*
[Cheering and applause]
Welcome, welcome, welcome to "Last Week Tonight."
I'm John Oliver.
Thank you so much for being with us,
and first off--first off a quick recap of the week.
In a nutshell, it has been fucking depressing.
Most of the week was dominated by the conflict in Gaza, which
has been escalating sharply over the past couple of days.
As of the taping of this comedy show, 18 Israeli
soldiers have been killed, as well as over 400 Palestinians,
the vast majority of which appear to be civilians.
This whole story is depressingly familiar,
and perhaps the best way of illustrating that is
with CNN's Anderson Cooper because this--this was
his report from last week.
Hamas, which controls Gaza, isn't backing down.
Its rockets are reaching deeper into Israel.
Now, if that rings a bell with you, it could be
because you're remembering this.
The number of rockets being fired from Gaza City, from
the central area in Gaza City, toward Israel--
Here's the thing.
That report was from 2012, not that you'd know it,
because Anderson Cooper looks and sounds exactly the same,
much as he did in 2009 when he was asking exactly the same
question that he's been asking all this week.
I mean, the Palestinians blame Israelis
for killing civilians.
Israelis say, "Look. You know, we're targeting military
"installations, Hamas installations, but they are
"hiding weapons in people's homes.
They are enmeshed within the civilian population."
Who's right here?
Why is CNN even wasting money having him report on this when
they could just literally rerun his coverage from 5
years ago and no one would notice?
Somehow--somehow, in 5 years, this situation has not improved,
and his face has lost none of its virile
yet tender magnetism.
In fact, you can even go back to 2006, when yet again,
Israel and the Palestinians were trading rocket strikes,
and guess who was there.
More than about 100 katyusha rockets and mortars fell
in and around this one town.
How does he still look the same?
Look, this was me back in 2006.
Time has ravaged me.
I have been ravaged by time,
and I have spent zero time in Gaza.
If this week has taught us one thing, it's that the Middle
East is truly the Anderson Cooper's face of geopolitical
disputes in that, in defiance of all appeals to reason
and human decency, it never fucking changes.
I actually think that in his attic, Anderson Cooper has
a painting of himself as an old man in a peaceful
Middle East.
Now, the Gaza dispute has been so depressing, it was enough
to make you wish for any story to distract us.
Unfortunately, on Thursday we got one when, for unknown
reasons, Ukrainian rebels apparently used Russian
weapons to shoot down an airliner.
It was clearly an international tragedy, and you
would think it might cause Vladimir Putin to do some
serious soul searching or at least some soul manufacturing,
but instead, he went a different way.
MAN: Russian president Vladimir Putin says Ukraine is
to blame, saying, quote, "This tragedy would not have
happened if there had been peace on that land."
Yeah, maybe, but it's also worth noting this wouldn't
have happened if you, Vladimir Putin, hadn't given the rebels
those fucking missiles.
What great outcome were you anticipating from
that, exactly?
Because no story in history has ever ended, "And then,
"an assortment of angry rebels were given military-grade
"weapons, they used them responsibly, and we all lived
happily ever after."
That has never happened ever.
There are so many upsetting questions surrounding this
tragedy, from "Why did Putin give them those weapons?"
to "Why did they shoot down that plane?"
to "Can you please change the subject?
"This is supposed to be a comedy show.
The Leftovers was less depressing than this."
But one of the most baffling questions of all involves
the airline in question, Malaysian Airlines.
The question is, why would they continue flying over
a known war zone where, in fact, there have been 3
shoot-downs in the past week?
It's a very simple answer, I'm afraid: a little bit
of lackadaisical behavior, and secondly, it's less fuel cost.
Hold on.
If it's true that some airlines choose to fly over
a war zone to save money, then I'd like to take a moment to
address the world's airlines and say, "Don't do that!
"Look, you've already got us paying surcharges
"for everything: $25 to check a bag, $5.00 for headphones, $10
"to watch Katy Perry: Part of Me with your $5.00 headphones
"that do not work.
"So, please, do feel free to offer us the option
"at check-in of a 35-dollar surcharge to steer clear
of any active fucking war zones."
"What do you think, honey?
Should we do it?"
"Let's treat ourselves.
We're on vacation."
And finally, thankfully, we turn to some lighter news:
crippling gambling addiction in Singapore.
At the start of this year's World Cup, which, of course,
Germany won, Singapore produced a powerful
anti-gambling commercial.
See if you can spot its one fatal flaw.
BOY: I really can't wait for the World Cup.
Who do you think is gonna win it?
My dad said Brazil will win.
How about you, Andy?
I hope Germany will win.
Why?
My dad bet all my savings on them.
*
Yeah, but Germany won, kid!
Your dad's the greatest!
He's the best!
Hey, why the long face?
That kid is now the richest sad person since
Kristen Stewart.
Now clearly, clearly, this was a little awkward, so Singapore
actually created a second ad, where the boy is asked, "Your
"dad's team won.
Did you get your savings back?"
to which he responds, "No. Dad never stops.
He wants to bet one more time."
But, yeah, of course he does.
The guy's on a hot streak, kid, and you know what?
The only thing that can stop that is your negative
attitude, you ungrateful little shit.
Now, interestingly, Singapore actually has a long history
of blowing it with their anti-gambling advertisements.
Just take a look.
I hope the Sea Hawks win the Super Bowl.
My dad bet all our savings on them.
Good luck.
There's no way a second-year quarterback can beat future
Hall-of-Famer Peyton Manning.
Your dad's a complete zero.
I'm gonna be homeless
and die in a shopping cart.
*
What's the matter, Andy?
My dad bet all our savings again on California Chrome.
To win this year's Triple Crown?
No. He has to win the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness
but then get fourth place in the Belmont Stakes.
Wow. That's a very specific bet.
I know. It's never gonna happen.
Fabricio, can you move my hot-stone massage to 3:30?
Thank you, Fabricio.
Ciao.
*
Guys, my dad's out of control.
Shut up, Andy.
Yeah, shut up.
Wait, this time my dad bet everything we have that
in the first half of the second week of July, news will
break that Ryan Gosling will have impregnated Eva Mendes
and that they're expecting a baby in October.
*
Your dad is the best!
BOY: Gambling is awesome!
Look.
The big lesson from Singapore is, gambling is terrible
unless Dad is really feeling it.
And now this.
ANNOUNCER: And now, "Last Week Tonight" asks, how is this
still a thing?
This week, the Commonwealth Games.
How is this still a thing?
If you live in certain parts of the world, this week you're
looking forward to one thing.
WOMAN: We've got the Commonwealth Games coming up.
The Commonwealth Games.
WOMAN: Commonwealth Games. MAN: Commonwealth Games.
DIFFERENT MAN: Welcome to the friendly games.
ANNOUNCER: In America, we not only don't know what the hell
they're talking about, we couldn't tell you if you
offered us $2,000.
That would be the Commonwealth Games.
ANNOUNCER: Here's a question.
What the fuck are the Commonwealth Games, other than
the winner of the Creepiest Mascot on Earth competition?
Well, imagine the Olympics without the United States,
China, and Russia.
Then imagine a track meet
dominated by sprinters from Wales.
MAN: Wales!
ANNOUNCER: And you have the Commonwealth Games,
a competition that's only open to members
of the British Commonwealth.
*
The Games began in the 1930s, just as the British
Empire was falling flat on its face, and for some reason
continue to this day.
Once every 4 years, the world is treated to the spectacle
of the Queen showing her full emotional range, from
irritated in Victoria to damp in Manchester to bored
in Melbourne.
But why would she be bored?
The Commonwealth Games feature all the world's top sports,
such as squash, lawn bowls, competitive mountain biking,
and netball, which is basically what basketball
would be if you didn't have the rights to play basketball.
As many of these games are British-derived, it's no
wonder that England has soared all the way to the top
of second place of
the medal count.
And for non sports fans, the Games also offer opening
and closing ceremonies that speak to our sense of wonder,
specifically the wonder of what an off-Broadway version
of the Olympic ceremonies would look like.
So tonight we salute this week's Commonwealth Games,
the historic display of a once-mighty nation gathering
together the countries it lost and finding a way to lose to
them once more.
So the next time
you're on "Jeopardy!"
and the answer is
"the Commonwealth Games,"
the only possible question is, how is this still a thing?
OK, moving on.
Moving on.
Our main story tonight concerns something Americans
simply can't get enough of: prison.
We love to be entertained by it, from "Orange is the New
Black" to seemingly MSNBC's entire weekend programming to
the TNT classic "Tim Robbins Stands Shirtless in the Rain:
the Movie."
We love prison so much, a shocking number of Americans
are currently inside one, as we learned last week during
a House Judiciary Committee hearing.
Our nation now has the greatest number of prisoners
of any country in the world.
Nearly one in every 100 adults in America is
in prison or jail.
That's true.
We have over two million people behind bars right now.
We have more prisoners at the moment than China--than China.
We don't have more of anything than China, other than,
of course, debt to China.
And it didn't always used to be this way.
Our prison population has expanded eightfold since 1970.
The only other thing that's grown at that rate since
the seventies is varieties of Cheerios.
Fuck you, fruity Cheerios!
You're trumped-up Froot Loops, and you know it.
And look, look.
Our prison population has exploded for a number
of reasons, from the dismantling of our
mental-health system to mandatory minimum sentence
laws which help explain why 97% of people plead guilty to
federal crimes rather than risk going to trial to,
of course, drugs.
Because half the people in federal prison are there
on drug charges, and it accounts for a quarter
of admissions to state prisons.
And of course it's tricky to know how to feel about all
this because on the one hand, the war on drugs has
completely solved our nation's drug problem, so that's good.
But on the other hand, our drug laws do seem to be
a little draconian and a lot racist, because while white
people and African Americans use drugs about the same
amount, a study has found that African Americans have been
sent to prison for drug offenses at up to 10 times
the rate for some utterly known reason.
It reminds me--it reminds me of a joke.
You know, black people who commit drug offenses, they go
to jail like this, whereas white people don't go to
jail at all.
In fact, so many people--so many people are incarcerated
in America right now that it's become one of the things that
"Sesame Street" has to explain to children.
My dad is...
my dad is in jail.
When I was about your age, my dad was incarcerated, too.
Incarcerated is when someone breaks the law, a grown-up
rule, and then they have to go to jail or prison.
* We will be your friend
* We'll help you through
* You're not alone
Just think about that.
We now need adorable singing puppets to explain prison to
children in the same way that they explain the number 7 or
what the moon is.
And at least "Sesame Street" is actually talking
about prison.
The rest of us are much happier completely ignoring it,
perhaps because it's so easy not to care
about prisoners.
They are by definition convicted criminals.
In fact, it's so easy not to care that we are really
comfortable making jokes about one of the most horrifying
things that can potentially happen to them.
Go directly to jail.
Do not pass go.
Do not collect $200, and do not, I repeat, do not
drop the soap.
Help!
No!
Look.
Doubloons.
Don't drop 'em.
You know what?
If we were in prison, you guys would be, like, my bitches.
We're going to federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison.
Puss, you got any idea what they do to eggs
in San Ricardo Prison?
It ain't over easy.
Oh.
Ohh.
Do you get it? Do you get it?
The egg is gonna get fucked against its will.
That's why it's funny.
Wake up your children and explain that joke to them.
They'll love it.
Dooh.
We are somehow collectively able to laugh about references
to the fact that 4% of prisoners reported being
sexually victimized in the past year.
One in 25.
Now, that might not sound like a lot, but think of it
like this.
If every time you bought two dozen doughnuts, one of them
had been raped, you'd be pretty upset, and those
are pastries.
Prisoners are people.
If you don't know a prisoner, though, or think that you're
ever likely to become one, then their safety and health
is not gonna be high on your list of priorities.
You don't need to know anything about the conditions
that they live in.
But you know who should know?
Maybe the Director of Federal Prisons, and yet, watch him
almost comically struggle to recall a basic detail
about one of the most mentally excruciating things prisoners
can be subjected to: solitary confinement.
How big is a cell?
How big is the average cell in solitary?
You say the average size?
FRANKEN: Cell. Yeah, the size of the cell.
How big is it?
What is--I'm trying to get--this is a human thing
we're talking about.
We've got a lot of statistics.
How big is the cell?
The average size of a cell is...
I guess I'm trying to--you're looking for the space
of what the--
FRANKEN: Yes, the dimensions in feet and inches, the size
of the cell that a person is kept in.
I want to get some idea of--I don't know.
Am I asking this wrong?
No. No, you're not.
You are not asking it wrong.
As far as I can remember, you're just asking him what
the size of the fucking cell is.
But it was a long time ago, and to be fair, he did
eventually get an answer.
The average size should be equivalent to 6 x 4.
What? 6 x 4?
A couple of things there.
One, that was clearly a guess.
And two, 6 x 4 is barely an elevator.
That is the length of a 6-foot party sub by the length
of the amount of that party sub that's left over
the following day because nobody wants party subs.
People put their hands all over them.
They're disgusting.
No, that's not the point.
That's not the point.
But thankfully, a few minutes later, the record
was corrected.
MAN: For the--actually it's 10 x 7 for the cell size.
Ooh. 10 x 7.
Step this way, your highness.
Plenty of room for a ping-pong table and an imaginary
opponent as your mind slowly becomes untethered.
What is clear so far is that we are doing a terrible job
of taking care of people that it is very easy for all of us
not to care about, but here's the thing.
Increasingly, we aren't taking care of them at all.
Private subcontractors have steadily been taking over
certain services, like the Aramark Corporation, who
provide food to prisons and a promise that "With Aramack,
you can expect more--more savings."
And hey, look.
When you're being thrifty with food costs, what's the worst
that can happen?
WOMAN: Records show 65 instances where Aramark
employees failed to provide food or ran out.
DIFFERENT WOMAN: The private vendor Aramark changed recipes
to include cheaper, sometimes substandard ingredients.
Aramark Correctional Services made headlines recently after
maggots were found in food served at prisons here
in Michigan.
That is not good.
The only time when you are happy to hear the words
"maggots were found" is when you are a maggot whose family
was lost at sea.
"We floated 3 days on a piece of bread, but we never
lost hope."
And it's not just food being privatized.
It's prison health care, too.
Arizona tried that.
Guess how it turned out.
MAN: Medical spending in prisons
dropped by $30 million,
and staffing levels plummeted.
50 people died in Arizona
Department of Corrections
custody in just the first
8 months of this year.
Compare that to 37 deaths in
the previous 2 years combined.
50 deaths?
At this point, you could hire the people who pretend to be
doctors on "Grey's Anatomy," and you would probably have
a lower mortality rate and a lot more intrigue.
Hmm. Cutting costs has led to some incredible things
happening in Arizona.
One prisoner had a C-section in jail, and this is how she
says they treated her.
They decided to use sugar, kitchen sugar.
What do you mean, they used kitchen sugar?
The packets, like McDonald's, the sugar.
They would open it, pour it inside,
and put gauze over it and tape it up,
and they had to do that for, like, 3 weeks.
And they poured them in your C-section.
Yeah.
Did they tell you why they were doing that?
One of the doctors learned it from--
I don't even know.
I don't know.
Basically it's a home remedy.
MAN: Sugar was used to treat wounds before the advent
of antibiotics back in the early 1900s.
Yeah, but then we all decided it was no longer an acceptable
medical practice, like curing a child's cough with heroin.
"But look. He's not coughing anymore."
"Yeah, he's not really doing much of anything anymore,
and I can't find any of the good silver."
But look, look.
You will never pay a political price for treating prisoners
like this woman badly.
You don't even need to pretend to care.
Here is how one Arizona lawmaker responded to
her story.
That doesn't sound like a true allegation.
That sounds ridiculous.
You know, prisoners have 24/7 to think up allegations
and write letters.
I'm not saying that some of them can't have a basis
in fact, but you've got to take them with a grain
of salt, or in the case of the hospital, maybe
a grain of sugar.
AUDIENCE: Oh!
Somewhere in hell, Satan just sharpened his pitchfork
and said to his secretary, "Do me a favor, Janice, and let me
"know when that guy gets here, OK?
I just want to be ready."
Many states are even contracting out
entire prisons.
Nearly 9% of prisons are currently run by private
firms, like GEO Group and Corrections Corporation
of America, who had combined revenues of over $3 billion
last year.
They're publicly traded, and while their marketing
materials emphasize how much they do to help their
prisoners rebuild their lives, their pitch to investors has
been a little bit different.
WOMAN: In a recent investor presentation, CCA pitches its
unique investment opportunity.
Another reason investing in the jailing of people makes
good financial sense?
High recidivism.
Oh, that's--that is a great way to reassure
your investors.
"Look, look, look. We see your concerns.
"You know, what if we fully rehabilitate the prisoners
"and they become fully functional members of society?
"Well, don't worry.
"That's not the kind of company we're running here.
"Don't worry.
"Once we're done with these prisoners, they're like human
"boomerangs: they're broken right in the middle, and they
keep coming back."
The key problem with running prisons as businesses is that
prisons are then run as businesses.
Pay and staffing ratios are so much lower that a GEO Group
youth facility in Mississippi sometimes had just two
officers overseeing as many as 256 prisoners.
That facility eventually closed, but only after
a federal judge wrote that physical and sexual abuse was
rampant there because its operators had "allowed
"a cesspool of unconstitutional and inhuman acts
and conditions to germinate."
Now, I know that GEO will say that presents an unbalanced
picture of their company, so in the interest of balance, I
will point out that they got an award from the state
of Florida citing their "bold and innovative cost saving
business practices."
Although I think we all know, when the state of Florida
gives you an award, that award is basically sarcastic.
In fact, a quick side note, the award was signed by
Florida governor Rick Scott, who has led the drive
for prison privatization in his state, but
on one condition.
Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.
Listen, if you think Rick Scott is going to look the
other way for a company with a history of the physical abuse
of minors for savings of a mere 6%, you don't know Rick
Scott, OK?
Ricky needs 7. Ricky wants 7.
Ricky likes 7, OK?
Now, if you happen, at all, to be interested in asking Rick
Scott about the conduct of the GEO Group, for goodness sake,
don't do it tomorrow night.
He's busy.
We actually checked, and he's going to be at a fundraiser
at the home of--and this is true--the CEO of GEO Group.
I believe the theme of that fundraiser is "a cesspool
of unconstitutional and inhumane acts."
Look, this is--this is all so depressing.
Private prisons are bad, yes, but the whole system just
seems fundamentally broken.
You know what?
I think, if you don't mind, I need a minute.
I actually need some help understanding this, if you
don't mind.
*
Hey, John. You seem sad.
Yeah.
I am sad, Timmy.
It's just I've been looking at the prison conditions
in America, and the whole system is just
so horribly broken.
Mmm.
Yeah. I know what you mean.
My daddy's in jail right now
for a low-level drug offense.
You see, that's exactly what I'm talking about, Timmy.
That's crazy.
Well, my daddy's in jail
because he killed 4 people.
Yeah, well, OK.
He's actually a dangerous individual who needs to be
in jail, so that's not really the same thing.
My daddy's in jail, and people pay money to see him.
Yeah, that's actually a zoo.
That's different.
He's in a zoo, OK?
It looks the same to him.
Well, let's not conflate the two.
Oh, he's gone. OK.
Hey, John, how badly broken
is the prison system?
Yeah.
Well, I can't believe I'm gonna say this,
but one prison actually put sugar in a woman's C-section.
Oh!
Wait a second.
What's a C-section?
Oh, boy. Um... Yeah.
Oh, wait, wait. You mean, like,
the letter C?
OLIVER: Yes. Yes, yes, that's what I mean.
That's exactly what I mean. Yeah.
Mr. Oliver, would it make you feel better if we
sing about it?
Well, it can't hurt, can it?
Yeah!
OLIVER: Let's do that. Yeah, why not?
We're singing about issues.
OK. Yeah.
* It's a fact that needs to be spoken *
* America's prisons are broken *
* It's a hard truth about incarceration *
* Prisons are needed for a civilization *
* But mandatory minimums for heroin and crack *
* Stack the system against Hispanics and blacks *
* Our prison population is bigger than Slovenia *
* Have we put people in jail *
* Instead of treating schizophrenia? *
OLIVER: It's true.
I know. They put my dad in jail
because they say he's a monster.
Oh, what did he do?
Nothing.
They just said he looked like a monster.
Well, that's racial profiling,
and that's wrong, too, OK?
Yeah. Ooh.
* It's a fact that needs to be spoken *
* America's prisons are broken *
* Prison conditions are a national disgrace *
* With violence
* And maggots
* And possibly rapes
* And we shouldn't lock up reptiles just to look *
* At their face
Those are zoos. Those are zoos.
Your dad is an alligator in a zoo.
I'm a crocodile. I'm a crocodile.
Oh, Jesus, here we go.
Oh, boy.
Oh, we all look alike, right?
No, no, that's not what I'm saying.
That's not what I'm saying.
No, no. You can't put that on me.
That is clearly not what I was saying.
That's so ignorant.
Oh, come on.
As we were saying...
* It's a fact that needs to be spoken *
* America's prisons are broken *
America's broken prison system
is brought to you by decades of neglect...
a lack of political courage...
and a generous donation by the GEO Group...
as well as viewers like you.
Yes! Yay! Whoo hoo!
We did it.
That's our show.
Thank you so much for watching.
Thank you to all of my friends on the stoop.
We'll be back next Sunday.
Please have a happier week.
Good night!
We did it! We did it!
Let's dance the show out, OK?
Let's dance.
*
Well done. I'm sorry.
I'm sorry about the...