Bill Maher On Spurning The Likes
The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan
Andrew Sullivan
4.6 • 836 Ratings
🗓️ 24 May 2024
⏱️ 44 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Bill needs no introduction, but he’s been the formidable host of HBO’s Real Time for 21 years now, and before that he hosted Politically Incorrect, which ran from 1993 to 2002. He has a new book out, What This Comedian Said Will Shock You — a collection of his best editorials on Real Time. Also check out his podcast, “Club Random,” which he recently expanded into a pod network, Club Random Studios. Bill manages to do all of that and still perform standup on the road — schedule here.
For two clips of our convo — on Bill not caving to political correctness after 9/11, and the two of us debating the credibility of the Gospels — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Bill going to church every Sunday as a kid; his Irish-Catholic dad turning away from the Church after Pope Paul VI; how the left today is bonkers; how Biden is captured by wokeness; the toxicity of the Trump cult; getting his GOP rivals to bend the knee; Ann Coulter’s balls in opposing him; the crisis of mass illegal migration; the dickishness of DeSantis on lab meat and rainbow bridges; his sensible approach to Covid; election deniers; the remarkable progress of legal weed and marriage equality; Bill’s movie Religulous; his admiration for Jesus as a philosopher; Muhammad the invading warrior; slavery in the Bible; the conflicting accounts of the Resurrection; whether Paul was a closeted gay; Christianity starting as a bourgeois religion; the pagan origins of Christian holidays; Richard Dawkins; the rise of the nones; wokeness as a religion; Bronze Age Pervert; Lauren Boebert on church/state; American exceptionalism as Christian heresy; October 7th; the profound illiberalism of Hamas; their Nazi-like tactics; “Hamas wants to commit genocide but can’t — Israel can, but won’t”; Rafah as Dunkirk; Biden’s Morehouse speech; Trump’s insane antics as the ultimate teflon; his humor; wokeness as a gold mine for comedy; comics who cave to PC; Trump’s energy on the trail; and Bill’s grueling book tour offering insight into campaigning.
Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Nellie Bowles on the woke revolution, Noah Smith on the economy, George Will on Trump and conservatism, Lionel Shriver on her new novel, Elizabeth Corey on Oakeshott, Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy on animal cruelty; and the great Van Jones! Send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to [email protected].
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Hi there. |
| 0:28.6 | Here we are. |
| 0:29.6 | Welcome to another discast. |
| 0:32.6 | I'm particularly psyched today. |
| 0:34.6 | I have a friend and someone who has been incredibly generous to me over the years. |
| 0:40.3 | In the studio, not in the studio, he's in LA, he's been around in New York for a couple of days doing incredible amounts of coverage, which you probably see a little bit. |
| 0:50.3 | And anyway, it's Bill Maher. He needs no introduction. He's obviously been the most extraordinary host of HBO's real time for 21 years. |
| 0:57.9 | And before that, he was the host of Politically Incorrect, which ran from 1993 to 2002. |
| 1:03.9 | And his new book is called What This Comedian Said Will Shock You, and it's a collection of those monologues and those tirades and those |
| 1:13.6 | hilarious little speeches that he gives on his show. And I have to say, and I don't mean to |
| 1:20.7 | buddy you up, Bill, but I do think that those monologues have gone from being a really fun thing |
| 1:26.5 | to watch and laugh at to actually a serious |
| 1:30.0 | and important contribution to our public debate in a way that has taken more, I think it has |
| 1:37.2 | even more strength now than it had when he started. And it seems to be getting, I think, |
| 1:43.5 | bigger and better. and he also has |
| 1:45.2 | this amazing podcast club random where he gets stoned and talks to bill burr and other people |
| 1:50.8 | including me and and at the same time he has this insane work ethic where he's constantly doing |
| 1:57.4 | stand-up as well as this show and And for all those reasons, I'm really grateful |
| 2:03.0 | for you coming on the show, Bill. Well, thank you for your kind words. And, you know, |
| 2:09.2 | not to make this a log rolling in our time, but I feel similar to you, about you, rather, |
| 2:15.9 | because there's nobody who, I feel like, has more of their |
| 2:19.4 | finger on the pulse of where common sense is. And that's what I'm always looking for. That's, |
... |
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