Trump Threatens Iran, Klepper Goes to Birthday Parade | Bill Clinton & James Patterson

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Speaker 9 You're listening to Comedy Comedy Central.

Speaker 10 From the most trusted journalists at Comedy Central, it's America's only source for news.

Speaker 11 This is the Daily Show with your host, Jordan Clapper.

Speaker 11 Welcome the next John North Club where we got so much to talk about tonight?

Speaker 13 Trump makes an Irish exit from Canada.

Speaker 15 I head to DC to crash the most tremendous birthday bash in American history.

Speaker 14 And the author James Patterson will be here along with his co-author, Bill Clinton, tonight, okay?

Speaker 17 So, let's get in the headlines.

Speaker 19 Now, this was supposed to be study abroad week for Trump, and things started out oh so well.

Speaker 15 He arrived at the G7 confidently, strolling out of the woods like a contestant on the golden bachelorette

Speaker 14 or a shaved Sasquatch, you know.

Speaker 15 You see what you want to see.

Speaker 24 Now, this is an important G7 for Trump because he had to prove that he had the discipline and wherewithal to fix the global economy after he fed up the global economy.

Speaker 17 And you know what?

Speaker 21 He almost nailed it.

Speaker 26 We all know the great great Prime Minister of the UK, and we just signed a document.

Speaker 18 This is slightly.

Speaker 10 Very important document.

Speaker 10 You never win, Danny.

Speaker 18 I can win everything.

Speaker 16 Don't worry, don't worry.

Speaker 19 There's a five-second rule with trade agreements.

Speaker 19 Trump's still totally good to eat those documents.

Speaker 15 And I know some of you haters are going to make fun of him, but Trump didn't drop the papers by accident.

Speaker 21 It was a 4D chess move to check out the British Prime Minister's badunk-a-dunk.

Speaker 15 But before Trump could sign and or drop any other trade deals, he decided to peace out.

Speaker 27 Overnight, President Trump with an abrupt about face, announcing he's cutting short his trip to the G7 summit in Canada, racing back to the White House instead.

Speaker 30 I have to be back. Very important.
I want to just thank our great host, but you probably see what I see. And I have to be back.

Speaker 31 We all know what this is, right?

Speaker 21 You're at an event, you have to rush home because something came up.

Speaker 31 Look, I get it.

Speaker 21 None of us like to poop in an unfamiliar place.

Speaker 21 Sometimes when you have a big matchup coming up, you just need that home field advantage.

Speaker 33 I understand, Donald.

Speaker 21 But of course, the real reason Donald Trump rushed home to Washington was to deal with the war between Israel and Iran.

Speaker 21 And the big question was, was he rushing home to help negotiate an end to the war or to bring America into the war?

Speaker 14 It's the most important decision a nation can make and one that we've whiffed on for the last like 10, 20,

Speaker 2 30, 40.

Speaker 16 It doesn't matter. The point is.

Speaker 14 The point is, it'd be really reassuring to know that the president has a clear and consistent plan.

Speaker 24 So Mr.

Speaker 25 President, are you looking for war or a ceasefire?

Speaker 26 We're not looking for a ceasefire. I didn't say I was looking for a ceasefire.

Speaker 16 Oh shit. Okay.

Speaker 15 He's not looking for a ceasefire.

Speaker 26 We're looking at better than ceasefire.

Speaker 14 Oh, great!

Speaker 37 Yeah! Better than a ceasefire! Ceasefire plus?

Speaker 36 That's great.

Speaker 2 I hate watching ads. That's wonderful.

Speaker 20 This is good news.

Speaker 15 I'm glad you're going to negotiate with Iran.

Speaker 26 I don't know. I'm not too much in the mood to negotiate.

Speaker 10 Okay. All right.

Speaker 16 Not in the mood. Okay.

Speaker 12 The president's not vibing on negotiations then.

Speaker 14 So it's war, because who would negotiate besides you, Mr.

Speaker 15 President?

Speaker 27 He's considering sending the vice president to negotiate with the Iranians.

Speaker 25 You know, I think this is fantastic.

Speaker 14 JD Vance is a great choice to negotiate.

Speaker 24 The Iranians will agree to anything to get him the f ⁇ out of there.

Speaker 10 You know what?

Speaker 14 And it's great for peace because if Trump is negotiating, it sounds like we're not going to flatten Tehran anytime soon.

Speaker 27 The president president warned everyone in Iran's capital city to flee, posting everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran with no additional explanation.

Speaker 37 You know what? I can use some additional explanation.

Speaker 39 Mr.

Speaker 37 President, I am more confused than ever.

Speaker 14 Please just sum up your explanation in one clean tweet.

Speaker 41 President Trump has just posted new comments directed at Iran. We know exactly where the so-called supreme leader is is hiding.
He is an easy target, but is safe there.

Speaker 41 We are not going to take him out and then in parentheses, kill, at least not for now.

Speaker 36 Okay.

Speaker 14 So we know where the Ayatollah is, but he's safe. We could kill him, but we won't.

Speaker 33 For now.

Speaker 2 Maybe later.

Speaker 16 We'll find out next on the Golden Bachelorette, okay?

Speaker 14 I mean, how does one tweet and have six different positions?

Speaker 21 I mean, clearly, we're not going to get any clarity from listening to President Trump.

Speaker 22 Maybe, maybe other people in his inner circle can shed some light on America's position.

Speaker 28 Tucker Carlson, huge supporter of the president.

Speaker 15 What do you think of the war?

Speaker 42 I just don't want my country to be further weakened or destroyed by another one of these wars. And boy, if you can't connect the dots after 25 years of this,

Speaker 42 you're either too dumb to participate in the conversation or you're just a liar who doesn't care.

Speaker 2 Wow.

Speaker 31 Wow. I mean, Tucker, he hasn't been this distraught since the WNBA got popular.

Speaker 24 Okay, Mr.

Speaker 21 President, I hope you understand what Tucker Carlson is saying.

Speaker 43 I don't know what Tucker Carlson is saying. Let him go get a television network and say it so that people listen.

Speaker 18 Thank you.

Speaker 10 Oh, snap!

Speaker 37 Trump's like, go on TV and say it, you bitch.

Speaker 37 That's right, you can't because you got kicked off Fox News for lying about me winning the 2020 election, which I appreciate, you bitch.

Speaker 13 So yes, Trump is not on the same page as Tucker, and he seems to be at odds with some of the other top MAGA minds as well.

Speaker 44 The American people have been brainwashed into

Speaker 44 believing that America has to engage in these foreign wars in order for us to survive. And it's absolutely not true.

Speaker 2 Oh my God.

Speaker 32 I can't believe I'm agreeing with Marjorie Taylor Green.

Speaker 32 I'm at war with myself.

Speaker 37 This can't be right.

Speaker 13 Keep playing the clip. I'm sure I'll find something to disagree with her on.

Speaker 44 They don't want to hear about politics. They want to be able to afford food and they want to be able to afford gas and they just want to have fun.
For once in their life, they want to have fun.

Speaker 37 Yes, I still agree with her.

Speaker 10 For once in their lives, Americans just want to have fun. I don't want a war.
I want to dance.

Speaker 15 Although, you know what?

Speaker 21 I'm pretty sure Americans do know how to have fun regardless of international conflicts.

Speaker 14 I've never gotten a text saying, hey, bro, territorial dispute in the South China Sea, barbecue's canceled.

Speaker 21 So, doesn't seem like Trump is listening to the anti-war wing of his party.

Speaker 14 Maybe he'll listen to the anti-war wing of his own administration, like Tulsi Gabbard, his own director of national intelligence.

Speaker 46 Tulsi Gabbard testified in March that the intelligence community said Iran wasn't building a nuclear weapon.

Speaker 26 What she said, I think they were very close to having one.

Speaker 32 This is the benefit of appointing unqualified crazy people to your team.

Speaker 19 You can always be like, do you know how crazy and unqualified she is?

Speaker 8 I don't care what she said.

Speaker 24 So, Trump is beefing with the anti-war wing of his party and dismissing intelligence from his own cabinet showing that Iran is not actually building nukes.

Speaker 24 It certainly seems to be leaning in a let's do a World War III direction.

Speaker 32 And weirdly enough, the final confirmation might be pizza.

Speaker 47 According to an account on X called the Pentagon Pizza Report, nearly all pizza establishments nearby the Pentagon have experienced a huge surge in activity.

Speaker 9 Here's why.

Speaker 15 When U.S.

Speaker 48 military personnel face a national emergency, they work late into the night and can't leave their desks.

Speaker 47 At 8.57 p.m. Thursday, Thursday, the Pentagon Pizza Report reported that the closest and second closest dominoes to the Pentagon had surged in traffic.

Speaker 8 Oh my god, we're going to war!

Speaker 37 Or everyone at the Pentagon just got divorced at the same time.

Speaker 15 Look, I don't know how things are going to end, but it seems like they're trending in a bad direction.

Speaker 49 I will say this though.

Speaker 45 If you told me after Election Day that within four months of Trump's presidency, I'd be staring at a Domino's pizza tracker to figure out if we're going to enter the final war of mankind,

Speaker 19 I'd have said, that's about right.

Speaker 24 For more on the pending war with Iran, we go live outside the Pentagon with our own Michael Costa.

Speaker 18 Michael!

Speaker 18 Michael!

Speaker 18 I'm curious, Michael. So

Speaker 18 what is it? What's the latest?

Speaker 9 Jordan, this is a nuanced and complicated situation, and the only solution is for America to enter a decades-long total war with Iran. Make no mistake, the U.S.

Speaker 9 military needs to dig in, buckle down, pick up some Mikey Kay's meat lovers pizzas with extra tangy sauce, and prepare for the worst.

Speaker 31 I'm sorry.

Speaker 16 What was that, that last part you said?

Speaker 9 About preparing for the worst, yes. We'll probably need a new draft, too.
Millions of able-bodied young men ready to fight for America and chow down on Mikey Kay's Buffalo Chicken Supreme Mama Mia

Speaker 9 with a free 45-ounce Mountain Dew Code Red, just like Nona used to melt.

Speaker 31 Do you own a pizza parlor or are you trying to profiteer from a war?

Speaker 8 No, no, no.

Speaker 9 I have a small investment in a pizza place nearby that I also manage and busboy at, but that in no way affects my impartial analysis.

Speaker 9 I've looked at the evidence and we have to go to war against Iran, possibly Iraq again, and definitely India.

Speaker 10 What did India do?

Speaker 9 Well, they're a regional superpower, Jordan. They're a threat to our survival.
Right now, their military leaders are plotting against us, working day and night, ordering delicious takeout.

Speaker 14 Michael, do you have a pizza place in India?

Speaker 34 Absolutely not.

Speaker 9 It's a small tandoori kitchen called Second to Nan.

Speaker 9 Free mango lassie with every any order, just like Nona used to make.

Speaker 17 Hey, Costa, come on, man.

Speaker 9 This is crazy. I know.
With any order, Jordan, there is no minimum.

Speaker 14 No, no, what's crazy is you're trying to start World War III so you can what, sell bad takeout?

Speaker 19 Bad takeout?

Speaker 9 How dare you? Art Chutney is the talk of New Delhi.

Speaker 9 I assume I can't figure out what they're saying.

Speaker 18 But what's the big deal?

Speaker 9 Defense contractors can goad our nation into endless, pointless wars for profit, but Nona Costa can't get a taste?

Speaker 16 Look, you're all bad.

Speaker 8 Americans don't want war.

Speaker 19 Isn't there a way to make money off peace so the world can live in harmony?

Speaker 9 International relations aren't that simple, Jordan. Two nations, they're total opposites, can't overcome their cultural differences, uniting in a perfect blend of magical serenity.

Speaker 9 The only place that that exists is in our new delicious

Speaker 9 sushi taco.

Speaker 9 As my Nona used to say,

Speaker 17 Es muy conichi wa.

Speaker 17 Get out of here. Michael Costa, everyone.

Speaker 11 We come back. I find out how Trump's birthday went.
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Speaker 51 Welcome back to the Daily Show.

Speaker 22 Donald Trump finally made his military parade dreams come true last weekend, but was it everything he wanted?

Speaker 21 I decided to find out.

Speaker 12 this past weekend I went to our nation's capital to join the celebration of the 250th birthday of the U.S.

Speaker 52 Army and the 79th birthday of Donald J.

Speaker 12 Trump this was reportedly a $45 million event and there was family fun everywhere I'm talking cornhole howitzers kids with machine guns kids with machine guns on top of jeeps kids with rocket launchers and the always popular killer robot dogs.

Speaker 14 Thank you for your service.

Speaker 34 We are here because we love America.

Speaker 54 We are celebrating the 250th birthday of the Army, and it's flag day. It's the president's birthday.
Today is America's Super Bowl.

Speaker 15 Wouldn't that be the Super Bowl?

Speaker 49 What are you most excited to see?

Speaker 22 Tanks.

Speaker 54 We're going to see all of our tanks, our Bradleys, our artillery.

Speaker 50 Tanks. Helicopters.
Howitzers.

Speaker 56 I want Mindy and Don Jr.

Speaker 33 Okay. Yeah.

Speaker 34 Have you ever been to an event like this? Yes, but in locals.

Speaker 50 smaller scale,

Speaker 34 Moscow, Pyongyang.

Speaker 57 No, no, no, no, no, no, no, not like that.

Speaker 49 Who do you think is going to do this parade better, us or the North Koreans?

Speaker 56 I don't compare myself to anybody because everybody in the world will love to be in America at least for a day.

Speaker 12 Looking around, I wonder, was this a military celebration or more of a Make Donnie feel like a big boy authoritarian leader party?

Speaker 50 You know one thing about Donald Trump? He's been the greatest leader this country's ever had.

Speaker 34 Is that why we're throwing him this parade? It's not his parade.

Speaker 55 It's the United States Army.

Speaker 34 I keep getting confused.

Speaker 34 I keep looking at these hats and I'm like,

Speaker 39 there's a tiny little American flag right there on the side.

Speaker 50 Now I see it.

Speaker 5 It's the 50th anniversary.

Speaker 57 It makes me mad listening to the people that are saying that this is all about Donald Trump and his birthday. No, it's not.
I love Donald Trump, but technically we are here to support our military.

Speaker 49 Your focus today is just on the military. Yes, sir.

Speaker 34 And that's why you wore your dress blues.

Speaker 50 Well,

Speaker 57 I'm not in camouflage to support the military. I'm here to support Trump because it is also his birthday.

Speaker 34 Was there some debate about where to put the U?

Speaker 55 Uh, nope.

Speaker 38 Not at all.

Speaker 52 Of course, parades come on the price tag. But if there's one thing this administration knows, it's what's useful and what's waste.

Speaker 49 Trump has had to make some cuts, had to make some really tough decisions.

Speaker 22 I know Doge cut back on the Department of Education.

Speaker 50 Cut back. Well done.
Well done.

Speaker 34 The EPA?

Speaker 2 Yeah. Yeah?

Speaker 34 Absolutely.

Speaker 49 There's some tough cuts, cancer research?

Speaker 58 Cut it. Let's go back to all natural.

Speaker 49 You don't need to be researching on cancer. We basically have that fixed anyway.
Alzheimer's research? Why not? Why not cut the Alzheimer's research? Yeah.

Speaker 49 That's... We're just cool with that.

Speaker 14 I'm cool with that. Are you excited about all these doge cuts?

Speaker 56 Yes, I am, because the government spent is stealing too much of the money and it wasted too much of my day on tax dollars.

Speaker 49 Oh my god, government wastes so much money.

Speaker 50 Yes. Oh my god, it's insane for you to spend money on.
Just foolishness.

Speaker 34 Well, enjoy the $45 million parade at all the tanks.

Speaker 56 That's a good use of your tax dollar, I think. It's important for America to flex their muscles.

Speaker 56 So people, people know that America is generous, America is nice, America is polite, but America can really become badass.

Speaker 20 Now, just brainstorming here, if we want to show the world that we're generous and nice, wouldn't it help to do like generous and nice things for the world?

Speaker 34 We are already doing it.

Speaker 56 USAID, more generous and nice, we let people to take advantage of us left and right.

Speaker 20 So we're showing them that we're kind by taking it away so they see how kind we are.

Speaker 56 Absolutely, absolutely.

Speaker 8 Okay, I get it.

Speaker 52 Tanks are fun and our military men and women should be honored.

Speaker 12 But it was hard to celebrate this public show of force when the president put the military on the streets of L.A.

Speaker 23 to confront other Americans.

Speaker 22 How do you think we're going to need our military? What is the biggest threat?

Speaker 57 To be honest with you, I see a global change right now.

Speaker 57 And if America doesn't want to support America, America won't be America very long.

Speaker 2 Get on. Get on board.
You're an American. Right.

Speaker 49 Which one of these tanks do you think we should send to Los Angeles?

Speaker 4 I think we should send all of them.

Speaker 49 Which weapon should we send over to Los Angeles?

Speaker 34 Oh, them clowns.

Speaker 56 I always said Trump needed to just give him some stuff to make him go to sleep and then just handcuff him afterwards.

Speaker 34 Okay, roofy.

Speaker 55 And then

Speaker 56 can't all him to jail.

Speaker 34 Is that a Pete Hagseth plan?

Speaker 56 I don't know, but that's my plan.

Speaker 56 Trump, if you're listening, that's what you do.

Speaker 49 You should roofy the Democrats.

Speaker 56 Put them all to sleep with some sleeping stuff and then

Speaker 56 lock them up.

Speaker 49 But like you said, today isn't about that. It's about America.

Speaker 12 But at the end of the day, Trump's parade was kind of a dud.

Speaker 23 It didn't have the cold, intimidating scope of other authoritarian displays. All we had was guys holding drones like pizzas and killer robot dogs who just wanted treats.

Speaker 20 I got a sativa gummy in here somewhere.

Speaker 52 See you at Trump's Adi.

Speaker 12 When we come back, Bill Clinton and James Patterson will be joining me on the show.

Speaker 18 Don't go away.

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Speaker 35 Welcome back to The Daily Show.

Speaker 13 My guests tonight are New York Times best-selling authors of the new political thriller, The First Gentleman.

Speaker 24 Please welcome former President Bill Clinton and James Patterson.

Speaker 24 What a nice crowd. What a lovely

Speaker 24 crowd of people.

Speaker 24 Not a bad bunch of folks, huh?

Speaker 40 Yes. Very kind.

Speaker 20 They're very kind folks.

Speaker 14 Gentlemen, you wrote a White House thriller.

Speaker 8 I gotta say, politics is so boring.

Speaker 25 Thank you.

Speaker 13 Thank you for trying to spice it up, you know?

Speaker 40 Well, right now it doesn't take a lot.

Speaker 18 It doesn't take a lot.

Speaker 21 Well, this is a story about the first gentleman who is accused of murder. President Clinton, I'm wondering, what's it like to live inside the headspace of the first gentleman?

Speaker 7 I don't know. I tried.

Speaker 7 It's the only job I ever wanted in politics that I didn't get.

Speaker 10 And

Speaker 40 he's got all the good lines.

Speaker 11 You're the writer. You got the good.

Speaker 10 I know.

Speaker 40 I was the writer.

Speaker 7 What? Let me say it's not easy.

Speaker 35 Sure.

Speaker 7 I mean, if

Speaker 7 but our guy is sort of a perfect

Speaker 7 picture of the dilemma

Speaker 7 because he was,

Speaker 7 he went to school with the president. Then they later met in California, fell in love, and got married.

Speaker 7 But he was a big jock. He was the first Ivy leader drafted in the first round in the NFL.

Speaker 40 No shit.

Speaker 7 And

Speaker 7 he's a complicated figure. He's not hung up about his wife being the president.
He's proud of it.

Speaker 40 Would you have been as good as our guy?

Speaker 5 You know, I don't know.

Speaker 8 On that score, I would have been there.

Speaker 19 You would have. You would have been better there, yes.

Speaker 40 Since I know Hillary, he would have been.

Speaker 7 I thought Hillary was the best qualified person in my life. I mean,

Speaker 7 but

Speaker 7 what we presented that's accurate is he did want something to do. that was his own thing.

Speaker 7 And he thought he could revive President Kennedy's Physical Fitness Council.

Speaker 40 Right. And also maybe murdering someone.

Speaker 14 Yeah, you're sort of burying the lean.

Speaker 7 Well, the murder thing comes up, but we're talking about right now.

Speaker 39 Oh, you always want to talk about the murder thing, James.

Speaker 40 Yeah, well, it's a peace.

Speaker 5 That's the hook.

Speaker 36 But you want to talk about it.

Speaker 49 You're inside the mind of the character here.

Speaker 7 Yeah, but my point is

Speaker 7 the White House staff doesn't know about the murder thing in the beginning. They don't know he's under

Speaker 7 any kind of clout. And

Speaker 7 immediately there are people who don't want him to do that.

Speaker 7 So that's a very typical thing in White Houses.

Speaker 7 All white houses. There are people who think

Speaker 7 that if anybody else gets any credit for anything, it will diminish the president.

Speaker 7 I never saw it that way.

Speaker 7 When I was president, when I was a governor before, I figured if I appointed somebody to an important job and they did a good job,

Speaker 50 that helped me, not hurt me.

Speaker 7 And I could never figure out.

Speaker 7 But it's kind of a deal in Washington, and it's not confined to one party, that one thing.

Speaker 7 So you see that in our book. You can figure it out.

Speaker 40 I have to agree with Marjorie Taylor Greene on this one thing.

Speaker 38 She's getting a surprising amount of love on this.

Speaker 40 The fun part of it. It It is a fun read.

Speaker 40 And you do need a little break, honestly, I think.

Speaker 40 You need a break, right?

Speaker 19 If you want to take a step away from all the chaos of the news cycle, read a story about a potential homicide and relax a little bit.

Speaker 18 Exactly.

Speaker 16 I guess it's curious, even hearing you guys talk about this.

Speaker 45 Like, I'm curious about where the genesis for some of these ideas are.

Speaker 45 Clearly, President Clinton, you come to this book with some ideas about what it feels like to be in the White House, some of the push and pull, the dynamics that exist within politics at that level.

Speaker 45 And James, you come into this, I'm sure, is it murder first?

Speaker 28 Is it story first? Is it plot first?

Speaker 40 It's always character first.

Speaker 19 It's always character first.

Speaker 40 But interestingly with this book, and we agreed, about halfway through, it wasn't working. Really? And that's never happened with us before.

Speaker 40 And he called up and he said, I don't like any of the characters.

Speaker 10 And I said, I agree.

Speaker 18 I don't either.

Speaker 40 So we had to really go back and work on the characters.

Speaker 7 We agree.

Speaker 8 But it's all character for me.

Speaker 2 It's all character.

Speaker 40 Alice Cross.

Speaker 40 It's all character.

Speaker 40 We all have to deal with our balancing, not all of us, but family and then work. That's what Alex has to do.
He's this detective, and it's obviously over-the-top detective work.

Speaker 40 Then he's got to go home.

Speaker 40 And that's the series that's on

Speaker 40 Amazon. He's balancing those two things.

Speaker 45 Do you struggle with the fact of writing empathetic characters in the White House, looking at the White House now, wondering, are there any empathetic characters in the White House?

Speaker 7 We always

Speaker 7 agree

Speaker 7 on trying to do an outline

Speaker 7 and then sometimes we try

Speaker 7 and then sometimes the plot takes us away. This is the third book we've done together

Speaker 7 and

Speaker 7 so far

Speaker 7 we agree on the outline.

Speaker 7 Then he gives me a list of 20 questions or more to answer to make sure

Speaker 7 that we're being authentic.

Speaker 40 Yeah, I mean that's a key thing.

Speaker 40 I mean I just make up stuff in my regular books but with this I have to pass the test of well that would never happen or here's how it would happen or here's what the citizen would do.

Speaker 16 You pop quizzes. It's a good discipline.

Speaker 10 It's the right discussion.

Speaker 40 And then he'll be fixing stuff for you.

Speaker 31 What parts have you done three books now?

Speaker 21 Your view of the presidency before you started writing these films?

Speaker 45 What did you get wrong initially? Everything.

Speaker 40 Now, you know, the thing that, and we tried to do it before about just humanizing. I mean, unfortunately, we've gotten into a habit of demonizing everybody.

Speaker 40 And I know the show does it, and it's a lot of fun, and it's funny.

Speaker 18 But ideally...

Speaker 8 Let me give you a quick.

Speaker 11 Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool.

Speaker 8 You're right about murder, man.

Speaker 18 Yeah, but

Speaker 40 there's only one, there may or may not be one murderer in this book, but everybody else needed to make them human. And the thing, let me give you a quick thing on

Speaker 40 this past summer, the president called the House, and my wife Sue was on it. He said, let me show you this, put it on picture phone.

Speaker 40 And there he was with his grandkids, and he's in a tiger suit, and only his face is showing. Human being.

Speaker 40 We need to do more of that, I think.

Speaker 2 Yeah. Human being.

Speaker 5 Human being.

Speaker 40 I don't know how we would do it with certain characters, but you know, because

Speaker 18 I don't know who that would be.

Speaker 15 You think that humanizes the president, suddenly saying that he's wearing a tiger suit at home?

Speaker 32 I think that makes me worry about the president.

Speaker 33 Well, are you okay, President Clinton?

Speaker 8 Kind of like with wardrobe at home?

Speaker 7 My grandkids thought it was great.

Speaker 40 If you're doing it with a four-year-old, it's okay. You're doing it with your girlfriend, it's a little weird.

Speaker 16 Not him. No judgment, man.

Speaker 10 No judgment. Good point.
Good point.

Speaker 13 Do you know when this book is going to be banned by the Trump administration?

Speaker 7 I was actually trying to think if there's some reason they could think of to ban it.

Speaker 40 They don't need it.

Speaker 40 It wouldn't be the White House, but in certain counties they may all of a sudden. And they don't need a reason.
They just go in. One person goes in, I don't like the book.
I go, okay, we'll ban it.

Speaker 40 So it'll probably be banned in a couple of counties.

Speaker 7 I don't like it. It's a bad deal.

Speaker 7 When

Speaker 7 Maya Angelou, who read the inaugural poem at my first inauguration, wrote it and read it, and was a great human being.

Speaker 7 The first thing the White House did was to ban her book, I Know Why the Cage Bird Sings

Speaker 7 at the Naval Academy Library and the Military Academy Library at West Point. And I can't figure out why.
It's a magnificent book.

Speaker 7 about a little girl who's abandoned by her parents and lives with her grandparents until she's three or four years old and her brother. Then she has to go somewhere else.

Speaker 7 while she's a child she loses the ability to speak for a couple of years because she was abused.

Speaker 7 And then she blooms.

Speaker 7 I couldn't figure out why that was a problem.

Speaker 40 So many mysteries he stayed.

Speaker 10 I don't know about that.

Speaker 35 Yeah.

Speaker 22 Do you think it's the blooming portion of it all?

Speaker 16 Do you think it has anything to do with it?

Speaker 39 Do you see an empathy for a small young black child perhaps had a little something to do with it?

Speaker 10 Yeah, we have to be on that.

Speaker 7 And she turned out to be about six feet tall and no longer small, you know.

Speaker 19 Do you think it was height? Height was the issue.

Speaker 38 Yeah, Trump is a very petty man.

Speaker 19 He's like, oh, all the books with characters over 511.

Speaker 33 Get out of here.

Speaker 7 She was a very large woman with a very deep voice and a massive talent and a great heart.

Speaker 7 And

Speaker 7 so I took a very dim view of that.

Speaker 7 We were friends. I spoke at her funeral.

Speaker 7 I didn't like it. I don't like book banning.

Speaker 7 And I wasn't ever for banning books

Speaker 7 that were full of things they said about me that weren't true. It never occurred to me that I should stop you from reading them.

Speaker 10 Yeah.

Speaker 31 You're going to have some regrets looking back on what you could have done, I'm sure. Yeah.

Speaker 13 It's interesting.

Speaker 21 In this book, another portion of this book is that the president is going after a grand bargain,

Speaker 19 which is a big, audacious bargain.

Speaker 45 I'm curious where that came in in the writing process.

Speaker 21 And in some ways, would this have been Clinton 3.0? Was this sort of an agenda that you could see for America today?

Speaker 45 And follow-up: why wasn't invading Greenland a part of that?

Speaker 40 Well, we took that part out.

Speaker 40 We didn't think it was credible.

Speaker 10 I like Greenland.

Speaker 18 I wrote it in and he took it out.

Speaker 16 This is how it starts. This is how it begins.

Speaker 7 Greenland does have a lot of rare earths and minerals

Speaker 7 that we might need someday. Denmark is a NATO allies of ours.
Instead of stealing it from them, we ought to just make a deal and have a contract like normal people do.

Speaker 7 But

Speaker 7 this grand bargain is we got problems of our own making.

Speaker 7 And part of them, the massive debt we have, which is about,

Speaker 7 it's over 100% of our annual income now,

Speaker 7 a lot of it was unavoidable because of the, we had the financial crash in 2008 and then the COVID problem

Speaker 7 only 12 years later.

Speaker 7 So when interest rates go down below inflation and stay there,

Speaker 7 you

Speaker 7 If you raise taxes

Speaker 7 or you

Speaker 7 do other things to tighten the economy, you'll just make it worse. So in those narrow instances, we had to spend more money than we were taking in to get any kind of economic activity.

Speaker 7 But you can't do it forever.

Speaker 7 And

Speaker 7 so we need to stop that now. And

Speaker 7 Therefore, I think this latest budget sent to Congress by the administration was a mistake because it's going to make it worse. It's like saying, okay, the economy is doing fine now.

Speaker 7 We have relatively low unemployment. We have relatively low inflation and it's getting better.
And let's make it worse now and have a huge increase in debt.

Speaker 7 I don't think it makes sense, and I think we'll regret it.

Speaker 45 I mean, I think some of the critique right now is that Republicans seem to be the party that wants to be fiscally responsible, but they get in power and they don't act on that.

Speaker 45 Do you believe it's insincere?

Speaker 7 Yeah, it's all rhetoric.

Speaker 7 We doubled the debt when President Reagan was in office.

Speaker 7 We've been a country for a long time by 1980, and we doubled the debt in eight years. And then we increased it by another 50%

Speaker 7 under President Bush.

Speaker 7 And he tried to do something about it. He signed a budget passed by the Congress under the leadership of

Speaker 7 the committee chair Leon Panetta who later became my chief of staff and President Obama's CIA chief.

Speaker 7 Then

Speaker 7 after

Speaker 7 the second President Bush got elected, the first thing he did was to pass a big tax cut again.

Speaker 7 He had a little bit of a recession

Speaker 7 to deal with

Speaker 7 six months or something.

Speaker 7 So if he had said, let's do this for a year so I can avoid a recession or minimize it, I would have supported it.

Speaker 7 But he wanted to make it permanent. And that's their, it's almost theology with them.
There's no such thing as a bad tax cut unless it helps poor people.

Speaker 40 But in the book,

Speaker 40 there is a solution that's proposed by the President. And what we do, which is appropriate for a suspense novel, we kind of build up suspense about what is it until the very end of the book.
Yeah.

Speaker 40 Yeah. Which is appropriate, I think, in this kind of thing.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I figured, look, it's a book. I mean, it's a mystery.
So we couldn't write a 30-page

Speaker 7 thing, but I tried to give an outline of.

Speaker 45 Was that the initial pitch of like, and the last 30 pages is sort of an outline for the plan for economic stability in America?

Speaker 16 And James is like, no, let's keep it to two.

Speaker 10 Not two, not two, but yeah, not 30.

Speaker 7 I tried to show

Speaker 7 that you could make a difference, you could make a change. Yeah.
And we went through these two deep holes. So I don't expect anybody

Speaker 7 to be able to solve this in four years.

Speaker 7 I didn't expect President Trump to be able to. But you

Speaker 7 got to follow the first rule. First, if you're in a hole, stop digging.

Speaker 11 Anyway.

Speaker 11 And then

Speaker 7 I was hoping there would be a balanced program to get us out. And that's what all this doge was sold as.

Speaker 7 But if you look at everything that

Speaker 7 Mr. Musk was working on before he went back to selling Teslas,

Speaker 7 all of it together is a tiny slice of our budget. Most of our budget goes to

Speaker 7 health care, Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, veterans health,

Speaker 7 defense, and the slice that he's got is not very big. You can't possibly solve a problem this big with a budget that's this and it's our future budget.

Speaker 7 If you ask yourself, why is America leading the world now? It's because of our lead in technology

Speaker 7 and in biomedical research especially and lots of other areas. So that's what they want to cut.

Speaker 7 It's a mistake.

Speaker 7 You don't.

Speaker 7 This is like, well, I love watching this,

Speaker 7 the NBA Finals. These teams have been great.

Speaker 8 Sure, yeah.

Speaker 2 What are you rooting for?

Speaker 31 Are you an OKC guy?

Speaker 34 Well, Pacers fan?

Speaker 25 Knicks initially, right?

Speaker 7 I like them both.

Speaker 18 Still the politician.

Speaker 10 I don't know.

Speaker 7 I was

Speaker 7 with Oklahoma City when it was bombed, and I've been with them ever since because of what they did with what they suffered.

Speaker 7 It's an unrecognizable place today because they worked together

Speaker 7 and they had an ethic, as they said, of

Speaker 7 kindness and hard work.

Speaker 7 It's worked.

Speaker 7 But I was not prepared for how good Indiana was.

Speaker 7 I mean,

Speaker 7 it's fun watching them.

Speaker 7 So,

Speaker 7 you know, I went in

Speaker 7 for Oklahoma City, and I haven't stopped liking them, but

Speaker 7 it's amazing the courage that Indiana has shown every time they're playing like this.

Speaker 45 If only our politics could get back to the legitimacy of NBA basketball.

Speaker 39 Where we can love one thing but understand

Speaker 7 what the other team brings to it all these people respect each other you can look at the

Speaker 7 and you don't see these oklahoma city guys jumping up and down because tyrese uh halberton doesn't make a lot of points because he tore up his right leg and what did he do he came back in the second half didn't score a bunch of points but he ran the offense and they did great in the second half yeah so i mean you know it's

Speaker 22 We just need to bring respect back to perhaps the New York Knicks as well, right?

Speaker 17 So they may be filling a a few of those pieces as well.

Speaker 10 More of the Knicks did great this year.

Speaker 39 They did great.

Speaker 19 We could celebrate that, right?

Speaker 24 Speaking of some, this last weekend, there was a little bit of money spent in Washington, D.C.

Speaker 45 at

Speaker 19 a couple, I think, $45 million last I heard at this big birthday celebration/slash Army parade.

Speaker 45 I was curious if you guys saw that or if President Clinton, you thought about throwing one for you.

Speaker 40 I was still watching the, you know, when you were interviewing people, people are going, oh, we're cutting education, great. Oh, we're cutting cancer research, great.
What are people, nuts?

Speaker 5 We're cutting cancer research, great.

Speaker 8 We're doing stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's a unique thing. So go back to natural.

Speaker 7 We don't need cancer in this.

Speaker 8 Yeah.

Speaker 21 One of the things I noticed when I was there, there's been a lot of conversations.

Speaker 40 That's what they should do with voting. You shouldn't be able to vote if you're going to say stuff like that.

Speaker 18 I'm sorry.

Speaker 10 You can't vote.

Speaker 11 I'm sorry.

Speaker 10 You can't vote. You can't vote.
That's

Speaker 40 against cancer research and no voting.

Speaker 5 That's the line, right?

Speaker 32 It's 18, and if you're against cancer research, maybe now is not the one for you.

Speaker 22 A few other things.

Speaker 7 Well, I think the Democrats need to ask themselves, how come we can't beat that?

Speaker 7 And we need to think about it.

Speaker 10 Now,

Speaker 7 the Supreme Court's going to have to step in this time, it seems like, because they seemed to say last year in two decisions, well, yeah,

Speaker 7 the president might commit a crime, but as long as he thinks it's the right thing to do, it by definition can't be criminal. Who ever heard of that?

Speaker 45 You see what happened this weekend as well with the No Kings protest.

Speaker 10 Five million people. Five million.

Speaker 16 Five million people to show up.

Speaker 17 There's definitely an energy there.

Speaker 45 When I talk to a lot of people who are progressive, I think they're frustrated. They're angry.

Speaker 20 many are scared.

Speaker 45 They don't know what the best use of their energy is or where to put that. I think this no Kings

Speaker 45 show-in was one way of a show of force. I think when you talk about the flaws, the Democrats unable to put up a defense against people who are anti-cancer, like where should that energy,

Speaker 19 where should that go?

Speaker 7 First of all, I think...

Speaker 7 I think Biden had a successful four years. He did a good job, I think.

Speaker 7 But we didn't have enough of a campaign on the back end. And I think it's a little unfair to say it's Camela Harris's fault because she didn't ask for the circumstances which were visited on her.

Speaker 7 So now we've got

Speaker 7 what they have to do, the people in Washington, is they do need to show what's wrong with this budget. and do their best to beat it or get changes in it and keep going.

Speaker 7 But

Speaker 7 it's not an election yet.

Speaker 7 And I think we need other people to come up with ideas. That's why we wrote the book, The Way We Dead, Partly,

Speaker 7 just to say, you can be a Republican or a Democrat and be for this. This makes common sense.
And we've gotten too far away from that. We're so interested in demeaning and debasing and name-calling.

Speaker 7 And

Speaker 7 President Trump's been richly rewarded for that, for being able to just divide and distract people.

Speaker 40 You know, I learned early on, in terms of life lessons, that skepticism is absolutely healthy and terrific, and cynicism is poison.

Speaker 50 Yeah.

Speaker 45 But what do you say to the young person who sees what's happening in Los Angeles and sees people standing up, upset about their neighbors being deported, and suddenly the National Guard being brought in?

Speaker 40 Protest and vote.

Speaker 21 Protest and vote.

Speaker 40 You can do things, though. Don't talk about it.

Speaker 11 Look.

Speaker 17 people,

Speaker 7 like, you know, a lot of the lawyers talk to me about

Speaker 7 the Supreme Court decisions, which seem to say that once you're president,

Speaker 7 you can't break the law. You can just do whatever you think is right.
And if it's against the law, you just say you thought it was the right thing to do.

Speaker 7 And I thought, well, there's an easy way to fix it.

Speaker 7 They said, what do you mean? The Supreme Court's six to three for them,

Speaker 7 maybe five to four.

Speaker 7 And I always say,

Speaker 7 if you elect a Democrat president,

Speaker 7 they will have an epiphany.

Speaker 7 And all of a sudden they'll rediscover the separation of powers and the things that, and constitutional rights and all this stuff. It'll change again.

Speaker 29 We, look,

Speaker 7 we are the longest consistently lasting

Speaker 7 democracy in history. We're not the oldest country in history, but we are the oldest democracy.
And Dwight Eisenhower, a Republican, said

Speaker 7 after he went through that mess with Joe McCarthy, he was very worried about whether we would have the mental discipline to sustain our democracy

Speaker 7 when all this happened.

Speaker 7 And today it may look so.

Speaker 7 And AI scares people. Everybody's scared of something.
But I'm just telling you,

Speaker 7 we're about to celebrate our 250th birthday. And so far, everybody that's bet against this country has lost money.

Speaker 7 So far, we have saved it.

Speaker 7 But citizens can't sit around and whine. They got to get off the bench and play the game.

Speaker 7 And if you don't like who's being elected and you don't like what they're doing, you've got to get out there and fight for it. And one of the things that we try

Speaker 7 to do in this book

Speaker 7 is to make people

Speaker 7 see that.

Speaker 7 We try to make them see democracy as

Speaker 40 and also a big thing about this book are the two journalists and who really are trying to

Speaker 40 find out the truth. And I think there are a lot of good journalists who do that.

Speaker 40 And we're forgetting about that. And people are going online for journalism that's written by fiction writers.

Speaker 40 Just making stuff up.

Speaker 10 That doesn't work.

Speaker 32 Not a lot of satirical comedians in this book, I notice.

Speaker 22 Oh, what? Yeah, it's surprising you didn't have more heroic, satirical comedians.

Speaker 40 That's the next book.

Speaker 16 That could be the next book.

Speaker 34 Before I let you guys go.

Speaker 55 You're a solomaniac.

Speaker 36 I like this.

Speaker 17 That's going to sell.

Speaker 12 That'll definitely sell. Can I maybe get in on some of the royalties writing a book like that with you guys?

Speaker 35 I guess we won't do that one.

Speaker 14 Before I let you guys go,

Speaker 45 I want to get your thoughts on what's happening in the news today. I think we covered this in the first act talking about Iran.

Speaker 45 You've sat at the table. You've tried to negotiate peace in the Middle East.
And we have Donald Trump talking about whether he's somebody who's going to summon that, bring that forth.

Speaker 21 There's a lot of questions as what the next steps are going to be. I think as somebody who sits and watches that, who's been in similar positions, like, what do you hope for? What advice do you have?

Speaker 7 First of all,

Speaker 7 they're not talking about negotiating peace in the Middle East because the

Speaker 7 Israelis have no intention of

Speaker 7 under

Speaker 7 Prime Minister Netanyahu giving the Palestinians a state and now they're too divided and crushed to organize themselves to achieve it.

Speaker 7 So and President Trump apparently agrees with that, that they shouldn't have a state.

Speaker 7 But you don't want a disaster either.

Speaker 7 And

Speaker 7 Mr. Netanyahu has long wanted to fight Iran because

Speaker 7 that way he can stay in office forever and ever. He's been there most of the last 20 years.

Speaker 7 But

Speaker 7 I think we should be trying to diffuse it.

Speaker 7 And I hope President Trump will do that.

Speaker 7 I hope anybody there will do that. We've got to stop.
We've got to convince our friends in the Middle East that we'll stand with them and try to protect them.

Speaker 7 But

Speaker 7 choosing

Speaker 7 undeclared wars in which the primary victims are civilians who are not politically involved one way or the other, just want to live decent lives, is not a very good solution.

Speaker 7 Do I think that we have to try to stop Iran from having a nuclear weapon? I do. I tried at that, and we had some success.

Speaker 7 But we don't have to have all this outright constant killing of civilians who can't defend themselves and they just want a chance to live.

Speaker 53 Well said.

Speaker 20 As successful authors with the book number two on the New York Times bestsellers listen.

Speaker 40 It wasn't my first wish, but it was my second wish.

Speaker 16 It's still a very good wish.

Speaker 22 I'm curious, as authors, can you tell me, do you guys know how the American story will end?

Speaker 40 It's not going to end. Not in our lifetime.

Speaker 16 You're all about sequels, huh? Yeah.

Speaker 11 I'm telling you,

Speaker 7 the people in this audience, you think about this. If everybody in this country who's worried about it

Speaker 7 would just start talking to their neighbors and generating interest,

Speaker 7 These five million people at the No Kings rallies, they're a pretty good canary in the coal line.

Speaker 40 Yeah, I suspect this summer is going to be interesting. I think there'll be a lot of people on the streets trying to express their...

Speaker 7 Just don't give up. Keep fighting.
You've got to...

Speaker 7 But I'm telling you.

Speaker 7 President Trump, whatever you think of the previous campaigns, did win that last election.

Speaker 7 And he has a right to govern and try to do what he thinks is right. And those of us who don't agree with him have a right to say we don't agree and here's why.

Speaker 7 And you just need to fight. You can win this fight if you'll stay at it.

Speaker 18 The first gentleman is available now.

Speaker 39 President Clinton and James Patterson.

Speaker 53 We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back after this.

Speaker 53 That's our show for tonight. Now, here it is.
Come over to Dennis.

Speaker 59 The Guardian newspaper reported that pizza deliveries to the Pentagon surged right before the U.S. invasion of Panama in 1989 and Operation Desert Storm in 1991.

Speaker 59 Of course, all of this is on a need-to-know basis. That's need with a K.
Stu.

Speaker 40 Oh, you had to go there, didn't you, Ashley?

Speaker 4 Oh, you did. I did.
You did it. I had to.
Yeah, you had to just have to.

Speaker 38 Explore more shows from the Daily Show Podcast Universe by searching The Daily Show, wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 38 Watch the Daily Show weeknights at 1110 Central on Comedy Central and stream full episodes anytime on Fairmount Plus.

Speaker 4 This has been a Comedy Central podcast.

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