[Bill Maher]

Barney Frank is Smarter Than You.

If you're a Republican, anyway. I encourage you to read the transcript from the Oct 20 Real Time, wherein Barney offered several stinging rebuttals on the economy, GOP corruption, Iraq, and gay rights to a stooge from the GOP. I'll give you one exchange, but the whole interview is strongly worth a read. Below the transcript, I'll link to Youtube video of the entire show, should you wish to actually watch it. There's also free audio on iTunes.

STEPHEN MOORE [Republican Stooge]: If this – if we had this economy, and Bill Clinton were president, this guy would be doing cartwheels down Pennsylvania Avenue.

BARNEY FRANK: Oh, please, Steve, that’s nonsense.

MOORE: [overlapping] This – this economy is solid, with the lowest unemployment rate. We have solid job growth. We’re outgrowing our competitors. [audience reacts/boos]

FRANK: Let me respond.

MOORE: Those are just the facts!

FRANK: No, these are not the facts. Because, job growth, you want to compare it to Clinton – and by the way, I haven’t done cartwheels in a long time; it wouldn’t be a pretty sight—[laughter]

MOORE: I want to see that.

FRANK: Certainly not on – and I’m certainly not going to do them on television. But what you have is job growth under George Bush, as you know, has seriously lagged job growth under Bill Clinton. The amount of jobs – let’s make – you think there has been greater job growth in the Bush years than in the Clinton years?

MOORE: In the last three years, we’ve had six million new jobs.

FRANK: No, but – three years! How long has George Bush been president? Almost six years. Now, you want to look at intellectual dishonesty? Bush has been president for nearly six years, so you count just three years. And, in fact, the six million – that’s two million a year – Clinton averaged more than two million a year.

MOORE: Yeah, but you know what? When the—

FRANK: [overlapping] No, wait a minute—

MOORE: [overlapping]—when the economy turned around? When the Republicans took over Congress in 1994.

FRANK: [overlapping] Steve, you’re changing the subject. You’re changing the subject. You claimed – you said the Clinton years versus the Bush years. Job growth has been significantly – was significantly greater in the Clinton years than under the Bush years. Wages grew much more in the Clinton years. Real, take-home wages for employees than in the Bush years! [applause]

Video (the Frank bits start halfway through Part 2 and go to Part 5): Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 |