Write . Since and the geometric random variable have the same expected value ,
This is also the entropy deficit relative to the maximum entropy distribution on the nonnegative integers.
The random variables and are independent, so part a gives . Consequently
which is the required bound in terms of the Entropic Ruzsa distance.
For , let be the geometric distribution
If is the law of , Gibbs inequality gives
Therefore
For , the nonnegative random variable is zero almost surely and both sides vanish. This proves that the maximum entropy distribution on the nonnegative integers with fixed expected value is geometric.