Real Time with Bill Maher, #340, 01/23/15 "Crazy"

Howard Dean

by Catherine Giordano


It’s deflategate! A football was under-inflated, as Bill Maher said, "Just like Sarah Palin’s brain.” Maher added, “You’d think Tom Brady got ebola and crashed a Malaysian Airlines plane into Benghazi.”  

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia died.  Maher said, “I’ll think of you every time I go to an Italian restaurant and see the tablecloth.  The successor to the throne is King Salman.  It’s said he be suffering from Alzheimer’s.  Maher said, “He’s really gone. He’ll say one thing and then the next minute say something completely different. Just like Mitt Romney.”

The official Republican response to President’s state of the union address was a little off its rocker. Joanie Ernst and her “bread bags on my feet” is the punch line for umpteen dozen jokes. Her robotic speaking style is the butt of joke as well.  Her whole manner, right down to her helmet-head hair made me think she was an animatronic mannequin left over from the 1960 world fair. (If all the kids had bread bags on their feet, what was the point to the story?) Oh well, when you can’t talk policy, talk bread bags.   

War is crazy: The Interview 

The interview was with James Fallows, a journalist, national correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly, “The Tragedy of the American Military.” He has written several books. His most recent book is China Airborne: The Test of China’s Future. He is also the author of Blinded into Bagdad: America’s War into Iraq. 

Fallows said. “The biggest strategic mistake as invading Iraq. The trillions we spent were a total waste.” He said “We lost the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.”  He reminded us about President Eisenhower’s concerns about the military. He pointed out that the way to get infrastructure done in this country is to call it defense.  

Fellows said, "Saying 'thank you for your service' to a soldier is not enough. You need to vote to end wars. 

Congress is crazy: Ninja Obama is back 

Maher said that after watching the state of the union address he knew “ninja Obama was back. He talked about “middle-class-economics”, taxes on the rich, free college, etc. Obama is back on offense. “Middle class economics” is the answer to “trickle-down economics.” 

Who coined that term anyway? Trickle-down makes me think of urine running down someone’s leg. And how insulting! It’s saying the rich get it all and the rest of us can have what trickles down. Like a dog under the table waiting for table scraps to fall to the floor. That’s the images I get from trickle-down. Maher sad that the 80 richest people in the world are worth what the entire lowest 50% are worth combined.  

Of course, Republicans have to denigrate Obama. The Republican panelist, Bret Stephens, journalist for the Wall Street Journal, couldn’t wait to sneer, “It took Obama six years to mention it.” Maher quickly corrected him. “We don’t have it because Congress wouldn’t give it. Obama was standing under bridges asking Congress for money for his jobs programs.”  

Stephens tried a new tack, “Republicans are champions of growth which helps the poor.” (I guess he was talking about those table scraps again.) Howard Dean, doctor, former governor of Vermont, former chairman of the DNC, co-founder of Democracy for America,” and author of Howard Dean's Prescription for Real Healthcare Reform, also upbraided Stephens for talking nonsense. Dean said, “That has been completely discredited.” 

Maher went on to mention all the good economic news, more jobs, stock market gains, etc. all accomplished despite Republican opposition.   

Stephens couldn’t say the economic facts so he tried to say it wasn’t good news; it was bad news. “It is low interest rates that raised the Dow. Low interest rates hurt the middle class.” 

Maher needed to move on, so this bit of idiocy went unnoticed. Low interest rates allow business to expand and create more jobs and low interest rates help the middle class to afford a mortgage to buy a home. 

Republicans have taken up the cry, “income inequality” because that is the only bad news in the “Obama economy.” I agree income inequality is a big unsolved problem. Obama has proposals to address it, the fair pay for women act, the raise the minimum wage act, the free college education act. He advocated for all of these in the State of the Union address. The consensus is that all these proposals are DOA in the Republican congress. Republicans won’t even vote on these acts. So what are the Republican proposals to reduce “income inequality”? The same discredited answer they have for everything--lower taxes for the rich. 

Crazy denial of climate change

If you have children,
climate change should be a priority.

Maher informed us that there have been 10,855 peer reviewed articles published on climate change. Only two of them rejected that climate change was happening and it was caused by human activities. In the last 15 years, 14 of them have been the hottest year on record. 2014 was gain the hottest year on record.  

I’m going to call Stephens “the artful dodger.” He reminds me of a bantam-weight boxer who manages to win by dodging and weaving. He moves with one spurious argument to another sometimes saying stuff that is so ridiculous that no has a comeback for it.

Stephens cited a study that he said showed that Maher was wrong. No one else on the panel had ever heard of this study. (Maybe it was one of the two studies that Maher referred to.)  

Then Stephens said it was a matter of priorities. Maher stated, “If you have children, I don’t know how climate change cannot be your priority. My priority is that I want to keep breathing…Earth is the one place that sustains human life.”  

Finally, he said, "Consensus should not rule science.” He cited Galileo being right about the planets revolving around the sun when everyone else thought the sun revolved around the earth. Everyone on the panel was too stunned to reply. Maher sputtered, “But that was the church.” What he was trying to say was that the church disagreed with Galileo, not the scientists. It took a while—there weren’t a whole lot of scientists around back then and the church had threatened them into silence, but once more scientists weighed in, Galileo’s views became the consensus.  

Science is always about consensus. Climate change theories were not immediately accepted. Over time, consensus was achieved as more and more evidence was found to support the theory and very little evidence was found to support the opposing theories.  

Stephens's remarks were so appallingly stupid, and all the more dangerous because they were covered with a veneer of seriousness. Stephens is the most dangerous of the crazies—he looks and sounds like he knows what he is talking about, but he is nothing more than the artful dodger. He has a book America in Retreat: The New Isolationism and the Coming Global Disorder. I wonder if the book is also filled with nonsense and stupidity. 

Crazy song titles: The mid-show comedy segment

Talking about stupidity about climate change, Maher said that Joanie Ernst said one of the stupidest things he had ever heard. “I have not seen any proven proof.” 

It seems Ernst was not only a hog castrator, she was also once a country singer. (I don’t know if the latter part is true or if it was just part of the joke.)

Maher gave us some of the song titles from her album “Bread Bags on My Feet.”  
 

• Harper Valley NRA
• I Walk the Line to Keep the Mexicans Out
• Mothers, Don’t Let Your Sons Grow Up to be Scientists
• Stand by Your Tan (The John Boehner Song)
• A Boy named Lindsey
• The Only Thing Gay about My Marriage was the Priest
• Crazy (No Seriously I’m F@#king Crazy)

See the video CLICK HERE


Crazy funny: Bill Burr

The mid-show guest was Bill Burr, a comedian, podcaster, and actor. He has a DVD: Bill Burr: Let it Go. His movies include Walk of Shame and his newest movie, Black or White.

Maher asked Burr if he thought political correctness was ruining comedy. Burr dismissed the whole notion. “It is nothing more than 20 people with a hashtag.” He called it “manufactured strategic outrage.” Maher said, “If you are not in my audience you have no right to complain.”

 

Movies about crazies: The American Sniper 

Maher said, the movie The American Sniper, has already earned $105 billion dollars an unheard of amount. In contrast, The Hurt Locker, which dealt with the same theme, earned only $17 million, probably because it was more artful and ambiguous. “The American Sniper is about a psychopath patriot.”  

Panelist, Nia-Malika Henderson who is a political reporter for The Washington Post said, “Americans just want to see someone doing some patriotic act because most people think the war wasn’t worth it.”

Stephens, of course, had to disagree. He said, “It’s an honest movie about war.” 

Crazy terrorists

Republicans have their panties in a bunch because Obama uses the phrase Mid-East terrorists instead of Islamic terrorists.

Howard Dean gave a very good explanation for not using the word “Islamic.” “[Calling them Islamic] gives them a propaganda victory.” Exactly. They are thugs and murderers and they are not acting on behalf of the religion of Islam. Dean said, "If we call them Islam, it makes it easier for them to recruit.” Exactly. A call to defend your religion is much more likely to attract recruits than a call to help this guy become the biggest war lord in the Mid-East.

In Overtime,  Stephens debated Dean on this again. “As a physician, you know you can’t cure a disease if you don’t name it.”  Stephens is so oily with his false analogies, I want to slap him. If someone tries to mug me, I don’t have to know his name to defend myself. Further, as was discussed last week (See my review titled Free Speech ), the terrorists are not acting on behalf of Islam. I wish Dean had said, “As I physician, I know I can’t cure a disease if I give it the wrong name.”

Maher was on the wrong side of the argument on this one. He’s still so upset for people calling him out as a racist because he said Islam was a religion of war. So is Christianity and Judaism—denigrating and warring against people of different religions is one aspect of religion.

There are 5,000 terrorists groups who want to be called Islamic, but they do not represent the billion Muslims in the world. To call them “Islamic” elevates them to the billion people who revere Islam. 

I am glad that Obama is not falling for their trick to make their acts of terrorism seem like a holy war in defense of Islam. This whole debate is nothing more than “strategic manufactured outrage.” 

Crazy New Rules: Elephant Men

There is a slew of Republicans vying to attract their very own billionaire “sugar daddy” to fund their ambitions to win the Republican nomination for president.

There are so many that the billionaire “donor class” may have trouble sorting them all out. Bill Maher wants to be helpful, so he has provided “The Billionaire Buyers Guide.”  

• It begins with Rick Perry who “wears glasses so he won’t seem like the evangelistic shit-kicker with limited intellect that he actually is.”
• It continues with Marco Rubio who everyone thinks is the kid Janet Reno sent back to Cuba.
• Ted Cruz likes the keystone pipeline because "he too oozed down from Canada" where he was born.
• Rand Paul has some good ideas about changing the drug laws and giving ex-cons the right to vote, but "he is like a Swiss army knife where half the blades are useful and half are Q-tips and AIDS needles."
• Mike Huckabee is "the guy everyone says is likeable, but no one says he likes.”
• Ben Carson is the Republicans “black friend du jour” and an "insane paranoid who will say anything.”
• Chris Christie “always goes with his gut” (insert joke of your choice here) and “he will chew you up and not spit you out.”
• Jeb Bush is “the smart Bush,”  but the last President Bush had a 22% approval rating when he left office.
• And it ends with Mitt Romney with his “unbearable whiteness of being” who in his quest for the presidency is “like your dog who wants that piece of Slim Jim that you dropped into the couch.“

See the video CLICK HERE

Crazy Crazy Crazy

Has the whole world gone crazy? Stop the crazy, I want to get off.

 

Bill Maher’s Guests for January 23, 2015

Howard Dean: doctor, former governor of Vermont, former chairman of the DNC, co-founder of Democracy for America, author of Howard Dean's Prescription for Real Healthcare Reform 

James Fallows: journalist, national correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly (“The Tragedy of the American Military.” ) He has written several books. His most recent book is China Airborne: The Test of China’s Future. He also wrote Blinded into Bagdad: America’s War into Iraq. .

Bill Burr: comedian, podcaster, actor. He has a DvD: Bill Burr: Let it Go. His movies include Walk of Shame and his newest movie, Black or White.

Nia-Malika Henderson: political reporter for The Washington Post (The Fix)

Bret Stephens: columnist, journalist for the Wall Street Journal, Pulitzer Prize winner, author of America in Retreat: The New Isolationism and the Coming Global Disorder 

Real Time with Bill Maher #339 01/17/16 “Free Speech”

Free Speech

by Catherine Giordano

Where does free speech end and hate speech begin? Maher and his guests tried to find the answer on Real Time with Bill Maher, episode 339, which aired on January 16, 2015. 

 

Free speech means free to provoke. 

One thing on Maher’s mind was Pope Francis (no more Pope Frank—the bromance is over.). Maher announced, “You are dead to me now.”) In the monolog, Maher reported that the Pope said that you should not provoke and then to demonstrate his point, he made a punching motion towards his aide “just like Jesus said.”   

Maher returned to this subject in New Rules. It was personal to him because Maher just did a commencement speech at Cal Tech and some students wanted him disinvited because of his remarks about Islam with Ben Afleck.  (See Wake Up, America ) Maher gave his speech any way, and in the New Rules bit, he said, “Where do I go to protest you?” 

Maher said if liberals are throwing around terms like “bigot,” then they are “Je suis part of the problem.” Maher said we should not advocate boycotts of Rush Limbaugh because we don’t like what he says. Countries like France are wrong to make it a crime to deny the Holocaust. The Ku Klux Klan should be allowed to march. The speech is offensive to him, but if we want free speech, it must all be permitted.  

How do I use my free speech to respond to speech that is bigoted except by calling the person saying these things a bigot? Isn’t it my free speech right to call them bigots? 

Maher makes jokes about The Donald looking like an orangutan and goes even further saying Trump is the love child of his mother and an orangutan. I know Trump finds this very offensive. (He tried to sue Maher over the jokes.) I think the joke is funny and laugh because I don’t like Donald Trump. 

I think the movie, The Interview, that ridicules Kim Jong Un and makes jokes about his assassination is funny because I don’t like Kim Jong Un, but what if the North Koreans made a move about the assassination of President Obama? I’d be angry.  

Free speech?

The cartoons of Charlie Hebdo were very offensive to some Muslims and nothing more than political satire to others. To Muslims it was hate speech. They are just as offended by these cartoons as I am by the Ku Klux Klan. (However, I don’t get a machine gun and start shooting the people who have offended me.) 

It is really hard to support the free speech of people who don’t just disagree with you, but disagree with you in a hateful way. Perhaps we should only draw the line where hate speech turns into hate acts. But it is so easy to cross that line. It happened in Nazi Germany.   

So is the answer then to censor some speech? Now I am right back where I started.

The interview  

Atul Gawande is a surgeon, public-health researcher, professor, chairman of Lifebox, (a nonprofit which aims to reduce deaths in surgery globally), and author of several books. His most recent book is Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End. He is also a very engaging guest.

 

Atul Gawande

He got into a tussle with Maher about the flu vaccine.  Maher thinks the flu vaccine is, in his word, “b.s.” Gawande explained why the flu vaccine was beneficial, and even worthwhile (saving 15,000 to 20,000 lives) when it is less than 100% effective.  Maher continued to say the flu vaccine was a scam. Is Maher a vaccine bigot? When you continue to state an opinion about something even after your opinion has been shown to be false, isn’t that the definition of a bigot.  
 

Gawande is taking on the subject of death and dying. He reported that the time in your life when you are most likely to have surgery is during the last week of your life.  He said that in the 1950’s most of us died at homes. Now we die in nursing homes and hospitals where we have been put for our own safety. Gawande said, “What old people really want is not safety, but autonomy."  
 

Terrorism

Josh Barro

Panelist Josh Barro is a correspondent for The New York Times self-identifies as a neoliberal and a Republican.

 

“Neoliberal” appears to be another word for libertarian, and he is very calm and well-spoken for a Republican. Unlike last week’s Republican, Carly Fiorina, he did not pound the table, he did not spout gibberish, he did not give us smug facial expressions). He made sense.

Barro said that in the United States, unlike in Europe, Muslims are integrated into society.  In Europe there is the legacy of colonialism complicating things. (Most European Muslims have immigrated from countries formerly ruled over by the European country where they now live.  There is a lot of resentment. Barro also blames high unemployment and living off of government benefits. It’s true that being on welfare hurts one’s self-esteem, but I hope that Barro’s solution is to address the unemployment and not just to cut off the benefits.
 

Maher added “Sometimes in a melting pot, people don’t melt.” 
 

Obama has been getting a lot of heat lately for using the term “radical terrorism” instead of “Muslim terrorism.” Obama is right not to inflame by implying that these terrorists are terrorists because they are Muslim. Barro said that in Europe, only 5% of Muslims attend religious services. He said the problem is not religion but a lack of social integration.
 

Mitt Romney  

Mitt Romney

 

Mitt Romney is running for president again. He made a speech about his intentions on a “moth-balled aircraft carrier that had outlived his usefulness.” Do you think Romney saw any hidden meaning in that? 
 

Romney appears to be trying to reinvent himself as the anti-poverty candidate, just one more reinvention in a long series or reinventions. Earth to Romney: 1)Republicans don’t like anti-poverty candidates. 2)You are the last person in the world anyone would believe was sincere about anti-poverty. 
 

Cuba 

Wes Moore

The United States is ending the embargo with Cuba.  Maher asked if the pace of change with Cuba would go as fast as it did with gay marriage and the legalization of pot. 

 

Panelist Wes Moore is a businessman, U.S. Army veteran, host of "Beyond Belief" on the Oprah Winfrey Network, author.  His first book, The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates, became an instant New York Times bestseller. His most recent book is The Work: My Search for a Life That Matters.

Moore said that his grandmother was from Cuba and that Europeans have freely visited Cuba all along. They have some of the best beaches in the world and it is an inexpensive place to visit.  
 

Prison Reform 

Maher mentioned that it is ironic that U.S. embargoed Cuba while maintaining a prison, Guantanamo Bay, on the island.  This was a segue into a discussion of prison reform. Maher pointed out that the U.S. has more people in prison than any other country.  Barro mentioned that during the last recession, the prison population went down because it was too expensive, but now the number of prisoners is on the rise again.



Josh Gad

Panelist Josh Gad, an actor best known for voicing Olaf in Frozen, asked “Where is the
money to reform people?” Prisoners are warehoused, but most of them will eventually be released unprepared for re-entry. I agree.
 

Maher said that he liked the idea of free college for two years.  He said, “It would get people ready for a job, so they don’t sell pot.” So true, a year of college is much less expensive than a new of imprisonment.  Yet there is always money for building new prisons, but not for education (in or out of prison).

 

Hollywood 

In the monolog, Maher joked that the best British movies this year were about a brilliant astrophysicist (Stephan Hawking, The Theory of Everything) and a brilliant mathematician (Alan Turing, The Imitation Game). "In the United States the biggest movies were about a wrestler, a drummer, and a sniper—everything a boy wants to be when he is ten." 
 

The 25 biggest movies in recent years have all featured superheroes, aliens, wizards, or talking animals of some sort. The only exception was The Titanic. 
 

Maher talked about the new movie Selma about Martin Luther King.  Some have faulted the movie because they say President Johnson’s support for the Voting Rights Act is not sufficiently shown.  Maher said, “A biopic doesn’t tell the whole story. When you don’t leave things out, you get 17 hours of The Hobbit. (By the way, Selma is a great movie—go see it.)
 

Mid-Show Guest: Kathryn Bigelow 

Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Bigelow is a director, producer and screenwriter. Her two most recent movies are Zero Dark Thirty and The Hurt Locker.  She was on the show to promote her  campaign to prevent the extinction of elephants and her animated/live action short/PSA called  Last Days.   
 

She told us that elephants are the most intelligent and sensitive communal creatures on Earth (she didn’t exclude humans), and that they could be extinct in the wild in 11 years.  They are being killed or their ivory. She claims that the profits from this illicit ivory trade are funding terrorism.
   

Her film is very short, very beautiful, and very important.  Please watch it now.

 

Mid-Show Comedy Segment

Politicians getting ready to campaign for office always have a book.  Maher had fun renaming some of these books. 

• Marco Rubio’s book: Hispanic But Not Too Much.
• Rand Paul: Just Like My Dad Without the Crazy Parts
• Sarah Palin: Hey Sucker. Yeah You. Give Me $29.95
• Donald Trump:  Me Want Banana. Me Climb Tree. Inside the Mind of a Half-Human Half-Orangutan Billionaire
• Mitt Romney: What Do I Have to Do to Be President? Suck Your Dick? OK, I’ll Do It.

Read more on this and see the video clip here: Bill Maher: So Sue Me

More Free Speech
 

The last two book titles are very offensive, but free speech means never having to say you are sorry for being offensive.
 

 Bill Maher’s Guests January 16, 2015.

 

Josh Gad: actor best known for voicing Olaf in Frozen 

Atul Gawande: surgeon, public-health researcher, professor, chairman of Lifebox, (a nonprofit which aims to reduce deaths in surgery globally) and author of several books. His most recent book is Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End 

Josh Barro: Self-identifies as a neo-liberal and a Republican, correspondent for The New York Times. (I checked the definition of neo liberal—it sounds like just another word for libertarian.) 

Wes Moore: businessman, U.S. Army veteran, host of "Beyond Belief" on the Oprah Winfrey Network, author.  His first book, The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates, became an instant New York Times bestseller. His most recent book is The Work: My Search for a Life That Matters 

Kathryn Bigelow: director, producer, screenwriter. Her two most recent movies are

Zero Dark Thirty and The Hurt Locker.  She has started a campaign to prevent the extinction of elephants and has produced an animated/live action short/PSA called  Last Days.

 

Real Time with Bill Maher #338 01/9/15 “No Joking”

by Catherine Giordano


My French is not too good, but I think it says
"700 lashes if you don't die laughing."
'Charia" means "Sharia."
"Hebdo" means "weekly."

Real Time with Bill Maher began the new season with a bang. Maher’s theme was “No joking” and he had some excellent guests to amplify his points. The terrific guests were Chris Hardwick, Jay Leno, Paul Begala, and Salmon Rushdie. Carly Fiorina was also present.

Monologue

Bill Maher began his monologue saying that free speech and joking were under attack. First the North Koreans did not want any joking about their glorious leader and the movie, The Interview” which featured a plot about some bunglers attempting to assassinate him, got pulled from theater chains. And now the much more serious case of the offices of a satirical magazine in France, Charlie Hebdo, being attacked by Islamic murderers because of satirical cartoons about Mohammed (another glorious leader who should never be insulted). Eight members of the staff were killed in the attack.

Maher commended the remaining members of the staff who have proclaimed that the next edition of the magazine will come out on time with a million extra copies printed. He compared the bravery of Charlie Hebdo to the cowardice of Sony. He offered mock congratulations to Sony for “putting up less resistance than the French.” He then said that the proper response to terrorists was “in the immortal words of Dick Cheney as spoken on the floor of the Senate, ‘Go f*@k yourself.’”

America is supporting France during this crisis, so much so, Maher said, “that the Senate wants to change ‘freedom fries” back to “French fries.’”

Interview: Chris Hardwick on Cyber Space

Chris Hardwick

Maher did the interview with Chris Hardwick, a comedian, actor, screenwriter, musician, podcaster, television host for @Midnight on Comedy Central, and author of The Nerdist Way: How to Reach the Next Level in Real Life).

Chris talked about hacking and about keeping your data secure. Have secure passwords. Don’t use public wi-fi. Never say anything in email or a text that you wouldn’t shout out loud in the middle of Times Square.

Hardwick said there was a lot of cyber crime in Russia because I lot of people have math and computer skills, but no job. He said not all cyber crime was done for monetary gain. Cyber terrorism in support of a cause. Hard core black hat hacking is done just because some people “want to burn stuff down”—they get their jollies by destroying things.

World reaction to Charlie Hebdo

Hacking can be a two-way street. A hacker group known as “Anonymous” (not sure what category they are in) has announced that will destroy all Islamic terrorist websites.

There has been universal condemnation of the attack. Even Islamic groups have not remained silent this time; they have spoken out to condemn it.

Maher said, referring to Islam, “Where there is this many bad apples, something is wrong with the orchard.”

Salman Rushdie

Salmon Rushdie, author of several books including Joseph Anton: A Memoir (about the time he spent in hiding because there was a fatwa calling for his murder due to his book, The Satanic Verses: A Novel) and his latest novel, Shame: A Novel, made news with his statements. Literally, I saw a clip from the Real time on TV the next day featuring Rushdie. He said that most of the Islamic terror groups were not about the west, but were part of attempts to “seize power in the Islamic world.” They want to return to the 7^th century, to the time when the Prophet lived.

Rushdie said that the best thing we can do is “don’t give a f*@king inch.” He objected to the “but brigade.” People who say they are for free speech …but they should have been more respectful, more sensitive, whatever.

Maher replied, “To a coward courage always looks like stupidity.” I put that quote in bold type because it is so good. Somebody needs to put it on a tee shirt, with “Je suis Charlie Hebdo” on the other side.

Rushdie said “We have to rock the boat. It’s our function. What would a respectful political cartoon look like?”

Read more about this discussion and see the YouTube video: Maher, Rushdie, and Charlie

Mid-show comedy Segment: Other Movies Sony Pulled

Maher showed us some movie posters for fake moves that might cause enough controversy and would have to be pulled. Some of them were:

• Tyler Perry in Medea Gets Choked Out by a Cop
• Mel Gibson in The Girl with the Swastika Tattoo
• Ray Rice in Black Chick Down
• Bill Cosby in While You were Sleeping

 

Jay Leno

Jay Leno
The mid-show guest was Jay Leno. Now that Jay Leno is no longer hosting The Tonight Show, (See Behind the Curtain: An Insider’s View of Jay Leno’s Tonight Show by Dave Berg) he has more time to devote to his cars. He is doing two shows about cars: Garage which can be seen on YouTube and a car show for CNBC.

Maher asked Leno, “If you had to choose between jokes and cars which would you choose?” Leno said, “Jokes because the jokes pay for the cars.”

The Republican contenders for 2016

Maher said that Mitt Romney will run again.



Paul Begala

Paul Begala, Democratic campaign strategist and author of many books on politics including his newest one assessing the possible 2016 candidates, 2016 Scouting Report: American Bridge's Media Guide to the Republican Presidential Bench,

thought this was wonderful news. He said, “I have a whole warehouse of old attack ads.” He added, “The Republicans always choose the oldest white guy next in line.” “Bush, Christie, Romney, the potty-trained Republicans.” Sorry Paul, I have to disagree with you about Christie. There are a few lessons he failed to learn in kindergarten.

Economic News

The economic news has been so good. The Dow has tripled since Obama took office. Unemployment is down to normal levels. Gas is cheap. Maher showed clips of Republicans making campaign promises on these issues and then said, “Obama has achieved all the Republican goals.

Carly Fiorina, former business executive, failed U.S. Senate candidate (R CA), author of Tough Choices: A Memoir and possible contender for the Republican nomination for president in 2016, (Yes, really—she says may run.) had to be the ants at the picnic. She put on her sourest face and nagging like a buttinski mother-in-law started ranting about poverty rates and income inequality.

Maher scoffed at her incredulously. “You care about income inequality!?” It turns out she vociferously says she does. Not that she has a plan to fix it, but just as something she could use to beat up Obama.BTW, Obama has a plan--raise the minimum wage. I wish Maher had called her fluff and asked her for her opinion of Obama’s plan to reduce income equality by raising the minimum wage.

Begala said, “We have the best economy in the world because we have a President who knows what he is doing.” Fiorina was screaming now, “Income inequality, Income inequality.” She was like a jack in the box—you slam down the lid, but she just keeps popping up. Oh, yes, Carly, please run for President. We need the jokes.

New Rules: Policeman’s Bawl

Drop the binky.

The final New Rules segment was about the New York Police Department and New York Mayor de Blasio. What did de Blasio do to raise the ire of the police? He said, “Many families wonder if their child is safe.” (de blasio has a black wife and black son.)

Maher accused the NYPD of suffering from PMS. “We have to tell them that we love them or they throw a tantrum.” Maher said with biting humor, “Next, it will be a baby with a rattle. He pointed the rattle at me. Drop the f*@king binky.”  

“Police say they are going by the book. Who wrote the book? George Zimmerman?” (BTW, Zimmerman just got arrested again—domestic violence against a girl friend again. How desperate do you have to be to be Zimmerman’s girlfriend?)   

Maher said the police unions were behind the bad behavior of the police. (In addition to openly disrespecting the mayor and turning a funeral into a political protest, they are engaging in a work stoppage.) The police union is supporting this bad behavior and Maher called them out for giving unions a bad name.   

Then he praised unions saying that when one in three workers belonged to a union, we had a strong middle class. Now that only one in ten belongs to a union, the middle class is sliding down the economic scale. 

“It's not hard to do the math. Wait it is, because we can’t fire teachers because of the teachers union.”

 
It ended there.

First Maher disses unions, then he praises unions, and then he disses unions again. Where’s the joke? Maybe there was no joking because everybody on the writers’ staff left their brains on vacation. It’s the first show of the new season—get back on your game! End with a joke that is funny. End with a joke that has some bite. End with a joke that would make Charlie Hebdo proud.

A Review of “The Affair” on Showtime

Cast of Showtime's The Affair

by Catherine Giordano

Showtime’s The Affair is a wonderful fable of love and marriage. It unfolds slowly, as life does. It hints at secrets, and then adds layer after layer as the secrets are revealed. Season One has just concluded its ten-episode run and is now available “On Demand”. It’s a great show to binge watch.  

The story is told in a unique way. A police investigation is taking place.The two main characters, Noah Solloway (Dominic West) and Alison Lockhart (Ruth Wilson), each have their time with Detective Jeffries (Victor Williams) to recount their stories. Noah and Allison are the man and woman having the affair, and they are each married to someone else.

The first half hour of each hour-long episode is Noah’s recounting of events; the second half hour is Alison’s recounting of the same events. heir stories don’t always match up. For instance, who initiated the affair? Depends on who is telling the story. At first the two segments of the show covered the same events, but as the story expanded, each segment included events known only to the protagonist of the segment.

During the first few episodes, we don’t even know why the two are talking to the investigator. Finally we learn that he is conducting a murder investigation, but viewers are not told who was murdered until near the end of season. As I said, secrets are slowly revealed. 

I don’t want to reveal too much of the plot. Part of the enjoyment of the show is just letting the show work its magic as we learn more and more about the characters and their lives. So I’ll just give a brief introduction to the main characters.  

Noah Solloway, is in his mid 40’s and has a comfortable life and a comfortable marriage. He is married to Helen (Maura Tierney), and they have four children ranging in age from about 5 years old to about 15 years old, and they all live in a comfortable Brooklyn brownstone. I hate to be trite, but he is ripe for a mid-life crisis. 

Noah is a college professor and has had his first novel published. The book was a critical, but not a financial success. As the story begins, Noah and his family have gone to Montauk where Helen’s father and mother live. Her father is a successful author of bestsellers. The family plans to stay in Montauk for the summer while Noah finishes his second book.  

Alison Lockhart is young woman—late twenties—who has lived her whole life in Montauk. She works as a waitress and has a lost waif-like quality. She is married to Cole Jackson, a local man, but they mostly lead separate lives. We discover that her young son has recently died, but we don’t learn how he died until nearly the end of the season. This is the crisis in her life that sets her into upheaval. 

As I said, the story slowly unfolds and as it unfolds, it slowly expands to include the stories of the families of the two lovers. Noah’s children and in-laws are brought into the story. Alison has a hippie mother named Athena and a grandmother in a nursing home.  She is also part of a sprawling family composed of her mother in-law, her brothers-in-law and their wives. The family owns a ranch n Montauk.  

The town of Montauk is almost like another character in the story. It’s natural beauty and its small-town life is woven into the story. 
 

CLICK HERE for more music from Fiona Apple

Usually, I skip the opening credits of TV shows, but not when I watch “The Affair.”  A haunting song, "Container" written and performed by Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Fiona Apple, opens each show. Each week I puzzle anew over its meaning. I think the first part of the song is about how each of our actions has an ever-expanding affect on others, like the ripples that occur when a stone is thrown into the pond. Then it changes, and the second half of the song is about how each life is just a part of the whole, like a wave that crests, and then falls back into the ocean.



Keep those two themes in mind when you watch the show.

 

(Here is a video of the opening credits.)

 

 

The Affair has been nominated for "Best Drama" by the Golden Globes. Dominic West, who plays Noah, has the Golden Globes nomination for "Best Actor."  I nominate him for "Sexiest Man Alive."  I'm just not sue if I am nominating Dominic West or Noah Solloway.

Learn more about the series on the homepage for The Affair



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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If you are a fan of the show, you might ant to order a copy of the DVD. Both season 1 and Season 2 are available.