BILL KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON’T TELL ME, the NPR news quiz. I'm Bill Kurtis. And we're playing this week with Adam Burke, Roxanne Roberts and Bobcat Goldthwait. And here again is your host at the Chase Bank Auditorium in downtown Chicago, Peter Sagal.
PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, Bill.
(APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: In just a minute, Bill Kurtis is nominated for a rhyme-time Emmy in our Listener Limerick challenge. If you'd like to play, give us a call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Right now panel, some more questions for you from the week's news. Bobcat, please listen to this interesting statement.
BILL KURTIS: Ms. Eisenstein, one question...
SAGAL: OK, it's not that interesting. What is interesting is the person who said it. Who asked his first question in 10 years?
BOBCAT GOLDTHWAIT: First question in 10 years.
SAGAL: Yeah.
ROXANNE ROBERTS: It happened in Washington.
GOLDTHWAIT: Yeah, that's not going to help me.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: For 10 years...
ADAM BURKE: He doesn't even know which Washington you mean.
GOLDTHWAIT: Yeah.
SAGAL: For 10 years, this guy's had a job with until recently eight other people. And they all ask questions. He never asks a question. He finally did it this week.
BURKE: And it's not anyone on "The Voice."
(LAUGHTER)
GOLDTHWAIT: Is it a Supreme Court justice?
SAGAL: It is.
GOLDTHWAIT: Yeah, that's - I'm out.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: That's all you got? No, wait a minute. You don't know their names. It's not a question of...
GOLDTHWAIT: Yeah, yeah.
SAGAL: ...Remembering. You just don't know.
GOLDTHWAIT: You are startled by not my stupidity but my honesty.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Yeah, no, I think it's actually admirable.
GOLDTHWAIT: It's refreshing, yeah.
BURKE: Wait, did you just quote Donald Trump?
SAGAL: All right.
(LAUGHTER, APPLAUSE)
SAGAL: So I'm going to have to - I'm going to have to throw it open. And I know both of you know.
BURKE: Yeah.
ROBERTS: Clarence Thomas.
SAGAL: Clarence Thomas.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Clarence Thomas.
GOLDTHWAIT: Oh, I know him.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: No, you don't. Ten years almost to the day after he last asked a question in court, Justice Thomas spoke. And observers were amazed that the first thing to come out of his mouth wasn't, say, a cocktail frank he'd been choking on since 2006.
(LAUGHTER)
GOLDTHWAIT: It sounds like a new hearing-aid battery.
SAGAL: You think?
(LAUGHTER)
GOLDTHWAIT: He just didn't know what they were doing all this time.
(LAUGHTER)
BURKE: It was so weird. Today at work was so weird. These guys came in...
GOLDTHWAIT: They were all talking and yammering.
SAGAL: I don't want to say anything because I'm embarrassed I can't hear. Here, I'll just sign this order banning abortion - fine.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Roxanne, this week, there was a milestone in the development of driverless car technology. For the first time, a driverless car did what?
ROBERTS: It got into a fender-bender.
SAGAL: It did.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: It caused an accident...
ROBERTS: Yes.
SAGAL: ...Which has never happened before. Driverless cars have been in accidents before, but it's never been their fault. The blame was always on driver-full car. In this incident, a Google car changed lanes suddenly, went right into a bus. Then, as its programming dictated, it pretended to have whiplash.
(LAUGHTER)
ROBERTS: It was going 2 miles an hour. How could they even tell?
BURKE: Even more impressive, that car blew a 2.1 blood-alcohol content.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Yes.
GOLDTHWAIT: But there's been other driverless cars. They just didn't have computers in them.
SAGAL: That's true.
(LAUGHTER)
GOLDTHWAIT: I grew up with many driverless cars.
SAGAL: Sure.
GOLDTHWAIT: We - our driveway was on a slant.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: You were a technological genius before your time.
BURKE: Yeah.
GOLDTHWAIT: I'm telling you just - you know, after a couple of pops, my dad didn't always put it in park.
SAGAL: Safe, yeah.
GOLDTHWAIT: We invented the driverless car. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.