BILL KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR news quiz. That's me in your ear. You're getting a wet Billy.
(LAUGHTER)
ADAM BURKE: What?
KURTIS: I'm Bill Kurtis. And here is your host at the Chase Bank Auditorium in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal.
PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, Bill. Thanks, everybody. Thanks. It's great to be back with you.
(CHEERING)
SAGAL: We have a great show for you today. Joining us later will be Charlie Day, star and one of the creators of the long-running sitcom "It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia." Now, that is a show that, thankfully, has nothing to do with current events. It's just about a group of awful people with no conscience or morals...
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SAGAL: ...Who keep doing terrible things and always get away with it.
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SAGAL: Nothing to do with the news at all.
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SAGAL: We want you to get what you deserve, though, so give us a call. The number is 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Let's welcome our first listener contestant.
Hi, you are on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
THOMAS FINER: Hi. This is Thomas from Naples, Fla.
SAGAL: Naples, Fla. - beautiful down there. What do you do there?
FINER: I'm a chef at a high-end retirement community.
SAGAL: Are you really?
FINER: I am, yeah.
SAGAL: All right. What sort of amazing things do you make for the 5 p.m. dinner?
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KURTIS: Mashed potatoes.
FINER: Anything they want. Anything they want.
SAGAL: Anything they want. Do you get any weird requests?
FINER: We always joke - we have gazpacho on the menu. It's a chilled soup. We always joke, one day, we're going to get a ticket where somebody's going to request that it's a warm soup.
SAGAL: Yes.
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FINER: So...
SAGAL: They're going to send it - send back the gazpacho because it's cold.
FINER: It's cold (laughter).
SAGAL: And when that happens, that will be, just so you know, my mother.
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FINER: It would. It would.
SAGAL: Let me introduce you to our panel this week, Thomas. First, a comedian appearing at the Pabst Brewery in Milwaukee November 22 and 23. It's Adam Burke.
BURKE: Hello.
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FINER: Hey, Adam. How are you?
SAGAL: Next, the host of the podcast "Fake The Nation," and you can see her in (Still) Asking For It at Joe's Pub in New York City October 5 and 6, Negin Farsad.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: And a humorist and author, most recently of "Save Room For Pie," it's Roy Blount, Jr.
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SAGAL: So, Thomas, as you've probably guessed, you're going to play Who's Bill This Time. Your job, of course - listen as Bill recreates for you three voices from the week's news. Your job - explain or identify two of them. Do that, you win our prize - the voice of anyone you might choose on your show. Are you ready to play?
FINER: Yes. Let's do it.
SAGAL: All right. Here's your first quote.
KURTIS: I don't know if I'm the most innocent person in the world.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: That was somebody who we found out this week is quite far from being the most innocent person in the world.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Who is it?
FINER: Is it Donald Trump?
SAGAL: It is Donald Trump.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: You figured it out, Thomas. What a fun, full week for Donald Trump it was. He signed a treaty. He said the Nobel Prizes were rigged against him. He got to sleep in his race car bed back at Trump Tower.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: And, oh, yeah, he ordered the release of a document proving an impeachable offense.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Who says he doesn't work hard? So a whistleblower accused the president of trying to blackmail the president of Ukraine into doing a bogus investigation of Joe Biden. So the president said he would release a rough transcript of their call, which we all assumed would just be a sheet of paper with the words, you are best president, Mr. Trump.
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SAGAL: But, no, they actually released what seems to be the real thing. And it shows the president doing exactly what he is accused of. And he said, there, it exonerates me.
(LAUGHTER)
NEGIN FARSAD: What I love is that he doesn't know how to respond to the accusations of quid pro quo because he thinks it's, like, a seafood dish.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: He just has no idea.
SAGAL: Yeah.
FARSAD: What is everyone talking about? I don't eat fish.
KURTIS: Quid - he likes quid.
SAGAL: Now, finally, Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the House, announced on Tuesday that she would support impeachment hearings. But if you saw it, her remarks were, like, weirdly halted and awkward for such a momentous occasion. And it turns out - and this is true - that she had written out a speech in advance, but then she left it on a plane. That's all true. So she had to, like, improvise remarks and maybe didn't do a great job. Even worse - think of the poor insurance exec who grabbed the wrong piece of paper and just impeached his boss.
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FARSAD: But you know what was really nice about Nancy during that speech...
SAGAL: Yeah.
FARSAD: ...Was that her skin was glowing.
SAGAL: Oh, yeah.
FARSAD: I was like, she should impeach people more often...
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: ...Because it works for her.
SAGAL: It really does. Yeah.
BURKE: That's the scent she's wearing. It's called Impeachment.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Anyway, Thomas, let's move on.
ROY BLOUNT JR: Oh, no.
SAGAL: Yeah. Thomas, here's your next quote. It's from a 16-year-old girl speaking at the U.N.
KURTIS: This is all wrong. I shouldn't be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean.
SAGAL: Her name is Greta Thunberg, and she is really mad about what?
FINER: The planet getting warmer - climate change.
SAGAL: Exactly right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Thunberg...
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SAGAL: ...Has become a leading global climate activist. She spoke at the U.N. this week, and she told the U.N. that she shouldn't have to be fighting climate change. She should be allowed to be just a regular teenager. Why would she want that? You think being bullied by the fossil fuel industry is bad, try the popular girls.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: And the climate change deniers really went after her. It was remarkable to watch. They said she was just doing her parents' bidding, which is news to anybody with a teenager.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Yes, I will convince my 16-year-old daughter to make herself the face of an international movement right after I get her to tell me where she's going Friday night.
(LAUGHTER)
BURKE: You're going to wear that to the U.N.?
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BLOUNT JR: But my money's on her. I think that she and Bill Belichick should have a glare-off.
SAGAL: Oh, man.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: She - yeah, there was an amazing little sort of couple of seconds of tape because President Trump happened to walk by her. And just her look on her face - they should create a phone app...
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SAGAL: ...That whenever you do something irresponsible, like idle your engine, her face appears staring at you that way. Greta came to the U.S. on a solar-powered sailboat across the Atlantic so as to lessen her carbon footprint, and that's why the Republicans were so upset. We thought she was one of us. She took a yacht here.
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FARSAD: But you know who gave her an electric car, though?
SAGAL: Who?
FARSAD: Arnold Schwarzenegger.
SAGAL: Arnold Schwarzenegger...
FARSAD: Yeah.
SAGAL: ...Gave her an electric car?
FARSAD: He gave her an electric car so she could drive up to Canada to do whatever things you do in Canada.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: And in so doing, she kind of made him seem cool. Like, I didn't know he had an electric car that he could lend to Greta Thunberg.
BURKE: What's crazy is he threw it at her.
SAGAL: Yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: All right, Thomas. Here is your last quote.
KURTIS: Don't use Juul.
SAGAL: That was a warning about Juul - J-U-U-L. That's the company that makes very popular vape pens. The warning comes from the CEO of what company?
FINER: Juul.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Very good.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: We're in the middle of a vaping crisis. There are apparently two kinds of teenagers - ones who admit they vape and ones who don't answer the question because they're vaping.
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SAGAL: So now we have a backlash to all this vaping because of reports of serious illnesses. Some states have banned e-cigarettes, and Walmart has said that they will stop selling them in all of their stores. So, sadly, kids shopping at Walmart will have to settle for actual cigarettes.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: And in the midst of this, the CEO of Juul - that's the biggest vape company - stepped down. He'll be replaced by an interim CEO, a 14-year-old wearing a backwards ball cap.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So there are some reforms being made. Juul and other companies say they won't offer any more flavors that kids like, such as cherry and mango and a distant father's love.
(LAUGHTER)
BURKE: Doesn't this happen with, like, every new technology? Like, I'm sure, like, the 1870s, there was, like, a rash of terrible bike accidents, and, like, we must keep our children away from the devil bicycle before...
SAGAL: It's probably true, yeah.
BLOUNT JR: You think crack would have caught on if it had mango flavor?
(LAUGHTER)
BURKE: Wait. Wait. Crack isn't mango-flavored?
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: You've been making it wrong.
SAGAL: Yeah.
BURKE: It's my mother's recipe. That's the weird thing.
SAGAL: Bill, how did Thomas do on our quiz?
KURTIS: Got us off to a good start. He got them all right.
SAGAL: Congratulations, Thomas.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: Thanks so much for playing. Take care, Thomas.
FINER: All righty. Thank you.
SAGAL: Bye-bye.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HANDS")
JEWEL: (Singing) My hands are small, I know. But they're not yours; they are my own. But they're not yours; they are my own. And... Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.