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November 26th, 1999 Guests on this program were: Ahmet ZappaBill's Opening Bill: Thank you very much. Boy, I appreciate that. Especially you're still stuffed from Thanksgiving. [ Laughter ] I know I am. Boy, I tell you, this show, I bought my Turkey. This was a bad mistake in Beverly Hills. You should never do that. It wasn't until I got the thing home before I realized the breasts were implants. [ Laughter ] [ Applause ] No, the reason why I have a problem with this day is Christmas is already here. They're already with the decorations and things. Even at the White House. Only the day after Thanksgiving and they already hung the mistletoe under the president's desk. I tell you. [ Laughter ] [ Applause ] On the Republican side, let me tell you, the day after Thanksgiving is a very important day also at George W. Bush's house. Because over there, cold turkey is not just a leftover. It's an unfounded rumor. [ Applause ] The bad news is, of course, travel. They say because we have so much money now it is the worst ever -- yesterday, horrible day. The day before. This whole season's going to be terrible. Airport personnel, they say, are stretched so thin that this year Diana Ross is going to have to grab her own breasts. [ Laughter and applause ] So you are a wonderful holiday crowd. Panel Discussion Bill: Let us meet our panel. She's a rising force in liberal politics and the host of mtv's "Web Riot" from the Zappa family, Gail and Ahmet Zappa. How you doing, buddy? Good to see you. And this is like WWF wrestling. And now on the other team, he is the legendary leader of the Jefferson Starship. Their cd is -- oh, here, I have it here. "Greatest hits, Live at the Fillmore." She is his daughter, and, of course, a human being in other own right, representing the Kantner family, Paul and China Kantner. Hi. Nice to see you. Pauly, how ya doing? Okay. [ Applause ] Are you ready to play "Family Feud"? We wish you a merry Christmas Oh, no. The wrong tune. Bill: I love that you're smoking, first of all. Paul: We smoke as a family. Bill: Do you smoke? China: Yes, I do. I'm not proud of that fact, but, yes, I do. [ Laughter ] Paul: The one American product the people that still want, worldwide. [ Laughter ] They don't want our cars, our TVs, or refrigerators, but they do want -- we call it Carolina incense. Ahmet: You're killing me right now. Paul: You won't have to go through armageddon. Bill: Anyway. Paul: Me, too. Darwin in action. Bill: Speaking of Jesus, I want to talk about this holiday thing. Because, you know, it's upon us again, and I have to say, upon us is the right choice of words, because it seems to me that there has to be a better way for families to get together than to have this scheduled event every year. It just puts too much pressure on us. No wonder people kill themselves at this time of year. Ahmet: That's why they invented Chuck E. Cheese! You idiot! [ Laughter ] I'm telling you. Go! It's fantastic. [ Applause ] Skeeball, video games, pizza. Stuffed animals. Paul: Friday afternoon dinner. Ahmet: Yes. Bill: Not that you guys really represent the American family. Ahmet: I disagree. [ Laughter ] Sorry. [ Applause ] Bill: I meant that as a compliment. Ahmet: Oh, thank you. Bill: No, but what I'm trying to say is that it just seems that it gets such a scripted event, that there's a way to be, a way to feel. Paul: That's the whole world, though. It doesn't happen, I don't think in these two families. Bill: That's what I was saying. Gail: Not at all. Paul: No. It's a bunch of people that you don't -- you don't make a big Martha Stewart thing out of it. But people get together, and there's some good food, and people drop in, and you eat, and then you don't. Gail: When your kids are grown, the one time -- that have you to see them. Paul: And it's pleasant, not quite pleasant, I think, and there's no high energy like you're talking about at all, not in our area. Ahmet: I so desperately want it to be a Martha Stewart kind of a vibe, though. Paul: Well, you can do that. Ahmet: That's the problem. Paul: I can give you a book. Ahmet: But you know -- we have no organizational skills at all. We try to plan, like, oh, well, you know, dinner's at 6:00. And it's like 9:30, 10:00. Bill: Which brings up a good point. Which is that kids will always rebel against whatever the parents do. Paul: That's their job. Bill: So your parents were hippies. So you want Martha Stewart. Ahmet: Frank Zappa -- Gail: We were not hippies! Paul: I don't think myself could be termed a hippie. Gail: No. Oh, no, no, no. Bill: Frank Zappa wasn't a hippie? Ahmet: No. Gail: I'm sorry. Ahmet: Not at all. Not at all. Bill: Tell me why Frank Zappa was not a hippie? Ahmet: He hated hippies. Gail: Freak we can live with. But hippie are those people that wore blankets, seriously. Gail: Didn't bathe. Bill: Yeah. Gail: We weren't even hippies. That was something of the news -- Ahmet: The power of rock! You idiot! The rock! They had the blood of a Jackal coursing through their veins! Bill: But why are you denying your heritage? Being a hippie is a noble thing. Gail: But hippie became a marketing term, just like everything else. Bill: Maybe it became a marketing term. That doesn't -- just because somebody abrogates a term doesn't mean it should not exist for you. Hippie was a great thing before they took it over. They overtook the Beatles. They took over the Beatles "Revolution" and made it the Nike song. Does that mean the song sucks? Paul: That's horrible. Yoko Ono, should be crucified for that, I mean, publicly. [ Applause ] Michael Jackson, too, owns the Beatles music. All these horrible things. Ahmet: Going bankrupt. Hello! Paul: Well, bankrupt, that's artistic. Such crass stuff. These people you're talking about were hippies before there was a word called hippie. You know, there was just a bunch of people who were on the fringe beyond a certain pale that got away with it for various reasons. Bill: Okay. But if you two aren't hippies, who is? Paul: Exactly. Gail: Exactly. That's the very excellent question. Bill: Well, who is? [ Applause ] Paul: I'll raise a flag. Ahmet: I'm part of generation X. [ Talking over each other ] Bill: Well, they give you the hat -- Ahmet: And? Bill: -- And then you're on your own. Get out of here. Here's the hat, and go ahead. Ahmet: It's cold in here, man. See how I shaved the head. Paul: Think warm. Ahmet: Yeah, I'm -- ooh, chilly willy! Bill: But, let me rephrase it. No, let me just say it again. If not you, who's a hippie? Paul: I don't have any idea. Hippies were buried, I think, in 1968. Gail: Those people stuffed flowers in the ends of guns. That's who hippies were. Paul: They were the last hippies. Bill: When did you get so cynical about the whole thing? Paul: I'm not cynical. It's just not our word. Gail: Did you ever listen to any of those records, Bill? Bill: Which ones? Like what? Gail: Well, any of Frank's, for instance. He made some serious comments about a hippie. Bill: What word would you like to call your counterculture lifestyle. Paul: There's no word for it. Bill: Oh, now you're Prince? [ Cheers and applause ] We'll take a break, and we'll slap some sense into these hippies! [ Cheers and applause ] Bill: All right. We're here with our counterculture of "Politically Incorrect" Thanksgiving family show. Hippies. No, we don't want to term hippies. I'm going to call you -- let's call you stock brokers. Paul: There you go. Bill: 'Cause you're either one or the other. You got to choose sides in the war. Now, my question to the kids is, how do you rebel when your parents -- China: I got it. Bill: Are breaking the law? China: Well, I'm a Christian server, student wife. Bill: Exactly -- China: That's rebelling. Bill: That was my point, yes. Whatever the parents -- Paul: A generational thing. Bill: Yes. Whatever the parents do, and that proves you are a hippie, Mr. Mother lover. Paul: Mother fletcher. Bill: Yes. Ahmet: The thing is, in our family, there was really no rebellion, I don't believe. I mean, maybe I have a difference of opinion than my brothers and sisters, but we -- Paul: Psychotic brothers and sisters. Ahmet: But we just kind of -- whoa. Watch it. Paul: I have psychotic children. Ahmet: Okay. Then we're on good terms. China: I'm sorry. Ahmet: No, we just follow the example set. My mother and my father, they would tell me to not dot something, I was like, "Okay, I won't do that." And if I did something bad, I was punished, and it felt like normal. Felt like "The Brady Bunch" to me, I was watching TV and learning all my life lessons from, you know, the television. And I just grew up thinking that life was great. Played with my action figures and life was good. Gail: I love where he goes on holidays -- to the television set. Ahmet: Help me! Paul: I mean, parents are like, in a way, they're presenting a menu to their children, ideally. Bill: That's interesting. Paul: Hello, I'm Paul. I'm your parent tonight. We have here, here, here, and you show them things that you've liked in the world. And that you know a little bit about, and sort of sound smart. You know, from one to ten, you're like God with your children. And then they get into double digits, and all of a sudden they realize, just what a [ bleep ] up you really are, on any number of different levels, and there's that -- and you go from being God to being like, mud of the Earth for a few years, and then it sort of settles back into a normal place. Right? China: The other thing is true, too, they're hitting their shoulder, and I don't understand this concept at all, of spanking. It makes no sense to me. And, you know, the thing -- Bill: You were never spanked? China: Once. Paul: One whack on the butt? China: And I don't -- whatever. It's not a big deal. Bill: And that was recently? China: Ah, no, no, no, no. [ Cheers and applause ] But he did a really cool thing to my brother, which was, my brother, I don't know what he did wrong, but he made him go down to the sea and carry these large rocks up the mountain and build this Japanese temple as a punishment. And the guy -- my poor brother had to schlep down the hill every single day after school, but it was something that was -- Bill: He was a sisyphus. China: It was artistic. Yeah! I mean, it wasn't like, you know take your toothbrush and scrub my butt or whatever. [ Laughter ] Something that was interesting. Gail: It's good to be creative. Bill: Yeah. Not with that, with the butt. Paul: I have those rock today, still, in my garden. Ahmet: My mother's punishment tactic was, "Hold out your hand!" So I would like -- whoosh, and then you're like, "Ow, don't do that!" "Okay." Or the worst -- the worst thing ever is like, "All right, go see your father!" China: Exactly. Ahmet: And you'd walk in, you know, we -- as children, we called our mother, Gail, that is her name. Bill: No? Ahmet: Yeah, Gail and Frank. Bill: That is so wrong. Ahmet: Did you call your father, Paul? Paul: No. China: No, but I know you guys did that. And that's -- you tripped. So what are they supposed to do? Gail: Introduced me that way. Ahmet: Yeah. It was, "Go see Frank." We'd walk in there. Then he would say, "What did you do?" And then he had a way of just looking at you and saying, "You were acting like a jerk." And you'd be like, "Yeah." [ Laughter ] And you just felt so ashamed. You felt so bad. Paul: My German father has that look, and he didn't have to say anything. He would just go into the look, and you'd know, "Oh, my God!" Ahmet: It's like a Jedi mind trick. Cool! [ Laughter ] And you should walk away. Like, "I am so tortured." Gail: Frank had really great advice. He said, you know, "Don't be a jerk unless somebody's paying you a lot of money." [ Laughter ] No reason for it. [ Applause ] Bill: But -- [ Applause ] All kidding aside, that's not a good thing to say to a kid. Ahmet: I loved it. Paul: Nobody's gonna pay a lot of money to a kid in the first place. Bill: And look at the show you're on! Ahmet: If we were crying, my father would, as a joke, walk up to us and go, "Stop crying." And we're like, "Ah, ah --" "Do you want to go to the hospital?" [ Crying noises ] Like, "You want a beer?" And then you start laughing. As a child, you know? You're 6 years old, and you're -- like, there was a panic situation. I cut my chin open, and my mother was the one that -- Bill: You cut your chin open? Accidentally? Ahmet: Yeah. I was in a bike riding accident. I took a razor, Bill. Is that what you want to hear? I have to get rid of this thing on my face! Yeah, that's the kind of psycho I was as a child! [ Laughter ] [ Applause ] No. Bill: Okay. Ahmet: I hurt myself on a bicycle. And it was panic station. You know, I kind of walked back to my house. And my friends's are like, "Don't touch your chin." I'm like, "Why?" My bone was hanging out. It was disgusting. So my father, who is normally working, I have to interrupt him and I feel bad about that. I walk downstairs, I'm like, "Ah --" and he's like, "Okay. Where's Gail?" And I'm like, "I don't know." He's like, "All right. We're gonna have to get the hydrogen peroxide." You're like, "Ah! No!" Because you know it's gonna hurt so bad. And there was no skill whatsoever to, like, heal the open wound. It was just -- he just sat with a cigarette, and we patiently waited. He was trying to calm me down. Bill: Once again, you people are hippies. Okay? Normal people would go to the hospital! We have to take a commercial. We'll be right back. Bill: All right. Now that it's a little later in the evening -- Paul: One quick thought regarding the parental thing. My mother when I was about 4 years old, I fell down and ripped my head open. On a stair, and I didn't want to go to the hospital. My German mother says to me, "Well, that's okay. We'll just put you in the oven then," you know, to get stitches. "We'll just put you in the oven, and that will take care of it." And she, like, actually pulls the oven door open. I said, "No, no. Take me to the hospital," because I was scared of the stitches. "Take me to the hospital. Take me to the hospital!" So there's a certain psychology there. Bill: It's a wonderful holiday story! [ Laughter ] Paul: Yeah. Bill: I always love a story about Germans putting people in ovens. China: Thank you. Bill: I tell ya -- Paul: Yeah, it got me to the hospital. Paul: With no worries. Bill: You're a hippie. Paul: No, just kill me. Bill: A German hippie. Okay. Okay! Bill: I was going to say -- Paul: That's my monkey. Bill: Now that the censors have gone to bed, I want to get back into this thing about drugs, because I know that from talking to your brother that it was never -- Frank was never into them. Gail: Yeah. Bill: You guys were never into them? Ahmet: I have never taken a drug in my life. I don't even like to take Tylenol or -- like, I would rather live with the pain. I really think that people -- the manufacturers are drugs, when you take them, they secretly want to rewire your dna and transform you into some form of mutant. [ Applause ] Thank you. Bill: And that's especially true of the legal drugs. Ahmet: I really believe that. Bill: Would you not agree? Paul: No, no. I have no use for pain, and find great solace in all legal drugs, and illegal drugs. Well, not all illegal, but from nitrous oxide or when you go to the dentist, you don't get any of that stuff? Ahmet: Well, I'm not insane! [ Laughter ] I'm not gonna -- Paul: Because -- for a certain -- is my point. And I like the Buddhist way and the American way, and the combination of both of them for acupuncture to novocaine is a great combination of science. And energy, I think that works well for the Western man. Bill: But as someone -- Paul: And woman. Bill: -- As someone who was stockbroker. Paul: Yes, in the '60s. Bill: Yes. Okay. Paul: '70s, '80s, '90s. Bill: Right, and had your moments with the counterculture substances, what do you tell your kids gentleman because this is a question that is germane to a lot of baby boomers. Paul: I tell them no. No way. It's like driving a car. China: No, no, no, nope, nope. Wait! He said, "When you're 21, you can smoke a joint with me." And I got sober when I was 21. There's the story. I screwed up my chance to, like have this moment with my father. Paul: I wouldn't give drugs to children. Bill: I wouldn't either. I agree with that. Paul: No, it's stupid. Bill: But what do you tell them? Paul: Any more than I'd let them drive the family car at age 10. Bill: Right. Paul: Or have a shot of vodka at 14. Ahmet: When I was in school and they started sending our flyers and all that -- Paul: I was a "Just say no" kind of guy for my kid. Ahmet: My parents sat me down, because they had the whole you know, Nancy Reagan, "Just say no," whole craziness. Right? So my mother and father sat me down and they gave me this speech that worked marvelous. Marvelously, I should say. They said, "If you want to take drugs, we won't pay for them." And I have never taken them. Bill: Wow! That's a really, really Republican approach. Ahmet: You think? Bill: That's Reaganesque. Oh, yeah. Ahmet: Thank you, thank you. Gail: But they certainly saw that you could be finding yourself in the unemployment line if you worked for Frank and you did drugs, because you put everybody at risk when you're touring with a band. Paul: True. Gail: You know. And one person can take down the whole band. When going through customs. Bill: But, also, I mean, my record collection has not been hurt by bands' drug use. Okay? Let's be really honest about this. There's a lot of bands that sucked when they got off drugs. Paul: True. [ Laughter ] Bill: I have to agree. I have to agree. I mean, please. This guy sang White Rabbit. Paul: That's quite a literary reference, if you look deep. Bill: Right, and what I got from that song, it was somewhat about drugs, but it was also about, here's a child's tail, advising kids that Alice goes on all these hallucinogenic adventures. Paul: Right, I mean, drugs have been going on for 10,000 years. Bill: Yes. Paul: And they're not gonna stop. And putting everybody in jail and making the prison industry a growth industry in California, one of the biggest, is not gonna stop people from taking drugs. All it's going do -- [ Talking at the same time ] Bill: But what I want to know because this is a family show -- China: Yeah, yeah. Bill: Is, when you were young, and were aware that he was doing them, what was your reaction, and what was -- ? China: I -- first of all, I don't blame my parents for my drug use. I find that B.S. when kids go, "Oh, it's because my parents did it." No, you do drugs. No one puts them in your mouth. You put them in your mouth. So I started drinking when I was 12, and I -- he didn't know about that. But -- well, yeah, you did. But, no, I mean, the thing is, for me, it's a different situation because I -- I consider myself, like a chronic alcoholic. I mean, I don't drink well. I generally drunk drive when I drink, I fall down, I throw up, I pass out. Those are problem areas for drinking. You know what I'm saying? Bill: Yes. China: So I think it's individual, and it's kind of like, if you don't shape up to your own drug use, and the fact that you're harming other people. I could have killed children driving, I could have killed myself. A lot of things like that. If you don't shape up, it's like your loss, and you're screwing other people up. Bill: And you bring up a good point which is that alcohol is, perhaps, the most dangerous drug of all, but because it's protected by a lobby, it's legal and has ads and all sorts of fun references. Gail: Don't we think drug are protected? I mean, by another company. Bill: Yes, legal drugs. Gail: Illegal drugs are protected by another kind of lobby. I mean, there's a lot of money floating around and it doesn't go through -- Bill: What lobby is -- ? Paul: Cocaine running through. Gail: Exactly, thank you. Oh, really. Paul: Don't you know that? Gail: You think the drug policy of the United States and other countries isn't driven by a money, you know -- Bill: We are presently, with our military, in Columbia. To stop the drug trade. Paul: And how many people do you think are making money off that trade? Gail: Yeah. People are making a lot of money. Paul: In terms of their own stash, their own airplanes. Bill: That's why they will stop the drug war. Gail: Do you know how much that would be in taxes if they legalize drugs? Illegal drugs -- if they legalize them, how much money will we collect in taxes? Bill: I think we're on the same page. Gail: I know. Bill: Okay. Gail: I'm not saying that I am anti-recreational use, but stay home. Don't involve your children. Paul: Right. Gail: Do it on a -- Paul: Intelligence, really. Bill: Happy Thanksgiving. We'll take a break. We'll be right back. Bill: All right, just a second. This may be the wrong time to ask, but around the holiday time people go home. They're living back with their folks for a couple of days. Do you feel strange having sex in the same house with your parents? Can you handle that? 'Cause I could never handle that. Paul: It's surreptitious sex is the best, isn't it? When you got to sort of keep cool. Not get caught. Ahmet: I feel uncomfortable when it's -- you know? Bill: No, no. Paul: We didn't do it out under the tree or anything. China: You know, to be honest, I'm into the candles, and the sounds if they come up, type of vibe, and then me and my husband like to have our -- our own spot. --- Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher Executive Producers |
Last Updated: 27 April 2001