Ep. #727: Gov. Wes Moore, Chris Cuomo, Sarah Isgur

Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO Late Night series, Real Time with Bill Maher. Real Time with Bill Maher Please, thank you so much. I know you're so glad you're in a good mood. Thank you very much. Thank you. I know why you're happy today. Because Trump said today we will not be using nuclear weapons in Iran. I didn't know that was on the table, but okay. Oh, this Iran way. It's gotten a little Groundhog Day, isn't it? It's always kind of this. It's the same story every week. We're seizing their boats, they're seizing our boats. It's less like a war and more like a Florida divorce. It's kind of become a war of, you block me? No, I block you. Straight or hermose, you think you can fuck it up? Oh, we could fuck it up. That's our plan now, is to win slowly by destroying their. their economy. Hopefully their economy. Yeah, it was Earth Day this week, but we found out we still use a lot of oil. Nobody can afford gas. This week, Tiger Woods crashed his bicycle. Wow. That is a. Eric Swalwell. has been turning. off the engine of the car when he gets blown. Now, he just. Really, still some residual affection for Eric Swalwell? Wow. Okay, but it's not just gas. It turns out everything is made of petroleum products. Did you see this week, condoms? Who knew condoms? Condoms, yes. They're getting trapped in the straight or hermose. So, condoms are now very scarce and very. very expensive. More bad news for Mike Vrabel. No, the. the condom situation is so serious that we are changing the name from Operation Epoch Fury to the Trojan War. And yet. And yet, lately, Trump on the war has been so chill. Have you noticed that? I know, it's not like him to veer erratically. But, you know, a couple of weeks ago, it was, if you don't do what he was saying today, I'm gonna destroy your civilization, bomb the shit out of you, you think your pencils and dolls are expensive. Whoa, you. And now it's like, is it really a war? It's more of a situation, really, I think. And the problem is, he keeps saying, we won, and we didn't. We didn't. Hermosa's not open. The people did not do an uprising. The regime is still in play. We did not win, sorry. And in social media, he keeps rubbing their noses in the victory we don't have. Every day. Every day, he tweets out stuff that's inflammatory and contradictory, all these bullshit claims. I gotta say, you can say what you want about his negotiating tactics. One tactic you can't get him on is the silent treatment. So. Turns out, the one thing we are really good at is killing their leaders who are too stupid to go underground when we're trying to kill them. That's what we're. The current Ayatollah, who's the son of the old Ayatollah, turns out he's very gravely wounded, he was badly burned, can hardly speak. When he sentences people to death now, he used to do it with a look. It's very sad. Um. Oh, and. In the middle of this war, here's big news. Pete Hegseth fired a white guy. Yeah, the Secretary of the Navy. And, uh, wow, this guy must have done some bad shit. You know, that doesn't happen a lot with Pete Hegseth. But it was either a war crime or, knowing that administration, there was a picture of him with huge fake balloon tits. That's one of the two. Oh, there's a. There's a lot of talk this week about drinking in the Trump administration, which is ironic, because Trump is a complete teetotaler, but, you know, Pete Hegseth, there were some rumors about him. Head of the FBI, Kash Patel. He is suing the Atlantic. He denies it, but they wrote an article saying he drinks too much. The Labor Secretary this week resigned amid allegations that she drinks too much on the job. That she had an affair with her security guy. And was, you know, going on trips. And I think it's true that she might be a bit of a party girl. Well, because. She once said, as Labor Secretary, my first priority is to improve twerking conditions. That's an indication that I think. And here's exciting news. The Michael Jackson movie opens today. Showings are 7, 9, and 11. Just like the victims. All right. We've got a great show. We have Sarah Isger and Chris Cuomo are here. But first up, he is a best-selling author and a U.S. Army veteran. And he currently serves as the 63rd Governor of Maryland. Governor Wes Moore. Governor, how are you? Good to see you again. Good to see you, too. Hey, guys. All right. Look at that. Look at. You're loved here in California. It's nice out here. You're in California. You're on Real Time. You must be running for president. No? I am not. No? No? It's so funny because, you know, the GOP is, like, historically unpopular now. And yet, every week, I have people on this show, Josh Shapiro, Alyssa Slotkin, you know, you, Gavin Newsom is here next week, Andy Bichette. No one's running. No one's running. It's going to be a great opportunity. No one wants. Maybe I should do it because no one wants to do it. I don't understand. You're right. Well, no, listen. I think. I've always said, you know. Everybody can do what they want. But my thing is this, is that my state is under assault right now. You know, I've had over 31,000 people fired in the past year by Donald Trump and J.D. Vance. Federal workers. That's because a lot of federal workers live in Maryland. Because a lot of them live in Maryland. Because the federal government is there. Yeah, and people who have the audacity of doing things like making sure our food is safe. Or making sure that our planes are not colliding. Or giving veterans like myself, making sure they can get the medication that they need. And those are the people who. Donald Trump and J.D. Vance went after first. So, my point is this. You know, our battle is now. Our battle is now. Well, I mean, I do think the midterms are going to be a blowout. I think the Democrats are going to just clean up. I mean, I guess the question is, how do you think they're going to blow it? I don't think they can blow it. I'm not worried about that. But my point is, what does that mean? Right? I mean, like, listen. I think it's very important that the Democrats can win Congress. But what then are we going to do? Because we have to be very clear. And I take this from a very personal perspective. Where, I mean, I don't come from a political family. You know, I come from a family, frankly, who's used to suffering the consequences of policies. And not used to making them. And when you ask many members of my family about bad policies that we've had to deal with my entire life. They couldn't tell you if a Democrat was the author or a Republican was. They just know it was just a stupid policy. And so I just think that we need to make sure that we have to be able to control what, in many ways, is just a completely lawless federal administration right now. However, however, our job, our job just can't be to now we can push back. We've actually got to figure out what does push forward actually look like? What does it mean to actually create a society that people can actually root for? What does it mean to make sure that you can have childcare? that people can afford and making sure that people can get get back to the workforce without wondering are my kids going to be okay what does it mean to make sure that we can have safe streets in our neighborhoods so like if the goal of all of this in november is to say yes we can now you know do subpoenas against the president then frankly i think the american people are going to look at us and say that's not enough what policies are you talking about you say that hurt you yeah which one because like i mean obamacare that helped that didn't hurt right okay correct medicare social security i mean that's going back a ways but 1964 civil rights act the voting rights act i mean it's even the epa creation of the i mean these are policies the government created correct mostly by democrats not all um what are you talking about so i'm talking about like for example if you look at what we're doing inside of the state of maryland it's just simply saying are you going to do what you say you're going to do so for example you know in my state when i said we are going to make sure we're going to invest in child care because it is it is ridiculous issue of parents that are trying to figure out can i go back to the workforce or can i make sure my kids are going to be okay and so that's why in maryland we've made the largest investments in child care scholarships in the united states of america right to get people back to work when when when we said that we're going to invest in housing and because housing is too expensive all over this country and in the state of maryland and i said well you know what who's the largest landowner in the state of maryland guess what it's the state of maryland so i said then you're going to invest in housing and i said well you know what who's the largest landowner in the state of maryland and i said then you know what we're going to take a look at all available state-owned land and land that is near transit near trains near buses i want to access to all that land and we are going to build affordable housing on that land to get more housing so this is about what are we doing to be able to push back to make sure we're going out to these corporations in these supermarkets who are price gouging people when they walk into supermarkets we made maryland the first state in the country that now bans price gouging and price manipulation so when you go into a supermarket you're going to be able to push back to make sure you're going to they can't use your data against you when you go to the checkout counter so you'd rather do that than what they're doing in new york which is city run i mean that's what mayor what you i see you laugh yeah no no no and i say good laugh yeah because that's ridiculous but that's what they're doing yeah i mean that's and and of course you know we find out now that the supermarkets that are around the areas where the city plans to put their supermarket are very pissed off because they're like well of course how are we going to compete uh but you know mayor mandami that that's extreme socialism some would say communism but so you're not for that because i feel like the democratic party has two wings now one would be democratic socialists that's the term they use mandami is one bernie sanders i mean there are several others aoc right and then there's what i would call democratic classic which are you well i'm gonna be very honest i mean like i when i the democratic party didn't choose me right when i ran for governor the democratic party put millions of dollars to try to stop me so i'm going to be very honest i mean like i when i the democratic party didn't choose me it just happened the people of maryland had a different point of view and the people of maryland made me the governor but no party boss and no party made me the governor and and i like that because there is no i i honestly believe if you just swallow a party ideology you're probably not thinking hard enough and i don't care what party but what i want to do but when but when i talk about what are the things that we've got to make sure we're focusing on uh you know when it comes to when it comes to us i believe that oftentimes the democratic party is this you know we have to stop being the party of no and slow and start being the party of yes and now right start being the party that actually moves to address with the kind of urgency that people are requesting if i'm telling you that listen i the school that my kids are attending is not preparing them for college or career i don't want to hear you tell me and that's why i'm going to do a six-year study okay but you mentioned scholarships before and i mean this is something democrats they are the party of education that is their portfolio so they should either own it for good or bad absolutely okay but like in pennsylvania governor shapiro not running for president he's he's eliminated the need for a degree a college degree to do i've done that too you have done that too yeah so you're on that page yeah because i mean because listen i i we we have eliminated this idea that somehow how we should be grading for our high schools is based on your four-year college acceptance rate because that's not the right that's a that's an indicator but that's that that's not something that we should be looking at so we've actually quadrupled the amount of slots in trade programs and apprenticeship programs for our young people so that we believe in our four-year colleges and we invest in them but if someone doesn't want to go to a four-year college we still need to make sure they have a path for long-term economic success and economic mobility and so we have allowed we've allowed these four-year colleges to be in our four-year colleges and we've allowed them to be able to dominate this conversation as if they are the end-all and be-all be-all and frankly i mean i think i mean einstein i think was the one who said it that if you tell a fish that the definition of a genius is of genius is climbing a tree then that fish will always feel like it's insufficient we need to make sure that all of our young people understand that there is a place for them and there's a place for their long-term success regardless of what academic pathway they chose to choose to go down okay so um uh governor newsom here i think he's on our show next week also not running for president he said if the democrats want to win uh again they have to be his quote was more culturally normal how do you interpret that uh statement and would you agree with that um listen i i don't um what i would say is this is that the democrats don't have a messaging problem we have a results problem there's a results problem when we are turning around and not producing the kind of results with the kind of speed that is necessary and required and you know who exploited that beautifully donald trump because donald trump donald trump was a fantastic vessel for the frustration right he points things out like nobody else's business he's just not a vehicle for the solution donald trump was the one who was pointing out you know what we've done all this work around electric vehicles and all this other stuff and we're not going to be able to do all this kind of thing and passed a big bill around it and do you know how many electric charging stations we had by december of 2024 37 he pointed that out he pointed out the fact that we are now still watching inflation continue to rise now he's done nothing but watch inflation rise under him as well but again he is a fantastic vessel for the frustration i have an honest belief and i think about it again with my with my own family i joined the army when i was 17 years old and there's a philosophy we turn to when we're talking about inflation and we're talking about turned, that we learned when I was 17, leave no one behind. I think if the Democratic Party can continue to embrace this idea of leave no one behind and making sure we can move with the speed and urgency that people don't feel like they're being left behind, then we're not going to have an electoral problem again. And you have actually just fixed your messaging problem by actually addressing with real results that people can rely on. RAY SUAREZ: But don't you think the Democrats have a problem with their primaries? I mean, everybody does, because it only encourages the far extreme wing of the party. That's true. The Republicans, true. I mean, if you were to run for president -- I'm not saying you are, of course -- -- but you would have to get through the primary process. Now, we talked about this when we had lunch at my friend's recently. I said, I think you're a great one to do it in the Democratic Party, because you wear the magic armor. It's just the truth that a black candidate can say things and has permission to be more centrist in the Democratic Party than a white candidate. Would you agree with that? RAY SUAREZ: I think so. I think that the closed primary process has run its course, because I think the problem is, the fastest-growing political party in this country right now is independents. It's people who are saying, I do not affiliate with Democrats, and I do not affiliate with Republicans. Here's the problem. Independents cannot vote until November. Their voice cannot be heard. And when you're looking at the massive gerrymandering that's taking place, for example, in the Congress, where over 92 percent of these congressional districts, they're even -- 92 percent are not competitive. By November, it doesn't matter. And so if that's the system that we have, you have a system where more and more people are disenfranchised, more and more people are taken out of the process. And so I think the whole idea of a closed primary system is one that has to be reevaluated, because if you believe in democracy, then let people's voices be heard, and don't make them have to affiliate with a political party. All right. Well, you're good at this. I never got you down. You never got me down, Ray. Governor Westmore. Governor Westmore. Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead. All right. I'll see you after the show. Thank you. Thank you. And you're coming back for overtime. Great. All right. I'll see you again. All right. Thank you. Let's meet our panel. Wouldn't get him down. All right. He hosts the Chris Cuomo Project Podcast on the fastest-growing cable news show, Cuomo on NewsNation. Chris Cuomo is here with us. Okay. She is the editor of the Dispatch's SCOTUS blog, whose new book is called Last Branch Standing. I'm your host, Oscar Serra. Great to have you back. Okay. Let's take a break from the war this week, shall we? It does seem to be just Groundhog Day. So this is the big story today. The Justice Department is dropping its criminal investigation of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. Now, this gets to something I want to ask you about, because you have this theory that we're actually blocking Trump more than people say. And I've read that, too. Now, the Fed chair, the Fed is -- is that monetary policy or fiscal policy? Right? One of them is -- okay, we're all stumped on that one. This is one -- I was just letting you go. It's monetary policy. Okay, there are two different things, but it's important. And these are one of those norms we never used to fuck with. But, of course, Trump fucks with every norm. So, and Jerome Powell, he's the chairman of the Fed, and he did not do what Trump wanted. And Trump has one speed when you defy him, publicly at least, which is, I'm going to kill you. So, he went after Jerome Powell, you know what, for redecorating. I'm not joking. They were building a new headquarters, and there were cost overruns. Like, Trump would not know about cost overruns in building. So, he had his attack dog, Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney there now, go after him. The judge said, essentially, zero evidence in this case. But it does bring up this point, you know, is Trump being blocked more? I mean, you say it's the court, the Supreme Court is doing it, right? Yeah, legally, he's being blocked at every turn. The Supreme Court has blocked him on alien enemies for immigration. They blocked him on federalizing the National Guard in Chicago. They blocked him on tariffs. They're definitely going to block him on birthright citizenship. The reason that Lisa Cook. Mail-in voting? Is that going to. Mail-in voting is coming, although that, at least, is a statutory question for Congress, in theory. The question of whether someone can apply for asylum at the southern border, though, that's an executive action. Lisa Cook is still a governor on the Federal Reserve, because the Supreme Court blocked President Trump's ability to remove her. But, and this is where I think you and I might agree, the Supreme Court, the lower courts, can block Trump every which way. All these indictments against James Comey or law firms or universities. But there is a political cost. There is still the fact that then people are afraid of being sued. People are afraid of being indicted, and it changes their behavior. So he may lose legally and still win politically, culturally, normatively. That's not good. No, he. Yeah. Yeah. I know this personally. You know, I mean, a lot of us in the media do. So do I. The club you never wanted to join is the, what's it like to be targeted by the President of the United States? Oh, yeah. It's okay. I don't know. It's kind of a fun club, dude. I'd rather be engaged than just not engaged at all. I think as long as he. Because he has said once, and I think he's right about this, he said, what people don't get about me is I have no permanent enemies. Like, one day you're out, next day you're in, next day it's like it never happened. I'd rather have it that way. I'd rather have it that way and talk to him and keep the dialogue going because, you know, I've said many times, I think we need more people like me talking to him. You know, you can. You can. You can hyperventilate all you want about what he does is wrong. I agree. It should not be a government by people of saying. He should be home reading the briefing books like Obama did. But that's not going to happen. It is a government by people of saying. Be one of the people saying. I would just like. Yes. I'm glad you're talking to him. I agree with your point. Although, the problem is, when you have a president who is talking to someone like you, he's also talking to Laura Loomer. And if I have to pick, I'd rather take both of you off the map. You're being compared to her. Why me? Why would you take me off the map? Not me, Bill. I wouldn't take you off. What about me should be compared to Laura Loomer? I'm saying we get the sane ones and we get the insane ones. You lost him with the Loomer thing. Yeah, really lost me there. It's all right. I'll show myself now. You'll be back. You'll be back. You can work yourself back in. I've been where you are right now. It's a little cold, but it'll get better. So what is the scorecard on backing Trump? Because a lot of people would say the Supreme Court, when they ruled that he had, what was it, complete immunity to do whatever he wanted? What was the. For a core constitutional. Absolute immunity for actions that relate to core or exclusive presidential powers. That does seem sweeping. No? Look. Look at that. One, shameless plug. Sarah's book is really good, The Last Branch Standing, about what the Supreme Court is supposed to be about. They are in a jam now. Because the answer to your question about whether they're checking Trump more is they have to. He is doing more absurd bullshit as president of the United States than we have ever seen before. We have never had a president even think about, you know what I'm going to do? Let me just sign this right now and change the Constitution. Nobody has ever been ignorant and arrogant enough to try something like that. That I'm going to change birthright citizenship. I don't think that's the way it works for us anymore. They have to check him. The problem is, I feel bad for the people who voted for him because they were right to want to see the lawfare stop. They were right to want to see it stop. You should not use your power to punish your political enemies. And we saw way too much of it. The problem is, he's doing more of it than ever. And for the DOJ. Which, you know, Sarah was the voice of the DOJ. Glad you're not right now, by the way, you know. Me too. May help the book sales. But, you know, that they usually. If you hear, God forbid, they're looking at you, Bill, you better call everybody you know. Because you got problems. But now they lose cases. They have like a 97% conviction rate. He's bringing it down. Why? BS cases that are just political payback. James Comey, that was embarrassing. What they just did with Powell was embarrassing. And they're losing. What they're. What are they doing with the Southern Poverty Law Center? People really are going to believe that they created the KKK? Okay, so we agree that he is being blocked. I always said, the thing about him that was just the biggest thing for me, he doesn't concede elections. If you don't have elections, if you don't have the peaceful transfer of power, you don't have the country. Another time the court blocked him, unanimously. On what? After 2020, right? He appealed and appealed to try to. Every Federalist Society judge said no. And the Supreme Court unanimously was like, get out. Get out of here. Good. But, I mean, he's very mad at his own justices now. He said this week, certain Republican justices have gone weak, stupid, and bad. He uses all the big words. I got to get him. He knows all the words. I do. All the best words he knows. My five-year-old knows them. But, you know, I've always thought, I mean, look, justices, whatever judge you are, I mean, there's a whole big wall of law books behind you. I don't think they. I don't think they really go to the idea of what does the actual law say. They go by their gut. They go by what they believe, and then they find a reason in one of those law books. It's very much like the Bible. You can find anything you want in the Bible. And, by the way, they're doing a Bible reading this week. The whole country for our 205th anniversary, because we're a Christian nation. Not really, but that's what they think. They're all reading the Bible, like Trump is taking a paragraph or something. Or whatever it is in the Bible, a passage. In Texas, they're putting the Ten Commandments back in schools. The Ten Commandments are back in the school. And the Fifth Circuit judge in Texas said this is okay? Were you on that? Yeah, I clerked on the Fifth Circuit for the judge who wrote that. So, look, this is actually another interesting part. Because have I got a book for you, Bill, to read. I think you'll really like it. What's it called? Last Branch Standing Press. Thank you for asking that. So, this narrative that the court is so conservative, right, and it's just controlled by Trump. The Ninth Circuit used to be the court that was overturned the most. That was the liberal Ninth Circuit where we are now, California and the West. That's not the court being overturned the most by the Supreme Court anymore. It's the Fifth Circuit because of cases like this Ten Commandments case. And if you really want to look at what the court is doing these days and why it is, you know, so much part of our conversation, why I can write a book about it, it's because Congress isn't. It's because Congress isn't doing anything anymore. So, it used to be the Supreme Court would say yes or no, and then Congress could just pass a law the next day. None of us believe that they will do that. None of us believe that we have the power to amend the Constitution anymore. So, we keep looking to the Supreme Court to be the last word on things, when, in fact, it was supposed to be part of this dialogue. They're not politically accountable. And so, the pressure builds because we feel like we can't change it. They don't answer to us. They're not supposed to. They're counter-majoritarian. They're supposed to tell all of us to go buzz off like they did in Brown, versus Board of Education, and West Virginia versus Barnett. Their worst decisions are the ones where they went with the majority, in Dred Scott, in Plessy, in Korematsu. Buck v. Bell is my favorite, the eugenicist case, if you haven't read that one. Yeah, we don't all know those, just by the look of it, by the way. I mean. It's a reading list. We get it. We get it. You're the expert. By the way, Laura Loomer sued me, and I won this week. Oh, man, I told her. I told her. I was really talking for a while. No, I'm not. No commentary. That's just a fact. Okay. But let me go back to the Ten Commandments just a little bit, because it seems such a clear case that you shouldn't have the Ten Commandments in a school. The school is just for learning. It should be. Now, obviously, the left has fucked that up, too. I mean, there's lots of leftist indoctrination in schools. So both sides play. But this one seems very clear. I'd also like to ask all the anti-Semites out there who seem to populate both the left and the right, who love the Ten Commandments so much, are you aware that this is a complete Jew-y thing? The Ten Commandments. Well, it is. I mean, it was written many, many years before Christ came along. It's just Jews talking to Jews about Jews. Chosen people conversation. Chosen people. I think that you get it in the picture of the guy who's fighting to put them in the school is a guy who has some of the ugliest. allegations against him of immorality. we don't want to do with all these people of faith in our society, which is great, depending on how you use it. Live the Ten Commandments. Show us how you live. Don't just say what you want us to think about you. And for Paxton to say, yeah, I'm going to put the Ten Commandments in, when he clearly only knows, like, two of them, in terms of his own life, what is the message for people? All those kindergartners committing adultery, really, if they had it up there, maybe they wouldn't do it. Yes. Coveting is a big word in lower school these days, you know? Covet, covet. The kids are crazy about it. All right, well, before we lose track of time, I did want to congratulate Trump on one thing this week. He'd made it easier to smoke pot. I gotta say, all of us pot-swokers have been asking somebody to make marijuana less criminalized. He's got to help with hemp. Hopefully he does. Well, good luck trying to get high on hemp. Some people use it for other things, but I take it for. It's the only useful for other things. It is a biological cousin of the stuff I smoke. It is not something you can smoke. It should never have been illegal in the first place. Okay. But it brings me to the bigger story that you know, Trump is a teetotaler. He really does not like liquor because I think he lost his breath in alcoholism. Okay. But it turns out that that administration does not follow the leader of the boss on this one. I mean, this week we found out the big story, Kash Patel is suing the Atlantic because they wrote this story and he denies it of course, but they say, you know, he sometimes doesn't show up at work because it's too much the night before. And then there's a. Oh, there's that picture. Yeah. I mean, we have. I mean. Oh, but you know what? That doesn't say anything. I don't believe it just because the Atlantic said it. It might be true and so they got a picture with a bottle in his mouth. We've all had a bottle in our mouth. When we were babies. Whoa. You've never had a beer in your mouth, Chris? Yeah, but I've never been telling people I don't drink. Okay. And you don't have to worry about it. And then he's literally downing the whole thing. I mean, take a break, you know? Okay. But does that really. See, this is just the. Look, do I care if he drinks or not? No. Do I care that you put somebody who is selling conspiracies about Epstein into the highest position of power at the DOJ? Okay. Yeah, that bothers me. All right. That bothers me. Yes. All right. All right. So, the point is, it is kind of a boozy administration because I remember Jeanine Pirro, who's now the U.S. Attorney. I remember when she was on Fox News. That was always the talk about her. Again, I don't know if it's true or not. And then there's the Labor Secretary. She quit this week because apparently the same kind of rumors. And, of course, there was always Pete Hegseth. I mean. Now, those pictures I would agree with. Okay. We don't know. But we thought we, as a PSA, because we're always trying to do service to this country, we would want to put a little guideline to know if you are part of a too-boozy administration. Would you like to see if you. These are just some of the ways you can tell. For example, if among all your colleagues, no one can remember who ordered the attack on Venezuela. If cabinet meetings begin at 5 o'clock somewhere, if RFK asked if you'd like to see a dead raccoon penis and you said yes. If you got arrested because you were climbing on the ballroom construction equipment in the middle of the night. Yes. Definitely a sign. Oh. Here's one. You keep slurring your ethnic slurs. If everybody does a shot every time the Strait of Hormuz opens back up. That's kind of understandable, that one. If when you tell a Senate panel, I don't recall, you actually don't recall. You appear on Face the Nation with a dick drawn on your forehead. That's. too boozy. If you wake up on the couch and Lindsey Graham is making waffles in a bathrobe, that is definitely a sign. I'm just. It's a public service, people. And if everyone keeps asking, do you think Hunter Biden left any more cocaine lying around? Okay, so. Alright. Now let's talk about the big political bomb. Michelle, that happened this week, which was the state of Virginia. They gerrymandered the fuck out of the state. And I hate to sound like a five-year-old, but Trump started it. He did. I mean, now it's out of control, but that's just the fact. He started it. He encouraged Texas to do this, where they. And I thought like, I had Eric Holder on, like, not that many, a couple of years ago, and it was like, we're going to fix gerrymandering, and we're going to stop it, because, you know, gerrymandering is just not fair. Both sides do it. And then Trump just, of course, had to make it worse. So now Virginia, it looks like it's going to be only the suburbs. We were talking to the governor of Maryland there. Only his people, his constituents in that area, those are the suburbs around D.C. That's part of Virginia, and they're all. Mostly, they do work in the government. That's why so many government workers got fired. So many people in Maryland got fired, because the government workers. They're going to gerrymander the state so like, almost all the votes are coming from there, and the rest of the state's a big state, full of hicks. And I say that in a not mean way. Hicks, don't have to be stupid. You're a hick, okay? I live in Virginia. Yeah, but rural people. Oh, you do? Yeah, well, that other part. Which part do you live in? I live right on the hick-to-Democrat line. Okay. But this is just a race to the bottom, is it not? Because now, I mean, California has done it, Illinois has done it, Maryland has done it. We're just going to get to. It was like the last pillar of somewhat a resemblance of democracy that we didn't fully do this, and now we're just going to do it where every state is just rigged. Rigged. Okay. On the one hand, I think it's really funny to fight over which party should control a branch of government that doesn't do anything anymore. Like, why are we fighting over Congress? What's the. That's hysterical. That's a great take on that. But okay, like, that's a fun, you know, tug-of-war team jersey thing to play. Virginia used to have a bipartisan, nonpartisan redistricting commission, so we're actually getting worse. But here's the good news. In order to gerrymander this hard in all of these states, you actually do have to make the districts more competitive. So in a wave election, like what we're planning to have this fall, where Democrats. What do you mean, make it more competitive? Well, each district gets gerrymandered to make sure that Democrats can win, but instead of winning some seats by, you know, 80%, now they can only win them by 54%, 55%. Oh, I see. Right. So in a wave election, the water would swamp you out. So Texas, my home state, Trump pressured them into doing it like you said. They started this. They're actually quite likely to lose many of the seats they gerrymandered if the Democratic wave gets high enough. They will be underwater. And in a year where there's a Republican wave, these Virginia seats will actually be lost by Democrats. So, like, maybe. Again, I don't know what we're fighting over. Again, a branch that, like, sits on Instagram and, like, takes pictures of themselves and says, $75? So glad one party controls that. Phew! Wow. Oh, come on. If the Democrats have the kind of success a lot of us think they're going to have in the midterms, you don't think that's going to make a difference? You don't think that's going to be different if the Democrats control all the committees in that Congress? They will not pass so much more not passing of legislation. You're right. Wow! They'll do oversight and they'll have hearings where they do more Instagram reels to raise more money. They're not going to actually use the power of the purse, pass legislation. They might impeach someone. They're certainly not going to convict them in the Senate, so it'll be another great. That's the one thing they can't do, is impeach. You're right. That needs 67. They can't impeach. They cannot remove. That's the problem. Okay, well, nobody cares about that. Well, but I'll tell you when you care, is when you see six months of your life vanish, because you're watching that process unfold and you know how it's going to end when you've been through it twice before, and they're doing it for the same reason they do the gerrymandering, which is all that matters to these people now is the retention of their own power. And I think the reason it's important this is happening is for people to see what the governor was talking to you about. Independent is the fastest growing part of the electorate for a reason, which is they hate the parties. And the more people are anti-party, the better a chance we have that anything gets better. Although on the flip side. Chris and I were talking about this. On the flip side, the reason. So independents now are more than Republican or Democrats for the first time in American history. More people don't identify with a political party. I would argue it's because we don't have political parties anymore. We got rid of them with campaign finance reform in 2002, which sounded like a good idea, but it means there is no one keeping all of the. you know, inmates in the asylum anymore. The parties have no carrots, no sticks to keep these people in line no policy agenda there's no policy platform for either party donald trump defeated the republican party before he defeated the democratic party in 2016 that's because we don't have political parties and i loved not having political parties until i saw the result now and i'm like this isn't better but all his original fans are turning on him have you seen that i mean this week joe rogan and tucker carlson both renounced the leader as has done candace owens did it uh alex jones all the people all people i look to for advice i respect how seriously you're laying this out i i do i do but just think about what it says about where we are that we are in a place where we are looking at candace owens and tucker carlson and joe rogan as bellwethers of our political status you know like wow rogan what am i going to do now that he's not with trump it's like we are in mouth breather land in terms of how we formulate our positions it's like oh tucker carlson he got attacked by a demon last week in his bedroom but now he's seen the light about trump i don't know how to feel you know it's it's a weird place we're in a weird place we're going it's a weird i never thought i would say that wow tucker carlson yeah trump's gonna have a problem he's gonna have a problem keeping the faithful in there he's got joe rogan you know the psychedelic you know thank god he had that otherwise he would have lost him completely i think there's a difference between joe rogan and candace owens and alex jones i do i think there's a bit of a difference i hope so well i don't know he's apparently going to the trump is the correspondence dinner this year i would i'm very interested to see what this is going to look like because you know the correspondence dinner the i think i did it one year they used to have comedians by the way i i said because i got shit about it everybody every comedian gets shit about it's the worst gig in the world because half the people in the audience are republican half of the democrats you're gonna insult anybody whatever what they say so they always i said you just get a magician just get somebody who doesn't do political they listen they're always trying to get the political and it's like the worst thing now they got they got a mentalist so they're gonna have a mentalist and a mental patient there no i can't i i i joke but uh but you know the president traditionally i mean this is why trump that a lot of people say this is why he ran for president in the first week because he was at the one where obama oh yeah just tore him a new asshole from the podium and now he's going to get a chance to say all sorts of insulting things to the press just like any one of his press conferences so it's not really that different i agreed to do this show so i could avoid that dinner tomorrow night so thank you so much oh really i wasn't invited no but i wouldn't have gone if they had invite me i want you to know that right now right i would have said no i'm gonna give that tuxedo back right away um blue but he i mean it's kind of interesting because you know when i look at the list of paramounts which now uh apparently uh owns me um paid 16 million to settle a lawsuit it's you know this is the media that he's talking to here uh over the 60 minutes interview with kamala harris disney uh one of my other old sponsors that fired me once um agreed to pay 16 million over the george stefanopoulos interview i mean they famously took jimmy kimmel off the air for a while i mean it's a little awkward him speaking to the people who he also calls the enemy of the american people he literally calls them the enemy which i i find to be i mean i would be personally affronted by it but you know he does that to everybody but it is the fourth estate i mean when you take on the press like that i think you are you are flirting with something that really knocks out one of the pillars of of what we love about this country well look i think that we all get it we just don't know how anything gets better anymore and i don't have any problem with nerd prom you know i i get that people like to get dressed up they like to go is that what you call it nerd that's yeah everybody everybody calls it people yeah that's right but we've always called it so it's it's the nerd prom and that's great that's great well i wasn't invited you know i'm too good looking so you know what i think you'll see there also bill is how many people are going to be there and how many people are going to be there and how many people are going to be there and how many people are going to be there and how many people are going to be there and you'll see how manufactured this is the division is manufactured trump hate you as you said until he doesn't and he's going to go there and he's going to get laughs and you'll see that all these people who are there who are saying you know they are not real journalists and this isn't real one they're all getting along it's a club and once you understand that you realize why things don't change really you think that's i'm glad there's a club i mean again to bring this back to the supreme court a little that's the branch that that is functioning that's the branch that gets along they actually spend time together they have lunch three four times a week after they have oral argument where they are not allowed to talk about work they have to talk about sports or what their kids are majoring in uh amy coney barrett loves binge watching slow horses she was super pumped about the new season like this is a good thing for people to actually have to see each other as humans uh and i i hope that's what happens at the white house correspondence dinner i read that reality tv viewership is plummeting and i think politics is downstream from culture and i hope we are turning the ship slowly away from reality politics all right let's end on that positive note all right thank you and you're both beautiful people it's time for new rules okay new rule uh don't make your babies spout your political opinions for you you don't know what that kid believes he looks he looks pretty maggot to me i say to babies what right wingers say to athletes shut up and dribble uh new rule if you complain about columbus day because it ignores the fact that you're that he killed indians and you complain about president's day because it ignores the fact that washington owned slaves then you can't happily go see a movie where michael jackson doesn't sleep with kids which is the movie that's out now where we just hear about the fun things michael did it's playing on a double bill with jeffrey epstein super host extraordinaire and john wayne gacy thanks for the laugh uh new rule now that red lobster is reviving its endless shrimp deal two years after they stopped doing it because it had led to an 11 million dollar loss they must tell us how can this work financially unless you're planning to sell some outdated stash of frozen shrimp that you've had on ice since 2009 oh i see new rule let's all give president trump credit where credit is due for forcing iran to call off their scheduled execution of these women protesters it was the right thing to do and it sends a powerful message to the world if you're a woman in iran and you look hot at least an eight america has your back oh new rule shopping in the grocery store has to stop making me feel like i'm flirting with statutory rape what's with very young small sweet peas and tater tots and baby carrots and extra virgin olive oil chief if i wanted to feel this pervy i'll go see the michael jackson and finally uh new rule someone has to explain the american economy to me i know i've said this before i still don't get it last week was tax day and as usual because hbo is so generous and i'm sure so will be the new owners i paid to the government if you add in state tax local sales property fees obamacare probably almost sixty percent of what i earned that's a lot and i still wouldn't mind if bernie sanders would stop saying the rich don't pay taxes and and while i'm sure the super rich with their army of accountants and corporate loopholes get away with murder us regular rich people pay a shit ton of taxes and who stands up and gives us a pat on the back nobody that's who the top ten percent pay seventy two percent of all federal income taxes and the bottom half three percent the democratic socialists talk about socialism like we don't already have a lot social security unemployment medicare nutritional assistance medicaid obamacare disability housing subsidies again not against it just as much as we don't have a lot of money to spend on the economy and we don't have a lot of money to spend on the economy and we don't have a lot of money to spend on the economy and we don't have a lot of money to spend on the economy That is the program modeled after medical teams that drop into the poorest countries in the world for a few days to set up a tent where people with no access to health care can get some. And now we're one of those countries. Doctors within borders. How can it be that the federal government alone took in over $5 trillion in taxes last year and we still need that? Are we really this incompetent and corrupt? Don't answer that. Whatever it is, somehow the ultra-rich keep getting ultra-richer while a growing percentage is feeling truly desperate. You just wouldn't know it because everyone on TV is rich. Reality TV? Rich women day drinking. Okay. Drama? Rich women whose friend got murdered. Comedy? Rich men shouting into cell phones. But these are the people with all the money. Get this. The richest one-tenth now does half of all the spending. Somehow we created an economy where the number of households worth $20 million or more is 644,000. Wow, that's a lot of people with $20 million. And all of them are looking for a girlfriend. You can find it on sugarbabies.com. Corporations go where the money is. Las Vegas used to be the town of $8 all-you-can-eat buffets and hotels where every room was $29. Nope, not anymore. Go fuck yourself. We don't want you. Their business model now is they only want the high rollers. Are you a whale? No? Then float yourself back out to sea. No, I'm not a whale. Who that is not rich could afford a concert now? Woodstock was free. Now if you want to see Morgan Wallen, you have to take out a second mortgage on your trailer. I kid the Hicks. I love the Hicks. Disneyland. For a family of four to spend the weekend. Between New York and New York. Between the cost of the tickets, plus lodging, airfare, rental cars, souvenirs, food. We're talking $10,000. To afford that, the average dad would have to be cooking meth on the side. The Disneyland's staff manual used to read, We roll out the red carpet for the Jones family from Joliet, just as we would for the Eisenhowers from Palms. No, you don't. Because the Eisenhowers from Palms Springs can buy a Lightning Lane Premier Pass that lets you skip the lines. The Jones family can suck my dick. And Mickey could give a rat's ass. Because that's what our economy has become. In 1992, a Lego speedboat toy set cost $2.99. Today, Lego sells Titanic for $680. It's an educational toy because you learn it sucks to be poor. And nowhere is that more true than when it comes to health care. Money can't buy happiness, but it sure can buy healthiness. Half the country can buy access to concierge doctors, specialists, new treatments, personal trainers, nutritionists, private chefs, and whatever Gwyneth Paltrow is putting in her vagina. And the other half has the place I was just talking about, remote area medical, the pop-up health care clinic that rolls into town once a year like a county fair, except instead of riding the Tilt-A-Whirl, a volunteer doctor pulls your infected tooth. And the saddest thing in the 60 Minutes piece is that nothing has changed since they covered it in 2008. Same line of cars parked overnight so people make sure to get seen. Same people who work two jobs but still can't afford to see a doctor unless a touring non-profit sets up shop in a parking lot. But here's the truth. You're not going to get health care to these people by threatening to tax and eat the rich. You raise billionaires' taxes, they just leave the state. Or they leave the country. Or in some cases, the planet. I kid Elon, but you know, he had a good idea recently that might be apropos here. During the recent government shutdown, he volunteered to pay all the TSA workers himself. You know, with couch money. That's how he did it. Those super-rich are super-rich are. They can single-handedly fund entire government programs. Okay, so let's make that a thing. The Adopt-a-Cause Challenge for Billionaires. Teachers who buy school supplies with their own money or people without homes or disaster victims, whatever it is, make the rich fucks competitive about solving it. Because that's what it's all about. That's all they care about anyway, beating each other. Yes. Just skip the middleman, the government and the health care bureaucracies that for whatever reason, no matter how much they take in, never seem to get enough to the people and just shame the billionaires into doing it directly because they have all the money and noblesse oblige isn't just the name of a cologne. All right, thank you very much. That's our show. I want to thank Chris Cobo, Sarah, Ezra, Deborah Westmore, Clever Angle Drops every Monday on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts. Don't go watch Overtime on YouTube. Thank you very much, everybody. I appreciate it. Thank you. 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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