Guests on this program were:

• David Cross
• Dinesh D'Souza
• Quincy Jones
• Sharon Lawrence

Bill's Monologue-

[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: Thank you very much, folks.
Thank you very much.
Thank you so much.
Well, thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.
Boy, the country's still buzzing about this nanny verdict.

[ Laughter ]

And of course -- well, it is.
Of course, this being America, you know, already -- already Louise Woodward, the nanny, has been offered over $100,000 to sell her story to a magazine.
The endorsement deals are coming in.
She took one today, I think in bad taste, for a diet program.
A shake for breakfast, a shake for lunch --

[ Laughter ]

Bad taste, I think.

[ Applause ]

Well, did you have off work today? Anybody have off work today? Because it is --

[ Applause ]

Yeah? That's why you're drunk.
I see.

[ Laughter ]

No.
It's Veterans Day, of course.
The one day of the year when President Clinton says to the press "Why don't we talk about Paula Jones?"

[ Laughter ]

See, 'cause he didn't go to war, so he would rather talk about that than war, yeah.
Do you follow the news at all?

[ Applause ]

No, no.
Please, please.
I tell ya.

[ Laughter ]

You really can't assume anything.
Well, have you been following the problems in Iraq? I'm sure you have.
But it's getting desperate now.
This is the eighth day in a row that Iraq has rejected the U.N. inspectors, including the American inspectors, and their excuses for rejecting them are getting more and more lame.
Today they said they weren't allowing them in because they had on jeans.
Now, ladies and gentlemen --

[ Laughter and Applause ]

Stop it.
Hey.
That applause is hypocritical.

[ Laughter ]

Well, another story which -- I have no hope for, is Jiang Zemin.

[ Laughter ]

Jiang Zemin of China, remember him? He was over here in this country a couple weeks ago.
He is hosting Boris Yeltsin, a very important international summit.
Gives you an idea of the state of diplomacy.
They spent the entire press conference talking about-- Yeltsin and Jiang Zemin-- about how much they enjoyed being grandfathers.
Of course, being a grandfather in China is a little different.
Jiang Zemin has a bumper sticker on his car that says "Ask Mia Farrow about my granddaughters."

[ Audience groans ]
[ Very light applause ]

Please.
And finally, Marv Albert.
A story you may have been following.
Continues his repatriation tour.
Tonight he did his stint on "Larry King."
And there was a meeting of the minds.
Larry King and Marv -- Larry King apparently does not understand Marv Albert at all.
'Cause Larry King said to him, "If you wanted a series of brief sexual encounters with a lot of women, why not just get married?"

[ Laughter and applause ]

Thanks for coming.
It's all been satirized for your protection.

[ Cheers and applause ]

Panel Discussion-

Bill: All righty.
Welcome to the show.
Let us meet our panel.
He is the best-selling author of "Illiberal Education" and "The End of Racism."
His new one is "Ronald Reagan, How an Ordinary Man Became an Extraordinary Leader."
Dinesh D'Souza.

[ Applause ]

Yes, sir.
Nice to see you again, sir.
He is the Emmy-winning co-star of HBO's "Mr. Show," with Bob and David, my favorite show.
David Cross, yes, sir.

[ Applause ]

How are you, buddy?

David: Good.

Bill: She's the star of "Fired up" on that must-see network, Sharon Lawrence! Hey!

[ Applause ]

Sharon: Hey, Bill.

Bill: How are you, hon?

Sharon: Good.

Bill: Good to see you.
He's a multi-Grammy, Oscar, Emmy-winning producer and multimedia entrepreneur -- the multilegendary Quincy Jones!

[ Applause ]

Quincy, how you doing? Okay.

[ Applause ]

All right.
Well, we're going to talk about Ronald Reagan here to start.
I read in "Newsweek" a couple of weeks ago that they found out that ketchup actually had cancer-fighting properties, which I thought was really funny, because Reagan, as you all remember, said at one point -- ketchup was a vegetable.
Everybody laughed at him.
Turned out he was right, okay?

[ Laughter ]

David: You know, the Bible says "And a child shall lead them."

[ Laughter ]

So let's keep that in mind.

Bill: He did appear to be dim.

[ Laughter ]

And my question is, was it like David says, "A child shall lead them"? Was he so dim that it worked, or was he really of a master plan? Was he really a genius?

Dinesh: Well, he wasn't an intellectual.
In fact, he didn't want to be an intellectual.
He went to his alma mater Eureka college, where he was a "C" student.
And he said to the students, and he was President at the time, he said, "You know, even now I wonder what I would have accomplished if I'd studied harder."

[ Light laughter ]

Bill Clinton --

Bill: See --

Quincy: Nobody can touch Quayle on that.

Bill: Nobody can touch Quayle? As far as stupid?

Quincy: This is the original nine.

Dinesh: Well, the thing about Reagan, if I may say so, was his vision.
Which is to say he was not a captive to the issues of the moment.
He was able to imagine the world differently than it was and to pursue his goals resolutely.
He had conviction, he was willing take action, and he communicated with the American people.

Bill: But he did sort of make greed and stupidity glorified.

[ Laughter ]

David: He also seemed to be greatly distant from the real populous.
And most of the people in America.

Dinesh: Is that why they re-elected him twice, and is that why he left office the most popular President?

David: Well, how many people voted? How many people voted in that election?

Dinesh: Well, by that criterion, every President is illegitimate.

David: Well, perhaps.
Yeah, perhaps so.

[ Laughter ]

Yes, perhaps, maybe.

[ Laughter and applause ]

Bill: But Reagan was different.
I would say that he really was different, and for better or for worse.
I mean, he was a guy who had a couple of very simple ideas.
And that's what I'm asking.
Is it -- ?

Dinesh: I mean, look, here you have these guys now, the Republicans and you have Clinton.
They sit around with their focus groups and their pollsters and their consultants, and they say, "Tell us what the American people think.
We want to do something that's in sync with the American people."
Now Reagan -- Reagan didn't go and ask people, "Should I invade Grenada?
Should I fire the air traffic controllers?"
He felt that there was a right and a wrong.
He was willing to take action.
And after he acted, then he would make his case with the American people.
See, you at least have to admire the man's vision and his courage, even if you don't agree with him.

Bill: I do.
I do.
But on the other hand, he thought trees caused pollution.

[ Laughter ]

Dinesh: And he was right.

Quincy: Trees do cause pollution.

Bill: Trees do cause pollution?

Quincy: They do.

David: Get rid of them!

Sharon: I haven't heard this.

David: Get rid of them!

[ Laughter ]

Put up plastic trees.
More plastic trees.

[ Laughter ]

Bill: Wait.
Shut up and let her talk.

[ Laughter ]

Sharon: When Reagan was voted in, I was in college, and not really savvy enough or certainly capitalistic-minded enough to necessarily care about the economy that he was promoting, or even some of his diplomatic policies, but he was smoother.
He was more photogenic.
He did have a background, a history, a charismatic sort of stance that I think we all have to admit we are prey to in this country.

Bill: Isn't that why we have Clinton?

Sharon: I think that has a lot to do with it.

Bill: Doesn't the best performer always get elected?

Sharon: Oftentimes.

Quincy: Let's be realistic.
It's still about show business.

Sharon: That's what I'm saying.

Quincy: Its about television, coaches and how to speak properly, how to sit, how to look at the camera.
And it's a popularity poll.

Bill: Right.

Quincy: Say the right things to the right group of people.

Bill: I notice when you have Clinton on "Vibe," you called him Bill.

Quincy: I know.
And I was addressed for it very severely by a lot of people.

[ Laughter ]

And they're sure that black people have no idea what protocol means.

[ Laughter ]

A throat medicine, you know.
Protocol.
But the problem was, these guys they called me Q. So I saw him at dinner tonight, two tonights before, Lou Wattsman, and you just flipped.
We had to go on fast.
We had to shoot earlier than we expected to, and we weren't prepared to get into a lot of protocol.
And so I just cut to the shortcut and say Sweet William, or Bill.
I didn't say Sweet William, though.

[ Laughter ]

Bill: Okay.
We've got to take a break.
We'll be right back.

[ Applause ]

Bill: Okay.
We were talking about Presidents.
Clinton came up.

Quincy: I just wanted to finish my other statement by saying that no matter what, show business or not, for 30 years I've waited for a President to get in the White House that understands the street.
Because it's very scary to have a man in charge of this country that doesn't speak at that -- understand what's -- but fashion, culture, everywhere in the world.
Whether it's Switzerland, Buenos Aires, or China, or music or culture, whatever, it's all molded by the street.

Bill: And you think Clinton does?

Quincy: Especially today.

[ Laughter ]

Yes, I do.

Bill: Really?

Quincy: More than any President we've had in history.

Bill: Right.

Dinesh: However --

[ Applause ]

Quincy: Anybody that can make the statement, you know, in the last 20 years, that speaks to the street on television and says, "Just say no to drugs," you know, does not understand the street.

Bill: I know, but --

[ Applause ]

But you think if you said to Bill Clinton -- "Let's spark up the chronic and listen to Biggie."

[ Laughter ]

That he would know remotely what you were talking about?

Quincy: I think he would surprise you.

Bill: Really?

Quincy: Yeah, I think he would surprise you, yeah.

Bill: Well, let's try it.

[ Laughter ]

Quincy: Yeah, I do, I do.

Sharon: What about Gore?

Quincy: The saxophone player.

Dinesh: Well, take the long view for a moment.
History is not going to ask whether Bill Clinton understood this or that record.
I mean, Reagan will go down in history as the man who won the Cold War, who revived the American economy and the American spirit after there was this malaise.

Quincy: What American spirit?

Dinesh: The American spirit was pretty down in the '70s.
You had inflation, you had the gas prices --

Quincy: Which America, though?

Dinesh: Well --

Bill: Yeah.

Dinesh: The majority of Americans.

Bill: The majority.

David: See, that's where I have a fundamental disagreement with you.
I don't think it's the majority.
And I think as long as people keep calling it that -- nobody ever corrects it or stands up and says -- because so many people don't have a voice.
There are 270 million people in this country and most of them don't have a voice.
They don't get heard.

Dinesh: But you're speaking for them.

[ Applause ]

David: No.
I'm speaking for me.

Dinesh: All right.

David: But you can't say that Reagan spoke for me or that you speak for me.
That's incorrect.

Dinesh: Well, I'm saying Reagan got a lot more votes than Clinton.

Bill: Right.

Dinesh: And so if we're going to use any objective standard --

Quincy: He didn't speak to me.

Dinesh: Well, he didn't speak for you, all right.
But in a Democratic society, when we want to make a decision, just as with a jury, we go around the table, everyone gets one vote.
You don't get to vote against 100 other people.

Bill: But isn't part of America also that you don't leave people behind? I disagree with you.
I think Reagan did speak for the majority.
That still leaves millions out in the cold.
I mean, when he made his speech for re-election, he said, "I see a shining city on the hill."
And then Mario Cuomo said, "But you know what? There's another city where they're doing a lot of crack."

Dinesh: Well, I think that's right.
And the problem is that we are in a society now where those inequalities have gotten even worse.
There's no question we that have an underclass, for example --

Bill: But you're the guy that wrote the book, "The End of Racism."
You think racism is over.
I can't even believe it's over for you.

[ Laughter ]

Quincy: You said that?

[ Applause ]

They have a different time --
now you're from India, right?

Dinesh: I'm not saying that racism is over.
What I am saying is that if you live in the inner city of Washington, D.C., or Chicago, your problems have a lot more to do with broken families, with gangs, with crack, you can go for days without even seeing a white guy.
The police sergeant is black, the school establishment is run by blacks, so my point is if you keep defining the problem as "Those racists out there," you're chasing a demon.
You'd do much better to focus on building capital, building entrepreneurship, building education.

David: 'Cause it's classicism, that's the true demon in this country.
It's classicism.

[ Applause ]

Bill: But to build entrepreneurship, don't you have to go to the bank?
And that's a place where you probably won't see a black guy.

Dinesh: Well, actually --

[ Applause ]

Bill: I have to take a break.
We'll come back to this very issue and point when we come back.

[ Applause ]

Bill: Okay, we had got on to talking about race relations.
And I know you advocate the repeal of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which -- that is a pretty radically conservative point of view.
That's largely considered a fairly essential piece of fair play in this country.

Dinesh: I don't advocate the repeal of it now.

Bill: Yes, you do.
Don't put the out on me.

[ Laughter ]

It's in your book.
Do not put the out.
It is in your book.

Dinesh: I've never been accused of that before.
But let me tell you this --

[ Laughter ]

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlaws two kinds of discrimination.
Public discrimination, discrimination by the government, and private discrimination.
Private discrimination means if I have a job, if I have a house, it tells me what I can do with that.
Now, what I'm saying is, we want to move to a society where the government can't discriminate.
We have a right to be equal under the law.

Bill: But you're saying --

Dinesh: But I'm saying private people should be free to discriminate against blacks, in favor of blacks, against whites, in favor of whites.

Bill: That's pretty radical.

Dinesh: That's the society we want to move to.

Bill: That's a pretty radical statement.

Quincy: You and Reagan are pretty tight, right?

[ Laughter ]

You guys spend a lot of time together, you wrote a book.
He lives two blocks from me in Bel Air.
He lives at what used to be 666 --

Bill: Right.

Quincy: I won't say that.

[ Laughter ]

Bill: Right.

Quincy: I want to say something.
Straight up, straight up to the East Gates of Bel Air.
I dare you to walk up after midnight and go to his house.
Try walking in there at 12:30 tonight and go up to his house.
We'll see exactly how you feel after that.
I dare you.

Dinesh: Right, right.
But isn't the point -- doesn't that point cut against you.
I couldn't get to his house, but you can.
Because you've got the money, and he does.

Quincy: It's not about that.
I had problems too, man.
I want you to walk with me up there.

[ Laughter ]

Dinesh: I'm sure I'd be fine.

Quincy: At two blocks, you can't tell who's who.
You know?

Bill: Let me tell you, neither one of you could get a cab above 80th street in New York City.

Dinesh: And why is that?

Bill: Easily.
Because there is racism and prejudice, which you say it doesn't still exist.

Dinesh: No, that's not the reason you can't get a cab.
The reason you can't get a cab in a lot of inner cities is because the crime rates are very high.
And the cab drivers, a lot of whom are black or who are immigrants, are careful about whom they pick up, because they don't want to get that bullet in the head.
That's the reason, it's not bigotry, pure and simple.

Quincy: Oh my God.

Bill: But that's not racism?

Dinesh: Well, is it racism?

[ Talking over each other ]

Quincy: More than that, is that they could go into Harlem.
You know, usually it's a total difference between the white and black cab drivers and the Puerto Rican cab drivers in New York.
I've had my arm almost torn off, you know, at midnight in New York trying to get a cab.
Because they think you're going to Harlem.

Bill: Right.

Sharon: So that indeed supports what you're talking about in terms of private sector ability to discriminate.

Bill: That's right.

Sharon: That's right.
That's right.

Quincy: But I don't want to defend that, though.

Sharon: But you're talking about public transportation.

Dinesh: Look, I'd be upset if I didn't get a cab.
But my right not to be inconvenienced is trumped, in my opinion, by the cab driver's right to protect his life and security.

Bill: But how wrong is it that his arm is being -- and, he's, "I've won eight Emmys!"

Quincy: I'm a musician, man.

Bill: "I know Michael Jackson, I produced the whole --"

Quincy: Why stop in the first place?

Dinesh: But how many cab drivers get to know their clients personally?
The cab driver doesn't know that.
He's forced to make a group judgment.

David: So your solution is just to be able to allow anybody to say anybody who's octoroon, say, down, you know, could not --
"You're not getting in the cab, you know, because there's a really high chance that you're going to pull a gun on me because that's what darker people do."

Dinesh: But that overstates the danger of crime.
I mean, cab drivers want to get a fare.
It is generally late at night.
Cab drivers are more cautious.
And the point is they don't just look at race.
They look at gender.
It is much easier for a woman to get a cab than a man.
If three 65-year-old blacks come out of the Hyatt-Regency, they have no problem getting a cab.
We're talking about people who dress a certain way, look a certain way, send a certain kind of signal.
And the cab driver takes that into account.

David: You're talking about Catholic school girls, and I wish you'd stop.

[ Laughter ]

[ Applause ]

Sharon: And Catholic school girls are raised in a segregated environment, aren't they?

David: Yes.

Sharon: They are.
Catholic school girls oftentimes, I mean, if it's a single sex school.
Our natural selection, our natural choice to segregate ourselves --

Bill: Right.

Sharon: -- Has as much an effect on us as whether or not the public or, say, politics and the government is going to demand it.
I mean, we're obviously seeing that more and more.
People choosing segregation.

Bill: You're right.
Yes. Including blacks.

Sharon: Obviously.
That's what I'm talking about.
It happens everywhere.

Bill: Colleges, black dorms, they want -- yes.

Sharon: That's right.
Are we benefiting from that?
When will we know?
How will we know?

Dinesh: Well, that's part of the -- I mean, there is a natural solidarity among people, not necessarily based on race, but based on culture.
And that's of what I'm getting at, is that, you know, if you go into a Korean grocery store in Washington, D.C., and you look in the back, 15 other Koreans.
Now, are they violating the Civil Rights Act of '64? Yes.

Sharon: Because they're killing dogs.

Dinesh: Because the Civil Rights Act of '64 --

[ Laughter ]

But they're doing it together.

Bill: But when somebody says to you in that store, "Buy something or get out!"
Don't you feel a little put upon?
Don't you feel that we should redress that in our society?

Dinesh: How would you redress it?
What would you have me do?
You would want to make that kind of statement illegal?

David: I want to go back to the --
so you've been to --
you go to the back of Korean grocery stores and go --

[ Laughter ]

Dinesh: I've peeked.
Take the Pakistani cab company in New York.

David: Where does that come from?

Dinesh: You go to "Ebony" magazine, everybody who works there is black.
My point is, you want to outlaw this in the name of some principle?
You want to force people to be nondiscriminatory in their private lives?

David: So there are two things you've said that --
So everyone that works at "Ebony" is black.

Quincy: That's not true.
That's not true.

Dinesh: I didn't say everyone, I said the majority.

Quincy: Absolutely not true.

David: I don't think you did say that.
You did say everyone.

Bill: I think he meant "Jet."

[ Laughter ]

But I have to take a break.
We'll be right back.

Nick V.O.: Join us tomorrow when our guests will be David Boaz, Dee Dee Myers, Peri Gilpin and Bobcat Goldthwait.

[ Applause ]

Bill: All right, we just have time to plug.
Which you richly deserve, 'cause this is one of those shows where everybody lined up against one guy.
You handled it with such grace, as you always do.

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