Guests: Mayor Cory Booker (D) Newark, NJ; Joe Queenan, Farai Chideya, Howie Mandel and Paul Begala.

On the Election

Well, it was a big, powerful election, and who doesn't like a big, powerful election. But, they're making it seem, on the cable news, like it's a sea change. I don't know if that's the case. And the reason I say this is because, you know, a Democrat won by six points in a year where you had the most unpopular president ever, and you had two wars, and you had a stock market crash, and people were in all sorts of economic distress. And he ran against a 200-year-old man. And the spokesmodel from the car show. Not to put water on this great moment, but is it really that big a deal?  Bill Maher

I think Barack ran a very nearly perfect campaign. He really did. I think Hillary would have run a good campaign, too. The country wanted change. They wanted change. They were sick of Bush, were sick of McCain. Barack ran on change against [Hillary's] experience in the primaries and won. But, I mean, come on. Standing up next to, you know, John McCain, who is basically, "Hey, you kids, get off my lawn."  Paul Begala

I think that there's a lot of work. I think that the Democrats could get very over-confident and say, hey, we put together a majority. But the reality is this country is going to need every last person. And I know that that's something that Senator Obama said in his acceptance speech. But, I don't know. There's a lot of gloating going on. And this is the time to actually reach out to Sarah Palin's supporters.  Farai Chideya

On Being American

We, as Americans, drink deeply from wells that we did not dig. This generation that I live in had so many sacrifices of those who've come before us, and the best thing we can do is show some measure of sacrifice to honor those people who bled on beaches from Normandy to Midway for us, or who stood on line to register people to vote back in the day that you could get killed for doing that. So, I'm not about a position. I'm really about a purpose, and I think we are a purpose-driven country. And I think it's time that we exalt all of the spaces of our nation, that we honor the sacred nature of human dignity and human life, and try to make the idea of democracy more emboldened and more inclusive, so that all of us enjoy the fruits of this great nation.  Cory Booker

On Palin

I think you guys are scared of her. She's that hockey mom -- she does that whole thing going out to the ice hockey rink. She went down to Philadelphia, dropped the first puck-- Everybody booed her, and she stayed there and she was interviewed. And when she was interviewed by the announcer there, he said, "Are you rooting for the Flyers?" And she said, "Nope, I'm rooting for the Rangers because one of their players is from Alaska." And that takes a lot of guts to do in Philadelphia. John McCain wouldn't do anything like that.  Joe Queenan

On Proposition 8

So, you have African Americans in California voted 70% yes for--for banning gay marriage. White Americans in California, 49%; Latinos 53%. And I had a really interesting, heartfelt conversation with someone who said, basically, "it's the black people's fault..." The reality is that this coalition -- and this is just analysis -- the coalition of people who were "No on 8" did not do any outreach in the black community... the person I spoke with today said, "If we went into their churches, they would throw us out." I said, "Try sending someone into the churches first..."  Farai Chideya

But, the elephant in the room is religion! Okay, it's not black, per se. It's that blacks love themselves some Jesus! And, you know, apparently, the old book of Jewish fairytales -- I mean, the Bible-- says, "You can't poke in the naughty place." And that's where it all comes from.  Bill Maher