CARL KASELL: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!, the NPR news quiz. I'm Carl Kasell. And here's your host at the Chase Bank Auditorium in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal.
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PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, Carl. Thank you, everybody. Thank you. Thank you so much. Big show for you today. Later on, we're going to be talking to Joby Ogwyn. He is the man who is going to be jumping off the top of Mount Everest on live TV in May. So once he's done with us, that will be the second dumbest thing he's ever attempted.
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SAGAL: You can attempt a risky feat right now, when you call us at 1-888-WAIT-WAIT, that's 1-888-924-8924. Now let's welcome our first listener contestant. Hi you're on WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!
RENEE FORSYTH: Hi, this is Renee Forsyth from Fort Collins, Colorado.
SAGAL: Fort Collins, beautiful city up there on the front range, north of Denver, right?
FORSYTH: Indeed, indeed.
SAGAL: I just like to feel good about my mastery of geography.
FORSYTH: Well done.
SAGAL: What do you do there?
FORSYTH: I'm a middle school teacher.
SAGAL: Those kids, those middle school kids, they're crazy.
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FORSYTH: Actually, as you were talking about Mount Everest, I was thinking that's what they were practicing on the staircase today.
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SAGAL: They were just leaping off it?
FORSYTH: Running up and leaping off, yeah.
SAGAL: Well, welcome to the show, Renee. Let me introduce you to our panel this week. First up a comedienne performing April 12th at the Florida Theater in Jacksonville, guess which state, Paula Poundstone.
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PAULA POUNDSTONE: We used to have a teacher in middle who, when kids were running around the hall, she would stick her head out the good and go ladies, and I use the term loosely...
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POUNDSTONE: So you might want to try that.
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FORSYTH: I will, thank you.
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SAGAL: Next up, the man behind Esquire's politics blog, it's Charlie Pierce.
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CHARLIE PIERCE: Hi Renee. When I was in middle school, we had ladies who used to wear long veils and long rosary beads, and they would stick their head out of the room and go stop it or you die.
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FORSYTH: I don't think I'll get away with that one.
KASELL: And lastly, making her debut on our panel, is a writer and TV producer whose newest book is "The Longest Date," please welcome Cindy Shupack.
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CINDY SHUPACK: Hi Renee.
FORSYTH: Hi.
SAGAL: Renee, you're going to start us off with Who's Carl This Time. Carl Kasell here is going to read you three quotations from this week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain just two of them, you'll win our prize, Carl's voice on your voicemail. Ready to go?
FORSYTH: I am.
Let's do this thing. Here is your first quote:
KASELL: All I can tell is you Abe Lincoln would not have done it.
SAGAL: That was Bill O'Reilly, indignant that President Obama did what to promote the Affordable Care Act?
FORSYTH: He - oh, he went on the show with Zach Galifianakis.
SAGAL: If you can say Galifianakis, we have to give you the point, yes.
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SAGAL: The show is called "Between Two Ferns." It's a comedy video series, yes. President Obama needs young people to sign up for Obamacare in big numbers because the whole program is powered by the blood of virgins.
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SAGAL: And someone told him that young people really like "Between two Ferns," this is a parody of a talk show hosted by comedian Zach Galifianakis. So the president went on it to pitch his program. Conservatives like Mr. O'Reilly on Fox were aghast that the President would stoop to being funny. Lincoln, he said, would never do that. This is crazy because we all know Lincoln spent most of his presidency working on his stand up routine.
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PIERCE: And the one time he went to the theater, look what happened.
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PIERCE: Too soon?
SAGAL: No, no, Lincoln would sneak - this is a well-known fact. Ask Doris Kearns Goodwin. He would sneak out and go to, like, open megaphone nights...
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SAGAL: At the local clubs in Washington. He'd get up there and do things like you ever notice how beds aren't long enough. Am I right, people?
SHUPACK: He was very upset that people did not find the Gettysburg Address funny.
SAGAL: Yeah, that's funny. He came offstage, and people were like Mr. President, that was pretty good. I thought that would kill, oh man.
SHUPACK: I thought it would get a laugh.
POUNDSTONE: What's not funny about we cannot consecrate?
SHUPACK: Who says four score? Come on, that's good stuff.
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SAGAL: All right, very good. Here is your next quote.
KASELL: It's No Toke: Colorado Pulls In Millions.
SAGAL: That was a headline about the amazing tax receipts Colorado is getting from the sale of what?
FORSYTH: Marijuana.
SAGAL: Yes indeed, very good, marijuana.
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SAGAL: Oh, you would know this being from Fort Collins, of course, right there. Colorado reported that in just the first month of legal, recreational marijuana sales, they took in $2 million of tax income.
PIERCE: No.
SAGAL: Yes.
PIERCE: It actually sells?
SAGAL: It does. Who knew?
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PIERCE: It must be the marketing campaign.
SAGAL: The problem with $2 million in tax revenue is the first thing you say when you get it is you know how much weed we can buy with $2 million in tax revenue?
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SHUPACK: Can I add - I'm - you know, I live in California, where there's the pharmacy with an F right down the - there's so many of these. You know, it's all medical. It's the real deal. So my husband has a prescription, which he got from a gynecologist. I'm not kidding.
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SAGAL: Really?
SHUPACK: For real.
SAGAL: So he goes to the gynecologist. The gynecologist says get up on the table. He says oh my God, he says you're completely deformed, he says. You need marijuana, he says.
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SHUPACK: It's such a racket.
SAGAL: I have to ask. You need a disorder, right, to qualify. So what is his problem?
SHUPACK: His was sleeplessness.
SAGAL: Yes.
SHUPACK: And I said, you know, how does staying up all night watching action movies and eating Doritos cure your sleeplessness? But I think, you know, we'll get the results of his PAP smear, and then we'll see.
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POUNDSTONE: Cindy, isn't this your first time on the show?
SHUPACK: It is.
POUNDSTONE: And that's the kind of thing you're revealing about your husband?
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SAGAL: All right, Renee, here is your last quote. It's about a very special single guy named Juan Pablo.
KASELL: The more he spoke, the worse he looked.
SAGAL: That was reality show host Chris Harrison, sharing his thoughts on the star of what reality show?
SHUPACK: "The Bachelor."
SAGAL: Oh, you're on top of this.
PIERCE: Wow.
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SAGAL: Was I right? When I said Juan Pablo, did people in the audience boo? Wow. Everybody in America, I guess including you guys, is furious at Juan Pablo Galavis, a very good looking guy who, for some insane reason, refused to actually propose to one of 25 random women he had met weeks before.
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SAGAL: This is on the show "The Bachelor." I heard that this was unusual, that in the middle of the show, two of these bachelorettes, who were supposed to be desperate to win this guy's affection, said no thank you, I'm leaving, I'm going home because this guy is such a jerk. And that, like, does not happen on reality TV. It's like some guy goes on "Price Is Right" and says oh, I won the dinette set. And the dinette says I'm not going home with you.
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SAGAL: And apparently when you get it down to like three, just three bachelorettes, they all go into what's called the fantasy suite, right, and then they remove the camera so they're allowed to do whatever they want. And this is supposed to be the final test for compatibility for marriage. Oh right. Do you want to find out if somebody you just met is compatible with you for marriage? You give them kids, and you send them to Disneyworld for Christmas.
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SAGAL: And they have to fly Southwest.
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SAGAL: Carl, how did Renee do on our quiz?
KASELL: Renee, you're a winner. You had three correct answers.
PIERCE: She was unbelievable.
KASELL: So I'll be doing the message on your home answering machine or voicemail.
SAGAL: Well done.
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SAGAL: Thank you so much for playing, Renee.
FORSYTH: Thank you, and I'm glad I made it on the farewell tour, Carl.
KASELL: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.