Archive for March, 2009

One of my favorite television episodes was from NewsRadio called “Super Karate Monkey Death Car“. It was centered around the boss of the radio station, Jimmy James, having a book he wrote that was not successful translated into Japanese where it was a huge success. He figured that he could capitalize on this by having it translated back into English and reprinted to be sold to the American public again. He made his first appearance on the new book tour without having been familiar with the new text. From that came one of those moments in my life where I honestly found it difficult to breathe because of laughter.

What I’ve come to discover is that this can be found in the real world as well — this dystopian thinking that by reverse-translation something new and wonderful can be found. Unfortunately most folks haven’t realized that it’s only true application is comedy. Case in point: A link to “Early Promo Stills” or a live-action adaptation of the highly popular video game Left 4 Dead.

For those who aren’t familiar, the game is based entirely on the stereotypes of the typical zombie movie, all the way down to the dichotomy of the cast of characters, complete with compulsory black male in a business suit and tough woman under extenuating circumstances. It’s what makes the game so popular apart from what I’ve heard described as fantastic gameplay.

So to think that anyone could be seriously considering making a video game that is based on all zombie movies into a new zombie movie is nothing short of hilariously inept to me. What makes it funnier is that people will spend money to see it.

If you caught Countdown last night you would’ve seen a piece that Olbermann quickly threw together regarding a post over at RedState which, in a nutshell, accuses every notable left-winger in the civilized world of being a part of an online conspiracy. Ironically, Erick Erickson titled his post — without a hint of irony — “A Peek at the Left Wing Echo Chamber“. One wonders if his keyboard is one of the silent ones lest it, too, would echo in the rather large chambers of RedState. Though I doubt it would drown out the din of decidedly right-wing commentary.

Now I’m not suggesting that RedState employs tactics which only allow republican/conservative comments to be posted there. But it is called RedState. That suggests a decidedly ideological cast of users and I don’t think they’re liberals. But it’s probably true that RedState has their share of trolls and there’s a good chance that a few moderate liberals attempt to make rational points there.

But it’s a conservative echo chamber. Pot calling Kettle — come in Kettle…

Granted, it’s not a perfect chamber, but it’s one that is open for all comers who baste in their own ideology. That’s fine. What Erickson is suggesting is something a bit more refined, and apparently much more heinous. His sources are apparently making him aware of a listserve which is available exclusively to invited parties — all of them died-in-the-wool, true blue Democrats — to conspire to skew the news towards liberal bias. If all of this is true, and there’s considerable evidence that it isn’t, I’m left with one nagging question: Why do you give a shit?

There is no question that conservatives have a home in cable news: Fox News. No one even tries to deny this anymore because it’s so laughably obvious. Fox News regularly beats all other news networks soundly in the ratings. It would seem to me that your propaganda is making it out without a problem. So, again, why exact does it bother you? Are you afraid of someone presenting an opinion that is different from your own? Or are you afraid that the very same tactics utilized by various Fox News personalities wherein you mix news and opinion to a thick mud and apply liberally to a braindead audience will be used by new ratings successes that make no effort to hide their own true liberal biases?

Quite frankly I could care less if Newt Gingrich, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh and Erick Erickson created “a secret email listserve where right-wing bloggers, policy guys, and journalists collaborate online to form news stories that inevitably skew to the right”. Because I know how tiresome it is to have discussions with like-minded people and have to constantly filter out the occasional remark from some fucknut who thinks his knee-jerk response to a statement I make is so devastatingly witty so as to change the minds of all involved.

But from all who actually know anything about this listserve, IE: not Erickson, that isn’t the case. All of the named co-conspirators who’ve no reason to hide their involvement have denied their involvement. Methinks Erickson could’ve wasted his time a bit more usefully.

It’s actually an example of typical communal behavior. I call it the “Taboo Reflex”. As any parent knows, if there’s a place you don’t want your kids to go, it’s the first place they want access to. You could have a six foot by six foot piece of desert in the middle of nowhere that no one would give two shits about…until you said they couldn’t be there. Then the whole world wants to know why and will do anything to get there to see what you could possibly be hiding. Tell someone that a book is good because of its content and prose and you won’t get many readers — tell them it’ll twist their thoughts to the point of killing their own family and they’ll flock to read it. This is pretty much the same thing only it’s the internet so it seems much more sinister.

But hey, I guess by defending it I’ll be added to the list of co-conspirators, too.

After going through the last week trading barbs on various programs, including an inexplicable appearance by Jim Cramer on Martha Stewart’s program, Jon finally squared off against Cramer on his show and let him have it with both barrels. By all accounts, Jon totally embarrassed Cramer. To the point where his “Post-Daily Show Exclusive Interview” with Joe Scarborough was delayed because he did not bother to show up.

My hope is that Scarborough and the rest of the righties out there who saw fit to defend Cramer watch this interview and realize that Stewart is someone that cannot be written off simply as a comedian, that his opinions, no matter how they are presented, have considerable thought put into them. Of course Scarborough has a rather spotty history of admitting his own failings, and his cast today made not one mention of Cramer’s televised disembowelment this morning, so I’m not getting my hopes up.

Watch and enjoy.

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[Edit: Removed remote links as they're causing problems for some users.]

Sean Hannity made what can only be described as the worst possible decision by allowing Victoria Jackson to be part of his program the other night. I say this because I wouldn’t let this person speak for my choice in cat litter, let alone my political philosophy.

Don’t believe me? Watch this video and try not to be embarrassed. It is so outlandish that is comes across as satire.

When a new media figure takes the scene, there is always a period of time where he or she has to win over the audience that a particular outlet is presenting them. For example, Craig Ferguson has definitely carved out a niche for himself in the late night shows and it seems that with the time given to him, his personality is much more relaxed than it was during those first few months when he seemed awkward an unable to get comfortable with his audience. One need look no further than Jimmy Fallon’s new late night show to see what I could be alluding to. (For the record: I don’t think he’s funny but wish him well in a very crowded market that, quite frankly, doesn’t really need him — but I do sincerely wish him the best.)

When I first heard Glenn Beck speak it was near the debut of his show on Headline News in May 2006 and he said something to the effect that he was “not a Democrat or a Republican, but the voice of the everyman”. I recognized that immediately as an O’Reilly-esque comment and concluded, rather correctly, that his program was dedicated to conservatism that didn’t call itself conservatism. In other words, Headline News was trying to find their own O’Reilly to maybe snatch some of his rating away. And over time his politics became more and more clear to me as I found out he was everything that the GOP was touting as core American principles: Deny global warming exists, fight numerous strawmen over the Second Amendment, Pro-Lifer, Pro-Iraq War cheerleader, etc.

Rather than allow this little bird to pick at their dominance of all conservative media, Fox News signed Glenn Beck to their own network and Headline News immediately scrapped his show on their network, which suggests, to me at least, that he screwed them. Regardless, his new Glenn Beck program was added to Fox News’ echo chamber of conservatism and off he went to collect the meager audience he had won in all of five months with Headline News. And it was about then that he seemed to finally get comfortable with that audience.

Now I was familiar with his occasional comments on his radio show and they never really reached escape velocity of the average conservative bullshit so I never really gave him all that much attention. That’s when the weird was loosed upon the world.

Colbert first brought it to my attention and he’s been keeping up with the latest and greatest moments of Beck ever since. It started with Beck’s goofy split screen program where one side of the screen was the normal talking head, and the other was a closeup of his eyes. He did this without apparent explanation. When his viewers asked why, as if they could avoid doing so, he answered more or less that “no one looks in anyone’s eyes anymore” and that it was his way of proving that he was telling the truth. If you’re wondering what that sound is, it was your bullshit meter exploding. Happened to me too.

Beck was seen a while later on Fox & Friends with Doochey and the Two Morons and let fly his wild conspiracy nut persona on an already brain-softened viewership. (No other explanation can be offered why anyone would watch that show seriously.) During his delivery he looked very much like a Bond Villain, calming explaining what would happen if “double-oh-forty-four” was allowed to continue to be president.

Colbert then put together another segment based upon a new feature of Beck’s program where he invites ideologues to his show and proceeds to craft doomsday scenarios out of thin air and asks his guests to validate their chances of actually happening and what, oh dear god please tell us, what shall the US do about it?

Now I know it sounds like I’m making this up, but I’m not. I’m actually convinced that Glenn Beck is just another nutjob who used to call in to Art Bell’s Coast to Coast program under an assumed name. I don’t think he could easily be discounted as the true identity of John Titor. I simply cannot understand how anyone can take him seriously, let alone give him a network news slot under the auspices of having a valid point to make.

But that’s Fox News for you — never afraid to go the distance with the nuttiest of the squirrel shit.