Real Time with Bill Maher - Overtime - Episode #451: Voting Age, Gov Class, Billy Graham, Jeff Sessions

Episode Date: March 3, 2018

Bill and his guests – David Hogg, Cameron Kasky, Amy Chua, Eric Holder, and Jon Meacham answer viewer questions after the show. (Originally aired 03/02/18) See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Saving those children is how we all go home. From binge all episodes exclusively on Paramount Plus. Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO late-night series Real Time with Bill Maugh. David and Cameron, and the first question is for you guys. Should we lower the voting age to 16? Would that incentivize schools to teach civic engagement earlier and with more urgency? I think schools could just teach civic engagement earlier and with more urgency. We're taking our Gov class senior year, and that's when most people, I believe, take their Gov class.

I think we should be doing that every year. Is that what we used to call civics? Yeah. Gov class. That's what they call it. That's what the kids these days call it. And they teach you like how government works. Like things like Trump doesn't know.

Like there are three branches. Three branches? House, the Senate, Supreme Court, that kind of stuff? Yeah. Well, no, it's, I pre-registered to vote the other day. And I think that's what we need to be doing because right now, a lot of the kids my age, are voting the way their mommies and daddies are voting.

And that's a little daunting to think about us. I mean, that still happens when people are adults, but, you know, there could be a little bit more freedom as it goes on. And again, that's the number one predictor of what political party you'll be part of is your parents passed, and that's terrifying to think about

considering that our parents have failed us. Oh, yeah. You really don't like us. Yeah. They're in the audience. We are. Okay. Let's not piss off the kids any more than we already have.

Right? Just give us some type. I know. Spiro. Exactly. How do y'all really feel? Don't filter it. Come on.

How do we feel about... We're being very subtle. Tide Pots? Or gun reform? So, yeah. Well, the way I feel about gun reform is we need to have... We don't have many limitations

on the Second Amendment right now. I believe in owning a gun. My father has a gun. Cameron's dad has a gun, I believe. Both our parents were in law enforcement. I do see the reason to be the reason to have a weapon. and I do see the reasoning behind the Second Amendment, but I think we should have limitations on the Second Amendment

the same way we have limitations on the first, where you can't scream fire in a crowded theater, you shouldn't be able to get an AR-15 if you're a mentally unstable individual. I don't get what's so hard for people to understand about that. I'm not trying to take your gun. Remember when slavery was a thing and women weren't allowed to vote, and we did something about that? It took a while.

Well, but if the only thing that comes out of this tragedy tragedy is that we outlaw bump stocks and we raise the age at which people are allowed to buy an AR-15, that will be a failure. That will be a failure. Because the reality, from my perspective, is you need to do what we've always tried to do, which is to ban the sale of AR-15s, have universal background checks, and also take away the ability to buy these large magazines. See, but the problem with that is, it makes way too much fucking sense for our elected officials to take care of. Yeah. There's a study that's out today from the RAND Corporation that's shows that these kinds of measures actually have an impact on gun violence. I mean, there's empirical evidence now that shows that.

What's your opinion on, like, the fact that the CDC can't research most of this stuff? And, like... And that's another thing that has to... This guy, Dickie... That's his name. This congressman put in the funding for the CDC, so they were unable to study the impact of gun violence and the causes of gun violence. That's another thing that has to be...

Who is this guy? He's a... His name was Dickie. I know, but he's a... He's a legislator? That was my nickname. He was a congressman of a football team. I think he was a congressman from Arkansas.

Oh. Oh, yes. He's like the Republicans Wiener. The other thing is... Anthony Wiener. What do you think I meant? What's up with ATF having, like, all of their records be paper? Like, that's just insane.

And that's required by law, right? Required by law passed by Republicans who want to hobble ATF. When we've tried to modernize these things and keep the records in the way any other corporation or a big entity would, keep them electronically. Republicans have said, no, you can't do that. Limit the amount of time that you could hold on to these things and say that you have to keep them. Okay.

We have other issues to get to. John Meacham, would the founding fathers agree with Billy Graham lying in honor at the U.S. Capitol? Probably just because it would not be a violation of church and state in so much as a recognition of a cultural figure. Madison, who wrote the bill. of rights and was a hugely important

thinker about religious liberty was actually presented with a case late in his life about why is the U.S. military paying for chaplains? Isn't that a violation of the establishment clause? Almost certainly, in a strict sense. But he said some things are just not worth

fighting. And I think that's where they'd probably stand. Eric, if you're in Jeff Sessions current position, would you resign? I mean, when I read the When you read these tweets where Trump is going on, and it looks like this is the kind of tweet you would write

if you were in the opposition party. Why isn't the Attorney General? Wait, he's your attorney general. It's so through the looking glass. And Jeff Sessions, I mean, you have nothing in common with him. He's a Confederate soldier. He said that. He's done on.

Do you feel sorry for him? Do you feel something? No, I mean, he took this job knowing who Donald Trump, was. Right. And who he is. Right. And, you know, at some point, though, you would hope that you would have the intestinal fortitude or the pride to simply say, you know,

I wanted this job all my life, but it's not worth it. And I'm not going to take that kind of abuse. And I'm simply going to tell you, you know, go screw yourself and I'm out. But he's kind of doing a service for the country by not doing that. Because if, right, John, don't you agree? If he left, then

Trump could appoint someone who would fire Mueller. Here is a sign of where we are in March of 2018. Jeff Sessions has become a pillar of democratic order. Right. But you're right. It's true. But you're right.

It's true. It's true. It could not be confirmed for the federal bench. Right. Right. Amy, is there any one particular cause that you see has the potential to unite the many different tribes in America? Is there anything? I think it's pot, but you go ahead.

Yeah, you've mentioned that. Yeah, that's interesting. Well, it's one of the few things that does unite red and blue America. You know, conservatives smoke pot. Yeah, you know, I think of it differently. How'd he explained Ted Nugent? Jeff Sessions? You know, I mean, look, for the Olympics, people come together.

I mean, a little, oh, I mean, yeah. I think, I think, I think, I think, no, not this, yeah, I think that if, if people, well, the studies that are most optimistic in my book are that if you actually pull people, out of their tribes and have them interact as human beings. Enormous progress can be made. So, for example, the integration of the military in the 50s was one where everybody said, there's no way this is going to work. And they went through, and then afterwards there was a study.

And did prejudice in America. No, but the study showed that the integrated units were, you know, equal or superior to. And what they said was when you're forced actually to live with people, talk with them, and your lives are in their hands. you see each other as human beings. And same attitudes towards same-sex marriage, too, actually. Dramatically changed when people started seeing these people as their neighbors, their children.

You know, it went from, like, 90% disapproval to 62% approval in just 30 years. It's hard to demonize somebody that you know or a group that you know. It's hard to demonize those folks. We should introduce the Democrats to the Republicans. But no, it's not just exposure. The studies also show that just diversity exposure is not enough.

That can make you hate each other more. You have to actually interact with each other as human beings. And that's the hard part when you are so tribal, right? It's in the circle. It's no mistake that the civil rights movement, the women's movement, the victory in the Cold War ultimately came after the mixing experiment of World War II. The sailors on PT109 were people that Jack Kennedy would never have, they would have carried his bag into a hotel.

Right. and he swam through the Pacific disabled. And he remembered them as he came through. And the prosperity was important. I just, you know, we always, the tribes come together, but it's always brief and it begins to fall apart again. I wouldn't over-romanticize the past. But I don't think it's a simulation I'm talking about.

I mean, I think where I get my optimism is, as I say in this book, I think that alone among the major powers were what I call a super group. That is we, this is not saying that we've met all these ideals, but that we have this overarching national identity that's strong. You know, not like Libya or, but it's strong. And at the same time, we allow individual subgroup identities to flourish. So they don't all have to melt away. I mean, we, and I think it's, if you look through all the different powers,

not England, not France, they have one or the other. But it's strong because it's built around ideas, that we're all different, but we are all, we all cut into the same. And that is what I think is going away. It is, but what Eric's doing is so important, too, because you can't just getting people to, how do you get people to buy into this national identity unity? It's not just by cheering the anthem very loudly, right? The system has to seem legitimate and the dream has to seem accessible to all.

Otherwise, people aren't going to buy into it. And we have got our work cut out for us. Thank you very much, everybody. You were a terrific audience. And of course, a terrific crowd. Hatch 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.