Smerconish At "Real Time With Bill Maher"
SMERCONISH: I did "Real Time" with Bill Maher last night on HBO. I think it was my fifth appearance and it's why I'm in Los Angeles this morning instead of Philadelphia. For me the most interesting exchange of the night was about the #MeToo movement and how it has impacted the writer Mark Halperin and former senator Al Franken, one of my co- panelists was former senator Heidi Heitkamp.</s>BILL MAHER, HOST, "REAL TIME WITH BILL MAHER": It's kind of a good week to talk about this #MeToo redemption issue because Mark Halperin, remember him? He -- look, I always say it's a case by case, and we don't know. He denied the worst of it which was accusations that he used to rub his hard-on against women at the office. He admitted to like inappropriately asking them out, denied the worst but of course he's going to. And then there's Al Franken who I have defended many times. I said, I don't think he did that shit (ph). OK? So it depends We need like a court, like a redemption court, because like Mike Halperin he has been gone two years. He did lose everything at the time but now he has got a book out. So, he interviewed a lot of Democratic strategists and now they are all having to back pedal saying, people are saying why are you in his book, Mark Halperin, and I'm asking, what -- who decides, what is the -- does he never get to come back?</s>SMERCONISH: I will own this because --</s>MAHER: Yes, you've had him on.</s>SMERCONISH: He re-emerged on my program. My calculus, as one who is privileged to have this platform, and am I going to extend the invitation to him, was this. Has he owned it? And has he been punished? You know that he wrote "Game Change" and "Double Down."</s>MAHER: Yes.</s>SMERCONISH: He lost the deal for what he would have written about the last one.</s>MAHER: Yes.</s>SMERCONISH: Lost the HBO movie that would have been adapted by it, lost all of his gigs, sat out for 500 days and I thought had been punished enough. And if not, then I asked the question, are we advocating the professional death sentence for someone like them --</s>MAHER: Right.</s>SMERCONISH: -- because I'm not comfortable with that.</s>MAHER: Right. And you said you regretted --</s>HEIDI HEITKAMP (D-ND), FORMER SENATOR: Yes.</s>MAHER: Helping push Al out.</s>HEITKAMP: Right. So if it turned into groupthink, which is what you're talking about.</s>MAHER: Right.</s>HEITKAMP: All of a sudden there is a huge litmus test out there, and you're either peer or you're not peer and you can't do any critical thinking, any kind of nuance discussion, and I knew at the time that I did it, and I'm not proud to say this, that it was wrong. I mean, my parents taught me doing that kind of groupthink was wrong but we did it because we were in the panic of the moment and I told Al that, and Al said, well, will you tell that to anyone who asked you? I said absolutely, I will own it and I will own it even if I were in the Senate because at some point we as the accuser, we as the judgers, have to make a decision on when is enough is enough.</s>SMERCONISH: Halperin has been my guest I should point out on SiriusXM radio, not here on CNN, and the social media reaction to my hosting him has been vicious at times. We can put up a montage of some of what I get constantly. In contrast, I should say to the radio callers who are free to dial in and offer a reaction and are almost universally appreciative of hearing his insight on the 2020 race. Still to come, the last three recessions were all preceded by a drop in RV sales. What does this bellwether category tell us about the U.S. economy, is it more accurate than the economists?