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HBO "Real Time with Bill Maher" Season 4
* Episode 321: October 21, '05
HBO BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT
October 21, 2005
Episode #321
“REAL TIME WITH BILL MAHER”
http://www.safesearching.com/billmaher/print/transcripts.shtml

BILL MAHER
ARIANNA HUFFINGTON

TUCKER CARLSON
MICHEL MARTIN

SPIKE LEE

CHRIS WEBBER
[via satellite]

All “Real Time with Bill Maher” transcripts are prepared immediately following the initial HBO broadcast. Due to the speed with which these transcripts are prepared, complete accuracy cannot be guaranteed.

[COLD OPEN: MOCK “HOME QUALITY CHANNEL” PROGRAM FEATURING “BILL” AND “CONNIE.”

“BILL” [Bill Maher]: Connie, this next product is an item that is long overdue.

“CONNIE”: Tell me about it, Bill.

“BILL”: Shut up and I will. [laughter] You know how Christian conservatives are always forcing their beliefs on us, everything from school prayer to the Ten Commandments.

“CONNIE”: Not to mention the shame and degradation I feel every time I make hot love to my lesbian lover. [laughter]

“BILL”: Hmm? [laughter] Yeah, well, now Christian conservatives can keep their religion to themselves with the new iGod!

“CONNIE”: Christian worship without all the proselytizing?

“BILL”: That's right, lesbo! [laughter] The iGod is the very first MP3 “prayer.” It's razor-thin, light-weight, and with 30 gigabytes of memory, it can hold up to 1,000 Psalms. [laughter] And the iGod library also includes Genesis and Exodus for those who like to kick it, “Old Testament.” [laughter]

“CONNIE”: From God's mouth to your ears. This is one Apple you'd want Adam and Eve to have. [she and Bill laugh][laughter]

“BILL”: Hey, this lesbian lover. Was that the roommate you introduced me to?

“CONNIE”: [with earbuds in] I can't hear you.

“BILL”: Because if you guys ever want me to “bear witness…” [laughter] [applause] [cheers]

[OPENING CREDITS]

[applause] [cheers] [standing ovation]

BILL MAHER: Thank you very much. Thank you very much. How you doin' today? Aw, good. Aw, stop it. Sit down. Thank you so much. Thank you. I – I know why you're excited. Bush was here yesterday! Ooh. [laughter]
I tell you, traffic was so backed up, it took Lindsay Lohan two hours to flip her car over. [laughter] Wow. No, Bush came to town, and our Republican governor, Mr. Schwarzenegger, snubbed him and publicly criticized him. Bush said he was so hurt by this because his positions on stem cell research and gay marriage are totally based entirely on that movie where Arnold gets pregnant. [laughter]

Yes, the president had a big Republican fundraiser here. All the usual suspects showed up. And when I say “all the usual suspects,” I mean people who are actually under indictment. [laughter] [applause] [cheers] I know. Unbelievable! I mean, Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Dick Cheney. This is the biggest Republican collapse since Bob Dole ran out of Viagra. [laughter] [applause]

No, the White House is peeing in its pants these days because they are waiting for this prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, to hand down his indictments about this Valerie Plame affair. And the people apparently in the headlights now are Dick Cheney and Scooter Libby – Scooter Libby. [laughter] Bush is beside himself. Laura had to calm him down today. She said, “Don't worry, honey, we'll get you a new Scooter.” [laughter] [applause]

Apparently Bush is so exhausted from fighting off all of these scandals, he is praying for another emergency like a flood or an attack so he can kick back and do nothing. [laughter] [applause] [cheers] Aw, thank you. Aw, please

Speaking of kicking back and doing nothing, did you hear this, this week? The only FEMA official who was actually in New Orleans during the flood, testified before Congress. And he testified that he was furiously emailing Mike Brown that the situation was – quote – “past critical.” Three hours later, he gets back an email from Brownie's secretary that Brownie needs more time to have dinner. [laughter] Had to make a reservation and eat dinner. You know, you know you're incompetent when you can't even cut through the red tape at the Olive Garden. [laughter] [applause] Wow.

Brownie's email back to him said, “You've got people starving? I've been here 15 minutes and they haven't even taken our drink order!” [laughter] And then it was just signed, “Later.” Wow, that's…bad. [laughter

And apparently it's going to get worse. There is another big hurricane. Wilma, today, slammed into Mexico . And wouldn't you know it? Mexico didn't have insurance. [laughter] [applause] Oh, come on, you liberal ...s, laugh! [applause] [cheers] [he laughs]
http://www.safesearching.com/billmaher/print/transcripts.shtml

Hey, you all saw Saddam Hussein in court this week. Full beard, right? Put on a little weight, and insisted he was still president. I thought it was Al Gore! [laughter] [applause]

And speaking of them, hey, congratulations to Bill and Hillary Clinton, because their former home in Fayetteville just became a museum. They turned it into a museum. And right over the couch in the den, there's a sign that says, “Bill Clinton slept here.” [laughter] [applause

And finally, my favorite story of the week. I love to follow this young lady. Paris Hilton, apparently – listen to this – broke up with one Greek shipping heiress [sic] so she could go out with another Greek shipping heiress [sic]. Paris says she prefers the Greek lovers because when they make sex tapes, they're both facing the camera. [laughter]

Okay, we've got a great show. [applause] We've got Spike Lee. We've got Michel Martin and we've got Tucker Carlson here. A little later, I'll be talking with the NBA's Chris Webber.

But first, her website, the HuffingtonPost.com, has led the coverage on the White House leak scandal. Please welcome Arianna Huffington, everybody! [applause] [cheers] Hello, lady. Get over here. Thank you very much. How are you?

ARIANNA HUFFINGTON: I'm good.

MAHER: You are the sexy millionaire who has uncovered this case. So, listen, a lot of people don't know what's going on. This is a very hard case to follow. There's a lot of parts to it. You've been blogging about it now. The rest of the world has caught up. The mainstream press is writing about it. But lay it all out for them as simply as you can, and hurry up to the part where Bush gets impeached. [laughter] [applause] [cheers]

HUFFINGTON: It's actually an incredibly simple story. Don't believe anybody who tells you it's so complex. Let me tell you how it is.

MAHER: Start with the crime.

HUFFINGTON: Okay.

MAHER: What is the crime involved?

HUFFINGTON: The crime – the crime is, this is a White House that took the nation to war based on lies and deception, and used the New York Times and Judy Miller—

MAHER: [overlapping] Okay, let's—

HUFFINGTON: --to sell the war to the American people.

MAHER: [overlapping] Okay, but that's not—

HUFFINGTON: And when – hold on a second—

MAHER: [overlapping] But that's not the crime. That's not the specific crime.

HUFFINGTON: [overlapping] And when it was proved – hold on a second, hold on a second – and when it was proven that there were no WMD's, then they tried to smear everybody who was telling the truth, starting with Joe Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame. Hence, “Plamegate.”

MAHER: Okay. Okay. Well, they don't know – some people might not know who that is. Joe Wilson – okay, let's start with the crime.

HUFFINGTON: Joe Wilson—

MAHER: The crime—

HUFFINGTON: The crime—

MAHER: --was outing a CIA agent. Whether you're a Republican or a Democrat, you can't out one of our spies.

HUFFINGTON: Right.

MAHER: You can out our gay people. [laughter] I outed John Roberts – not a crime. [laughter] But he's not in this—[applause]—okay. But he's not – but this Valerie Plame was a CIA agent.

HUFFINGTON: Right, was an undercover CIA agent.

MAHER: She was married to the guy who busted Bush on telling his lies about the war. That's what it's all about.

HUFFINGTON: Exactly.

MAHER: Joe Wilson went to Africa and found out Saddam wasn't really trying to get a nuclear weapon from Africa . He was married to this CIA agent. Somebody – somebody gave reporters that name. Said, “Hey, you know what? Joe Wilson's wife works for the CIA.”

HUFFINGTON: Right.

MAHER: Outed her.

HUFFINGTON: In an effort to destroy all the president's enemies, which meant anybody who was going to tell the truth about this war and how we got into that war.

MAHER: Right. So let's go to the Judy Miller Part. She's the reporter for the New York Times who went to jail, right?

HUFFINGTON: Right.

MAHER: Went to jail to protect her sources. The Times portrayed her as a First Amendment hero.

HUFFINGTON: Hero.

MAHER: You have a different version.

HUFFINGTON: Yes, the Times portrayed her as a First Amendment hero. Compared her to Rosa Parks and Nelson Mandela. In fact, when we got her first-person account in the Times on Sunday, she couldn't even recall who her source was. Remember? She said, “I cannot recall who gave me the name “Valerie Plame.” So she actually must be—

MAHER: Which is odd, because she went to jail to protect her source.

HUFFINGTON: That source, right. [laughter] Yes, which is a little odd. Also, she demonstrated in that article that she wrote how incredibly cozy she was with Scooter Libby.

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: This was not just a journalist and a source. And that's one of the other major problems.

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: This woman was really the Shirley MacLaine of Neocon “Rat Pack.” [laughter] She was as cozy—[laughter]—she was as cozy with them—

MAHER: She had past lives as a spy? [laughter]

HUFFINGTON: We don't know that yet. But she was so cozy with them that Scooter Libby actually said to her, you know, “Don't identify me as a White House official. Identify me—

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: --as a former Capitol Hill staffer. Do you remember that?

MAHER: And then she – he wrote her a letter which looks like right out of a spy movie. This is when she got out of jail. She was in jail to protect him, saying, “I don't know if he really…” She – every other reporter thought, well, okay, he gave me permission to talk to the federal prosecutor – she wasn't sure. She went to jail.

Then he writes this letter. Listen to this: [reads] “You went into jail in the summer. It is fall now.” [laughter] “Out west, where you vacation…” See, this is how I know it's bullshit. Who talks like this? [laughter] If you vacation there, you don't have to say it. It's like bad exposition in a movie. “Ted, you're my brother.” [laughter] [reading again] “Out west, where you vacation, the aspens will already be turning. They turn in clusters.” [laughter]

HUFFINGTON: “Because – because” – let me finish – “because their roots are connected.”

MAHER: “Because their roots connect them.” [laughter] I think the source of the leak is Walt Whitman. [laughter] [applause] So…

HUFFINGTON: When Libby – if Libby is indicted, and if Rove is indicted, I think it's going to be bigger than Watergate. Because here you have – here's why – because here you have two people who are as close to the president and the vice president as anybody, right? You have basically “Bush's brain” and Scooter. [laughter]

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: Who run everything. If these two guys are indicted, basically, it's going to be for lies to protect and cover up the lies that took us to war.

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: It can't be any more serious than that. You know, nobody died because of Watergate.

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: We now have close to 2,000 American soldiers dead and tens of thousands of Iraqis.

MAHER: Okay, but let me ask you this. I've read your accounts of this from the beginning. And you were out ahead on this. But some of it seems so personal with Judith Miller. I mean, you talk about stuff about her marriage. A lot of it seemed – I read it and I go, “Why can't they solve this with nude mud-wrestling?” [laughter] [applause] I mean, honestly, when you make it so personal, don't you think you undercut your own case and give people reason to doubt it?

HUFFINGTON: There is nothing about her marriage. The only thing I said about her marriage is that while she was in jail, her husband was on a Mediterranean cruise. [laughter] Which is not exactly what you want from your husband.

MAHER: [overlapping] Well, you also implied – wait – you also implied that she had an affair when she was embedded with the troops in Iraq .

HUFFINGTON: Which was based on some sources who told me that she sent a picture of Gonzales, the guy there.

MAHER: But why throw that in with the kitchen sink? I mean, it just seems—

HUFFINGTON: Because, you know, being embedded—

MAHER: [overlapping]—to make it like chicks going—[mimes cat claws]

HUFFINGTON: No, no, no. Being embedded is part of the problem. Being embedded with the administration—

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: Being embedded with the Alpha unit she was in Iraq . [applause]

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: That is part and parcel of the problem. What happened to objective journalism? It has to be the bloggers in there, us in the blog-o-sphere, the HuffingtonPost.com and the others – who have to bring the objectivity and the truth-telling that is missing from the mainstream media. [applause] [cheers]

MAHER: So – so, look – yeah, I agree with that. So where does this all go? I mean, look into your crystal ball – you are from Transylvania . [laughter] Bush has three years left in his term. I mean, Clinton was – a groan over that – Clinton was impeached—

HUFFINGTON: Here's – here's where it goes.

MAHER: --you know, for something far less, that started with Whitewater. This is – where could this go? Where is this in two years?

HUFFINGTON: Here's where it goes. This story is bringing together two men: George W. Bush and Arthur Sulzberger, the publisher of the New York Times—

MAHER: Right.

HUFFINGTON: --who are really charter members of the “lucky sperm” club. You know, the—

MAHER: The “lucky sperm” club?

HUFFINGTON: Yeah, you know what I mean.

MAHER: I have never heard of that club.

HUFFINGTON: They got there – they got there because of who they were born to.

MAHER: Wow.

HUFFINGTON: And what we have here is basically – to paraphrase Pete Hamill – “they were born on third base and they thought they hit a triple.” And now they're busy trashing the stadium. And it's about time that we stopped them. That we stopped George W. Bush, and that we stop Sulzberger. [applause]

MAHER: Arianna Huffington, everybody! [cheers] All right, let's meet our panel. [applause] All right. Home early! [cheers] All right. He hosts “The Situation with Tucker Carlson” on MSNBC, weeknights at eleven. We get it here at eight. It's an awfully good show. Tucker Carlson right over here. [applause]

She is the Emmy Award-winning correspondent – had to rub it in – for ABC News “Nightline,” Michel Martin. How are you doing? [applause]

MICHEL MARTIN: Good, thanks.

MAHER: And you all know this guy, a big-time movie director whose new book is, Spike Lee: That's My Story and I'm Sticking to It. Mr. Spike Lee! [applause] [cheers]

SPIKE BILL: Hi, Bill.

MAHER: Okay. So, let me start off picking up what we were talking about with Arianna Huffington there. When this story first broke a couple of years ago, Helen Thomas, who I love dearly – Helen, come on our show, would you, please? I have a big crush on Helen Thomas. [applause] She said to the president, “Mr. President, why don't you just call in all your aides and staffers and ask them who did the leak?” [laughter] That's still a good question, isn't it? What was all the bullshit? Why didn't he just do that?