Real Time with Bill Maher - Overtime - Episode #501: Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, Seth MacFarlane, Max Brooks, Adam Gopnik, Joy Reid

Episode Date: June 29, 2019

Bill Maher and his guests answer viewer questions after the show. (Originally aired 6/28/19) 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. Joy, your new book is all about Trump's impact on America. Do you think we'll be able to recover from his presidency once he finally leaves office? I keep saying he never will.

Well, you know what? He keeps saying he never will, right? Now he's doing it. You know, it's going to be very hard. I interviewed a lot of people from all around the world who all said one thing. The thing that America has said about itself since World War II,

we kind of suspect it might be a bit bullshit. Donald Trump has made us feel, yep, it was always bullshit. We don't believe it anymore. So getting the world to believe, again, to believe that we are... The good people. The good people. The leader of the free world. Moral news.

The real democracy. The multicultural democracy. I think that went pretty far down after Vietnam, you know. Yeah, but he's cratered it. And the other thing is it's like supply chains, right? So Donald Trump does a tariff war. People stop buying our soybeans. Do you think because Kamala Harris is president,

suddenly they'll be like, oh, we're going to buy your soybeans again? No, they've already found other people to buy them. And they don't just refer it back. So economic, a lot of the damage will be really, really hard to do. Okay, Seth. What are your thoughts on Twitter's new policy that it will label the tweets of national figures that break the platform's rules?

That's a really fucking hard question. Tweetes of net that will break, what are the rules? Again, this falls into the category of, you know, if I was running Twitter, I would not know, I would curl up into a fetal position and hide in a corner. It's the hardest question in the world to ask because it's you want absolute freedom of speech, but at the same time, Twitter's impact and the impact of Facebook and the impact of social media is undeniably potent.

So there is some regulatory responsibility to prevent the dissemination of bullshit information. But how do you, how do you, when to go down that road? It's the only advice I can give is to the people up top is just use your, use your brain, you know, case by case. I don't know how to... I would say to most of the normal people out there, you have to stand up to Twitter. That's what has to happen.

That's what liberals are not doing. They do it privately. The problem is that's easier said than done because you have the press that latches on to it for the sake of clickbait. I don't know. We've got to stick together. Better educated public wouldn't be as susceptible to it. I mean, they've tried this all over the world Russia has,

and it's been more potent here. And I think we also need to be responsible to push back on just on a personal level. I mean, I had a friend once who posted an article on Facebook that said, the Russians are feeding people in Aleppo. Why aren't we doing that? Well, I clicked on the link, went to another link, went to another link, which went to Bashar al-Assad's website.

And I had to call her out and say, you do realize you are forwarding the article of a dictator. She didn't know. She said, oh, my God, no idea. So if we smell bullshit, we need to be community leaders as well as big and public about it. Absolutely true. It also is important to turn off your phone. I mean,

You know, it's to remember that Twitter is not reality. And it's something that I think we saw in the debates, you know, that if you believe that the Twitter mob is the real world, you're going to get in trouble. And it's easy enough to turn off your phone and walk out in the... They're bullies. Do you think it's getting to the point where this thing that we've created is getting so powerful and having such an impact that it's almost like a department of social media

needs to be created in the U.S.S. Well, but then what would they do? And who would staff it and what... To be on Twitter all day. That's right. The only thing I'd say about that, Seth, is that when you think about it, Twitter only works in a context where you have the institutions that allow free speech to be propagated.

I'm not advocating. I'm just asking you question. You know, you saw a member in Iran at the time of the so-called Green Revolution, Twitter was alive and sparkling, and they shut it down, and they'll do the same thing in Hong Kong. In China, doing much the same thing. So given those choices, you know, Twitter is properly protected by liberal institutions. that's more important than the fact that bad information does get out,

and we have to then correct with good information. That's the way the system should work. And I can tell you, the companies don't accept any responsibility. I was at a conference in D.C. for the Atlantic Council, and they were asking about national security on social media. And I won't say which company, but a rep basically said, like, hey, we're just the carton. We're not responsible for the eggs inside. There's nothing to do with us.

I mean, at the end of the day, you're relying, it's at the end of it all comes down to the conscience of Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg and do they want to do what's right? And I don't know what's right. When's the last time you posted to Facebook? The first thing will happen when you post, when you... I think it was like 2006. Right. I mean, I've only been recently doing it for this marketing stuff.

The first thing you get is boost post. So they're immediately trying to monetize your post. You can be about your cat. They're like, do you want to send this to 20 more people? $30. You can do it. I mean, they're about... They are trying to make money based on how many people use it, even if the people aren't real people. They don't care if they're humans. They don't care if it's a, you know, troll farm and, you know, Dubrovs.

They don't care. They just want the money. And so the problem is saying they're just a platform. They're not. They're also monetizing us. We're not the customer with a product. Okay. So do you anticipate that Robert Mueller's public testimony, another story that happened. We didn't mention, but it's not going to happen until July 17th. Robert Mueller will testify. You anticipate his public testimony will reveal anything lawmakers don't already know.

No. And I don't know if you agree. Can we please Democratic Party? Can America stop outsourcing the responsibility to contain the president to Robert Mueller? He's going to disappoint him. He is not going to do the job of the Congress. Congress, if you want to reign in the president, you have all the power you need,

it's in the Constitution. Stop outsourcing your jobs to Robert Mueller. Absolutely right, Joy, but with one addition, I would make. Look, Robert Nuller did his job. He had a very narrow conception, very precise and legalistic conception. Nonetheless, what did he say in the end? He said, I can't indict the guy because I'm not allowed to. And I can't even say, I think he might be indicted.

But nonetheless, he was taking it by the letter of the office. But then he said, and it was like, you know, trying to help somebody when they're getting a question wrong on a test. He said, if we could say that he was innocent of obstruction of justice, then we would say it. But we cannot say it. So say he's guilty. Yes, exactly.

He was saying he is guilty of obstruction of justice. And he was trying to go on the Democratic Congress. make the same command of my ears. Why be so subtle? The institutionalists are going to kill us. He's trying to be such a voice doubt about it. He did not step up when history called. Maybe so, but the conclusion

is perfectly clear if you read the Mueller report. He doesn't work with politicians. What do you think this card said, you know, they did a reading of the Mueller report at a church, what? In New York, right. A lot of celebrities,

Justin Long played Comey? Or no, played somebody. Justin Timber. No, Justin Lange? They couldn't get Justin Timberlake, I promise you. But there were some big names there. Julie Wee Dreyfus was there, John Lithgow, and they read the Mueller report. I don't know what this accomplishes. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Guys, we don't know. We don't know what's going to happen until the votes are cast.

And listen, there might be a lot of people that come out of those voting booths and say, listen, I was hardcore, right-wing, MAGA. then I heard the guy from third rocks changed everything. Thank you, everybody. It's our vacation. Catch all new episodes of real time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10 or watch them anytime on HBO on demand.

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