BILL KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR news quiz. Pick up the phone, it's a Bill Kurtis-y (ph) call.
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KURTIS: And here's your host at the State Theatre at Playhouse Square in Cleveland, Ohio, Peter Sagal.
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PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Oh, my gosh, thank you, Bill. Thank you, everybody.
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SAGAL: We are so excited to be in Cleveland, home of the NBA Champion Cleveland Cavaliers. And, as visitors from Chicago, that is the only sports team we are allowed to mention. Later on, we'll be talking to Bernie Sanders. Senator Sanders, he's...
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SAGAL: He is very excited to play our game. But, unfortunately, no matter how well he does, it's already been decided. The winner will be Hillary Clinton.
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SAGAL: But our games aren't rigged against you. Give us a call. The number is 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Let's welcome our first listener contestant.
Hi, you're on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
TOBY BROOKS: Hello. This is Toby Brooks from Los Angeles, Calif.
SAGAL: Hey, how are things in LA, warmer than here I would suppose?
BROOKS: Well, it's pretty cold today. It's about 65.
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SAGAL: Just be glad you're not standing in this room, Toby.
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SAGAL: What do you do in LA?
BROOKS: I work for the Sundance Film Festival.
SAGAL: You do?
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BROOKS: I do.
SAGAL: What do you do for them?
BROOKS: I assist the director of the festival and help assist them facilitate the selection process.
SAGAL: Oh, wow. You're one of the people who selects films for Sundance?
BROOKS: Well, I sit in the room silently as other people talk about them, but...
SAGAL: Oh, really?
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SAGAL: Well, welcome to the show, Toby. Let me introduce you to our panel this week. First up, it's a contributor to "CBS Sunday Morning," is - Ms. Faith Salie is here.
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FAITH SALIE: Hi, Toby.
BROOKS: Hello.
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SAGAL: Next, it's an alum of "The Colbert Report," who's also one half of the website, Quality Time With Pete And Deb. It's the Pete. It's Peter Grosz.
PETER GROSZ: Hello.
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SAGAL: And, finally, a comedian performing New Year's Eve in San Francisco at the Nourse Theater, it's Paula Poundstone.
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SAGAL: Well, Toby, welcome to the show. You're going to play Who's Bill This Time. Bill Kurtis, of course, is going to read for you three quotations from the week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain two of them, you'll win our prize - scorekeeper emeritus Carl Kasell, his voice on your voicemail. Are you ready to play?
BROOKS: Oh, I am so ready.
SAGAL: All right, now your first quote is - as is often the case these days - from the president-elect, but he is now speaking a year ago.
KURTIS: I told you they would never pick me as Person of the Year, despite being the big favorite. The magazine's going down the tubes.
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SAGAL: Mr. Trump was wrong and this week was named Person of the Year by whom?
BROOKS: Time magazine.
SAGAL: Yes, indeed.
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SAGAL: Time magazine named Donald Trump Person of the Year. It was pretty much a gimme (ph). Their cover photo of Donald Trump as person of the year has Mr. Trump peering over his shoulder, back at the camera as if it caught him doing something he shouldn't.
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SAGAL: Get used to that look.
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SAGAL: Now, it turns out, according to Time magazine, that Time - Mr. Trump collects magazines and has for years with himself on the cover. They're all framed and up in his office. And he's always been obsessed, for years, with becoming Time magazine's Person of the Year. That's what his motivation is. That may have been why he ran for president.
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PAULA POUNDSTONE: You know, what if his goal, next - because now that he's achieved this - is to be in Highlights magazine, maybe?
SAGAL: Yeah.
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SALIE: Oh, like, in the hidden picture.
POUNDSTONE: In the hidden picture.
SALIE: Yes...
POUNDSTONE: It could be, like, OK, find the Trump in...
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POUNDSTONE: Yeah. He's...
GROSZ: He's already - he's been in Highlights for years, though, because he's the role model for Goofus in "Goofus And Gallant."
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POUNDSTONE: "Goofus And Gallant," yeah.
SAGAL: Meanwhile...
GROSZ: Goofus doesn't ask permission to use his hands.
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GROSZ: That kind of thing.
SAGAL: Toby, here is your next quote.
KURTIS: It was almost like walking the red carpet in Hollywood.
SAGAL: That was Republican Congressman Lou Barletta describing the experience of showing up in New York City for his interview to get a job in what?
BROOKS: A person's Cabinet.
SAGAL: Yes, the person's Cabinet.
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GROSZ: Oh, my gosh. I have a question...
SAGAL: Toby, Toby, he's not Voldemort. You can say his name.
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GROSZ: Exactly.
POUNDSTONE: He whose name cannot be spoken.
GROSZ: I think he thinks he's Beetlejuice and if he says his name he'll show up at his house.
SAGAL: Yeah.
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SAGAL: An array of politicians and plutocrats have been going up the elevator in Trump Tower to be interviewed for Cabinet posts. Sometimes they're selected. Sometimes they're dropped into the piranha tank underneath...
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SAGAL: ...Trump's desk. It's been a steady parade of people up there, not just politicians, but everybody from Al Gore to Leonardo DiCaprio to Chris Christie. But it turned out, Christie already had a new job, so he just delivered the pizzas and left.
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POUNDSTONE: There's a chorus line feeling about it, isn't there?
SAGAL: Yeah...
POUNDSTONE: Yeah. When Mitt Romney left he was singing, (singing) oh, God, I need this job.
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SALIE: I have felt uncomfortable all week with the headlines, "Trump Taps Secretaries."
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SAGAL: Here's the other thing, Trump has been picking a lot of generals. There's General Mad Dog Mattis to run the Defense Department, General Mad Person Flynn for national security advisor, General John Not Obviously Mad So Far But We're Waiting For The Shoe To Drop Kelly for Homeland Security, and maybe General David Petraeus as secretary of mistress procurement.
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SAGAL: Well, you know, Donald Trump, as he once said, he just likes to grab generals.
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POUNDSTONE: That was just locker room talk.
SAGAL: And it's actually - it's better than it used to be back when he used to just grab privates.
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SAGAL: He's moved up now - president-elect.
GROSZ: I feel like Trump - like, all these people, it's like one of those like '40s, like, news of the world reels where it's like, and look who's going to Trump Tower. It's movie star Leonardo DiCaprio. What's he and Trump going to talk about? And there's Al Gore, he's returned from the wilderness, he shaved his beard. He's going to talk to...
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GROSZ: It's four-star General Michael Flynn. He's bananas. Like it's...
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SAGAL: Toby, we got one more quote for you. You ready?
POUNDSTONE: Toby is strong.
SAGAL: He is.
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SAGAL: Toby...
POUNDSTONE: Toby is this close to a Cabinet position right now.
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SAGAL: Last man standing.
POUNDSTONE: If he can handle this...
SAGAL: Toby, here is your last quote.
KURTIS: Simply enter the store, take what you want and go.
SAGAL: That's an ad for a new store. It was just opened by a company that's already done a lot to change the way we shop. What's the company?
BROOKS: Amazon?
SAGAL: Yes, Amazon very good, Toby.
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SAGAL: I don't know if you heard this. Amazon has opened an experimental new store in Seattle that relieves us of the worst part of shopping - talking to other human beings.
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SAGAL: This is serious. How it works - you go in, you check in with your phone at a kiosk, you pick up what you want and you walk out - no cashier, person or thing. Isn't it great? You can get a bottle of Rumchata, a six pack of Twinkies and a copy of Maxim and no one judges you.
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SALIE: Is it like the hotel refrigerator where if you lift something up you're charged? I mean, what if you decide that you don't want the mayonnaise?
SAGAL: Yeah. Well, according to the trailer - they put out a trailer show how it works - you can put it back...
GROSZ: Like a movie trailer?
SAGAL: No, like - yeah, almost. I mean everything is a trailer now. Books have...
GROSZ: In a world where you don't want to talk to someone.
GROSZ: Right.
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SAGAL: No, Amazon put out a little film. And that shows that if you choose you, you know - it has a woman and she picks up a doughnut and she says, oh, I don't really want the doughnut. And she puts the doughnut back.
POUNDSTONE: Oh, great.
GROSZ: She just fondles a doughnut and puts it back on the shelf (laughter)?
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POUNDSTONE: Wait, so far I'm loving this store.
SAGAL: Yeah.
POUNDSTONE: Yeah. So if there's bacteria you don't want, you can put that back, too?
SAGAL: Yeah.
SALIE: This is really brilliant because...
SAGAL: You think?
SALIE: Yeah. People are going to buy so much more. If I didn't think I'd be judged - I mean, I limit the amount of ice cream I buy...
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SALIE: ...Especially when I'm also buying super-plus tampons.
SAGAL: Right.
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SALIE: And if there were nobody watching, it would be like tons of...
POUNDSTONE: Well, I don't see the - what's the relationship?
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POUNDSTONE: Faith is saying that she feels uncomfortable going to a store where people buy things of very personal natures all the time. She doesn't feel comfortable buying super-absorbent tampons and ice cream, and yet, she'll go on the radio and say it.
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SAGAL: You make a good point.
GROSZ: I do have to say there's a - at my grocery store, which is a regular grocery store, but it does have, like a lot of people's, has the automatic checkout where you can...
SAGAL: Yeah, yeah.
GROSZ: ...You can like play cashier and like scan things...
SALIE: Oh, I hate that.
GROSZ: ...And like, get really frustrated with yourself. And there's always an employee there who has to help you two items in...
SAGAL: Yeah.
SALIE: Yep.
GROSZ: ...When it's like, (imitating register beep) are you old enough to buy that orange juice, or whatever.
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GROSZ: And then you - they come over and they scan something on the thing and then it fixes itself...
SALIE: Yeah.
GROSZ: So someone is going to have to be at this store - they're going to hire a human beings to check the machines...
SAGAL: Yeah...
SALIE: Right...
POUNDSTONE: Oh, you have to have employees because otherwise you have to call yourself on the PA and say, can I have a price check on the super-absorbent tampons?
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POUNDSTONE: And ice cream?
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SAGAL: Bill, how did Toby do?
KURTIS: Well, those Sundance executives should listen to Toby. He got them all right.
POUNDSTONE: All right.
SAGAL: Congratulations, Toby.
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SALIE: Yay, Toby.
(SOUNDBITE OF WARREN SMITH SONG, "UBANGI STOMP") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.