Maher's brilliant recap on the '08 campaign

On Friday night, Bill Maher's final show before the '08 election was a very good one. For me, the highlight of the entire show (as is often the case) was his New Rules, which, as usual, was a good mix of political opinion and humor. However, his last Rule was a spot-on assessment of the entire '08 election.

From the stupid, deranged girl carving a "B" in her face to flag pins to all of the lies spread about Obama, it's been one, long, remarkable soap opera. We don't have much longer to wait until the end of this episode, and as much as I love the political season, I'm happy the next episode will be four years from now. And I'm even happier that Bush will be out of office in under 80 days. It can't get here soon enough.

Bill Maher is on a roll

Bill Maher may have been off all summer, but he's certainly making up for lost time... in a hurry.

Maher's teeing off on Sarah Palin is well deserved, and dare I say it less than two weeks after she was declared as McSame's running mate, already long overdue.

At the beginning of the clip above, we are treated to Palin's characterization of our troops as "on a mission from God," which I find despicable and highly distasteful. Isn't that sort of justification for violence something that most Americans chastise (Read: HATE) Middle Eastern Muslims for? Just a thought.

Even more amusing is Michael Steele, the GOPAC chair, defend Palin - that her experiences as a "small town mother" are good enough to be vice president of the United States. An indignant Maher asks, "Are you kidding me?!?" and that's exactly what I was thinking when I heard Steele say it.

Maher was probably over the top when he characterizes Palin as a "Jesus freak," but I do agree with him when I hear people in this country running for elective office talking about our troops being on a "mission from God," I find that wholly offensive. What mission exactly would that be? To go to Iraq, kill people who were no threat to us, and cause one of the biggest refugee problems in the world, currently at over four million people.

And by the way, Dan Savage is brilliant - I love him. And don't believe the spin for one second that Bush wasn't at the convention because of Hurricane Gustav - that crisis had largely passed by the time it was his turn to speak in St. Paul and he very easily could have attended, but McCain's people didn't want him there, making Bush the first sitting president in 40 years to not attend his party's convention.

One other thought - when I heard Steele say with a smile on his face while pumping his fists, "Drill baby, drill!" I let out a mongrel yelp - GOP and Big Oil are so in bed with each other, sometimes it's hard to distinguish between the two, and evidently Steele has little awareness of just how much of a jackass he looks like when he does and says things like that. .

Of course, no discussion of an episode of Real Time is ever complete without mentioning and including his infamous New Rules, and this one was particularly funny. One of my favorites from this week was his lampooning the plastic Fred Thompson for his speech at the convention. In it, Thompson criticized Obama for trying to make a difference with a teleprompter, and, as Maher notes, that's pretty stupid to do when you're reading a speech off of a teleprompter. I guess Thompson is about as familiar with irony as he is with running a presidential campaign that lasts longer than an episode of Law & Order.

And Maher's final New Rule ? It stands on its own - watch it! I can think of nothing to add other than how funny was it for Karl Rove to paint Barack Obama as an "elitist at a country club"? This leads me to believe that Rove has never actually been to a country club.

Bill Maher's New Rules - on elitism

Last night's New Rules on Real Time With Bill Maher was one of his best segments in recent memory. His joke about Pope Benedict was funny, but I loved his slamming the Blockbuster/Circuit City deal. Great! My boycott list will shrink by one - now two companies I hate and will never frequent are getting married. I'm not sending a gift.

But, as usual, his best New Rule was saved for last, and it was about McCain.

The highlights:

If you think the Democrats are going to take away your Bible, you're an idiot. If you think they are going to take away your gun, you're an armed idiot. And if you think they are going to take away your gun to give to a Mexican immigrant to kill your God, you're Bill O'Reilly.

[Snip]

...The truth is that religion, and guns, and hating gays and immigrants are crutches that people lean on. So are fast food, crystal meth and child beauty pageants, but we don't have time to tackle all of America's addictions in one night. So let's focus on the big thing. The people who claim to be the non-elitists, are the ones who shift tax burdens from the people who fire you, to you. [Emphasis Mine] John McCain voted to repeal the estate tax, voted against raising the minimum wage, has no health care plan, and is fine with keeping the working class in Iraq for 100 years, but he's a real man of the people. And the president went to Harvard and Yale and inherited your country from his dad, but he's not an elitist because he can neither read nor write. What does it take to label someone an elitist these days, anyway? They wear shoes? They don't buy their groceries at the gas station? Their dog has a name and their truck doesn't? You know who's bitter in America? I am! Because shit kickers voted twice for a retarded guy they wanted to have a beer with, and the rest of us had to suffer the consequences.

Television gold. Don't think a small part of me didn't say to myself (okay, a very small part of me) that the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast deserved the shoddy treatment the government gave them following Hurricane Katrina because Bush carried both of those states, twice. I bet they'll think twice this time, won't they? That's if McCain doesn't work like crazy to suppress the vote in poor areas, which the Republican Party was so tragically effective at in 2000 and 2004. We'll see.

Maher's New Rules

On Real Time With Bill Maher on Friday night, Maher had some pretty strong words for those who are getting pretty impatient and antsy that there isn't a presumptive Democratic Party nominee for president.

And finally, new rule: If voting can destroy the Democratic Party, then the party isn't very democratic. Democrats need to stop freaking out about how this long primary battle between two popular candidates needs to be "settled yesterday! Because the candidates are bloodying each other! They're causing irreparable harm! Mommy and daddy are fighting!" Hey, you people need to reach into your teenager's knapsack and pull out a Paxil or Prozac and chill out.

Democrats, your task is not just to choose between this pair, it's to grow a pair. Now, I know the idea of a very close race brings up some pretty bad memories for Democrats, but these are Democratic primaries. There are no Republicans in this race, so there is nobody organized enough to actually steal the election. What is so terrible about a long, drawn out contest? A season of American Idol is, what, 87 weeks? That's a lot of time just to pick out a cruise ship entertainer. This is the presidency we're talking about. I understand that a lot of Democrats feel passionately about their candidate, and that's great. But then their passion gets the best of them and they go on Websites like DailyKos, and post stuff like the Obama supporter who wrote, "I will vote for Hillary, but then I will leave the country." Yes, because who could live in a nation that elects the person that you just voted for?

And that is what is so great about the Internet. It enables pompous blowhards to connect with other pompous blowhards in a vast circle jerk of pomposity. But that doesn't mean I'm throwing my hat in for Hillary. For one thing, she would say I was shooting at her. And I know she's going to have a tough time catching Obama, because he's black and she's not that fast. But this is America, we don't call the election before we know who the real winner is. That, after all, is the job of the Supreme Court.

Another good set by Maher, especially the crack about Coulter's, ahem, balls.

I have to respectfully disagree with Maher about "pompus blowhards" on the Internet. Hey pal, how are so-called "blowhards" on the Internet different from blowhards on TV? I'll remember that word the next time you take off on on of your "legalize marijuana" or "down with religion" rants. Just a thought, Bill, even though I love your work most of your work.

And yes, I guess I'm getting a little defensive, but sometimes, can't we just agree to disagree? I don't call Maher a blowhard when I disagree with him on something. His show is one of the few on TV anywhere where opposing views are generally debated in a reasoned and spirited yet respectful manner. He should know better.

Maher's New Rules, the coarse edition

Warning: This clip is for mature audiences and it not safe to play at work!

Bill Maher's New Rules last night were some of his funniest yet. He certainly took plenty of swipes at Hillary last night, from his humor piece on her Bosnia gaffe lie (see below) to his making fun of her not becoming president (with a beard), he made good sport of roughing her up last night. I'm sure it was mostly in good fun, and if, by some slim chance, she becomes the nominee, Maher will support her. As irritated as I am with the Clintons and their borderline despicable behavior (more on that in a bit in a separate post), I too will support her if she gets the nod to go up against McCain.

Anyway, enjoy, but again, be careful at work and who you play this one around - it's probably one of his rawest version yet. The upside: this version of New Rules would not have been nearly as funny on regular, network TV.

New Rules: McSame scares Maher (Me too)

Last night, Bill Maher's New Rules on his show, Real Time With Bill Maher, ended with some pretty poignant points about John McCain. Maher contends that McCain's supposed strength, foreign policy, is his weakness. Considering McCain's multiple gaffes this week in Iraq and Israel, I don't know how anyone could argue otherwise. Some in the media really have dismissed it as a "senior moment." Well, considering the firepower he would have at his disposal were he to become president, that sure is comforting.

This really was an edition of New Rules for the ages. Just in case the video gets taken down for some reason or is no longer available in the future, here's what Maher had to say about McSame:

New Rule: Old soldiers never die, they get young soldiers killed. This week John McCain said for the third time in two days, that Iran, a Shi’ite stronghold was training Al-Qaeda, a militant Sunni organization. That the Hatfields of the Muslim world would be working with the McCoys is so not true even Dick Cheney hasn't said it. Now the press, which loves McCain because he feeds them BBQ, dismissed this as just one of those senior moments. Not to worry, he's only going to have his finger on the nuclear trigger. But it's not just a 'gaffe,' it's what McCain really thinks. And therein lies the paradox of this campaign: McCain's strength is really his weakness. He's a warrior who's dumb about war. Whoever read The Art of War, chapter three of The Art of War says, "Know thy enemy." And John McCain plainly doesn't. He thinks the solution is our presence in the Middle East. No, the problem is our presence in the Middle East. [Emphasis Mine.]

That's why I don't care if John McCain is better than Bush on global warming or torture or campaign finance, because he's exactly the same as Bush on the war. They both don't get the same thing. As long as we're setting up shop in the heart of the Arab world, we're not keeping America safer. Bin Laden goes ballistic over cartoons in Danish newspapers, and Goober and Grandpa want to put up a Hooters in Fallujah. They don't "hate us for our freedom," they hate us for our fiefdom. [Emphasis Mine] Winning the War on Terror comes down to this: what will make us safer from pissed off Arab teenagers who are willing to die? There are a number of good answers to that question, but occupying their land for the next 100 years is not one of them.

Some people look at McCain and see a tough guy who is going to protect us from the "Islamofascists." I look at him and see a walking Tom Clancy action figure who is going to get us all killed. [Emphasis Mine] And yet a new poll shows that a majority of Americans believe John McCain is the candidate best qualified to answer when that red phone rings at 3 a.m., because he'd be up anyway, trying to pee. Yes, 55 percent of Americans think it's McCain who should answer that phone, because they know John McCain is a warrior. He will not waver or hesitate. He will answer that phone and give the order that sends men to die and it will turn out to be a recording asking him if he's happy with his mortgage.

I hear Maher loud and clear, but I'm not at all confident that the rest of America does. But, Obama & Hillary need to continue to hammer away at McCain's views on the war, including his getting wrong so many facts and assumptions about Iraq and the War on Terrorism. Soundbites as usual aren't going to get it done in '08.

By the way, Maher is right about Diet Chocolate Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper. As much as I love the Diet Dr. Pepper flavors, this one doesn't cut it. As I've written before, it tastes like the world's first dessert soda. It's something I want to drink about once a month or so. Just my 2¢.