Real Time with Bill Maher #336 11/14/14 "Revelations"

by Catherine Giordano

Obama is in Ninja mode.

It was a night of revelations on Real Time with Bill Maher, episode 336, which aired on 11/14/14 on HBO. I’ll reveal what I heard and learned from Bill Maher and his guests in this recap and review.

Obama as ninja

Maher began his opening monolog by revealing that “Obama went all ninja on them” and “He was like Pacino at the end of Scarface. He compared Obama to the idealist President Bartlett on the defunct TV series The West Wing. (I always wished we could have a real-life president like President Bartlett.  

Here is what Obama did that earned Maher’s (and my) respect.  

• He went to China and got a carbon-capping deal that can help reduce global warming.
• He came out strongly for net neutrality.
• Obama announced that he is going to use executive action on immigration. 

Obama will allow illegal immigrants who have close relatives who are citizens—this usually means the parents of children who are citizens because they were born here—to obtain green cards and will not deport them. This is a family-values policy because it keeps families together.

Republicans are going ballistic at the mere thought of this action. They are threatening to shut down the government and to stat impeachment proceedings in retaliation. Ninja Obama is fearless. He has nothing to lose and he has finally realized that Republicans will never cooperate with him on anything.  It’s a shame that it took the loss of majority control in the Senate for him to let his inner ninja out.

Maher also joked about “fake outrage.” The President was chewing gum.  And walking at the same time. Maher quipped, “It’s a blatant attempt to show up Bush.”
 

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The interview with Rand Paul

Maher began the interview with Rand Paul by showing the cover of the Time magazine that featured Paul with the headline “The most Interesting Man in the World”. The introduction set the tone for the whole interview. Maher said he was open to voting for Paul if he ran for president.  (Maher began his political career as a libertarian.  He has since matured into a liberal, but he still sometimes has a weakness for libertarians.)

Rand acquitted himself well in the interview.  He said, “It’s a low bar” about his title as “most interesting man in the world.” 

 

Rand revealed his progressive side to us. He came out in favor of restoring voting rights to felons. There are 200 million people who can’t vote because they are felons.  He is also in favor of prison reform.  H objects to prisons as a for-profit business.  He also objects to the expense of keeping people in prison when it does not add to the public safety.

If Maher was going for a gotcha moment with a question on climate change, he didn’t get it.  Rand said he favored a “balanced solution.”  He said we should pursue renewable energy, but not shut down one source of energy [coal]. Darn. Why aren’t Democrats saying that? Of course, we can’t shut down the coal industry overnight; it has to be phased out while coal-miners are trained for new jobs in renewable energy.  I can’t imagine there are many coal miners who wouldn’t jump at the chance to earn a comparable wage without having to do the dirty and dangerous job of coal mining.

Rand is for ending the drug war and ending the shooting war in Iraq and the Mideast. He pointed out that every time we topple a secular dictator, things get worse.  

If he keeps talking like this, I might be open to voting for him. However, I’m hoping the Democratic candidate will take the same stands on these issues because Paul is wrong about a lot of other things. Also with common sense rational views like this, I doubt he can win the Republican nomination.   But you gotta give Paul credit--he tailored his message to his audience.  Let’s see what he says when he is talking to Republicans in the primary debates.

 

The mid-term elections

Maher bemoaned the fact that Obama waited until after the elections to reveal the good news.  If he had done if before the elections, he might have motivated some more people to vote.



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Panelist Margaret Hoover, a Republican political commentator and author of American Individualism: How a New Generation of Conservatives Can Save the Republican Party was magnanimous. She said “The map was just not in your favor this year” because the majority of the elections were in red states. 



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Panelist Andrew Sullivan is Blogger- in-Chief at The Dish and author of six books.  (His most recent book is Love Undetectable: Notes on Friendship, Sex, and Survival.) He said, “Show that you believe in something. No one wants to vote for the guy mumbling and shuffling away.”



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Panelist Jeremy Scahill, an investigative journalist and author of two books. (Blackwater and his new book Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield, said, “It is like an acting troop that comes out for the encore, but they never did the show.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Immigration

Hoover said that the Republicans are “quietly back-channeling” that they are will to move on this.  Maher retorted with disbelief, “VERY quietly.”  Sullivan was also skeptical. He said, “When have they ever won out over the crazies.”


The mid-East and ISIS

Maher said it would take 30,000 ground troops to defeat ISIS. Scahill said this war was a continuation of the war against Bushes troops and that the Bathists had joined a coalition with the Muslim radicals. Sullivan said we need a president to say “This is not our problem.” Maher agreed that we should just let them fight it out among themselves.  

Religion

Maher said that there are power struggles in the Vatican as Pope Frank (as Maher calls Pope Francis) tries to move the church into the new age.  He canned Cardinal Raymond Burke, a very conservative cardinal. (Actually, you can't fire a cardinal. The Pope just transferred him to some minor post.)

Pope Frank has to serve in the unusual circum stance of having another living Pope, the retired Pope Benedict. Maher said Pope Benedict was the Dick Cheney of the Catholic Church. Maher then launched into the mid-show comedy segment where he showed a mock war-of-words on twitter between the two popes. 

The conversation about religion continued when the mid-show guest, Martin Short—comedian, actor, and author-- joined the panel. Maher said the he and Short and Sullivan were all raised Catholic and the only one stuck with it.  “The gay one! “(Sullivan.)

Sullivan said, “We can leave room for doubt.  If you have never doubted, you have never really believed.”

Scahill said Pope Frank is trying to push for economic change.  Hoover said he is trying to go back to “the simplicity of Christ.”  Maher pointed out that after he does these things, he comes out for exorcism. “He’s a good politician, throwing a little something to the base.”

Maher brought up the Mormon religion. The Mormon Church has been trying to modernize by being honest about the history of the church.  They are admitting that Joseph Smith, who founded the religion in the 1930’s had 30 to 40 wives, one of whom was a 14 year-old girl and others who were already married. Maher called it “a sex-cult.”  Maher said, “They can’t hide the facts because this history is so recent.”    

Sullivan then tried to claim that the stories in the Bible wee history true.  There was a virgin birth and Christ did come back from the dead—it can’t be empirically disproved.  Maher said that none of the Bible stories about Christ were written until 40 years after his death.  “It is like no one noticed the Beatles until 2010.” 

Martin tried to end the discussion by saying that the truth of religion is not important: “Who cares if it gives you strength.”   

Maher had one more point to make.  He said that the Mormons have Revelators who get messages from God and that even the Mormon missionaries will no longer go to Syria and Iraq. 

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Martin Short

The mid-show guest was Martin Short, an actor, comedian, and author of several books. Maher discussed Martin Short’s new book I Must Say: My Life As a Humble Comedy Legend.  Maher praised Short for his beautifully written memoir and for his honesty in talking about the losses in his life the death of his brother, his parents, and his wife of 36 years. In the book Short reveals a lot of personal details about his life and career including the fact that Gilda Radner was his first real love.

New Rules: The Importance of Voting

Maher was on fire about people not voting. He started with the little stickers that say “I voted” that are given to people after they vote. Why should people get a sticker just for doing what they are supposed to do? It is like getting a sticker for flushing the toilet.  Instead, there should be stickers for non-voters that say “I couldn’t be bothered.”


He castigated people like comedian Russell Brand who made a statement saying don’t vote because the system is broken. (It got broken because people didn’t vote.)  Politicians are all the same? Tell that to the 700,000 people in Florida who would have gotten health insurance if the Democrat had been elected governor. Obama didn’t deliver? Maybe you missed it because it wasn’t on TMZ.

 

President Mitt McCain

Maher asked us to imagine life if we had elected President Mitt McCain instead of Obama. (He morphed pictures of the two into one. It was very funny.)  Maher revealed what would have happened.

• There was no stimulus and the auto industry was allowed to die.  We are in the sixth year of Great Depression II.
• Paula Dean and Joe the Plumber is on the Supreme Court.
• The Attorney General is Dick Cheney’s head.
• The nearest abortion clinic is in London.
• There is no renewable energy but one trillion dollars was spent on an electrified fence on the Mexican border to keep out the one Mexican who still wants to get it.
• Homeland Security chairman Ted Cruz deported all 12 million Mexicans and now we have no fruit.

“No fruit, no jobs, your girl friend is having a baby you don’t want, no health insurance and your tap water is on fire!  But you didn’t dirty your hands in the gutter of politics.” I think the bit should have ended with this line. 

The last line seemed a little weak to me. Maher ended with, “If your hands are not dirty, it is not because you are pure. It is because you are not helping.” The writers should have battered that one around a little more. 

Yu cn read more about this and see the video clip at Bill Maher: President Mitt McCain

 

Martin Short

Bill Maher’s Guests: November 14, 2014
 

Rand Paul:  Senator (R, KY), and author (with Ron Paul) of Government Bullies: How Everyday Americans are Being Harassed, Abused, and Imprisoned by the Fed  

Martin Short:  Actor, comedian, and author of several books. His most recent book is I Must Say: My Life As a Humble Comedy Legend

 

Margaret Hoover: Political commentator and author of American Individualism: How a New Generation of Conservatives Can Save the Republican Party

 Andrew Sullivan: Blogger-in-Chief at The Dish, blog and author of six books.  His most recent book is Love Undetectable: Notes on Friendship, Sex, and Survival

Jeremy Scahill: Journalist and author of two books.  His most recent book is Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield 

Real Time with Bill Maher #307 Bon Bons Mots

Bon Bons Mots

by Catherine Giordano

Bill Maher and Bill Nye

Real Time with Bill Maher, #307, aired on Valentine’s Day, February 14, 2014.  The hour breezed by.

It was a bit of a love-fest—the guests did not disagree with each other very much, and when they did everyone remained calm. Here's my review, recap, and commentary on the show.

In “New Rules,” Maher did a bit called “Zero Dark Chocolate.”  He began by saying “Politicians are like a box of chocolates. The Democrats are too often soft and gooey and the Republicans are mostly nuts.” I’ll take my cues from this and deliver up some Valentine’s Day bon-bons, a Whitman’s Sampler of the bons-mots served up on the show.

In the opening monologue, Bill Maher said that 58 million pounds of chocolate will be consumed on Valentine’s Day. Then he added “And one small diet Coke.”

In the monologue, Maher talked about Ted Cruz. With a nod to the blizzards occurring all over the country, Maher pointed out that both Ted Cruz and snow are white, but the snow eventually goes away.

The interview was with Bill Nye (The Science Guy), the author of numerous books that explain science to the layman, including Consider the Following.  Nye tried to explain how global warming leads to climate change which leads to weather. Hot air rising causes changes in the atmosphere—that’s why you have been hearing about the polar vortex. 

Nye also talked about his recent debate with Ken Ham, the creationist, about evolution.  Nye said that it is OK to say that we don’t know the answer to everything.  But whenever he did, Ham replied, “There’s a book.”  Nye said he had to resist the urge to slap his hand to his forehead in a gesture of disgust so many times during that debate. 

The panel included Dylan Ratigan, a former host of MSNBC, author of Greedy Bastards, and currently a sustainability entrepreneur; Jeremy Scahill, author of the best-selling book, Blackwater and writer/producer of the new documentary, Dirty Wars; and Eric Klinenberg, a sociologist and author of the book, Going Solo: The Extraordinary Rise and Surprising Appeal of Living Alone.  (This sounds like a book I want to read, but it was not discussed on the show.)

The panelists were not happy about the pending merger of Comcast and Time Warner/Brighthouse.  It will reduce competition.  Klinenberg pointed out that cable fees keep going up, forcing people of modest means to cut themselves off from the national conversation. Scahill described Fox News as the television station that thinks Obama is “the black Marxist Manchurian candidate who wants to resurrect Chairman Mao.”

On the subject of the nation’s crumbling infra-structure, Maher said that the real bridge scandal is that the George Washington Bridge is 80 years old and needs $1 billon in repairs.  Rattigan said that most of our infrastructure, like our power-grid, is pre-Eisenhower.  Obama recognizing that there is a lot of work that needs to be done and a lot of people looking for work and proposed a jobs bill that would address these two problems.  Of course, the Republicans blocked it. Klinenberg said “the Republican idea of infra-structure is a fence on the border.”

During the discussion about drone strikes against suspected terrorists, we got some disagreement among the panelists. This is a difficult one—Bill Maher said that if someone is plotting terrorist acts against America, even if he/she is a citizen, we can’t just do nothing.  Scahill, had a different point of view and thought the drone attacks were unlawful.  Where are the safeguards to protect people who may be innocent?  Where do you draw the line and who gets to draw that line?

Did you know that February 15, 2014 is “National Youth Enrollment Day” for the Affordable Care Act.  Bill had some spoof posters featuring celebrities for the Day. Here’s a few of them:

Miley Cyrus:        There is a 1 in 3 chance you are currently touching something I licked.

Sarah Palin:        Traumatic brain injury can strike anyone.          

Bob Costas:        When Putin poisons you contact lenses, will you be covered?

George Zimmerman: I still walk the streets. Any questions?

 The mid-show guest was Mayim Bailak. She has a PhD in neuroscience and is an actress. She plays Amy on The Big Bang Theory TV series.  She is also a vegan, and the author of a cookbook Mayim’s Vegan Table.   Cancer rates are increasing and there must be prevention and not just treatment. We can pay for organic food or we can pay for healthcare.  What role should the government play in regulating the food we eat.

Ratigan spoke about cities of the future being “green” cities. Louisiana is on the forefront of this movement. Texas, because of the drought they are experiencing is interested.

It seems that Philip Seymour Hoffman, the actor who recently died, kept a diary. Some of his diary entries have been published.  Klinenberg said “There is a feeding frenzy on the internet; we no longer have a news cycle, we have a news cyclone.”

Michael Sam, the football player, has come out publically as gay.  Maher said that the rednecks now know that they have been following and cheering for a gay man, “just like they do at the mega-church every Sunday morning.”

In NewRules, Bill spoke about how we like our politicians to be “new.”  If you are new on the political scene, people don’t know your negatives yet.  He said, “Chris Christie should have run in 2012 when he still had that new candidate smell… Now he is just 350 pounds of toast.”

Don’t forget the “Flip a District” campaign.  Send in your nomination for the congress person from a gerrymandered district who you think most needs to be retired. The Bill Maher show will do everything possible to help flip the district.

Noticed the show did not end with the “True Confessions” segment where the guests hold up signs making phony, but funny, personal confessions.  I wonder if it has been dropped?

So that’s the bon-bons, and the bons mots and now it is time for the bye-byes.

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HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” #281 “Do We Have Time for the Truth?"

by Catherine Giordano

The best line on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher”, episode 281, airing on May 5, 2013, came not during the show, but during the “Overtime” webcast.  Lawrence O’Donnell, host of “The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell” on MSNBC said “Do we have time for the truth?”  Bill tires to allow time for the truth, but it is difficult when he has two Republicans on the panel.

Bill’s monologue began with good news.  The Dow hit 15,000 for the first time ever and unemployment is the lowest it has been in four years. But according to Republicans, Obama is wrecking the economy. Later in the show Mattie Duppler, from a group called “Americans for Tax Reform” managed to turn that good news against Obama saying it proves he was wrong about the sequester—it has not ruined the economy.  

Bill also used his monologue to opine on Republican nuttiness. He reported that a survey showed that 44%, nearly half!, of Republicans believe that armed rebellion against the government might be necessary in the next few years to protect our freedoms. Bill said, “I wish they’d start an armed rebellion because I want to see their faces when they walk out of The Waffle House and get smashed by a drone. Later on he talked about how Waco showed what happens when a well-armed group gets into a battle with the government. They are smashed. My opinion: These 44% are sick, sick, sick. Are there lives so drab that they have to entertain rebellion fantasies just to get through the day. The hatred and anger that they hold within themselves is what they should be worried about. If they would just stop listening to the rabid fear-mongers on Fox news, talk radio, and the internet, they might be able to relax and enjoy life.

And, of course, Bill had a pope joke. He said that the former pope, Pope Benedict, was back in the papal palace, “Or as I call it,” he said, “Club Ped.” Pow! Then Bill added that they keep a chart on the fridge so they know whose turn it is to be infallible. Pow! Pow!  

The interview was with Jeremy Scahill, national security correspondent for The Nation, with a new book “Dirty Wars” and a documentary, being released in June with the same name.  Bill Moyers has called Scahill a “one man truth squad.” Scahill slams us with the truth: No one knows why we are in Afghanistan anymore. Drones, assassinations, torture, night raids are making us more enemies than killing terrorists. He was especially damning when he told us about the killing or Anwar al-Awlaki’s 16 year old son, who had nothing to do with terrorism. There was a lot of controversy about the drone strike that killed Anwar al-Awlaki and one could argue both sides of that case, but killing a child because of who his parent is, is indefensible.

The third panelist Peter Hegseth, CEO of Concerned Veterans of America, at least made a little sense when he said that the sequester is making stupid cuts. O’Donnell, said that America wasn’t as stupid as the European countries who “went wild with austerity.” Their economies are sinking and ours is not.

Bill lampooned two Republican Congressmen in a Craziest Congressman segment. He skewered them with the truth. He lambasted Louie Gohmert of Texas for his ignorance and for his off-the-wall comments that Muslim terrorists are going to Mexico so the can sneak into the United States and that oil pipelines are good for nature because they make animals horny. 

But maybe Tennessee congressmen Scott DesJarlais takes the prize for craziest. His campaign slogan is “truth and faith” and he is strongly anti-abortion—except, it seems, for the fetuses that he conceives. He had numerous affairs with patients (he’s a doctor) and coworkers, pressured his co-worker to have an abortion and consented to his wife’s abortion, twice. Two abortions for his wife!. This is the “he’s-not-crazy-he’s-just-vile” moment of the week.  

Marc Maron was the special guest. He is a triple threat comic—he has a podcast, a TV show, and a book. He’s also insightful about current events.  He said that the media is calling the second bomber (I can’t spell that name) and his friends “kids.”  “They are adults, not kids.” We don’t call 19 year old black defendants kids. He also asked how many of the people who recognized the bombers called the FBI and how many just spoke to the news media.

New Rules was good this week. One of the New Rules was “Slime and Punishment.”  Speaking about the bombers, Bill said that the uncle had it right.  They are “losers.” We should rename the “War on Terror” as “The War on Losers.” The Boston bombers were too stupid to realize that there would be cameras at the Boston marathon. Bin Laden wasn’t living in some fantastical rigged-up cave, but a drab suburban home. The Times Square bomber, the shoe bomber, the underwear bomber, all failed. The Liberty 7 would-be terrorists were caught because they made a video of themselves shooting guns and shouting to Allah, and then brought it to Circuit City to be made into a DVD.

Bill concluded that bin Laden’s plan was not to kill us all but to scare us into over-reacting. The one thing they can blow up—it’s our balance sheet.”  And that’s the truth.

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