. hello, everyone. welcome to "amanpour & company." >> members of congress the state of our union is strong. >> president trump touts unity only to fall back on the division that will define the 2020 presidential race. i will hear from both sides of the debate. plus, as yet another government shutdown looms, just nine days from now, it's deja vu all over again, with the president still standing by his wall. texas congresswoman veronica escobar on why he has it all wrong. with all the division, should the country call it quits and

break up? comedian collin quinn on the role of humor in our fractious times. >> uniworld is a proud sponsor of "amanpour & co." when bea tollman founded a collection of boutique hotels, she had bigger dreams, and those dreams were on the water -- a river, specifically -- multiple rivers that would one day be home to uniworld river cruises and their floating boutique hotels. today that dream sets sail in europe, asia, india, egypt, and more. bookings available through your travel agent. for more information, visit uniworld.com. >> additional support has been provided by rosalind p. walter, bernard and irene schwartz, sue and edgar wachenheim iii, the cheryl and philip milstein family, and by contributions to

your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> welcome to the program. just over a week before the american government is once again set to shut down, the president's state of the union was a double-edged sword. on the one hand, a call for bipartisan cooperation while offering no signs of compromise on the ideological divide that stifles washington and the nation. there were supports of chants from the president republican cohorts. a large block of democrats often sat in disapproving silence. much of the president's rhetoric was largely sign posted ahead of time. tough on trade, immigration and ending foreign wars. beneath it all, was this also all about the next presidential

election? playing the long game with some insight into how he hopes to frame the narrative and his democratic opponents while in the short-term, talking up the economy and lambasting the russia investigation. >> an economic miracle is taking place in the united states. the only thing that can stop it are foolish wars, politics or ridiculous partisan investigations. [ applause ] if there is going to be peace and legislation, there cannot be war and investigation. it just doesn't work that way. >> so, let's discuss for and against it with van jones, the

former white house adviser to president obama, and scott jennings, former assistant to george w. bush. welcome to the program. let me first ask you, scott, your takeaway from last night. was it convincing? was it strong? was it coherent? >> i think it was a good speech. there were a couple of moments he could have done without in my opinion. i don't think the talk about the caravan works for him. i thought the line about war with north korea was misplaced and probably didn't belong in the final draft. however, everything else i think would sound reasonable and the snap polling conducted showed most people responded positively to what he had to say. he threw nods out there to groups he needs to talk to, the independent voters who don't love either party. he cast himself above that. he ca

overall, i think conservatives and republicans are happy. if he can stick with this kind of a message it sets up nicely r him. >> van jones, was this a kickoff to the 2020 campaign? do you think the democrats, your party, came out thinking that this was good for them or like scott says, the republicans and conservatives felt that they came away with a lot of red meat? >> it was a mixed bag. that was part of the frustration is there was a buildup, this was going to be a unifying speech. there were parts that were very unifying. i was brought to tears when he had miss alice johnson stand up. somebody who he personally freed from prison. other things like that. but then also the rhetoric against the immigrant community was so harsh that for progressives like myself, it just drowns out everything else.

he is so tough on the immigrant community. it's causing problems. you are having immigrants being spat on in stores and children being bullied. i think that his rhetoric as well as his policies on immigration are so awful that it makes it hard for liberals and progressives to hear anything else he says. >> let's take it step by step. on the idea of bipartisanship and trying to at least in some parts of the speech talk about bipartisanship and unity, let's just play this sound bite from the president. we will get you both to talk about it. >> we must reject the politics of revenge, resistance and retribution and embrace the boundless potential of cooperation, compromise and the common good. so, you know, that sounds really good. that's what presumably a lot of people want to hear.

but the only problem, scott, is that before all of that, we understood from the off the report conversations he had with the tv anchors, as is traditional before a state of the union, he used an epitaph to describe chuck schumer, the minority leader in the senate. sob, i think. before i play the schumer sound bite, how does this work, scott, for your party? how can you, as the president says, get beyond revenge? >> the president, i think is looking at a divided congress that has so far shown no interest in working with him at all. it strikes me that what he is worried about is that their only interest is in politics. ending this presidency as early as possible, making him as irrelevant as possible. that's what he thinks is happening. what he wants to set up is a messaging war here where they look intransigent and he looks like he is willing to compromise. he wants to look like the people to bring people together versus the obstructionist.

this could work at a political level if the democrats refuse to work with him on every issue. i think it would behoofve them o work with him. he wants to work with folks and the democrats don't. >> van, i can see you are shaking your head. i do want to first place the chuck schumer response which goes to a lot of what scott is saying and perhaps what you will say, too. let's do that and, van, we will get you to talk about it. >> you can't talk about working together and give a speech that is so divisive. that doesn't fly. in the areas where he tried to reach out, drug prices, transportation, infrastructure, there was no meat, there was no enthusiasm. all the enthusiasm was for the divisive parts like immigration, abortion, things like that. >> van, there's chuck schumer describing the tone.

but admitting there are areas where the parties could actually work together. is that a basis for some bipartisan policy making going forward? >> i certainly hope so. i see it a little bit differently from scott in that democrats did work with the president in a bipartisan way on criminal justice reform. you had groups from freedom works and american conservative union working with cut 50, aclu and leadership conference on civil rights. you have had bipartisanship on criminal justice. you had bipartisanship on opioids. i think you could have a buy partisanshbuybu buybipartisanship. at the same time, i think that what he is doing is what we call a phony populism where he says

he is for the working folks, but then his tax bill helps the rich and he is dividing people based on where they were born and the color of their skin. that was good marbled in with toxic stuff. it's something that makes it hard for people to trust his intentions and want him to be successful as a president. we say cut off with racial dog whistles and racial bullhorns. >> you want to see the president -- nobody wants to see a president fail. in fact, even the democratic response -- stacey abrams from georgia, she did the response. she said the same thing. she wants the president to succeed. she doesn't want to see a president of the united states fail. however, this is what president trump and stacey abrams said about the key issue that seems to be plaguing this

administration, the opposition and the showdown over the border wall is about immigration. here is what they both said. >> tens of thousands of innocent americans are killed by lethal drugs that cross our border and flood into our cities, including meth, heroin, cocaine and fentanyl. the savage gang ms-13 now operates in at least 20 different american states. and they almost all come through our southern border. >> we know bipartisanship could craftcentury immigration plan. this administration chooses to cage children and tear families apart. compassionate treatment at the border is not the same as open borders. president reagan understood this. president obama understood this.

americans understand this. >> she's right, isn't she? americans do understand this. all the polls that show a majority of americans don't necessarily believe the very heated rhetoric and frankly the false statistics that come out of this white house. we know that there are a lot of false statistics about what happens at the border, where the drugs come in, where the illegal immigrants come in, how this happens. it's usually main points of entry, not the border. given that, how do you see going forward two more years on this term and potentially 2020? how do both parties -- let me ask you, scott, first, get -- go forward on this unbelievable issue of immigration? >> i hope they do go forward. we have been stuck for many, many years. both parties have failed at this over and over and over again. i think americans are getting sick and tired of the failure. i think the president here is looking for a way to be able to tell his people that we got the barriers that the border patrol

says we need, that we are stopping drugs, that we are stopping human trafficking and making sure violent people aren't getting into the country. the democrats are looking for more comprehensive fixes on the immigration front as well. it strikes me that a deal could be made at this moment, because donald trump is the only person that could sell the entire republican party, his base, on a comprehensive solution. that's what has been so frustrating about this for people like me who have been wanting an immigration deal for a long time. if trump blesses a deal, the republicans will follow him. i feel like the elements of it are there. he has come down from the concrete wall. he says steel bare yearriers. it feels like to me he is moving around looking for a way to find issues on which to compromise. i hope i'm right. a big deal helps him and it helps the other party, too, the democrats. it will look like everybody is there to solve problems and not just play politics. >> van, that's fascinating the

tone on concrete versus industrial, the idea that scott said talking more about -- is there space do you think now that the democrats would agree to a proper comprehensive immigration reform from this president? >> i do. part of the thing is, that's what happens on criminal justice reform. if hillary clinton would have put forward the same bill, she would have gotten zero votes from republicans. trump, because he has been tough on the issue, when he moved, he was able to move his party on a -- a big part of his party. i think that's possible. nobody wants more bipartisanship and cooperation than i do. ivanka trump is pushing for a paid family leave. that could be an area of compromise. one of the big heartbreakers of this administration is you have a moment of real disruption where you've got somebody who is not a normal republican, not even a normal politician. a lot of good things could

happen. the problem is that in some ways it does feel that he has a view that his governing coalition is hinged upon this issue of being unreasonably tough on immigration. that's a big part of the democratic party's base, big part of my personal friendship and family network. when it doesn't matter how many nice things you say about family leave or tax policy or infrastructure or cancer for kids, when you follow that up or round that off with a dismissal of 11 million people in this country who go to work every day and who are mostly good people, it's hard to work together. that is a tough pill to swallow. >> scott, clearly the president needs to be helped across this hurdle. the majority of the people, the majority of the party believe a different way than the minority which still seems to push the president into a corner whenever

he tries to come out and say something reasonable about immigration. can this president not stare them down? >> i think the president -- there's been a lot of debate about whether the conservative hard liners in the republican party leaded president or does the president lead them. i have been arguing the president leads the party. they will follow him. if the president comes out and blesses a deal, whatever that deal is, the party will fall in line. you will have people carping from the peanut gallery. the president is the leader of the republican party. they will follow him. i think there's something to be done here. i continue to believe there's a solution for the dreamers as long as the democrats could find a way to help donald trump get the barriers that he wants. whether you call it a wall or barriers or steel slats or whatever, if they can get the barriers for the president, i believe he would bend on a couple of issues and we could come out on the other side of this with some solutions and the party -- the republican party would follow this president down that road. >> any chance of that, van? >> i just don't know.

i hope so. listen, if you are looking for a model, look at who he put up in the gallery. it was individual people who had individual stories. miss alice johnson who he let out of prison. it's conceivable that there's a strategy by which we could double down on humanizing some of the stories. the problem is, you are deporting dreamers who are veterans. literally, people who served the country are being deported from the united states under trump. he said happily, off script, he wants more legal immigration. at the same time, the workers in the federal bureaucracy are giving fewer visas, letting fewer people in. there's something that makes it hard for people to trust that there's a deal that won't be snatched away or changed at the

last minute like has happened a couple other times. that's the problem is a lack of trust that we could get to a deal and he would stick with it and he would sign it. what i will say is, when you talk about opioids, you talk about criminal justice, when you talk about anti-poverty and the opportunity zone, you do have three examples now where this president has led, has held people together in a bipartisan way, has signed a bill and those bills are doing positive things. democrats can focus, if democrats choose to, on some positive examples. >> that seems to be an extended hand there, scott. you both have worked for presidents. you know how this works. let me ask you this. i'm fascinated by what seems to be a growing opposition to any tendency the president might have to declare a national emergency over this wall. mitch mcconnell say the republican party would not

follow him if he did that. we heard from lindsey graham, the opposite, that actually there could be a civil war in the republican party if the president doesn't get what he wants on these issues. give me your analysis. >> i think the president wants barriers. the president ran on a wall. it doesn't have to be a concrete wall. the border patrol experts want barriers. he is not going to come down from that. the democrats have not shown any interest in the barriers he wants. that's a problem. he thinks the national emergency route is the only way he can build a wall or barriers or whatever you call it. the problem is, republicans -- a lot of conservatives are worried. if you set the precedent a president can go around congress with these emergency declarations, a future democratic president could declare all kinds of emergencies that we wouldn't like on our side of the ball. you don't want that. also, this law allows the congress to repeal an emergency

declaration. then the president, in order to keep it in place, would have to veto it. it would be a very embarrassing back and forth. he could lose votes in his party and it would eat up valuable floor time. the president mentioned nominations in the senate last night that are languishing. this is privilege motion. the senate would have to take this up. it eats up all these hours on the floor. that's hours you are not putting judges on the bench or people in his administration, which i know senator mcconnell is very worried about. going down this road sets up a host of problems. that's why it's -- when obama was in power, we attacked obama for overreaching on executive authority. we have to be consistent. don't makeshift something here with executive authority that's going to open up a pandora's box. >> do you see him, the president, sort of staking out the tent poles for the 2020 election? you said, america will never be a socialist country.

>> that stuff is all fair play. he spoke on abortion. he spoke on socialism, which is now a real conversation in the united states. he spoke about immigration. that seems to be how he wants to run, as being the democrats are for killing babies and for open borders and for this type of stuff and he's not. that's politics. you expect that. i think the problem that you've got is that it's hard to -- if you are -- it's hard to explain the level of poison, the level of fear, the level of division, the level of distrust that seems to be building up and building up in our society. i think the president has to make a decision. i called him one time the uniter in chief.

i got a lot of flak for saying that. i saw him doing it. i hoped when he said he was going to give a unifying speech and do something to show he could be a uniter in chief on these other issues, since there's a unifying deal out there on immigration. instead, he didn't do it. we know he has the potential. we also know he seems to have an angel and devil on his shoulder. you don't know which one will grab the veto. that's the problem. >> if i might ask you two to stand by for a moment. i'm going to go to a newly elected congresswoman from texas, talking about this issue of immigration. she's veronica escobar. her district is very much around the el paso area. she's joining us now from capitol hill. we will talk about this specific border area around where your district is. i know you have to run to vote in a moment. we are going to drill down on this. what did you hear in the speech

last night? actually, in the conversation that we're having with scott and van jones about the possibility, if all sides could possibly work together, on a proper immigration reform and a resolution of this border area? >> first, let me clarify, i am from el paso, my district is in el paso. one of the safest communities in the country. we have been safe since the early 1990s. long before a wall was constructed in el paso. it was very disturbing and distressing to hear the president last night misrepresent my community, malign my community once again. he incorrectly said and completely inaccurately said that we were once the most dangerous city in america. that is absolutely false. it's very difficult to have a whole lot of faith in someone who can lie so easily and

without remorse. i believe he owes my community an apology. he also owes the american public the truth. the challenge for us right now in this moment is the threat of another shutdown. we cannot be having rational, thoughtful, sober conversations and debate while federal employees are held hostage. the other frustration for communities like mine is we have seen very significant amounts of money pour into border security because it was supposed to be what was given in exchange for comprehensive immigration reform. over the last 15 years, we left -- last 20 years, we have seen border patrol grow by five times. we have seen the size of i.c.e. in the last several years grow times three. we have a wall that's been there for about a decade.

we were safe before. we have been since.he border ar lower today than a deck aade ag. >> now maybe -- sorry to interrupt. i want to ask you. the president said he is going to come for a rally down to el paso on monday. i don't know whether you will be there as a representative of that district. if you are there to greet him amongst the officials who will be there, what would you like to tell him? what would you like to show him about your town? particularly, in this moment. you heard these two gentlemen who both worked for presidents before talk about potential areas. this president being somebody could who could bring the republican party along with him if he really was so inclined. what would you tell him? >> i absolutely intend on being there monday night when he is in my community.

he will be receiving a letter from my office inviting him to get a full, complete picture of el paso. i don't know if he is simply going to parachute in for a political rally, or if he will truly make time to see el paso. if he is willing to make the time, i would show him a number of things. number one, i would show him the location where a man was apr apprehended. they were apprehended in the el paso sector and he died in u.s. custody. they were apprehended along with other undocumented crossers and asylum seekers at a part of our community that has a wall. the president has said he believes that the wall will stop asylum seekers. i want to show him an example of why it will not. the wall is not actually on the border. it's several yards away.

as a sin asylum seeker step foon our soil, they ask for protection. he will get briefings and information from federal law enforcement as he should. i have received those briefings and those tours. he also neetd needs to hear fron rights and legal advocates. i would like for him to see the el paso processing center and speak to detainees who right now as we speak are being tied down and force fed through their nose in what many of us believe is tantamount to torture. he should also speak to families who are seeking asylum. it's very easy to do a dog and pony show and go to a community and basically show or see what really is kind of a predetermined outcome.

i have invited a number of people to do it, that they see the full and complete picture. >> congresswoman, the president did talk more about legal immigration, saying he would like to see more of that. he did, as we have been discussing, sort of redescribe the so-called wall. i want to play that sound bite and see if you agree whether his position may be evolving. >> this is a smart, strategic, see through steel barrier, not just a simple concrete wall. it will be deployed in the areas identified by the border agents as having the greatest need. and these agents will tell you where walls go up, illegal crossings go way, way down. >> well, i mean, he is making, again, an equation between walls and illegal crossings.

you can discuss that. but we have discussed that a lot. in terms of the see through steel wall and slats, do you see a position evolving there? do you see the beginning of a process whereby democrats could work with the president and this administration? >> you know, the challenge is nobody ever really knows what he is talking about. his thought and opinions and what he says, it's all very fluid. i think it's important that the committee is allowed do their work and have the discussions that they need to have in order to legislate. the president had two years of absolute control where the house and the senate and the white house were controlled by his party. during those two years, they didn't get it done. and yet, here a committee is supposed to get this done in two weeks. i think it's absurd. it's not going to cure the very issues that he claims to want to cure.

the number of asylum seekers coming from central america and drugs. we know drugs come through our ports. here is the thing. we have never heard the president talk about a thoughtful, long-term solution to stemming the flow of asylum seekers coming from central america. what is the american role in dealing with the countries in the northern triangle? what is america's responsibility in that? the wall -- we have to understand what the wall is for him. it's a symbol and it's a campaign promise. he is holding federal employees hostage so that he could try to deliver on something that he could not deliver on when he was in complete control of washington, d.c. >> you have to go and vote. i will ask you one last question. your new class of newly elected congress people, you are one of two hispanic to be elected from

texas. we saw last night this sea of white on the democratic side. all these women wearing the white and men wearing the white ribbon in their lapel. what does this mean to you not just as a personal victory but as a way to do something for the country, for your community and maybe try to break through this poisonous partisanship? >> it's an absolute privilege to serve a community that i love so deeply and the u.s. congress. i feel a tremendous responsibility to deliver on what my -- on the great values that my community demonstrates every single day. i think that's why diversity is important. that's why female leadership in particular is important when you have a whole chamber full of mostly men. women lead differently. we have a different perspective. we are fierce advocates for the

important values and beautiful values of the places that raised us and that we come from. it's an honor to represent el paso. it's an honor to be there with so many amazing, talented women. >> congresswoman veronica escobar, thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> let's get back and continue this conversation with van jones and scott jennings, who have been standing by in washington. the congress womwoman had to go vote. we are delighted to see she has gone off to do that. what did you take, van, as a democrat, from her position on what we have just been talking about, the wall, the potential shutdown, the continued hard politics over this massive policy area that surely needs to be resolved? >> it's a tale of two cities, a tale of two countries. if you are a part of a community that has a big immigration population, the level of fear

and anxiety that people live under is just excruciating. people are living in terror. kids are living in terror that their father, mother, may be taken away at any moment. the number of raids have been going up. the hostility, the hostility toward latinos is crazy. everybody's algorithm shows something different on their smartphone. we live in different worlds. i'm constantly seeing videos of people being spat on in walmart and target stores, being yelled at. get out of my country, that kind of stuff. sometimes saying -- invoking donald trump's name in that. for those of us close to this issue, this is a very personal issue. i appreciate her trying to

explain. a lot of the rhetoric -- that doesn't even make sense in some of the communities. doesn't make sense in some of the towns. it gets thrown around as rhetoric. my big hope is that scott jennings is right and that trump is looking for a way out. i do think i missed last night and other democrats missed last night his throwaway line -- it was not in the speech saying he wants more legal immigration. that is not what the policies are. but that does open a door, as scott said before. if you want more legal immigration, that's a very different conversation. it seems like right now you want less of all immigration and all immigrants are being demonized. it's a tough time in america right now. i hope that we can get to some kind of a deal, even if it's a minimal deal. move on to do some of the things that we have been talking about on infrastructure, drug prices, medical family leave. there are deals out there to be done. this is the deal that is destroying every other deal.

>> scott, i wanted to turn to you, expand this point. demonization versus diversity, if you like. in the response to the president's state of the union, sta stacey abrams, talks about lot of things, including voter suppression. she is saying that's the thing that really has to be tackled to level the playing field. listen to what she said. >> let's be clear, voter suppression is real. from making it harder to register and stay on the rolls, to moving and closing polling places to rejecting lawful ballots, we can no longer ignore these threats to democracy. this is the next battle for our democracy. when we're eligible citizens and can have a sags about ty about we want for our country.

americans understand that these are the values our brave men and women in uniform and our veterans risk their lives to defend. >> she said power grab, referring to something that the senate majority leader mitch mcconnell talked about, the democrats are just looking to grab power. obviously, it's close to home for her, because the person she ran against for governor was accused himself of being sort of the lead vote suppresser. is this going to be a lasting issue? is she right to bring this up as a major part of the democratic platform? >> it's not just her. the democrats have made their voting bill one of the top issues coming out of the new house democratic majority. i don't think it has a chance to pass in the senate. i think everybody should have a chance to vote. i think every legal vote should be counted. she gave an interview in which she said she thinks people who aren't citizens of the country should be able to vote in some of our elections.

a lot of us on the republican side are not quite sure that she's the right spokesperson on that issue. she's been out saying people should vote in u.s. elections who aren't even citizens of this country. in the last midterm, we had higher turnout for a midterm election than in 100 years. i will bet you anything, we will have a massive spike in turnout in the 2020 election. the fact is in this country right now, there is high enga engageme engagement, relatively speaking, to previoefsvious elections. i think it's a good thing. people should vote. people should participate. we should make it easy for folks to vote. we should make it easy for folks who should be participating in our election do it and hard for people to cheat if that's what they are trying to do. i don't think we should open up elections to the point where non-citizens are participating. >> i don't think anybody is part of the pro cheater caucus. let's be clear about that. what she was talking about was

in local elections for school boards where you do have immigrant families there, is there a way for some of the immigrant families to have a voice in those very local elections? that's not the same as saying she wants non-citizen voting in state and federal elections. that's important. by the way, there was massive participation in georgia and florida. there's a strong feeling that in a fair election -- if there had not been suppression, it would have swung a different way. the cheating seems to be happening for big republicans in strong positions of power like the secretary of state, making it almost impossible for good people to vote. this will be a big conversation. >> as both of you said, scott, van, thank you. it's been interesting to hear fferences, but areas where you feel that there are some ways that both parties could potentially cooperate.

we hope that happens. thank you both very much. our next guest thinks the state of the union is so far gone that america needs to break up. in his latest solo show, red state blue state, collin quinn takes stock of both sides of the political divide. he is talking about how to be funny in today's era of political correctness. >> there is a thesis here. what's the thesis? >> the thesis is that we are headed for a civil war. people don't believe that could happen again. >> you are not joking about that. >> i'm not joking. >> how did you come to this conclusion? >> i did a show called unconstitutional. it was similar. it was about the country breaking up ideologically. i feel like the people that have the most vitriolic personali personalities -- not just trump.

trump would be the most obvious example. >> why do you think people are calcified? >> i don't know. i don't know. it's strange. i don't feel like people are. i feel like the people that you hear from -- this is like everything else. you take any positive thing like the internet was a positive thing. it becomes the province of the fastest typists and people with the most time on their hands and the most -- the people that want so badly to make sure that you said that they set the tone. that mindset of people that want to control the conversation. this is their day in the sun. >> we don't necessarily care about nuance. we care about speed? >> it's not that we don't. once the people set the tone, that's the way it goes. things speed up and suddenly everybody is in a fear mode. you gotta lock down. once wars start, you can't just be like, hey, hold on. i'm staying with my people.

>> you have a clip in your standup about growing up offline. let's look at that. >> when i was growing up offline -- if you wanted to have a political debate, you would have to get dressed and go down to the bar. you get dressed, go down to the bar, pick up the newspaper, find somebody you knew disagreed with you and you would be like, you probably like this [ bleep ]. don't you? give me the paper. as a matter of fact i do. what's your problem? you would have a debate. it was people you kind of knew, friends, family, neighbor. the bar itself was facebook. twitter was all the strangers in the bathroom doing coke together. short bursts of paranoid of 280 characters. >> the idea of a place to meet, a place to actually -- >> sure.

>> the fact that there was a human being connected to those thoughts that might disagree with you, now not the case. >> right. it was tempered by the human interaction. it's not now. >> you would have to go to the bar and say, i can't be -- >> right. you have to face everyone in the bar looking at you, giving you feedback that no longer exists. it's like, everyone -- you don't get that look like -- everyone is turning away from me. you read the room. down the have to read the room online. just read the people that you like. >> technology has come before to change our way of communication. what is it about this? do we have a tendency to take things too far? >> yeah. i feel like everything gets taken -- i feel like everything that's good gets hijacked by people that are either greedy or are their own anger issues and then it beens -- sbecomes -- i badly.

look at albert einstein. he is the inventor of the nuclear bomb. that wasn't his intent. he started out good. it got in different hands. people are like, we have to make sure we use this. it was used for a good cause to stop hitler. it's like anything else. it becomes a thing where everybody wants it. it becomes something else. >> another clip that i want to play. it's about free speech maybe going too far. >> free speech, what did it do? gave everybody an opinion. an opinion that got ruined by social media. free speech is an acoustic art. it wasn't meant to go electric. it's meant to be spoken on a tree stump, a porch at a general store. somebody told you 15 years ago, we have this idea, we will give everybody is going to give their inner most thoughts to the whole

planet all day, every day. you would say, my god, please, don't do that. >> this is -- you wrote this material not just as a reaction to the trump presidency. you have been feeling this way about america for a while now. >> yeah. i mean, look -- i just -- i guess compromise just doesn't really work. this country has always been divided as far as ideologically. it's never really gotten along. it's been the last 20 years. before that, people were like, i heard they act like that here. that's weird. you would never go there unless you were from there. you should see the way it is where i'm from. now it's in everyone's face all day. nobody likes it. the other thing is, i feel like people really believe that they are put on this earth to change other people's behavior and

opinions. they are finding out, it's not going to happen. people are too stupid to realize, i'm not going to change other people. either we find a way to break this thing civilly or it's going -- wars start with this stuff where people are like, you gotta understand and do things this way, no, i'm not doing it. nobody can hear each other. why wouldn't they want do things this way? don't they understand how much better it is for them? people are like, i don't care. i'm not doing it your way. >> because it is your way, it's not my way. that's pessimistic. >> i'm a pessimistic guy. a good comedian should be pessimistic about all things. >> is there a solution here? >> i mean, i would divide the country up. i would chop it up a little bit. i don't know. i haven't drawn my plans. city states is what i say in the show.

i just think, look, you look at uzbekistan, all these places -- >> the breakup of the soviet republic. >> i have less money but i'm happier. but i mean, they broke up. everybody survived. >> states have less in common with each other and should be separate? >> it's so obvious that people don't want to be around each other. we started out with 13 colonies. we became 50 states. what's wrong with 13 colonies? 13 seems like plenty. we are bigger than england and france put together. we got greedy. we couldn't take the hint from god. god put mountain ranges, rivers to indicate those are different countries. mississippi, the rockies, natural borders. europe knew. europe is the same size as us.

made a bunch of countries because they understood every 700 miles people have a different personality. do you think hungary and scotland have less in common than utah and new jersey? >> this experiment is a failure? >> no. it was a great thing. we brought a lot of things around that people -- other places use. it was great. no more of a failure than monarchy or anything else. it was just -- monarchies are successful. i can see the benefits in other systems now that i never saw before. a monarchy, if you were born under a good king, just all the roll on how your king was in your lifetime. you got a bad king, i got a crazy king. that was it. >> we should be city states like sparta. >> exactly. there are some people who are not political. here is the other thing that happened. everybody has to be political now. in the old days, 90% of the people go, how do you feel?

i'm not that political. that's not acceptable anymore. a lot of people want to be -- zone out. they like to just go to the gym. they like to watch the food network and cook and talk about that. now everybody has to -- everything has to be infused with politics because people are saying, how do you feel on this subject? they are asking taylor swift to weigh in. this should not be -- people are like, it should be the case. you are not the kind of person i like. i don't like that autocratic -- i don't go for this personality where people are like you have to weigh in. >> you are moderate. >> i'm a radical moderate. >> explain what that means. >> now being moderate is being radical. if you don't march in lockstep, if you are not on every issue on the left or the right, people really look at you like -- you

can't -- a copout? >> yeah. >> you are one of us or them. >> exactly. that's how everybody is. you are dealing with a simplistic, idiotic view from these two -- from both sides. it's unbelievable. >> how does growing up in brooklyn affect, impact your work? >> when i grew up in brooklyn, it was multi-ethnic. it was new york at that time was different. now every place is like this. everybody was just lumped together all the time. in some ways, it was really good, because it was good for somebody like me because i was a wise -- in retrospect, a lot of people are like, what is this? i had a big mouth. i peeked at 13. everybody who grew up with me knows it's true. i'm not just saying it. i peeked at 13. maybe i didn't know how to develop material, but i was on fire from 11 to 13 1/2. >> it went out the window?

>> yeah. at the time, there was a lot of danger, there was a lot of madness and stuff going on. in retrospect, i look back and i'm like, it was magic. >> has comedy changed since when you got involved? how is so? >> yeah. >> how many years you have been doing this? >> please. 32. >> in 32 years -- >> 33. >> 33 years of working with ensemble casts, doing standup on your own, what's the biggest difference do you think for a comedian coming up now that maybe you didn't have either the advantage or challenge of? >> when i was coming up, you could get -- if you went on stage, people are like, a comedian, this guy is crazy. they started laughing over the awe d a audacity to be a comedian. now people are like, my cousin does this.

have you met -- >> the youtube videos. >> so many comedians now. that's the negative side. there's too many. once there's too many, even the good ones have a hard time breaking through. >> bottom 10% out of the business every year. >> that's good. >> are you getting better as a comic? >> i'm getting better as a comic, yes. but when you get older -- from my perspective, i don't like seeing old people in front of my face any more than anybody else. >> are you borderline old person? >> yeah. old person going to talk? you better be funny? you better be really funny? if you are going to have the nif nerve to be old and perform, you better be really funny. >> otherwise, you are an old angry guy. >> young people are funny. you see them up there. i see -- you are laughing at the idea of somebody young and seeing them. something funny about the energy.

you better -- you have to get funnier when you are older. >> who did you look up to? >> pryor and carlin. >> there are a lot of things they said out loud that would not be possible on a stage today. >> that's correct. >> what does that do to you as a creator? >> i never heard that say in that phrase, but that's the saddest thing i have heard in a long time and truest. there's a lot of things we would not be able to say. what does it do? i don't know. i guess you try to -- you try to do what you think is funny. my work speaks for itself. my last special was all about ethnicity. you try do what you think is funny. do it unapologetically. i'm sure it affects a lot of people badly and in some ways it keeps you on the straight and narrow in a good way. you have to really think of what

you are trying to say. you can't just be sloppy. in the grand scheme of things, it's not good because it's a lot of people judging comedy. it's like me talking about the knicks. you know what their problem is? i have anticipate opini opinion. but i don't really know what i'm talking about the way the knicks do. they think these things all day. you know what i mean? it's like anything else. there's a lot of amateur opinions that aren't necessarily coming from a good place. the enemy is here. we met the enemy. he is us. now we're in danger of a civil war. you don't want to see a civil war in this country. we had one. we're not built for another civil war. the first time in history you will see fat refugees. never a good look. flip-flops and shorts. carrying coolers, trundling

toer towards canada. nothing glamorous. 50 years from now kids in history class reading about the battle at six flags. >> is this show then more to inform an audience or to warn them? >> i mean, you know, my mother just died. my mother -- she died in november. i feel like this show -- she wanted me to work with my director. she said, i want you to work with him again. we did a show together that she loved. >> it was a long time ago. >> a long time ago. she loved that show. she wanted me to do something. this show is really for her. it's just to scold people, to let everybody know, you are wrong, you are wrong, you are all wrong. i'm wrong. we're all guilty. i feel like it's a very irish thing, too. nobody is innocent. nobody skates on this one.

let everybody know they're all -- we're all guilty. we're all entrenched in this. >> thanks so much. >> thank you so much. >> certainly funny but pessimistic humor from collin quinn. big news from the state of the union that we didn't mention. donald trump says he will hold a second north korea summit in vietnam at the end of the month. i will discuss whether this will deliver any more concrete results than the last one with the former defense secretary william cohen who joins me. he served in the cabinet of bill clinton. that's it for our program tonight. thank you for watching "amanpour & company" on pbs. join us again tomorrow night. >> uniworld is a proud sponsor of "amanpour & co." when bea tollman founded a

collection of boutique hotels, she had bigger dreams, and those dreams were on the water -- a river, specifically -- multiple rivers that would one day be home to uniworld river cruises and their floating boutique hotels. today that dream sets sail in europe, asia, india, egypt, and more. to travel is to eat. bookings available through your travel agent. for more information, visit uniworld.com. >> additional support has been provided by rosalind p. walter, bernard and irene schwartz, sue and edgar wachenheim iii, the cheryl and philip milstein family, judy and josh westin and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> you are watching pbs.

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