Real Time with Bill Maher - Overtime - Episode #446: Immigration, Ethical Dining, Comedy vs. News

Episode Date: January 20, 2018

Bill and his guests – Michael Wolff, Larry Wilmore, Andrew Sullivan, and Saru Jayaraman answer viewer questions after the show. (Originally aired 01/19/18) 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. Before I get to the questions that you folks have asked, the vote just came in. Four GOPs, no. Five Dems, yes.

Shutdown starts at midnight. Okay. Andrew Sullivan, why do you think it is that Republican politicians in D.C. support policies with which virtually all of their constituents Disagree? Like...

Like who? Well, I guess they're thinking about... Flake? Something like the Dreamers. People support the Dreamers overwhelmingly. I mean, they do support a lot of the things that... What I found interesting is that, you know, the Republicans have not... I mean, no one can be.

It's just a question of human decency that people have lived here for half their lives not be taken to a country they don't even recognize. There's something about that that's just so disgusting. the core meaning of this country. And so I haven't been, and thank God, I haven't heard a lot of Republicans actually going, rah, rah, rah, rah, on that. I mean, some of their base may be wanting that, but in public, the senators have not been saying that,

because they know. So maybe that gives Democrats a lot of leverage. On the other hand, if that is inhumane, and you can get that stopped, then letting him build a wall for a year and a half doesn't seem to me a big problem. I mean, it's... You're talking about it, like it's not a giant thing.

A wall is there from a 1900 miles of wall. I'll just give him the wall. It won't happen. It won't happen. I know. So give it to him. And save them. Okay.

Well, shut the government down. Okay. How can we make sure that the restaurants we dine at are treating their staff? Yeah, how do you know what's going on in the restaurant? You know, we actually created an app. It's called the ROC National Diner's Guide. It tells you which we're...

restaurants are faring better on wages, benefits, and promotions. And I can tell you, most of the chains are not doing very well. And, you know, most of the chains have a zero-tolerance policy around sexual harassment. We call it a zero-tolerance policy for complaining about sexual harassment because you speak up and you get fired. Oh, wow. Oh, my gosh. Those are the restaurants.

Is there an app that would tell me if the busboy has the flu? The app does tell you. Yes, actually. The app does tell you if they have paid sick days because 90% of these workers don't have a single day to take off when they're sick, which means two-thirds of restaurant workers work when they have the flu.

Yeah. Michael Wolf, do you feel like you had an advantage over traditional media because it didn't matter to you if you burned sources or bridges with your reports on the White House? 100%. Absolutely. Totally.

You said that like Dr. Evil. I'm not going back. Are you Dr. Eve? I'm just noticing. It kind of look like it. Yes. Do this. Come on.

That internet would explode. Already. Exploded. It would explode. Just say $1 million. Oh, he's making that every day on this one. How much have you made from the book? I'm still maxed out.

I'd say from the side, though, you look a little bit like Professor Fonsworth from Futurama? Really, I was thinking I would look a little like you, actually. Actually, we all look a little. We're all Michael's. Right. Yeah. Three baldies. I feel pretty good on my almost birthday.

On my almost birthday. Larry Milmore, do you think comedy shows are at the front line of combating the lies of the government because they can say and do things that normal news shows can't? Well, that would be better if you still had a show. Oh, well, it would be very kind. Thank you. The truth. You know what?

Bill, I always used to answer this question differently, but it seems more and more it is, you know? I mean, there's no news person that's going to deliver, you know, the statement that you just said. You know, there's... I haven't seen you on CNN. I'm sorry. I don't see you coming out on shows

where we hear these things. The way there's agendas that happen on newscasts now, they're not presenting news. They're presenting agendas. And, you know, CNN, everything's breaking news except actual news. I mean, it's insane, you know. And now they've done a thing

where they're in the business of media criticism itself. You know, where CNN will criticize Fox. Fox will criticize CNN. It's like, what the fuck are you guys doing, for Christ's sakes? You're not the news. They're making themselves the news. And John Stewart, you, of course, I call the father of other, with politically correct.

John Stewart... Incorrect. Political incorrect, right? Yes. And John Stewart, people felt like they could trust you. guys because they felt like you were telling the truth and I think that's just grown now. All right. Do you think the Supreme Court...

That's my long answer. Do you think the Supreme Court will finally put an end to gerrymandering this year? I mean, that could be huge. That would be... Well, something's happened in South Carolina on that right now, right? What's going on? With, I think there's...

There's the Wisconsin Supreme Court's case, which is the... Now, this is the big one that the Supreme Court is ruling on this year. It's, you know, looking at other countries, the way they do, their district. This is crazy. The idea that you would let the actual interested parties,

you know, and depending just on musical chairs, who happens to be in after the census, determine your politics, you could just, we have computers now. You know, you can actually put into a computer, okay. Of course. Put in the factor of compactness and put in the factor of diversity, and I will put in the factor of whatever this region will make it closer, will make it more about, so there's a real battle.

And you can do all that and have a new map in a few seconds. and we can't have. It's another, like we were talking about tipping. One of those things where America, almost unique and not in a good way, you know, one of the only countries now to pull out of the Paris Accords, one of the only countries left

who hasn't had a woman president, and the high incarceration rates, and one of the only countries that has direct advertising for prescription drugs, you know, all these things that make us, oh, I know we're not a shithole country, but, you know. We kind of are.

Most of it. In some ways, when you look at lots of stats like infant mortality and literacy, you know, we're not in the top ten. And having a sexual predator for president. Right. We definitely should be very careful about who we're calling the shithole. I'm not going to defend all that, but I am going to say the comments on all made in all those things is that people have more freedom here than they do elsewhere. And I know you appreciate that kind of freedom. And that means that means that things are not going to be as great as it might be if you have a very tightly controlled.

old big government country to make sure everybody ends up the same way. It's just a cost-benefit. The reason we have to have a wall to keep a thing we do to keep people from coming. Some people build walls to keep them from leaving. But it should not prevent us for speaking up for injustices that happen in this free society. That's right, because not everybody's as free as everybody else. That's right. We're going to fix that this year.

Thank you, everybody. We're off to a good start. Happy New Year. Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10. many time on HBO on demand. For more information, log on to HBO.com.