Ep. #509: Salman Rushdie, Gina McCarthy

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

Start the clock.

Okay, I know

do I even have to say it this week?

I know why you're happy this week.

We have an impeachment inquiry.

Wait a second, liberals.

It's an inquiry.

We may not get a puppy.

We're just here to look.

Look,

I have been hurt too many times.

You know, Republicans are definitely the party of rednecks, but...

Democrats are the party of blue balls.

I tell you,

I could tell liberals are really excited about this one.

You know why?

Because I was checking out the Halloween store in West Hollywood the other day.

Don't ask.

And

you know what is flying off the shelf?

The sexy whistleblower costume.

Look.

There is a real chance we will know once and for all if Trump did the things he openly admits to to doing.

Well, he did admit it this week.

You know, we saw a transcript of the call that's at the center of this big controversy with the Ukrainian president where he asks a favor of the Ukrainian president.

And this raises some very serious questions: like, is there a foreign country he hasn't asked to interfere in our elections?

Any of them?

I mean, look,

it may come to nothing.

Like I say, I've been down this road before, but you know what?

For now, it feels good.

Feels good.

Feels like

that moment when a parent goes, you know, the timeouts aren't working.

I'm going to slap them.

That's right.

Slap your kid.

I said it.

Not abuse.

Slap.

That's right.

But this one could be different.

I mean, the reason, you know, people around the president are scared, because they look like they're complicit.

I mean, in the whistleblower's complaint, it says that maybe 12 or more White House staffers listened in on the call, and then some of them helped hide the transcripts of the call in a more private server.

Remember that term?

Trump's got treason on his computer like most men have porn.

I got to erase my browser history before Nancy Pelosi gets home.

And Trump, this man,

he's such a mental case.

Every day, he says over and over that the phone call, it was a perfect call.

He said it a million times.

Perfect.

Never at a loss for word, Donald Trump.

What the fuck does that mean?

It's a perfect call, like he's the Simone Biles of talking on the phone.

Perfect.

He refers to hanging up as nailing the dismount.

My question is, if it was such a perfect call, why are you behaving like a bedwetter trying to hurry up and wash the sheets?

These people,

they are so comically inept at covering up the crimes that they are committing.

The White House, this is true, wrote two pages of talking points about this, as innocent people do.

And sent it out to the Republicans in Congress, but also accidentally sent it to the Democrats.

This is the political equivalent of sending a dick pic to your mom.

And

of course,

and who do they pick as the centerpiece of this?

Rudy Giuliani, who is not a federal employee, you know, he's an Uber driver, he's an independent contractor.

He's at the center of all this, pushing the Biden conspiracy theory, meeting with the Ukrainians, which explains Rudy's new nickname, America's Traitor.

Yeah, he.

Rudy came back from Eastern Europe and Trump said, where's the dirt?

And he said, in my coffin, why?

He is so out of control.

Did you see

this is true?

We heard the tape.

He was talking to a reporter.

He said, it is impossible that the whistleblower is the hero and I'm not.

I will be the hero.

When this is over, I will be the hero.

And if it wasn't for Scooby-Doo and those meddling kids, I'd be the hero already.

I mean, really,

the Republicans really, they look desperate.

They do.

Did you see this at the whistleblower hearing this week?

Devin Nunes from here.

Here in California.

He claimed the Democrats tried to obtain nude photos of Donald Trump.

And in the picture, you can tell it is Trump's penis because he drew it bigger with a Sharpie.

All right, we've got a great show, Barney Frank, Lynette Lopez, and Noah Rothman are here.

And a little later, we'll be speaking to former head of the EPA, Jane McCarthy.

But first, he is the literary lion and author of the new New York Times best-selling novel, Key Shot, which has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

Sir, Salmon Rushdie.

Hello, sir.

How are you, you, pal?

Good to see you.

You too.

All right.

Okay, so, you know, as I was reading your book, I was thinking a lot about what I often tell my audiences, which is that we're so bonded because we live on this knife's edge, this dilemma we all live with, where you don't want to look at Trump and what he's doing all the time because that drives you crazy and it normalizes it, but you also can't look away because you don't want to be a bad citizen.

So, for those living on that knife's edge, I think your book might be a very good tonic because it is totally about Trump's America, but it never mentions him.

It never mentions him.

I just, what can I say?

I didn't want his name in my fucking book.

But

what I did want is to look at this

country and what the state it's in,

and of which he may be a symptom

as well as a cause.

That's true.

And so the book is like

a voyage across America

to try and look at what's going on and looking at it through the eyes of this crazy old optimist.

Right.

And Don Quixote, you know, the other thing I loved about reading your book is that it brought back memories.

This is one book, Don Quixote, the real one, that I read in college.

Me too.

You know, and I was so glad they made me.

First of all, it's a great book.

Yeah.

And it's, you know, you're a novelist.

This is like the first real great novel, right?

It's 1605, same year as Hamlet.

But before that, that wasn't an art form very much.

He kind of invented it.

Right.

And I don't think people realize how much this is in our culture, even when they don't know it.

Like Borat

is Don Quixote.

He's on a quest.

He's got a Sancho Panza, the Russian guy who was with him.

He wants to win over Pamela Anderson.

Yes.

The honeymooners

is Don Quixote.

Ralph Cramden is tilting at windmills.

He's a dreamer.

He's got Ed Norton.

He's the Sancho Panza.

It's a great...

Well, you know, the quest is one of the most ancient metaphors of life, because, you know, in a way, the road is

the road we're all on, you know, and he goes on the road for us.

But this is a quest from a crazy person.

From a crazy person.

Right.

I mean, that's why tilting at windmills, there aren't really windmills.

No, he thinks they're giants.

Right.

So

you love this country.

You're here.

You chose it.

I mean, you were knighted by the queen.

I was.

And yet you chose to live here.

Isn't that rude?

There were people who said that.

But no, I mean, I

was in love with America from my early 20s.

You know, I came to New York when I was like 25,

and I just thought one of these days I want to put myself here and see what happens.

And you became a citizen in 2016.

What timing?

Just age 15.

Talk about jumping on the sinking ship.

Yeah,

I became a citizen just in time to vote, and that that went well.

But why do you choose this country?

What is it that this country you like better?

Well, it's a number of things.

First of all, it's a big country, you know, and I come from a big country originally, which is India.

Incredibly diverse, incredibly varied.

It's, I think, a very optimistic country.

You know, I think it's a country in which the subject of hopefulness has been a part of what it is to be an American.

And you don't think Britain is that?

Much less so, I think.

Right.

I think, no.

I mean, I always remember Prince Philip saying that the reason children should be taught sports in schools is so that they learn how to lose.

I thought,

there it is.

We could use a little of that.

Yeah, a little of that.

You know,

we have the opposite.

We have trophy syndrome.

But anyway, I wanted to send this guy, this hopeful person,

across America and for him to encounter everything that's going on, you know, racism, drug addiction, corruption, and etc., and somehow not lose his essential optimism.

Right.

It's interesting.

A lot of the characters are sick.

It's a sick country.

Yeah.

It is.

You know, one of the characters is an opioid salesman.

I know this is close to you because you lost your sister from

opioid overdose, yes.

And I mean, this is a corrupt thing that goes on in this country.

Yeah, because the thing that struck me when I was researching this is not just that there are crooked capitalists, I mean, gosh,

but how it was possible for relatively modest sums of money to corrupt substantial parts of the medical profession.

So for like $30,000, $40,000, I mean, not life-changing money.

It turns out that your integrity isn't that expensive.

Right.

And not just money.

I mean, you know, you're a great satirist because you make the character have these pole dancers who are,

I've seen this in real life.

Anytime you've been sitting in a doctor's waiting room, very often you see someone come in, and that's the pharmaceutical rep.

Yes.

It's always a very attractive woman.

And she's, you know, toting her little sample case behind her.

And, you know, hey, doctor, I have new boner pills, samples.

And he's like, let's try some.

Well, there's a true story.

I mean, in my novel, there's a crooked

opioid pharmaceutical entrepreneur who's based actually on a real person that I found out about.

And he specifically employed only the most beautiful women he could find, many of whom he found in strip clubs and so on, and sent them to doctors' offices to work their magic.

And they did.

And suddenly, these doctors, that plus a check, you know, means that they're willing to prescribe these lethal drugs, as they say, off label, right?

For things they're not supposed to be for.

And so I thought, and so my character is a pharmaceutical salesman, so he's very involved in all that.

So it becomes an important subplot.

So

you're obviously known for 30 years now as one of the great, not only proponents, but martyrs of free speech.

Where do you put that situation today, the state of free speech?

It is attacked, as I have said many times, not just from the right, but from the left.

It's sad that it doesn't even have a mooring spot in it.

Yeah, you're right.

And I think it's a, you know, I think I saw some thing in the paper about how this last year was the most dangerous year in history for journalists.

I wouldn't doubt it.

I mean, more journalists killed in the last year than ever.

And not for.

Tom made a joke about it.

When he was, last time he was in Japan with Putin, and remember they were sitting together and he went full Manchurian and said, they asked him about it, and he was like, Putin doesn't have a problem with journalists.

Get it?

They kill the LOL.

Yes.

Yes.

Journalists in Russia are very bad pedestrians because they keep getting hit by trucks.

trucks.

Right.

Yeah, they must be looking at their phone.

You know, exactly.

But, you know, I was it last week that we read that that Trump had failed to defend an American journalist in Egypt.

Right.

And then the Irish came in and rescued him in an hour.

Right.

You know, so we live in this moment when it's very dangerous to start telling the truth.

So to conclude with what the conclusion of your book is, you know,

there's so many great fantastical moments in it, but at the end it's very real, and you're pretty upfront.

Sometimes we can't decipher exactly what you're getting at right away.

Here, you're very upfront.

It's about love.

Love is the saving thing.

So I don't want to, I've never gone Barbara Walters on anybody.

But since it's your thing and it's your book, you know, or David Frost, you used to remember David Frost.

What is your definition of love?

What is your definition of love, Salman Rushman?

Well, I tell you what it is.

There's one of the great poems of W.H.

Orden, which he wrote just before the outbreak of World War II.

In fact, the poem is called September the 1st, 1939.

The day the war started.

Yeah, and it contains this very famous line, says, we must love one another or die.

And I think that's literally true right now.

I think this is what young Gretcher thought of.

How do you know what love is?

How do you define it?

They've had trouble defining it.

Well, in this book, I wanted to look at

different...

There's many kinds of love.

There's romantic love,

but also in this book, there's the love of country, there's the love of place,

there's the love of family, you know, parents and children, brothers and sisters.

There's the love of ideas, there's the love of freedom.

You know, these are all things that engender and deserve love and need love in order to keep them alive.

I always thought it was just unselfishness.

It's just the opposite of being selfish.

Yeah, because love is lovely.

That's when you know when it's love and not lust.

Yeah.

You know,

when I was younger, it was, I love you.

It's like, no, I love the way you make me feel.

Yeah, yeah.

That's not love.

No, love is

wanting the other person's well-being

more than your own.

Right.

And I want that for you.

Salman Rush, do you everybody?

It's a great book.

You get it.

All right, let's meet our panel.

Okay.

Here they are.

He is the associate editor of Commentary Magazine and author of Unjess, Social Justice and the Unmaking of America.

Noah Rothman, Noah, great to see you.

She is a column master business insider, a contributor on American Public Media's Marketplace.

Lynette Lopez, how you doing?

Great to have you on for the first time.

Thanks for having me.

And for 16 terms, he represented Massachusetts' 4th District in the U.S.

House of Representatives.

He was always my favorite Congressman, Barney Frank.

All right, don't forget to send us your questions for tonight's overtime so we can answer them after the show on YouTube.

Okay, I'm going to get right to my big question.

I feel like the dog who caught the car

because,

I mean, I've been back and forth on impeachment, but last week I was like, we've got to impeach.

Now that they're going to do it, I'm like,

should we?

I mean, obviously

there's great reasons to do it, but, you know, for a guy who like Trump must have an impeachment act a day calendar that he has used for the last year.

So why will this one be different from all the other times?

I feel almost like I'm going to pass over Seder.

Why is this crime different from all other times?

For several reasons.

First of all, you may remember the last time I was on the show, I was arguing against impeachment.

And I continued until this came out.

Frankly, from the political standpoint, the Democrats are much better off without impeachment because impeachment will preempt all other debates.

We have a failed presidency.

He has not succeeded in making any deal.

He has appointed people to head every important office that he says was incompetent.

Economically, he got a job, a tax cut through that juiced the economy temporarily, and the economy is now fading to the point where he is trying to blame his own appointees to the Federal Reserve for the failure.

There's health care, there's climate change.

And I wanted to deal with those things.

The difference is, first of all, the magnitude.

What he has done, well, let me put it this way.

Some of the stuff that they were talking about impeaching him from before,

trying to cover up that he paid to cover up his sex with Stormy Daniels or being rude to James Comey, which almost everybody wants to be.

I almost got the feeling it was like trying Al Capone for tax evasion.

But now we got him for extortion and being an accessory, I believe,

to murder.

I mean, let's be clear.

Yeah.

Murder by the Russians of Ukrainians.

We forget what the context is.

The Russians, his friend Putin, are invading a peaceful democratic country.

Congress voted to give weapons to that country to defend itself against an attack.

He was withholding those until he got threatened even by Lindsey Graham.

That was too much even for him.

But what he was saying basically to

he was delaying the self-defense weapons that Ukraine needed.

And this argument, oh, well, he didn't explicitly say that.

Let's have an analogy.

You're walking along, and a man comes up and points a gun at you and says, I'd like you to do me a favor.

I really need money and nothing more.

He doesn't say, if you don't give me yours, I'm going to shoot you.

I don't think that makes any difference in any kind of criminal case.

And that's where we are.

I mean, he clearly...

All of that, all of that, and it's the right thing to do.

It's the right thing to do.

That's right to do it.

You've got to do it.

That's the right thing to do.

My point is that's why it's the right thing to do, even though I don't think it's politically the best thing.

It was always always a good idea.

But if you are not saying that, if you don't stand up for justice at one point, the American people will believe we don't have it.

Right, that's right.

And then what kind of republic do we have?

We're done.

But Democrats have a real messaging strategy ahead of them that they're going to have to embrace, and I haven't seen that yet.

If you're a Democrat, you have to be very concerned when you hear them say, oh, we can walk and chew gum at the same time.

We can talk about this presidency and also make the case against for prescription drug pricing.

No, you can't.

You can make one case well or both cases badly.

Well, let me say, first of all, yeah, we have made those other cases.

We won the midterm election based on them.

But there is a clear strategy.

And look, the important thing I think to remember is the pivotal role of Nancy Pelosi.

She was not only against impeachment, she was risking political damage from her closest supporters by rejecting it on the grounds that it wasn't important enough, it wasn't clear enough.

She agrees with what Lizette said.

I agree.

This is so terrible.

This is such an assault on the title.

Let's get back to that.

Will that resonate east east of La Brea?

I really

wonder.

I mean, I hear this, this is all I heard on TV this week.

This is different because this is so simple people could understand.

The magnitude is much more important.

But have you met the American people?

I mean,

there are pictures involved.

Okay, but the last time we were hurting Hillary Clinton, who no one liked, and now we're hurting Joe Biden, who a lot of Americans kind of like.

Well, but Bill, here's the deal.

One of the key things was that there are about 30 Democrats in the House who won seats that were carried by Trump and held by Republicans, and they were afraid of the political consequences of impeachment.

They unanimously now have said two things.

First of all, it's so terrible you can't ignore it.

But secondly, they feel they can defend this.

I got to agree with Noah.

If we do this, the country is going to be paralyzed.

I'm not saying don't.

I'm just saying.

It's going to be paralyzed for a very long time.

And all the oxygen in the room is going to be taken by this

Okay,

that was meant that until now there's gonna be I'm just asking about the people who matter who are not the there's 40% for sure probably on both sides There's 20% in the middle who might be persuadable.

Are these people going to be saying I don't care about Trump's phone call to a country I know nothing about?

I care about my phone bill.

So here's what are you doing about my phone bill, about my problems?

I just wonder about that.

So if it's not

an effort at messaging, then it's really a real strategy, then you do need Republicans in the Senate to get on board.

And if not, he's going to be acquitted in the Senate, right?

You can draw up articles, go to the Senate.

He's definitely going to be acquitted.

Now, so let's say he's going to be a very important thing.

You cannot underestimate.

If he's re-elected in November, you've already played the impeachment card.

That's an academic issue.

It is no longer on the table in his second term.

So are special counsels, by the way.

So essentially, you have a president now who's undeterred and unchecked and vindicated in a way he's never been before.

Imagine what that Trump president's doing.

Oh, I think that's totally, he is more constrained than if we didn't go, if he paid no price for this at all.

But let me go back to what Bill said.

I agree.

This will,

I started out by saying we had a failed presidency to contest, and he's not going to be able to blame his complete failure to accomplish anything he promised on the impeachment.

But I differ with you to say that people don't just see this as

a call to an obscure country.

This is American foreign policy, national security.

That is what it is.

I don't know if it plays that way.

Let me ask you this other question about who profits.

Let me ask the question detectives ask, Huey Bono, who profits from this as far as Democratic presidential candidates go.

At first I thought it would have been Joe Biden because now he's elevated.

He's the villain that the, I mean, the hero that the villain is opposing and elevating in this matter.

But you know what?

The more I read about this, no, I don't think he was doing something terrible in Ukraine, but it's just so, why can't politicians tell their fucking kids, get a job?

Get a goddamn job.

I mean, this kid, this kid was paid $600,000 because his name is Biden by a gas company in Ukraine, this super corrupt country that just had a revolution to get rid of corruption.

It just looks bad.

And the Republicans are geniuses at muddying the water.

Not on this one.

Just to know, it's all going to be about you did this in Ukraine.

Well, Joe Biden did this.

It's too swampy, and the anti-swamp candidate is Elizabeth Warren.

I say Elizabeth Warren gets to win off this one.

I say

this is the kind of speculation that may keep us busy when we're bored, but nobody will know what the American people are ultimately going to say.

I will say this, when you talk about Trump versus Biden, Donald Trump's extended family has made more money off the connection to Donald Trump in the three years since he was elected than Hunter Biden could make in ten lifetimes.

Say it.

Being accused.

I know, but.

But being accused of having your family profit from your political preominence by Donald Trump is like being called silly by the three stooges.

Ivanka's China trademarks.

Ivanka's China trademarks.

I understand that.

But that's going to be a good idea.

But that's what about ism, and we don't do this on this show.

It's too easy.

We do better on the show.

I think Elizabeth Warren wins because she is an anti-corruption candidate.

Obviously, Trump's children are all degenerates who haven't worked a day in their lives.

I disagree with that.

But,

you know.

But we shouldn't be the same on the other side.

And by the way, Bill,

if Don.

It's not an operational matter.

I think, again, we would have been better off if we were not morally compelled to impeach.

I do think that other people see this.

And already, by the way, the pro-impeachment polls have gone up 5% in just a few days.

So I think that this is an open question.

But who is he going to benefit or not?

It's irrelevant.

It does sound like something Don Jr.

would do.

And if Don Jr.

did it, it would be all Rachel Matter was talking about.

You have to think that Joe Biden would have used this as an opportunity to be more visceral and emotional and lash out and say, how dare you attack my only surviving son like this, if he wasn't scared of a news cycle surprising Hunter Biden.

Exactly.

And that's not a good news cycle.

And that, yeah, that's right.

You guys are

now nibbling at the edges by trying to do political punditry.

We don't know in the first place.

This is an overwhelmingly important issue.

I think, and who it's going to help is, first of all, on the Democratic side, yes, helps Elizabeth Warren stuff.

But one last point.

One of the things we know is the best thing that can happen if you are a Democrat is to be attacked by Donald Trump.

I wanted to see two of the women from the Midwest, Tlaib and Omar.

I was hoping they would lose in a primary until this jerk announces they should go back where they came from, and he's re-elected them.

He's immunized them from any intra-party criticism.

And so, yes, that's true for Warren, but what's true for Biden is if you are strongly motivated by wanting to spite Trump, you vote for Biden.

And it's also clear that Trump regards Biden as his by far the most dangerous opponent.

Those remarks, by the way, made it into articles of impeachment that were voted on in the House and got 95 Democratic votes, which is illustrative of the Democrats' problem messaging around the remarks, the go-home remarks.

They were actually voted on as articles of impeachment on the House floor.

And they're not articles of impeachment.

It's part of the Democrats' problem.

They have to say that it was a very different issue.

That feels like it was 75 years ago.

Yeah, but Nancy Pelosi is a very good idea.

It's a very different issue.

But people who have been paying attention to this know that there were a lot of articles.

And now you have this trying to use American foreign assistance to a country under siege from Russia right the day after the Buller report to help yourself politically okay

Trump said the other day anybody voting for Trump you could add anytime you get a poll you could add ten points or seven points or six points take it any way you want but I don't know if I consider that to be a compliment

I don't consider that to be a compliment.

What that says to me is people are ashamed

that they they are voting for you, and they will not say in public or to another human being, yes, I'm voting for Donald Trump.

So I don't consider it a compliment that you add 10 points or 7 points or 6 points.

But is it true?

No, it's wrong.

By the way,

in the 2016 election,

the margin by which Hillary Clinton beat Donald Trump, one of the largest in American history in sheer numbers,

pretty much tracked the national poll.

There were three states with very marginal 10,000, 18,000.

As you narrow it down, it's less predictable, but it wasn't off by six points.

But the national poll, the overall vote where Hillary Fitton beat him by three plus million votes, tracked the polls.

Okay.

So I don't know if you saw this, but Facebook shut down,

showed this page, a popular page called I Love You America, which sounds like they love America.

I found out they don't.

It had 1.1 million fans.

Get this, more engagement in the last 90 days than USA Today, the LA Times, and BuzzFeed.

And it turns out it's from Ukraine.

These are and our Russian friends.

They never stopped.

The 2016 election was all about this, trying to divide us.

They put up those memes, and they're still doing it.

Like, did you show the one?

Oh, look at this.

Veterans deserve the best.

Illegals deserve nothing.

These things that they put up there that sound patriotic, like they love America, they don't.

So we found some of the other ones, and I'm telling you, these people do not love America.

Like, look at this one.

Our troops fight for that oil.

Light a candle at the gas station to show you care.

Cigarettes cause cancer.

Teach your toddler to vape.

See,

that is not.

Get 20% off on your next Uber.

Just say the code, let's have sex.

Treat yourself.

Make toast in the bathtub.

And of course, don't be a pussy.

You can make it.

All right, she is the former EPA administrator under President Obama and the director of the Center for Climate Health and the Global Environment at Harvard.

Gina McCarthy is back with us.

Gina,

how are you?

Great to see you again.

All right, well, as someone whose job had been the number one protector of our environment, these must be very trying days for you.

I mean, it's trying days for anyone who picks up the paper.

I don't see a headline that a week goes by that isn't like more alarming than it even was a couple of years ago.

First, it was the insect apocalypse, all the insects are dying.

Last week, it was the birds.

We're killing, I think, a third of all the birds in North America.

Are you doing this just to depress me?

I am.

I'm doing it to, well, I want to answer.

Yesterday it was about the oceans.

We've made a spit sink out of the oceans, and we can't live on this planet without the oceans.

I just want to know, give it to me straight, Doc.

Is it too late?

Because Because I know they wouldn't tell us if it was.

Because

I've read quotes from like James Hansen.

He said in 2006, we have to, in the next 10 years, decrease the growth rate of CO2.

If that doesn't happen within 10 years, we're going to pass these tipping points.

Al Gore, Inconvenient Truth, the world will reach the point of no return if drastic measures weren't taken to reduce greenhouse gases by 2016.

I see we've passed

415 parts per million of carbon dioxide.

I remember when they said you you can't pass 400.

So

what say you?

Well, what I say is that we have a big challenge ahead, but it's not too late.

And I say to you that we have to work together.

I can't, by myself,

tell you that we're not past tipping points.

But if you can't do something about this shit, then stop worrying about it.

Let's just do what we can do.

There are so many things that we can do.

Can't we focus on that?

Big good stuff.

I read Al Gore's op-ed in the New York Times last Sunday, and you know, I didn't realize we actually are so close.

We're so close.

Some of the things he points out, as recently as 2014, electricity from solar and wind was cheaper, only in about 1% of the world.

Five years later, These are the cheapest sources in two-thirds of the world.

We actually are not that far away.

Germany gets all of its electricity now from renewables.

And Bill, you asked me me about how do I feel now.

There's all kinds of rollbacks at EPA going on,

and I get that.

But there's two things that, you know, really I keep telling myself every morning.

One is that they're not particularly good at governing.

So they stink at rollbacks.

They have an 8%

approval rating in the courts, so we're doing pretty good.

And the other thing is...

So everything we read about that they try to do

a lot of announcements.

Well, if you can't

do it.

But you're saying it's not happening.

No, because

what they're trying to do is come to a specific outcome that's contrary to law and science.

And when it gets to the courts, they don't tend to appreciate that.

Right.

But the other thing is that we've got to stop focusing everything we think about on climate or other things, about what Trump is or isn't doing or what his administration is doing.

Let's talk about what's really going on in the real world.

You mentioned that.

Clean energy is going gangbangers because it's cheaper, it's better, the air is cleaner.

Oh, that's too.

Oh, my God.

You meant gangbusters.

Did I say gangbangers?

Yes, you did.

Well, that was because I listened to your monologue.

You're right.

Blame it on me.

Mr.

Potty Mouth, it's infectious.

But

let's start that over again.

A lot of good things have happened.

And the best one was

Greta Turnberg.

You're at the UN climate.

I mean, you know about this young lady from Sweden.

She's a teenager.

She sailed across the ocean.

Show it.

I mean this was this has already, I think, become iconic, but I want to show it tonight.

You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.

And yet, I'm one of the lucky ones.

People are suffering.

People are dying.

Entire ecosystems are collapsing.

We are in the beginning of a mass extinction.

And all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth.

Pretty powerful.

Yeah.

And, you know, this is because

this week, kids all over the world went on a climate strike.

Apparently, they're pissed off that we've robbed them of their entire future and killed the planet.

They're always so picky, those kids.

Yeah, they're so picky, the kids.

But it reminds me a little of the Vietnam protests when I was young because they have skin in the game.

Unlike other generations, they really feel it and they see it and they know, Christ,

what is the world going to be like when I'm

40?

There is a feel right now that

we have reached a tipping point.

We're not going to tolerate it anymore.

And we recognize that we have a moral responsibility and we have to meet it.

Let me ask this.

I saw on the view, because I never miss it.

Joy said something that I've said many times, which is that I think, I'm sorry, people don't like to hear it, but if you are not doing anything for the environment or you're denying climate science and you have kids, you're kind of a lousy parent.

And Abby Huntsman took great umbrage at that, but I don't see what's wrong with playing the bad parent card.

How can you not not say that you're a bad parent if you have a kid and you're not doing something for this problem?

Couldn't you also say that you're a bad parent if you were to allow a child to suffer that kind of anguish, real, moving, pure pain, over something that is frankly an erroneous assumption, the notion that capitalism, that economic growth is the problem here.

It's frankly not true.

The developing economies, the developed economies of the world, have contributed more to the reduction of climate change emissions

deforestation because they've planted 19 million.

We've planted 19 million acres of forest.

We have emissions from power plants, the fossil fuel generating power plants at 1985 levels.

Whereas the developing world

is responsible for some of the worst environmental disasters in human history because they don't have a robust middle class.

Can we just step it back a little bit?

Because I think what you're talking about is just feeling that that young woman is distraught and I don't want her to be.

And the only way that she's going to feel better is if she sees a genuine reaction about listening to her and doing something about it.

There are things that we can do today that will make her life easier and healthier, never mind what it's doing for the planet.

And I'm sick about talking about the planet instead of talking about people and our health, our moral responsibility.

The planet doesn't care if we're here.

We care if we give our kids away from the people.

I disagree with some of what she said.

She's very eloquent.

I think some of what she said was wrong.

I do not think that capitalism is the problem.

But that's a lesser mistake than Donald Trump not only denying it intellectually, but undoing every public policy he can get his hands on in which we try to alleviate things.

And as far as kids are concerned, I speak to young people, and I and others, liberals, have been troubled for some time that younger people don't vote enough because we think they'd vote more our way.

What I welcome is their understanding now that this is their issue.

And you're right, it's like Vietnam.

There was not a lot of student activity protest in Vietnam until they started drafting students.

That's when the colleges got involved.

I was there.

And now what you have, I would speak to students and say, look, I don't understand why you're not upset about climate change.

I'm going to be dead by then.

But it's going to have a terrible effect on your life 20, 30 years from now.

I welcome this.

But see, I disagree with that.

I don't think it's, I think that's an old talking point.

I don't think it's 20, 30 years away.

It could be two.

It's now, and it could be two years.

You know,

the oceans absorb most of the crap we put up there.

We don't know.

We don't know what that point is.

I agree, but I disagree with this case.

I think we had him, say you yourself noted the 400, over 400.

Making very specific short-term predictions weaken the case if they are not fully borne out.

I don't see that saying it's immediate.

And then people don't see anything, that helps their argument.

I think it's important to see.

And there have been a lot of those arguments.

Yes, but I think instead of just rebuking those, you ought to also rebuke the people who are much guiltier of saying there's no problem at all.

And I always say we should do everything we can.

Exactly how many years it's going to take, that's not the issue.

The issue is we should do everything we can as soon as we can.

I don't think it's useful to feel any kind of anger toward the young kids who are out there protesting.

It's completely useless.

The most useful thing we can do is push politicians to actually enact some kind of policy that an exchange works toward this problem.

And I don't care if it's a problem that's coming within two years or five years or 10 years or 20 years.

It is coming.

We do know that.

So complaining about the kids is just like a waste of everyone's time.

Political consensus is

the most important point because as Director McCarthy, you said, regulatory overreach is a problem that hits the courts and the courts push back.

And you know better than anybody else that places like, for example, in Michigan versus EPA in 2015 where we had a pushback on regulatory overreach that established a precedent now that forces regulators to concern themselves with costs.

I'm not making regulatory overreach.

I'm mentioning regulatory overreach.

Let me ask you this.

Have you ever criticized those like Trump who say there's not a problem at all?

Are you for any action here?

Absolutely, of course.

I mean, you promise.

This is more important than winning a high school debate.

Well, what have you?

You haven't said anything now.

Can you show me the writing?

Have you been critical of the people who say it's not a problem and we shouldn't do anything about it?

Absolutely.

You should Google me.

I write about this pretty frequently.

What I also write about is the the extent to which the advocacy along these lines by Democrats and liberals who embrace ideas like the Green New Deal have failed to convince people who are skeptics because it is not about environmental remediation.

It is about ubiquitous health care provisions and free advantage.

But I think it is working.

I think people do feel more about,

are more conscious of this problem.

I think that the kids marching is important, even though they have their hip-hop and their eyes.

I don't know how many of you went to these marches, but they felt just like the 60s and 70s when people realized that the world wasn't going the direction they needed.

And I by the way.

And they were demanding adults to stand up and do something.

And they became marches.

Unless they become mobilizations for voting.

But I would say this, again, the Green New Deal is a strong hand.

No, I said this.

I'm sorry, Congressman, but they can do things themselves.

We can do things in our community.

I don't need federal regulation

if I can get everything else to happen.

It's a nice goal.

Their families.

are.

Then you disagree with Greta because she was.

I don't disagree with you.

Let me finish.

She was there saying you do.

Whose side are you on?

I'm just kidding.

Mine.

She was, I'm on the side of politically effective action.

She was correctly saying she needs governments to do things, not just the parents.

And I do think that's it.

But I want to go back to Green New Deal.

And I said this when it comes out.

The Democrats have ignored it.

It was a talking point for a few people.

It's getting some lip service.

It's a straw man.

Well, it's

a big New Deal.

It's certainly going to be in every campaign ad the Republicans run.

And I wish they hadn't done it.

We can't talk about these student marches without talking about what they're advocating for, which is very interesting.

Yes, you can, but you can also not pick on the student marches as your straw man.

Talk about what the government is doing.

What have the Democrats just congressional?

We have a climate change in Ireland.

I don't know one 2020 candidate who hasn't endorsed

polar in theory.

Yeah, in theory,

and since Democrats have run the House for this year, what action has the Democratic majority taken?

They've been very active on a lot of issues on climate change that you think was bad.

That sort of makes my point, though.

What actions have they taken?

Okay, but no, I've tried to unlock some of the

gold backs.

But

I did read the one.

I read the article you wrote.

It was called The Climate Strike, which I just was talking about with the kids, is all about indoctrination, not science.

Yeah.

And you know you're named after a guy who had to save the world when it it was about to be extinct.

Well look, one of the

why is the

why is why is it that I notice that seems to be the new talking point and the Republicans have had many talking points over the years for climate for getting away with, I think, murder on this issue.

What does that mean, indoctrination?

This is the idea that the kids don't really have the science, they're just being misled by teachers teachers and professors.

One of the sources of frustration for me on this is that when you push back on some of these projections, which go from the United Nations for IPCC, for example, that go 50, 60, 80 years out using a series of variables, and you express some skepticism about that, they push back and you say, you're not, you haven't paid attention to the science.

We're all working off the same documents, like the IPCC report from 2001, which projected a whole lot of milder winters, which didn't materialize.

The 2007 IPC report, which forecast that next year there would be so much drought that we'd have a food problem.

We'd have food shortages.

Precisely the opposite.

Rain-fed agricultural yields are up in the domestic

public.

I read your column and I couldn't tell whether you were a climate change denier or you just wanted the kids to get off your lawn.

I don't think it's useful.

I don't think it's useful

for you to judge these kids for being scared about something that is real when the people who are leading this country, we have a climate change denier in the White House who is running this country, who is doing more harm than any of the noise that these kids could possibly be making a brief response and it is very equally as unuseful to conflate denying that the climate has changed which denotes with denying that the solution to it is dismantling what actions of trump do you disagree with the solution what actions of trump issues what actions of trump do you disagree with do you disagree with his do you agree or disagree with his pulling out of the paris talks do you agree with his rollback on the clean air and taking away california's uh thing let me ask you those two specifics uh california and the paris climate yes because Paris was toothless and we've also adhered to our self-set

regulation.

No for the California issue.

No for the California issue, but no federalism issue.

No, I think it's a federal issue.

But not a climate change issue.

No, it's a federalism issue.

Is there any issue?

Yes, but I'm trying to get whether there is any of the anti- efforts to deal with climate change actions the Trump administration has taken that you disagree with based on climate change.

Based on climate, I'm not exactly sure what issue you're referring to, but on those two issues.

Let's do

trying to get

the waiver that California has always had off the books.

Talk to me about

California, if people don't know, has led the...

No auto manufacturer stood up and said it's a good thing.

But again, if we go back to fossil fuel fire plants, we're at 1985 emissions, and it's not a result of government regulation entirely.

It's a result of the fact that we have had a revolution in energy production in this country that has made natural gas a cleaner-burning burning bridge fuel, a more productive, cost-efficient, consumer-efficient system.

So we should let the market deal with climate change?

Yes, it's doing a better job than the public.

Let me, I have to ask you to do that.

You know,

you follow this.

You follow this.

You cannot tell me one of the anti-climate change efforts of the Trump administration that you disagree with.

And please don't invade.

You're not sure.

You follow things very closely.

You've given us a lot of specifics.

Trump has done a number of things to undo efforts to deal with climate change.

Do you disagree with any of them them because of climate change?

Do you deny climate science?

No, I do not deny the fact that the climate is dynamic because we have a dynamic climate.

I don't think anybody who thinks it.

No, we have no dynamic privacy science.

But you're not worried about green change.

I don't think that's in capital.

I'm not worried about climate change.

I don't disagree with anything.

At the same time,

the efforts to mitigate it are better in the developed world with a middle class that demands that sort of thing than in China or in India or anywhere else that is contributing to greenhouse gases.

We need to follow the science.

We need federal leadership.

We need an international effort.

We need kids up to speak to the people.

To go to new rooms, everybody.

Thank you, Paul.

It's time for new rooms.

That's what we need to do.

All right.

All right, new rule.

We've had a good run, but it's time to admit this whole USA, we're number one thing, might be over.

Look at this kid.

She sailed across the Atlantic and faced down the UN.

The only time an American teenager makes that face is when her mom takes away her phone.

Neural, someone has to explain to me how the new gender-neutral vibrator, the Envy,

is different from the old gender-neutral vibrator, the Schwind bicycle seat.

role, since Sylvester Stallone keeps updating the Rambo and Rocky characters, he now has to do the same for the first movie he ever did, The Party at Kitty and Studs.

That's a real thing.

That's the softcore porn that Stallone did before Rocky.

Okay, here's the pitch for the new one.

Kitty and Studd throw another party, and they lure you out of retirement.

And even though you told yourself that you quit tapping Kitty's ass years ago, that ass needs you and you tap it one last time.

New Roll, we must admit global warming is out of control when you can buy the new snowballs,

freezable underwear that keeps your testicles cool on hot days.

Yes, snowballs, because for some reason nobody thought to call it numb nuts.

New rule, don't drink before taking the SATs.

But if you do, drink this.

So if you throw up on the test, you can say, I got 1,800 on my SATs.

And finally, New Rule, white liberals have to start listening to me when I tell them, you can't be more offended than the victim.

It happened again last week when presidential contender Andrew Yang faced criticism because he said that SNL should not have fired comedian Shane Gillis over racist comments Gillis made about Asians.

That's when the internet did what it does best and deemed Yang a racist

for not being offended.

Because if he wasn't offended, well, someone had to be.

There was a study done last year where people were asked to rate their feelings about various races and white liberals were the only group that has a biased against themselves.

They want to hang out only with people who are not them.

That's like your mother preferring the neighbor's kids.

There is a weird self-loathing going on among white liberals, and it's not helping anyone.

Lifting up those who society has cheated or forsaken, that's liberalism.

Hating all things white is just tedious virtue signaling.

You look like Justin Timberlake and bad teacher.

I just hate slavery so, so much.

Slavery is the worst.

If I could go back in time and undo slavery, I would.

I hate it.

The answer to mass incarceration is to stop putting undeserving blacks in prison, not to put more white people people in Twitter jail.

Every thought needs a disclaimer now.

The other day I heard a guy say, I realize I'm only speaking as a white male and I acknowledge our tragic history of oppression, but you left your lights on.

Look, white privilege is real.

And yes, you have some advantages for being white, but you also have some disadvantages.

Many of you were born born with a terrible personality.

No.

No, that's not right.

That's not.

I didn't ask for that.

I'm sorry.

They knew.

You know why?

No, that's.

I'll fire the director.

But folks, you don't need to advertise it.

What's with the I'm embarrassed to be white subgenre on the internet?

I'm finding myself constantly embarrassed to be white.

I'm watching Tall Girl.

I've never been so embarrassed to be white.

Read tweet if you're embarrassed to be white.

Jesus, fuck.

Rosanna Arquette tweeted, I'm sorry I was born white and privileged.

It disgusts me, and I feel so much shame.

Exactly.

You think it's hard being a black man in a white man's world?

Try being a white woman who feels bad about you being a black man in a white man's world.

Look, none of us chose to be born white, not even Ed Sharon.

So just stop.

Because you know what might be the worst part of white shame?

You bore the fuck out of black people at parties.

I know.

And he learned how to dance.

You meet black people and say things like, Black Panther was so meaningful to me.

No, it wasn't.

It wasn't a cultural milestone for you.

I have taken an informal sampling among some black folks I know, and the consensus seems to be awareness, yes, is great.

White people certainly should acknowledge they've had an easier go of it.

But black folks are not asking whites to always be flagellating themselves because it makes everything awkward.

Awkward.

It puts the burden on black people to absolve you.

It's really

asking black people to again do something for you.

Forgive me.

Absolve me.

Recognize that I'm one of the good white people.

Jesus.

Haven't black people suffered enough slavery?

Jim Crow, and now I gotta make some yuppie feel better about himself?

As a black friend of mine said, and I quote, I'm doing all right.

I don't need your pity.

Here's my question: How many white liberals would pay actual reparations, real money taken out of your paycheck every week?

If you really feel this bad about the whole race thing, if being white is really this toxic for society,

let's tax it.

Let's tax whiteness.

A hunky tax.

We'll do it like carbon offsets.

We'll calculate your exact level of white lameness

and then

charge you a Caucasian offset fee.

based on a mean percentage of household income indexed to the net, not gross national product, and average with the consumer price index.

We will come up with just the right dollar figure to offset the exact amount of you being a fucking loser.

A lame white loser.

Now pay up, you fucking white piece of shit.

You fucking worm.

I mean, that's what you want to hear, isn't it?

Isn't it, maggot, you fuck?

You want to be told what a disgusting piece of white shit you are, you white piece of shit.

Look,

in conclusion, I just want to say America has done a lot of good things and a lot of bad ones, and the number one bad one with no close second is racism.

It's a sorry history, and we're not done with it.

And yet, black and white increasingly intermingle.

We get to the finish line on race by just being with each other more.

We don't need awkward.

We need laughing with each other, finding out what's good about each other, befriending, intermarrying, enjoying somebody's company without thinking every minute, I'm with a person of color.

You're with a person.

And you are not uncool just because you're white, and it is not a crime to know all the words to sweet Caroline.

All right, that's our show.

We're off next week.

Damn, and back on the 11th.

I'll be be at the Orpheum Theater in Memphis, October 4th, and at the Mirage, my home in Vegas, October 11th to 12th.

I want to thank Noah Rothman, Lynette Lopez, Bonnie, Frank Tina McCarthy, and Salvin Rushdie.

Stay tuned for Overtime on YouTube.

Good night.

Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10.

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