CARL KASELL: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!, the NPR news quiz. I'm Carl Kasell. Here's your host at the Lerner Theater in Elkhart, Indiana, Peter Sagal.
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PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, everybody. Thank you so much. It is wonderful to be here in Elkhart. Later on we'll be talking to Muffet McGraw, who is not an adorable cartoon character but the celebrated women's basketball coach at Notre Dame. Now Elkhart, Indiana, where we are, is most known for being the RV capital of the world.
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SAGAL: They make - this is true. They make half of all RVs right here in Elkhart. This means, if you think about it, half of all your miserable family trips, born here.
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SAGAL: This place is like the Fertile Crescent of screaming at your kids.
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SAGAL: Well, we've gathered around the fold-out dining table. So why don't you join the conversation. The number is 1-888-WAIT-WAIT, that's 1-888-924-8924. Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!
MONA KOSSEIM: Hi, this is Mona Kosseim from Riverside, Connecticut.
SAGAL: Mona Kosseim from Riverside, Connecticut. Where in Connecticut is that?
KOSSEIM: That's near the New York border, near the Sound.
SAGAL: Near the Sound, so you're down there near the Sound, along the water there. What do you do?
KOSSEIM: I am responsible for field marketing for a technology research company.
SAGAL: Field marketing?
KOSSEIM: Yeah, we help sales sell.
SAGAL: You help sales sell.
KOSSEIM: Yeah.
SAGAL: I just don't understand the world anymore.
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KOSSEIM: I know.
SAGAL: Well, welcome to the show, Mona. It's a pleasure to have you. Let me introduce you to our panel this week. First a comedian and the host at vocalo.org over in Chicago, it is Brian Babylon.
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BRIAN BABYLON: Hey, Mona, how are you?
SAGAL: Next a contributor to "CBS Sunday Morning" and host of Entertainment Weekly's afternoon show on Sirius XM, it's Faith Salie.
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FAITH SALIE: Hi Mona.
KOSSEIM: Hi.
SAGAL: And finally the man behind Esquire's inflammatory politics blog, it's Charlie Pierce.
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CHARLIE PIERCE: Hey Mona.
SAGAL: Mona, welcome to the show. You'll start us off here with Who's Carl This Time. Carl Kasell will re-create for you three important quotations from the week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain two of them, you'll win the prize, Carl's voice on your voice mail. Ready to go?
KOSSEIM: I am.
SAGAL: All right, Mona, here is your first quote:
KASELL: Kaboom.
SAGAL: That was the sound of the nuclear option, as described by the Daily Kos website. The nuclear option was deployed where this week?
KOSSEIM: In Washington, in the Senate.
SAGAL: In the Senate, exactly right, very good, Mona.
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SAGAL: The nuclear option sounds so exciting. Imagine a new Robert Ludlum thriller with a picture of a bare-chested Harry Reid on the cover.
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SAGAL: OK, don't do that, but still - I mean like (makes noises).
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SAGAL: But it still was thrilling when Reid detonated the nuclear option in the Senate, spreading deadly radiation everywhere so that horrible shambling mutants with baggy skin and dead eyes came crawling out of the capitol. Actually, the nuclear option, just a procedural change. And those desiccated husks, just what senators usually look like.
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SALIE: You know, people are saying the political process is in shambles, but this - I think this is progress because finally on both sides of the aisle we've got people saying nuclear, and no one's saying nucular.
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SALIE: Do you know that filibuster comes from a Dutch word for pirates?
PIERCE: Also freebooters.
SALIE: Yeah, freebooters.
PIERCE: It comes from the word freebooter.
SALIE: Yeah, and I mean I would be totally up for any senator having the floor for hours and days on end if he had, like, an eyepatch and a leather vest.
PIERCE: And talk like a pirate?
SALIE: Yeah.
BABYLON: This could be like a new Disney ride, where some of those animatronic things...
SAGAL: Oh god.
PIERCE: Like Pirates of the Congress? Or the thing comes down through a dark hallway and goes around a corner and down a dip, and suddenly you're in the Appropriations Committee.
BABYLON: You got it.
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BABYLON: Disney.
SAGAL: So here, Mona, is your next quote.
KASELL: I know in my heart everyone has personal problems. I urinated in a parking lot.
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SAGAL: That was somebody who's become known all over North America for his personal problems. Who is it?
KOSSEIM: Oh god...
PIERCE: Oh come on, the world's greatest politician.
KOSSEIM: Oh, Rob Ford.
SAGAL: Of course, thank you.
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PIERCE: Or as we like to call him around my house, the human spring break.
SAGAL: He is amazing. We thought we had seen every possible way the mayor of Toronto, Canada, could screw things up. He smoked crack, he talked graphically about sex at a press conference. But he keeps, he keeps going further. It's like Rob Ford sat down, saw stories about himself on TV and said hey, I can beat that guy.
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SAGAL: So this week - we've just got to keep checking in, the Toronto City Council called a meeting to strip the mayor of his powers, such as the power to set the budget. He still has some of his powers, such as invincibility.
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SAGAL: While doing keg stands. And he still has X-ray vision. OK, it's really just a creepy stare, but still.
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BABYLON: I heard Charlie Sheen gave him a call for support.
SAGAL: He did. He wrote him an open letter and said give me a call, man.
BABYLON: Like I know the best crack spots.
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SAGAL: Exactly.
SALIE: You know, he had his own TV show.
PIERCE: He still does.
SALIE: No, it lasted one day. I'm devastated. I mean, that's a - he's the best thing to come out of Canada. I mean, you got - take back your Celine Dion and your Justin Bieber. I'll even give you Ryan Gosling if I can continue to watch this man.
BABYLON: He's like the Honey Boo-Boo level of...
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BABYLON: He's like on Honey Boo-Boo level of amazing.
SAGAL: He is amazing. But here's the problem they have, which is that according to the rules in Toronto and Ontario, you cannot fire the mayor, nor can you recall him. You have to wait for the next election. So that's why they just took away his powers so he can't do any more damage.
BABYLON: You know what you do?
SAGAL: But that's a terrible mistake because everything he's done so far, the crack smoking and the drinking and all of it, that's been while he's trying to keep it together to do his job.
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SAGAL: He doesn't have anything to occupy his time. He's going to climb the CN Tower and try swatting down airplanes now.
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BABYLON: You know how you get rid of him?
SAGAL: How do you get rid of him?
BABYLON: You do like a little - like a crack crumb trail out of town, like little sprinkles of crack out of town like Hansel and Gretel. And he'll leave eventually. He'll end up in Detroit somewhere.
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SAGAL: Here, Mona, is your last quote:
KASELL: Drunk at a mates 21st, I tripped and landed lip first, and sorry about the focus, it was a selfie.
SAGAL: That description on a blog about 10 years ago of a photograph is the first recorded use of the word selfie. The Oxford English Dictionary has named that what? Is somebody there with you? Because we keep hearing this very low, masculine voice in the background is that - somebody there?
BABYLON: It's Rob Ford.
KOSSEIM: It's my alter ego.
SAGAL: Your alter ego is there.
KOSSEIM: Exactly, yes. My husband is sitting next me.
SAGAL: Your husband's sitting next to you. Does he know?
KOSSEIM: He's saying word of the year.
SAGAL: He's right.
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SALIE: So twerk can just suck it.
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SAGAL: Twerk was a runner-up.
BABYLON: The only thing with selfies, Peter, is I don't mind them so much, is as when I see people take selfies with filthy rooms in the background.
SAGAL: You think they should clean up?
BABYLON: Just clean up your house or wherever you are a little bit before you take a selfie.
SAGAL: Or you can just get a picture of a clean room, hold it behind yourself, phone in front.
BABYLON: Something. So what do you think the next (unintelligible) forecast, if we can Miss Clio this up. What would be the next word of the year next year?
PIERCE: How about the word Forded, like I went out Saturday night and had 15 vodka shots and got really Forded?
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SAGAL: That's true.
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PIERCE: Or, invariably, Ford-faced. Boy, did I get Ford-faced last night.
BABYLON: Ford-faced is a bit more - yeah.
PIERCE: Damn, I got Ford-faced. Don't get in the car, you're too Ford-faced. Give me the keys.
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SAGAL: I'm sorry, man, I Forded all over your backseat.
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SAGAL: Carl, how did Mona do on our quiz?
KASELL: Mona, you had a perfect game, three correct answers, so I'll be doing the message on your voicemail or home answering machine.
SAGAL: Well done.
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SAGAL: Thank you, Mona, for playing.
KOSSEIM: Thanks a lot. It was a lot of fun.
SAGAL: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.