Comedian Adam Conover ruins what you think you know

In his comedy series “Adam Ruins Everything,” Adam Conover reveals hidden truths behind everyday things people accept without question. Season three premieres tonight on TruTV. The victim is America.

"This time we wanted to tackle some of the biggest myths about America. So we talk about the myth of the American Dream. We have this story about ourselves as a country where anybody can rise from rags to riches. In reality, we actually are very low on our rankings of social mobility worldwide," Conover says. "We talk about the myth that the Constitution is a perfect document when in fact it has a lot of issues." 

Is his comedy a form of journalism? 

Conover says no, and that instead he's a communicator. A journalist is someone who finds the information in the first place and shares it publicly. 

"But sometimes the reach of their work is a little bit limited. It ends up in one New York Times piece, and then the day goes by. And my job as a comedian is to take that information and make it really punchy, really interesting, and spread it as widely as possible." 

Does he have a political point of view?

Conover says he has his personal political viewpoints, but does not consider himself a political comedian. 

"Instead we talk about policy issues on the show. For instance, we talk about how it's so hard for all of us to do our taxes because the tax preparation lobby H&R Block and TurboTax have lobbied the government for decades in order to keep it difficult for you to do taxes, so that they can sell you a solution," he says. "Now that's not a political issue. That's a policy issue. I like to lay out that policy issue… We really don't get into the day-to-day of politics on the ground because there's enough comedians doing that. And I prefer to go to a more investigative and philosophical place with my work." 

Ruining the Olympics and other things he likes

Conover says the Olympics is his favorite sporting event, and he loves international competitions and track and field. 

"The fact is that the Olympics is terrible for the host cities. People are displaced. Rents go up. There's a lot of development that then lies fallow. Almost every city loses money," he explains. "And then even worse, the athletes are not paid. They're amateurs. And for every Michael Phelps who is actually able to go on the front of the Wheaties box, there's a couple of thousand athletes who are literally spending money in order to be there."

--Written by Amy Ta, produced by Alex Tryggvadottir