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Who's Bill This Time

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: The following show was taped before a live audience.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

BILL KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR news quiz. Get quarantined in my stateroom. I'm your Carni-Bill Cruise...

(LAUGHTER)

KURTIS: ...Bill Kurtis. And here is your host at the Chase Bank Auditorium in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal.

PETER SAGAL, HOST:

Thank you, Bill.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Thank you, everybody. Thank you. We have a really fine show for you today. And it's not only going to be a good one. It will be useful because later on, we're going to be talking to Karamo Brown from "Queer Eye." He's the guy whose specialty isn't fixing your hair or your clothes but fixing your life. He has put together on that show so many moving moments and reconciliations, you could power a hydroelectric dam with the tears.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: So we'll give him a chance to fix all of your problems as soon as he fixes ours. But in the meantime, give us a call. The number is 1-888-WAIT-WAIT - that's 1-888-924-8924.

Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.

AMANDA LONG: Hi. This is Amanda Long from Falls Church, Va.

SAGAL: Falls Church - that's one of those rustic places that's now, like, a suburb, right?

LONG: Exactly - lots of Best Buys and TJ Maxxes and...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Oh, how quaint.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: I do love to go down through the rolling Virginia hills to see the Best Buy.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Welcome to the show, Amanda. Let me introduce you to our panel. First, she's a writer whose solo show "Approval Junkie" opens off-Broadway for a limited run starting March 17 at Audible's Minetta Lane Theatre in New York. It's Faith Salie.

FAITH SALIE: Hey, Amanda.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Next, it's the author of The New York Times best-selling "Mobituaries: Great Lives Worth Reliving" and host of the Mobituaries podcast. It's Mo Rocca.

(APPLAUSE)

MO ROCCA: Hi, Amanda.

LONG: Hello, Mo.

SAGAL: And making his debut on our program today, he's a comedian who was a writer on "The Good Place" and "The Late Late Show With James Corden." He hosts Everything's Great every month at the Dynasty Typewriter in LA. It's Demi Adejuyigbe.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: So we're all here, and it's time to get started. You're going to play Who's Bill This Time. Bill Kurtis is going to read you three quotations from the week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain two of them, you'll win our prize - any voice from our show you might choose on your voicemail. Are you ready?

LONG: I'm ready.

SAGAL: All right. Here's your first quote. It's a man having a moment of confusion Tuesday evening.

KURTIS: This is my wife. This is my sister. They switched on me.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: There was somebody who might have been a little confused as to who his family was but knew that he won big on Super Tuesday. Who was it?

LONG: That's Joe Biden.

SAGAL: It is Joe Biden.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

SAGAL: Amazingly, Joe Biden came from nowhere and took back front-runner status from Bernie Sanders. It was just like that classic fable, "The Tortoise And The Slightly Older Tortoise."

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Biden now has to consolidate the splintered Democratic Party under his banner with the slogan, hey, America - get on my lawn.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: Biden and Bernie - it's, like, grumpy old men 2020.

(LAUGHTER)

SALIE: You know, the real stars of Super Tuesday were his wife and - well, his wife and sister, but really his wife...

SAGAL: Yes.

SALIE: ...And his senior adviser, Symone Sanders...

SAGAL: That's the...

SALIE: ...No relation. I don't think...

SAGAL: No relation - although she...

SALIE: ...It's Bernie Sanders' wife.

SAGAL: She had worked for Bernie Sanders, but...

SALIE: Yeah.

SAGAL: ...Now she works for Biden.

SALIE: And so these protesters rushed the stage...

ROCCA: Vegan protesters, right? Yeah.

SALIE: Lunging vegans...

ROCCA: Right.

SALIE: ...Rush...

(LAUGHTER)

SALIE: ...Rush the stage. And Jill Biden and this woman, Symone - they just body check them.

SAGAL: They did.

SALIE: And Joe Biden just stands there.

SAGAL: No, Jill Biden came off the line like a weak side linebacker and...

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: So I don't want to provoke something nasty here. But do you think if those protesters ate meat, it would have ended differently?

SAGAL: If they had more...

(LAUGHTER)

DEMI ADEJUYIGBE: I was going to say...

SAGAL: ...A little more protein.

SALIE: They would have felt logy...

SAGAL: Yes.

SALIE: ...I think.

SAGAL: This is crazy because three weeks ago, Joe Biden was so out of it, we didn't bother making jokes about him.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Then on Tuesday, he won Virginia, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Texas. Wait - this just in - Joe Biden just won Bill's voice on his answering machine.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: He won states that weren't even states when he began his political career.

SAGAL: I know.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: I've won the Dakota Territory.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Well, what happened? If - well, if you're a Biden voter, then it's that moderate Democrats followed the lead of African Americans and chose a steady known quantity who has a good chance in November. If you're a Bernie voter, gah (ph).

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: The night was even worse for Michael Bloomberg, who spent $500 million to only win American Samoa, when he could have just picked up a box of Samoas for five bucks from a Girl Scout. It literally would have been cheaper for him to buy...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: ...American Samoa. It's just an island or two.

ROCCA: For $500 million...

SAGAL: Yes.

ROCCA: ...I would demand that they throw in Guam. I mean...

SAGAL: I know...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: ...Just as a little bonus. For your next quote, Amanda, here is the president of these United States.

KURTIS: I haven't touched my face in weeks, and I miss it.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Mr. Trump said he was not touching his face because of what?

LONG: The coronavirus.

SAGAL: The coronavirus...

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

SAGAL: ...Yes.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: We have gone from concern about coronavirus to worry to full-on panic, especially because experts are telling us to stop touching our faces, and it is impossible to stop touching your face. If you want to find out how not touching your face keeps you alive, ask the nearest Tyrannosaurus rex about it.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: I just...

SALIE: It is impossible. If you don't touch your face...

ROCCA: I know.

SALIE: ...How do you know it's there?

ROCCA: It's made me - it's actually made me really hot for my face - that I can't touch my face.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Well, the president, by the way, said that at a appearance or a press availability. And then he immediately touched his face seconds after saying he's not touching his face anymore. It's possible he just doesn't feel it through the orange foundation.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: Listen. Dealing with a nation in crisis may not just be in his skill set.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: You can't do everything. You can't be good at everything. Maybe, like, when the nation is terrified and in need of someone to calm them and reassure them, that's maybe just not his bag.

SALIE: That's when you put them in the hands of Vice President Mike Pence.

(LAUGHTER)

SALIE: I have now a whole assortment of hand sanitizer because one scent is not enough. I feel like it's aromatherapy.

SAGAL: Don't use it, Faith.

SALIE: What?

SAGAL: Hoard it.

SALIE: Oh.

SAGAL: And then after the apocalypse, you can trade it for gold...

(LAUGHTER)

ADEJUYIGBE: Wait.

SAGAL: Because it is, in fact, more valuable than gold. I don't know if you're aware of this. There are people trying to sell bottles of hand sanitizer...

SALIE: Really?

SAGAL: ...On Amazon for, like, 300 bucks because there just isn't enough of the stuff. But it turns out, you'll be happy to know, that you can make it at home. You just get a bottle of aloe vera lotion and a bottle of cheap vodka. And then you drink enough of the vodka so you just don't care anymore.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: It's - I am kind of upset about the rise of artisanal hand sanitizer recipes on the Internet...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: ...Because you're going to look for one, and you're going to find a good one, but to get to it, you're going to have to scroll through 20 paragraphs...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: ...About the time the author traveled through Tuscany and came down with Giardia.

(LAUGHTER)

ADEJUYIGBE: I can't wait to shake hands with someone and go, Grey Goose?

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: All right. Amanda, here is your last quote.

KURTIS: It's not good, but it's something.

SAGAL: That was Daily Variety's review of the new hit dating show on Netflix, "Love Is Blind." That's the name of the show. But that is the show where people fall in love and get engaged all without what?

LONG: Seeing each other.

SAGAL: Seeing each other...

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

SAGAL: ...Amanda.

(APPLAUSE)

SALIE: What?

SAGAL: Amanda, do you know this show? Do you watch it?

LONG: I did not stay up until 2:30 in the morning the other night watching this show. I did not.

SAGAL: No.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Well, perhaps you, then, like many others, watched "The Bachelor" and said to yourself, you know, it's humiliating, but it doesn't really highlight enough how human beings are ridiculously shallow attention addicts.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: In this show, groups of men and women are put in, quote, "pods" where they can only speak to each other. And they keep doing it until somebody proposes marriage sight unseen. Now, you may scoff, but until the coronavirus thing is done, this is how all dating will be done.

(LAUGHTER)

ADEJUYIGBE: I feel like blind people look at the show and go, you're choosing to do this.

SAGAL: Yeah.

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: Can I just tell you that this week, the host of "The Bachelor" was hosting a different special, which was Nik Wallenda walking across a volcano in Nicaragua. But when I turned on the TV, all I saw was the host of "The Bachelor" and a giant volcano. And I thought, this is a new twist on "The Bachelor."

(LAUGHTER)

ROCCA: Are the girls that aren't chosen thrown into the volcano at the end?

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Bill, how did Amanda do on our quiz?

KURTIS: Amanda knew every answer. Congratulations, Amanda.

SAGAL: Well done, Amanda.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Thank you so much. Bye-bye.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.