The Newsroom #306 "What Kind of Day Has It Been"

The final word for "The Newsroom"

by Catherine Giordano

"The Muddle"

At last, The Newsroom, is over. It ended, as it began, in a muddle .Actually, it literally ended as it began, with numerous flashbacks to the first episode and prequel segments showing how the team all got together.

I was so tired of this show. I know you were too. My reviews for Season 3 got far fewer views that my reviews for the first two seasons. Elsewhere on the web, I saw the term “hate-watching” used in reference to this show. It is an actual word that appears in The Urban Dictionary. It means to watch a show that you hate precisely because you hate it.  I think this series survived on hate-watchers, although I will admit, some people apparently liked the show. 

The unlikely plot of this final episode centered on the return of ACN to its former glory. The former owner, Leona, meets with the new owner, Pruitt, at Charlie’s funeral, and convinces him to endeavor to be the best news channel on TV instead of the most profitable channel or the channel with the highest ratings. (Yeah, that is going to happen—never in the real world, but The Newsroom was always about an idealized world.)  

Pruitt takes Leona’s advice and makes MacKenzee the president, replacing Charlie (who had a heart attack on the floor of the newsroom and died in the episode #305). (See my review and recap, “Til Death Do Us Part”).By the way, if you were sad about not seeing Charlie anymore, not to worry-- with the flashbacks, he was a dominant force on the final episode.  Also, it is revealed that Charlie was not enraged that everyone on his staff was deliberately disobeying his orders; his wife tells us that he secretly wanted everyone to disobey his orders. He was only putting on a show for Pruitt. So no one had to feel guilty that their insubordination got Charlie so angry that he had a heart attack.  

Neal is back. He just shows up in the Newsroom and takes over the ACN website. He tells the insufferable Bree to shut the whole thing down. The entire website is going to be revamped and restored to its former glory.  

Mackenzie is pregnant, having conceived the night before Will went to prison. Will is all aflutter with the news that he is going to be a father. Seriously, he was in dire need of a fainting couch.  

We are not given any finality about Jim and Maggie. Jim is Maggie’s boss, and he recommended her for a job as a field producer in DC. If she gets it, she and Jim will embark on a long distance relationship which will work out because Jim loves Maggie. Don is Sloan’s boss, and indications are that their affair will continue as well. None of them has any qualms about the boss dating his subordinate, and none of them seemed to have learned anything from the Jim-Hallie breakup about the dangers of love affairs with the people you work with even if it is only because you work in the same industry. 

The emotional high point of the episode is when Will, while at the funeral gathering at Charlie’s house wanders over to the garage and sits in with Charlie’s grandson’s band. Is Will a news anchor who plays country music on the side? No. Will tells us he is a musician who does news anchoring on the side. (Funny, this is the first we have heard of Will’s interest in playing and singing country music.)  

It’s a real nice song called “How I Got to Memphis. It’s about going home to Memphis. It’s a metaphor. It is supposed to symbolize how all the characters got to where they are from where they were at the beginning of the series. It is even explicitly stated that “Memphis” can be any place where you feel at home. 

 

Watch the video "How I Got to Memphis"

The problem with “The Newsroom” is that it never knew where its home was.  Was it serious drama about a TV newsroom giving viewers a behind-the-scenes look at the TV news industry? That is a good show. I would have love-watched it. Was it a situation comedy about the high-jinks and mishaps of the Newsroom cast of characters (like Night Court  was for the courtroom or Scrubs was for the hospital)? That is a good show. I would have love-watched that.  Was it just a platform to presenting ideas about politics? That is a good show. I would have love-watched that. 

The Newsroom, however tried to be all three of these shows at once.  As a consequence, it was a muddle.

 

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The Newsroom #305 "Oh Shenandoah" 12/07/14

by Catherine Giordano


Sam Waterson as Charlie Skinner

“Til Death Do Us Part”

As HBO’s The Newsroom heads for that big newsroom in the sky, death is stalking the halls of ACN as the penultimate show, episode 5 of season 3, plays out. I don’t see any reason for the name of this episode except to remind us of the haunting words and music of the song by the same name. “Oh Shenandoah, I’m bound to leave you.” It’s a song of loss and pain.

Will McAvoy has lost 52 days of his life in his solitary jail cell, confined because he has refused to name the source who stole classified documents. Will is all alone except for a wise-ass wife-beater cellmate with very politically incorrect opinions. It turns out, the cellmate was just a hallucination of Will’s; a hallucination impersonating his father. It’s all the more spooky when the cellmate threatens Will with bodily harm, and Will stands up to him and points out he’s taller and stronger and not a woman who you can push around. This harkens back to a scene early in Season 1: Will’s father has died and Will doesn’t want to go to the funeral. So it’s a father-son reunion in that jail cell as Will deals with his dead father.

Will gets released from prison since the judge has become convinced that Will won't reveal the source. It turns out the source, Lily Hart, is dead. She committed suicide in a dramatic and public way on the steps of the capitol to prove something or other. I’m not really sure, but I think she died for the sake of the plot. Despite the source being dead neither Will nor Mac (and presumably Neal who is still in Venezuela) will give up her name. So noble! But also, they are off the hook for protecting the identity of a terrorist who might be a threat to America.

The leaking of secret documents in the fictional show plays off the actions of the real-life leaker of documents, Edward Snowden. Jim and Maggie are in a Russian airport trying to get on the plane that everyone believes will take Snowden to Cuba. They finagle their way on to the plane, only to learn that they are going to Cuba and Snowden is not. Maggie makes Jim change his seat because she can’t bear to sit with him, but the boring monotony of the long plane ride has a weird effect on her. She decides she loves him after all. They may well follow Will and Mac down the aisle to “until-death-do-us-part” land. The plotline is nicely tied up. 

Meanwhile back at the newsroom, Don has been ordered to find the identity of a co-ed who claims to have been raped by a BMOC. She can’t get justice, so she has started a website where women who have been raped can name their accusers. Pruitt wants Don to find the woman and convince her to go on air with the man she has accused for a bit of a slug fest. It will be great TV, and the woman wants to do it. She thinks she can bring down the rapist. Don tries to talk her out of it saying this will ruin her life. She will be slut-shamed and worse. The woman still wants to do it to bring attention to the issue of women being raped on college campuses. Don refuses and goes back to the newsroom and says he couldn’t find her. Another close brush with reality since this episode aired soon after the Rolling Stone magazine covered a similar story in real life.  

Sensationalism is rampart at ACN since the new owner, Pruitt, took over. He is turning the network into the on-air counterpart of a tabloid newspaper. There is even stalkerati. An obnoxious young man, Bree, is running the website in Nel's absence, and he has started a feature called ACNgage. It’s citizen journalism for celebrities. People can call in “sightings,” and they are reported, but never fact-checked. Sloan is very unhappy about this, so she uses the young man’s smug vanity to get him to agree to an interview. He’s on air live, and Sloan slaughters him. (Metaphorically, of course.) He looks like a fool.

 

Sloan and Don are both dead at ACN. (Metaphorically, of course.) Pruitt fires them. 

And then the episode ends with a real death. Charlie, mid-rant, has a heart attack right there in the newsroom. He dies.  

What next for the newsroom? What next for “The Newsroom.” It all wraps up on Sunday December 14^th, the series finale.

 

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The Newsroom #304 11/30/14 “Contempt”

by Catherine Giordano


Will and MacKenzee Wedding Photo

The Best Laid Plans…

Nothing is working out according to plan for our friends in The Newsroom in episode 304, Contempt, which aired on November 30, 2014. I’ll examine the unraveling in this recap and review.

The biggest unraveling of well-laid plans was Will McAvoy’s joust with the FBI and the courts. Will is refusing to reveal the source of stolen classified documents.  He thought he would escape being jailed for contempt of court because he was a big star.  Apparently, he is not a big enough star. The episode ends with him in hand-cuffs being marched off to jail.

MacKenzee had to abandon her well-laid plans for the-wedding-of-the-year in response to the jailing of her fiancé, Will. She had just hours to prepare for a wedding in City Hall before Will was taken to jail. The rushed wedding was done partly for love and partly because a wife cannot be forced to testify against her husband. 

The wedding part of the show was great fun as everyone in the newsroom rushed around getting flowers, music, and a cake. It might not have been the wedding of MacKenzee’s dreams, but gosh darn it, it was going to be stylish. MacKenzee looked every bit the beautiful bride in an ivory knee- length sheath. It was all so romantic, including the last passionate kiss MacKenzee bestowed upon Will as he stood in handcuffs.  Evidently, the rest of the honeymoon will have to wait.

There was a scurry of plans to find a “White Knight” buyer for the company so ACN could avoid a hostile takeover. Sloan found a billionaire who was interested in buying a media company and she and Don had a lunch meeting with her. They thought she was about to save them. It turns out, she took that lunch because she was using ACN as a ploy to negotiate a better deal with another media company. It worked out for her, but it left ACN in a awkward position. Charlie, the president of the news division spoke some angry imprudent words to Pruitt, the new buyer, thinking they had escaped his clutches. Everyone at ACN is a hot-head. 

At least. ACN will have a big scoop when they report on the stolen documents. No, that plan goes awry as well. It turns out that Pruit does not want the financial liability that the story will bring so they must quash the story. But they ship the files to someone at the AP so she can run the story. Will the story get out? Will ACN survive new ownership? Stay tuned.

 

The relationship between Jim and Hallie is not working out very well. It’s a case of strange bed-fellows because Hallie is now working for a rival news outlet. Haillie took advantage of information that she learned from Will for her own story, and then to top it off, she wrote a personal tell-all about their relationship. Their relationship ends in a hail of accusations and recriminations.  And also a bit of sorrow, because their commitment to their relationship was strong, but their commitment to their work was stronger. 

Sloan and Don’s attempt to keep their relationship secret from the HR manager failed also. It failed because Sloan had submitted the form reporting their relationship to HR weeks earlier, and the HR director finally got around to checking his inbox. Don is flabbergasted to learn that he has been working so hard to keep their relationship secret, and all the while, Sloan knew she had already reported it. But this is the very basis of Jim and Sloan’s relationship—head-games. (In the last episode, they played “gotcha” with each other as a way of testing the other’s commitment to their relationship.) Fortunately, the HR director likes games also. He was only pretending to be opposed to their relationship.   

Even Maggie’s new relationship with her ethics professor has collapsed. It seems her new suitor has realized that Maggie is still carrying the torch for Jim, and he doesn’t want to be second fiddle. I think this break-up is Maggie’s good fortune. Mr.Ethics was constantly blurting out things about Maggie to her co-workers that could hurt her career. For instance, Maggie turned down an exclusive story with a government source because it might have been borderline unethical to take it. She was trying to impress Mr.Ethics at the time.  

Another reason Maggie’s new relationship had to end--there are only two episodes left until the series finale, and plot arcs must be resolved. Jim has broken up with Hallie, and Maggie and Jim are now both free to be each other’s one-true-love again. 

What plans does the series have for viewers? Will is in jail and ACN may be “sold off for parts.”  But, at least, everyone’s love life seems to be going well.

 

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The Newsroom #303 11/23/14 "Main Justice"

by Catherine Giordano

Grace Gummer plays Hallie

Boisterous Buffoonery

A “bacchanal of boisterous buffoonery”—that pretty much describes every episode of HBO’s The Newsroom, although this was the first time a character on the show flung out that over-blown phrase.   

If the previous episode was all about ethics and honesty, this episode was all about ethical lapses and dishonesty.

The FBI has raided the newsroom to confiscate hard drives and who knows what else.  They are thwarted and the effort is aborted when Charlie has the crew turn the cameras on the newsroom and threatens to broadcast the raid live. It was a bluff, but the FBI backed down.  

All the bed-hopping that happens among the newsroom’s staff is about to have consequences. There is a new director of HR and he is coming down hard on producers having sexual relationships with the people they supervise. He’s suspicious of don and Sloan and they are lying through their teeth about their personal relationship.  

The Lansings are trying to save ACN from a hostile takeover by finding a friendly buyer.  They have a possible buyer, but the cure may be most than the disease. He wants to turn ACN into some hydra-headed network of mini networks catering to 100 different niches. At last the buyer is honest. The Lansings are trying to sell the station before the news of the FBI raid gets out. That kind of news would definitely hurt the sales price. 

Hallie has a new job. She’ll be working for an online news group with a pay-per-view policy. Are these payments bonuses or commissions? Will Hallie sell out her journalistic ethics in order to pander sensationalism?  It looks like she will? 

Neal’s source got in touch with MacKenzee. The source is a beautiful young Pakistani woman and she gives Mac an ultimatum—release the news about the CIA disinformation that caused 39 deaths or she will dump all of the 17,000 documents that she has onto the media.  Mac wants to handle the news responsibly, but will she cave? 

The FBI has found Neal.  He is in Venezuela—a country without an extradiction policy with the U.S. so much for standing up for principles.  McAvoy has heroically tried to protect Neal.  He got Neal to tell him the name of the source so the FBI would focus on him instead of on Neal. The plan worked out great--to a point.  McAvoy thought that the FBI would not dare to arrest at TV news anchor star.  But at the end of the episode, he is served with a subpoena. McAvoy's boisterousness is definitely subdued as he wonders if he is as big a star as he thought he was.

There was one segment of the show that didn't seem to fit.  The government climate scientist that Peggy met the airplane. McAvoy interviews him on air apparently without a pre-interview. The government guy announces the end of the world due to climate change. No buffoonery; only bleakness. His message: We are doomed and it is too late to save us. Newsroom often weaves true facts into its stories. Is this one of those times?  Id the future of the planet as bleak as this guy presents it? The show gives us no clue. McAvoy just shrugs. Maybe there will be a follow-up in the three remaining episodes.

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The Newsroom #302 “Run” Where's the Truth

Jane Fonda as Leona Lansing

Where's the Truth

by Catherine Giordano

The theme for episode 2 of Season 3, titled “Run” of The Newsroom is truth, lying liars, and ethics. Very lofty! The problem with a theme on The Newsroom is the hit the viewer over the head with it.  A little subtlety would make the show more enjoyable. 

The Lansings

Where to begin?  Reese Lansing, president of ACN News and son of founder Leona Lansing (played by Jane Fonda) are the owners of the ACN Network which is just one piece of their media empire. The evil twins, children from Leona’s husband’s second marriage, will inherit 45% of CAN from their father’s estate on their 25^th birthday which is just about a week away.  They are planning to sell their shares to another company which will then execute a hostile takeover. Leona offers to beat the competitor’s offer. No the truth will come out. Are the twins selling their shares for the money as they claim or are they doing it to punish their father’s first family? There’s also another truth involved. Leona doesn’t actually have the money. 

Maggie

Maggie, a young producer for ACN is one her way back to Boston.  She is on a train. She overhears a government official discussing the EPA.  Realizing this will be a great scoop, Maggie slides down in her chair, out of the official’s sight and records the conversation.  When he is finished with the call, Maggie tells him that she has recorded it and asks for a comment.  He begs her not to use it even though she is legally able to do so. The official claims no fair because she hid herself.  Maggie decides that it would not be ethical to use the story. (What!  He could have seen her if he had just looked a little more carefully.)  The man offers to trade her story in place of the embarrassing one she has just recorded. She says no because that would be blackmail.  (What! That kind of horse-trading is done constantly between journalists and news reporters.) The man then gives her an advance copy of a report anyway. So Maggie will have a scoop after all.  See how things always work out when you play nice. 

 

Neal Sampat as played by Dev Patel

Neal

Back in the newsroom things are not working out so well.  Neal, a reporter,  (played by Dev Patel) has obtained stolen documents from a source.  He will not reveal his source.  The news value of these documents is tremendous.  He has evidence of how a USA disinformation campaign resulted in the deaths of 38 innocent people. Neal stands firm to his journalist ethics and says he will go to prison if he has to because he will never reveal the source. 

Neal will be in the clear if ACN doesn’t air the story because the FBI will never know that he has the documents. But, if the FBI finds out, he could be charged with treason.    

There is a big ethics argument in the newsroom.  MacKenzee, the executive producer, says they must air the story. It is their moral duty to air the story.  Will, the anchor and finance of MacKenzee is more interested in protecting Neal.  Rebecca Halliday (played by Marcia Gay Hardin) is the lawyer for CAN.  She warns them of the dire consequences if the FBI learns about that CAN has the documents. 

Neal is all about ethics and he sneaks out of the room and calls the FBI and tells them about the documents.  Within the hour, an army of FBI agents has swarmed into the newsroom. confiscating the hard drives on all the computers. Will had previously told Neal that he needed to go into hiding. Neal said he wouldn’t run. Now, Neal forgets his high and mighty ethics and runs.  

Hallie

Another ethical dilemma.  Hallie (played by Grace Gummer) is new to the staff of the newsroom. Jim, who she is “sleeping” with, is her boss.  Hallie sent out an inflammatory tweet on Will’s account which results in a mega-ton of bad publicity for ACN.  Hallie is ethical enough to admit that she did it.  She also tells the truth and says she did it for the “retweets.”  Haillee has to be fired.  Jim says, as her boss, it is his duty to be the one to fire her.  Charlie, the general manager, spares Jim this painful task and fires Hallie himself.  

Don and Sloan

And finally, a silly little romantic subplot.  Don, a producer and Sloan (the station’s money-honey”) have been having an affair.  Or something.  The way they try to figure out what it is they are having is to take turns lying to each other only so they can then pounce saying, “It was a test, and you failed the test.”  In the end, they admit that they have serious feelings for each other and decide they have to bring their affair into the open. 

Even the occasion for their story-telling is a lie. Don and Sloan are at a buffet restaurant and Sloan does not want to be seen in public going off her diet.  She makes Don pile up his plate and then surreptitiously stuffs the food into her own mouth.   

Liar! Liar!

Liar. Liar.  All kinds of lies.  All kinds of reasons for the lies.  Bam!  That’s the sound of my brain being crushed by the heavy-handed theme.

 

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The Newsroom Returns to HBO

by Catherine Giordano


The Newsroom Season 3 poster

It’s baaack! 

It’s like the little girl with the curl—when The Newsroom was good, it was very, very good. The show was very, very good when it dealt with the news and the behind-the- scenes look at the workings of a television newsroom

And when it was bad, it was horrid.  When the show dealt with the personal lives, particularly the office romances, of the characters, it was very, very horrid. The characters are all high-powered professionals with serious careers, but most sixth graders handle romantic attractions better.

At the end of season two it seemed like all the story lines had been tied up, and the series was going to its well-deserved eternal rest. But now it is back for season three which will have only six episodes.

Have the writers and show runners have managed to grow up in the year since the last episode? I hope so. You can see it on HBO on Sunday November 9^th, 2014 at 10pm.

For all my complaints, it was a well-loved show among the viewers who loyally tuned in each week. You can read my reviews of all the previous episodes.  Just do a search on this blog for “The Newsroom” Or you can start here with the review of season one, episode one, titled The Newsroom.  

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Real Time with Bill Maher #331 10/03/14 "Wake Up America!"

by Catherine Giordano


Elizabeth Warren

If anything is going to wake up America it is Bill Maher and his guests on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, episode 331, which aired on October 3^rd, 2014.

Elizabeth Warren

The interview was with Elizabeth Warren, a senator (D, MA) and author of A Fighting Chance.  She is a fighter with so much energy and enthusiasm. She got a standing ovation from the audience when she was introduced.  She believes that America has lost its way and she wants to bring us back to our values.

She said after the Great Depression changes were made so that we would not have a “boom and bust” economy, but we slipping back into an economy run by Wall Street, the type of economy that brought us the Great Depression. Wake Up Amercia! “The economy is leaving people and families behind and we have to fight back.”  

Elizabeth Warren believes we need to raise the minimum wage because no one who works full time should live in poverty. She believes in equal pay for equal work. She believes it is not your employer’s business what kind of contraception you use. She believes that the government should not profit from student loans to pay for tax loopholes for billionaires. She said, “This is what the upcoming election is all about.”

Warren told us that the government is making $66 billion in profit annually on student loans. “This fight is personal,” she said. Her family suffered a lot of economic hardship when she was growing up and the only reason she was able to go to college was because it only cost $50 a semester to go to a commuter college. 

Flip-A-District.com

Maher mentioned that one of the reasons he is trying to oust Representative John Kline (R, MN) from congress in the upcoming election is Kline’s support for oppressive rates of interest on student loans.   

He said Kline’s campaign strategy is simply to hide. Maher believes that in order for democracy to work candidates have to put their issues on the table. Maher is encouraging the media to report on Kline’s positions and records. He mocked people who always vote for whoever as an “R” next to their name.

If you go to flipadistrict.com, you can download posters and other stuff.



The Republican brand is a lie

Republicans

On the prior week’s show (see my review, Safe), Alexandra Pelosi, documentary filmmaker, sowed video clips of her man-on-the-street interviews.  One after another, a person who indicate that they supported the Democrat position (which weren’t labeled with a party name), and then they would proudly proclaim they were voting Republican.  The Republicans have done a good job of branding themselves as the party of strong defense, lower taxes and family values. Wake up America!  

The Republican controlled House of Representatives went on a six week vacation without voting on the war in Iraq in Syria to fight ISIS. They were too cowardly to take a stand. When Republicans talk about lowering taxes, they are not talking about YOUR taxes; they are only interested in cutting taxes for corporations and billionaires. When they talk about family values, they say one thing and do another. Wake up America! 

Maher mentioned during the show that the unemployment rate is down to below 6% after a steady decline since Obama took office.  Also the deficit has been cut in half sine Obama took office. And the Obama administration accomplished this while the Republicans did everything possible to impede his success. But Obama has low approval ratings (in the mid 40’s). Wake up America!

(P.S. When a Republican says he is going to cut taxes, ask him what he is going to cut to make up for the lost funding. Chances are it is a government service that you like and depend upon. Wake up America!) 

Mid-show comedy segment

Republicans are so elitist that they actually had to put out a commercial saying Republicans are good citizens too. They drive a Prius, they recycle, etc. So Maher did a parody ad, saying that Democrats are just like Republicans. They ride scooters (like Sheldon Adelson) they shoot unarmed black people, etc. It concluded with “Democrats are Assholes Too.”

Read more about this segment and see a video at Democrats are A-Holes Too.

New Rules: Dirty Vancing 

Maher totally lambasted Republican hypocrisy in New Rules. He said it was “a good election year for the bad boys of Congress” – congressmen who blatantly misbehave and the electorate sends them back to congress anyway. 

There is Vance McAlister (R, LA) who was caught on tape passionately kissing a staffer. “His tongue was forming an exploratory committee.” “That’s not kissing, that’s fracking.”

Mark Sanford, (R, SC) who gave new meaning to the phrase “hiking the Appalachian Trail ,” when he went AWOL from his job as governor to see his Argentinean mistress. Maher called him "another born-again booty-caller.

And the worse one of them all Mikael Grimm (R, NY) He’s under a 20-count indictment for fax evasion, fraud, and perjury. He forced his ex-wife to have two abortions and also forced his mistress to have an abortion. He’s a doctor who had an affair with two of his patients. He’s up for a third term in congress and will probably get it unlike the fetuses he conceived.

Maher said he has a new definition for insanity: Giving Congress an 8% approval rating, and then sending them all back to Congress.

Wake up America!

Secret Service badge

The Secret Service

What is in the news this week? The same stuff that was in the news last week. Every day he learn about another failure of the Secret Service.  Maher quipped, in the monolog that America hasn’t been this worried about a crazy person getting into the White House since Sarah Palin.

Maher pointed out that Obama has three times more threats made against him than any other president. This is no time for laxity of the secret service.

Nicholas Kristof is a journalist, author, op-ed columnist, and a winner of two Pulitzer Prizes. His latest book is A Path Appears: Transforming Lives, Creating Opportunity. He said, “The vitriol against this president is unequalled. No prior president has been called the anti-Christ and had his citizenship questioned.”

Maher pointed out that the Supreme Court pronounced that racism is America was over. Even Republican  Michael Steele, former chairman of Republican National Committee, political commentator, and author of the 2010 book, Right Now: A 12-Step Program For Defeating The Obama Agenda had to admit it. He knows racism is not over because he is a black man.

(BTW, take a look at the title of Steele’s book:  It proves my point about Republican obstructionism.If Obama hasn’t accomplished as much as you hoped he would, it is the Republicans who are to blame for that. Wake up America! )

Ebola virus

Ebola

The United States has its first case of Ebola. The victim is a man from Nigeria who was visiting family in Nigeria.  Maher quipped that it is Rick Perry governor of Texas, is now in charge of preventing an Ebola outbreak.  Maher quipped, “Rick Perry doesn’t know whether to shoot it or cut its taxes.”

Maher said that it would be nice to have a surgeon general to deal with this problem We don’t have a surgeon general because Republicans won’t confirm Obamas nominee because he once said something about guns that they don’t like.

Kristoff pointed out the problem has come to our country because we ignored it when it was in West Africa.  When will people learn that we cannot ignore problems anywhere in the world.  They will grow larger and eventually threaten us too. Oceans can’t protect us anymore. Wake up America!

ISIS

Batman Ben Affleck

ISIS is another problem that was ignored for too long. The discussion on ISIS was dominated by a shouting match between Ben Affleck (panelist) and Sam Harris (mid-show guest). Ben Affleck is an actor, director, writer, producer, activist. (His newest movies are Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Gone Girl, based on a novel by Gillian Flynn). Sam Harris is an author, philosopher neuroscientist. His newest book is Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion.His other books are: Free Will, Lying, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, Letter to a Christian Nation, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. 

Waking Up by Sam Harris
CLICK HERE

Sam Harris has correctly pointed out that a large majority of Muslims hold dangerous beliefs. He said, “Islam is the mother lode of bad ideas.” He said a small proportion of jihadists who want to kill people. However, a larger proportion are Islamists who want Muslim supremacy. Many more are Muslim conservatives  who are horrified by ISIS but hold many of the same beliefs about gays and women and death as a punishment for anyone who leaves the religion. Harris is merely informing us that fundamentalists are not a fringe group in Islam.  

Affleck couldn’t wait to jump into the conversation and tried to shout Harris down. Harris, to his credit, stood his ground. Yes, there are many Muslims who are peaceful, but we can’t ignore the many more who are still in the Middle Ages with respect to their beliefs.   

Maher pointed out that reasonable Muslims are afraid to speak out. “Islam is the only religion that who acts like the Mafia—they will kill you for writing the wrong book or drawing the wrong cartoon.”  

Maher and Harris have the facts on their side. They recognized that although there are many Muslims who do not hold dangerous beliefs, a very large proportion do. Affleck seemed to think that should be no criticism of Islam. He was acting like an asshole. I think Maher may have had people like him in mind a couple of weeks ago when he did another New rules segment about holier-than-thou liberals who make it easy for people to dismiss liberals. 

Spiritual, but Not Religious



Sam Harris

I wish Affleck would have shut up so Harris would have had more time to talk about spirituality without religion, the topic of his new book, Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion. Harris explained that we all have spiritual experiences, but we have to apply science to it, and not just attribute it to religion. He said, “Swapping a belief in the virgin birth of Jesus for a belief in Atlantis is not much progress.” 

Wake Up America

I took the title of this review from the new book by Sam Harris. Harris wants America to wake up about religion.  Elizabath Warren wants us to wake up about the economy. Maher wants us to wake up and stand up for liberal values. One thing for sure, Bill Maher’s show, was lively enough to keep us all wake.

Maher’s Guests for October 3, 2014

Elizabeth Warren: Senator (D, MA), author of A Fighting Chance. Maher did the interview with her.

Sam Harris: author, philosopher neuroscientist. His newest book is Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion. His other books are: Free Will, Lying, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, Letter to a Christian Nation, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. Harris was the mid-show guest.


Ben Affleck: actor, director, writer, producer, activist. His newest movies are Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Gone Girl based on a novel by Gillian Flynn

Nicholas Kristof: journalist, author, op-ed columnist, a winner of two Pulitzer Prizes. His latest book is A Path Appears: Transforming Lives, Creating Opportunity

Michael Steele: former chairman of Republican National Committee, political commentator, author. His book, published in 2010, Right Now: A 12-Step Program For Defeating The Obama Agenda, sounds out of date. 

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HBO's True Blood as Social Satire

by Catherine Giordano

Show Your Trubie Love

Undeading True Blood
 
The seventh and final season of True Blood premiered on Sunday June 22, 2014. Will the series go out in a blaze of glory or will it just flicker out leaving us with the taste of ashes in our mouth. Does the episode title “Jesus Gonna Be Here” portend a resurrection of interest in this show?

I stopped watching a few seasons ago. I gave more reasons for quitting the show in my previous post, but essentially I felt that the whole point of the show had become a game to see if each new episode could top the previous one’s body count, gore, over-the-top sexual misadventures, and number of buckets of blood. My last post was for an episode named “Save Yourself.”  I decided to save the time I had spent watching this show.

But now I’m feeling a little nostalgic for Sookie and her friends.  Maybe I’ll come back.

One thing that I liked about the show was its social satire elements. Today, I came across an article from Mother Jones that discussed the social commentary embedded in the show. True Blood is really all about civil rights, political malfeasance, and religious bigotry. Read the article: “A Political History of “True Blood.”

I just added True Blood back to my viewing list. If it doesn’t revive my interest, I won’t hesitate to put a stake in its heart.  All I have to do is click “delete” and the undead are dead to me again.

 

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“Real Time with Bill Maher” #302 “Drama Queens and Cocaine Dreams”

By Catherine Giordano

Maher does a great tribute to JFK.

Drama queens and cocaine dreams ruled on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” #302, the season finale

which aired on 11/22/13. In the monologue, Bill Maher talked about the change in the Senate rules so that a filibuster could not be used to block a vote on President Obama’s nominees for the courts. Majority rules—at last!. Maher said Republicans are acting like a bunch of “drama queens,” red faced with fury. 

The so-called “nuclear option” was so easily accomplished—it was done in an afternoon. Why did they wait five years? It should have been done four years ago as soon as the Republican plan to do nothing but obstruct became evident. Bill Maher joked, “Just wait until President Ted Cruz fills the D. C. Circuit Court with Ann Coulter, Bill O’Reilly, and a fetus.”

The “cocaine dreams” part of the title refers to Trey Radel, Republican congressman from Florida. He pleaded guilty to possession of cocaine and was sentenced to one year of probation and a very small fine. He’s going to “Club Rehab,” but not resigning. He said that his arrest was a wakeup call. Maher quipped, “His wakeup call used to be a ginormous line of cocaine.”  Maher added that “he is taking a page from Rob Ford [mayor of Toronto also busted for cocaine and also refusing to resign], blaming it on alcohol.”  As if abuse of alcohol makes the use of illegal drugs OK. 

It should also be pointed out that Radel voted to drug-test recipients of food stamps and also voted to cut food stamp spending. Maybe he did those votes while high on cocaine.

Later in the show there was a discussion of cocaine use. Maher says he knows several very successful people in Hollywood who use cocaine.  It doesn’t interfere with their ability to function.  Maher didn’t take it one step further and bring in the proposition that it is not the drug, but it’s illegality that causes problems. For rich people, it really is just like drinking too much sometimes.

The interview was with Dan Savage, who is gay and dramactic, but anything but a drama queen. He is the epitome of cool with a biting wit. He is the author of a sex-advice column named “Savage Love” and the author of several books.  His most recent book is AmericanSavage: Insights, Slights, and Fights on Faith, Sex, Love, and Politics. Maher called him our “unofficial ambassador to Gaytopia.”

Maher mentioned a priest who recently testified in Hawaii that the children of gay couples are more likely to commit suicide.  Dan coolly delivered the priest’s comeuppance. “He’s confusing children with gay parents with the children molested by gay priests.” Pow!

Savage also had quite a few things to say about the two daughters of Former VP Dick Cheney. Liz Cheney (who is straight) is in a primary election in Utah. She is down 50 points in the polls. She thought she could improve her standing with conservatives by condemning her sister, Mary, who is a lesbian married to another lesbian. The ploy only made things worse for Liz.  Bill said, “Liz misjudged people. The only thing ickier than gays is throwing your sister under the bus to win votes.” 

Savage used somewhat stronger language. He called Mary and her wife a couple of “rich dikes.” He reported that Liz had donated money to politicians who seek to repeal gay rights (including $2,500 to Romney) and she never spoke out about the anti-gay statements by her father when he was running for VP. Anyway, it seems that Dick Cheney has been trying to patch things up between his daughters. Savage commented on this thusly: “It’s funny that you need a dick to adjudicate a dispute between a lesbian and her straight sister.”

The panel was introduced and the discussion went straight to the filibuster. Paul Begala, who is a political consultant and co-author of several books with James Carville; the most recent is Take It Back: Our Party, Our Country, Our Future. He said, “The Constitution mentions nine things that require a super-majority; confirmation of judges is not one them. There is no filibuster in the Constitution.”

 Katty Kay, the lead anchor of BBC World news America and co-author  (with Claire Shipman) of Womenomics: Work Less, Achieve More, LiveBetter, said, “It had to be done to make the government work… Harry Reid has had 400 filibusters.”  

Former Republican governor of Maryland, Bob Erlich, said, “Be careful what you wish for. An election is coming up.” This is the “whistling-in-the-dark” moment of the week. Until Republicans change their policies concerning women, minorities, the middle class and the poor—and that doesn’t seem likely to happen anytime soon-- they are not going to retake the Senate. Moreover, I feel positive that if Reid had not abolished the filibuster, the Republicans would have done it the moment they regained control of the Senate. The last time they were in control, they threatened to do it, and they would have if the Democrats hadn’t caved and allowed totally unqualified nominees to be confirmed.  So this move costs the Democrats nothing, and may allow them to get enough done to win favor with the voters and thereby keep their control of the Senate.

  

The comedy segment began with Maher wishing liberals “a very merry war on Christmas.”  Then he showed us some mock books from politicos about Christmas.

Bill O’Reilly:       Killing St. Nick

Paula Dean:        Extremely White Christmas           

Chris Christie:    The 12 Days of Thanksgiving

Barack Obama:  If You Like Your Present, You Can Keep Your Present

John Boehner:    Little Drama Boy

There was also a discussion about JFK and assassination conspiracy theories and the crazy conspiracy theories about Benghazi, especially those on Glenn Beck’s website..  Maher said, “We need conspiracies  like we need God, we’can’t accept that things are just random.”  Kay said, “They have almost a pathological mistrust of government. They project their feelings onto it.” Erlich tied to protest that Benghazi was really different, but no one took him seriously.

There was also a discussion about the Republicans shedding crocodile tears about the Affordable Care Act. They focus on the 1.5% of people who may have to get insurance without qualifying for subsidies. (This group is probably well–off and can afford the insurance.) Maher asked “What about the 5 million people who are not getting the Medicare coverage that the new law provides for them because the governors of their states have refused to take the federal money that will pay for it 100% for the first three years and 90% thereafter.  Erlich gave the “where-does-it-end” argument.  He said, “It was supposed to be just for poor women with children, not for everyone." Begala showed him up by informing him that it is not just poor people who suffer. Hospitals suffer because they are stuck with the bill for uninsured people who can’t pay.

The mid-show guest was the very talented and charming actor, Wendell Pierce, who appears on the HBO drama Treme and on The Micheal J. Fox show. He spoke with heart about New Orleans. After Katrina, some people had said we should let the city go. Wendell says that if anyone dares to sa let this cit go,"we will kick their ass." 

Pierce spoke about his new venture, Sterling Foods, bringing fresh affordable food to the inner city. Each store employs about 50 to 60 people from the community it serves paying them good wages. They even have the Sterling Shuttle—customers who arrive by bus get a ride home if they spend $50 or more.  He compared his store’s policies to Costco. Costco pays good wages, provides healthcare.  “If everyone did the right thing like Costco, we wouldn’t need government regulations.”  This is the “Amen-Brother” moment of the week.

Pierce’s comments wee a perfect segue to New Rules which began with Maher saying that the Wal-Mart Smiley Face is laughing at us. Wal-Mart was conducting a food drive for its own employees asking other employees to donate. “When you sell food and your employees don’t have enough food …”  Another “Amen-Brother” moment. The family that owns Wal-Mart is the one of the richest families in America—they should be donating to their employees who are in need or better yet, paying them a living age so they can buy their own food. (See Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price.)  

The final New Rules segment compared Democrats to Republicans, and JFK to Reagan. Maher said, “We have gays in the military; they have gays in the airport restroom.”  The gist of his riff was that for Republicans, Reagan is their Kennedy. Then he made a bunch of comparisons to show how cool Kennedy was (and still is) and how Reagan was already way past is prime in the 1980’s, the era of “greed is good.” One example:  “Kennedy is James Bond; Reagan is Matlock.” He ended with, “You can call someone ‘your Kennedy’ but it will never make it true because ‘our Kennedy’ is Kennedy.  Another “Amen, Brother” moment.

  

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