Politically Incorrect
April 10, 2000

Guests on this program were:

James Coburn
Michael Graham
Julia Butterfly Hill
John Lydon

 

Panel Discussion

Okay.
Let's meet our panel.

[ Applause ]

He's a Republican Political Consultant and talk show radio host on News Radio 730 in Charleston, South Carolina, Michael Graham.
Michael, hey, good to see you.

[ Cheers and applause ]

Michael: How are you, bill?

Bill: Good to see you. All right.
She is the environmental activist who spent two years --
this lady lived in a tree to save its life.
I'm not kidding.
It's great.
For two years in a redwood.
Her book is "The Legacy of Luna," tells that story.
Julia Butterfly Hill.
Julia, hey.

[ Cheers and applause ]

How are you doing?
Thank you for being here.

Julia: Thank you.

[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: One of the original sex pistols, he hosts VH1's "Rotten TV" and his documentary, "The Filth and the Fury," opens Friday.
Johnny Lydon.
Yeah.

[ Cheers and applause ]

John, how are you?

John: All right, bill.

Bill: Good to see you again.

[ Applause ]

Bill: And -- he is a film legend.
He certainly is -- and star of "The President's Analyst,"
"Affliction," and "Our Man Flint," oh, and that movie you did on CBS last month was great.
"Shattered" -- what was it called?

James: Which one, the CBS?
"Shake Rattle and Roll?"

Bill: No.
Called "Shattered Pieces."

James: Oh.

Bill: "Missing pieces."

[ Laughter ]

James: Oh, "Missing Pieces."

Bill: You were fantastic in it.
James Coburn is right over here.

[ Cheers and applause ]

How are you?

James: I enjoyed the hell out of that.

Bill: Really, you were great.

James: Thank you.

[ Applause ]

Bill: Okay.
Well, as I mentioned, Julia, you lived literally in a tree.

James: Oh, God.

[ Laughter ]

Bill: You've heard the phrase --

Julia: I know --

Bill: She's up a tree.

John: Did you ever see a luna seed?

Bill: But you did it to save that tree's life.
And I've got to say, I think that is a great thing.

James: I'll say.
I mean, just climbing up there has got to be a trip.
And she stayed up for 2 1/2 years?

Julia: A little over two years.

James: And never came down until just a month ago?

Julia: Four months ago.

Bill: And we're talking all the hardships of living in a tree.

[ Laughter ]

John: Silly.

Bill: No room service.

John: What did you do with your waste product?

Julia: Well, that you have to either read the book, "The Legacy of Luna."
That's the one question that everybody asks.
I answer just about every question but that one.
Because, I think, for people to get that answer, they need to do a little research to find out why I lived in a tree for two years, which is why I talk about it.
So, you can either find out the information from "The Legacy of Luna," for which I am donating 100% of my proceeds back to social environmental issues.
So you are actually supporting good causes.
Or you can go to our Website at --
---
www.circleoflifefoundation.org --
and then you can find the answer.
All of you can find the answer there.

James: Bravo.

Michael: Couldn't we follow you to the ladies' room?

[ Applause ]

John: You did nature no harm?

Julia: Well, no -- well, as little as I know how.

Bill: She protected nature.

John: I know that you had a meeting -- was it in San Francisco -- not long ago, where so-called "anarchists" were booing and hissing you.

Julia: Well, it wasn't --

John: For saying you've sold out since.
But, you know, my point is --
where the hell were they when you were stuck up there for two years?

Bill: Yeah.
This lady was up a tree --

[ Laughter ]

For two years, going to the bathroom however.
Now, I want to ask this because this is going to be a huge issue in the election is the environment, and George Bush, the little Bush kid who is running --

[ Laughter ]

-- He is attacking Gore on the environment the way his dad did.
Remember he called him "Ozone Man."

Julia: Oh, my goodness.

Bill: Ozone Man.
He called Gore Ozone Man, because he's worried about the ozone.
What a nut.

[ Laughter ]

George Bush says that Gore's book, "Earth in the Balance" needs some explaining.
But of course, he says that about all books.

[ Laughter ]

[ Applause ]

But listen, he's basically saying that Gore is in a panic about the environment.
And I say, good, I want a guy --

John: Yeah --

Bill: -- Who is in a panic about the environment.

John: If you can believe Al Gore.

Julia: Exactly.

[ All talking at once ]

James: Well, anybody that wants to do something with the environment, I'm for.
I don't care whether they say it believe it or not.
But as long as they get the word out there --

[ Talking at once ]

John: Pin them to their word.
Pin them to their word.

James: Absolutely.

John: When they make these statements, execute them at dawn if they contradict.

[ Laughter ]

James: They want to talk about everything they want you to believe.
But they don't believe it themselves.

[ Talking at once ]

They want you to vote for them because it's a popular issue.
But you can make them do something that they stand on that issue, man, I mean, please.

John: Of course, yelling and ranting and raving about the environment, look at the state of Texas, what they said -- right.
It's a bloody disaster.

James: It's a desert.
And this lady did more for the environment than those guys ever will.

Bill: All right.
Let's hear from the villain in this play, Michael?

Michael: Thank you very much.

[ Applause ]

The token right-wing Republican.

Bill: Let's hear from Lex Luthor.
Michael: Before we get to Al Gore's hypocrisy, let's stick with his stupidity for a few minutes.
We're going to eliminate the internal combustion engine completely.
I'm sure the voters in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Indiana can't wait to hear that --

Bill: Her's the quote, he wants a goal --

Julia: You are saying Bush is brilliant?

Michael: No, I'm saying Al Gore is saying he wants to get rid of --

Bill: Wait a second.
Why should we not have that as a goal?
He said, "The goal of completely eliminating the internal combustion engine over a 25-year period."
And you're right, attacking cars is almost as bad as attacking Jesus in America.

Julia: But they have --

Bill: It's like neck and neck.

Michael: In the South, it's worse.
With the pickup trucks.

Bill: Especially if monster trucks are involved.
Exactly.

Julia: We have cars that run out there on water.

Bill: We have had the same model for a car for 100 years.
Why is it such heresy to want to improve that, especially since we do have the technology.

Michael: Because of government action stepping in today, cars are more fuel-efficient than in 1970, and that includes all the monster SUVs.
They are getting more miles per gallon all the time.

John: That's still crappy, though.

[ All talking at once ]

Bill: First of all, that's wrong.

Michael: That is not wrong.
It's absolutely true.

Bill: SUVs get eight miles to a gallon.

Michael: SUVs get eight miles to the gallon -- some SUVs get eight miles to the gallon, but the average miles per gallon of all the cars on the road in America today is better than it was in 1970 because technology is changing.

Bill: Well, 1970 must have been right before they changed.
That's probably when people were driving big-finned cars.

[ Laughter ]

The point is --

Julia: They have technology to run cars off of air and water.
Of off air and water.
You would rather promote extraction of natural resources out from underneath us and have cars from hydrogen and water?

Michael: Well, then we can have a hydrogen-run car.
It's great, and as soon as everyone is ready to spend $250,000 for a car, we'll all run out --

Julia: But our government subsidizing fuel cars, why can't they subsidize --

Michael: They're not subsidizing anything.

[ All talking at once ]

Bill: It's a goal.

John: They are talking about the future.
I want research, I want advancement.

Michael: The government has to do with this?

John: I don't want things staying the same.

Bill: The government, of course --

John: Damn right, because I'm voting him in.
So do what I tell you.

Bill: All right.
I've got to take a break.
But we'll come back to this big argument.

[ Applause ]

---


[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: All right.
We were talking about the environment.
On the one side Al Gore -- I agree, I don't trust him either.
But at least he's saying the right things.
And on the other side, we have the geniuses Bush.
And let me read this quote from Dan Quayle, who was --

[ Laughter ]

Wait a second.
Dan Quayle was scheduled to be on this show, I think, in December, and he canceled because he read some things I said about him --

John: Couldn't find it.

Bill: That were unflattering.
And here's why I speak unflatteringly of him.
He said, "There's a growing scientific opinion that global warming might have positive effects on our health and our wealth."

[ Laughter ]

It's not about misspelling "potato."
Okay, this is a lie that affects my life.
It's not about oral sex.
This is a lie that could kill me.

James: That's right.

Bill: The only people who think it might have positive effects are Irwin Corey with and the Shell Answer man.
Those are the only scientists I can think of.
Michael, this would be your part to jump in.

Michael: Give me the impossible.

Bill: What about that?
Do you think global warming might have positive effects?

Michael: First of all, the longest study of Earth temperatures that's been conducted yet -- European temperatures from 1751 to the year 2000, the total change in temperature --
.58 degrees that whole time.
And before that was an ice age.
We have actually had an ice age since man has been around.
We also had that warming period.
The reason the Vikings called it Greenland -- it was green and then it got cold.
The man did nothing --

John: That's wrong.

Michael: That is not wrong.

John: No, no, no.
They were looking for Greenland and landed in the wrong place.

[ Laughter ]

Michael: Vikings were able to put their small wooden boat from Northern Europe to America because there weren't ice flows because the temperature was so much warmer.
They Earth warms, Earth cools --
it's the arrogance of Hollywood that you guys can do something that we matter.

Bill: You think --

Michael: A man is a jock itch in the surface of the Earth.

Bill: Wait a second.
Wait a second.

Michael: We are meaningless.

Bill: You think --

Michael: Our biggest efforts mean nothing in the scheme of the globe.

John: Everything you said seems to mean nothing.
I don't know what you just said.

Michael: That is the truth --

Bill: You think all the pollution, all of the cars have had a negligible effect?

Michael: Negligible is a good word.

Bill: Really?

Michael: They have had some effect.

Bill: Really?

Michael: I admire the fact --

Michael: What if you are wrong, then we all die?

[ Laughter ]

Michael: We're not going to get a memo, "Hello. This is the Earth, you just maxed out the meter."

Bill: We are getting a memo.

Michael: What is the memo?

Bill: The last two years have been the warmest two years on record ever.

Michael: And in the 1930s, we had the coldest series of years.
Up to that point we had an ice age before that.
We had an heating period before that.
The dinosaurs thought we had great weather.
The Earth changes.

John: There are - there is natural changes.
But we are affecting the world.
We are.

Michael: In some negligible way.

John: Negligible is important.
It shouldn't be.

Michael: When farmers were being chased out of Norway, because it was getting cold and they couldn't till the ground, I have no doubt there was actor sitting around their troubadour circuit wearing little ribbons going, " stop the ox, stop the ox, we're changing the world."
We're just people.

John: You can close your ears, and you can close your eyes, but you're going to have to use your nostrils.

[ Laughter ]

Something stinks out there.

Bill: Yes, I really do.
I'm one of those nuts like Al Gore who believes what scientists say.

[ Laughter and applause ]

Michael: Well, I may or may not be a nut.
But unlike Julia, I don't believe what trees say.
And when you were talking to the trees, I'm wondering if they mentioned to you, Julia -- because in your book you said the trees spoke to you, that in the United States, 30% of the U.S. is now forest land --
that we have reforested the entire East Coast, that more trees have been planted every year since 1950 than harvested --
did any of that get mentioned by the tree while were you chatting?

Julia: Well, actually what does get mentioned by all kinds of people --

Michael: But the tree, I am curious about what the tree said.
It's in the book.

Julia: Well, you're trying to discredit me, when --

Michael: You said the tree spoke to you --

[ Talking at once ]

Bill: Okay.
Don't bark at her.

James: Right!

Julia: Actually, number one, there actually has been scientific proof that plants and trees respond to communication.
We can go into other countries --

John: Okey-dokey.
This is where I switch off.

[ Laughter ]

Julia: And that's okay.
And that's okay.

John: I talked to the trees.

Michael: Come on.
Come on.
Let her talk.
I was speaking to my Ottoman last night, I said do you really think --

Julia: Actually I wasn't going to.

[ All talking at once ]

Bill: All right.
She's lived in a tree for two years.

Julia: And that's okay for people --

Bill: Just allow her --

Julia: And it's okay for people to think I'm extreme or radical or all the different labels that we put on each other.
But I'm trying to say there's actual scientific proof that plants and animals and trees respond.
We have gotten to the point that animals respond to each other.
Trees do as well.
I'm not saying the trees have a voice that said, "Julia, do this, do that," but negating all of that, what you're talking about is trees -- and you're refusing to look at a forest.
And the forest is an ecosystem.
It is biodiversity.
We are causing extinction on this planet and it's not negligible --
that supersedes anything except for the extinction of the dinosaurs.
If you look to species, they're like the canary bird in the mine.
They are very, very fragile and they die first, and they are saying, "Hello, something is out of balance here."
That is our symbol.
That is our science.
That is our speaking to us saying, "Wake up.
Your actions do affect" --

[ Applause ]

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

[ Applause ]

---


[ Cheers and applause ]
Join us this week on "Politically Incorrect," when Bill's guests will include --
From "Xena," Lucy Lawless, Monty Python's Eric Idle, from the new series, "Battery Park," Elizabeth Perkins and "Inside Edition's"
Debra Norville.

Bill: All right.
We were talking about species becoming extinct.
You mentioned the dinosaurs.
We all know the dinosaurs were walking around like they were all that.

[ Laughter ]

And then suddenly a meteor hit, things changed and they were tyrannosaurus-ex.

John: That, and their gas emissions killed them off.

[ Imitating flatulence ]

Bill: Well, whatever did it, I think it could happen again.
Because, you know --

[ Laughter ]

I've been reading about the Neanderthals.
You know who the Neanderthals were?

Michael: Well, I'm from South Carolina.
They still vote.

[ Laughter ]

Do I know them?
They live three houses down from me.

Bill: That's my point.

John: They vote Republican.

Bill: Have you ever saw that movie "Quest for Fire"?
They depict it in that.
It's about 30,000 B.C. --
which is not that long ago cosmically -- we, Homo Sapiens, people who look like us, shared the planet with these neanderthals, who were like us, but a little more --

[ Grunts ]

James: Weird.

Bill: You know?
And they were stronger, and they had rocks and they were big, but they suddenly died out.
Why?

John: They were stupid.

Bill: Because the humans were a little smarter, and they learned that --

[ Imitating blowgun ]

That blow gun -- and the guy had a rock and --

[ Imitating blowgun ]

They were dead.

[ Laughter ]

And I think this could happen again with the people who don't believe that pollution is killing us and watch wrestling.

[ Laughter ]

John: Well, there's many kinds of wrestling, and some I highly recommend.

James: There are some Neanderthals that are wrestling.
Absolutely.

John: Lady mud wrestling is wonderful.

James: Certainly.
I mean, that's what they get paid for here.

John: Are you saying --

Bill: If you are not afraid of the environmental problem, you are not afraid of the right things.
That's what you should be afraid of.

John: You should pay attention.

Michael: Are you saying there are two different species that are alive now today --

Bill: I'm saying --

Michael: -- Humans who get it and humans who don't, that kind of thing?

Bill: In human nature -- in nature -- there are corrections.

[ All talking at once ]

James: There may be, you know, the integration took over as well, I mean, where everything got together, all of the Neanderthals and the so-called "sort of humans" --

[ Laughter ]

-- And then the sort of nonhumans, but they all got together and in a big mixed pot came out --
what was that guy?
That was the guy down in Africa.

Bill: Right.

James: Right?
And that's the one that Leakey, a couple of million years ago --
and you know, who knows, that's probably what's happening today.
Everybody is getting all together.
Everybody is making love together.
And everybody is having a ball and pretty soon we'll have a new race.

[ Cheers and applause ]

John: Except current research --
the latest developments in research -- said that we weren't actually related to the Neanderthals at all, so we didn't go around shagging them.

James: Who said that?

Bill: That was the latest thing is that we just killed them.

[ Laughter ]

That we were in competition for about 40,000 years and then we came up with fire --

James: The blow gun.

[ Imitating a blowgun ]

Bill: They had the --

[ Grunting ]

[ Laughter ]

John: Get out of the way, you thick --

Bill: Yeah.

Michael: Are you advocating that the arts crowd of Hollywood run up to the nearest mobile home and start clubbing people?

Bill: Wait!
Wait!
You say "Hollywood," like the only people --

[ Talking at once ]

Bill: First of all, the arts crowd of Hollywood -- you're right, the only people who care about the environment are you and me and Alec Baldwin.

James: Yeah, right.

[ Laughter ]

Bill: And I think Madonna is involved.
But that's it.
Everybody else doesn't care.
No, it's not just the arts crowd in Hollywood.
It's people who breathe.

[ Laughter ]

It's the high school students outside of Houston who have coughing fits and couldn't continue with football practice --
another religion.

James: Yeah.

Bill: You know, when you notice that it's like, 85 in March --
it was 85 in New Jersey -- I know you think that it's just incremental changes, but it's --

Michael: You know this Gen-X that this has never happened.
We had these wild fluctuations --

Bill: Gen-X?
So now it's the generations?

Michael: It is -- you all think --
that this never happened before.

[ All talking at once ]

John: Why do you not want to pay attention?

[ Laughter ]

Julia: And even if you don't want to pay attention, why don't you and others have enough compassion and respect for the fact that we all share this planet whether we like it or not?

Bill: What if you're wrong?

Michael: If I'm wrong, you will see the change over time --

Bill: Then we --

James: Then we die!
Then we die!

Bill: If you're wrong.

[ All talking at once ]

Bill: I've got to take a break.

[ Applause ]

---


[ Applause ]

Bill: All right, you Homo Sapiens, tomorrow we have Eric Idle, Elizabeth Perkins, Zach Galifinakis -- had a touch of that last week -- and Monica Crowley.
And they are all Homo Sapiens.
Not a Neanderthal among them.

[ Applause ]