Real Time with Bill Maher - Ep. #615: Chris Wallace, Chris Christie, Katty Kay

Episode Date: October 8, 2022

Bill’s guests are Chris Wallace, Chris Christie, and Katty Kay (Originally aired 10/07/22) See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO late-night series Real Time with Bill Maugh. I appreciate it. I know. Believe me. All right. And now we start. Now I say this every week, but today I really do know why you're happy. Because Biden pardoned everyone who has been convicted of simple possession of power on. Yeah. And this is very smart. because a lot of people in this country, I don't know who they are, I don't know any of them, but a lot of people do smoke pot, and they do show up to vote,

not on the right day, but they do show up. I want to mind you, all you ages out there, who did this? Yes, the old president. Obama didn't do it. And more credit to him, because Joe really doesn't know anything about pot. He thinks THC is that channel that shows the old movies, you know?

So that's the good news. There's a little bad news because the war in Ukraine is going so badly for Putin. Biden said the other day that the risk of nuclear Armageddon is the worst since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. So, you know, good news, bad news. And that war is going badly. There are videos, have you seen this online that have gone viral of Russian young men who so don't want to go in the army that they're breaking their own arms. Finally, a TikTok challenge I can get behind.

A kid, of course. Yeah, no, that is very worrisome. I mean, you've got to root for Ukraine, but the worst Russia does, you know, Putin, who knows, he had a birthday this week. He went to his favorite restaurant, TGI, whatever day I say it is, and it did not turn out to be a good birthday.

Because the next day, he was confronted personally. Who has the ball started? to do that some guy in Russia in his inner circle confronted him with how bad the war was going and how he was in his managing it, that takes balls. And then the guy said, don't get up, I'll show myself out the window. So here in this country, they're cleaning up in Florida, our friends in Florida from several states from Hurricane Ian.

But it's not over. Thousands of people in South Florida are still without cocaine. So it is really disrupted. But, you know, in this very troubling, decisive world, I thought it was rather encouraging to see, did you see President Biden and Governor DeSantis of Florida, who have nothing in common and hate each other, I'm sure? But they worked together, and they were cordial.

Nothing, people. Okay, I mean, come on. Give me something. But, I mean, it did not last. Biden got back on Air Force One, and it was filled with Venezuelan migrants. That was a dirty trick. But, of course, what everyone's talking about

is this picture that emerged of Governor Nsantis down there, and, you know, what's with the go-go boots? I mean, but in Florida, I can't even say gay. But I just got to say, somewhere in Dallas there was a cheerleader performing in her socks. I'm just going to say Only needs us a wig

And he can do drag queen's story hour Oh, Republicans, they're just like us No, not really Well, our friend My gosh, they do run some beuts Herschel Walker, have you seen this down in Georgia? You know, the former football player Herschel Walker who has been running

I mean, he's a hard right on abortion. No exceptions He is like rape and nothing. No abortion. We criminal pregnancy in this country. Turns out his ex-girlfriend, one of his many ex-girlfriends, came forward this week with

proof that he paid for an abortion for her. She had a signed check from him, a receipt from the clinic, and a sympathy card. She had everything but the fetus in a jar. I mean...

And hers... It's just not that bright. He signed the card, glad to hear about your loss. I mean... So this story breaks on Monday, the actual friend coming forward with all the evidence, and Herschel said it's a flat-out why. Then it came forward a few days later. This woman, who he said is a liar, had a child with him. And then Mori Povich came out and said, Herschel, you are the father.

I mean, all right, we've got a great show. We have Chris Christie, Patty Kay. But first up, he is a CNN anchor and host of Who's Talking to Chris Wallace with The episodes available to stream Fridays on HBO Max and airing Sundays at 7 Eastern on CNN. Chris Wallace for the second time in two minutes. Welcome to HBO.

Can I show you around the commissary? Sir, you can have lunch with a dragon. You're going to love it here, Chris. You actually are. And have you found it so far? Great company, right? It is a great company. and this is a very exciting hybrid

because on the one hand, as you just said, I'm on HBO Max, three interviews a week, drop each Friday. We have three that just dropped today. And then the best parts of those three interviews on CNN, prime time, seven o'clock Sunday night. So it all came out in a lot. My family is here in force tonight.

Well, I can't think of anybody better to talk about the news business with, I mean, who was more steeped in it. Obviously, your father was Mike Wallace. You worked for, I think your first job was for Walter Cronkite? Well, job is a little bit of an overstatement. I was his gopher. Go for coffee, go for pencils.

That's the Democratic. The Republican Convention in 1964, the Barry Goldwater Convention, yeah. Right. And Walter Cronkite, I mean, for those of people who don't remember, this was the last guy, perhaps, that everybody trusted. I remember when I was a kid watching TV and he was the newsman, and when a comedian, like, wanted to make a joke about, like, somebody who had utter integrity. That was the go-to.

You know, Walter Cronkite, because it was understood by everybody in America that this, what he said, it, we both sides agreed. That is such a bygone world now that we could even have such a thing. No, I completely agree. And in fact, in 67 or 68, he went to Vietnam. And, you know, he was a straight newsman. He didn't give commentary. He just reported the facts. But we were in the middle of this

of this terrible and long and bloody war, and he came back, and despite what all the generals were saying, he said, the war is not going well. And Lyndon Johnson, the president at the time, supposedly said, if I've lost Walter Cronkite, I've lost America. Right. And he did, and he did. It's true. Didn't even run again.

That's right. But today, some side, probably the right wing, would just have attacked Walter Cronkite. No, it has gotten so siloed, if you will. You know, you've got conservative media, and they have built up an audience, and they only want to watch conservative media and what it is that supports their conception,

their view of the world, and liberal media, and liberals want to watch that. And distressingly, few people just want to get the news and make up decisions for themselves as to what they think the truth is. Well, that's a very small sliver of the country, I think, who even wants news. I mean, when I talk to people under 40, even, and I ask them, where do you get your news? Most of what they say is like, well, what somebody posts on my Facebook page.

In other words, it's gossip. Like, that's to me what gossip is. Your friend is passing around the story. They don't know if it's true. They don't care. But, I mean, Walter Crunkite got 29. million viewers. I mean, nothing, no TV show gets even

a third of that, even the biggest hits, I don't think, anymore, in prime time. This was the news. And if he got 29, Huntley Brinkley got 25 or whatever. I mean, you had 50, 60 million Americans at a time when the country was a lot smaller who wanted to tune in to see the evening news.

I mean, in fairness, the world has changed. And, you know, you don't get your news at 630 at night. you're getting it all day and you can get it on your phone or, as you say, Facebook or Instagram or TikTok or whatever. But the world has definitely changed and not for the better in terms of the desire to get the straight facts and to have your preconceptions be challenged by what reality is. People don't want reality. They want their view.

And this really all came about because news used to be a lost leader. for a company. It wasn't Kronkite's Day. Absolutely. I mean, with the giants of television back in the end, by that point, I mean, the owners, Bill Paley at CBS, Sarnoff at NBC,

they viewed news as a public service and that you know, it didn't have to make money. If it didn't lose money, that was okay. But even if it lost a little, that was all right. And I've got to be careful with this because I know you're a huge fan of 60 minutes.

but I kind of feel that to a certain degree, 60 minutes and my father were a little bit responsible for what happened. Not that their journalism wasn't terrific, but when 60 minutes went on the air in 60A, and then as it became more and more successful, ended up being the number one show in America for a number of years, it made money. And suddenly the executives and television said, you can make money with news. And I think that led to the idea of not having an audience come to you, but chasing an audience. And that led, I think, to more biased news coverage.

But aren't you a bigger fan of 60 minutes than me? Oh, I'm... Isn't that what put food on your table? Did it take your father away from home? Is that what it is? I'm sorry, Bill. I'm sorry, but our time is up here now. No, I'd love 60 Minutes, and I think their journalism is first right.

What I'm saying is it open the Pandora's box that you can make money from news. Right, and that's the problem, because the media works backwards now. They work backwards from what does our target demographic want to, how does they want them to filter us, filter this news for us? So they were only hearing what doesn't upset us. I mean, I don't know if they still have those dials that they use for, like, focus groups, but I think they do. where you can tell the people, as they're watching, oh, no, I don't like that. I remember, you know, try to have it during the debate.

You know, Obama's a little sarcastic, no. That's right. You'd have the blue line and the red line and then the whatever line in the middle of the independent. And the people who are these anchors on these cable news shows, they know that those dials are somewhere. They don't want to say something that makes the people turn the dial the wrong way. So that's why they live in a bubble.

except on this show, of course. And by the way, you know, I've paid for that. There are, you know, lots of woke people who used to watch this show. I know who don't anymore because, like, I will present. I've always did that. It's just that the left went crazier, so I have to do it more. And I would wish they would come back, but not at the price of not calling out both sides. No, and I've got to say, and I agree, that I think that's absolutely true of you.

I like to think it's true of me as well when I was at Fox. It is. You left Fox News. But on Fox News Sunday, I told it straight. And they never second-guessed me on a guest or a question. They let me do what I did. And I'm doing the same now. No, I always thought you were the canary in the coal mine at Fox. I did.

I want to see how this metaphor ends up. Well, well, the canary gets out the mine. collapse. That's my no, I mean, you got out. I mean, it became, come on, isn't that why you left? Because it just became too hard to be in that looney bin. You know, I am so excited

about who's talking to Chris Wallace. I am so excited about CNN and looking ahead to the future. You just said you're a big straight shooter, but you wouldn't answer that question about talks? You know, I have found message discipline. I know you're going to be talking to Chris Christie in a moment. Message discipline.

That's for politicians, not for us. What? We're the other side. We're the other team. Yeah. All right. I'll ask you. All right.

Yes, I'm thinking. One, two, right. Actually, I was thinking Mitch McConnell. Just repeat the line over and over again. So, last question. You moderate. Yeah, almost. All right.

I'm having a good time. I'm having a good time. It goes fast when you avoid it. question. Well played. Okay, so... Yes, sir. I think you moderated both the Hillary Clinton

Trump debate. One of the debates in 2016, one of them in 2020. And also Trump and Biden. Yes, the first one. I mean, it's just a clown show at this point. These debates, is it not? I mean, Trump is going to trump. He's just this, you know, incredible gorilla buffoon. in the room. He's going to break the furniture. I mean, it's pointless to

debate him. He doesn't know anything. He doesn't care. His audience doesn't care. He doesn't know anything. Biden, I mean, I'm getting more and more in love with Biden, but on a debate stage... Just because of the marijuana? That didn't hurt, Chris. No, he's just...

You know what? He's too old for this shit. That should be his motto. He's just... He just gets things done. He's like... I'm not sure too old for anything should be his motto. I think it's working for him. Lean into it. Like, Afghanistan, I'm too old for this shit.

Get out. You know, here's where I'll disagree with you about the debates. The first debate of 2020 where Trump just went nuts. I mean, we had somebody count how many times

he interrupted, either Biden or me, 145 times in 90 minutes. That's a lot. But having said that, 80 million people watch that debate. So there is a real hunger out there among Americans to, we want to see these two guys and size them up. Okay. Well, if I put porn on that channel, I could get 81 million.

You know, it doesn't, anyway, I got to go. Thank you very much. Good luck here. Welcome in-house. Thank you. Chris Wallace. All right. Let's meet our panel.

Okay. All right. Here they are. He is the former Republican governor of New Jersey and a political and legal contributed for ABC. News. Chris Christie is over here, Governor. And she's a special correspondent for BBC News and host of the new documentary, Trump. The comeback? Available to...

There was a question mark at the end. There is a question. That's right. The comeback? Stream on BBC Select via Apple TV and Prime Video. Caddy Kay is our returning champion. So I just want to start off. I was watching these pictures from Florida, and I thought of you because you're coming on this weekend.

The pictures of Biden and descent, together must bring back warm memories of when you were with Obama after another storm. It was Hurricane Sandy. And there was the famous picture of you and Obama. And, you know, they said you hugged. That's as close as you got. Yeah. It was not a hug.

Not from Jersey. That's not a hug. Yeah. But I noticed that with DeSantis and Biden, he must have had that in mind because the picture he got taken, and there was a relative in between them at all. See, this is what relatives are foreign politics. Get between you and the guy from the other team who you can't touch.

Silly. So, you think that's why he did that? I don't know why he did what he did. But, like, when you have, what we had in Sandy, we lost 365,000 homes in 24 hours. When he has what he has and what it looks like to me from here in the Gulf Coast, you can't think about anything else but those people.

I mean, their lives are not going to be normal for a very long time. And they've lost everything they own. They've lost their sense of who they are. So, you know, for me, it's not going to be 10 years ago at the end of this month. I just said to all of our folks, like the President comes, we're going to show him around, we're going to make sure he sees everything and meets those people. And I didn't worry about the politics. And the analogies here are kind of a little bit misplaced, too.

I mean, this is five weeks away from a mid-term. term election where DeSantis looks like he's going to win and Biden's not even on the ballot. When Biden came to New Jersey, or when Obama came to New Jersey, it was six days before the presidential election where he was on the ballot. So the

everything was heightened and all the tensions were and it was my job to get them focused on the job, which was rebuild the state, repair these people's lives. Okay, I know, I know. But it's true. I know. You guys do that.

I know. I know. I know. But you do that. But you do that. And I took enormous shit for that. I know you did. Yes, you did. Right. So it's not like it was the easy thing to do. Right.

But it was the right thing to do. There you go. And Descentus would be crazy not to welcome Biden, right? I mean, you know, you've got Biden there. You need money for your people who are going to vote for you at some point. And then to diss him. Also, because, see, DeSantis has it both ways. I think he's a very clever politician.

On the one hand... White boots aside. What? White boots were a bad look. That was bad. What makes a guy... How can a guy so smart be so dumb? You would never accuse DeSantis of being elected

purely on the basis of his charisma and his cool. You know, I never see him. I don't live in Florida. What I know is that he's great at political performance art, so he's ginned up the base. He's got them with the, you know, don't say gay shit and all that. And then when something like this happens, he looks like, oh, I'm also a very normal politician who can get along with the president

and do things done as a governor can. I have a suit in a tie. And my white book. So I think that's a very clever one-two punch. I mean, he's definitely going to be the candidate. I mean, run against Trump or join Trump. Do you think he's going to run against Trump? Possibly.

The Republican polling likes him better to be at the top spot of the ticket. Now, that means you have to take it away from Trump, which is very hard to do from a baby. That would suggest he has a little bit. But what if it's Trump and DeSantis as his running mate? Never happened. No.

Why? Never happened. You can't fit both of them in the same room on the same ticket. Oh, you never. I've heard never so much in politics. Much more likely it would be somebody like Carrie Lake in Arizona. Okay, but if it does, it's an irresistible ticket. She could pull off the white boots too.

All right. So it's odd because there's sort of this disconnect. I mean, on the one hand, this looks a little encouraging. Biden and dissent is working together. On the other hand, one of the big stories I saw this week was, like, talk on the Internet of a civil war has jumped like, I don't know, a zillion percent or something. And, you know, a lot of this stuff,

54% of strong Republicans say they feel a civil war. A civil war we're talking about is at least somewhat likely. They seem a little hungry for it, which makes me ask the question, And you mean you actually want to kill Americans? You know, I know you've done a lot of reporting on this recently. I was interviewing people who, an elderly couple in their 70s, who had clearly sat down and thought about how a civil war would unfold.

I mean, they took it almost like it was a sober, rational thing to do. They saw it as their patriotic duty to take up arms and kill other people. And they had a whole plan for this. It was going to start. The Democrats would start the civil war. They would respond by fighting back. and it would be small village against small village and then it would spread to small town against small town

and then it would be state against state. And this couple were in the late 60s, early 70s, the husband and the wife told me repeatedly that they would be happy to take up arms and they would do it to defend democracy in America. That's the kind of level that people are talking about. This is not young hotheads. This is an elderly couple who are going to fight.

But actually it is young hotheads. This is from the southern poverty, Center when asked people who approves of threatening a politician, approves of threatening a politician who is harming the country or our democracy, which of course is what either both sides think the other one is doing, 24% approved, slightly higher for Democrats, and driven largely by the approval of young democratic men. People over 50, only 9%. So really, my generation of the ones who were fucked up. Well,

but you're you're mellowed out by the pot though, so that helps. All right, well, we're going to talk about that. You're going to have to answer to that. But here's another one. 41% of Democrats and 52% of Trump voters think it's, quote,

time to split. And I just want to know what this looks like. When we split, how does that work? And I asked the people who made the great movie Gandhi if we could use a little bit of that because the only time I could remember a country splitting and show that video.

This is from Gandhi. It's a great movie. This is 1947 when Indian Pakistan split. And that's the Hindus going one way from Pakistan into India. And the Muslims going the other way from Indian to Pakistan. Of course, they don't show the next scene there

where they go into a ditch and start killing each other. But is that where we know? There's a line of cards from a... Arizona going into California and the 4 million Trump voters that we have in California are going to be driving into Arizona? Is that really what? What does that mean? Like, time to

split? Describe that. I don't buy it. I just think it's anger. And I think they're figuring out new ways all the time to express their anger. And I look at it much differently, the Civil War part that you brought up, I mean, I look at the stuff that happened on January 6th. And instead of that, inciting a Civil War,

what it did was force, everybody in Washington to do their job and certify the election and certify that Biden had won it because he had. And, you know, it made our democracy... I look after January 6 and say that democracy proved how resilient it is, not the other way around. Yeah, except you have 200-odd candidates running as Republicans who say that Joe Biden shouldn't be president

because Donald Trump won the election. Well, sure. Yes. Yes, you're in the minority of your party, at least for the people who are running. Of the major... Wait, wait a second. We have midterms in a month or something?

Okay, 299 of the Republicans who are running. This is for Congress and Senate, the major seat. 299, a majority think what you just alluded to. They don't think the election was fair, and Biden actually lost. That's an astounding... Well, and we'll see how they do. How they do. We'll see how they do.

They're going to win. A lot of them are going to win. Well, some of them will and some of them won't. But in the end, you've got to get out there and fight that. I mean, you know, you can't just expect this stuff. Are the Republicans you're talking about? Sure. Yes.

Yeah. Is that what you're doing? Well, I just said it, didn't I? Right. I mean, but I mean, is that... What do you want me to do? I want you to... I don't want me to do.

You know, shit, hell? Like, what do you want me to do? I want you to do more. I want more Republicans. You know, this is what I call the as good as it gets Republicans. I don't take that the wrong way. Oh, how could I?

How about you're the pain in the ass talk show host? But don't take it the wrong way, you know? No, no. But I just mean, like, for people who are like, but the people who just are adamant about how they won't even talk to Republicans, you know, you want something that's not going to be. Republicans see the world differently.

It's okay. We have to have that. But this is as good as it gets. Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney and Kinser. I can never say his name, Kinsaker, whatever, that guy. I mean, but even Bill Barr and Pence, they both, Mitch McConnell, of all, said this was a legitimate election. That's as good as it gets, liberals, for Republicans.

Deal with that. Don't hate those people. Anyway, my message. I think, you know, what you raised about young Democrats, I think there's something there, too, because the young guy from Florida, Maxwell Frost, who's come out and said that DeSantis wants to impose a fascist state in the country. I mean, America's not going to become a fascist state. It's not going to become a socialist state.

I mean, is there a far-right tendency? Is there, you know, are there conservatives on the Supreme Court? Of course there are. But fascist, I mean, I don't think that's not helpful either. If you want to gem up, you know, violence and backlash in the country, you start throwing around words like fascists. You're not helping the cause of not avoiding a civil war particularly. That's exactly right.

All right. So you mentioned pot. Yes, Biden did it. You know, he finally did this. He pardoned people who had just had minimal records with marijuana. Also, SpongeBob is now the secretary of the name. But I seem to remember when you were governor. Yeah.

You are very hard. In fact, I have a quote here. Go ahead. This is after it started to become legal across different states. And you said, I don't care, quite frankly, that people think it's inevitable, meaning inevitable it become legal in this country. it's not of an inevitable here. I'm not going to permit it.

Never, as long as I'm governor. What are you? The George Wallace of Prohibition? You're stand in the doorway of the dispensary. Well, if you win, you get to make the decisions. And I got elected twice, and I got to make the decisions. That was the decision I made. And I know you disagreed with it then, and I know you disagreed with it then, but you just said,

but you just said, we're allowed to have different opinions. I have a different opinion on it. I agree. Okay, I'm not... I'm just asking... But like, even most Republicans don't have that opinion anymore. Okay.

Okay, I'm just asking why you have this hard on for pot? Because... They don't have it just for pot. I know, but... Go ahead, guys. Next question, Bill? No, no, no.

He's doing great tonight, isn't he? All right. you'd say mean for other drugs. But pot is not like other drugs. And this is part of it. I understand you think that. I don't think that. This is, this is, here's what we have.

Schedule 1 drugs, which pot, this is, I think, where Biden is moving, to get rid of this insanity. Schedule 1. In other words, these are the drugs that they say are the worst. Schedule 1, 1 equals worst. Pot, lumped in with LSD, heroin, ecstasy, and mushrooms.

You mean, you see those all the same? I don't see them all the same, no. But that's the way the law puts them together. So if you want to try to change it, I've always said the same thing. If someone wants to pass a law to change it and you can get a majority of the people to vote for it, great. You ask me my opinion, I vote no on that. We all agree. We all agree.

But, I mean, they've studied pot a zillion times. I don't understand that. Look, we have a difference of opinion about it. But I'm talking about what... I mean, there is an absurdity here that you have pot classified as a class one drug, which hasn't ever killed. anybody, but then you've got fentanyl and methamphetamines, which are not classified as class one drugs, which are causing an epidemic of death. And they should be.

Well, they should be. It should be open to your vision, right? And that's what I just said. If you get people, it became a Schedule 1 drug because people voted to make it one, and if they vote to not make it one, it won't be. Okay, but the question isn't... And I'm telling you that my view in it from the quote you read at the time was that I was going to permit it to be a recreational

legal drug in New Jersey. I didn't permit it to be. And now we have a new guy who came after me, and he permitted it. Am I, like, standing in the corner holding my press saying, I can't believe you did that? He gets to make the judgments now. He made the call he made. Right? I mean, like, that's the way it works, isn't it? And that's the way it's

supposed to work? Yes, but the question isn't that. We all agree on that. Okay. That laws matter, and people make laws. The question is... Not everybody agrees with that. You're right. You're right. But this question... This question... This question was why do you seem to be so adamant about standing up to or ignoring what we have studied for so long? I mean, the Schedule 2 drugs, which is the ones who are not as bad, Coke, meth, and oxy.

I can tell you from personal experience, I've done all these drugs. What? All right. Coke and meth and oxy are worse than LSD, heroin, ecstasy, mushrooms, and pot. I've never done heroin. So... Tomorrow. I think you've...

After this show. With Chris. I think you've given me the solution. I'm going to leave here and try all of them. And then we'll see... Then we'll see what happens. You know, I'm just here and experience. You're doing it all at the same time, Chris.

Not all at the same time, though. A tutorial from you, maybe? All right. So Kanye West is in the news. Did you see this shirt? He wore, you know, he's a fashion designer, too. Makes, I think, a fortune from doing that. And he, of course, blessed him.

his heart, loves controversy, and you know, I can't not like Kanye. You know, I've said it many times when he said he loves Trump, which of course we disagree on, but when he said, the mob can't make me hate him. I just fucking love that. We need more of that in this

country. Anyway, so he wore this t-shirt that says, white lives matter, which, you know, a lot of people we're not going to debate that whole thing, but there certainly was a reason why Black Lives Matter became a movement and a saying and a cause

because obviously black lives have been disproportionately at peril in this country. So, but Kanye loves controversy and we got aboard, this was not the only controversial a shirt he wore in that show.

Do you want to see some of the other ones that he ain't... Oh. For example, he had this one. Bring back asbestos, which is just... I don't get... He had mothers for drunk driving. Putin, bring on the nukes.

No, no. No. A clown's rock is not Hillary 2024. Oh, for fuck, no. Jesus was Asian. I don't even get it. It's so Kanye, isn't it?

Free Harvey Weinstein. No. Kanye. Come on. And George W. Bush does care about black people. Oh, so we reverse. Anyway, speaking of T-shirts, I want to put out a T-shirt.

I want a manufacturer. I think this would be a great t-shirt that would sell a lot of money. I know if you saw, but Joe Biden, when he was down there in Florida, talking about the hurricane, was caught on a hot mic. Oh, yeah.

And he said to a guy, no one fucks with Biden. With a Biden. Well, I'm going to change it to just bite. So I want to put this on a t-shirt. I think we mocked up a little thing with Joe wearing it. No one fucks with Biden. I just want to ask you, as someone who once had the Republican Party eating out of your hand,

because you had that kind of confrontational, I don't take no shit from nobody attitude. What do you think of this? Of the t-shirt? I love it. I think the t-shirt's a winner. I mean, I don't know if Biden did this intentionally. No, that's the beauty of Biden. Like, he didn't do it intentionally.

He's like, talked to that guy and thinking like, he's my buddy. I'm going to tell him. Don't you worry, man, I got your back. Nobody fucks with Biden. And meanwhile, he could barely walk over there, right? But he's like, some people would, nobody fucks with Biden. Come on. If he wanted to do it intentionally, he'd have messed it up.

That's right. That is Biden. They would have put it on a car and he would have messed it up. I'm just... Joe Rolls with the aviators, the whole thing. It's perfect. I think he should go with that. I think people love it.

I mean, profanity isn't a deal breaker in politics anymore. Not anymore. And people like that, again, that's what... We're thrilled about that in New Jersey, by the way. So it makes you touch you feel you, right? When you say no one fucks with me, it's like... Think you're my friend. In New Jersey, that translates into, I love you.

I love you. Let's the leg cover hug moment. Okay, so there's an interesting story in this paper this week about this Dr. Maitland Jones. You guys have kids, right? Yes. Ah, kids, I love them. Do you?

No. Come on, crazy. Anyway, he... So, he's a professor. He's, like, not just a professor. He's kind of like a big deal in the world of organic chemistry. It's like he wrote the textbook, okay? He's semi-retired.

He was at Princeton for years. now he was at NYU, I think, as kind of a relaxed sort of professorship, but he was like the man. I remember when I was at Cornell, there was a dude like that in the English department. He had wrote the textbook, and he was like, very respected.

We all... He thought he was a thousand years old. This guy, I'm sure is too. Anyway, his course is hard, because organic chemistry is hard. These are kids trying to become doctors. This is pre-med. You've got to know your chemistry.

So the course is so hard, out a petition asking for him to be fired and of course the school said no I'm joking the school said of course we will and they fired this guy for having a course and it's so interesting he said after COVID the kids came back

he said only did they not study they seem to not know how to study he said they were misreading exam questions at an astonishing rate so we can talk about COVID in a minute and whatever we handled that right but for now I just want to ask about the kid question and what's going on on college's

question because it does seem to me that the inmates have taken over the asylum. Okay, if this isn't the kids, this is the parents. And actually what's happened is that American universities has become so expensive. It's like, what, 60,000?

By the way, you can go to Cambridge University in the UK for 20,000. So if anyone's looking for a bargain, head over there. But if you are a parent, and they refer to the parents, the people who pay the tuition fees, is what the email firing this guy referred to. And actually it's all these parents saying,

hold on a second, this is a crappy deal. I'm paying $60,000 a year, and little Johnny just failed organic chemistry. I want a better product. And I'm going to put this as much on the parents as on the kids, that they're the ones that are starting to say, you know, we have to have our kids pass everything.

Your kid doesn't pass. He shouldn't pass because he probably shouldn't become a doctor. I mean, this is doing no favors to the children. And by the way, bring down the cost of American University. This is a good. the absolutely foreseeable result of the participation trophy society that these kids started, right? When they were playing six and seven-year-old soccer, everybody had to get a trophy, right? Now those six- and seven-year-olds who are all getting the trophies are now at NYU.

And they're like, what the hell are you talking about? I've got to pass organic chemistry by studying. Just give me my grade and let me go on. And it is, we've done this. And I agree with Caddy. the parents who are running the soccer leagues set up this thing where, oh, I don't want I don't want my child to have disappointment. I don't want them to be fail at anything. And so my remedy for this, Bill,

was I've made all of my children New York Mets fans so they know pain and disappointment from the very beginning. Send them to a university that does not cost an obscene amount of money, so if they fail, you don't feel like you bought a crack product. It's ridiculous. I have two children in college right now. My oldest sons at Providence College in Rhode Island.

Go friars. It's $74,000 a year, and I have a daughter at Notre Dame, and it's $72,000 a year. It's insane. And now we're going to forgive loans, and we're going to do all the rest of this stuff, so that there's no price pressure at all on colleges,

and then they're going to fire professors. Why are we even bothering going? Are you saying they're lowering the standard of exams in places around the? the world. You think China, they're saying, oh, let's make our organic chemistry exams easier so that our kids don't have to pass such a high level. No, I mean, we're competing with kids around

the world, you have to pass organic chemistry. Maybe the answer is better adderall. I'm not... We could add it to the drug list. I'm just going to say, I don't know what schedule that's on. Maybe we can make a deal on that, you know, trade the pot and the adorol.

We'll try Chris on that tomorrow. Someday I'm going to get you high and you're going to thank you. Can't wait. It's coming down. But, you know, there's always talk these days about anxiety among the younger generation. And I think what you're alluding to, I think, is exactly where it comes from.

They have not been prepared for a world that does not revolve around them. I keep reading about the way, and now this is celebrities, so it's celebrities, as we know, are not like us. But I don't think it's that. It's far from the way a lot of parents treat their children. So I wouldn't mention the names, but I was reading about one celebrity couple who their daughter has changed her name, like five or six times.

She's like 10. Like not even a gender thing. Just let her do anything she wants. Change her name. How about you have a beautiful name. We'll call you that when you become 18. You can change it if you want. Another couple talked about how they don't ever have doors that close

in the house, including the bathroom. They've just given up on having any privacy because the kids will just walk in. You know, how about... Yeah, no. I know, but... This is why you've never had kids because you read all these stories. There are some upsides

to having kids. That is... Well, I mean... Maybe it's the Victorian in me, Sina not heard, but, you know, I have doors in my house. But that's not the only reason I don't have kids. It's not just the stories. I see children when I...

I love this. Come on. I do. When I'm out in the world... You get to see them. We're doing a terrific session. Like you're at the zoo? Is that what you're saying, Bill? They should be at the zoo.

They're out of control. They're feral. They're feral. What? And nobody is doing anything about it. They're running wild and the parents... This is what I see. I also see...

Okay? I watch television and movies. Now, the way children are portrayed in every television show and movie, they can't all be lying about it. And it's, it's, they talk back to their parents. I mean, including cursing it, you know, I call it the fuck you mom generation.

I see it on, I've seen it in dozens of TV shows and fuck you mom and they storm out of the room. Really? You've just done a whole segment with Chris Wallace on fake news and like misinformation? You think that's fake? I think that's drama. Yeah.

You don't think, oh, really? You don't think kids in this country say fuck you to their parents? I think some always have. You're living in a dream world. I think some, I think some always have. But here's the difference. If any of my kids are, well, not in house I grew up in.

No, exactly. No. Nobody did it in art. And by the way, you can stop it now too. But you know what it means? Yes. It means doing things like, I understand. But we can't give into that, Bill.

No, I'm not saying we should. I'm just answering the question. Why don't have children? Because when you have children, you can't raise them in isolation. Maybe no one wanted to have children with you, Bill. What happened? Maybe no one wanted to have children with you. That I promised you was not.

Don't answer it. Don't answer it. It's not good. I consider it one of the great accomplishments of my life. That I was able to... Resist. Right. All right.

Time for new rules. New rule. Now that's a new rule. If there's a Scooby-Doo show that makes it official that Velma is gay, uh, we have to talk about Fred and Barney. They vacation together, go camping together, and their wives hate their guts.

Because whenever they walk in on them, they're not wearing pants. New World, if you want to impress me with sports memorabilia, forget about showing the Aaron judge's home run ball. Show me your Herschel Walker autograph abortion card. New Rule, as tragic as it was, that a riot at an individual. Indonesian soccer match resulted in 125 people being trampled to death,

soccer fans must look on the bright side. Nobody used their hands. New Rule, Germans must resist the urge to explain to Americans the storied history and cultural significance of October Fest. Trust me, you had us a three-week festival of giant tits and unlimited beer. New Rule, now that author Helgard Mueller has written a book called President Donald J. Trump, the son of man, the Christ.

Someone has to tell all the other sycophant Trump cultists, hold your cards, we have a bingo. Although I think Hellgard is ignoring the one glaring difference between Jesus and Trump. Jesus took his beating like a man. And finally, new rule, you can't be in charge of counting the votes if you think the votes from one of the parties don't exist.

Normally in a democracy, this is not something you'd have to say, but let me introduce you to Mark Fincham. He is the Republican nominee for a Secretary of State in Arizona, and I'm guessing the bartender at an OK Corral theme part. If he wins, it'll be his job to count the vote next time. And Mark, not only believes Trump won the 2020 election, he literally can't conceive that Biden could have. Why? He says, I can't find anyone who will admit that they voted for Joe Biden. Yeah, forget the meticulous the hand recounts, the independent verifications, run by Republican officials.

This guy has never personally met a Biden voter, so they don't exist. You know, I've never been to a BTS concert, but I believe K-pop exists. And I gotta say, more than anything, this is what is wrong with this country. A real division isn't between red and blue. It's between the people on both sides

who aren't willing to mingle with Americans, outside their political tribe, and so I have no idea what they're really like. And the people on both sides who are willing to do that. Of course, Mark Fincham never met a Biden voter, and probably thinks Democrats eat babies, because everybody he knows voted for Trump,

because he never leaves his hermetically-sealed right-wing panic room. And I could say the same of many liberals who would never even talk to a Trump voter. I asked a friend of mine recently, if he wanted to come to a little party I was having, and when he found out one of the guests had voted for Trump, he told me he wasn't coming because, quote,

I wouldn't breathe the same air. Okay, there's a word for people like this, assholes. When we confine ourselves to bubbles, alternate points of view become not just objectionable. They're unfathomable. This guy Fincham thinks Biden voters are literally a fiction, like wizards or the female orgasm. When he was pressed on this and asked,

isn't it possible that lots of people you don't know personally did vote for Biden? He replied, in a fantasy world, anything's possible. Mark, have you ever been to a Whole Foods? Or talk to a woman under 50? You know, in a nation based on pluralism, it's very dangerous that Americans are so in our silos, and it's largely because we've stopped living amongst each other. The latest census data revealed that Americans,

have hit the lowest rate of moving since they started tracking it in 1947. And while some of that is economic, much of the reason Americans don't move anymore is they just wouldn't feel welcome in too many places in their own country.

Would anyone ride the New York City subway wearing a MAGA hat? Would anyone go to a NASCAR race in a Biden t-shirt while they chant, fuck Joe Biden? That's where we are now. Where other parts of the country are as scary no-go zones.

America's like a prison now where the inmates think they need to join one of the gangs to survive. And we dare not walk on the wrong side of the yard. In January of 2021, the New York Times published the headline, They can't leave the Bay Area fast enough and followed it up that July with the headline, tech workers

who swore off the Bay Area are coming back. Yeah, they saw all the red hats and were like, fuck this, I'll take the wildfires. And the same would be true. if an evangelical preacher showed up in West Hollywood. Once he was done blowing all those guys, he would hate it.

All right, I'll be at the Fox Theater in Detroit. Tomorrow, October 8, at the Klein and Chesa Col and Buffalo on the 9th, the Mirage in Vegas, number 25th, and 26. I want to thank my guest Chris Christie, Katie Kay, and Chris Wallace. Now go to YouTube and join us on Overtime. Thank you, folks.

Thanks, guys. Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10 or watch them anytime on HBO on demand. For more information, log on to HBO.com.