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Opening Panel Round

PETER SAGAL, HOST:

We want to remind everyone to join us most weeks back home at the Chase Bank Auditorium. For tickets and more information go to wbez.org, or you can find a link at our website, wait wait.npr.org. Right now, panel, your turn. All your questions, of course, as they will be this show, are about politics.

Tom, back in 1999, during a tense debate, the Lieutenant Governor of Alabama was forced to do what on the state house floor?

TOM BODETT: In a tense debate.

SAGAL: Yes, it was very tense, a lot at stake.

BODETT: Breathe into a brown paper bag.

SAGAL: No.

Well, when I say he did it on the floor, I mean he did it on the floor.

BODETT: Oh my goodness. He wet himself.

SAGAL: No. Close enough, he urinated. He urinated on the house floor.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

SAGAL: This is what happened. Back in 1999...

BODETT: Without getting any on himself?

SAGAL: Yeah, it was intentional.

(LAUGHTER)

CHARLIE PIERCE: Oh, so he was making a point.

SAGAL: No, he wasn't. Everybody is a critic.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: There was this huge legislative fight in Alabama and he had the floor of the house during this fight. And he knew if he left the floor, his political opponents would grab control of the session.

PIERCE: Oh.

SAGAL: And nature called and called again. And so he decided to finally take the call behind the speaker's podium.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Turns out, he hadn't been state house trained.

(LAUGHTER)

BODETT: But since then, they've installed a urinal back...

SAGAL: What happened was actually, the sergeant of arms came in and rubbed his nose in it and said "Bad, bad lieutenant governor."

(LAUGHTER)

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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