Follow LA Observed on Twitter here
This weekend's edition of "Wait Wait..Don't Tell Me" on NPR stations worked in a question about the caper we reported here a few weeks ago in which Rep. Brad Sherman either added or removed his mother from a campaign mailer. He later joked about it.
You can listen here, or check out the NPR transcript excerpt below.
CARL KASELL: From NPR and WBEZ-Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT...DON'T TELL ME!, the NPR News quiz. I'm Carl Kasell. We're playing this week with Roxanne Roberts, P.J. O'Rourke and Mo Rocca. And, here again is your host, at The Music Center at Strathmore in North Bethesda, Maryland, Peter Sagal....
P.J., California Democrat Brad Sherman is facing a tough primary fight against Representative Howard Berman. They got redistricted together. Mr. Sherman isn't taking any chances. He recently sent out two versions of a family photo to voters. In one designed to appeal to Jewish voters, Sherman allegedly digitally altered it to include what?P.J. O'ROURKE: Well, like a Yakima. [sic]
SAGAL: No.
O'ROURKE: Well, it wouldn't be a big ham salad, would it?
SAGAL: No, it wouldn't be that.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: I'll give you a hint. She's the one in the picture telling him to put on a sweater because she's cold.
O'ROURKE: His mom.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Both Mr. Sherman and his opponent are both Jewish, and so are a lot of the voters in his district. Which might explain why the district at large got a flyer with a picture of Sherman with his wife and kids, but the Jewish voters got a picture with his wife, kids and the smiling grey-haired Bubbe in the background.
(LAUGHTER)
MO ROCCA: Where is this again?
SAGAL: This is southern California.
ROCCA: OK.
SAGAL: I think in the...
O'ROURKE: And they rhyme.
SAGAL: Berman and Sherman.
Yeah.
This is the Berman-Sherman race. This is a problem. So Mr. Sherman, who's also Jewish had to come back with his own strategy. He sent out two versions of his own mailer, one with a foreskin and one without.
(APPLAUSE)
More over there.
Couple of things: One, where NPR's transcript generator says Yakima up there? On the audio the word said is yarmulke. And also, when Sagal makes the foreskin joke, he says Sherman but he almost certainly meant Berman.
