed to speak as we are today? Well, we’ll have it documented that we were allowed to speak that way once. So I don’t know. Am I optimistic for myself? Personally, yes. I’m strong. There’s not much they can do. They could laser beam me, they could drone me, they can plutonium me, they could do whatever they wanted, but spiritually, I’m set. I’ve already got it. So they can’t do much.”
On corporate control of news outlets: “I just wish there was more media that was trailblazing and independent, and this, to me, is a big danger right now in this setup. You’ve got these corporations like the New York Times and Amazon now with the Washington Post, and Time Warner, and–all of them seem to be the same. This is what’s frightening. And there’s so much news in the course of the day, and the reason I think the Drudge Report is interesting every morning is it’s not exactly the same as you would see elsewhere. And that’s because I’m not involved with other people.”
On class and wealth: “I’ve been traveling a lot and I’m seeing a lot of desperation everywhere, a lot of sad desperation. I was just at an airport and, even down to this, a woman selling Southwest Airlines credit cards, standing like a robot. ‘Have-you-signed-up-yet. Are-you-a-member-of-the-club.’ It was tragic. This is a mature woman with a beautiful face and life and I’m like, ‘how did she get there? What has happened to this culture that she’s now standing as a robot like this?’ They are sucking our ability to make an income that is compatible with what you need to. So I’m getting a little frightened as I travel. On the other side of it, when I go to New York and I see some of the billionaires–it’s the other side! Endless. You know, they’re fighting over pieces of artwork. It’s gotten to the point where the have and the have-nots here is breaking.
On political television: “Why are we not allowed to have a Gore Vidal-William Buckley anymore in the media scene. Do you see who they hire–do you see who’s hired for the shows? How dull they are? Dull! Dull as dishwater… Where are the flamboyant characters? This is what America desperately needs right now: flamboyant, intellectual characters who can cut different ways. And that’s just what I’m missing. I’ve been fortunate enough to meet some of the greats of this generation. And I’ve got to tell you, they are there. It’s just they are suppressed and hidden and they’re not hired the way Gore Vidal and Buckley were back [in the] previous generation. They were not afraid of ideas. This generation is frightened of ideas, or at least it’s being suppressed.”
On national security–and impeachment: “We never even heard of ISIS until recently… Did you know it was designed to be confused with Darrell Issa? Did you know that’s what it was? Because Darrell Issa was the enemy, at the time, of this administration. You know, there would have been a time that Obama could have been impeached. And I’m thinking the IRS scandal most likely; that would have been the one. You get the depositions going; you get the President under oath. You follow the chain. Obama most likely would have been impeached. Boehner decided, ‘we’re not going there. We’re not gonna have those cities burn. We’re not gonna do it; we’re not gonna impeach Obama.’ So, I felt Darrell Issa–that’s his name, right? Cuz I’m getting all, ‘eye-sul,’ ‘eye-suh,’ ‘iss-suh,’ Darrell Issa. I think they came up with the name ISIS to be confused with Darrell Issa. I’m really being honest with you… Designed to confuse. And then the President going, ‘it’s not even ISIS, it’s ISIL,’ or Ice, or IS. This is Dr. Seuss.”
On film: “Where’s the greatness coming out of Hollywood? Enough with the Martian crap. Tell us something big and real and profound as Kubrick would have–on a human level… You know, Spielberg keeps going back to World War II. I mean, enough already. Let’s get focused. I look at a P.T. Anderson and, I don’t know, it’s kind of gone into a marijuana cloud for me. Where are the artists who are challenging this generation like Kubrick did?”
On Jones’ debate with Piers Morgan: “[That] ended up being the most dramatic moment on CNN in a generation. That’s why they need to hire people away from 6th Avenue just to look at the scene. I remember once saying to Charlie Rose, ‘why don’t you have more conservatives on?’ And he says, ‘Who?’ And there’s a whole list of them. Why are they limiting themselves, because you would say it’s a contrived plan–to limit. But I still think to make provocative programming, you’ve got to have different points of view a la the Buckley and Gore Vidal. Where is that in this culture? It’s missing. I get it from InfoWars. I get it from other places, too–mainly talk radio. Talk radio seems to be the driving force of this culture, at least in spoken word. I’m not getting it from television that much; I’m just not. Where are the intriguing television shows? You could say Homeland, you can say some of these others. Okay, yes. But where are the real dynamic things that are pushing?”
Will media institutions successfully censor alternative viewpoints? “It all depends if the sick Americans get unsick. If you get well, you’re not that interested in what Anderson Cooper is saying about things. You’re just not, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be insulting. if you’re sick, you find comfort in that.”