Comic and pundit Bill Maher got annoyed with CNN anchor and Max host Chris Wallace for bringing up – and playing the clip of, comments Maher made over 23 years ago about the 9/11 hijackers that eventually resulted in him losing his TV show.

Wallace interviewed Maher for this week’s edition of his Max series Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace on a variety of topics, including politics. his affinity for marijuana, and his new book. And, in the course of talking about Maher’s long career — the controversy after 9/11 that cost him his show Politically Incorrect.

After Wallace brought up the remarks, and played a clip of them, Maher first responded with disdain that this still comes up all these years later.

“First of all, this is so old,” said Maher. “Really? That’s of interest still?”

“Well, yeah. I mean, we’re talking about your career,” said Maher. “We’re talking about 20 years.”

Maher said he regrets that he said it right at the time, but not that he regretted saying it in principle.

“I mean, George Bush said, the cowards, uh the terrorists win, unless we go back to doing what we were doing. So I went back to doing what I was doing, which was telling the truth as I saw it.”

But he also pointed out that the decision to cancel wasn’t based on losing viewers.

“We never lost ratings. We never lost the audience,” said Maher.

WALLACE: In 1993, you launched Politically Correct – –

MAHER: Incorrect.

WALLACE: Incorrect, sorry, and yes Politically Correct would not be the name of your show, and – –

MAHER: I was rebelling against it.

WALLACE: — On ABC. And eventually, years later, the biggest controversy of your career, where you, right, days after 911, you made some kind of a comparison of the U.S. military and the al Qaeda hijackers —

MAHER: Not the U.S. military-

WALLACE: Take a look

MAHER: It never was.

WALLACE: Take a look.

[CLIP]

MAHER: Yeah, but wasn’t about the military, I said we. We as a society.

WALLACE: Well, I know, but, the missiles, it wasn’t the grocer who was lobbying them.

MAHER: Yeah, and the military didn’t pay for them either. Okay, that’s just that was, that was — first of all, this is so old. Really? That’s of interest still?

WALLACE: Yeah. Well, yeah. I mean, we’re talking about your career. We’re talking about 20 years. Let me just ask you this question and then we’ll move on.

MAHER: Anyway.

WALLACE: Looking back, were you just trying to be contrarian?

MAHER: Of course not, I was agreeing with somebody who said that. You skipped that part of it. Somebody said, they the people who did the mission may have been evil, but they were not cowards, which is, I feel like not even controversial. Sticking with the suicide mission — um, not cowardly.

WALLACE: Do you regret having said it?

MAHER: I regret having said that that night. It was probably, it was six days after 9/11, and the country wasn’t ready to hear the truth. I mean, George Bush said, the cowards, uh the terrorists win, unless we go back to doing what we were doing. So I went back to doing what I was doing, which was telling the truth as I saw it. We never lost ratings. We never lost the audience. What we lost was the sponsors.

WALLLACE: And you ended up losing your perch because ABC cancelled you a few months later. I agree, the ratings didn’t go down, but they cancelled you.

MAHER: They definitely cancelled us. And I’m glad they did, because I wound up in so much of a better place.

Watch the clip above via Max’s Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace.

The post ‘Really??’ Bill Maher Gets Pissed When Chris Wallace Confronts Him Over Shock Terror Comment That Got Him Cancelled first appeared on Mediaite.

from Mediaite https://ift.tt/VwXp8Er