REAL TALK WITH BILL MAHER

Love him? Hate him? It doesn’t matter. Because the comedian knows how to push America’s buttons. And if it were up to him, he’d push the “OK” button on legal pot.

He’s as politically polarizing as Palin. He’s as sharp and funny as the top stand-up comedians. And he’s a fixture on cable’s best network.

Love him or hate him -- and there are plenty of people on both sides of that line -- there’s no denying the significance of Bill Maher.

Rolling Stone magazine recently called Maher “one of the leading satirists of his generation,” which isn’t a generation of nobodies.

He’s the guy whose HBO show “Real Time With Bill Maher” attracts a stew of fascinating people -- politicians, journalists, celebrities. The kind of place where Don Draper from “Mad Men” mingles with a CNN correspondent and the man who is considered the most prominent gay politician in the United States.

But then Maher is also the guy who trashes religion and, to a certain percentage of people, represents everything that’s wrong with America. He is to conservatives what Sarah Palin is to liberals.

And we haven’t even gotten to marijuana yet. Maher is one of most prominent and outspoken supporters of legalizing marijuana. People, of course, find him divisive for that.

Take all this, squish it together and you’ve got a guy who has been able to meld comedy and politics in a way that make Jon Stewart’s shtick look as safe as an episode of “Yo Gabba Gabba.”

Love him or hate, there’s no denying that Maher knowshow to push America’s buttons, and there’s no denying that makes him utterly fascinating -- especially as we prepare for a hotly contested, and predictably contentious, presidential election.

Big, Bad Bill

To some people, Bill Maher is what the enemy looks like.

He’s the smart-alecky, liberal, know-it-all who think he’s better and smarter than you.

He’s the guy who will make a movie like “Religulous” (the title is a mash-up of religion and ridiculous, so that tells you enough about its content) and take joy in how it makes people uncomfortable.

When right-wing talk radio giant Rush Limbaugh was under attack earlier this year for calling a birth-control advocate a “slut,” Maher was the de facto other bully Rush’s defenders pointed at. “But … but … but … did you hear what Bill Maher said about Sarah Palin? He’s said worse.”

Maher is the tough kid in the playground -- but, guess what? His mom and dad are HBO, which have given him free reign on Friday nights expound his thoughts and spout off about his “new rules” since 2003. Fact is: He can get away with it.

He’s the guy who will stick his finger in the thumb of organized religion, or tell off someone he disagrees with better than you wish you could. And that’s why his supporters love him.

Since this is Erb’s New York issue, we’d be remiss not to mention that some of what makes Maher who he is that New York attitude of his.

Born in New York City and raised in New Jersey, he grew up in an Irish-Catholic household until he was a teenager and his family stopped going to church. Maher went on to attend prestigious Cornell University in upstate New York, where he got an English degree.

Though he lives and records his TV show in Los Angeles nowadays, Maher obviously still has ties to New York. In June, it was revealed that he purchased a piece of the New York Mets baseball team.

The pot quotient

Let’s go back to that thing about pushing buttons. If Maher were in charge, there’s one button he would push -- and readers of this periodical would certainly appreciate it. The “legalize marijuana” button.

It’s not just because Maher is a well-known stoner, either. In 2009, on “Real Time,” he said this to Senator (and oft-presidential candidate) Ron Paul:

"When FDR came into office in '33, one of the first things he did was repeal prohibition. He said,  ‘We can’t afford this any more.’ When he was making radical changes, he said ‘Look, we’re serious now. We’re gonna get serious, and people like liquor.’ Well, in this country, people love pot … [applause] … and if we ended that prohibition, it’d be a giant boon of money."

Marijuana legalization is something Maher has talked about frequently. There are, for example, plenty of YouTube videos of him going on the about the subject. But in a 2011 Rolling Stone interview, he talked about the subject from a perspective of personal liberty.

“What could be more private than what goes on inside your mind?” Maher said. “You should be allowed to manipulate that as an adult any way you want. Is it one of our top 10 problems, to legalize pot? No, but ending the drug war would be a great way to save a metric fuckton of money.”

He then talked about how he perceives the effects of marijuana:

“Some people, it makes paranoid,” Maher said. “Some people, it makes tired and lazy. And some people, it wakes up and makes creative. I'm in that group.”

Creative enough for HBO and for political punditry, sure. But, one question Maher gets asked every so often is whether he himself would ever jump to the other side and run for office. Like Al Franken did.

Sure, potheads would welcome a guy like him. Maher, however, is realistic.

“I think drugs are good and religion is bad,” he told Rolling Stone. “You try starting a campaign with that. I am not the person who is saying the things the majority wants to get behind. But it's a big country, and I'm very happy with the minority that likes me.”

THE WORLD ...

ACCORDING TO BILL MAHER

Some choice quotes to leave Maher’s mouth over the years:

“The problem is that the people with the most ridiculous ideas are always the people who are most certain of them."

“We need more people speaking out. This country is not overrun with rebels and freethinkers. It's overrun with sheep and conformists.”

“You know, if you're an American and you're born at this time in history especially, you're lucky. We all are. We won the world history Powerball lottery.”

“If I thought the Lord was speaking to me I'd check myself into Bellevue, and I think you should too.”

“Jesus, as a philosopher is wonderful. There's no greater role model, in my view, than Jesus Christ. It's just a shame that most of the people who follow him and call themselves Christians act nothing like him.”

“I wish someone would just start Fly At Your Own Risk Airlines. How 'bout that? You can have your hair gel, you can have your lighter, you can have a fucking gun, how bout that? You can show up at the gate five minutes before the plane leaves, and pay in cash, like in the good ol' 1980s. The ticket just says "shit happens" on the back, because that's the way it is anyway.”

“It's very sad how in the information age you cannot get information into people's heads. As long as you write something on the internet and do not add LOL — it is true.”

“Can we go back to using Facebook for what it was originally for -- looking up exes to see how fat they got?”

“New Rule: Stop asking Miss USA contestants if they believe in evolution. It’s not their field. It’s like asking Stephen Hawking if he believes in hair scrunchies. Here’s what they know about: spray tans, fake boobs and baton twirling. Here’s what they don’t know about: everything else. If I cared about the uninformed opinions of some ditsy beauty queen, I’d join the Tea Party.”

“I'll show you Obama's birth certificate when you show me Sarah Palin's high school diploma.”

“Y'know, every time in America some guy gets caught cheating, every media outlet does the same story: "Why Do Men Cheat?" Oh, take a wild fucking guess, would you? I think you're over-thinking this. They're not looking for fantasy, they're looking for … sex. That's it! They want sex. And not just sex; they want new sex. The way women want new shoes. Right? You have shoes, they're perfectly good shoes, you don't want those shoes, you want new shoes.”

“I want to thank some very special people without whom I would not be here today. George Bush, Sarah Palin and the Pope. When I came to Hollywood in 1983, I had one dream — to sleep with Jodie Foster. That didn't work out, but this is nice, too.”