On January 2nd,
I was quietly summoned
to the Pentagon
to meet with
the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Each branch was represented--
the Army, the Air Force,
the Navy, and the Marines.
"Michael,"
they said to me,
"We don't know
what the fuck we're doing."
Dressed up to win,
we're dressed up to win...
They hadn't won a war outright
since the big one, WWII.
We are just beginning
and we won't stop winning...
They went over
each of the wars that they had lost.
One...
after...
the other.
They regretted
having wasted trillions of dollars
and helping to create
new groups like ISIS.
They admitted that what they got
from these wars was just...
more war.
They couldn't even get us the oil
they promised us from Iraq.
They felt embarrassed,
humiliated.
Their hands were all placed
in a no-fly zone.
They asked me for my advice.
I thought for a moment
and then said the following.
"You must stand down."
I told them that our troops
needed a much-deserved break.
Finally a break.
Finally some downtime.
For the foreseeable future,
there are
to be no invasions,
no sending in
military advisors...
no more using drones
as wedding crashers.
Instead of sending in the Marines,
my suggestion?
Send in me.
I will invade countries
populated by Caucasians
with names I can
mostly pronounce,
take the things
we need from them,
and bring it all back home
to the United States of America.
For we have problems
no army could solve.
I believe
our government has a responsibility
to go to the aid of its citizens.
The life of a Vietnam vet
comes to a tragic end.
The man was found frozen
to death in his own home...
After Consumers Energy
turned his natural gas off.
I've made it clear
that we will hunt down terrorists
who threaten our country
wherever they are.
You will find no safe haven.
Our enemies
are innovative and resourceful,
and so are we.
They never stop thinking
about new ways
to harm our country
and our people
and neither do we.
This country will hunt down terrorists
and bring them to justice.
- On your face!
- No! Let me go!
The rule of law,
not the law of the jungle,
governs the conduct of nations.
Let her go! Let her go!
One of the things
this country stands for is...
Put your hand
behind your back.
- ...freedom.
- I can't breathe. I can't breathe.
I can't breathe.
We're disrupting their command
and control and supply lines.
We're destroying their facilities
and infrastructure
that fund their operations.
We cannot save
all the world's children,
but we can save many of them.
Some school districts
are asking parents
to buy toilet paper
for the upcoming school year.
Our troops will have
the best possible support
in the entire world.
Banks illegally foreclosed
on nearly 5,000 service members
while they were fighting abroad.
We destroyed a threat
and locked a tyrant
in the prison of his own country.
I've been in prison almost 42 years
for something I didn't do.
I spent my 20s, my 30s, my 40s
and nearly all of my 50s
in prison.
Should the day come
when we Americans
remain silent in the face
of armed aggression...
A doctor in the middle
of the abortion debate
was gunned down in the church lobby
while serving as an usher.
...then the cause of freedom
will have been lost.
We will not hesitate
to use our military might
to defend our allies
and our way of life.
Hands up, don't shoot.
I hitched a ride
aboard the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan
and made my way
to my first target--
the country of Italy.
It was time...
to invade.
Have you ever noticed that Italians
always look like
they just had sex?
Meet Gianni
and Cristina Fancelli,
two working-class Italians.
Gianni is a cop
and Cristina orders clothes
for department stores.
It was my first encounter
with the enemy.
They led me to their compound
where they wouldn't shut up
about where they had gone on vacation.
We usually plan one week
during the winter...
and then the first week
of June...
- Right.
- ...because it's our anniversary.
Okay.
Then three weeks in August.
Okay.
'Cause in Italy,
during the month of August
is usually, like,
a shutdown.
And are you paid
for these weeks?
Yeah, sure,
because every year
we usually have,
like, 30, 35 days
of, you know, holiday.
- Paid holiday, yeah.
- We don't pay.
So, wait, that's five days a week--
that's seven weeks.
Plus, we have
the national holidays.
How many are there of those?
- Dodici.
- 12? 12 days.
So that's another week or two.
Ah, each city
has a saint patron.
Patron saint, yeah.
- It's a city holiday.
- You're paid for this date?
- Yes.
- Yes.
And when you get married,
you have 15 days more.
Yeah.
- 15-- wait a minute.
- 15.
When you get married,
you have 15 days' paid holiday?
- To go on honeymoon.
- To pay for your honeymoon?
- Yes.
- They pay for your honeymoon?
Yes.
Eight weeks' paid vacation.
In December, we have
an additional salary in Italy.
- Most-- I think everybody.
- What's additional mean?
We call it 13th
because 12 months.
So we have the 13th salary
in December.
- Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
- Yes.
You get this 13th month,
this imaginary month
that you didn't work...
- Yes.
- ...and then you get--
Another salary
during the month of December.
Like, what, 10% more?
20?
No, no, a full salary.
So you get two months' pay
for one month of work?
Yes.
Why?
Your regular pay
is to pay the monthly bills.
What money do you have left over
to go on vacation?
That's the way
the Italians see it.
What good's a vacation
if you can't afford to go on it?
If you don't use
all those days,
the following year, you still have
the vacation of the previous year.
- Wait a minute.
- So you don't lose that.
- No, no, that's not true.
- It's true.
No, that's not true.
Tell him, tell him
how many days you have.
- 80 days.
- You have 80 days in the bank?
In the holiday bank.
He would like
to do more, of course.
Of course.
But how do companies
make any money
if they pay all this
to their employees?
I approached the owner
of a multimillion-dollar
clothing manufacturer,
the Lardini Company,
who makes men's fashions
for brands like Dolce & Gabbana,
Burberry, and Versace.
Do you mind
paying your employees
for all this time off?
And stress causes a lot of sickness.
So, do you get sick very often?
No.
Italians have one of the highest
life expectancies in the world.
They live four years longer
than the average American.
Yes, it's lunchtime at Lardini.
But they're not getting in their cars
to drive to the vending machine
or the takeout window.
They're going home,
like they do every day,
for a nice, relaxing two-hour lunch.
Do you come home
every day for lunch?
I continued my invasion of Italy
by going to the Ducati
motorcycle company.
Agreeing to meet with me
for a possible surrender
was the C.E.O. of Ducati,
Claudio Domenicali.
There is the very end
of the assembly line.
You call this an assembly line?
The line is hardly moving.
- It's moving very, very slow.
- Very slow.
The C.E.O. explained to me
that his workers
have numerous weeks
of paid vacation,
including other benefits,
as well as a strong union.
He saw no problem
with any of this.
We really feel that we are
being rewarded by this,
because the people
are very committed.
There is no clash
between the profit of the company
and the well-being of the people.
"There is no clash
between the profit of the company
and the well-being of the people."
Yes.
He explained that by paying
a good wage with good benefits,
the company still made
a healthy profit.
Here we go again.
You know what that means.
It's lunchtime, I-talian style.
Grown men eating vegetables
and smiling?
What kind of factory was this?
All the fine benefits
these workers have--
vacation, a wonderful lunch--
how did this come about?
Is it still a struggle?
It's the system
that's part of the welfare, no?
- Yeah, the social welfare.
- Yeah, of course--
Welfare's a bad word
in the United States...
- Okay.
- ...with certain conservative people.
They don't like that word, welfare.
- Here, it's not bad.
- It's not a bad word.
- For whatever reason.
- It's a good word.
Yeah, it's a good word.
Of course, you pay more--
You take care
of the welfare of the people.
You take more-- you pay
more taxes for that.
Uh-huh.
You mind that?
Because when you pay something
and you get something back...
- Yeah?
- That's okay, you know?
I asked the Lardini family
if they felt the same.
You, the boss, C.E.O.,
if you did it the American way,
you could make more money
and have more for yourselves.
And you agree
with your sisters?
Yes.
He says that many Italians--
that the dream of Italian people
is to come to America.
To United States.
Maybe they don't know
how it works there.
Yeah, you know
what the law says in America?
If you come to America,
for paid vacation,
you know how many paid weeks
you get by law?
- No.
- Zero.
- Zero?
- Yes, zero.
Zero.
I'm serious.
So, would you think twice now
about living in America,
knowing that you get
zero paid weeks' vacation?
Zero. It's zero.
Zero.
Their law does not mandate
a paid vacation for anybody.
So, if you decide to go on holiday,
you're not paid for that days?
- So, it's--
- That is correct.
Now, if you have a good union,
you may have a contract that says
you get two weeks' paid vacation.
- In a year?
- In a year. That would be good.
- Two weeks would be a good--
- So, two weeks is a good--
- A good job.
- Wow.
- Three would be awesome.
- Ah.
If you have that kind of job.
I don't know anybody
with four weeks' paid vacation, frankly.
I don't know.
Zero paid weeks guaranteed.
Zero.
I see what's going on here.
First comes eight weeks
of vacation sex
and then comes...
You have five months
of maternity leave.
Five months?
Are you paid for this?
- Yes, sure.
- What do you mean, "Yes, sure"?
You act as if I--
It's something that for us
is very natural.
What about the dad?
I think one or the other can--
Esatto.
It's like a substitution, you know?
But the mother
must take five months?
For sure.
It's true, the whole world
does have paid maternity leave,
except for the two countries
too poor to afford it--
Papua New Guinea
and this place.
Even with the long vacations
and extended lunch breaks,
the U.S. and Italy
are amongst the top 15
most productive countries
in the world.
We work many more hours
than Italians,
but we are not that much more
productive than you.
I believe that's true.
I believe that you are having
more sex here
and because of that you are happier
and you do better at work.
Volare...
Oh, oh...
I've come to Italy
and I've invaded Italy--
one man, one-man army--
to take the best ideas I can find here,
bring them back to America,
and convince
my fellow Americans
to do some of the things
that the Italians do.
And one of the things
I'm going to take from you
is this concept of giving workers
eight weeks' paid vacation.
Two or three years from now,
they're gonna be known
as American ideas
from that point on,
even though you were
doing it here first.
- Yeah.
- You don't mind?
No mind.
No worries.
I shake your hand for that.
Thank you, sir.
And thank you for being
the first C.E.O.
to meet with me
on a factory floor.
- Big pleasure.
- Yeah, I got my American flag here.
And I'm gonna plant my flag
here at Ducati.
Good. We've got something.
We've got something good
for the United States here.
I'm gonna just plant the American flag
right here in your living room.
- Oh.
- Is that okay?
- Cheers.
- Cheers.
- Salute.
- Salute.
Sure, Italy has its problems,
like all countries,
but my mission is to pick
the flowers, not the weeds.
- We have just one life.
- Right, yeah.
- That's the only one we have.
- We're not coming back.
And we have to enjoy it.
Your love has given me wings...
- I am French.
- Ooh.
You say you're French?
Oui.
"We"?
No, we are not French.
We're American
'cause you're in America.
Okay?
Greatest country on the planet.
Well, what have you
given the world
apart from George Bush, Cheerios,
and the ThighMaster?
- Chinese food.
- Chinese food.
That's from China.
- Pizza.
- Italy.
- Chimichanga.
- Mexico.
Really, smarty-pants?
What did Frenchland give us?
We invented democracy,
existentialism,
and the blowjob.
Those are three pretty good things.
Yes, there was all that,
but there was something else
we could steal from France.
As usual, the French
offered little resistance.
So, I entered a small village
in rural Normandy
and went to one of the finest kitchens
in the country
to see how they prepare
a gourmet meal.
By my standards, it was a three,
maybe a four-star kitchen.
It was definitely
the best place to eat in town.
It was the school cafeteria.
I only had
one year of French in school.
Would you like to hear
my first lesson in French?
- Yes.
- Ahem.
The French love their cheese
and they eat a lot of it.
Chef Montignac
had dozens of types of cheese
right here
in the school refrigerator.
I showed the kids
what I used to do at their age
when the lunch lady served us
what she called Thursday Surprise.
The American way.
Didn't take long to get this going.
Once a month,
the school chef gets together
with city and school officials
and a dietician
to go over the daily menu.
Why is the mayor's office
concerned
with what is being served
in the school cafeteria?
See, here in France,
lunchtime isn't just 20 minutes
where you have to stuff your face
as fast as you can.
They consider lunch a class.
A full hour where you learn
how to eat in a civilized manner,
enjoy healthy food,
and serve each other.
And, yes, drink water.
Lots of water.
Mm, water.
They don't stand in a long line
waiting for a bunch of slop
on their plastic
or Styrofoam tray.
Wow, actual real china.
Yeah.
The chefs bring the food to them.
Scallops with a curry sauce.
Wow, and-- and with carrots?
Oh, okay.
And this was just the appetizer.
C'est bon.
French fries.
Oh, oui.
Two times a year
you'll have French fries.
But French is in the wording.
I couldn't find a single
vending machine in the school,
so I smuggled in some contraband.
- Do you drink Coca-Cola?
- No.
You don't-- no?
No Coca-Cola? No?
Coca-Cola? You don't drink--
you don't drink Coca-Cola?
No?
Nobody drinks Coca-Cola?
No.
Here, try this.
Try this.
- No.
- No.
Want to try Coca-Cola?
- It tastes good.
- It's what?
Pretty good.
It's okay?
All right, tell me how you feel
in 15 minutes.
How about a sloppy joe?
Jamais. Never.
- Never?
- Not at all.
On this day,
the children were being served
lamb skewers and chicken
over couscous.
A four-course meal
that included a cheese course
and dessert.
Here's something
I had never seen before.
When does a kid
share his ice cream?
Come on,
you've had a Whopper.
You've snuck somewhere
sometime in your life and had a Whopper.
Well, you haven't lived
till you've had a Whopper.
What's for lunch?
The daughter
of one of our crew members
is a high school student
near Boston.
When she heard we were
filming a school lunch,
she started sending
her mother pictures
of what her school lunch
looked like.
This is what American children
eat for lunch.
Okay, yes,
that looks familiar.
Does that look good to you?
- No.
- No.
We don't know what's inside this.
No, no, no, no.
Yeah.
I know, it's like I'm showing you
photographs
on an episode of "C.S.I." here.
Uh...
You know it's bad
when the French pity you.
What's even more remarkable
is that Chef Montignac
spends less per lunch
than we do
in our schools
in the United States.
And this public school
is not in a wealthy area.
In fact, I got ahold
of a copy of the menu
from one of the poorest schools
in one of the poorest towns in France,
and this is what
they're eating this month.
A filet of cod in a dill sauce.
Fennel and beef stew.
Moussaka.
And a choice between
a caramel or vanilla flan.
Not to mention
there's at least one cheese option
every single day.
It seemed almost unbelievable
that this country,
which provides
free health care for its people,
nearly free day care,
also makes sure
that the school lunches
are fit for a king.
I had to ask myself,
how do the French afford all of this?
Europe, for the past four decades,
has been raising taxes.
Very high income taxes.
- Some higher taxes.
- They're sick of the high taxes.
Grard Depardieu said,
"No more!
I'm outta here."
Here's how much
the average working American
pays in income
and social security taxes.
And those taxes get us
the basic services--
police, fire, roads, water, war,
and bank bailouts.
And here's what the average
French worker pays in taxes.
A little more than we do.
And for paying
just a little bit more,
they, too,
get the basic services,
but they also get
all this extra stuff.
We can get some of that stuff, too,
but we have to pay extra.
And when we pay extra,
we don't call it a tax.
We call it tuition and day care fees
and the nursing home bill
and copays and deductibles
and on and on and on.
We don't call them taxes,
but they are,
and we pay a whole lot more
than the French.
One more thing--
every French paycheck
has a detailed list of where their taxes
are going, line by line.
This is what our paycheck
looks like.
Other than Social Security
and Medicare,
it doesn't say a damn thing.
Maybe if we saw where
our income taxes were going,
we wouldn't let Congress
spend nearly 60% of it
on this.
But the French aren't fighters,
they're lovers.
Sweetheart,
Pep Le Pew loves you...
And if there's one thing
the French know how to do right,
it's passion and desire.
But where do you learn
something like that?
Magical moment?
I thought the whole point of sex ed
when I was in school
was to scare us
from ever having any.
Now, you took a risk by doing something
that society condemns.
Perhaps you didn't realize
some of the penalties involved syphilis.
Syphilis?
Oui?
Yeah, but what about abstinence?
Too risky?
What does she mean by that?
A small high school in West Texas
that does not offer sex education
is dealing with an STD outbreak.
A significant rise in STDs
among Utah teens.
Parents can always
preach abstinence,
but teens, we know,
don't always listen.
- A chlamydia outbreak.
- Chlamydia.
Chlamydia.
Why does Texas continue
with abstinence
education programs
when they don't seem
to be working?
In fact, I think we have
the third highest teen pregnancy rate
in the country,
among all the states.
Abstinence works.
But we are the third highest
teen pregnancy--
we have the third highest
teen pregnancy rate
among all states in the country.
The questioner's point is
it doesn't seem to be working.
I'm gonna tell you
from my own personal life,
abstinence works.
The teen pregnancy rate
in the United States
is more than twice
France's rate,
more than six times Germany's,
and more than seven times
than the Swiss.
Yes, education.
I grabbed a copy
of their high school textbook,
"Lovemaking is Fun,
Volume 1,"
packed up a few
of their school lunches...
and hopped aboard
what they call a train
to a country that really was
number one in education.
Finland is ranked at
or near the top
of having the best-educated
students in the world.
Which left everyone wondering,
"Really? Finland?"
These are the people who gave us
the air guitar championship...
Hello? Hello?
...and the sports
of cell phone throwing
and wife carrying.
These are the geniuses
that cracked the code to good education?
I mean, how is it
that the kids in Finland
are ahead
of the rest of the world?
So, here's what happened.
Back in the day,
Finland's schools sucked
on the level that ours suck on.
When they tested the world's kids,
both Finland and us
were usually about the same,
you know, somewhere down
the list of nations.
But Finland didn't like that,
so they tried some new ideas
and, in no time, Finland shot
to the top of the world.
Their students were number one.
How did they do that?
That was the one question
I wanted an answer to.
And I went straight to see
the enemy's minister of education.
Before I could say anything,
she blurted out their top secret.
They do not have homework.
Wait, so you reduced
the homework you give them at school?
Yes, yes.
They should have more time
to be kids,
to be youngsters, to enjoy the life.
How many hours of homework
did you get last night?
About 10 minutes or something.
- 10 minutes of homework?
- Yeah.
- Maybe 15 minutes or 20 minutes.
- 20 minutes.
- 20 minutes?
- Not much. Yeah.
Well, if I would've
done the homework,
I think it would've been
like 10 minutes, tops.
Usually I don't really
do homework that much.
The whole term "homework"
is kind of obsolete, I think.
- In that way--
- Moore: Homework is obsolete?
Yeah, yeah.
In that way that these kids,
they have a lot of other things
to do after school.
- Like what?
- Like being together,
like being with family,
like doing sports,
like playing music,
like reading.
So they have no homework.
What if all they want to do
is climb a tree?
They could climb a tree, yeah.
They can climb a tree.
Then they learned how to climb a tree.
But they'll end up,
while climbing the tree,
probably finding out
about different insects,
and they can come
to school next day,
tell me about what they found.
Compared to the older kids,
how many hours a day
do the younger ones
go to school?
Mondays, three hours,
Tuesdays, four hours.
It varies.
It's 20 hours a week.
So they're-- oh, man.
Now, does this three or four hours
of school include the lunch hour?
Yes.
How are they learning anything?
How are you
getting anything done?
Your brain has to-- it has to relax
every now and then.
If you just constantly work, work, work,
then you stop learning.
And there's no use of doing that
for a longer period of time.
Finland's students
have the shortest school days
and the shortest school years
in the entire Western world.
They do better
by going to school less.
Yay!
How many languages
do you speak?
English, yeah, Swedish,
Spanish.
Finnish and Swedish.
Finnish, English, and German.
- French, German.
- Finnish and English.
- English.
- Swedish and French and Spanish.
So, you were
an exchange student in the U.S.?
- Yeah.
- When you got back here in school,
what did you notice
that you felt relieved about?
No more multiple choice exams.
They--
- No multiple choice exams here?
- Or very few of them, if any.
- Really?
- 'Cause all of my exams in the U.S.--
How do you answer the question right
if it isn't listed
as one of the four choices?
- You write your answer.
- You have to know it.
- You have to know it, actually.
- Yeah.
- You actually have to know it?
- Yeah.
If there was one thing I heard
over and over again from the Finns,
it was that America should stop
teaching to a standardized test.
- Get rid of those standardized tests.
- National testing.
- The standardized tests.
- The "standardizized testings."
If what you are teaching your students
is to do well on those tests,
then you're not really
teaching them anything.
No, we are teaching them.
We're teaching them
how to flunk a test
and then a bunch of schools
fail the test
and those schools
are turned into charter schools
and then somebody
makes a lot of money.
But school is about finding
your happiness, finding what--
you know, finding a way to learn
what makes you happy.
They figured out
about one-third of the school time--
the students are in school--
is spent preparing
for the standardized test.
And so they've eliminated
a lot of things that aren't on the test.
So, music is gone,
art is gone, poetry is gone.
- Art is gone?
- Yeah, in many schools.
Civics isn't even on the test,
so now schools are dropping civics.
- Really?
- Yes.
- Civics, American civics.
- Okay.
Unbelievable.
- We got rid of poetry.
- Really?
- Yeah.
- Why?
It's a waste of time.
When are they ever gonna speak
as poets when they're adults?
How does that
help them get a job?
We try to teach them
everything that they need
so that they could actually use
their brain as well as they can,
including PE, including arts,
including music--
anything that can actually
make brain work better.
The children need to be baking,
they should be singing,
they should be doing art
and going on nature walks
and doing all these things
because there's this very short time
that they're allowed
to be children.
If you don't have standardized tests
here in Finland,
how do you know
which schools are the best?
You know, people need a list.
The neighborhood school
is the best school.
It is not different than the school
which can be, for example,
situated in the town center,
because all the schools in Finland,
they are all equal.
When we move to a new city,
we never ask
where the best school is.
It's never a question.
So nobody
has to shop for schools.
There's nothing different
in any of our schools.
They are the same.
It is illegal in Finland
to set up a school
and charge tuition.
That's why, for the most part,
private schools don't exist.
And what that means
is that the rich parents
have to make sure
that the public schools are great.
And by making the rich kids
go to school with everyone else,
they grow up
with those other kids as friends.
And when they become
wealthy adults,
they have to think twice
before they screw them over.
In the United States,
education is a business.
They're corporations making money.
Here, it's so student-centered
that when we had to redo our playground,
they had the architects
come in and talk to the kids.
- Were they listened to?
- Yes, yes.
There are things on our playground
that the students really wanted.
Being in school here
is more independent.
We are treated more like adults
than in the United States.
- Yeah.
- I mean, we don't need a hall pass
to go to the bathroom
during class.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
And we'll see students
commuting on the subway,
even as young as seven and eight,
going on their own to school.
When I started doing teacher training
practice back in the U.S.,
I was in these certain neighborhoods
teaching these kids
and telling them, "You can be anything
you want to be when you grow up."
This is kind of a lie.
And when I came to Finland,
a lot of my teaching is based
on what the kids want
and what they see for their future,
so it doesn't feel so false
to say, "You can really be
whatever you want to be
when you grow up,"
because they're making it
happen already.
They already have such power.
That's upsetting
to think about that.
That our kids don't have that.
That's really beautiful.
It's not that we have
figured out something
that nobody else has done
in education.
That's wrong.
Many of these things that have made
Finland perform well in education
are initially American ideas.
We try to teach them
to think for themselves
and to be critical
to what they're learning.
We try to teach them
to be happy person,
to be-- respect others
and respect yourself.
You're concerned
with their happiness.
- Oh, yeah.
- What the hell do you teach?
I teach math.
So the math teacher says--
the first thing out of your mouth
of what you wanted these students
to get out of school
was to be happy,
have a happy life.
Yep.
- And you're the math teacher?
- Yep.
When do they have
their time to play
and socialize
with their friends
and grow as human beings?
'Cause there's so much more life
around than just school.
You want them to play?
I want children to play.
And that was the principal.
I'm planting the American flag
right here in the middle of your school
and claiming
this great idea for us.
Thanks for stealing it.
Yeah, that's how we roll.
- All right.
- I'm just saying.
So after getting
a great K-12 education,
where do you go next?
Deep in the heart
of the eastern slopes of the Alps
is the home of Rapunzel
and Sleeping Beauty--
Slovenia.
Not Slovakia, Slovenia.
Actually, much of Slovenia's mail
gets missent to Slovakia,
but that's not why I'm here.
Slovenia is a magical fairyland
home to the rarest
of mythical creatures--
a college student with no debt.
How much debt
do you have here, being a student?
None.
- None.
- It's free.
Slovenia is one
of dozens of countries
where it is essentially free
to go to university.
Do you have any debts?
No.
Do you know what I mean
by debt?
- Not really.
- No?
Debt is, um, when you owe other people
a whole lot of money.
- Ah. We don't have it.
- No, we don't have any. No.
No. No.
- Nothing?
- Nothing.
I did find one student with debt.
I actually moved here four years ago
to finish my education
'cause I couldn't afford
to go to CU Boulder anymore.
- Really?
- University of Colorado, yeah.
- Yeah.
- I still owe the government $7,000.
- So, what do you pay here now?
- I don't pay anything.
- Nothing?
- No.
You're an American?
Why'd you decide to come here?
I couldn't even afford
to finish community college.
So, then I found out
the situation in Slovenia.
I had never heard
anything like that before,
- school being so cheap.
- Did you even know where Slovenia was?
No, I had no idea
where Slovenia was.
Yeah, but, seriously, what kind
of education are you getting here?
- It's miles better.
- Really?
Yeah, it's not even comparable.
It's like high school here
is more difficult
than American
undergraduate work.
How do you say in Slovenian,
"Any American student can come here
and go to university for free?"
Wait a minute. Slow, slow.
Do you use
the regular alphabet here?
A-B-C-D-E-F-G?
Yes, we do.
- We have 26, right?
- One less, yeah.
Which one did you cut out?
Did you cut out "W" while Bush
was president or was that before?
I'm just curious.
No, it's not--
it's from the beginning.
It's from the beginning.
It has nothing to do with Bush.
- No, nothing.
- Okay, all right.
Luckily, the University
of Ljubljana in Slovenia
offers nearly 100 courses of study
that are taught in English.
Why do they do that?
You're a foreigner.
I mean, it's-- their tax dollars
are paying for you.
Well, I think-- the thing is that here,
education is really seen
as something
that's really a public good,
and the issue is once you start charging
foreign students for education,
you automatically open up the idea
that you can charge everyone.
And as soon as anyone
starts paying tuition,
the entire idea of "free university
for everyone" is under threat.
That changes the nature
of school being a public good.
A while back,
the government of Slovenia
decided it was time
to start charging students tuition.
That sent a shock wave
through the country
and the students responded.
We organized
a protest against that law.
We spent nine months meeting
with the minister for education,
with the heads
of the universities.
We managed to delay the law
long enough
for the government
to eventually collapse.
Wait a minute. An organization
that's got 40 to 50 active members...
- Yes.
- ...and you helped to bring down
- the government...
- That's right.
- ...and force a new election?
- That's right.
That's amazing.
That's an amazing story.
Here's what students do
when the government tries to fleece them
in countries like Canada...
...Germany, France,
Finland, and Norway.
And here's what happens each time
there's a tuition hike in the U.S.
I would like to give you
a small present to memorize...
- Oh, thank you.
- ...your visit to the university.
Here, there's a very strong tradition
of lace-making.
- Of lace-making?
- Lace-making.
But this is a metal lace.
No man has ever given me
a gift of lace before,
so thank you for this.
The idea
of making college free
and not sending 22-year-olds
into a debtors' prison...
was something I could definitely
take back to the United States.
I asked for a meeting
with the president of Slovenia.
And, strangely enough,
they gave me one.
- How are you today? Welcome.
- Thank you.
- How are you?
- It's such a pleasure.
No, it's an honor to meet you.
Thank you for seeing me.
The president
was happy to meet with me,
but he ordered my crew
out of the room
because he did not want
any witnesses to his surrender.
Thank you so much.
See how easy that was?
Success.
No casualties, no P.T.S.D.,
no Dick Cheney.
Just me walking away
with something better than oil.
I've just met with
the President of Slovakia...
...and he has surrendered
to the United States.
I have invaded your country,
essentially,
to take this incredible idea
that all college
should be free for everyone.
Thank you.
Germany.
With no student loans to pay off,
imagine then going
into the real world
and getting a job where you
only work 36 hours a week,
but got paid for 40,
a place where you can still find
a thriving middle class,
even amongst people
who make pencils.
We are producing pencils.
- Pencils?
- It's still a good business.
- We start in 17-- still, yes.
- Still?
Even with computers
and everything?
They're still buying pencils.
And, by the way, last year
was the best year
in producing pencils
in Germany ever.
Where are the pencil factories?
The pencil factory is this here,
around us.
- Right behind us?
- Yeah, yeah, those factories.
No, no, no, no.
These aren't factories.
- They have windows.
- What do you mean, windows?
Factories don't have windows.
Doch.
Of course we have windows.
They must have good light.
What do they need sunlight for?
They're just making pencils.
Yeah, but good pencils
and also to feel better,
not to get sick.
Because if you have workers who are ill,
then you have problems.
We don't want that.
I opened a door...
Hello.
...and found something
that was missing in America.
The middle class.
What's everybody doing in here?
You're on a break?
You only work
36 hours a week as it is!
How many of you
have a second or third job?
Nobody.
You're laughing
like that's a funny idea.
You leave here at 2:00 PM.
You're home at 2:30.
What do you do
with all this free time?
And do what?
- Nothing.
- Nothing?
In Germany, work is work.
And when work is over,
work is done.
In fact, they're so concerned
that the workplace
has created so much stress
that under the German
universal health care system,
any stressed-out German can get
their doctor to write a prescription
for a free three-week stay
at a spa.
You don't have to cook,
you don't have to wash.
I need time for me.
I need more time for my children.
We have massage,
gymnastics, then we go to the pool
and we eat healthy.
It's very yummy.
I don't understand
why the government does this.
Because it's cheaper.
In the long run, it's cheaper.
Definitely.
To prevent worse sickness.
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
So, it makes sense
to pay before.
And what about the kids also?
Yeah, well,
some kids get massage and--
- The kids get massage?
- Yeah, yep.
Yeah.
- We really like it.
- We are in paradise here.
If everybody takes
a little bit care of the neighbor,
life is more easy for everyone.
It's just common sense.
One of the reasons
that German workers
have all this free time
and other benefits
is because they have power.
Real power.
It's a law that companies
have to have a supervisory board
which consists
50% representatives
from the workers' side.
That's right.
Not a token worker on the board.
Half of these boards are workers.
And one of the good things about having
workers with power on the board
is that when the company
breaks the law...
End of the road.
Volkswagen, the world's
largest automaker,
was busted for cheating
its way around the law.
...the workers make sure
the company is prosecuted.
That's why companies
listen to the workers.
We ask our employees,
"What can we do better?"
Why? You're in charge.
You're management.
Just tell them what to do.
They observe what we are doing
and they make proposals,
what we can do better.
Do you ever adopt
any of the workers' proposals?
Yes, of course.
We do it regularly.
- Of course.
- Why? Just to keep them happy, or...?
No, no, they have good ideas.
- They have good ideas?
- They have good ideas.
- They know--
- You don't really mean that.
Of course.
It's true.
You're just saying that
'cause the camera's on.
No, no, no. They are so important
and so intelligent.
Believe me, it's--
it's the key to success.
We know that the more
you give people a say,
the more they help
the company to win.
The latest area that
German workers have advocated for
is how they're to be treated
during their free time
when they're not at work.
It is against the law in Germany
to contact an employee
while he or she is on vacation.
And now many companies in Germany
have adopted the rule
that the company cannot send an e-mail
to employees after work.
At Mercedes,
the company's computers
will block any boss who tries
to bother an employee at home.
Employees have
the right not to answer e-mails,
and bosses are not supposed
to intervene on the weekends
or in the vacation or after
normal working hours a day
into the private spheres
of employees.
Ah!
No, the Germans
don't want to interfere
with your private sphere.
But things weren't always
like this in Germany.
Here in Nuremberg,
they didn't just make pencils.
They made documentaries.
My duty is to make a future
without such things.
To make everything that
this is never possible again.
Or to do everything.
Every day in Germany,
in every school,
they teach the young
what their predecessors did.
We had the chance
to meet survivors
and they told us their stories.
And, yeah,
you can't forget it.
They don't whitewash it.
They don't pretend
it didn't happen.
They don't say,
"Hey, that was before my time.
What's this got to do with me?
I didn't kill anyone."
I just adopted
the German nationality,
and I think by my adopting
the German nationality,
I have to adopt the history
of Germans, too,
and also feel responsible
for the things a German did
because I'm German, too.
They treat it as their original sin,
a permanent mark
on their collective German soul,
one for which they must always
seek redemption
and make reparation
and never forget.
And they can't forget,
because outside of their homes
on the sidewalk
are little engravings
that remind them
of the name
of the Jewish family
that used to live in this house,
but was taken away and killed.
Local artists
have installed around town
the "Jews Forbidden" signs
from the 1930s...
...to remind today's generation
that to be German isn't just
about Beethoven and Bach...
but also about
genocide and evil.
What would our signs look like?
What would our classes teach
if we wanted to teach our young
the whole story
of what it means to be American?
What reparations
would we make?
Have we truly changed?
Until 2015, the United States
never had a museum of slavery.
Why do we hide from our sins?
The first step to recovery,
the first step to being a better person
or a better country
is to be able to just stand up
and honestly say who and what you are.
"I am an American.
I live in a great country
that was born in genocide
and built on the backs of slaves."
If there's one thing we should
steal from the Germans,
it's the idea that if you
acknowledge your dark side
and make amends for it,
you can free yourself
to be a better people
and to do well by others.
If they can do it,
surely we can.
My invasion across Europe
continued.
The next stop was Portugal,
the country that helped
to bring slavery to the Americas.
After a few hundred years,
they gave up the slave trade,
but they kept the slaves' drums.
Somehow, the Portuguese
had caught wind of my invasion.
But of course this was May Day,
a celebration of workers
held all over the world.
In some countries,
it's a day off work.
But not in the United States.
Portugal, like most countries,
had a war on drugs.
And, like most countries,
they were losing that war.
So they decided to try
something new.
It's my understanding
that you don't arrest people
for using drugs anymore.
No?
Heroin? Pot? Meth?
Pills? Nothing?
If I told you I had cocaine
on me right now,
you wouldn't do anything?
- No? Okay.
- No.
Officers, I have cocaine
in my pocket.
A whole bunch of it.
Sorry, ahem, allergies.
I found my way to the offices
of Portugal's...
well, I don't know
what they call this guy.
I guess he's some sort
of drug czar.
Nuno Capaz.
You know, you look like a drug user.
Yeah, people told me that before.
I know that.
It's-- well, it helps me relate to them,
so I'm okay with that.
- You don't care?
- I don't care. No, not really.
Right.
Are you a drug user?
Yes, I am.
Yes, I am.
What drugs do you use?
Well, mostly alcohol,
Internet, a lot of coffee,
some sugar,
sex, occasionally.
Well, a lot of things
that make me feel good.
How many people last year
went to prison for using drugs?
For using drugs?
Zero.
How many people went to prison
two years ago for using drugs?
- Zero.
- Five years ago?
In the last 15 years,
no one was arrested in Portugal
because they were caught
using drugs.
- No one?
- No.
It's not considered a crime,
so there's no legal possibility
of someone getting
a jail sentence out of it.
So, if I had 25 joints on me,
I would be considered a user.
Mm-hmm, yeah.
Yes.
Have you had an increase
in drug-related crimes as a result of...
No. If there's less people using,
there will be less people
causing troubles
because they are using.
Okay, wait a minute.
You're saying that
by decriminalizing all drugs,
not throwing people in jail,
drug usage went down, not up?
Mm-hmm.
Um...
When you think about drug users,
everybody thinks about those
small 10% that are causing problems.
People don't think about
the 90% of people
that are not causing
any troubles
although they are using
illicit substances.
People that are using drugs
might be causing harm...
Causing harm to themselves,
but not necessarily to others.
...but not necessarily to others.
I mean, they may be bringing sadness
to their marriage or their family or...
So? So does Facebook.
Are we going to illegalize it?
See, we think of it the other way.
By identifying those
who are using and doing drugs,
we can weed them out.
- We use that as the crime--
- Is it working?
Well, actually, it is.
It's probably just a coincidence,
but in the 1950s and '60s,
the Negroes of the United States,
after 400 years of oppression,
got all uppity and started
demanding their civil rights.
And they started
to assert their power.
Our people want an end
to the living hell
that drug-pushing has spawned.
In order to fight
and defeat this enemy,
it is necessary to wage
a new, all-out offensive.
- Down.
- On the ground.
On the ground, man.
On the ground.
This is one area where
we cannot have budget cuts.
Drugs are menacing
our society.
They're threatening our values
and undercutting our institutions.
Here's how I think
the history books
will record all of this
100 years from now.
"Around the time that the blacks
began to rise up,
coincidentally, new laws were passed
imposing harsher sentences
on the drugs that were created
for the 'urban' demographic"...
See this cute little vial here?
It's crack, rock cocaine.
This is crack cocaine.
..."while the drugs used
in the white community
resulted in lesser punishments."
So help me God.
I experimented with marijuana
a time or two and I didn't like it,
and didn't inhale,
and never tried it again.
"Their leaders assassinated,
the uprising grew quiet,
and over the next four decades,
the police coincidentally rounded up
millions upon millions of black men,
stripping from all of them
their right to vote,
with 35 states
not even letting them vote
after they get out of prison.
Which means that in states
like Florida and Virginia,
one in three black men
cannot vote."
When we fight drugs,
we fight the war on terror.
"And the way you get the states
with the largest percentage
of terrorists
to become red states
is by taking away
their right to vote."
Yes, white America
had inadvertently
figured out a way
to bring back slavery.
And master knew
that the way to get rich
was having all that free labor.
Today's masters
have found our prisons
to be the perfect places
to make their products
for as little as 23 cents an hour.
Yes, that burger you're eating,
that airline reservation you've made,
the software you're using to watch
the pirated copy of this movie,
your child's backpack
with its five hours of homework.
I always wondered
what Victoria's secret was.
And now I know.
It's one of many companies
that have used 21st century slaves.
It was an act of pure,
mad genius.
So, what do you do
with your black people here?
- Do you have black people here?
- Yep.
And you don't-- you don't have
drug laws to put them in prison.
No, no.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
You're telling me that if you arrested
someone who was black
for usage of drugs,
they wouldn't go to prison?
They wouldn't be arrested
in the first place.
The usage of drugs
is not an excuse
to arrest anyone in Portugal,
regardless of their color.
Right, but it's a way
to help control the population,
if you understand what I'm saying.
- In the US, we have millions...
- I know.
...of black, mostly men...
With a criminal record,
and it's--
Even though they're out of prison.
And they can't ever vote again.
Our prisoners actually vote first.
I'm here right now
to steal your great idea.
I'm gonna take it back
to the United States.
The thing is it won't work
if you just take it there and pfft.
If you just go there and you just
decriminalize drug usage,
that's not going to work.
You have to steal some other good ideas
that we had before.
Yeah?
Like what?
A health care system
that is universal and free for all.
That will increase
the accessibility to treatment.
So, what you're saying is
it's not just taking back
the criminalization
part of drugs,
I am also gonna have
to convince the United States
to increase treatment,
basically take the stick out of our ass,
and help people.
Exactly.
As we were packing up to leave,
the Lisbon cops asked
if they could say something directly
to law enforcement
in the United States.
- Is against that dignity?
- Yeah.
And you guys are cops
and this is how you feel?
I don't know what to say.
A lot of work to be done, yeah.
- Thank you.
- Thank you very much.
And I think in general...
Yeah.
Yeah.
Welcome to the Norwegian
prison system,
based on the principle
of rehabilitation, not revenge.
I want to meet prisoners.
- Yeah, you wanna meet prisoners?
- Yeah.
You're meeting one now.
You're-- you're a prisoner,
dressed like this?
Yes.
So, this is the house
and in here is the living room.
It's a nice, okay view.
And this is my room.
It's pretty okay.
Yeah, so, this is your cell.
Yes.
Do they lock you in at night?
No. I am the only one
that has the key for it, so...
We watch TV,
we can play basketball.
- Bicycle or running, swimming.
- Fishing.
Wait a minute.
What do you mean swimming?
You can swim
to the other side?
That is not allowed.
From another side,
you can swim here,
but you cannot swim from here
to another side.
Because they call escape.
- You're in prison for murder.
- Yeah.
- You killed somebody.
- Yeah.
I can't help but notice
that right behind you
are a whole bunch
of very sharp knives.
Yeah.
Yes.
- Nobody here is worried about that?
- No, no.
- Should I be worried about that?
- No.
- You're not worried about it.
- I'm not worried about it.
- I love this.
- Yeah.
If I could get one of these
to take home,
I would have ketchup
on everything.
That is, like, the cool--
look at it, it's still going.
Yeah.
In the weekend,
it's four guards at work
in another building.
- That's it?
- Yeah, that's it.
And how many of you
are there here?
- 115.
- 115 and four guards?
- Yeah.
- Wow.
Warden, where's the punishment?
Where is the punishment?
The main idea is we're just supposed
to take away their freedom.
That's the only punishment
we're actually giving them.
They miss their family,
they miss their friends.
Right, right.
But also I think and I hope
when you speak to them,
they will also feel
that we're trying to help them
back to the same society.
You know, this is gonna be very hard
for Americans to see this.
This looks very strange to understand
why you're doing it,
why you do
your prison system this way.
We have to show more love
and affection for each other,
to take care of each other
in another way.
- This is the way.
- Yeah.
This is a sense of life,
you know?
If we showed a little more
love and affection
and kindness toward each other...
Yeah, yeah.
This is the way.
And this is so important.
- So important.
- Yeah.
The U.S. has one of the highest
recidivism rates in the world.
Nearly 80% of prisoners
are re-arrested within five years.
Norway has
one of the lowest, at 20%.
And that was something
I was claiming for the U.S.A.
Of course, I was visiting
a model prison.
A place for inmates
who were being rewarded
for their good behavior.
I said it wasn't fair to show
the American public their nicest place.
I wanted to see
a maximum security facility.
And that's where I went.
When the prison
first opened in 2010,
the guards wanted to send
a strong message
to the new inmates,
so they made
this orientation video.
There comes a time
When we heed a certain call
When the world
must come together as one
There are people dyin'
And it's time to lend a hand
To live, the greatest gift of all
We can't go on
Pretending day by day
That someone somewhere
will soon make a change...
Is that braille?
For the blind?
Yeah.
For the blind, yes, yes.
It's art.
Modern art.
You have modern art
throughout the prison here?
We are the world
We are the children
We are the ones
who make a brighter day
So let's start givin'
There's a choice we're making
We're saving our own lives
It's true we'll make a better day,
just you and me...
How many fights have you been in?
I have never been in fights,
actually.
You don't need a knife
to protect yourself with?
- Oh, no, no, no.
- No?
- We don't need that.
- No.
Show me your wounds,
the number of times you've been stabbed.
- Oh, no, never.
- Never been stabbed.
I've never been stabbed.
How many times have you
been beaten up here
- by other prisoners?
- No, never.
How many times you've been
raped in the shower?
Never.
That's not gonna happen
because you got
your own shower.
Yeah, here's the bed.
Mm-kay, that's a bed. TV.
- Got the flat-screen TV.
- Mm-hmm.
I'm painting, and besides that,
I'm studying art class, you know.
You're taking philosophy class?
I'm gonna have exam
after summer.
I want to work with community problems
and things like that.
Maybe politics later on.
That's not a bad idea.
Go to prison first,
then become a politician.
And speaking of politicians,
as in Portugal,
prisoners in Norway can vote.
And in order
to get their votes,
candidates show up
for election debates,
televised live
from inside the prison.
I had to keep reminding myself
this was a maximum
security facility.
Here, the inmates have keys, too.
And this inmate was a murderer.
They had Xboxes and a library
as nice as any suburban
high school library in the U.S.
They even had
their own record label
and a recording studio.
Music can actually open
a lot of the creativity inside of them.
And if it's one thing that's said
about the guys here,
they are very creative
in all sorts of ways.
They've got their own laundry,
they've got a pantry,
and, yes, they've got
their own knives, too.
Where are your guns?
- We don't--
- We don't need it.
- You don't need any guns?
- No.
We talk to the guys.
That's our weapon.
- Your weapon is your mouth?
- Yeah.
When it comes to do the job,
they will do it good, you know,
because the officers,
they serve you.
You know,
they're there for you.
- The guards.
- It's not like in America.
They're there for--
beat the shit out of you.
Crawl, motherfucker, crawl!
This way. Go!
Get him! Go!
Don't get bit.
You're gonna get bit.
Get down and spread!
Get down and spread!
- Don't move!
- Behave yourselves, behave yourselves.
This is Trond Blattmann,
a plumber by trade.
On July 22nd, 2011,
he lost his 17-year-old son
when he was murdered
with 54 other teenagers
on a summer camp island
in a lake in Norway.
One killer, who espoused
neo-Nazi and racist beliefs,
not only killed
all of these children,
but blew up a federal building
in downtown Oslo.
My son called me
from the island and said,
"Daddy, Daddy,
there's somebody
shooting at us on the island.
What are we gonna do?"
I had never been on the island,
so I didn't know what he meant,
and I said, "Are you together
with other people,
other youngsters? Yes?
Well, then, hide
and stick together,
take care of each other,
and be careful."
He called me around 5:20
and he was dead
just past 6:00.
Do you wish
that your son had a gun
instead of a cell phone
that day?
What I wished that he had done
was to swim.
Because the ones
who swam survived.
We don't have
death sentences here in Norway,
so we kind of said,
"That mass murderer,
he's going to have the same
kind of treatment as everybody else."
The justice system
is going to judge him
and he's going to have
his sentence.
You cared about
whether he had a fair trial.
- Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
- You. You yourself.
But don't you personally
want to kill him?
- No. No.
- If you had the chance?
- If you had the chance?
- No.
- But he killed your son.
- Yeah, but I-- no.
- You don't want to kill him?
- No.
- But he killed your son.
- Yeah, he killed my son.
- You wouldn't want to--
- But I don't want to step--
I don't want to step down
on the ladder and say,
"I had the same right
as you thought you had to kill."
I don't have the same right.
Even though he's just
a piece of scum?
Yeah, but that's-- I know
he's a piece of scum,
but it doesn't give me the right
to shoot him or kill him.
So, after this horrible
act of terrorism,
Norway didn't change its system.
You don't try to institute
a Patriot Act.
No.
You don't try to take away
people's freedoms.
No.
You're cautiously thinking
about arming the police now.
But even that is bothersome
and worrisome.
Why didn't you respond
the way we responded after 9/11?
Well, let me put it this way.
The whole establishment,
from the prime minister
through the king's family
and all of the officials in Norway,
all of the press,
the media said,
"Well, let's now
take care of Norway.
As we have been used
to taking care of each other,
we take care of Norway.
So, we stay together,
we open our hearts,
we open our society.
We're gonna have more democracy,
more freedom of speech,
because to lock up
wouldn't help us.
That would just create
more hatred.
It's true, we'll make a better day,
just you and me
We are the world
We are the children
We are the ones
who make a brighter day
So let's start givin'
There's a choice we're makin'
We're savin' our own lives
It's true,
we'll make a better day
Just you and me
It's true,
we'll make a better day
Just you and me.
There was much
I took from Norway
and much more to think about.
A country that forgave.
A country that,
when it locked up its citizens,
it treated them as human beings.
So what was I to do now?
Where to invade next?
Sweden?
Denmark?
I could go somewhere else.
Like Iran
or Brazil
or even Rwanda.
But I chose Tunisia.
A country
in Muslim North Africa
that has something
that we don't--
free government-funded
women's health clinics
and government-funded abortion.
We have 24
reproductive health centers in Tunisia
and it is our main mission--
contraception.
We have I.U.D.s, pills, implant,
and of course condoms.
- So, how about abortion?
- Yes, of course.
In Tunisia, abortion is legal
since 1973.
And the Tunisian people
are okay with that?
Yes, because
these kind of services
help women
to be the equal of men,
and when a woman
is well-educated,
when she work,
she have a better quality of life,
so she will have
a better life expectancy.
And I think that family planning
has played a great role.
As in other countries,
once women had control
over their own bodies,
eventually
both women and men
want control
over their own lives.
And in Tunisia's case,
that meant the dictator had to go.
We are gonna turn now to an almost
inconceivable act of protest.
More than a dozen men
across the Middle East
have now set themselves on fire
to oppose corruption and repression
in their own countries.
This massive uprising
began with one man--
Mohamed Bouazizi.
A 26-year-old college grad,
he was unable to find work
and forced to sell fruit
in the street.
Last month, harassed and insulted
by corrupt officials,
he snapped
and set himself on fire.
Mr. Bouazizi, he was a hero.
Mr. Bouazizi was a martyr.
He was a hero.
He's a symbol.
He's a-- I thank him
because he freed me
of my fear.
Fear of what?
Fear of oppression,
fear of the government.
Armed only with the fruit
from Bouazizi's broken cart,
the people of his town
stormed the governor's mansion
and the revolution had begun.
When the revolution happened,
I was pregnant,
and I was so proud
that my babies are born free.
They are born free citizens.
They are born
proud to be Tunisian.
I wasn't proud.
I was so ashamed.
I studied in Paris
and I was like,
"I'm here, I can talk to you
because it's in France. I'm safe."
But I won't have the courage
to outspeak in my country
because I choose life
and I didn't have the courage
to be persecuted.
And I'm quite ashamed
about that.
So, what did you do
when the revolution started?
The day of the revolution,
the 14 of January,
as I told you, I wasn't in the street
because I was pregnant.
And I was having journalists
all over Tunisia.
I was trying, really,
to not censor
as much as I could
because censorship
was everywhere.
And at some point,
one of my journalists called me crying
and said to me,
"My brother was shot
three minutes ago.
So what are you
going to do now?"
And it was like
a point of no return for me.
I was ready to lose my job,
everything, but this guy--
I still remember when
I put the phone down and I said,
"Okay, stop.
There's no turning back.
His brother is dead
in front of him."
So, I went into the studio and said,
"Guys are shot.
We have to outspoke this."
There were many women like Amel
who played a key role
in the revolution.
They toppled the dictator
and formed a democratic government.
But when the newly formed
Islamist Party
decided they
didn't want women's rights
as part of the new constitution,
the women of Tunisia
fought back.
We have many new
political movements
that weren't here before,
and those movements
are threatening women's rights.
And so now we're here
to defend them
and to show that
we'll not lower our guards.
E.R.A.! E.R.A.!
Like with the women in Tunisia,
women in America had tried to get
their Equal Rights Amendment
to the Constitution passed
back in the 1970s,
but it fell three states short
of ratification.
The Tunisian women
were determined
not to have the same fate
as those in America.
They took to the streets
and rallied the people.
And before long, the majority
of the country was behind them.
The final vote
on the constitution was passed,
with 200 voting yes,
four abstentions, and 12 no votes.
Although
the Conservative Islamist Party
controlled the most seats
in Parliament,
they agreed to abide
by the will of the people,
who wanted an equal rights provision
for women in the constitution.
They also offered
to voluntarily step down,
even though, legally,
they didn't have to.
That's really amazing
that you decided to step down
and follow the will of the people
as opposed to following,
you know,
maybe what some religious leader
might have told you to do.
That's not
the impression that we're given
in the United States
of anybody who's a Muslim.
Do you require women
to cover their heads here?
How do you feel about
discrimination against homosexuals?
Is there something you think
America can learn from Tunisia?
Americans are lucky.
They are-- they belong
to the most powerful country
in the world.
But being the strongest one
maybe stopped them
from being just curious.
I know a lot about you guys.
I know your music
from the '70s until today.
I dance on your music.
I speak, as much as I can,
your language.
I know Henry Miller, Kerouac,
Scott Fitzgerald.
I wear your clothes.
I eat your food.
But I also have my culture.
What do you know
about my culture?
Or Estonian culture?
Or Zimbabwean culture?
I read an interesting article
about the average time
an American spends
watching the Kardashian show.
Why do you spend
your time for this?
You invented the most powerful
weapon in the world--
it's Internet, guys.
Use it the right way.
Check, read, watch,
and then come to visit us.
We're worth it.
It's a little, small country.
Its name is Tunisia.
It's in North Africa.
And I really think we deserve,
as the other countries,
your attention,
because if you keep
this way of thinking,
that you are the best
and you know everything,
it won't work.
I was seven
when the women of Iceland
went on strike
on October 24th, 1975.
They marched into the center
of Reykjavik and filled the streets.
90% of women
did no work that day.
No schools opened.
No banks opened.
No kids ate.
No busses rode into town.
It was impossible
to get anything done on that day
because when women don't work,
nothing works.
They changed the impression
of the value of women
for women and men
alike forever,
because nothing worked
in Iceland that day.
So they changed the very reality
that I grew up with,
and they changed
my view on it forever.
And five years after this day,
we were the first country
to democratically elect
a female president.
She was a single mom.
She had
a seven-year-old daughter.
You cannot help but to thank
those role models--
and these women
who came before us--
and think that we owe it
to the next generation
to empower ourselves
and the generations that follow.
I campaigned all over the country
and it was absolutely
a unique experience.
I never slept in a hotel.
I slept in children's beds
around the country,
and it was arranged.
I knew who in the area
would vote for me
and I campaigned,
and then--
and finally I was elected.
There were hundreds of people
outside the house here.
My daughter, seven years old,
was standing beside me.
You know, if you take
the really long view of history,
you have, essentially,
a few thousand years
of it being just one way.
Men in charge.
Men in control.
Men making the decisions,
calling the shots
politically, economically,
socially, and personally.
Look what's happened in this time
since that women's strike in '75,
since your election in 1980.
How many countries
have elected women?
I mean, dozens.
And that doesn't even count
the women elected by parliaments.
All fathers know that their daughter
is as clever as the boy,
has the same intelligence.
All brothers know
that their sisters
have the same intelligence
as they have.
I'm very proud that Iceland
was the first and set an example.
- Right.
- And, definitely, it had a very good--
a very good effect
on our women and culture at home.
Okay.
That's exactly how I would've hit it.
Dead center.
I predict an eagle for this hole!
Meet Hafds,
Brynveig, and Margrt.
Aside from beating me
in a game of golf
on a balmy 29-degree day,
these women are all C.E.O.s,
one of them the former head
of their Food and Drug Administration.
They're part of a generation
of Icelandic women
inspired by the election
of President Vigds.
I think Iceland is the best country
to be a female in
in the world.
There has been a lot of change
since the last, maybe, 20--
- 15-- yeah, 15 to 20 years.
- To 20, yeah.
- We've gone like that.
- Yeah.
We have the same chance
as the men.
- You do?
- Yeah, definitely.
You do feel--
in your bones, you feel that?
Yes, in your bones.
We grow up believing that.
I mean, we don't even
think about it.
We have a gender quota
for the biggest companies.
You mean the company's
board of directors?
- Yep.
- So, you have to be
either at least 40% women
or 40% men.
Because you also have to think
about the young men.
They need to get
on the boards also,
so it's a good law
for them also.
Right, so-- so, yeah.
So it can't be
more than 60% women.
- Yeah.
- No, no.
That's true, yeah.
Research has shown us that--
and this is international research--
that once you have three women
in the boardroom,
that's when culture starts changing.
Not when you have one or two.
Because one is a token
and two is a minority.
But once you have three,
it all of a sudden changes
the group dynamics,
it changes how the dialogue
is taken, what is discussed,
and it's been well shown that
that goes beyond the balance sheet
when you have more women
around the table.
They start asking more
about all stakeholders,
and this is what I call a different
moral and ethical compass.
And I think this
is extremely valuable today.
And I actually don't think you can
survive long-term in business
without doing this today.
Throughout my invasions,
it was clear that where women
had power and were true equals,
people were simply better off.
Yet here in Iceland, I felt that
the women had taken this
to an even higher level.
And while they controlled nearly half
the seats on company boards
and nearly half the seats
in Parliament,
it did make me wonder--
what was it that the men of Iceland
still controlled?
When much of the world
went into recession last year,
no country melted down
faster than Iceland,
dragging down
three major banks with it.
The only bank to operate in the black
is run by women.
So, does gender make a difference
in the financial world?
Here's Sheila MacVicar.
Iceland's collapse
was the fastest in history,
with 85% of the economy
wiped out in weeks.
There was only one
financial institution,
Audur Capital, in Iceland,
that did not lose money
for its customers.
Founded by two women
on the investment principle of
"if we don't understand it,
we're not buying it,"
there's a lot of talk here
about the difference it would've made
if more women
were on the trading floors.
It's been 99% men
that wanted to take risk,
wanted speed,
wanted individual rewards
and excessive rewards.
There is new evidence emerging
that some of what happens
on trading floors
may be partly the result
of male hormones.
When testosterone levels
get too high,
traders become overconfident,
take too much risk,
and the bubble bursts.
Women, they think,
"What's good for the whole?"
Where men, more,
they think, "What's in it for me?"
It's a provocative question
being debated around the globe.
Where would we be
if it had been Lehman Sisters?
So, do you think
any of this would've happened
if women had been
in charge in 2008?
I thought we had created a world
that was on
an empty pursuit for more,
and I had a question about
if this growth journey we had been on
was really a successful
business strategy
that I had somehow missed
during my M.B.A. education.
Is it a relentless pursuit
for getting big?
Or is this the great big
penis competition?
So, 20, 30 persons in Iceland
has turned the whole economy
on this island on its head?
Yes.
20, 30 persons?
Yes.
That's insane.
Yes, that is.
Normally stoic and proper
Icelanders have started protesting.
Yo.
Ahem.
His name was Jn Gnarr
and he's Iceland's top comedian.
He decided to run for mayor
of its capital city, Reykjavik,
as a joke.
The people of Reykjavik
thought it was the best way
to send a message to the bankers
and the people who had
ruined their country.
So, why did you decide
to call it the Best Party?
Well, because there's
this idea of "best."
Here, we're not allowed to say
that something is "best."
You mean, here--
it's not against the law.
You mean Icelandic culture.
- Yeah, I'm-- it's a law.
- Oh, it is a law.
I cannot say that this brand of coffee
is the best brand of coffee.
- Oh, really?
- No, you-- you cannot say it.
- Have you tried it?
- Yeah, it's very good.
But it's not the best.
It's the best, but I can't say it.
It might be the-- okay.
No, but they don't have
these rules in politics.
He won in a landslide.
His election was a total rebuke
of these guys.
The bankers.
Anybody who has kids
will know
that if the kids get away
with their crime,
chances are they will continue.
When the bankers went to court,
they went to a real criminal court.
And when the judges
issued the sentence,
they put the bankers away.
Far away.
Far...
far...
far...
really far away.
They were being kept as far away
from society as possible,
where they could do no harm
to the people of Iceland.
That's not exactly
how we did it.
Well, there was that one guy
named Kareem.
But since the crash of '08,
not a single banker
without a Muslim name
has been tried in a criminal court
in the United States of America.
In Iceland, nearly 70 bankers
and hedge fund managers
were prosecuted,
with many of them sent to prison.
I went to see the top cop,
the special prosecutor appointed
to put the bankers in prison.
His name was
lafur Thor Hauksson.
The bankers
know him as Thor.
So, Thor, I have
the files here, actually,
of the people that I think
helped precipitate
the banking collapse
in the United States.
- Okay.
- Just take a look at that
in your spare time here,
if you can.
If you read through these,
these files...
you'll see things that will make
even Icelandic hair stand up on end.
- Okay.
- I mean, it's--
- Can I keep these?
- You can, actually.
Yep, I wish you would.
Yes.
Actually,
you know, in the States,
you have the ability
and the knowledge
- to do the right thing.
- Yes.
In America,
you had a prior incident.
You had the savings
and loan scandal.
You had some prosecutions
at that time.
- We did.
- Yeah.
That's right,
and people went to jail.
So, you have-- one of the prosecutors
that actually worked on that,
he gave us an advice.
So, our prosecutor,
one of them,
gave advice to your office
to help you...
- Yeah. Yeah.
- ...do this?
Jack Black?
No, no, no.
Not Jack Black.
It was Bill Black, I think.
The former prosecutor
in the U.S.
He was quite blunt with us.
We learned a lot from him.
Well, Thor,
I've invaded Iceland
because you've decided
to investigate and prosecute
your bankers
after your banking collapse
and put a number of them
in prison.
And that's just a genius idea
I want to take back
to the United States.
Okay.
You're the man.
Thank you for this great idea.
- Thank you.
- God bless you.
Because Iceland
didn't bail out their banks
and instead prosecuted
the bankers
and turned much of the financial
decision-making over to the women,
their economy
has completely recovered.
In fact,
it's doing better than ever.
Why do you think
the United States is like this?
Why don't we have
what you have?
In America, you have
the American dream.
That you have--
it's a land of opportunities.
That everybody will be able
to do whatever.
But in reality it isn't like that.
Every kid should have
the same opportunity--
the basic opportunity
to get education and health care.
It's not Communism,
it's just a good society.
Mm-hmm.
- You play more solo.
I'm taking care of myself
and my family
and the rest,
I don't care about.
But we are more
like a big group
and we try to take care of each other
within that group.
Right. You structure yourself
with "we" in mind
and we structure ourselves
with "me" in mind.
- It's the women.
- More women.
- It's women, right?
- It's our DNA.
Yeah.
I'm convinced.
It's my conviction.
That's my belief in women,
the capacity
and the intelligence of women.
If the world can be saved,
it will be women that do that.
And they do not do it with war;
they do it with words.
Women, if they are running society,
they are looking for peace.
They want to save humanity.
They want to save their children.
When the men on Earth open up
to how women see things
and add it to their way
of seeing things,
then we get a better world.
If you were to talk to Americans,
if you had two minutes
to say anything you wanted
to the American people,
what would you say?
And don't be afraid
of hurting our feelings.
- No.
- We need some truth here.
No.
I wouldn't want to live in the States,
even though you paid me.
Because there's-- the society
and the way that you treat people,
the way that you treat
your neighbors.
I would never want
to be your neighbor.
Never, ever.
Because you don't treat
your fellow Americans
the way you should.
How can you, in a way,
come home and feel well
if you know there are
so many people that can't eat,
they're sick, they can't
go to the doctor's,
they can't get any education?
How can you come home
and feel okay with that?
I couldn't.
I don't feel okay about it.
No, that's good.
You shouldn't feel okay with it.
We just had, like,
a hammer and chisel
and we were just-- I don't know,
there were a couple dozen people here,
and we were just like--
the chisel
and then banging away
on this thing, you know?
Did this for two or three nights,
and the crowd kept getting
larger and larger.
And there was no hole yet
in the wall,
but you'd hit this steel stuff
and then sooner or later,
you know, a little crack
would appear in the wall
and the East Germans
on the other side,
they were just, like,
having a smoke.
They didn't-- I think
they knew it was over.
This is my buddy Rod
from Michigan,
and we've met up in Berlin now
at the end of my invasions.
In November of 1989, we happened
to be traveling through Berlin
when we heard that a few people
were down at the Berlin Wall
and were chiseling on it
for some reason.
We thought, "Hey, we got
a couple hours to kill.
Let's check this out."
You know, there weren't
that many doing it then.
It was just those first few nights.
And I don't know,
I was just chiseling away on this thing
and all of a sudden I looked up
and you were on top of that,
you know, like, dancing around
on the top of the wall.
I'm trying to remember,
how many Germans did it take
to hoist you
up to the top of that wall?
Well, there was one that got me--
you know, he sort of grabbed my foot.
And then another one grabbed my belt
and kind of shoved me up,
and then I was able
to grab hold of the top of it.
We stayed at the wall,
chiseling away
for the next three days.
The thing about this
is that you and I grew up
- in the Cold War...
- Yeah.
...and if there was one thing
that was certain, it was that this wall
- would never come down.
- Yes.
Built to stand forever.
Impenetrable.
It lasted less than 30 years.
Yeah.
And, in a night,
it was over.
I remember that,
and around the same time,
Mandela got out of prison
and then became
the president of South Africa.
And those two events--
like, from that moment on in my life,
I was like, "Oh, I get it.
Anything can happen."
They always say
the solution is too complicated,
but there's always
simple answers to these things.
You just take the hammer
and you knock it down.
- You know?
- It really was as simple as that.
Hammer, right?
Chisel, down.
- Down.
- Hammer, chisel, down.
- Rinse, repeat.
- Hammer, chisel, down.
You know?
And then three months later,
- it's official.
- Yeah.
This Cold War, this wall that was
supposed to go on forever
was-- boop-- gone,
just like that, you know?
It's like, three years ago,
gay marriage in the United States
was outlawed in every state.
- Yeah.
- Now law of the land.
It was like, wow, that was quick.
You know?
So, I'm just-- I've turned
into this kind of crazy optimist
that-- just name something
that seems impossible,
and this wall proves
that that could happen.
- Yeah.
- That, you know, suddenly--
first it's a wall,
now there's a hole in the wall,
and then soon
the wall comes down.
- Pretty cool.
- Yeah.
We discussed all the great things
I had taken from my invasions,
but I began to lament
that the American dream
seemed to be alive and well
everywhere but America.
It was then that Rod reminded me
that he and I and most of our generation
went to college
for practically free.
He reminded me
that the Finnish education chief
had said that their education ideas
were American ideas,
and that May Day didn't begin
in Moscow or Lisbon,
it began in Chicago in 1886.
That's where the fight
for the eight-hour day
and a vacation came from--
American unions.
The fight for the E.R.A.
began eight years
before Iceland elected
the first female president.
The same thing
with the Norwegian prison warden,
that the idea of no cruel or unusual
punishment was ours.
And it was our state,
Michigan,
that became the first English-speaking
government in the world
to eliminate the death penalty.
And the special prosecutor
in Iceland,
he based his whole investigation
and prosecution of the bankers
on our savings and loan scandal
back in the '80s.
Even hired an American
to help him with it.
These weren't European ideas.
These weren't new ideas.
These were our ideas.
We didn't need to invade
all these countries
to steal their ideas.
They were already ours.
We didn't need to invade.
We just needed to go
to the American lost and found.
Maybe that was the answer.
Oh, will you help me?
Can you help me?
You don't need to be helped
any longer.
You've always had the power
to go back to Kansas.
I have?
Yes, you have.
And so have we.
We've always had it.
Kansas, anyone?
What's your plan
for tomorrow?
Are you a leader
or will you follow?
Are you a fighter
or will you cower?
It's our time
to take back the power
We don't need
to run and hide
We won't be pushed
off to the side
What's your plan
for tomorrow?
Are you a leader
or will you follow?
Are you a fighter
or will you cower?
It's our time
to take back the power
What's your plan
for tomorrow?
Are you a leader
or will you follow?
Are you a fighter
or will you cower?
It's our time
to take back the power
What's your plan
for tomorrow?
Are you a leader
or will you follow?
Are you a fighter
or will you cower?
It's our time
to take back the power.
Anything you can do,
I can do better
I can do anything
better than you
- No, you can't
- Yes, I can
- No, you can't
- Yes, I can
- No, you can't
- Yes, I can, yes, I can
Anything you can be,
I can be greater
Sooner or later,
I'm greater than you
- No, you're not
- Yes, I am
- No, you're not
- Yes, I am
- No, you're not
- Yes, I am, yes, I am
Anything you can sing,
I can sing higher
I can sing anything
higher than you
- No, you can't
- Yes, I can
- No, you can't
- Yes, I can
- No, you can't
- Yes, I can
No, you can't
- Yes, I can.
- No, you can't.
- Ma'am. Ma'am.
- Ma'am, get off the pole.
- Ma'am.
- Ma'am!