Chris Cuomo | Club Random with Bill Maher

On this episode, Bill catches up with journalist Chris Cuomo. They get into Chris’s current life since his CNN exit, why he’s suing to clear his name, and reflect on the media’s “scalp-hunting” mentality. Chris opens up about growing up in a political dynasty under his father Mario and working closely with his brother Andrew, how policy fights don’t always match party ideals, and what it’s like navigating scandal in a 24/7 news cycle. They swap thoughts on Trump’s flair for the dramatic, America’s appetite for outrage, the “defund the police” debate, how we lost the art of joking about sensitive topics, and why it’s vital to push back against extremes on either side. Throughout the conversation, Bill and Chris find common ground in calling out hypocrisy, highlighting nuance in politics, and believing we shouldn’t judge people by their worst moments—and they close out with some friendly banter on self-defense, fatherhood, and the value of letting go of grudges. Go to https://www.ffrf.us/freedom or text "CLUB" to 511511 and become a member today Try ZipIntro FOR FREE at https://www. ZipRecruiter.com/RANDOM Get 15% off OneSkin with the code RANDOM at https://www.oneskin.co/ #oneskinpod #ad Go to https://www. RadioactiveMedia.com or text RANDOM at 511511 to save up to 50%, today! Follow Club Random on IG: @ClubRandomPodcast Follow Bill on IG: @BillMaher Don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast for free wherever you're listening or by using this link: https://bit.ly/ClubRandom Watch Club Random on YouTube: https://bit.ly/ClubRandomYouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Speaker 01

  You're like Trump, so just keep insisting it'll make it more true.

• 0:33Bill Maher?

  No, it'll make it more true because it's just, because look at the depth chart.

• 0:41Bill Maher?

  You're all in the mob, is that right?

• 0:42Speaker 01

  Of course.

• 0:43Bill Maher?

  Could you ask a guy?

• 0:44Speaker 01

  What do you need? What do you need? Whose car are we gonna take?

• 0:50Bill Maher?

  Chris?

• 0:51Speaker 01

  Hey, bud.

• 0:52Bill Maher?

  How are you?

• 0:53Speaker 01

  Good. Thanks for having me over.

• 0:56Bill Maher?

  Thanks for being had. Oh, look at you. What are you, ready for a workout?

• 1:01Speaker 01

  No, I had a shirt on. You want me to put it on? Do you want me to put a shirt on over?

• 1:04Bill Maher?

  No, I'm not homophobic or anything. I'm just saying you look a little buff. I mean, are you expecting trouble? What is all that about?

• 1:12Speaker 01

  Oh, what about?

• 1:13Bill Maher?

  I mean, you look like the kind of guy who spends all day in the gym.

• 1:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's flattering.

• 1:21Bill Maher?

  What?

• 1:22Speaker 01

  No. No, I just don't know.

• 1:24Bill Maher?

  Look at those guns. What is that? Why? Why so, why so big? I mean...

• 1:30Speaker 01

  Why so big? I'm actually like 20 pounds lighter than I played at in college.

• 1:34Bill Maher?

  No, but like you look like you do a lot of lifting and shit.

• 1:37Speaker 01

  Not too much.

• 1:38Bill Maher?

  Really?

• 1:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, I do mostly classes and I fight a lot. I do a lot of self-defense fighting. A lot. Sparring and scenarios and shit like that.

• 1:47Bill Maher?

  You're talking about the CNN lawsuit?

• 1:49Speaker 01

  No. No, I wish, I wish that shit would go away, honestly.

• 1:53Bill Maher?

  Still going on?

• 1:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I would settle it. I mean, I'm not looking for $100 million or anything like that. I just want everybody to be on the same page that I didn't lie to anybody about anything. And I totally get why the, you know, the new ownership didn't like it. But the idea that my boss didn't know what I was doing is silly. He's all over the communications.

• 2:14Bill Maher?

  Oh.

• 2:15Speaker 01

  So I would settle it.

• 2:16Bill Maher?

  It's, you know, you should because it's been so long that like as you go through that I'm like barely remembering.

• 2:24Speaker 01

  I know and my main witness is my brother.

• 2:26Bill Maher?

  It's like.

• 2:26Speaker 01

  So it's like, you know.

• 2:27Bill Maher?

  But it's so funny that the way, I remember when it was going on, it was like the biggest thing and everyone was talking about it is the giant scandal and it's so ha- so often happens in this country. I've been there myself where something is like the biggest scandal and then like a year later, people are like, what? Oh, yes. What happened?

• 2:45Speaker 01

  You are right.

• 2:45Bill Maher?

  And then like, if you can't.

• 2:47Speaker 01

  You are right.

• 2:47Bill Maher?

  I think there should be some rule or law like if you can't even remember later what it was about. Like I can remember what the Clinton scandal was about.

• 2:57Speaker 01

  It was supposed to be about a land transaction, right? That's how it started with Whitewater.

• 3:01Bill Maher?

  Yes.

• 3:02Speaker 01

  Um, I'll tell you what's frustrating is when something totally disrupted your life in material ways. And then people say to you, what, what was that again? What was it? It really stings because you're like, I lost so much over something that now they can't even remember.

• 3:21Bill Maher?

  That's what I just said, yeah.

• 3:22Speaker 01

  But that's how the media is, you know? I mean, you'll see that now with what we're living through with the, the Signal thing. Um, they're gonna chew on it and, uh, the longer there's resistance on one side. And then it'll just go away and you won't even remember it. Next time I see you.

• 3:37Bill Maher?

  You're talking about the group chat?

• 3:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:39Bill Maher?

  With the, you don't, you think that's a nothing burger?

• 3:42Speaker 01

  I think, well, look, it's not a nothing burger, but it's not an everything burger either. And that's the problem is that it's gotta be one or the other.

• 3:49Bill Maher?

  Well, no, it doesn't. It's, it's, no, I mean, it's not like we, the war started, but I mean, to, to be so sloppy. Especially administrate, an administration that like was threatening Hillary Clinton with jail.

• 4:06Speaker 01

  The hypocrisy is what makes it deeper waters, what they're dealing with. But look.

• 4:10Bill Maher?

  To, to like be that sloppy about like who gets on your group chat.

• 4:15Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 4:16Bill Maher?

  I mean, I'm not.

• 4:17Speaker 01

  About a, about a war plan, by the way. It's not about whether or not I'm coming on Club Random. I mean, this was, this was a big deal.

• 4:23Bill Maher?

  Well. Okay, okay.

• 4:24Speaker 01

  And they condemn the reporter.

• 4:26Bill Maher?

  Now you're saying it's a big deal.

• 4:26Speaker 01

  No, no, I'm saying it's a big deal, but it's not everything. You know, the idea, everybody's got to be fired. Hegseth is gone, Walls is gone, they should all be gone.

• 4:32Bill Maher?

  Right, I agree.

• 4:33Speaker 01

  It's like, that's the media just wanting that pound of flesh.

• 4:36Bill Maher?

  Of course, I agree.

• 4:37Speaker 01

  And that's a part of the problem also. But Goldberg, you can say whatever you want about him. He did the right thing here.

• 4:43Bill Maher?

  Which?

• 4:44Speaker 01

  He contacted them once he knew what it was. I mean, that's crazy, I wouldn't have done that.

• 4:48Bill Maher?

  That's the reporter who was mistakenly put on the group chat.

• 4:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:52Bill Maher?

  I mean, I once, this is, oh, many, many years ago, like fifteen years ago.

• 5:00Bill Maher?

  I guess this was Twitter or something, and somebody wanted me to contact them. And anyway, I did push the wrong button or did the wrong thing. And my phone number was, and you know, like, look, I think, oh, I, in two minutes, I had six thousand messages.

• 5:13Speaker 01

  You doxed yourself.

• 5:14Bill Maher?

  You know, yeah. So, you know, it was no big deal. We, I got rid of the phone number in twenty minutes, and I had a new phone number. But, but, you know, people can do that. But that's, I, I'm not the Secretary of Defense, and I wasn't attacking the Houthis.

• 5:28Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 5:30Bill Maher?

  So, but it's so funny that you mention

• 5:35Bill Maher?

  this common ground that we have, and maybe we could get on this common ground. It's something lefties and righties can really agree on, that when you make one mistake, they come after you and want their pound of flesh. You can understand that, and Pete Hegseth can understand that. You and Pete Hegseth could definitely have a drink over, and I could join that party over that idea of, it's not really about the issues, stop lying. It's about, you want a scalp on the wall. That's what you want. And I certainly have read enough stories that you can tell, they just, this is just somebody at the paper who wants a Pulitzer Prize.

• 6:21Bill Maher?

  So they're gonna go after this. It's not about the story, it's about them and what they can get from it. And I think that'd be a great place for us to break bread.

• 6:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:32Bill Maher?

  Commonly.

• 6:33Speaker 01

  The problem is that you only see it that way when it's your balls that are in the mousetrap. And when Hegseth was saying that Hillary Clinton had to go to jail and everything that had happened, this was the worst he'd ever heard of, you know, he signed up for what he's getting right now.

• 6:49Bill Maher?

  Correct. So we both gotta climb down from there. That's, that's the thing.

• 6:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:55Bill Maher?

  That's the point that has to be made.

• 6:57Speaker 01

  That's right. You know, and people get frustrated. Like, right now, I'm sure my phone is warm to the touch with people saying, how can you say Hegseth doesn't have to go? How can you say this was classified? Well, because not everything has to be a death sentence.

• 7:13Bill Maher?

  Also, like, any, any job, when you're in it a month or two, you're, you're learning. Like, do I think somebody with his little experience for a job that big should have gotten in the first place? I do not.

• 7:26Speaker 01

  Right.

• 7:27Bill Maher?

  But he's there, and now that he is there, okay.

• 7:31Speaker 01

  And I said that at the time.

• 7:33Bill Maher?

  That's water.

• 7:33Speaker 01

  But it's not our call, it's the president's call.

• 7:35Bill Maher?

  And it's water under the bridge. He is there. And when you are new in a job, yeah, there's gonna be some fuck-ups like that. But, you know, you just can't.

• 7:44Speaker 01

  But I'll tell you what, I think that one of the things that has really, and everybody watching should know, that Bill hasn't just been, you haven't just been a good friend to me when I needed it. But I am, I, I say it all the time, Bill Maher, right now, is top of class and on his game.

• 8:05Bill Maher?

  I'll finish your thought.

• 8:06Speaker 01

  And I think the reason is, that I say that, is you expose the game. Here's the hypocrisy, here's why they're doing it, and that's where everyone really is. Not on that phone, not on social media. There they pick sides. But everybody sees it the way you see it, if they're independent and just critically thinking.

• 8:26Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 8:26Speaker 01

  They're like, wait a minute, so they all have to go now?

• 8:28Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 8:28Speaker 01

  Oh, and, and wait, was the mission? Okay, oh, the mission was okay, but nobody talks about that.

• 8:33Bill Maher?

  And that's the, there's a little, thank you so much for that, I really appreciate it. But that's the little hitch in the plan, what you said there, independent and critically thinking. If there were just more of them, I mean, I feel like that's my audience and that has become your audience.

• 8:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:50Bill Maher?

  You know, which is great, and they need more of us. But however more of us there are, I don't know if there are more people that it's just so easy to go to your corner, and I certainly know people, some very, very close to me, who have no interest in this kind of thing, they just want to hate. I'm sorry, but that's what it is, they they hate Trump. I don't think it's a good place for your mind to be, by the way, to hate anybody. Hate what they do, policies, I mean, I could list things I hate about Trump from right from like making fun of McCain, you know, I mean, right off the bat, I really, really hated that.

• 9:32Bill Maher?

  And I'm not even a Republican, but like, you know, I mean, people.

• 9:36Speaker 01

  No, but you're decent.

• 9:37Bill Maher?

  Well, people, you know, if you get shot down, you're not a hero. If you get captured, he got shot down, like, wasn't it like he? He wasn't, who was trying to get shot down or wasn't try, when he, his plane hit the ground and he broke his leg? He wasn't trying to get away, it was so offensive, but I don't hate him. And you, you, you know, if you let yourself into that hate, then everything that happens, you only see through the one partisan lens. So that's where you think is about the signal thing, the worst thing that ever happened. You're right, it's not the worst thing that ever happened. But on the other hand, the administration's response is so different than responses in past eras.

• 10:19Bill Maher?

  I mean, when the Bay of, when the Bay of Pigs went bad, JFK went out there and he said, I fucked up, my bad. Success has a thousand fathers, right?

• 10:31Speaker 01

  Failure has one.

• 10:32Bill Maher?

  Failure is an orphan, he said. Exactly, but it was just sort of understood that you owned things. Reagan, after the Contras, okay, it was a little squirrely, but he said, well, I my, I didn't think we sold arms to the hostages, and that's what my, my heart told me, but the facts tell me otherwise. And that was his way of saying, yeah, I fucked up.

• 11:00Speaker 01

  But we didn't have the crowdsourced consequences of cancel culture.

• 11:03Bill Maher?

  Now we're into the era of just, fuck you.

• 11:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:07Bill Maher?

  You're talking about.

• 11:09Speaker 01

  And then two weeks later, we don't remember why we killed him. You know, why, why, why was that guy canceled? Why was she canceled? Something happened, right? And these people move on. I don't think it's an unfair level of scrutiny. I don't know what the mechanism would be. I don't know how to do it, but I do think that if you are in the scalps game, you should be open and investigated as well. And I know that a lot of the brothers and sisters in the media will say, well, you're gonna have a chilling effect on journalists. It depends on what you're reporting on. If you're reporting on why they invoke the state secrets privilege in the litigation about the migrants that they sent out of here, then go deep and take it where it leads. But if you were just trying to get the guy for his sex life, if you're just trying to

• 11:51Speaker 01

  get him for something, cancel him, then why shouldn't that be done to you? And see, and then see how ready you are to find that relevant the next time. Because we didn't used to report on that. I can't tell you how many personal.

• 12:04Bill Maher?

  Sex life, are you talking about your brother?

• 12:05Speaker 01

  No, no, because his party has rules. His party has rules. You may not like the rules, but in the Democratic Party, an allegation is enough. And then they cancel you. And he had like a dozen, you know what I mean? So that's the rule of his party.

• 12:19Bill Maher?

  But.

• 12:19Speaker 01

  Don't be a member of the party then.

• 12:20Bill Maher?

  I had Andrew on, I don't know when it was, a year, a year and a half ago, you remember? And. I mean, I've never done or rarely done as much homework as I did that week because I needed to do a deep dive into the allegations. By the way, I did the same thing the one time I ever did my homework here, because this is not a homework show, for Armie Hammer. Because I wanted to know. And in both cases, yeah, not much there.

• 12:50Speaker 01

  I know.

• 12:51Bill Maher?

  And I say that not because you're his brother, or because you're here, or whatever. But when you look at it, and we did this on the show, and the acid test is, when I just read some of the factual stuff, the audience laughed. That's my acid test. If the audience is laughing, it's absurd. Some of it was absurd. Now, maybe he like, I don't know, you Italians are a little too touchy for my taste to begin with. It's just a thing. It's just a cultural thing. But I just don't, I just, yeah, it was a stretch. And the Armie Hammer thing was nothing, and I'm glad to see that both of them are rehabilitated. I take a lot of pride in my contribution. I'm not gonna say I take credit for doing it, but I have contributed.

• 13:36Bill Maher?

  That's one of my missions in life, to rehabilitating people who get cancer. Kathy Griffin was on my show. I mean, people, you know, have to have, you can't just always be judged by your worst moment, which is one of my pet peeves about the left that I would say they like to do, is judge you by your worst moment.

• 13:57Speaker 01

  Yes. And that's why MAGA is immune, because they can only do it to their own. Donald Trump is truly the Teflon Don. The media cannot take him down.

• 14:08Bill Maher?

  No.

• 14:08Speaker 01

  Because his people reject the basis of the criticism. There's an old expression, you know, that if you have to decide whether or not to care about what someone says about you, the way you start is, well, who said it? What do I think of them? And People have made that assessment about the media. And they've said, you know what, I don't care what you say about him. Because I think that you allow a lot worse, and I think you're kind of what you say he is. And that's why they're not going to get Hegseth out.

• 14:36Bill Maher?

  No.

• 14:36Speaker 01

  But they would be if it were the Biden administration. They can cancel all day on the left. They cannot take out members of MAGA. Trump would have to go bad on the guy. It would probably have to be a federal case to make him even think about it. And there is a power in that for him. Um, do I think he's handling this the right way? No, but part of the reason he's not handling it the right way is that he doesn't respect the criticism. He knows he can just say, The Atlantic is a failed magazine.

• 15:02Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 15:03Speaker 01

  This guy sucks.

• 15:04Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 15:05Speaker 01

  They all suck.

• 15:06Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 15:06Speaker 01

  Okay, but is what he's saying true? Well, who cares? They suck. And we killed the Houthis. That's good. And they move, they move on if they're smart. They just move on and the media will move on to.

• 15:20Bill Maher?

  Thank God we're bombing someone. I mean, they're, they're a bad group of people. Uh, maybe not, not the whole country, but who are out to destroy Israel. They're bombing, they're disrupting shift, uh, shipping in the Red Sea. I mean, they're, they're not, they're not some, you know, lovable ragged bantam miscreants. I mean, they're terrorists.

• 15:47Speaker 01

  But we have lost sight of good and evil. It's all advantage, Bill. You know, you mentioned Israel. Who ever thought that kids on American college campuses

• 15:57Bill Maher?

  I mean.

• 15:58Speaker 01

  would be pro Hamas? I thought the Jews had become white, like I have. You know, a generation ago, my father was an ethnic. He was described as an ethnic, all these little sneaky pejoratives. People like you saying they touch too much. And a generation later, I'm a white guy. And you're all Not the Jews.

• 16:16Bill Maher?

  You're all in the mob, is that right?

• 16:18Speaker 01

  Of course, of course. My father

• 16:20Bill Maher?

  Could you do me a favor then? Could you ask a guy? No.

• 16:23Speaker 01

  What do you need? What do you need? Whose car are we gonna take?

• 16:30Speaker 03

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• 16:45Speaker 00

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• 17:15Bill Maher?

  No, they used to say, they used to intimate that about your father when he was the governor of New York.

• 17:19Speaker 01

  My father, may rest in peace.

• 17:20Bill Maher?

  Who was like the least mafioso guy in the world.

• 17:23Speaker 01

  George H. W. Bush says to him at a dinner, later in life, may they both rest in peace. Hey, you know, Mario, we had a file on you when I was at the agency. We never found anything about the mafia.

• 17:37Bill Maher?

  Yeah, George Bush was the head of the CIA.

• 17:39Speaker 01

  He said, "We never found anything about the mafia." And my father knew that he was trying to say it in a nice way, but he was so offended that there was this kind of surprise that he wasn't a mobster. My father hated the mafia. He would not watch any of those movies.

• 17:59Bill Maher?

  Oh, well, he's missing a lot.

• 18:00Speaker 01

  He would not. He was like, "Why do I want to see the worst affect of my ethnicity?"

• 18:05Bill Maher?

  Because they're great movies. Godfather, Goodfellas. He was just, he missed a lot. If we could bring him back, the first thing I'd do is sit him down.

• 18:15Speaker 01

  Let me tell you, you obviously didn't know him. You didn't sit that guy down anywhere. That guy didn't do anything he didn't want to do. That's why he struggled in politics. You know, one of the advantages my brother has in having watched my father develop and really be his guy. My brother was the main guy for my father since he was 18, okay? And Andrew can make deals. Andrew knows how to make things happen. My father could not get past the fact that what you want is wrong. Okay, I know there's a deal to be made. I don't want to make a deal with you. What you want is wrong. And I'm not making the deal. Fuck you, let's fight. And so he was a great orator.

• 18:59Speaker 01

  He was a great motivator of people and their interests.

• 19:02Bill Maher?

  You're talking about your father?

• 19:03Speaker 01

  Yes, but a deal maker? No. Andrew has a different skill set. Andrew gets deals done. He uses mechanisms of government.

• 19:09Bill Maher?

  He's running for mayor in New York now.

• 19:11Speaker 01

  As far as I know.

• 19:14Bill Maher?

  Are you helping him with this tragedy?

• 19:16Speaker 01

  No.

• 19:16Bill Maher?

  No? Come on, why? What have you got to lose now? You're not gonna lose your job again.

• 19:20Speaker 01

  He's got better people, but you know what? My brother, because of what happened.

• 19:24Bill Maher?

  You don't talk to your brother about?

• 19:26Speaker 01

  I talk to him all the time.

• 19:27Bill Maher?

  About political strategy? About, hey, what's going on in your life? Well, I'm running for mayor. Nothing interesting there. What you have for dinner?

• 19:34Speaker 01

  Worried about protecting me because of what happened.

• 19:37Bill Maher?

  Really?

• 19:37Speaker 01

  That...

• 19:39Bill Maher?

  When News Nation's gonna fire you now?

• 19:40Speaker 01

  No, I mean, I hope not. But, you know, or at least not for that. You know, but...

• 19:45Bill Maher?

  Can't get fired off this show.

• 19:46Speaker 01

  That's true. That's true, I'm safe. It's a safe space. Um, but, you know. He, I'm his little brother. He's worried. He hates what happened. He feels so guilty about it. And I try to tell him, look, I made my own choices. I was always gonna help my brother. I just didn't do anything underhanded. And I didn't lie about it. So, do I talk to him? Of course I talk to him. Does he have better minds? Yeah, he's got good people around him. So...

• 20:11Bill Maher?

  I mean, I like him. Uh, he's been on my show now a couple of times. Even did the panel, which was great, I think. Um, I don't think he's gonna get past the nursing home thing. I mean, I read the New York papers. When, when The Times and The Post are both on the same page. It's, you know, and, you know. I'm sure he, of course, he wasn't trying to do something bad. But just like with the Hegseth thing, almost, you know. You kind of have to own, politics is a high-wire act. Yeah, like, one boner decision can, yeah. People go, I'm sorry, I can't trust that guy's judgment. Or they don't.

• 20:56Bill Maher?

  I don't know what the fuck will happen, but I, that would be...

• 21:00Speaker 01

  I don't think it determines the race. I think he's got a lot...

• 21:02Bill Maher?

  I do.

• 21:03Speaker 01

  I think he's got a lot of pressure, uh, against him within that party. And they're gonna have to make a decision whether they want to be in power or they want to police their own set of beliefs within their party. I mean, that's what they have to decide. What are they about as a party? I'm not a fan of the parties. I'm not a fan of the Democratic Party. I don't think they're my father's party by a long shot.

• 21:28Bill Maher?

  No.

• 21:29Speaker 01

  Um, but.

• 21:30Bill Maher?

  Well, they could be.

• 21:31Speaker 01

  You know, Andrew's leading in the polls for a reason. It's not name recognition. It's because when people look at their experience living in the city, they believe he's someone who can make it better.

• 21:40Bill Maher?

  It's also huge name recognition. You're the Cuomos. You're like royalty in New York. Your father was the governor. Your brother was the governor. Um, you know, come on, of course it's name recognition.

• 21:51Speaker 01

  Right, but they know, they know the controversies also.

• 21:54Bill Maher?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 21:55Speaker 01

  So.

• 21:56Bill Maher?

  People will, I mean, and luckily for him, he's got a weak field. I mean, Mayor Adams is, that name is, is, is pretty much in.

• 22:05Speaker 01

  I don't think Trump did him any favors with how that deal was structured. I, I was happy to hear that the amicus brief, uh, that the, the person who was brought in to look at it, who's a very legitimate person, said, these charges should be dropped. It shouldn't be that, let's see what happens after the election. It's not fair that Trump is trying to keep those hooks in Mayor Adams like that. I know my brother's running against him, but that's, that's how I feel. I think the federal indictment was weak sauce. And I think this deal by Trump was manipulative. And you drop the charges, you.

• 22:36Bill Maher?

  Okay, weak, weak sauce. You talk, you talking about the, the actual thing itself, the deal with Turkey?

• 22:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:42Bill Maher?

  Right, I agree.

• 22:43Speaker 01

  It's like upgrades.

• 22:43Bill Maher?

  I agree. I thought the same thing. I'm like, of all the things politicians do.

• 22:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:48Bill Maher?

  This guy, I mean, of all the places, Turkey.

• 22:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:52Bill Maher?

  It's just like, okay, was it completely right that Mayor Adams will now say, I don't think there was, uh, I read about it. There's not, you know, I know what the Kardashians say about the whole Armenian genocide, but you know what? I've looked into it. It completely, it was over a hundred years ago. All right, it was Turkey. Can we just all enjoy Thanksgiving? Okay, it wasn't the greatest thing to do, but like.

• 23:16Speaker 01

  Federal charges?

• 23:17Bill Maher?

  The, um, it, it, again, like he and Trump bonded.

• 23:23Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 23:24Bill Maher?

  Over, it's funny that we bond left and right over what the scalp hunters do to both of us.

• 23:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. And it's the party's plan to their worst instincts of those fringes.

• 23:36Bill Maher?

  What?

• 23:37Speaker 01

  It's the fringe. The fringe dominates our dialogue, dominates our process. And you're either, look, and then, and then you get really pissed off when you see the hypocrisy of it.

• 23:47Bill Maher?

  I mean, there's a

• 23:50Bill Maher?

  I'm roofing you.

• 23:51Speaker 01

  No, what is, what is that that's in there?

• 23:53Bill Maher?

  It's, it's, every show I have to explain this.

• 23:56Speaker 01

  Well, it's a dropper bottle.

• 23:57Bill Maher?

  Jing, I drink it. It's great. It's a way to make just normally carbonated water into tasty diet soda that has no chemicals. Boy, these people should pay me more.

• 24:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:11Bill Maher?

  I don't think they're paying me.

• 24:12Speaker 01

  I never heard of it before, but I gotta tell you, the dropper is a little menacing.

• 24:15Bill Maher?

  I love it. And I, it is, but you only need that much. Jing, I drink it. And I pour it on, no, I'm not gonna say that. I used to say I poured it on dog shit and they got mad. I was like, I'm most kidding. I was just trying to say, I don't know what I was trying to say. I was high, but it's not an insult. I like it. Anyway, oh, there was something important we were talking about. What, what did you just ask me?

• 24:39Speaker 01

  Well, we're kind of going through the hypocrisy of these fringe elements.

• 24:43Bill Maher?

  Oh, Family Guy. They have a character on Family Guy. You watch Family Guy?

• 24:48Speaker 01

  Oh, I love Seth MacFarlane.

• 24:49Bill Maher?

  Oh, well.

• 24:50Speaker 01

  You know, I did his first, I know, I saw your whole thing with him.

• 24:53Bill Maher?

  Okay, what?

• 24:54Speaker 01

  I, I liked, I liked.

• 24:56Bill Maher?

  He's one of my best friends.

• 24:57Speaker 01

  I know, I liked that the conversation.

• 24:58Bill Maher?

  I mean, we scream at each other sometimes, but he's one of my best friends.

• 25:01Speaker 01

  I thought it was super smart and, you know, I.

• 25:03Bill Maher?

  We had a screaming match in the middle of the Tower Bar, one of the nicest restaurants in town. But, you know, he also brought me the most amazing birthday present and we came out fine, but like, yeah, we, we are that couple that just fight sometimes. I mean, like COVID, we did not agree on that shit.

• 25:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, but that's called being human.

• 25:25Bill Maher?

  But anyway, there's, there's, there's a, there's a cripple character on, on, you know, Joe the cop. And they make a thousand jokes about it.

• 25:34Speaker 01

  But he's a comic.

• 25:35Bill Maher?

  But I, but it just shows you that, you know, you can joke about these things without, without.

• 25:41Speaker 01

  I'm fine, I'm fine with it, but when you cancel one person, but because it's a black woman, who's doing it, they're not gonna cancel her.

• 25:47Bill Maher?

  Totally.

• 25:48Speaker 01

  That's the problem.

• 25:49Bill Maher?

  You're right. She wears the magic armor. She wears a magic armor so she can do that. Yes, you're right. And, and both parties do that. Like, when you're in our side? Like, if I made a fat joke about anybody in the world, uh, how dare you, from the left, if, if you make it about Trump or Chris Christie, it's just hysterical.

• 26:07Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 26:09Bill Maher?

  That's what we gotta get past.

• 26:10Speaker 01

  I know.

• 26:11Bill Maher?

  That's those independent, what did you call them, independent?

• 26:14Speaker 01

  Critical thinkers.

• 26:14Bill Maher?

  Critical thinkers.

• 26:15Speaker 01

  You know, like, I tell people, I don't want the lemmings, I want the lions. You know, you can have the lemmings. There, you got forty, forty-five percent of the country are happy to follow. Sheeple.

• 26:24Bill Maher?

  Way more than that.

• 26:25Speaker 01

  Um, no, I think they just stay on the sidelines. I think they watch what's going on and they're like, these people are fucked up. Let me just stick to my regular life. Politics doesn't affect me anyway. I'm not gonna let this toxify my, my, my brain space.

• 26:36Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 26:37Speaker 01

  Because I have a lot of those people in my life.

• 26:38Bill Maher?

  I do too.

• 26:39Speaker 01

  You know, they're running businesses.

• 26:40Bill Maher?

  You're right.

• 26:41Speaker 01

  They're raising their families. They dip in and out.

• 26:44Bill Maher?

  They're having sex with me.

• 26:46Speaker 01

  And they're feeling like, you know, I don't get what your people are fucking doing. It doesn't make any sense to me. You guys play by rules that don't exist in any friendship or any professional relationship.

• 26:58Speaker 01

  You're still laughing at yourself.

• 27:00Bill Maher?

  No.

• 27:01Speaker 01

  You're still laughing at yourself.

• 27:02Bill Maher?

  No, I'm, no, what I'm laughing at is that we've been here for like, I don't know, a thousand hours. And like, I really wanted to just say, how are you? And like, right away, because we are the people we are, right away, what's comfortable for us is to go right into, and this story, and this story, and this race, and this thing, because that's the language we speak and what we love to talk about. But I really meant to say, you know, you're not on TV here. This is a different thing. How, how are you, my friend?

• 27:29Speaker 01

  I'm happy to be here. Um, I'm-

• 27:31Bill Maher?

  Are you happy in general?

• 27:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, look, I like, I like where my kids are at. Uh-

• 27:37Bill Maher?

  Where are they at?

• 27:39Speaker 01

  So-

• 27:39Bill Maher?

  Did you teach them not to end a sentence with a preposition?

• 27:43Speaker 01

  The mother's cat or whatever that stupid thing is between the A and the T. Um, I, the youngest is, uh, determined to go to boarding school. Heartbreaking.

• 27:53Bill Maher?

  Determined to go to boarding?

• 27:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, she's and.

• 27:55Bill Maher?

  Is that a sentence anyone has ever said? I thought kids resisted boarding school.

• 27:59Speaker 01

  And this kid is just, I mean, obviously it's, it's my kids, so I'm biased, but I'm just so impressed by her. Her grind, her name is Carolina Regina Matia. We call her cha cha and she's.

• 28:14Bill Maher?

  You gave her all those names?

• 28:16Speaker 01

  Well, Carolina, my wife, I gave her Regina is one grandmother. Matia is the other grandmother, so she has their two names and we call her cha cha. And she's a grinder.

• 28:27Bill Maher?

  Cha cha, how'd you get that?

• 28:29Speaker 01

  When she was a kid of, of an infant, she had, born with abdominal weakness and she wasn't able to move the way she was supposed to. And when she started walking, she had to walk like this and it looked like she was doing the cha cha. So we kind of gave it to her as a joke.

• 28:46Bill Maher?

  Straighten that out?

• 28:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, and she's just a grinder. She was a worker then and she's a worker now. And she said, I love my friends. I love where we are. We live in this really great little place. She said, but I want to be around kids who are more ambitious and come from different out settings. And I think it'll help me more in figuring out what I can do next. And I was like.

• 29:11Bill Maher?

  So she lives in Queens now? Is that where you are?

• 29:13Speaker 01

  No, out in East Hampton.

• 29:15Bill Maher?

  Oh, East Hampton. Well, no wonder why she wants to get away.

• 29:17Speaker 01

  So she goes to school in Sag Harbor, which is a great public school, great principal. Uh, they have great outcomes there. They have the international baccalaureate program. It's really great public high school.

• 29:28Bill Maher?

  I always hated the Hamptons.

• 29:29Speaker 01

  And I've always loved it off season. You know, when all you guys show up, we call them the City-ots.

• 29:35Bill Maher?

  I was there once. It was terrible.

• 29:37Speaker 01

  Oh, I love it.

• 29:38Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I know, I guess people do.

• 29:40Speaker 01

  As a fisherman?

• 29:41Bill Maher?

  It seems snobby.

• 29:43Speaker 01

  Oh, eh, eh, parts of it certainly are, but mostly during the summer when the white pants show up. You know, in the off-season, the rest of the, the rest of the time. It's a great, it's a great community and they're real people.

• 29:54Bill Maher?

  So it's like a beach community that only becomes asshole town in the summer.

• 29:58Speaker 01

  That's right, when the City-ots show up.

• 29:59Bill Maher?

  Right, the City-ots. But yeah, that's what I remember. This is a long time ago, but it was like the same people who were in the clubs in New York and then, oh, you'd see them at the.

• 30:08Speaker 01

  No, those aren't my people. You know, my people are artisans, their family people, fishermen, yeah.

• 30:13Bill Maher?

  Artisans?

• 30:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:14Bill Maher?

  Fishermen?

• 30:14Speaker 01

  Electricians.

• 30:15Bill Maher?

  What are you, Jesus?

• 30:16Speaker 01

  Electricians, uh, they, they run plumbing.

• 30:18Bill Maher?

  Like, what kind of artisans? What are they making?

• 30:20Speaker 01

  They're trades guys.

• 30:21Bill Maher?

  Trade, like what?

• 30:23Speaker 01

  Electricians, plumbers, you know, all the people who built this fucking house.

• 30:26Bill Maher?

  You think a plumber's an artisan? Okay.

• 30:28Speaker 01

  What, you don't think so? Have you ever tried to fix a toilet?

• 30:30Bill Maher?

  You know what? I'll say this. It's so funny. Whenever people talk about plumbers, they always complain like, oh my God, this guy charged an arm and a leg. If plumbers only knew what they actually could charge. I mean, when shit is backing up in your house, you could.

• 30:45Speaker 01

  That's why I say artisans and they know what they're doing, man. They know how to do things, build things, fix things.

• 30:52Bill Maher?

  Yes, I agree. We need more of that in America.

• 30:55Speaker 01

  The biggest boats in the marinas where I go, yeah, you got your hedge funds, guys, but those are yachts. The big fishing boats builders, HVAC, you know.

• 31:05Bill Maher?

  Let's build a schooner right here.

• 31:06Speaker 01

  Artisans, artisans. We need more of them.

• 31:09Bill Maher?

  I wanna work with my hands.

• 31:10Speaker 01

  Getting away from the artisan class in this country.

• 31:12Bill Maher?

  I wanna do things with my hands, Chris.

• 31:14Speaker 01

  Come on, what man doesn't want to? What woman doesn't want to? Everybody wants to be able to fix shit.

• 31:19Bill Maher?

  I do something with my hand every night.

• 31:20Speaker 01

  Oh, boy. Do you think of me?

• 31:23Bill Maher?

  Oh, we didn't need to take it in that direction.

• 31:26Speaker 01

  You didn't say no.

• 31:27Bill Maher?

  Oh, my gosh. These bromances, these bromances turn so quickly. First it's a bro thing and then, uh, but you're happy, so good. I mean, because, you know, you did kinda go through the mill.

• 31:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, and you have to choose. I had to choose, uh.

• 31:46Bill Maher?

  Between?

• 31:48Speaker 01

  There is a truth that is really hard to live with, which is nobody hurts you, nobody insults you, nobody damages you. You decide to feel those ways. Now, physical pain is different, but I get to choose whether or not I'm gonna be angry at you, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna hate you because of what you say or do to me. That's a choice. And I had to choose to, if not forgive, move past what happened and who did what and who said what and who didn't say or do what I thought they should. Just let it go and just live going forward. And I had to make that choice and it took me time, but I do it more than I don't now.

• 32:27Bill Maher?

  I don't know. I sometimes get off on like, like, I have these scenarios in my mind of just

• 32:33Speaker 01

  Too toxic.

• 32:34Bill Maher?

  I'm just doing, no, it's not horrible things.

• 32:37Speaker 01

  It was for me.

• 32:38Bill Maher?

  It's just like, you know, I'll just like, uh, I don't know.

• 32:43Speaker 01

  It was for me. I was in a, you know, I just, I didn't know how to handle it. I'd never seen anything like that. I'd never seen six cars of paparazzi chasing one of us. You know, it's people in the media, that doesn't happen.

• 32:56Bill Maher?

  I think it's healthy when you imagine your enemies having horrible things happen to them, not obsessively, but just like to get to sleep. Just to get to, just like, ah.

• 33:08Speaker 01

  What does it do for you? Marcus Aurelius was right. He said the best revenge is to not be like whoever harmed you.

• 33:15Bill Maher?

  It's interesting, you know, Jerry Seinfeld's a big Marcus Aurelius.

• 33:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, it's an amazing

• 33:20Bill Maher?

  He could have a, uh, to tell him, tell me

• 33:23Speaker 01

  He won't come on. All these people that I know personally, Marcus Aurelius is a tough get.

• 33:28Bill Maher?

  Well, he died in 1888, but

• 33:30Speaker 01

  I mean, you know, but you gotta, gotta have hope.

• 33:32Bill Maher?

  What we call great name, bad guest.

• 33:36Speaker 01

  It's hard to get a dead man on.

• 33:39Speaker 01

  But you know, I know all these people. I just don't ask them to ever do anything professional unless they ask me. If I can help, then I have them on.

• 33:47Bill Maher?

  But what is it about Marcus Aurelius? I'm curious.

• 33:49Speaker 01

  I don't think it's just, it's just him. Although it is fascinating to me that he had kept this compendium of notes for himself. Which I thought was very cool.

• 33:57Bill Maher?

  For the people who might not remember Marcus. He was the Roman emperor. You might remember him played by, um, was it? Richard Harris played him in Gladiator, the first one. He is the emperor who, uh, presided over the last great era of Roman history.

• 34:17Speaker 01

  They called him one of the last good.

• 34:19Bill Maher?

  Yes.

• 34:20Speaker 01

  Emperors.

• 34:21Bill Maher?

  So when he dies in 188 D. But he, he also, uh, wrote, um, philosophy. As, as, as rulers of the day did. They were philosopher kings.

• 34:32Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 34:33Bill Maher?

  That's concept seems very bizarre now.

• 34:36Speaker 01

  I know, and it's a big mistake. Philosophy matters. We do not test these men and women about their why. It's just about getting power and keeping it. And policy is a byproduct.

• 34:47Bill Maher?

  But what is Marcus Aurelius's basic philosophy? Cause I kind of forget.

• 34:51Speaker 01

  So he was taught by Stoics, okay? Stoics were ancient Greeks. Not, the misconception is that it means don't feel anything. That's not what it is. It's about choice. It's about living your life as a function of reasoned choice whenever possible.

• 35:07Bill Maher?

  Oh.

• 35:08Speaker 01

  And understanding what guides that. And that is what you control. And then there's a whole big basket of shit that you just don't control. So you gotta give very little attention and energy to it. Cause you cannot change it. It's like the Serenity Prayer.

• 35:21Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 35:22Speaker 01

  And it's just training yourself to be that way. And it is not easy. It's simple, but it's hard.

• 35:28Bill Maher?

  Okay, here's a Roman Empire joke.

• 35:30Speaker 01

  You were just waiting for me to finish.

• 35:32Bill Maher?

  Yeah, but I was listening.

• 35:35Bill Maher?

  So this is an old Jewish lady watching a movie like Ben-Hur, one of those movies, and it's the Colosseum, because you mentioned this about like, so the lions and the Christians are in the Colosseum, and it's very, and she says, "Turn off the movie, turn off the movie," and they come in and say, "Man, we turn it, what's the matter?" She said, "It's too violent. I can't watch the, I can't watch this." So they, okay, they turn back the movie, and she watches two minutes more, "Turn off the movie, turn off the movie," they come back and say, "What's the matter?" She says, "I can't watch the lions, they're eating the Jews." And the guy says, "No, they're not eating the Jews, they're eating the Christians." They turn the back movie on, two minutes later, she, "Turn the movie off, turn the

• 36:20Bill Maher?

  movie off, what's the matter now?" She says, "One of the lions isn't eating."

• 36:27Speaker 01

  All pain is personal. It's much easier when it's not you. My father used to tell a very funny joke, you know, it's so sad that so many things that I grew up with, where the different ethnicities swapped humor with one another. I think it added such a more healthy nature to the relationship than now when it's all sanitized.

• 36:44Bill Maher?

  It's terrible that, I think racially, we've lost out on so much that we made it so that you're walking on eggshells, because I certainly remember an era, you know, I would say, the late or mid 90s, certainly Clinton, our first black president, and there was certainly lots more work to do.

• 37:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:04Bill Maher?

  Racially, I mean.

• 37:05Speaker 01

  Still is.

• 37:07Bill Maher?

  Yes, but like, just certainly in the arts, I think we have, you know, you cannot say that African-Americans are not represented in TV and movies as they were, that was the complaint, it was valid. That is definitely not a valid complaint. No, sure, and great, happy for you. Okay, but like, in that era, in through Obama, I feel like you could joke. I mean, there was a lot of comics who their whole act was like, "Black guys do this, white guys do this," you know, like, even making that comparison now. It's like, how dare you? That's racist. And the fact that we can't like, take the piss out of each other. You think of a movie like White Men Can't Jump, you know, that's, it's a black guy

• 37:52Bill Maher?

  and a white guy, and they're... I think you've got to get it out there. And it doesn't mean you're racist or have hatred. It's just like, and also to be able to joke with someone is a bonding experience that we are denying ourselves.

• 38:08Speaker 01

  Yes, I agree with you. And so then you, you know, when you're in my business, you know, you start kind of trying to plumb why, why, why? And the best I've been able to come up with is it's like the ultimate manifestation of rich people problems, that in this country, we ignore things that we could be fascinated by, you know, like the degree to which we have hungry kids in this country is always shocks me every time I go to these areas. And I'm like, how is this happening here?

• 38:37Bill Maher?

  How is it happening?

• 38:38Speaker 01

  Because.

• 38:39Bill Maher?

  There's so many programs.

• 38:40Speaker 01

  We have become.

• 38:41Bill Maher?

  Where are the kids hungry?

• 38:42Speaker 01

  So top heavy.

• 38:43Bill Maher?

  They look fat.

• 38:44Speaker 01

  We have more of a, we are at once, but that's the truth. We are at once, per capita, one of the most obese places on the planet. And we have crazy percentages of women who die in childbirth and hungry kids.

• 39:01Bill Maher?

  That one's crazy.

• 39:02Speaker 01

  For us.

• 39:03Bill Maher?

  I know.

• 39:03Speaker 01

  And it's like, because we've become so top heavy.

• 39:05Bill Maher?

  It's so embarrassing.

• 39:06Speaker 01

  And that's what Trump was playing with, right? Which is that there is this real anger out here that like, how are you?

• 39:11Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 39:13Speaker 01

  Living this way, when it's so uneven in a land of opportunity. I get it. And we have created this dynamic of rich people problems where we destroy each other on these marginal bases you never would if you had a real enemy. You know, nine 11.

• 39:30Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 39:30Speaker 01

  Which, you know, you and I lived. There were some real fights politically for Bush before that. And Giuliani was dead man walking in New York City. Nine 11 happens. And it checks every box of Boogeyman for us. And all of a sudden, all those fights ended. That was the last time we saw Congress vote on a conflict. And now, unfortunately, they voted the wrong way because they had bad information. And there was no yellow cake in Iraq. And that's not where the nine 11 guys came from. They were all Saudis. And. But we were so scared. We were so scared.

• 40:10Bill Maher?

  But that was not the real reason for the war. And there is, look, I was against the war too. But there is a world in the future, because everything undergoes revisionism. You know someone will write a book in 20 years and say, "Going into Iraq was the smartest thing we ever did." I don't think it was. But it was all a cover for one thing. Thomas Friedman used to write about this a lot. It really was about this, which wasn't a bad idea. That there is this cancer in the world, which is Islamic jihadism.

• 40:43Bill Maher?

  Even people who argued with me about Islam would admit, use the word "cancer," there is a cancer on this religion. And I would say, "Okay, well, you know, the next thing you always say about this is..." But it's not everywhere. But if you get cancer, you don't go, "Well, it's not everywhere." You deal with it.

• 41:06Bill Maher?

  Right?

• 41:07Speaker 01

  And we started off the right way, and then we got into the political correctness. And Obama refusing to say Islamic terror.

• 41:15Bill Maher?

  But the point about Iraq being... Yes, that's true, down the road. But the point, what they were trying to do, what they were saying was, "This world is never going to be safe or at peace until the Islamic part, which is a huge part." We're talking about a billion and a half people.

• 41:34Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 41:36Bill Maher?

  There has to be some example, other than theocracy and madrassas and reading one book and Sharia law. There has to be some place that is an example. And it's not Egypt, and it's not Syria, and it's not Saudi Arabia, and it's not Gaza, and not the West Bank. And the only place in the world where Muslims are really free to speak is when they're in the West. Yes, there are people, you know, this specious argument about, "What about moderate Muslims? I'm all for them. I love them." They just don't exist. Uh, that much anywhere, or when they do, they're just shouted down and intimidated.

• 42:16Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 42:17Bill Maher?

  Uh, so we need a country. That was the idea. Maybe Iraq, which has a history of, I mean, they're not stupid.

• 42:25Speaker 01

  Paris, Paris of the Middle East.

• 42:27Bill Maher?

  That was Beirut. That's not, that was not Baghdad. Beirut, they called the Paris of the Middle East. But Baghdad is a, um, one level could be, yes, absolutely.

• 42:37Speaker 01

  I believe you. I'm just thinking.

• 42:38Bill Maher?

  But, uh, yeah, Beirut also, which.

• 42:41Speaker 01

  Beirut is gorgeous.

• 42:42Bill Maher?

  Yeah. But if we had this country, so that idea, but of course, if you really wanted that idea to work, you can't just do it in five years. Okay. We're talking about changing a whole culture. You have to say, this is a 50-year plan.

• 42:59Bill Maher?

  Good. Cause even though it happened in Japan and Germany, this is a little more ingrained. Japan and Germany, they're, they were just different. And this was gonna take a longer period of time.

• 43:11Speaker 01

  I think if you really cared about killing the idea, you would have gone to Saudi Arabia. And look, I don't believe you can bomb.

• 43:18Bill Maher?

  What idea?

• 43:19Speaker 01

  Terrorism as a function of extreme Islamism.

• 43:22Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 43:23Speaker 01

  Um, I think that you go to Saudi Arabia, which is the manufacturer of Wahhabism, which is the seed root of that.

• 43:30Bill Maher?

  And 15 of the 19 hijackers.

• 43:32Speaker 01

  And you say, look, we're not gonna bomb you. I can't bomb an idea out of existence. But.

• 43:37Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 43:38Speaker 01

  You are funding it. And we will come in here and overtake you. And all your oil will be ours. Or you can police yourselves.

• 43:50Bill Maher?

  Yeah, that sounds like something Trump would say.

• 43:52Speaker 01

  I know.

• 43:52Bill Maher?

  I'm not saying it's wrong. I'm just saying.

• 43:54Speaker 01

  No, because look, you're not gonna bomb your way through it. I gotta tell you, one of the, I have so many regrets. And, you know, that's not being a good stoic, by the way, because regret is one of the most useless emotions there is. Um, because you can't change the past.

• 44:08Bill Maher?

  I know, but you have to regret something to learn and do better in the future.

• 44:13Speaker 01

  That's fine, but you gotta get to that. You gotta, like, oh, man, I fucked this up. And so, you know what I mean? The longer you stay here, you're not here. And so I have a lot of that still, especially in this job. Because, you know, at the end of the day, odd people can say whatever they want.

• 44:26Bill Maher?

  I have a lot of regrets.

• 44:27Speaker 01

  Media Matters, I have a lot of regrets. Um, you know, people say you're not supposed to give the answer. If you could go back, would you? Everybody's supposed to say, no, because I wouldn't be where I am now. I would definitely go back.

• 44:36Bill Maher?

  I'm almost seventy, but I, I cannot stop beating myself up about stuff I should have done better and known better at forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, sixty, I, I, you know, it just, it just took so long to not be so stupid. And I can't, I can't get over, like, kind of hating myself, you know, about certain things. I mean, you know, like, you know, just somebody who perhaps I should not have, like, you know, been in a relationship with. And people think, you don't like, no, I don't, I, she's fine. I don't like me because I made that choice and I should have known better. I wasn't a kid.

• 45:21Bill Maher?

  I, I can't get over those kind of regrets. Now, you're right, I should. I should be a stoic, I should read Marcus Aurelius, I should smoke less pot, or maybe more pot.

• 45:30Speaker 01

  More pot, more pot.

• 45:31Bill Maher?

  More pot, exactly. That's what I was just trying to get to. I should smoke more pot.

• 45:35Speaker 01

  I'll tell you, it's good.

• 45:36Bill Maher?

  Continue your thoughts.

• 45:37Speaker 01

  And I'll tell you why, because you should use the things that allow you to be in the right headspace. And there's a reason that the assassins started using hashish, right? That's where the word comes from.

• 45:50Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 45:51Speaker 01

  And it helped them deal with these extreme thoughts and process less and process differently. And I think that there's value in that. And. Um, I am a self-loather and it is my biggest thing that I deal with. Uh, I have a great therapist who's tried to help me for so long.

• 46:10Bill Maher?

  Really?

• 46:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:12Bill Maher?

  A therapist, you?

• 46:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, I believe in all the tools, brother. Anything that can help you get to a better place, you should be using it. There's no shame in my game. Um, but you know, cigar smoke will change this whole place, you know, so that's why I didn't know. But I was gonna bring you cigars. I know, that's why I didn't.

• 46:30Bill Maher?

  You can, no, please, if you want one, have one.

• 46:33Speaker 01

  No, I don't want it.

• 46:33Bill Maher?

  No, no, I want you to be happy.

• 46:35Speaker 01

  I don't smoke in my house either. Um, but I am happy.

• 46:37Bill Maher?

  It is, it is, it is, it smells like a skunk.

• 46:39Speaker 01

  It's disgusting. Um, but the smoke is, the taste is great, but I, you know, I'm, I just so enjoy spending the time with you, so I'm, I'm fine with that.

• 46:46Bill Maher?

  Alright.

• 46:47Speaker 01

  So, I have a buddy, uh, that Christina introduced me to. And, um, and, and Don Lemon is good friends with this guy and his husband also.

• 46:55Bill Maher?

  Don was here recently.

• 46:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, I saw him, it was a great episode. Um, I did, it was a great episode.

• 47:00Bill Maher?

  Oh, good.

• 47:01Speaker 01

  Um, he, uh, owns a company called Dragon Hemp.

• 47:05Bill Maher?

  Don?

• 47:06Speaker 01

  No, I'll dr- this, this is far too intelligent for that. The, the, this guy owns this company called Dragon Hemp. And he makes hemp.

• 47:14Bill Maher?

  I love the title.

• 47:15Speaker 01

  Hemp derived, he has all these Chinese botanicals and stuff, he's a very wise guy.

• 47:19Bill Maher?

  Hemp doesn't get you high.

• 47:20Speaker 01

  Let me tell you, it does.

• 47:21Bill Maher?

  It does?

• 47:22Speaker 01

  No, it does, it does. So, he has, I'm telling you, I'll send you the, I'll send you them. Now, you are hardcore.

• 47:28Bill Maher?

  Okay, I'm mind-blown now.

• 47:29Speaker 01

  So, it's not marijuana flower, it's, it's different. It doesn't have the same psychotropic effects, but it does give you like a two-drink buzz. But your processing is still there.

• 47:38Bill Maher?

  How much do you have to take for this two-drink?

• 47:40Speaker 01

  You would take two of them, I would take half of one.

• 47:43Bill Maher?

  I'd probably need ten.

• 47:44Speaker 01

  And, no, I'm telling you, I have big-time weed smokers in my life who love these things.

• 47:49Bill Maher?

  Okay, well then, Woody Harrelson and I really have to put out a mass newsletter apologizing, because we have been making the case for a very long time about hemp and we should legalize it because, you know, they lumped it in with, because it's a cousin of.

• 48:04Speaker 01

  I don't have any problem with it being legalized.

• 48:06Bill Maher?

  Cousin of THC, but we always said, you know, guys, they make sailboats out of this.

• 48:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:11Bill Maher?

  They, they make.

• 48:12Speaker 01

  I don't have any problem with it.

• 48:13Bill Maher?

  Declaration of Independence was on hemp paper, it doesn't get you high. Now you're telling me it gets us high.

• 48:19Speaker 01

  There is a way, uh, that you can pull it out, but it's not like THC from marijuana.

• 48:24Bill Maher?

  Take our argument and add to it.

• 48:25Speaker 01

  Take, um, marijuana.

• 48:27Bill Maher?

  You can read the Declaration of Independence and then snort it.

• 48:30Speaker 01

  The, so I take the gummy. It takes about forty-five.

• 48:34Bill Maher?

  Oh, you do take the gummy. You're not kidding?

• 48:35Speaker 01

  No, yeah, I took it. And it just.

• 48:38Bill Maher?

  Oh, today you took it?

• 48:39Speaker 01

  I just took it before I came here.

• 48:40Bill Maher?

  Oh, wow.

• 48:43Speaker 01

  Do you have any cookies? No, I'm kidding. So, I, um.

• 48:46Bill Maher?

  Oh, boy.

• 48:47Speaker 01

  And it just gives you like a relaxed feeling.

• 48:49Bill Maher?

  Yeah, but tell me.

• 48:51Speaker 01

  And I love it. Cause I don't really drink anymore.

• 48:53Bill Maher?

  See, that's the problem with me is I wish I was you for this because it doesn't, it, it's too much. It's a commitment, and you know me and commitment, not a big thing. And you're in it for too many hours. You don't control it. Like this, I can, as soon as I stop smoking, I'm not high. Uh, that's not the case with eating it. And also makes me a little paranoid.

• 49:16Speaker 01

  I think that's the marijuana flower. I do not get it. And I'm very susceptible.

• 49:20Bill Maher?

  We're all different. See, this is why I had my issues with the COVID reaction in this country. Because I just know from other experiences, health-wise, we're all different. We're all very individuals when it comes to our health. So don't put out a big, you know, write it in the sky banner, we all have to do this. I'm sorry, we don't all have to do it, or we shouldn't all have to do it.

• 49:45Speaker 01

  Well, remember, you had Republicans and Democrats who were on that boat until it became inconvenient. Trump gave us the vaccine. Okay, it's a great vaccine.

• 49:53Bill Maher?

  We needed a vaccine.

• 49:54Speaker 01

  It's the fastest.

• 49:55Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 49:55Speaker 01

  And now, he just doesn't talk about it. And I'll tell you, the only time I've seen him booed, he was on stage with Bill O'Reilly. And they were doing something like this. And O'Reilly, out of nowhere, you know, cause he's pretty deferential to Trump, I don't care what he says. But he looks at him, he says, let's just get this out of the way. You were vaccinated, right? And Trump says, yeah, boo. And you got the booster. I know you did, cause I got it too, because of our age. Yes, I did. Boo. And he turns and he says, don't you boo me. And they keep booing. And he says, I'm all you got. Don't you boo me. I'm all you got. And they settled down and it was a really interesting moment.

• 50:37Bill Maher?

  I mean, Trump

• 50:38Speaker 01

  Really interesting.

• 50:38Bill Maher?

  Is one of the most effective politicians, whether whatever you think of the policy and him as a person. Just as a politician, just understanding that always lean in to being more who you are. The people are not savvy about issues, but they smell a phony a mile away. And that kind of shit, nobody else does it. You know, there, there's a couple of times when, I mean, I've been his biggest critic for good reason. And when he got reelected, I said, I'm not going to pre-hate anything. And then the first week I said, well, there's lots of things I hate because I do.

• 51:20Bill Maher?

  Okay, there's some things I don't hate also, but the, the way he can do that. And sometimes kind of make me go, oh, man. Uh, I gotta give it up. Like when he did that thing where the guy came in from the Taliban and he said, uh, this is an aerial picture of your house. If during a withdrawal, one American is hurt, just know I know where you live. I was like, oh, can we just play the music now? Cause I don't care. It's Donald Trump and he's the worst person ever, blah, blah, blah. I fucking love that. One time they were doing something, something was going on with, and he said, you know what?

• 52:02Bill Maher?

  When you come after New York, you gotta go through me. It's like, oh, hometown boy, you know? He has those moments that no other politician has, and the Democrats have to find that guy.

• 52:16Speaker 01

  They need a message and then you find, and you find the messenger. No, but that's how it works for Trump.

• 52:22Bill Maher?

  That's what they, that's the worst thing the Democrats always say, message. Who's here a message? Yeah, first of all, they did, and they don't like it. Second of all, they don't give a shit. It's not about the message. Trump changes his message from day to day. Tariffs everywhere, tariffs nowhere.

• 52:38Speaker 01

  No, those are policy decisions.

• 52:38Bill Maher?

  Well, it doesn't matter, but they don't care about policy. They don't understand it. His message is, I'm me, I'm strong, and I'm daddy. You know, they're on this daddy thing, you know, and people want a daddy. You know, Tucker Carlson, that whole thing, you've heard that thing about daddy came home and then you need a spec. I'm like, this is getting a little weird, Mrs. Robinson, you know, daddy. But you know what? That's what works and that's what people respond to. They don't know the issues. They don't know the facts.

• 53:11Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 53:11Bill Maher?

  And they have no interest in learning about them. They just, they're, they're like an animal. They're instinctive, like I smell fear or I smell alpha. And they smell alpha. And Democrats have to come up with an alpha and it's not Tim Walz.

• 53:28Speaker 01

  No, probably not.

• 53:29Bill Maher?

  And it's not Tim, the other Tim who ran.

• 53:32Speaker 01

  Kay.

• 53:32Bill Maher?

  Tim Kay. These are not alphas. It's like this, this thing of like, let's, let's get a, a woman and then a docile man who's in every, uh, commercial where he's the asshole. Well, mom takes care of business. You know, that is, that's not a message that makes the tribe go, who is strong? Who's strong? Who's strong? Tim Walz? No, no, org, give me rock. I need to kill myself because Tim Walz. You know, that, you gotta appeal to people at a sort of post civilization stage where we're kind of at on a primal level. You just do, and Trump does it better than anybody.

• 54:17Speaker 01

  Trump does, and he started with a rejection principle. What took him from being a joke to, uh, being a messenger was, uh, two things. One, that was really missed in the media and I was just fortunate to be covering the rallies. So I saw it sooner. We forgot how powerful celebrity is in the American psyche. And that Trump being a TV star, see, I never saw him as a TV star because I've just known him my whole life.

• 54:46Bill Maher?

  Not just a TV star, but one who played a boss.

• 54:49Speaker 01

  Yes. And that apprentice is really, everybody wanted to be him. Now, maybe not certain aspects of his personality, but the money, the power, the agency. So they missed that. But when he really turned.

• 55:04Speaker 01

  Was, I know who you hate, and I know what you hate. Because they all come to me, and I hate them too. And I will make them pay. The idea that Trump was ever selling himself as a cure is bullshit. He was selling himself as a virus. I will get into the political corpus and I will make it sick. And that is what sustains him. Is that when the media comes after him for something? People are like, yeah, but you're kind of part of what I hate. And he's fighting what I hate. Oh yeah, but he's this and that, you know, that's what you say. But you're like that too. Everybody is, and the people who you like are like that too, but you're only going after him.

• 55:41Bill Maher?

  I totally understand their hate. A lot of what they hate, I hate too.

• 55:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, I get it.

• 55:45Bill Maher?

  But I just won't go, but I also have a rational mind.

• 55:49Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 55:49Bill Maher?

  So I don't go all the way to then, this is because it is worse to me.

• 55:53Speaker 01

  Right.

• 55:54Bill Maher?

  Well, you know. Um, if you don't really believe in the secession of power, if you don't really believe in the emergency of climate change, I can't get on board with you. But, yeah, the, the political instincts, the, the, just the connection with people. I mean, people are always saying, I'm saying, it's, it's my editorial this, this Friday, about Republicans being North Korean with their leader, but why? The reason why that they're so afraid of him is that they know, he has a connection, if you're a congressman, a senator, he has a connection with my voters.

• 56:32Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 56:32Bill Maher?

  That I do not have.

• 56:34Speaker 01

  Nope, he will beat you.

• 56:35Bill Maher?

  I do not have that connection.

• 56:37Speaker 01

  He will primary you, and more often than not, you will lose.

• 56:40Bill Maher?

  You know?

• 56:41Speaker 01

  And that's, if all you're about is keeping power, that's all you need to be kept in check.

• 56:45Bill Maher?

  So that's why every Republican is like, you're the alpha, like animals do.

• 56:50Speaker 01

  The inflection moment for me, and this was like, Probably, I don't know, right now is a little bit of a competition with what, how the Democrats are handling this. But when I heard people on TV suggest that he hadn't been shot at and that the bullet didn't hit him.

• 57:09Bill Maher?

  Oh, I did that bit in my ass, actually. It's so ridiculous.

• 57:12Speaker 01

  It was so, I was like, wow, they've really lost the fucking plot. This guy just got shot in the head. I called him. I was so embarrassed by how he handled it.

• 57:21Bill Maher?

  He did not get shot in the head, Chris. He got nicked in the ear.

• 57:24Speaker 01

  Listen, if it was your ear, you'd say, I got shot in the head.

• 57:28Bill Maher?

  He did not get shot in the head. If he had, this country would probably be in a civil war right now.

• 57:33Speaker 01

  I know. Thank God it didn't happen.

• 57:34Bill Maher?

  Thank God.

• 57:35Speaker 01

  But I gotta tell you, if it's me and that bullet grazes my ear.

• 57:39Bill Maher?

  Oh, I agree.

• 57:40Speaker 01

  You, you hear the full story of someone tried to kill me and you'd never see me again because I would have never continued running. That was way too close. That guy gets up, pokes his fist, bleeding down the side of his head, and the Democrats say, maybe it's fake. That's when I think they really lost the plot.

• 57:57Bill Maher?

  Conspiracy theories are, I mean, yes, they're probably worse on the right. Uh, but they, it's not like they're nonexistent on the left.

• 58:05Speaker 01

  They just hate him.

• 58:06Bill Maher?

  There are, exactly.

• 58:07Speaker 01

  It's not like it's a conspiracy. They just hate him.

• 58:08Bill Maher?

  They do.

• 58:09Speaker 01

  So he can't even get shot and get compassion.

• 58:11Bill Maher?

  Right. That's a great way to put it. He can't even shot. I should have put that in my bit. He can't even shot and get compassion. Right. Yeah, I know. The first thing, I mean, it's so funny. You are making me remember. I was on the road that day and I remember arriving at the hotel. We had flown from the first city. It was the second city on my weekend things that I used to do. And I remember getting out of the car in front of the hotel and the guy who came to get the bag said, did you hear? Trump got shot. I said, no, we hadn't. It just had happened. I looked on my phone and I was gonna go on stage in three hours. And I, you know, wrote a whole thing and also did it on my show Friday that night, that, later that week.

• 58:56Bill Maher?

  Like, this is not funny. I'm not laughing at this. Any jokes about how, what a shame he missed are not what I'm interested in hearing and should not be done. I don't find them funny, I don't find them appropriate. You know, I've been as critical of Donald Trump as anybody I have standing here. But this is not cool because people were already doing.

• 59:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:21Bill Maher?

  You know, and, you know, the.

• 59:24Speaker 01

  And they weren't kidding, by the way.

• 59:25Bill Maher?

  No, and they were not kidding.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  There are people who wanted him to die.

• 59:28Bill Maher?

  If you want, if you want better discourse, you know, you can't be part of the problem.

• 59:34Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 59:35Bill Maher?

  So.

• 59:36Speaker 01

  I'm with you. I think, you know, the expression, you know, I think Maya Angelou gets credit for it. But the idea of if you don't like what you see in the world, try to change it. If you can't, change your attitude. And that's the place where people are stopping short, man. They're making it way too easy on them fucking selves to fall into these, like, kind of like these, these like lust, rage-driven, short cycles of things. And they're forgetting their humanity. I don't like what Trump says and does on a regular basis. I called him because I wanted to say, look, you, he, he is very familiar with me and what I do and who I am.

• 1:00:20Speaker 01

  I said, I am embarrassed that you were treated this way by the media. And I just want you to know, I feel for your family. I don't know how they're letting you stay in the race. And the way you handled that was really impressive. And I just, I hope you're okay and I wish you well going forward.

• 1:00:38Bill Maher?

  Oh, that's great.

• 1:00:39Speaker 01

  And I didn't say I wanted him to win because, you know, that was not my interest. But, and then I start getting attacked. And I'm okay with getting attacked.

• 1:00:48Bill Maher?

  You said that personally to him or over the air?

• 1:00:51Speaker 01

  I said it to him personally. And then I said, I'm not asking you any questions and I'm not going to talk about our conversation. I'm just going to say I reached out for this, you know. And what he said, he said. But, so I start getting attacked. I have no problem getting attacked. I get attacked all the time. I sign up for it. I try to provoke it very often. But this was crazy. Where is your decency? He doesn't deserve decency. Who the fuck are you to say he doesn't deserve decency?

• 1:01:19Bill Maher?

  That's exactly why I have the issues I have with the left. That fucking attitude, that fucking bad attitude. Right.

• 1:01:28Speaker 01

  They get to judge you as people.

• 1:01:30Bill Maher?

  They're just the.

• 1:01:30Speaker 01

  That's what their politics have become. My father never did that. And now I get this funny thing. I see it with you a little bit sometimes also where people are like, oh, yeah, Bill doesn't understand Democrats. Fuck you, the guy's been a Democrat for 55 fucking years. You're gonna tell him?

• 1:01:44Bill Maher?

  I've never been a Democrat. But I also will say I somehow never vote for the Republican. But I actually make a discerned decision every time. I mean, if you go back, did I think Bill Clinton was better than George W. Bush? George Herbert Walker? Yes, I did. Did I think that Gore would have been better than Bush? His son? Yes, I did. Did I think Bush was not as good as John Kerry? I liked a lot. Yeah, I voted. Did I think Obama? You know, you go through the thing. I always act, I give, I feel like I give the other side another chance.

• 1:02:24Speaker 01

  That's the way you're supposed to do it.

• 1:02:26Bill Maher?

  Right. I like McCain in 2000.

• 1:02:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:02:30Bill Maher?

  If McCain.

• 1:02:30Speaker 01

  Tell the economic stuff.

• 1:02:32Bill Maher?

  What?

• 1:02:33Speaker 01

  He killed himself, McCain. McCain, when that election was about who can keep us safe, he had a shot. Even with Palin. When he said, look, I'm not the guy for the economic stuff. That's not me, but I'll keep us safe. And then we had that fucking recession and it killed him.

• 1:02:50Bill Maher?

  You know, it'd be interesting if 9/11 had happened in 1999.

• 1:02:54Speaker 01

  He would have won.

• 1:02:55Bill Maher?

  Instead of 2001.

• 1:02:56Speaker 01

  He would have won.

• 1:02:57Bill Maher?

  It could have been McCain.

• 1:02:59Speaker 01

  100%.

• 1:02:59Bill Maher?

  War hero.

• 1:03:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:03Bill Maher?

  I like, I like people who don't get captured.

• 1:03:07Bill Maher?

  I mean, come on, man. That's just a terrible thing.

• 1:03:10Speaker 01

  It is, it's terrible, and it's one of like a dozen things. And what's more terrible to me is not him. It's how people who used to beat me over the head with the idea that character counts with Bill Clinton. Now forgive anything this guy does, and I have no problem with forgiving everything somebody does, especially if you're a Christian. But you don't, you only forgive your own when it's convenient, and then you judge everybody else. And that's what bothers me about the MAGA movement is that these people used to say that, I mean Pence, that's why I was sideways with Pence, he wrote this letter when he was in Congress about Governor, about President Clinton, and how he has to be judged, you have to treat him the way you would your neighbor, and if he's doing these kinds of things that are immoral, you gotta say it.

• 1:03:55Speaker 01

  Oh, oh, really? But you're gonna, you're gonna stand next to this guy, though. Right? And then all of a sudden that goes out the window, right? That's what bothers me is the hypocrisy, and it bothers people, too.

• 1:04:04Bill Maher?

  But I also have a feeling, I may be wrong about this, that if I could, like, say to Trump hypothetically, you know, that really bugged me about what you said about McCain. You know, I mean, he flew this mission over, he was, he was an Air Force pilot, it wasn't his fault. I feel like he's a guy unlike most politicians who have to never flip flop on anything. I feel like he could go, you know, you know what? I think you're right.

• 1:04:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just don't think he has that person in his life.

• 1:04:33Bill Maher?

  He may not. And, and, and he may not be able to do that, but, but I just feel like he's, he's, there, there's a kind of innocent honesty to him, like the way he just, he just voices his interior monologue.

• 1:04:46Speaker 01

  Yes. Which is so. I don't know about, I don't know that I give him the label of honesty, but he's authentic.

• 1:04:52Bill Maher?

  Authentic, well.

• 1:04:52Speaker 01

  I'll give you authentic, honest.

• 1:04:54Bill Maher?

  It's like, well, it's his honesty, it's his truth. For the people who like are always about, well, there's, you know, my personal truth. Okay. I agree, what he's doing is worse, but it is sort of a version of that. You know, my personal truth is that Zelensky has an approval rating of 4%, even though it's 57. It's not really that different than my personal truth, I can give you some examples. So, like. I I just feel like there there is a guy in there uh who's you know obviously gotten everything he could ever want. He won the presidency twice. You can't win it more times than that, although they will try.

• 1:05:35Speaker 01

  I know, Steve Bannon told me different.

• 1:05:37Bill Maher?

  I it's the end of my editorial this week about the third term. It's it's okay. But anyway.

• 1:05:42Speaker 01

  You're welcome.

• 1:05:43Bill Maher?

  He he uh he you know, I feel like he has the capacity, unlike most people, to maybe go, yeah, you know what? Yeah, yeah, you know, I I just feel like there's that there's because he's so all over the map with everything. Let's invade Greenland. Let's do things that nobody ever thought of. Canada is our biggest enemy or whatever.

• 1:06:07Speaker 01

  Good reason.

• 1:06:08Bill Maher?

  Or let's get the minerals out of, you know, Ukraine. Well, you know what? If I had forgiven them so much money, would it kill them to give them some minerals? Not the way he's doing it with a gun to their head, but like like he just thinks outside the box.

• 1:06:19Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:06:20Bill Maher?

  So I feel like there there is a virtue to that. That's not always all bad. And I feel like he might be a guy who would go, oh, yeah, you know, I was mad at McCain, but you know what? You're right. He was a pilot. He did his thing. He loved America.

• 1:06:38Speaker 01

  He may. There'd be one thing that would be stopping him, assuming that's what he believes. There'd be one thing stopping him and he'd be right. Never ever apologize.

• 1:06:49Bill Maher?

  Yes.

• 1:06:50Speaker 01

  Not in this climate.

• 1:06:51Bill Maher?

  You're right.

• 1:06:52Speaker 01

  You know, I love when people say to me, oh.

• 1:06:53Bill Maher?

  But that's not an apology.

• 1:06:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I'm saying he is very aware in his head that there are two things that we say that are fucking lies. Okay, the first one is, hey, look, if you just own it and apologize, you know, people will respect that. Yeah, people will, not the media and not people on social media who are driving these algorithms.

• 1:07:11Bill Maher?

  They'll just make it worse.

• 1:07:12Speaker 01

  That's right. And the second thing that we say is, everybody loves a comeback. Not when it's in process, they don't. They love it. Once you are successful and have come back, then they like it. They don't love it when it's in process. They're trying to kill you the whole time. It's like in the in-laws, serpentine, serpentine, serpentine, when they're running across the road. That's what it is.

• 1:07:33Bill Maher?

  Hey Chris, we're all rooting for each other. That's the thing, that's the thing about them.

• 1:07:37Speaker 01

  We're rooting for each other to come in second.

• 1:07:39Bill Maher?

  They're all rooting. You're being too silly.

• 1:07:42Speaker 01

  I mean, especially in this business.

• 1:07:44Bill Maher?

  They're just good, they're good.

• 1:07:45Speaker 01

  This business is the worst. Hunter S. Thompson had it right.

• 1:07:48Bill Maher?

  They just wanna get the truth.

• 1:07:49Speaker 01

  No, they don't. Hunter S. Thompson had it right. The television business is uglier than most things. It's a money trench dug through the heart of journalism. It is a long, plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs for no good reason. That is this business. It is the ugliest thing I've ever been around. It's not that people don't do beautiful things with the opportunity. America has a signature blessing in some of the people it has in its media.

• 1:08:19Bill Maher?

  So I'm supposed to be impressed by that quote from that bloated old colostomy bag Hunter S. Thompson?

• 1:08:26Speaker 01

  I think it's a great quote. You don't have to like him.

• 1:08:28Bill Maher?

  No, I do. I'm kidding. I'm a big fan of Hunter S. Thompson.

• 1:08:31Speaker 01

  Gonzo journalism. That's what everybody does now. It's all gonzo. It's all first person. Everybody wants you to tell you their experience.

• 1:08:39Bill Maher?

  I mean, talk about a guy, Trumpian you might say, who just like never like gave an inch to anybody.

• 1:08:46Speaker 01

  Never.

• 1:08:47Bill Maher?

  And I mean, this guy like went out strong.

• 1:08:50Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:08:50Bill Maher?

  I mean, he was not destined to live to 90.

• 1:08:52Speaker 01

  Nope.

• 1:08:53Bill Maher?

  Because he just lived the, he was like, I'm gonna live the Hunter S. Thompson lifestyle. Like, you know, maybe I'll get 60, what is it? I don't know how old when he died, this maybe 63 or something. Yes, not late.

• 1:09:08Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:09:08Bill Maher?

  Not crazy early, but like from doing acid every day.

• 1:09:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, right. You know, like. There were several origins in his body that were in the fetal position.

• 1:09:17Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:17Speaker 01

  Six, seven years of his life.

• 1:09:18Bill Maher?

  I'm gonna have a good run and then I'm, you know.

• 1:09:22Speaker 01

  I look, I really don't have any part of it, you know, a problem with it. I say something that people misinterpret, or at least they misinterpret how I mean it. I don't have any real interest in longevity. I train the way I do because I wanna be capable of certain things as long as I can. But, and like my kids, they get upset at me. You don't wanna see my grandkids?

• 1:09:44Bill Maher?

  Lifting a Tesla?

• 1:09:45Speaker 01

  You don't wanna see.

• 1:09:46Bill Maher?

  What are you training for?

• 1:09:47Speaker 01

  Um, I train for, to be capable, defend myself, defend the people that I love.

• 1:09:52Bill Maher?

  Oh, really?

• 1:09:53Speaker 01

  Be able to lift things.

• 1:09:54Bill Maher?

  I lift. Yeah, I mean.

• 1:09:57Speaker 01

  Athletic, you know, those things matter to me.

• 1:09:59Bill Maher?

  I mean, I'm definitely athletic. I mean, I don't feel like I need to, to, you know, lift a tire or that shit. That looks, looks like you can do that.

• 1:10:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm a strong motherfucker.

• 1:10:08Bill Maher?

  I can, I said that when it came in and you were like, what are you talking about?

• 1:10:12Speaker 01

  No, I'm just saying, I don't think I'm like too big. I mean, but that's what it is.

• 1:10:16Bill Maher?

  I don't know. It depends on how you like tits.

• 1:10:19Speaker 01

  How you like tits?

• 1:10:20Bill Maher?

  I mean, you know.

• 1:10:21Speaker 01

  On women.

• 1:10:21Bill Maher?

  Generally, well, that's, that would be my point of view on women. Uh, but men like tits now. I mean, you know, it's all mixed up these days with kids.

• 1:10:30Speaker 01

  This, I, look, you know, politics has this concept called the eighty twenty. You look for eighty twenty issues in politics where you know the people are overwhelmingly.

• 1:10:39Bill Maher?

  I just read about it, yes.

• 1:10:40Speaker 01

  And trans athletes is an eighty twenty.

• 1:10:44Bill Maher?

  That's an eighty twenty.

• 1:10:46Speaker 01

  It's an eighty twenty all day.

• 1:10:47Bill Maher?

  Well, explain to the people what that means. It means that eighty percent of the.

• 1:10:50Speaker 01

  Eighty percent of the people feel the way, one way on it.

• 1:10:54Bill Maher?

  Eighty percent of the people have common sense.

• 1:10:56Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 1:10:56Bill Maher?

  And they understand that there are men's leagues and women's leagues because the women are not as good as the men. That's not an insult to women. It's just life on earth. I didn't invent it. The god I don't believe in invented it. Okay, so that's what it is. But you could, the best WNBA team, if they played the worst NBA team, it would be a slaughter.

• 1:11:25Speaker 01

  They'd have a hard night.

• 1:11:26Bill Maher?

  It would be more than a hard night. They wouldn't get a shot off. They, the people, they're great scorers, not when you're, I'm talking about the defense now. They, I just think every shot would be blocked. They're faster, they're bigger, they're stronger. They wouldn't get any rebounds. I just think it would, if they really played as hard as they could, it would just be a fucking massacre. And that's not an insult to women. It's just a nod to reality. And that's what, you know, to, to your point about eighty twenty. Like, when, when eighty percent of the people get that, and again, my point about they're not savvy about issues, but they get men and women. They get that.

• 1:12:12Bill Maher?

  Women have not changed that much.

• 1:12:15Speaker 01

  They get fairness in most things and they get to square it with what their lived experience is. And they see things and they understand it. And when it seems upside down in politics because of party preference, it pisses them off. And that's what Trump seized on. And he had to be an outsider. The one thing I'll give you-

• 1:12:35Bill Maher?

  What does your genius daughter think about something like this?

• 1:12:38Speaker 01

  The, well, my 22 year-

• 1:12:39Bill Maher?

  Your boarding school-

• 1:12:40Speaker 01

  Oh, the 15 year old. So, the 15 year old is different than the 22 year old in several ways.

• 1:12:48Bill Maher?

  22, you got a kid 22?

• 1:12:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, she's about to graduate. She's a singer and a songwriter. I'll play you some of her music when we're done.

• 1:12:55Speaker 01

  She is. What are you laughing at? Laugh at my daughter?

• 1:12:59Bill Maher?

  No, but it just, no.

• 1:13:02Speaker 01

  Everybody's kid is a singer-songwriter? Is that what it is? So, that's what she does. She's done it her whole life. I don't know what she's gonna do with her life, we'll see. But the 15 year old is very locked into character. So, Trump or anybody who seems mean has a problem with her straight off the bat.

• 1:13:23Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:13:24Speaker 01

  And that's the end of the analysis. Which is what it used to be for conservatives, by the way. Which is if you're not a good person, it's over. I don't really give a shit which-

• 1:13:31Bill Maher?

  But it shouldn't be the end of the analysis. It should be the beginning.

• 1:13:34Speaker 01

  I'm fine with that.

• 1:13:35Bill Maher?

  Right, don't you agree?

• 1:13:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, but that's not how they used to play it. Oh, yeah. Look, first of all-

• 1:13:40Bill Maher?

  It should be the beginning.

• 1:13:41Speaker 01

  Yes, because-

• 1:13:42Bill Maher?

  Because there were some mean liberals.

• 1:13:43Speaker 01

  Look, they're mean everything.

• 1:13:45Bill Maher?

  And they got shit done.

• 1:13:46Speaker 01

  That's right. So, what I say to her is, what are you electing? Are you electing your moral figure? Is that what you think this is? Is this some pastor that you're going for? Is this your husband? Is this someone who's gonna date your mom? You know, who is this person? And if this is somebody who's gotta do a dirty fucking job, then you have a different set of credentials. And I say to her sometimes, if you had to hire somebody to kill somebody, okay? And get past your problem with doing that, I'm just saying. Would it be the nicest person that you could find?

• 1:14:17Bill Maher?

  No, it'd be a mafia guy.

• 1:14:19Speaker 01

  That's exactly right. Because they kill with no fucking thought. Kill their own parents.

• 1:14:23Bill Maher?

  Not the ear in the mafia.

• 1:14:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, right.

• 1:14:26Bill Maher?

  But, but wait.

• 1:14:27Speaker 01

  So, she has a problem with anybody on the basis of meanness and she can't get past it. So, she's not a particular fan.

• 1:14:33Bill Maher?

  But you said date your mom. That's your wife.

• 1:14:36Speaker 01

  I know, but I'm saying like that's how you would measure the person.

• 1:14:38Bill Maher?

  Why would she be thinking about someone dating you?

• 1:14:41Speaker 01

  When you're figuring out what you're asking this person to do, you're gonna have a certain lens of what matters to you.

• 1:14:48Bill Maher?

  Your wife shouldn't be dating you.

• 1:14:50Speaker 01

  I didn't use that as an example. I'm just putting it out there now.

• 1:14:53Bill Maher?

  I'm just saying your wife should not be dating.

• 1:14:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, I get it. I get it. There would be a problem to start before who we were picking for the position. I get it. But the point is, you gotta think about what you're asking the person to do. And what set of traits go with that. And the idea that you want the nicest person, you want the most upstanding person to be your leader is rarely the case of who's best for the job. And it's a dirty fucking job. There's a lot of compromises. There are a lot of moral compromises that you have to make. And that's the reality of it.

• 1:15:22Bill Maher?

  You know, Chris, as Jack Webb used to say on Dragnet, we have to recruit from humanity.

• 1:15:31Bill Maher?

  And humans are imperfect. Humans are not good people. I've said that many times.

• 1:15:36Speaker 01

  I believe that. In general, they suck. Sometimes they don't.

• 1:15:38Bill Maher?

  Sometimes they don't. And, you know,

• 1:15:44Bill Maher?

  it's so hard to tell.

• 1:15:46Speaker 01

  Do you believe people are inherently good or bad?

• 1:15:52Bill Maher?

  I believe they're inherently horny.

• 1:15:55Speaker 01

  I'll listen. I'll take it and I'll tell you why. I agree. I believe that they are self-interested. And I'll tell you what I call the cookie test. They are not good or bad. They are self-interested.

• 1:16:07Bill Maher?

  You're right.

• 1:16:07Speaker 01

  The cookie test. When I would have the babies, when they were young.

• 1:16:11Bill Maher?

  Have the babies?

• 1:16:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, when I had them like, you know, with each other when they were playing in their groups.

• 1:16:15Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:16:16Speaker 01

  You put a cookie between two infants, and you see what human nature is.

• 1:16:23Speaker 01

  Okay?

• 1:16:24Bill Maher?

  That's awesome. I never thought of that.

• 1:16:26Speaker 01

  You put the cookie between the two.

• 1:16:28Bill Maher?

  But babies eat cookies?

• 1:16:29Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:16:31Bill Maher?

  Oh, I thought babies ate milk.

• 1:16:34Bill Maher?

  I thought they only had liquid.

• 1:16:35Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:16:36Bill Maher?

  No?

• 1:16:37Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:16:37Bill Maher?

  How old, how old do you?

• 1:16:38Speaker 01

  You, they phase six months, a year, a, a, a year, year and a half.

• 1:16:43Bill Maher?

  Oh, before then, they're on the milk.

• 1:16:44Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, you know, they're taking formula, whatever it is. But what I'm saying is,

• 1:16:47Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:16:47Speaker 01

  you think that that's as good as they're ever gonna be.

• 1:16:50Bill Maher?

  Now, like, first day at home.

• 1:16:52Speaker 01

  No, you'll kill it, you'll kill it. Uh, so.

• 1:16:55Bill Maher?

  What about soda?

• 1:16:56Speaker 01

  But the idea that they're good, only Jing, Jing I give them, right? From, because it looks like a nipple.

• 1:17:00Bill Maher?

  Jing is healthy.

• 1:17:01Speaker 01

  It looks like a nipple anyway.

• 1:17:01Bill Maher?

  That's what I should say.

• 1:17:03Speaker 01

  You just put a hole in it.

• 1:17:03Bill Maher?

  Drink, I drink it and I give it to babies.

• 1:17:05Speaker 01

  It looks like mother's milk.

• 1:17:06Bill Maher?

  I give it to babies.

• 1:17:07Speaker 01

  And it's just as good for you. It looks like mother's milk.

• 1:17:09Bill Maher?

  It's not gonna hurt you.

• 1:17:10Speaker 01

  So, you see, they go for the cookie. And it's also true that they don't see race. Race is a learned quality.

• 1:17:19Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:17:20Speaker 01

  Do you see it with the babies?

• 1:17:22Bill Maher?

  Well, they must see it.

• 1:17:24Speaker 01

  But they don't judge it, is what I'm trying to say.

• 1:17:25Bill Maher?

  They don't judge it, right.

• 1:17:27Speaker 01

  We build that in. That's learned. We created race.

• 1:17:31Bill Maher?

  Yes.

• 1:17:31Speaker 01

  We created race. So I'm talking to Tucker Carlson the other day, and I say that. And he says.

• 1:17:36Bill Maher?

  On purpose?

• 1:17:37Speaker 01

  Yeah. And he says, but where's the race gene? I said, what are you talking about? And he says, well, I mean, a black guy's a black guy, white guy's a white guy. I said, yeah, on the inside, we're like 99.9% the same. He's like, well, but obviously there's a difference. I said, yeah, we made it a difference. We look different. You may have a trait for a certain kind of hair, and I have one for a different kind of hair, but there is no race.

• 1:18:03Bill Maher?

  No.

• 1:18:03Speaker 01

  Gene.

• 1:18:04Bill Maher?

  No.

• 1:18:04Speaker 01

  And he was looking at me like I was fucking crazy. And I realized, there's like an army of people who agree with him. That, what are you talking about? Race is a thing? No, we created it. We created it. Yes, people look differently.

• 1:18:18Bill Maher?

  Well, it's real, but it's just based on where you grew up. If you grew up where the sun was shining a lot.

• 1:18:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're gonna be brown.

• 1:18:26Bill Maher?

  You need to be darker.

• 1:18:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:28Bill Maher?

  And if you grew up where the sun wasn't shining a lot, you got lighter.

• 1:18:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:33Bill Maher?

  I mean, it's really that simple.

• 1:18:34Speaker 01

  And then they started moving around. So a guy like me, who's got all the Sicilian blood in him. I I'm I look like a snowman compared to some of my cousins. Why? That's what's in the blood. The Normans must have come down at some point and done what they were gonna do.

• 1:18:48Bill Maher?

  No, you look like a Guinea.

• 1:18:50Speaker 01

  Well, I definitely look like a Guinea. Look at these features. My daughters are so happy they don't have my nose.

• 1:18:55Bill Maher?

  Really?

• 1:18:55Speaker 01

  Oh. They look at my face with disgust.

• 1:18:59Bill Maher?

  Why? It's a strong, fine, proud nose.

• 1:19:01Speaker 01

  That's what I say. Luckily, though, they look like their mom.

• 1:19:04Bill Maher?

  That does not deter women. I I have a proud nose, as you know, borrowing that phrase from someone, but like, you know, that that is, that is, that doesn't, I think that maybe psychologically registers you have a big dick or something. I don't know, but it is not a deterrent. I mean, look.

• 1:19:20Speaker 01

  I have a size fourteen shoe, I have huge hands and a big nose, and I'm hung like a sparrow. So there are exceptions to the rule.

• 1:19:27Bill Maher?

  Well, there's our lead.

• 1:19:31Bill Maher?

  But it's sort of like what you were saying about like race. Like, I don't think it's actually in the DNA. I think it's it's it's past the DNA. It's just, again, where your melanin was exposed to.

• 1:19:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:44Bill Maher?

  It's something that happened after the DNA was put into it. I don't think our DNA is is that different.

• 1:19:49Speaker 01

  But we created the value system around it, is what I'm trying to say.

• 1:19:53Bill Maher?

  There are like certain, obviously, um, in professional sports, important differences in like very tiny levels of efficiency in like your your lower legs. That's why all the Olympic runners.

• 1:20:12Speaker 01

  I think it's multifactorial. I think that you will get groups of.

• 1:20:15Bill Maher?

  That's physical.

• 1:20:16Speaker 01

  You will get groups of genetics, though, that are more advantageous to quick twitch.

• 1:20:20Bill Maher?

  Cornerbacks, my friend.

• 1:20:22Speaker 01

  There are some. There are not as many as there are blacks.

• 1:20:23Bill Maher?

  No, there are none. There are no white.

• 1:20:25Speaker 01

  Adam Arcaletta was one of the most athletic defensive backs we've ever seen in the NFL. He was a white guy.

• 1:20:32Bill Maher?

  What what year did he retire?

• 1:20:33Speaker 01

  Like ten years ago.

• 1:20:34Bill Maher?

  Exactly.

• 1:20:35Speaker 01

  No, he was he was real, though, this guy.

• 1:20:37Bill Maher?

  Yeah, so was Jason Zehorn on my Giants.

• 1:20:40Speaker 01

  He was a great white athlete.

• 1:20:41Bill Maher?

  Yeah, that was a long time ago. Uh, what?

• 1:20:45Speaker 01

  I'm just saying, I don't think it's as simple as that.

• 1:20:48Bill Maher?

  Of course it is. Why would there be none?

• 1:20:51Speaker 01

  You're like Trump. So just keep insisting it'll make it more true.

• 1:20:54Bill Maher?

  No, it make it more true because it's just, because look at the depth chart.

• 1:20:59Speaker 01

  Oh, I'm not saying that there aren't more black athletes in the professional sports than there are white ones. Yeah, you're right.

• 1:21:05Bill Maher?

  Okay, well, that's because of just a simple scientific, physical reason.

• 1:21:09Speaker 01

  I think there is, that is an ingredient. I also think it's about focus and how big a part of your life that's made when you're young. How are there?

• 1:21:19Bill Maher?

  Really, you don't think white kids wanna be in the NFL too?

• 1:21:22Speaker 01

  I don't think that there is many white kids as a percentage that believe that's their only way to success as you have with black kids.

• 1:21:30Bill Maher?

  You're delusional. That's, that's, that's lefty bullshit. That's, no, no. White kids would love to be the NFL just as much as black kids.

• 1:21:38Speaker 01

  They don't have to be the same way.

• 1:21:40Bill Maher?

  Oh, please. A- a- as if we're living in some era where if a black kid doesn't get in the NFL, their life is some racist nightmare in America.

• 1:21:49Speaker 01

  No, I don't agree with you.

• 1:21:50Bill Maher?

  You can.

• 1:21:51Speaker 01

  I don't agree. I think that you're right. They don't have to be in the NFL to not have a nightmare life.

• 1:21:55Bill Maher?

  Right, exactly. So, so this idea that the, oh, the, the NFL is mostly, and the NBA is mostly blacks because like, otherwise, they, they, then what else could they possibly do in America?

• 1:22:08Speaker 01

  No, I just think it's not, it's not just genetics, is all I'm saying. I'm saying is genetics a factor?

• 1:22:12Bill Maher?

  It's mostly genetics. And, and when you're talking about elite athletes, we're talking about like fractions of a second. Okay, and when you lose a step in the NFL?

• 1:22:23Speaker 01

  It's over.

• 1:22:24Bill Maher?

  You're retired, I mean, it's a very.

• 1:22:26Speaker 01

  Look, we see it in fighting all the time. The myth is that once you get knocked out, yeah, once you get knocked out, you're never the same. No, it's that you got knocked out most likely because you've lost a little bit of the acuity that you needed.

• 1:22:38Bill Maher?

  So little.

• 1:22:38Speaker 01

  And just a little bit. And then, once it's exposed, it's gonna keep happening. That's why it keeps happening. And I, I've seen that in myself, my own skills, in terms of how they've deteriorated.

• 1:22:47Bill Maher?

  What, what skills for what?

• 1:22:49Speaker 01

  I fight, I train a lot.

• 1:22:50Bill Maher?

  Are you talking about boxing?

• 1:22:51Speaker 01

  Self-defense, no, I don't box.

• 1:22:53Bill Maher?

  Boxing, we're ridiculous.

• 1:22:56Speaker 01

  No, boxing is fine.

• 1:22:57Bill Maher?

  I have a new boxing day.

• 1:22:59Speaker 01

  Self-defense is about, you know, no rules. You know, you gotta get out of this situation.

• 1:23:04Bill Maher?

  And this is organized?

• 1:23:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, you have one of the best coaches I've ever come across that lives right here.

• 1:23:11Bill Maher?

  Me?

• 1:23:12Speaker 01

  Um, you, you are the best. You are like my Miyagi.

• 1:23:14Bill Maher?

  Who are we talking about?

• 1:23:15Speaker 01

  No, his name is Tony Blower. He's got a technique called the spear technique. Um, and he's got a big following online. He trains all kinds of people. He's great.

• 1:23:23Bill Maher?

  He's out here.

• 1:23:24Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, it's great. I'll give you one.

• 1:23:26Bill Maher?

  I don't want to.

• 1:23:27Speaker 01

  It's a great guy. No, because he does it. His training is for this. It's not, it's not this, it's this. It's about understanding fear and understanding what to do with it. And what your choice structure is. And it's about how you grow your business. It's about how you deal with your relationships. And it's about how you protect your ass if somebody's trying to hit you.

• 1:23:46Bill Maher?

  Can I just hire another bodyguard?

• 1:23:47Speaker 01

  Yes, you can.

• 1:23:49Bill Maher?

  I mean, you know.

• 1:23:49Speaker 01

  In these days, you better have one.

• 1:23:51Bill Maher?

  Oh, yeah. No, I, I, I'm very serious about that, Chuck. No, I, I get it.

• 1:23:56Speaker 01

  We've gotten, so I'm watching the other day. Stephen A. Smith is showing up in polls for president of the United States.

• 1:24:01Bill Maher?

  Oh, yeah, we talked about it.

• 1:24:02Speaker 01

  And I see his clip. LeBron James comes up to him, starts saying some shit about his, his son. Stop talking about my fucking son.

• 1:24:09Bill Maher?

  Oh, I saw that.

• 1:24:10Speaker 01

  And then Stephen A. puts out a clip on one of his shows where he says, hey, if he had put his hands on me, I would have swung on his ass. I would have swung on his ass. And I'm watching it go around and how completely, we are so uncivilized. We give ourselves so much credit for being a civilized society.

• 1:24:28Bill Maher?

  Couldn't agree more.

• 1:24:29Speaker 01

  And we are not. We are kidding ourselves.

• 1:24:33Bill Maher?

  Well.

• 1:24:33Speaker 01

  We are violent. Everything about our culture is violent. And now they look at this manifestation of it in our president like it's such an aberration. This is who we are. People honor The Rock. They want to look like The Rock.

• 1:24:47Bill Maher?

  You look like The Rock.

• 1:24:48Speaker 01

  Please, I look like a pebble compared to The Rock. I look like something that would get chipped off the rock.

• 1:24:53Bill Maher?

  Exactly, you look like The Rock.

• 1:24:54Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:24:55Bill Maher?

  What are you talking about?

• 1:24:55Speaker 01

  Crazy guys like three times my size. That's not the point. The point is that's what we idolize. Every sport is violent. Everything that we want, the, the males have to look a certain way. Everything's violent. Everything's aggressive. And then you expect to not see that manifested everywhere in your society. It's who we are. You know, what do you think so happens?

• 1:25:12Bill Maher?

  I've said it many times. Civilization is a mile wide and an inch deep.

• 1:25:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, I agree.

• 1:25:18Bill Maher?

  Like, you just scratch the surface. That's why when shit goes down and the cops don't show up, it is really scary.

• 1:25:26Speaker 01

  One of the big mythologies on the left is the defund the police bullshit. I remember calling Andrew when that first came out.

• 1:25:32Bill Maher?

  Such bullshit.

• 1:25:33Speaker 01

  I was like, listen, I was like, I don't get in your head very often, but do you know who doesn't want to defund the police? Poor black people who live in communities.

• 1:25:42Bill Maher?

  Absolutely.

• 1:25:42Speaker 01

  Where they need the protection.

• 1:25:45Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:25:45Speaker 01

  This is crazy what your people are saying.

• 1:25:48Bill Maher?

  Why? What were his people saying?

• 1:25:50Speaker 01

  The Democrats were saying, defund the police.

• 1:25:52Bill Maher?

  Oh, his people, yeah.

• 1:25:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:25:53Bill Maher?

  Well, you know what? Not mostly the politicians, but the crazies who the Democratic politicians never have the balls to basically say, we're not part of this. These people are saying what they're saying on MSNBC, that's not us, okay? That's where the Democrat politician falls down because mostly Democratic politicians were not for that. But they were too afraid. They don't have the balls to say, you know, that's bullshit. That's not who we are.

• 1:26:23Speaker 01

  You don't police your side. Now, it depends on what it is. Because with cancel culture, the left will take out bold-faced names everywhere it can. It can't get the MAGA people.

• 1:26:32Bill Maher?

  No, I, I, I, one, I mean, I, I told you before, I have a list of things I hate that Trump is doing and are things I don't hate. Among the things I don't hate is that police now have their morale back, which they lost after 2020. And they got blamed, the entire police force of the entire country, for George Floyd. Now, that guy, I'm glad he's in prison. I think it was murder. I don't care what the police manual says. You could tell you were killing him and you still kept your foot on his neck. And it's just, it's, you know, no sympathy for you.

• 1:27:18Bill Maher?

  I know people are trying to get him freed now, not on that page. But that is just not who the police are. Are there racists there? There are racists everywhere.

• 1:27:28Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:27:28Bill Maher?

  Including on the other side.

• 1:27:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:27:30Bill Maher?

  Okay. But the police are not some racist assassin gang. They're not some slave patrol, as I've heard talked about. And maybe the police-

• 1:27:41Speaker 01

  They come from overseer into officer.

• 1:27:44Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I mean, it's, it's, come on, man. It's one of the toughest jobs.

• 1:27:48Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:27:49Bill Maher?

  It's split-second decisions and blah, blah, blah. Yeah, could they be better? I've done many editorials about how they can. They don't need to fire their whole clip, all of them, into the same person over and off. Yeah, I get it. But I'm glad that the police have their morale back. Because they feel like they have a guy in the Oval Office now who has their, their back.

• 1:28:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, he just doesn't have that much control over their lives.

• 1:28:14Bill Maher?

  He doesn't, but it's a, it's a psychological thing.

• 1:28:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, he says the right things most of the time.

• 1:28:18Bill Maher?

  Doing that job is a psychological thing.

• 1:28:20Speaker 01

  Oh, there's no, listen, I've lived it up close.

• 1:28:23Bill Maher?

  What do you mean?

• 1:28:24Speaker 01

  I've been with police in so many situations. I mean, that's why for the media-

• 1:28:27Bill Maher?

  Why?

• 1:28:28Speaker 01

  Because I covered crime for 25 years. I was the anchor of 2020, I was a crime reporter.

• 1:28:33Bill Maher?

  You were embedded with them on the-

• 1:28:35Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, I've seen the police do such amazing things and what they have to put up with. And, I mean, just go out with a HIDA team, the high-intensity drug trafficking areas. And you watch these guys volunteer to go into these things with drug-crazed animals who want to kill them. And-

• 1:28:52Bill Maher?

  Are they holding?

• 1:28:53Speaker 01

  They are, they're holding all right. Uh, they're holding off their lives. Yeah, I know. And what they do on a daily basis, what they get paid. And the scariest part for me is how little they're trained. You know, you have these guys go out there, they're not trained to fight. They're not trained to fight. So what do you think they're gonna do when you resist arrest? Well, I'm not a fighter.

• 1:29:16Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:29:17Speaker 01

  I've had like three months of training. Now I'm supposed to know what to do when you're some drug fueled psycho? Who's like a steroid head or something like that? I'm gonna shoot you. That's what's gonna happen. The legal standard is lower for them for a reason.

• 1:29:30Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:29:31Speaker 01

  We're expecting a level of discretion we don't train them for. Cause you don't wanna pay for it. You don't wanna put in the time. You don't wanna put in the energy.

• 1:29:38Bill Maher?

  No, it's true. You can't give people a monopoly on violence.

• 1:29:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:42Bill Maher?

  If we do. Without giving them. Right. The proper training and.

• 1:29:47Speaker 01

  And we don't do it. And like firefighters? You know, I remember after nine 11. Everybody loved their firefighters, right? Love them, love them. They got fucked in the next contract. Right after nine 11. They got fucked with what they were asking for. And nobody gave a shit. It's the same thing with the cops.

• 1:30:06Bill Maher?

  Those astronauts who just came back from space after nine months. Did you see? They didn't get any like extra. They didn't get overtime.

• 1:30:15Speaker 01

  They lost bone density.

• 1:30:18Bill Maher?

  For being lost in space for nine months and they didn't get overtime.

• 1:30:21Speaker 01

  Listen, Paul Whalen, so Paul Whalen is one of the guys that we got back from Russia, right? One of the guys who was unlawfully detained there for.

• 1:30:27Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:30:27Speaker 01

  Years. He's, I'm doing this interview with him, very compelling. And all of a sudden he says something as an aside. That almost made me vomit. He says. You know, and then you come home and. They have the act that they passed for people like me to be rehabilitated. But they never funded it. So there's no money in it and you. And he just keeps going. I'm like, wait, wait a minute. You didn't get any money when you were taken because you were an American? And you didn't do anything wrong? And you were held for five years in a Russian prison? He goes, yeah, no. You don't get any compensation. They never funded it.

• 1:31:03Speaker 01

  Are you fucking kidding me? I mean, and then you want to tell us that you're a just society, that you're a good society and that you're going to make judgments about people?

• 1:31:13Bill Maher?

  It'll be so easy.

• 1:31:14Speaker 01

  And you're OK with that?

• 1:31:15Bill Maher?

  Like, where does that break down? Where the guy who could have made that call just didn't? It's just, it's so lazy.

• 1:31:25Speaker 01

  We got to talk about Signal Gate for the next week until something else happens.

• 1:31:29Bill Maher?

  No, I'm going to let you go. But, um, you have anything to plug? I think it's great that you're on News Nation. I'm glad you landed somewhere. I'm glad your voice is out there. I'm glad you're talking to the people. I'm glad that you are not quite the, like, reliable lefty you were on CNN. I feel like I trust you the way I help people trust me. To just call it down the middle, call balls and strikes. I feel you're doing that. And I want, you know, yes, I'd like to feel to myself, but I'm glad what people are doing it for the sake of the country. And Chris, I'm always here for the country. That's mostly what I'm doing, for the country.

• 1:32:17Speaker 01

  It's a great poster. You got my vote.

• 1:32:20Bill Maher?

  Thank you.

• 1:32:20Speaker 01

  Thank you for having me over.