Last night, on Real Time with Bill Maher, the host took aim at Marjorie Taylor Greene, specifically one particular tweet to which Maher dedicated most of the final segment of his show.
The host took exception to Greene’s tweet from Feb 23 that stated, “We need a national divorce.”
Greene, one of the many politicians who are unable to understand the idea of compromise (which ironically should be a qualification for the job), unsurprisingly claimed that the country needs to separate with Republicans on one side and Democrats on the other. She did not specify if those without political affiliation would be allowed to remain in her fantasy country.
Maher blasted the idea and, instead of calling Greene a clown, decided to make use of his show airing on St. Patrick’s Day and referred to her as “America’s National Leprechaun.”
Maher went on for five minutes about how those who believe everyone should agree with their opinion can’t deal with the reality that we all have different ideas. He also asked, “It’s always such a tempting thought, isn’t it? If you can just keep the a**holes out….but where do you draw the line as to how much someone can disagree with you before they’re an a**hole, too?”
Maher did point out how Greene isn’t the only one to think this, saying, “She didn’t invent our country’s polarization any more than she can spell it.”
At one point during the segment, he showed a result of a poll that claimed that 60% of both Democrats and Republicans said they would be against their child marrying someone of the opposing political party.
The host also pointed out that one third of the country, when polled, said they are in favor of a “national divorce.”
“Just voicing this idea is dangerous,” Maher explained, “because it reinforces the belief that you can’t even talk to those people. You just have to somehow nullify their very existence by creating a country of only your type of people.”
Referring to how even those in the same political party strongly disagree with each other on certain topics, Maher suggested that the country would have to separate into more than just two different countries into what would likely be several, ultimately stating, “Seems like we would need a lot more new countries than just two. OR we can stick with the one!”
Maher’s conclusive thought, which he ended his show on to a round of applause, was simple. “You can’t call yourself a patriot of the United States and not be for the whole ‘United’ part.”
Real Time with Bill Maher airs Friday nights on HBOMax.