Friday night, Bill Maher hosted two live events back to back, a taping of Real Time with Bill Maher, then drove cross town (with live commentary by Micheal Moore and Keith Olbermann) even running 3 blocks for a funny comedy bit, then walked right into hosting, winded as hell, an hour long comedy special live, and you know what? He killed it! The crowd was literally dead when he…
A Real Time with Conservatives is Real Dull
While the Real Time was filled with Washington cronies like Haley Barber, John Huntsman and Nancy Pelosi along with token journalist host Andrea Mitchell (who is no right winger but no friend of the Left), Bill defended the Left almost single handed (Pelosi was the interview). Until the second interview which featured comedy legend Jerry Seinfeld, all we heard was Obama is not a leader this and that with Bill shutting it down as normal. He got some good snubs in and I have to say that when Barber tried to be funny, you could really see what a resentful small minded man he is and it didn’t count for much..
Oh but it was joy watching Bill Maher and special guest Jerry Seinfeld call Haley Barber Boss Hogg (from the Dukes of Hazard) , he had to sit there and take it and pretend to laugh, knowing that this radical conservative who is a major opponent against women’s rights, civil rights, gay rights, and rights to the common man in general, became the symbol of Mississippi Southern idiocy.
That was the first act of a grand statement. With the Seinfeld interview being a conversation among comedians with an, at times, arrogant Seinfeld getting overly involved in the New Rules. I love Jerry, but tone down the arrogance a few notches. The gloating aura of self-satisfaction could be better served with a little curbing of his enthusiasm, pun intended.
A congressman in Minnesota, beautiful country, and he did a piss-poor photoshop of a stock photo background?
The Biggest Loser
It should be noted as well that the winner of Maher’s overturn a district bit was Robert Kline. There were bigger prized pigs at the show to go after, like Blake Farenthold and Louie Gohmert, but they are so Gerrymandered into their districts, there is no better term to use here then: fuhgettaboutit!
Honorable Mention: Jake the Snake Farranthold, for Biggest Douche-bag!
Kline’s webpage read’s more like a Yelp ad. He brags about his service but never saw any campaigns or else he would brag about that too. He also brags about limiting the scope of government. In other words, he is a tool of the corporations.
As Bill Maher points out as well, he is a tool of the private corporate university system (who pay him handsomely), which sees a near 90% failure rate (non-grads) which puts them in line with most pyramid schemes and other assorted business get-rich-quick-schemes. He is also a tool of the right, voting relentlessly for big business, I mean liberty and freedom and is an enemy of women’s rights, especially on abortion and voted against the Fair Pay Act (which passed). He is one of the guys who is keeping Guantanamo Bay Prison open, very pro-NSA and government privacy encroachment (he voted for the PATRIOT Act) and is even against the regulation of Tobacco.
The more I researched his record, the more I became disgusted. I went to his website and wrote this:
I love that your career of being a lackey for big business will soon be at an end.
Thanks to Citizen’s United, I am donating all that I can to every cause against you.
You are below human waste and exactly why Congress is failing.
Good luck in your career Congressmen, while it lasts!
Well I have very little money to give, but I thought is was effective all the same.
The Real Show
Then it was off to the next act for Bill Maher. He pulled off a surprisingly entertaining bit with humor driven commentators Micheal Moore and Keith Olbermann. Both are humorists, not comedy, and it was refreshing that they managed to pull off a live bit that was risky. It included a lot of toe stepping, but seemed to be funny to the crowd and I enjoyed Micheal Moore’s cracks on Bush myself.
They had this whole bit worked out, that included a whole routine of Bill Maher traveling through Washington with inside jokes to the locals but filled with Moore and Olbermann’s cracks at Washington. Bill exits the vehicle in Presidential tradition and runs 3 blocks to the studio.
He is briefly pancaked and offered a water, which he refuses, and walks right on stage, obviously winded but smooth. Bill is no spring chicken, so it was no surprise that he was tired, he isn’t Superman. Yet to go on and be funny was impressive. He shrugged it off and went right to the laughs, which he got, but he obviously got funnier as he cooled off and the routine went on.
I have walked into business meetings after biking a couple miles and I was not as sharp, but to put on a show? Amazing! I think he straddled that line of risk/reward. If it failed, they’d call him a mad idiot, but it worked, so he is a genius!
Added to the mix were hecklers. I couldn’t make out their annoying jokes but Bill shuts them down at least 5 times and allowing one in, before declaring that his comedy special had become a Tea Party rally. That ended the heckles because they must have been out of love. They sounded more like drunk people who really really really really love Bill Moore!
The Truth
In the meantime, Maher rips Washington to shreds. I mean, I’d feel sorry for them if he wasn’t utterly telling the truth! He attacks the idiots on the angry Right who can’t remember the date of American Independence, fight for the agenda of billionaires and act as dumb as dirt.
I don’t want to spoil his best jokes because this is one of the best comedy bits I have witnessed and I have watched the masters like Pryor, Murphy, Carlin, Rock, Cosby, Carson, Kinison, Hicks, and so many more. It is a near obsession of mine to see the best in stand-up. I don’t want to ruin it for you also, your fancy may be tickled differently, but to me, this is legend.
However I will spoil one bit because I think you should hear it. He essentially gets right into the skull of the Republican mentality. With young people not getting married and gays getting married, with young people against religion while the Republican agenda is growing ever more dictated by the parts of the Bible they like (conveniently ignoring most of the parts they don’t, like, uhm, Jesus and the Gospels). With all of the legal pot and the growing anger at our lousy for-profit prisons and healthcare and education. With an insurgent Latino population (having most of the kids) and even the Cubanos don’t like Republicans anymore because Castro was 50 fu**ing years ago! To top it all off a black man sits in the Oval Office chair and he not only beat sitcom dad Mitt Romney, he crushed him.
Bill describes these things and says it’s like a 1960s dorm room, that they were never invited to.
So true.
To them this is some kind of game. Well let me be the Alex Trebek in a game of Jeopardy, oh wait, let me talk right wing level, let me be the Pat Sajasck to there Wheel of Koch Brother’s Fortune.
You lose. The game is over, you lost 8 years ago, change your strategy because I honestly don’t think they can even take the Senate and gambling experts like Nate Silver have been trumpeting their overblown chances for almost a year! These guys are week and a new poll shows that over 72% of the country “Strongly Disapprove” of the Republican Party!
What more do you need folks?
Bill Maher is right and Republicnas are hated in this country. You can’t just blame this on the Democrats, We the People are the Democracy. So if you don’t vote, you don’t count!
