Ep. #537: Lawrence Wilkerson, Chris Evans

A message from McAfee.

I'd say howdy, but I'm not a real cowboy.

And I'm not a real alien.

We're deep fakes, and because of fakes like us, it's hard to tell what's real.

Unless you have McAfee.

McAfee's scam detector automatically identifies text and email scams.

And even deep fake.

And it works everywhere, even out on the range.

Yeah!

But you're not even a real cowboy.

If they're faking it, they're not making it past us.

Get award-winning scam detection today.

McAfee.com/slash keep it real.

Some people think nature is like this, but actually, it's like this.

That's why Columbia engineers everything we make for anything nature can throw at you.

Columbia engineered for whatever.

Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO late night series, Real Time with Bill Ma.

Start the clock.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, my fake study audience.

Love to see you all and your smiling faces.

What can I say?

It's August, and I'm still here at home.

I haven't spent this much time in my yard since I used to have to grow my own weed.

I miss my old life, I got got to tell you.

This time of year, I used to always be like in the Midwest doing stand-up gigs on the weekends, and

God, I missed it.

Today I called up the Westboro Baptist Church, and I asked if they would come over and pick at my house.

But hey, let's look on the bright side.

We've got a great show.

We've got Chris Evans is on, Captain America, and we're going to be talking about our president, the incredible Sulk.

Oh, yeah, he had quite a week, Trump.

Some disastrous interviews.

They asked him about the high death tolls from COVID.

He said, it is what it is.

Ah, yes, thanks, President Shrug emoji.

I'm sure that looked better when Melania wrote it on a jacket.

Yeah, he said, you know, his usual litany of crazy things.

He said, the coronavirus will go away like all things go away,

says the man who will not go away.

I'm starting to think someone

if someone was paid to take his dementia test

and he has been hammering away on Joe Biden's age.

I love this.

Don't vote for this really ancient guy who's three years older than me.

Democrats keep grumbling that Biden needs to be more visible.

No, no, he needs to be more invisible.

Don't fuck this up.

This is working.

This shit is working.

They announced this week Biden will not go to Milwaukee at the Democratic Convention where there is none.

He will accept the nomination from home in Delaware.

He will become the first official candidate to accept the nomination over webcam and very likely may be the first to accept it without pants on.

Good.

Keep him safe.

Keep the idea of Joe Biden.

That's what we really like.

Let him, you know, do that thing where he does and watch from home.

He says he's going to be watching from home on the state-of-the-art 13-inch CRT color television he takes such pride in.

But yeah, it's going to be an interesting night when he accepts the nomination.

His wife Jill is going to get up on a ladder and drop a balloon.

But I tell you, the writing is on the wall here that Biden, I think, is going to win the election, and so the Republicans are just going to now steal everything that they possibly can.

Listen to this.

This week, Kodak, Kodak, you know, the picture people, okay, were awarded a $765 million loan to begin producing drug ingredients.

Like I always say, you're never too old to start experimenting with drugs.

And finally, Trump says he has done more for the black community than anyone since Lincoln.

Yes, that's so true, because there's so much love in the black community for Donald Trump for months.

They've been marching in the streets, chanting his name.

All right, we got a great show.

We have Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Paul Bogala, Megan Dome, and Chris Evans.

I spoke to them all yesterday.

Let's get to it.

Okay, my first guest is a distinguished visiting professor at the College of William and Mary and former chief of staff to Colin Powell.

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, great to see you.

Always, Colonel, thank you for joining us.

And I first must say to you, I have a special affection for you because for the last few years, you're the only person I could get interested in my theory that Trump was not going to leave if he did not win the election.

So before we get into the details of that, which I know is your area of expertise,

it's a a given that on Election Day, no matter what happens, he will declare a victory, right?

I think so.

Okay.

So you had a group called the Transition Integrity Project.

Now that Trump has tweeted maybe we should delay the election, I assume that things are more urgent than ever over there.

What is the plan?

What does the Transition Integrity Project do?

Let me say that I'm also a member of the National Task Force on Election Crises.

So two groups.

The larger group, the task force, looks and has been looking since June of 2019 at the entire process.

In other words, everything that's happened and everything that will happen before 3 November.

The TIP looks, the Transition Integrity Project looks at, as its name suggests, the transition.

the some 70 days or so between when the election is determined and it's very important to understand it will not be determined determined probably on 3 November.

It might be 7, 8, 9 November before it's determined because of all the new voting methodologies and votes coming in and coming in well after the election and the usual poll closings occur.

So the TIP is looking at that time period.

all the way up to 14 December when the Electoral College must meet, all the way to 20 January at noon when the incumbent has to leave the Oval Office.

So it's two different perspectives.

It's Tip that's been doing the war games, and I think that's the one you're probably interested in.

War games, meaning that you are gaming out scenarios that happen after November 3rd and what he might do and what the Democrats might do in response.

Can you tell us?

Exactly.

Can you tell us?

We've had some really high-powered political analysts, scholars, and others playing the Republicans, and I might add many of them are Republicans.

Think Lincoln Project, for example.

And we've had Democrats play in the Dims.

And we've had different scenarios.

One, you might suspect, is a complete Biden blowout.

That is to say, electoral college and popular vote, Biden wins.

Then what does the Trump team do?

Another one,

as you might surmise also, and very difficult and complex, is where there is really a lot of closeness.

a lot of indecision, maybe a popular vote one way and electoral college vote another way, or possibly even no way to determine, and it's thrust into the House of Representatives.

So different scenarios, different reactions from each team.

Interestingly, when the Republican team got the scenario decisive Biden win and threw its moves out there, the Democratic team was stunned by the arrogance, the sheer power, and the sheer indecency, if you will,

of the Trump team moves.

Everything from, okay, we got 70 days to destroy the United States government.

We got 70 days in which to not provide the incoming team with any transition whatsoever.

You want to know what our policy is on Iran, on China, on taxes?

You won't know it because we've destroyed all the paperwork and we won't let anyone brief you.

You are coming into an empty White House.

There'll be no National Security Council staff, nothing to brief you.

You might have a note in your desk drawer in the West Wing that says, welcome, you stupid idiot.

These moves really put the Democratic team on its feet.

Coming back with moves that were mostly legalistic, mostly not powerful, mostly not dramatic.

And so I think an insight from that game was, hey, you Democrats, you can't be so timid.

The Republicans may be quite ruthless.

They may be quite strategic.

They may be quite arrogant with their power.

Another insight here.

If you own the government, you have a considerable advantage over those who don't.

Yeah.

I mean, honestly,

that's a more benign reading of it than I would have thought, because at least in that reading, they're leaving.

Maybe they're being assholes when they leave and say, well, we're not going to give you the briefing books, but who gives a shit?

Fine, who wants your briefing book?

You were a bunch of ninnies anyway running the government for four years.

I don't give a shit what you were doing with China.

We're starting anew.

I'm worried that he just doesn't leave.

So I've asked you what the Republicans are going to do, what the Democrats are going to do.

The key question, what does the military do?

You're a military man.

I know people say it can't happen here.

Okay, everything anyway said can't happen here has happened here.

It could happen here.

Now,

I know that there's a breakdown between the top leadership.

I think they're much more anti-Trump.

But I've heard heard you talk about people in the ranks who are like literally neo-Nazis.

That's the real issue, I think.

If you're familiar with General Milley's promenade, I'm sure you are, with Trump and Mark Esper, the Secretary of Defense, to St.

John's Episcopal Church in Washington Lafayette Square.

You know that Secretary Esper was less than happy about that.

And you know that Mark Milley, the chairman of the General Chiefs of Staff, actually made a speech to the National War College.

and I recommend that to every American citizen.

The speech essentially said, I shouldn't have gone, and it explained to all the military officers listening

what his view of the Constitution was and so forth, which was quite good.

I also happen to know that about 300 flag officers, that's generals and admirals, weighed in, active duty and retired afterwards to let Mark Milley know that he'd done the right thing.

So at that level, the command level, we're probably in pretty good shape.

But as you suggested, there are a lot of people in the ranks, particularly the staff sergeant and below ranks, that I'm not so sure about.

Many of them voted for Trump.

I understand from people I've talked with that that's falling away, that support is falling away a bit because they're not happy with what he's doing and has done with regard to the COVID-19 epidemic.

But still,

that's a question.

I do think, as a military professional, the military will, quote, stay in barracks, unquote.

That is to say, it will not come out and follow any untoward orders to do anything against the American people.

At the same time,

I wonder what will happen.

And here we go back to the scenarios in the tabletop exercises, if Trump calls his base to the streets with their guns.

His base owns something like 60 to 70 percent of the 300, 400 million guns in America.

If they answer that call and come to the streets with guns, then we probably are going to have a need for the military.

And then all bets are off as to how much blood might flow.

Okay, but just to be clear, obviously no one thinks any sort of large percentage of people in our military are neo-Nazis or far-right supremacist.

But

there is a faction, you think, that could be trouble?

There are some.

And I'll give you an example.

We just got an email from one who said after I made a remark that times are different today,

that we have Muslims in rifle squads, we have Jews in rifle squads, we have Christians, of course, we have different varieties of Christians, we have Wiccans, we have Jedi Knights in rifle squads.

You have them all across the panoply of religious and non-religious beliefs today.

I got an email from a Marine who said, yeah, you're right, Colonel.

I am friends with that Muslim soldier in my squad until we get to combat, and then I'm going to shoot him in the back.

Well, on that note, I think I'll just go out there and drink myself silly for the rest of the afternoon.

These are trying times.

I'm glad we have a steady hand like you watching it for us.

I sure hope it comes out better than the worst scenarios might suggest.

And

what can I say?

Let's have faith in America and hope for the best.

Thank you, Colonel.

Let me throw something else out at you that another group I belong to, the Silver Linings group out of New York, is doing.

They're working with people like Mark Cuban and LeBron James and so forth to create, they're working with the

baseball league, the NFL, the NHL, the NBA to create these voting centers like Louisville had recently.

They'll turn their arenas over and 300 or 400 voting stations will be set up in them.

This is a marvelous development in terms of the COVID-19 epidemic because you can stay safe and you can stay healthy in these centers.

So this is an initiative that's happening too.

I think the American people are coming together in a way that's really positive to make sure this is a free and fair election.

Yeah,

I got my fingers crossed.

And yeah,

I think we'll be here next year.

Thank you.

Appreciate it, Carter.

Okay, here's our panel.

He is the CNN political contributor and author of the new book, You're Fired, The Perfect Guide to Beating Donald Trump, Paul Bagala.

And she is the host of the new podcast, The Unspeakable, and author of The Problem with Everything, My Journey Through the New Culture Wars.

Wanting to meet you for a long time.

Megan Dow, Megan,

big fan of yours.

Listen, if you guys think I'm a little upset right now, I just had a very disturbing conversation with Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson.

So that may be why.

And we were talking about the election.

I didn't get to the topic that I wanted to.

Let me ask you about this, the mail.

It looks like democracy might be lost in the mail.

You know, I knew Trump was going to steal this election or try.

I never could have predicted that it would be politicizing the U.S.

mail.

But that's where we're going.

51% of Democrats say they plan to vote by mail.

Only 20% of Republicans do.

What are we going to do about this

problem of them stealing the election through the mail?

Well, first, actually, first, thanks for having me on.

I wish I was there in person.

First, Democrats are holding up the COVID relief bill over this and other things.

And I think that's terrific.

Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, they need to fight like hell to make sure that the Postal Service is fully financed so they can do this.

One of the things that the Trump guy who's in there running the Postal Service is doing already is he's canceled overtime.

He's telling mail carriers, if you're backed up, just leave that stuff back there.

So mail is slowing down already.

He's setting the stage for this.

The other thing that Democrats need to do, that I'm doing, is explain to people that vote by mail has been around for 150 years.

It's perfectly safe.

It's perfectly ethical.

It's perfectly honest.

The five states vote 100% by mail already and have for quite some time.

I took a look at Colorado, which is a swing state.

The Brennan Center for Justice at NYU looked at all the vote by mail in Colorado.

You know how much fraud there was?

0.0000001%.

That is 110 millionth of 1%.

So it is the most ethical, safest way.

By the way, there's another option that people need to know.

A lot of places you can just drop off your ballot.

You don't even need to use a mail.

A lot of places, I'm pushing states and counties to do this.

Put a Dropbox at the firehouse.

Put the Dropbox at the police station.

Put the Dropbox at the government center so that you don't even have to bother Jesse the mailman.

You can go down

to the firehouse.

But, Paul, that's not really the issue.

We know it works.

Who are we arguing with?

The problem is that they're going to gum up the works so that it doesn't work, so that there's a surge in ballots that come, as there always are, right before the election, and can't be handled by the post office because he appointed his lackey to head the post office and because they're sabotaging it from the inside.

That's what I'm asking.

What do we do about that?

We know the thing works

if it was staffed correctly.

Right.

So it's why they have to fund it, right?

And the Democrats are forcing that.

They're pushing that.

I think they're going to win that fight, which will expand the capacity of the Postal Service.

But also, we can work around it.

That's why I love these drop boxes.

Some people who are younger and healthier and not at risk can and should vote in person.

By the way, your audience skews young.

If you can and it's safe, you should volunteer to be a poll worker.

The majority of poll workers are over 60.

So young people going to volunteer to work at the polls can shorten the line so that in-person voting is less dangerous.

That's another thing that anybody who's watching this show can do.

Okay, let me ask about the vice presidency.

Why don't you handle this one, Megan?

You get the first crack at this because you're a first timer here.

Who do you think it should be?

Which black woman?

You know, I have to say,

I don't have a favorite.

And what really troubles me about this whole dynamic is that, you know, when I cringed when Joe Biden, during that debate in March, said he was committing to picking a woman.

Don't get me wrong, I will be happy when he announces a woman running mate.

It would be wonderful to see a woman of color.

But it was a setup.

What he did by committing to that was

set up whoever it is as his running mate to

be boxed in and to have to deal with a whole bunch of stigmas.

There's going to be a whiff of tokenism.

It would have made me so much happier if he had said, I will pick the most qualified person and then pick a woman.

Instead, he set somebody up for

all kinds of whiffs of tokenism.

And frankly, if it is a woman of color, which it's looking increasingly like it will be, that stigma will play out on multiple fronts.

And it's really not fair.

And now it's a foregone conclusion.

And you know, people who are now talking about this strategist pundit, it's who will she be?

The pronouns are already in place.

And it's starting to sound like picking the homecoming queen.

And it leaves a bad taste in my mouth, I have to say.

Paul, you're one of the best handicappers I know.

Who, from a strategy point of view, who do you say is the smart pick?

I don't know because I think what Biden's going to do is pick someone who can be a good governing partner.

the way he was for Obama.

And that depends on the rapport that he has in the room.

And I can't, I'm not there.

I don't know.

I was actually surprised when Clinton picked Gore.

It turned out to be a terrific pick.

So I just don't know, honestly.

I will say that we've had,

I largely agree with Megan, that I think it was a tactical mistake, but a strategic genius to make sure that you have a woman on the ticket.

We've had 48 vice presidents, every single one a man, every single one white.

Women, if they get a run between now and the year 2251, they'll only be tied with men.

vice president.

So it's about time.

It really is.

I can't handicap who, though.

I really don't know.

Okay.

You say in your book, which I read in one big gulp, it's really like a novel almost.

But it's about how

we could beat Trump.

And you say there's a chapter that says, we'll guarantee it.

Do you want to

tip what that is?

Or do we have to buy the book to know what that answer is?

Yeah, this is actually so obvious, but Democrats never do it.

Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, they're the most popular programs in America.

Trump has proposed cutting them by $2 trillion in his last two budgets in a row.

Democrats never talk about it.

Understandably, we get distracted by the racism, the misogyny, the Islamophobia.

I mean, we get distracted in some ways, understandably.

But Ronald Reagan, who was twice, 10 times a politician of Trump, could have never gotten away.

with a $2 trillion cut in Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

So I suggest in the book that Democrats like set their Apple Watch every five minutes and just spit it out, just repeat it.

I love Beyoncé's new film, and Trump Wants to Cut Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

You know, it is, it's beloved.

By the way, it's disproportionately going to impact Trump voters.

You could actually peel off a lot of seniors from Trump if you tell them the truth, which is to pay for his tax cut for corporate America, which was $2 trillion.

He wants to cut grandma's Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

But I must tell you that he will just say, as he always does,

they're the ones who cut it.

I agree.

He'll just say fake news and lie his ass off, and

people will believe that.

But okay, let me move on to this.

I read today that his poll numbers have stabilized.

He was getting his ass kicked real bad by Biden a few weeks ago.

How does this happen?

Now he's within striking distance again.

How does a guy who is this viral video of a school bus fire

have this much popularity left with people?

Whose fault is that?

Is that people who just, you want to judge on the right, who, you know, are not smart enough to see through this con man?

Or do they know he's not good, but

there's something going on on the left that they hate even more?

Megan?

I think that progressives have to get smart about who who are they going to get behind, who they're going to come out and vote for, who they're going to get excited about being the vice president.

You know, I can address that actually by saying something about Elizabeth Warren of all people.

You know, progressives had a really hard time getting their minds around the idea that she was not going to be the nominee.

She's incredibly intelligent, highly, highly qualified, meticulously prepared, charismatic, all of that, and yet she couldn't go the distance.

I think that

people forget to consider the fact that, you know, The presidency is, it's not like the most intellectual gig.

You know, I think that's clear now but it never has been yeah it's not a job for egghead intellectuals and you know i love barack obama i'm number one fan i'm glad he was president but there were moments there where i couldn't help but think that on some level the job was beneath him.

It wasn't using his skill set.

The job of the president is to unify people, to be a deal maker, a horse trader, to function as a symbol.

And I think progressives make the mistake of thinking that they need to support like the smartest person, the person who is most like them.

They forget that

there is sort of an inherent blandness to the job, and that can be a good thing.

And so I'm worried that progressives are not going to show up and vote for Biden.

And that may be the reason we're seeing a slight uptick in Trump optimism this week.

Let me read a couple of stories that I saw in the New York Times this week.

See what you think about this.

I just read about this guy's name, Tom Goodwin.

I don't know who he is.

He's an executive at an ad group,

Publicus Group.

And he got shit canned because he tweeted, he said he found the total obsession with COVID deaths over all deaths gruesome.

He said 7,500 Americans die every day, but only the ones with this precise new virus matter.

Now, you may not agree with that opinion, but it's an opinion.

Okay?

Now I read the very next day I read

biggest monster rebounds.

Tuberculosis, HIV, and malaria are making a big comeback.

Tuberculosis was already the biggest infectious disease killer worldwide, a million and a half lives every year.

Said until this year, all three were going away.

Now they're making a comeback.

The World Health Organization's director of the malaria program said COVID-19 risks derailing all our efforts and taking us back to where we were 20 years ago,

diverted scientific attention from these three diseases is causing this.

The lockdowns have raised instrumental barriers to patients who must travel to obtain diagnosis.

I mean, all this.

In other words, he wasn't even wrong.

But at worst, you could make the case.

And I think people don't like, I said this last week, but I have to say it again.

people don't like living in a country where you can't have an opinion.

And they blame the left for it.

We are in this moment of

a narrative free-for-all.

Conspiracy theory is a loaded phrase.

It's a loaded term.

But frankly, nobody is in agreement on what any set of facts are.

I think that 24%

of Americans think there is some truth to the theory that global elites

set the virus upon us.

And I mean, there are just a million iterations of these things.

And frankly,

there are intelligent, educated people that believe some version of this or some aspects of certain versions of this.

And we just don't have enough information.

The masks work, they don't work.

This treatment works, it doesn't.

And granted, this is a novel virus.

We're learning as we go.

But

I don't think a lot of Americans are sort of like cognitively able to metabolize such conflicting strains of information.

It requires dealing with cognitive dissonance in a way that we're just not very good at.

And you're also allowed to have an opinion other than the one true opinion.

I'll stop talking about it there.

All right.

So

Mongo learned a new word this week, anarchist.

He was talking about what's going on at Portland.

He said, you had radical anarchists.

you had horrible people, always so many horrible people, absolute anarchists, and in many cases, professionals.

You know, anarchists are bad enough, but when they're professional, I think we all know that's the end of it.

But

this is a new theme with him, you know, that there's anarchists and he's going to restore order.

I can't help but think how, you know, Richard Nixon in 1968 ran on, I'm going to end the war in Vietnam, did not, and then was enough of a salesman to in 1972 run again on I'm going to end the war in Vietnam.

As somebody once said, that's quite a salesman when you don't do it the first time.

Okay, Trump seems to be running on its American carnage, except now there is because of him.

What do the Democrats do about that?

Right.

I think they have to take the fight to Trump.

I mean, it is, it is,

first off, yeah, professional anarchists, they're probably hard to organize.

I don't know when they have staff meetings, the Zoom calls.

You know, it's baloney.

But the Democrats have to take the fight to him.

The conservatives today believe that wearing a mask to visit your grandma in the nursing home is tyranny, okay?

But camouflaged unmarked men in body armor, ripping peaceful protesters off the streets and throwing into unmarked vans.

Oh, that's law and order.

That's what it is to be a conservative today.

The key to this, I think, is for Democrats to make it, though, about voters' lives.

Trump will always try to create some mythical enemy out there.

And it's Antifa, if you listen to him, or anarchists, or all that nonsense.

Meanwhile,

your life sucks because of him.

We got 160,000 people dead because of what he did and failed to do.

We have tens of millions of jobs lost for him.

By the way, the opioid crisis has only gotten worse.

We lost 71,000 people to drug addiction last year, most of them to opioids, 38,000 to handguns violence.

He hasn't done squat for what we're paying him to do.

And there is an appeal, there is with him when he says, I hate the same people you hate.

But Democrats have to poke through that and say, that's not the point.

The point is, he's trashing your life.

And that's like the, I'm sorry, but that's like the whole point.

You read the book.

That's the whole point of the book is that don't be completely distracted by Trump and his latest thing.

You know, his whole presidency has been a match race between stupid and evil.

And the truth is, no matter who wins, you lose.

Right.

He rope a dope shoe, doesn't he?

By doing crazy shit, and then you wind up talking about his crazy shit and not what we're going to do for the American people.

Right.

This week, I'm sorry, this week,

all the Democrats are all got their panties in the wad because Trump says, I'm going to give my convention speech from the White House, which is actually illegal.

It's uncool.

I don't like it.

It's not going to change anybody's life.

He could give it in the White House.

He could give it in some convention hall in North Carolina.

And meanwhile, a thousand people a day are dying.

He should give it from a COVID ward.

He should give it from a morgue.

He should should give it from a cemetery.

Because those are the hallmarks of his presidency.

That's how Democrats should answer to that instead of like wringing their hands about the hatch act.

And I know in your book, you say, you know, you got 2016 wrong because you forgot Bill Clinton's first rule of politics, which is make it about them, not about you or even the other guy.

But let me ask you about Bill Clinton, because this always comes up with the Democrats with every election.

What do we do with the Clintons now?

Seriously, I mean, now Bill Clinton, people are are saying that there are witnesses who saw him on Jeffrey Epstein's Sex Island.

Obviously, it's denied.

Well, I mean, you shake your head like that.

Oh, that's impossible.

Bill Clinton, a horny guy on Sex Island, ridiculous.

I mean, that just so not.

Look, it's possible.

My question is, you know, he has assets and he has things that are not quite assets.

And same with Hillary.

What do the Democrats, what should they do?

Megan, you go first with the Clintons.

Well, I mean,

why are we not allowed to have any problematic people from our past?

I mean, the Republicans have their share of incredibly unsavory figures, and a lot of them are still in office.

I would just say, let's...

Can we take the Clintons off the table for the moment?

We've got enough distractions.

It's like,

let's move on.

But they are distractions.

That's the point.

They are huge distractions.

I could see them being huge distractions.

That's why I'm asking this question.

Paul, what do you think?

Yeah,

he did win two landslide presidential elections in a row, and she did win more votes than Trump.

So they're pretty talented politicians.

The part of the problem the Democrats have is that they have a really good

bench, right?

They have Barack Obama, they have Michelle Obama, they have lots of talent.

It's very hard to deploy them all, actually, when you're in a COVID quarantine.

So actually, there's plenty of places, I think, to send them in a campaign, and they could do a whole lot of good.

Particularly, Bill Clinton has credibility on the economy, which is the one issue holding Trump up right now.

It is still holding him up.

And it's the last thing, I guess people think they saw him portray a CEO on a cardboard set for 14 years on NBC.

So they feel like he's a businessman and loves the economy.

I think Bill Clinton could puncture that.

And if it was me, that's what I'd send him out to do.

Okay.

My last thing is: Tina Smith, senator from Minnesota, is proposing full-on legalization of pot.

I just want to say if the Democrats had a brain in their head, they would get behind this huge.

I've said this many times before.

This could be your winning issue.

It's a personal issue.

People like pot.

Well, look, everybody has their drug of choice.

I've never smoked weed.

I like beer.

Come over.

Come over.

Yeah, exactly.

I like beer.

You like weed.

Trump likes hydroxychloroquine.

Okay, fine.

Everybody gets their drug of choice.

But what changed me on this bill, bill, and I hope it changes Joe, is it took me a long time.

This has been going on a long time, but I was blind to it.

You know, you don't know what you don't live.

The ACLU did a study.

In all 50 states and in 95% of our counties that have more than 1% black population, black people are arrested for weed 364% more.

They don't use it more.

They're arrested more.

So it has been a tool of systemic racism.

And Joe needs to wake up to that.

I've woken up to it.

So I think he needs to

join,

join me.

Very late comer to this cause, but it is time because the way it's been used to systemically discriminate against people of color.

Exactly.

It needs to be made part of the Black Lives Matter message.

It needs to be rolled into

the discussion about structural racism, about policing, about

school-to-prison pipeline, all of that.

It's a very organic

match.

They fold perfectly into each other.

So someone just needs to

smart about how to integrate that and have the conversation.

So you're saying we should take something organic and roll it into

a discussion.

I'm going to do that as soon as I get out of here.

Sell it at the post office.

Thank you guys.

A real pleasure talking to both of you.

We'll see you soon.

Thanks, Bill.

Well, it's back to school time.

The little ones are going off to school.

Well, wait, they're not because, you know, the pandemic.

And almost half of parents say they're going to homeschool.

And of course, with any phenomenon that big, there's going to be a magazine about it.

And we got it, the inaugural issue of better homes and kindergartens.

Would you like to see some of the articles in the inaugural issue?

I'm sure you would.

For example, there's, you've taken attendance.

Now what?

Drug taking in the classroom.

How to get away with it without your children noticing.

Calling their bluff.

Making your kid wait till the dog shits out his homework, because the dog ate the homework.

Ways to shut your kids up that aren't technically illegal.

Becoming the gym teacher made me realize I'm gay.

What to do when your student turns 30 and still won't move out of the classroom?

One mother's revelation.

It wasn't the teacher.

My kid really is a little asshole.

What to do when you're frustrated, exhausted, and out of ideas.

A guide to day two.

The best cough syrups that make nap time really last.

And can you still put your kids up for adoption?

The answer may surprise you.

Okay, my final guest, an actor, producer, and director who recently founded the civic engagement platform, a starting point.

Oh, it doesn't say he's also Captain America.

I guess people know that.

Chris Evans.

Are you true?

Yes, I think you've done that in a few movies.

Hey, how you doing?

Are you in,

I know you have places in L.A.

and you're, I know you Boston guys.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Boston guys are very loyal to your home turf.

You know, I think in this, these, these,

the, the carnival of horrors that is 2020, I felt like I just wanted to be home.

Yeah,

I figured you would.

And I've read that, like, for you, quarantining, you said it was not that big a difference because you're home alone all the time anyway.

Is that because I never leave the house?

Yeah.

That's not true.

I'm not like, you know, I'm not like, you know,

I'm not like agoraphobic or anything, but, but I, I, I just, you know, it takes me a while before I need human contact.

I like being alone.

Maybe it's that, or maybe you're a kind of guy who just doesn't need to leave the house to get laid.

Maybe it's that.

I have a kid.

I wish that were the case, Bill.

Oh, yes.

Oh, poor you.

By the way, some of the women around our office have mentioned that if you need someone to quarantine with,

they are

Chris Hemsworth.

They're volunteering.

Yeah.

Anyway, let's go to politics.

I know you started this website called A Starting Point.

I'm going to let you explain it.

It's your baby.

You were talking to me about this years ago.

Yeah.

You've been brewing this a very long time.

I know it's really important to you.

So you explain what it is and what you want to accomplish with it.

Sure.

Well, it grew over time.

I think when you and I spoke about it, it was only in its infancy.

Initially, Initially, it was just meant to kind of demystify certain political issues.

I wanted to try and, you know, I'm a bit of a political junkie, and I know a lot of people are wary of the political landscape because it's daunting.

And when I've tried to Google things in the past, I've found that there is a missing piece there, this kind of gentle entryway into kind of basic political understanding.

So we wanted to create a site that would ask the questions that the average American would want to know, you know,

what's DACA?

What's the difference of Medicare and Medicaid, you know, and have it answered by people across the political spectrum.

So that's where it began.

And then over time, it grew into these other sections now that try to explore debate,

but ultimately create engagement, just more participation in the political process.

And what I love about it is that it's, well, a couple of things.

One, it's bipartisan.

You know,

last year, at the end of the year, the last good year we had, I was trying to say something to people, and I did a long editorial about how we can't own each other.

You know, no one wants to try to work together anymore.

They just want to own the other side.

They don't really want to coexist.

They want to vanquish them.

And I feel like what you are doing is trying to say, no, that never can work, which is what I was saying.

Even if the Democrats win,

all the Republicans in the country are not going to self-deport.

They're still going to be.

There is,

and I suppose this has always been true, there's the perception of injustice on all sides, which is probably power for the course.

But this is a, if we're going to live in a country of, you know, 300 million plus,

we're in a relationship with the other side.

We have to find a way.

You know, most relationships, if they're toxic and unhealthy, you'll leave them.

We can't leave this one.

We have to find a way to speak to one another, to listen to one another, find common ground, and move the ball down the field.

And, you know, we've just kind of retreated to our own sides and it's become such a toxic culture.

And I think that breeds apathy and a dispirited disinterest.

And I think when that happens, politics stops working the way it could.

I think that is the exact right analogy.

It's a relationship that you can't leave.

We have to find the tools necessary.

We can't leave this.

And pretend you're not there.

We can't just scream louder than you.

We have to find a way to speak to each other.

And people in a relationship know the three most important words aren't i love you they're let it go oh i was going to say i hear you or that i think the most important thing in my opinion humble opinion i mean i'm single so i guess i'm not doing something right but but i i would argue that i think just saying or you again

you know just to say i hear what you're saying that doesn't mean i agree with you that doesn't mean i endorse what you're saying it just lets you know that i'm listening And I think right away we start to put our weaponry down when we realize that we're in a discussion where someone else is recognizing who we are.

And, you know,

it's not a pleasant process trying to find common ground, and no one's going to get the whole loaf, but we have to get better at it.

Well, maybe with women out there hearing you say how much you like to listen, someone, someday.

That's all this was.

This is basically like my teacher profile.

Someday someone will take pity on you and go out with you, Chris.

I feel for you again.

But the other thing I love about it is there's no likes.

I feel like likes have ruined America.

They make people inauthentic and phony and virtue signaling.

And I call it the avatar.

It's not the real you.

It's the you that you put out in public.

And

you have no message board there.

You have no likes.

We got to get back to that, right?

Just information.

Yeah.

I mean, I think, you know,

being an actor, you have an intimate relationship with message boards, and I've never in my life felt better after reading one.

And, and, and, you know, I think politics in general is a very

vitriolic landscape.

And I think that's one of the things that turns people off.

So I think we just wanted to remove that,

there are some negative reward mechanisms when it comes to likes and comments and things like that.

And I think we just wanted to keep it purely scholastic.

And I think both sides, I think not only the viewers of the site, but the contributors of the site also appreciate it.

And where did you get your interest in politics?

Was it from your uncle?

I know your uncle, Mike Capuiano, right?

Yeah.

He was the longtime congressman who was unseated recently by Ayana Presley, right?

That's the district you are probably in now where you grew up, right?

It's actually not where I grew up, but you know, Mexico.

Close.

Okay.

So

is that why you became so interested in politics because of Uncle Mike?

Nah, you know, maybe.

My family has always been very altruistic, very passionate.

unafraid to share their point of view.

And,

you know, I don't know.

To be honest, it's not that I'm interested in politics you know it's it's more about trying to uh help and and politics to me seems like this weird broken machine that we've all kind of given up on but the truth is if we gave it a spit shine this thing might actually work and and i and i that that that starts with participation and and engagement and uh again it's become such a toxic landscape it it

breeds this exhaustion.

People just can't, they can't be bothered.

These are

intelligent people that I'm speaking about, people who aren't just, they understand it's their civic duty, but it still feels so daunting.

Life as it is is overwhelming enough.

So to dive into a pool where everyone is just so horrible to one another, there's no interest.

And so I think there's a way to kind of

bring that back to a

you don't see yourself running ever.

That's not something in your future because we are entering an era, I think.

I mean, it started with Reagan, or even a little before Reagan, but now we've moved to Trump and where really people look to show business

for

that who has credibility, they have name recognition.

Look, it's a dumbed-down society.

So I think in the future, you could see, you know, Clooney, Ben Affleck, a lot of these people.

And

is that for you?

I would never,

you know, I just don't know enough.

That's another thing I think we're all kind of scared to say.

I don't know.

I don't know.

And I don't know enough.

So I wouldn't disservice or disrespect the position by thinking that I could handle it.

I've thought about

somehow helping in that capacity, but it would require...

a lot of homework.

Well, listen, I'm not pushing you to run or not to run, but I just want to disabuse you of this one thing.

I've spent a very long time on television talking to an awful lot of politicians, and I know you pretty well by now.

You know a lot more than a lot of them do.

They're fucking idiots, a lot of them.

All you need to run is a fucking clip-on tie and a suit.

There's no qualifications, and that's proven every day by the guy at the top of the world right now.

He knows absolutely nothing.

Don't run if you don't want to, but don't do it because you think you know less than they do.

Because they don't have to know anything, and many of them don't.

Well,

I think my heart's in the right place, but

there's a real tapestry of cause and effect.

you might think you're fixing one thing and the downstream impact is something you could have never been aware of and so I just think before I dove into that recklessly I think you can get away with that in my industry you can say I'm gonna I'm gonna try and direct why not you know I think I think when it comes to politics you got to have a little bit more reverence okay well I'm anxious to see your next projects I always enjoy you in the movies I hope the epidemic ends the pandemic ends soon and your loneliness epidemic will follow soon after that I All right,

thoughts and prayers.

This was it.

This was it.

Put out feelings.

Thoughts and prayers, Stevens.

All right, we'll see you soon.

Thanks for doing it.

Take care, buddy.

Okay, time for new rules.

Backyard edition again.

New rules.

Here we go.

New rule.

I know that it's terrible so many people are out of work, but you have to admit, there's at least a million people in this country that are so awful at their job, it's actually better they're not working.

Baristas on their cell phones, waiters who disappear, salesmen who call you chief, mechanics who rip you off, the cashier who always reacts to you walking into the store like it's the worst thing that ever happened to them.

I'm not into free handouts or able-bodied workers, but I wouldn't mind Uncle Sam cutting them a check each month to stay home forever.

Never all, the French baker who

uses urine she gathers from public toilets to make what she calls Goldilocks bread

has to answer one question for people here in LA it doesn't have gluten does it

New Roll the British man who lost his penis

to an infection and is growing a new one on his arm must answer this question you know that's not where it goes right

But hey, congrats on your can-do attitude.

At a time when everybody wants other people to solve their problems, you said, screw it, I'm going to roll up my sleeves and do it myself.

You're a shining example of that classic adage, when life hands you lemons, make an arm dick.

Oh, and bonus joke for political junkies.

New role, can't your mom have anything, even her idol?

Geez, she's been trapped with your dad for five months, checking your temperature, thinking of new ways to make pasta and crying in a car the bank is going to take.

And now Biden is going to let Antifa loot her condo.

At least let her have her gay best friend.

New rule, America's scolds have to stop freaking out about this picture of Jerry Falwell Jr.

and his friend on a yacht.

Haven't you ever seen a married Republican Christian University president before?

I don't know what I like best about this picture.

The creeping hand, the unzipped skinny jeans, the black underwear, the redhead and the Daisy Dukes, whose pants are also unzipped, or the fact that he, the kind of creep who uses a plastic cup on a yacht.

And finally, new rule, if even dead people hate you, you got to ask, am I doing something wrong?

You know, the only bipartisan agreement we seem to have these these days is that neither party wants Donald Trump at their funerals.

John McCain,

Barbara Bush, Elijah Cummings, John Dingell, and now John Lewis, all their families felt the same way.

Our loved one is dead.

Don't ruin it.

Trump is about as welcome at a funeral as the gypsy woman who wanders into restaurants and sells you roses at a business dinner.

And he's the president, and people still don't want him there.

It's like a children's hospital turning down Batman.

What kind of spectacular prick do you have to be that everyone's last request is, make sure that asshole isn't at my funeral?

You know, I watched the eulogies last week for John Lewis and was struck by the genuine outpouring from everyone who ever encountered this model of a man.

And I thought of Trump and actually felt sad for him because at his funeral, funeral, no one will ever talk about him like that.

Then I thought, maybe if Trump could hear what a eulogy for him would sound like,

maybe that would give him some insight into himself.

So I've prepared a modest example.

Now, let me be clear, so the Secret Service feels no need to visit, I wish Donald Trump a long, healthy life, someplace where he can't harm America.

And I have only condemnation for anyone who would ever wish any president, no matter how much you dislike them, any physical harm.

But in the adventures of Tom Sawyer, when Tom and Huckleberry Finn get to attend their own funeral, they learn a lot about themselves.

So, in that spirit, let us imagine ourselves many years in the future and listening to these soothing words.

Dear family and frenemies of Donald Trump,

some men look at the world and ask why.

Donald Trump looked at the world and asked, What's in it for me?

His generosity knew only limits, and he never once failed to put himself before others.

He was a devoted father who every day tried to teach his children the wrong lessons of life:

be quick to anger, never let go of a grudge, see the worst in people, and treat them all equally, based strictly on how much money they make and what they look like.

So many wanted to speak here today, but couldn't break their non-disclosure agreements.

And our hearts go out to Melania, who RSVP'd maybe.

Donald

always said he knew she was the one the moment he saw her and said those three little words, add to cart.

Donald loved so many things, money,

golf, lawsuits, porn stars, dictators, organized crime, and the 35% of the American people who still like him, the other 65% could go fuck themselves.

Once said that the experience of not being in Vietnam taught him the most important lesson of all, that there's no problem so big you can't lie your way out of it.

And when it came to flouting the law, he was a criminal's criminal, and intellectually a midget among giants, a man of few words, about a hundred, mostly tremendous, disgusting, strongly, and shithole.

Donald Trump

never met a man he liked.

And yet he always suffered fools.

You could tell him anything and he'd believe it.

It's painful to think he could still be with us if only his personal physician wasn't that lady who believed medicine came from outer space.

Donald's greatest hero, Winston Churchill, said of his own mortality, I'm ready to meet my maker.

Whether my maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.

Well, God,

Trump's your problem now.

As for me personally, I guess what I'll miss most about Don is his dull wit.

He was never laughing.

And when he made you laugh, it was always unintentional.

But as a walking parody of himself, he was a challenge to satirize and made me a better comedian for it.

He died as he lived.

wearing makeup and lying in front of all of us.

So,

fly free, whiny little bitch.

Fly free.

May you find the peace your Twitter thumbs never could.

Okay,

that's our show.

I want to thank my guests, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Paul Bagala, Megan Dahm, and Chris Evans, and we'll be back next week.

Good night.

Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10, or watch him anytime on HBO On Demand.

For more information, log on to HBO.com.