 Bassem Youssef, welcome to UC Berkeley. Can you describe how you went from being a cardiologist to starting a satirical TV show? When the revolution came, everybody found himself so involved in a way that it was never seen before. So I was not like exceptionally outspoken. I was a normal guy, like living in a normal community, and then the revolution rattled so many people's cages. It just changed so many people's life and so many people's perspectives. I'll give you something that might sound trivial, but for example with our Facebook statuses, we would always, if you were from a certain educated level, you would write your statuses in English. After the revolution, we all turned it to writing in Arabic because now we're talking about what's happening in our country. So you started this show called The Program in Arabic. What was your purpose? The purpose was giving high quality entertainment to people about issues that we care about. And giving the very, very politically infused environment, it was mostly politics. And because we wanted to be humorous, it was satire, so it was political satire. And of course I had that dream of replicating the John Stuart experience. So that was the purpose. But also the purpose has changed as we continue to do The Program because suddenly people kind of looked up to us in a way that we did not ask for. And I think this is partly because they have seen other people serious, political people fail. So people reverted to satire, which is number one weird, number two, it puts a lot of pressure on us. So we were always put in a position by our supporters to be their voices and by our enemies as being a target. One of my episodes said the end of this program will be because you're putting too much hope and too much weight on the role of the program. We are not required to tell you what to do or not required to lead you in what to do. We're not demagogues. We're just saying our opinion in a different way and don't hold us responsible for whatever happens in the country. Why take the risk of producing such a politically irreverent program? The risk came to us. And when the stakes was getting higher and higher and higher, we decided that it's a wise decision to stop taking the risk. And this is why I mean, I always tell people, hey, I'm not an Elsa Mandela. And I don't want to be. It's not my role. So at a certain point you had really to stop and think about the safety of your family and yourself. There's so much turmoil in Egypt right now. What are your hopes for your country? Anybody who likes this country, I like, hopes that it will be stable but not falsely stable because there's stability. I mean, there are some of the biggest dictators, dictator countries in the world that stable. But like, what is stability? I mean, because there is that such a certain kind of stability that you live in a bubble and you think everything is stable until it bursts and you think, oh my God, that's not stable at all. And I just, I think a coexistence, coexistence is a big word. And diversity is another big word. And these two like targets or hopes or values should be, I think that's a solution of so many things, so many problems. You're here as part of our commemoration of the free speech movement on campus. Did its legacy have an impact on you? It's amazing what actually happened here in Berkeley 50 years ago. And I've always been a big fan about that era, about the civil rights movements and about what happened because I think maybe we need, in our region, a civil rights movement of our own. And to actually stand here and to be in the same spot that actually originated, it's an honor to be here. It's an amazing, amazing place to be here. Having gone through college yourself and then having gone on to two careers so far as a cardiologist and a TV personality. Is there any advice you can offer to our students? I don't think that your life choices are limited to your college life. I mean, as a matter of fact, that's a lot of pressure to put on people who are like 18 and 19 years old who's like, okay, you have to decide something now that will affect you to the rest of your life. Which I did, deciding that I want to be a doctor. So after seven years of medicine and 13 years of practice later, after 20 years of total studying and practicing medicine, I changed my life into media. We like to set our path or goals in tracks, but there's so many things and so much happening outside the tracks. And I think people who have made it in this world are people who actually got off the tracks at a certain point. So tracks are good, but just look it out for the exits and the diversions because actually it's good. I mean, I don't know, I'm an old guy, 40 years old, telling people what to do. You know what, do whatever you want. What's next? What's next for me? Maybe I'll just come here and make a startup in Silicon Valley about nutrition because I'm a big avid vegan person now. I used to be a trash bin of every single junk food you'll ever think about a year ago with a huge horrible eater. Now I'm vegan for one year now. I do triathlons and half marathons. I'm running the next Sunday's half marathon in San Francisco. People tell me I look younger.