Real Time with Bill Maher - Overtime - Episode #459: Libertarianism, State Secrets, Party Futures

Episode Date: May 5, 2018

Bill and his guests – Jon Meacham, Michael Tubbs, Michael Hayden, Sally Kohn, and Matt Welch answer viewer questions after the show. (Originally aired 05/04/18) See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Night my way. Forever. I just love my job. Get tickets now. The Devil Wears Prada 2 in theaters May 1st. Directed by David Frankel. Welcome to an HBO podcast. from the HBO late-night series, Real Time with Bill Maugh.

Welcome back. Thank you, sir. Since you're the one who's rested, even in the bullpen. Yeah, there's some nicotine out there. What would the Republican reaction be if a Democratic president hid their health from the public or pushed for their physician to make false statements? Yeah, we didn't even get to that schedule, really, that he wrote his own medical report and gave it to his doctor, like that guy's a doctor. I think the answer depends on the flammability of show.

Sean Hannity's hair. Right. We're so past where the bus is run on all this stuff. Right. Oh, good. I'm glad you're loosening up and agreeing with me on Open 5. Bringing you around. I'm trying to save the Republic here.

I know you are, and you're doing a hell of a job. Okay. Matt, does libertarianism have a place in today's political parties? Hell yes. I mean, for the libertarianism. Party, first of all, I mean, we're in an interesting moment right now where both major parties have really retreated on stuff like government spending, like holding the line on interventionism against surveillance, warrantless surveillance, and other things like that. And I would also argue free speech. And so we need more libertarian ideas in both parties and also in the libertarian party, I think.

What does that might look like in his underwear, General? General, how are NSA operations being protected from a president who leaks intelligence to our adversaries? So, all right, without arguing the premise, all right? Right. Here's the seriousness. You carry Ohio. You carry Michigan. You carry Wisconsin.

You get the secrets. And so if you got an issue there, you need to talk to the voters. Yes. Not to the agency. That's so depressing. But that's the reality. It would be worse if he was interested. It would be worse.

First, if he actually read a briefing or cared about anything except whether, you know, Nordstrom is selling Ivanka's shoes. And that's one of the challenges we have. We have a president, Michael Gerson, one of Bush-W.'s speechwriters, said, Donald Trump lives in the eternal now. Little history, no consequence. The whole job of intelligence is context. And we just fly by one of them. And the long game. Yeah, exactly. You know, that's why we didn't have a hot war when we had a cold war. Because it was fought by your people.

Yep. And that's a preferable way to do it. All right. Is there a chance, John, that current partisan divide could become so irreconcilable that America plunges into a second civil war? I don't think so, but you rule nothing out. See, he's coming over to my side. There you go.

Because historically, we did have one. I think it's more likely that there will be a reshuffling of the parties, the element that belong to the parties. That's happened whenever there's been a failure of consensus on the central issue of the time. So on slavery in the 50s and 60s, on industrialization,

at the turn of the century, on the role of the state, then in the middle of the century, and then chiefly, in our own time, the shift from Republicans being the party of Lincoln, truly, and the Democrats being the party of segregationists. They've got to stop saying that,

the party of Lincoln, you know. The party switch. They completely switch. It's just ridiculous. But there's nothing wrong with aspiring to that. Now, of course, the case recently is... But they don't. Well, the case right now, the case right now is that in 2016,

it's the first recorded case of a hijacker boarding a plane and the passenger siding with the hijacker. And that's what happened with Trump. He took over the base. They got rid of the pilots, the Jeb Bushes. the great moral question right now is who wants to be on the right side of history as we were talking about earlier

and say this will not stand to your point I love when Republicans say they're the party of Lincoln like I love it I'm like okay now could you act like it do it again right I mean do it again right I mean it's just like when conservatives suddenly are all worried about women's rights and gay rights right they bring it up so that they can bash Muslims but then when it's actually their own policies and actions,

they don't do anything to uphold it, but they're like, when it's convenient... They say it. They use it as a fig leaf for their otherwise racist behavior. Oh, we're the party of Lincoln. It's sort of the way George Bush, remember when he was talking about his National Guard service,

like, don't denigrate the Guard. Well, in his day, the Guard was a way to get out of the service, and he took advantage of it. When he was president, it was a way to get sent to Iraq. so he conflated those two. Okay. The question right now, it seems to me, and the Democrats are going to face it again

with Sanders and Warren and the Republicans are facing it right now, is the central issue is globalization and its implications. And neither party, as it stands, has a coherent answer to that. And the racism, the xenophobia are all related to the fact

that people are worried that immigrants are coming in, undercutting them. The data is not very strong on that, of course, which makes it all the more hard. to make an intellectual argument about it. Right. Okay. Mayor, as a young Democrat, do you think the party would be better off

if Nancy Pelosi announced she would endorse a younger, less polarizing Democrat to be leader? I think Speaker Pelosi, or House Leader Pelosi, will retire when it's time. I think I've read this Atlantic article that talked about how a lot of the hate she gets is precisely because she's a woman and the one with power

that she's been one of the most effective party leaders ever. So I'm thankful for her leadership and everything she's done. I think when it's time, she... Oh, I'm glad you stick by her like that, because, like, so many Democrats throw her under the bus. Okay. But I think to the wider point, the party does have to develop a bench. Oh, yeah.

But it's not just age, it's ethnicity, it's sexual orientation. That looks like the party. But I think we're seeing that. I mean, there are more women candidates than ever this year by, you know, a margin of... That is, yeah. All right. Thank you, everybody. Thank you, audience. We will see you next week.

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