the town that bore me and eventually will rob me of my life precious. second, i'd like to say to all those out there who think they can screw chickens just to teach people to read, your days are numbered ! and finally i'd like to say that reading totally sucks ass. ( together ) hurray ! yes, at first i was happy to be learning how to read. it seemed exciting and magical, but then i read this, "atlas shrugged", by ayn rand. i read every last word of this garbage and because of this piece of !@#$% i'm never reading again ! ( together ) hurray for barbrady ! i guess reading really does suck ass. that's what i've been saying all along, you guys. i'm just glad everything turned out okay, and barbrady got his job back. it's poetic justice. thanks, boys.

captioning made possible by comedy central >> from comedy central's world news headquarters in new york, this is "the daily show" with trevor noah. ( cheers and applause ) ♪ p. >> trevor: how you doing, everybody? welcome to the show! i'm trevor noah! thank you so much for tuning in! you guys are fantastic! my guest tonight is a pulitzer

prize-winning journalist and author of a new book about american diplomacy, ronan farrow is joining us, everybody! ( cheers and applause ) really smart day, we're going to have a great conversation. but first, we spend so much time talking about how president trump is driving america crazy that we sometimes forget he drives the rest of the world crazy, too. >> two united states closest allies are expressing anger and disappoint over recent comments made by president trump. france is upset over claims the president made about the november 2015 terrorist attacks in paris. >> they took their time and gunned them down one by one. boom! come over here. boom! come over here. boom! >> and a lot of people in turkey are angry about the president's claim that the country has a knifing or stabbing problem. >> they say it's as bad as a military war zone hospital -- knives, knives, knives...

>> trevor: not only is trump a bad leader, he would be the worst at movie sound effects. ( laughter ) it would be just like, shower curtain open sound, knives, knives, knives, water in background. ( laughter ) and i honestly wish that bad sound effects were the worst thing happening here but i get why the u.k. and france are so offended. trfer was trivializing other countries' tragedies. imagine how the country would feel the president trump macron got on stage and said, and the planes flew into the towers, come over here, airplane, wee, boom! it felt like he was a one man show around the world, in australia boomerang, boomerang, in russian, poison, poison. in africa, aids, aids. in poland they have submarines

but build them c screen doors. so many drownings! it's a tragedy, folks, it's a tragedy! ( cheers and applause ) let's move on now to some news in the sports world. the n.h.l. playoffs runsway and bait of a scandal going on. think of the worst behavior you can imagine by a hockey player. i bet you it wasn't this. >> the boston bruins brad was warned by the n.h.l. and his own coach not to lick the faces of any more of his opponents. he's had his tongue out for much of the series against the lightning but it didn't help. >> trevor: how long is his tongue? how is he doing that? i know it's disgusting but in his defense if fighting is a normal part of the sport how do you take it to the next level? in hockey you punch a guy -- whatever, man, it's monday. lick a guy, he's scarred for life. i don't want to talk about it!

( laughter ) the bad news is the player got in trouble with the n.h.l. and his coach. on the bright said he got a call from d.j. cal it's wife. ( audience reacts ) big news, while donald glover was looking for his shar shirt n airplane, rudy giuliani was looking to redeem himself. he's also donald trump's new lawyer and if his debut last week he revealed the first time trump was involved in the late 2016 hush money payment to stormy daniels. despite trump having denied he knew about it. the next morning trump tweeted in support of giuliani's statement. giuliani's big relegal is he didn't get the response he and his boss were working for. >> did he create more legal problems for the president and michael cohen? is there a strategy? >> i'm scratching my head saying what are they doing? >> what the heck, did he know or

not know? i love rudy but they better have an explanation for that. >> shocking. >> major screwup. >> appalling to watch. >> i liken it to a murder-suicide. >> trevor: damn. ( laughter ) that is the most brute reel view i've heard since mike pence saw wonder woman. ( laughter ) the only thing i'm wondering about this woman is where her husband is. two thumbs down. so i've one from fox to msnbc agreed, giuliani's story was a disaster. all he did was get the president in more campaign violation trouble. trump broke out a move he usually reserves for golf, a do-over. >> rudy is a great guy but he just started a day ago. but he really has his heart into it, he's working hard. he's learning the subject matter. uh, he'll get his fact straight. he's a great guy. >> trevor: it's so weird to heahear trump defend someone --

still learning, new to the job, getting used to it -- that's how you defend a kid having trouble at school. we're getting rudy a tutor, folks, give him a chance. he's a good kid and he already knows all his shapes. give him a chance, folks. ( laughter ) as of friday, that was the new plan, throw away everything giuliani said last week because he doesn't know what he's talking about? and you can see why trump likes giuliani because saturday he went back on tv to throw himself under the bus. >> did you misspeak or did people not interpret what you were saying? >> the facts i -- i -- i'm still learning. this is 1.2 million documents. i have been in the case two weeks, vier ciewlly one day in comparison to other people, so i'm not an expert on the facts yet. i'm getting there. but i am an expert on the law and the fact is there is no way this is a campaign finance violation of any kind.

>> trevor: whoa, whoa, can't have it both ways. giuliani says he's new, doesn't know fact, but then he also says, for fact, trump didn't break any laws. you can't do that. it's like a defect walking into a crime scene and middle east saying i don't know what happened but i'm saying he's innocent. let's get lunch. shit, who killed that guy? oh! murder mystery! ( laughter ) saturday, fox news was willing to forgive and forget which was great for juliany. unfortunately, on abc sunday, a very short man with a long memory asked giuliani a simple question that led to an amazing response. >> so the president did know about this after the campaign? >> can't say that. at some point yes, but it could have been recently, could have been a while bag, those are the facts that we're still working on athand that, maybe in a little bit of a dispute. this is more rumor than anything else. >> that's what you said that to buzzfeed. >> well, yeah. i mean, that's one of the possibilities and one of the rumors.

the reality is -- >> you stated it as fact. >> well, maybe i did, but right now i'm at the point where i'm learning and i can only -- i can't prove that. i can just say it's rumor. i could prove it's rumor but i can't prove its fact. ( laughter ) >> trevor: i feel like i just smoked weed through the tv. giuliani is in an interview telling us that we shouldn't listen to what he says in interviews. and i don't know if i'm confused or if he's confused, but i guess fortunately he cleared it up immediately he's confused. >> as a matter of fact, on hannity and buzzfeed you talked to "the washington post" about it. >> i don't know, how do you separate fact and opinion? >> trevor: that's pretty basic but i guess in a way he has a point. i mean, see, like, my opinion is

that giuliani is bat boy after he grew up. but that could also be a fact. so who knows, who knows? ( laughter ) now, at this point, giuliani's defense strategy seems to be dismantle reality. but really, it fits into the whole idea that trump and his people have always been playing with, fiction versus facts. facts or anything that helps trump and anything that doesn't help trump isn't a fact. yeah. now, as trump's lawyer, this is going to be giuliani's challenge because they haven't figured out what version of events won't get trump into trouble. yeah, once they figure that out, that's when they'll start calling things facts. it's like when a cop pulls you over and asks you how fast you were going and you try to figure out the speed limit. you're, like, officer, i was going 50, 55 miles an hour? oh, that's 10 miles faster. before i went 45 miles an hour, you didn't let me finish, yeah, yeah. you said you were going 55.

no, that was a rumor, this is a fact. i just started driving a week ago. i'm very new at this. this is all very new for me, i don't know how any of this works, officer. ( applause ) and, look, i completely understand the strategy, but you have to admit, it makes these guys look super guilty right now and i'm not on trump's legal team but i have some advice, giuliani, i know you're still learning the facts, but until you get them settled, maybe take a page from d.j. khalid and stop using your mouth for a while. we'll be right back. ( cheers and applause )

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>> trevor: welcome back to "the daily show." obviously, obviously, rud rudy giuliani had a terrible weekend from a p.r. perspective, but legally speak, how will this affect president donald trump? we turn to michael kosta, everybody! ( cheers and applause ) michael, do you think the president regrets bringing giuliani on to the team because the feels like a total mess. >> oh, yeah, maybe to you, you sweet, dimpled simpleton, but to a trained lawyer like myself, rudy giuliani is a legal wizard, and this is his fan a fantasia. >> trevor: first of all, you not a lawyer. >> how come every judge in the city knows me on a first-name basis? >> trevor: because you don't pay your parking tickets. >> wrong again. it's because i don't pay child support. ( laughter ) here's how i know rudy is a genius. before he showed up the facts seemed obvious. donald trump paid hush money to

a porn star three weeks before the election open and shut case. now, thanks to rudie, we know president didn't pay cohen to pay daniels except he did but from a general legal fund which didn't exist unless it does. either way, the president didn't know about it other than the parts he knew which was nothing. ( laughter ) and clearly no campaign finance laws were broken because trump was going to pay stormy daniels or not regardless of the election, and this massive tiny payment was church change that also made her rich. you can trust rudy on that because he's an expert on campaign finance, even though he knows nothing because he just started on the case, like, an hour ago. ( laughter ) ( applause ) >> trevor: what? >> exactly. no one knows what's going on, which means reasonable doubt, case dismissed, huh? everybody head back to the

judge's chambers for sangria and chips. >> no, no, don't encourage him. michael, hold on. mud i didn't think the waters might work in the press but actually doesn't work in a court of law. how is rudy giuliani going to convince a judge at the trump didn't illegally impail stormy daniels? >> used mas an airtight defense. >> the agreement with a michael cohen is a long-standing agreement that michael cohen takes care of situations like this and gets paid for them sometimes. >> did michael cohen make payments to orthowomen for the president? >> i have no knowledge of that but i would think if it was necessary yes. >> trevor: okay, how does that help? i mean all rudy said was that the president might regularly pay women to be silenced about affairs. >> exactly. it's what we near the legal profession call the scumbag defense. >> trevor: the what? >> the scumbag defense otherwise knowing as pleading the 69th.

( cheers and applause ) >> trevor: i'm not high-fiving you. what is the scumbag defense? >> you see, paying off stormy daniels is only illegal if trump did it to help his campaign. but if trump was paying hush money to women all the time it wouldn't be for the tam cane, just a recurring expense like cable or child support. >> trevor: wow. so the bigger a keating scumbag trump is the less likely it is this hush money broke any laws. >> bing o. let me break it down. on this chart -- >> trevor: oh, not a chart. >> on this chart here shows, there are two spheres of the scumbag defense. here is innocence and over here is being a scumbag. normally they don't overlap but now giuliani inserted trump right here and this is his comfort zone and he can bounce back and forth between these two with total freedom. innocent, scumbag, innocent, scumbag, and he can get right in

the middle there and just be perfect! justice, trevor! justice! and that's why rudy is a genius! all he has to do is prove to a jury that donald trump is a bad person, and there's newt jury in the world that would rule against that, case dismissed. >> trevor: michael kosta, everybody! we'll be right back! ( cheers and applause ) ♪ [ heavy breathing ] mom! if we don't find the money you and your kids will not survive. big mistake. i'll do anything to protect my kids. we have ourselves a problem. what? my mom. ♪ you're an impressive woman. i'm just a mom. now get the hell out of my house. breaking in. rated pg-13.

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( cheers and applause ) >> trevor: welcome back to "the daily show." my guest tonight is a pulitzer prize-winning investigative journalist who writes for the "new yorker" and is the author of the new book "war on peace: the end of diplomacy and the decline of american influence." please welcome ronan farrow. ( cheers and applause ) >> trevor: hello.

welcome to the show. >> pleasure to be here. >> trevor: you are an overachiever in the journalistic world. people talk about the stories you're breaking. i mean, the #metoo movement was broken by your story. it's what sparked a movement. they were very brave women, sources who were great activists who preceded that, but i'm honored to be a conduit for the stories. they were tough to tell. >> trevor: they were tough to tell for the women involved and you as a journalist. we read all the stories about harvey weinstein and people he was hiring. were you ever afraid? is that a point where you go, like, maybe i shouldn't break stories, i'm just going to tweet ten most likely things people will click on. >> i will do that, too. but it is true that there was intimidation, there was a system designed to shut down the stories and that affected not just me but a whole range of brave journalists going up against this i thin thing. sure, the moment you decided do i go home because i'm getting staked out and when i do go

home, i look under the bed and pull back the shower curtain, and you go i'm either crazy or the story was greater than fiction. he was hiring operatives following people around using false identities. >> trevor: the news you just broke today or that just broke today is a story of how the trump administration was secretly hiring an israeli team of spice to dig up dirt on people who with worked on the iran deal. is that correct? >> in fact, the same israeli spice from a firm called black cube that harvey weinstein hired, and in some cases using the same false identities and front companies that i heard from when i was getting stalked by these guys. >> trevor: so explain to me just a little bit of the details. they were hiring these people not to undermine the deal itself but to undermine the people who put the deal together. why? >> that's the surprising part of this. these are policy wonks. these are obama advisors and,

you know, we don't have all the answers yet, but sources close to this and documents that we obtained at the "new yorker" show very clearly there was a seemingly political in focus operation design to smear them, seemingly all connected to their work on the 2015 iran deal. >> trevor: this sounds less like a story you would hear in a first world country or a country that claims to be pro democracy than a country that's totalitarian. the book "war on peace: the end of diplomacy and the decline of american influence," it really speaks to, in a way, what's happening with the iran deal. it seems like trump and his people do not care about the diplomacy america conducts in the world. it's now become war or no war, talking or no talking. why do you think that's happened? >> these stories all connect. look, these are individuals fighting desperately to save a deal because they believe if we unilaterally as a nation back out of the iran deal, for all its imperfections, it's worked

in a narrow goal of containing them for a time, and if we back out we fear it drives a wedge between us and our allies and sends a message to other rogue states that they shouldn't come to the table. they're getting smeared and intimidated. >> trevor: right. >> their profession is in danger, where people who make our deals and negotiate and secure option force addressing conflicts around the world that don't involve going in guns blazing are under attack, getting fired en masse, people don't understand what they do anymore and more and more that work is outsourced to the military, our spice, the intelligence community. >> trevor: that's interesting because you spoke to every living secretary of state and how america's diplomacy has been on the decline, maybe hasn't started with trump buzz may be accelerating now, is this a sustainable way to conduct one's way in the world where it's military first, diploimsy

second? >> what i chron qul in "war on peace," in place after place when we sabotage peaceful ways out and go in shooting first, it really comes back to haunt us, trevor. again and again we see situations where we end up lying down with warlords and strongmen and unsavory character and have no leverage over them because we fired all the diplomats that negotiate and play hard ball in that way. >> trevor: if you look in the current situation, there are countries where america doesn't have a diplomat and no one is handling the high level of investigation. what's happening in that case? >> this is happening to an extreme now. donald trump unceremoniously fired ambassadors across the world, assistant secretaries that run some of the most sensitive regions in the world. we have an understaffed, undermanned diplomatic operation. there is precedent for this. we've seen other administrations, democratic and republican sidelined, but this

is disastrous and when you look at the consequences, we see situations where there are active opportunities to make peace and we just give them up. we see situations where you could bring people to the table potentially and spare brave servicemen and women going into the fire and we give those up. it's a real problem. for people who don't want to think about the high-level talks, these are people who screen dangerous interlopers from coming into the united states, that stamp your passports and save you if you're kidnapped abroad. unglamorous but life saving. >> trevor: and independent grat and currently crumbling. you're a fascinating man. thank you for being on the show. "war on peace: the end of diplomacy and the decline of american influence" is available now. ronan farrow, everybody. we'll be right back ( cheers and applause )