For the next three hours gets underway now. Host author dave barry, lets begin where you begin in your book, best. State. Ever. What the heck is wrong with the state of florida . Guest we do have a levitation are stupid, where people. And there are many stupid, weird people are doing stupid, weird things. But my argument is its not our fault. The example that i give, and i know this may offend you personally, and i apologize ahead but there was a famous example of florida craziness a couple years ago where a woman was driving south on the overseas highway that connects miami to key west, and she, according to this Florida StateHighway Patrol later filed on the synthetic and was in a hurry to get to key west because you wanted to see her boyfriend. She was eager to see her boyfriend. She wanted to shave her bikini region in preparation for the big reunion. So a lot of people went off to the side of the road to do that, but she come again and was in her associate outsourced this during the car to the person who was the passenger, who turned out wiser exhusband, who is very florida detail. So theyre going south pictures using the operating big seller in history the car and she is shaving. What could go wrong, right collects the car in front of them, and it won in a million fluke occurrence, slow down. And they ran into it and theres a big accident. This was International News once they got out. Did you read about this woman in florida . That women was from indiana. [laughter] she was shaving her hoosier, and yet we got, florida got the blame. My point is willy ellis island to accept the tired and before we get the insane people from other states pick a summary decides he wants to get naked and pleasure himself into a stuffed animal at walmart, he doesnt do that in ohio. He doesnt do that in pennsylvania. He comes to florida to get that and it would become international. Look at these instances come on these people, a lot of people, to just be weird. Host he writes lord has become the joke state, the state everybody makes fun of. If states were characters on seinfeld, florida would be kramer. Every time it appears the audience automatically laugh knowing its going to do some idiot thing. Guest we got that reputation. Used to be more just miami. Many years people mocked miami. Ive been a longtime defender of miami and avon at bumper stickers made up the said come back to miami, we were shooting at you. Years ago. Then the miami vice days bit but then it expanded to the whole state and it happened, you can trace directly to the 2000 president ial election where every other state was able to determine fairly quickly whom it had voted for for president of the United States, but we didnt do it, you know, like early in the night. They called it for gore and been called for bush and they called it for granted again. Lately i think William Shatner was leading down here, and at the end of the night they were shooting heroin on television. Nobody knew who he had voted for. Then we had that like four or five week. Were all in but it talked about was florida because theyre still counting the votes. They which are evident some pork Palm Beach County election official looking at about that event shooter by weasels or something. What was this person thinking when he did this to this piece of cardboard . I proposed at the time in florida voter approved ballot. Apparently it was too much for florida voters to how to punch a hole in a piece of cardboard. I found i do what you would print photographs of the candidates faces on the ballot to vote by poking at your candidates eyeballs. But have we done that probably a lot of voters that it wouldve poked out your own eyeballs so we didn could do it. But anyway thats when it started. Thats in florida became the joke state. Then all this come everything anybody in florida did anything come it makes the news. Morning Radio Station all about the country would probably have nothing to talk about if it were not for florida. We provide a service, providing entertainment for the rest of the country. Host on the short drive from the airport down here to books and books in coral gables, theres a couple things i notice that it wanted to ask about there i saw a lot of guest utero . Host i drove. Guest i felt like the way people miami drive, these people dont know the law. I now know everybody miami is right according to the law of his or her individual country of origin. There are many, many different interpretations of what a stop sign might mean but it doesnt mean stop in dade county florida. Florida. Thats the last thing it means. Host i saw quite a few slip and fall lawyer billboards, massage parlors and Plastic Surgery centers. Guest those are the big ones, all big ones. Reptile sales also. If you need like a butt enhancement and of his snake at 2 a. M. , its going to be minutes away. Its like starbucks down here. Venomous snake. Lawyers are everywhere. Basic if anything happens to the number to call write what you get millions of dollars. Its an another wonderful reason to live here. Host you write every group, immigrant groups had own foreign policies. Guest miami does have a Foreign Policy and has for many, many years. Its kind of lesson alone but now that weve open a relationship with cuba, but thats still a pretty big issue in dade county politics is where you stand on cuba. Which is doctor, i think in most cities because cities are thank you susan stuff. Were not. We thinking about cuba. Host comedy times did you run for president transfer its hard to keep track. It used to be considered a joke but not so much. [laughter] guest not so much lately. I pretty much always running. I do but years on the bumper stickers, just to save money. My campaign, candace and most we consists of accepting cash contributions. Not that thats different from other candidates, but i do have policies on some issues. Glad to show my policies with you if you would like. Host goahead. Guest health care. A lot of discussion about obamacare, to repeal or replace . If i were present at highest priority would be get the medical profession to find a way to get to the prostate client other than the way theyre getting to it now. [laughter] but i like to proceed with a doctor which chemically five yards away and says and looks good from here, dave, you know . [laughter] and then host immigration. Guest again big issue, a lot of discussion. President trumps issue is the wall here can build the wall. How is it going to pay for the wall . I dont think we need a wall. What i would do if i were the president , i would take the Florida Department of transportation, send them down to the border and say repair the roads between us and mexico. No one will ever get through again. [laughter] host in your book money secrets, you write Social Security problem number one, the Younger Generation is, with all due respect, worthless. Social security problem number two, there are too many baby boomers. Guest yeah, yeah. I agree with both those statements. You want me to respond . Host you can add on. Guest i feel really bad. Im old, not older, im an old person and i realize what we have done with Social Security. We putting this huge burden on the generations follow us. As we have with the environment. We do whatever we want and we are leaving i honestly think is going to be a lot of problems after im dead, so the hell with it, is my feeling, you know . Payback for hiphop is what i think. [laughter] host you have a chapter about donald trump in your book, money secrets and you wrote it in 2006. Guest i read his entire book on the art it was how to make, something but getting rich. It was after the art of the deal and it was even more shallow. Basically, you know, donald trump, a lot of bullet points about how great donald trump is. Not unlike how it really is now but there were not a lot of specifics about just that he really, he demands excellence from everybody. Like when he picks up silver patterns for his hotel, he gets the best silver pattern. Thats the tip yet and im thinking if i had hotel i wouldnt really, you know, need any more tips i dont think. Host and this book is from 2002006 and is what you write. In 2000, donald trump considered running for president. And he had some terrific ideas but then he decided not to because that wouldve been a pathetic joke. Just kidding. He decided not to because he is too darn blunt for politics. Guest thats right. He came here to miami. I do remember if it was before or after wrote that book, but i followed him around for a day and he was again exploring it. I do remember one thing he said, comparing himself to he said as any other president of United States made himself into 1 billion or . I dont think. Like basically Abraham Lincoln, loser, right . [laughter] so yeah. Well, we are just beyond the realm of humor nowadays. People seeking all the time, this would be so great for you, you know. And i go know, because the idea with you is you take something that everybody can recognize it because it really is exaggerated and make it absurd. But hes already doing that. You dont need me. Its like a brilliant piece of performance art. Unfortunately he is the president. Host what is the year in review . Guest every year, and addenda for many, many years, i do it for the miami herald but also runs in the Washington Post and other papers. I take the year, actually i could it in like late november, so i have to make up december. [laughter] thats the kind of journalism i practice. Fake news i would call it if i do come up with i was in fake news way before it was cool. [laughter] and i take the events of the year that really happened and try to make a funny narrative out of it. Ive done this for many, many years, at people like it a lot. A lot of people, someone here today just mention it. And so but i had to take them every processing process. I get a list of headlines for the year and they go through an echo my god, this is horrible. Like terrorist attacks, natural tragedies and mass slayings, and theres nothing funny. And yet im supposed to make it into a funny narrative. In the end i figure out a way to do it, often by just leaving out stuff that was really too depressing to write about. Its a big project, probably the biggest project i do every year, kind of pathetic now that i think of it. Host how does it how long does it take to write it . Guest the truth, it takes a couple of months. Im doing other things along the way but thats kind of nagging at me starting in really september through the end of november. Thats amazing and thinking about and trying, working on. And then its over real fast like depressing, this conversation. Host your year in review 2016, its entitled what the but you and times try to avoid november in here. Guest skipping to december or going back to the previous month just to avoid confronting what actually happened in november, which america is still not processed what happened or will not even close. My wife and i were talking this morning, i would ever going to just settle back down in this country . I dont know. I dont know that we are. Four years of everybody being like all the time. All the time . I mean, im in the news media. A lot of people i know our newspaper people. A lot of them and they are also all the time. Host when did you give up your weekly column . Guest a long time ago. I stopped writing a weekly, i think in 2005. Now heres why get defensive and explained that i still work for a living. But i still write a lot. I write books. Like last year 2016 i went to iowa, wrote about the iowa caucuses. I went to New Hampshire and what about the New Hampshire primaries. I went to both Political Conventions and what about those. And it went to the olympics and wrote every day for a couple of weeks. So really i work a lot harder than you do, mr. Television man with that type, asking when i retired. Host from your 2010 guest coal mining but harder. Host i will mature would i did. You write Political Conventions are excellent places to observe vithe ip area lost because they are teaming with highlevel washington dwelling people chosen careers in Public Service specifically to avoid having any contact with the actual public. Yeah. I agree it would i wrote that statement i agree with you completely. Washington is all about status and power and there is no more clear example of that. It crystallized at the Political Convention all of these people who are obsessed with power and prestige and privilege come together and have two forget ways to exclude as me people as humanly possible, justify the own power and trustees. What specifically talk about their, i cant remember, i think it was 2004, political and convention in philadelphia, the republican convention, i think, so im there and i usually go, cartoonist, the only people who are true and michel as i am in journalism field, used to be. Now its pretty much everybody on twitter. We made it our mission to get into parts that we were not invited to. And thats kind of the sport of going to convention. The lowest form of human at the convention is a delicate. The delegates of the people who stand there holding up whatever stupid sign they were handed wearing stupid hats and nobody pays attention two delegates. They are not important. Its a vip set are important and have a lot of receptions and parties youre not invited you. There was this reception for somebody somewhere, and were just determined to get it and we did. We talked her way past the initial your people. Were in this building now but then theres another vip area thats hard to get into. And we couldnt get into that but then we went into this, there was a thrill, ill never forget, it was a strange, fairly large room like a ballroom and the middle was a platform which i guess have been used for speakers or a better something that is kind of in the middle of the floor like a raised maybe twofoot high, maybe the size of ping pong table, about this big. We got up on it. Theres 45 of us and we found these cones that gender is used to keep you from getting on a wet floor. We put a coat on either side of the thing and we stood up on this and when people would wander through, people who were attending can we take you cant come up here. This is a reserve area. The first to people like, but by the people started coming over and why cant we get up the quick you cant. This is for us. But then dick armey who was then like the majority leader of the house of representatives came in. Dick armey, do you want to get up . He said sure. And he got up with now its like a cartoonist and me and dick armey. All these republican vips coming and dick armey, they dont know what it is but hes up on this thing, you know, and now suddenly they really do want to get up on the platform with us. We are like, we are manning the edges of the parameter and we are very reflective he was getting the joke. And hot women. More and more crowded out there, and more and more people come industry and wanting to get on it was a wonderful night really. I wrote about the next day, like one of the great night of the convention. But it really was in a nutshell what washington is, everybody tried to get up on this completely arbitrary little raised platform. Host common theme in a lot of your columns, your 30 plus books, cable news. Are you a fan of cable news . Guest yeah. I do, i watch cable news because most of the network news now consists of like celebrity gardening tips. Not so much news it when i wake up in the morning and turn on today, no offense to the day show, i love the today show, special when you had the audit to promote my book, but its generally like heres 38 seconds and is followed by 47 minutes of someones gardening tips. Whereas if you want to watch the news if you go to cnn, you go to msnbc or you go to fox. I want all of them because i find it fascinating that none of them is trying to be unbiased anymore, in my opinion. Fox is like completely protrump. Cnn, they are more subtle but they hate him. Nbc hates him. Morning joe which is a good show, i that sugar but everybody on is biased one way or the other. There isnt any show that if you like anymore is presenting unbiased i dont even know what unbiased means anymore. Its just so hard to find. Host at what point did you know that you were a humorist, that youre funny, in your life . Guest well, there were two things. When i thought it was funny was really young. My family valued humor more than any other quality as a human being. My parents were funny people, and so i thought i was funny as a kid. I got the joke, whether we were into sarcasm heavily an in our family. Nobody ever said anything he or she ever met, ever. When i thought i could make a living as a humorist was way later. I wrote humor columns for my high school newspaper, for my college newspaper. Got a job at a newspaper when i got out of college where, when i could, i wrote a humor column but thats not what they paid me to do. They paid me to go to incredibly dull municipal meetings, some which are probably still going on about sewage. So i wasnt, you know, and then i was still writing a humor column and i left journalism altogether for a while and taught effective writing seminars to businesspeople. That was my job but have still writing a weekly humor column for the full paper in pennsylvania. By then im in my 30s and it still hasnt occurred to me this is a job i could have. And then what really changed it for me was, if somebody had said to me at the beginning, you could have a job where all you do is write humor, that wouldve been my goal but it never occurred to me that was possible. That did happen to people i knew like art buckwalter i didnt think would happen to me. And then my son was born, and im writing a weekly humor column but the Philadelphia Inquirer, the editor of the sunday magazine at the Philadelphia Inquirer, had read a couple of my columns, maybe submit some stuff. I submitted some things that the inquirer ran, but then i wrote this big long piece, humor piece about the birth of my son. This was 198080 when he was born. The baby boomers were just in the process of taking over the world at that time. The thing about the baby boomers is, as everyone knows, we are very special and theres nobody like us and i will never be a generation like us because we are so freaking special. One of the special things we did was have babies. Nobody had ever had babies before. Certainly not the way we had them, the w