Monthly Archives: January 2016

William Saletan calls Ted Cruz "the most spectacular liar ever to run for president." And explains why he thinks that.

I have to finish a script about a lazy, lasagna-eating cat so I may be neglecting this page today. Before I leave you…

Eric Idle discusses how much money he's made as a member of Monty Python.

That link was recommended to me by my longtime pal, Joe Brancatelli — the man who knows more about the airline industry than anyone in it. Here's Joe with tips on air travel during the winter and how you might avoid sleeping in the terminal. And here's Joe telling you some problems you may encounter this year.

If you're a fan of Lewis Black, you're nuts to not check out his webcasts. After every live appearance he makes, he does a 20 minute (or so) segment answering questions from the audience, including the audience watching on the web. It's broadcast live when it happens — follow his Twitter feed to know when that is — and then a day or so later, it turns up for viewing on this page. They aren't up there forever but at any given time, the last six or seven of them are there to be watched.

The Golden Globe Awards are tonight. Awards of this kind are only meaningful in two, maybe three senses. Awards make people feel good even when they know deep down how arbitrary the selection process is and how the pick may represent the opinions of a very small group of somebodies. Secondly, awards boost careers. Your movie may sell more tickets and you may get more offers of work for better money. And then there's the "maybe" one, which is that you may have a great time at the ceremony, win or lose and it may be a fun show. The Golden Globes are of real dubious validity on the first point, some worth on the second and a lot on the third, especially when Ricky Gervais hosts. Here's an article about who gives them out and who votes and how the more you know about this, the less impressive these awards are.

I'm looking forward to Samantha Bee's new show, which debuts on TBS on Monday, February 8. This article makes a big deal about how it'll be — and I quote: "…the only late-night satire program currently hosted by a woman, and one of very few in the decades-long history of the genre to feature a female star."

That's all well and good but I'm looking forward to it because Samantha Bee is very clever and funny. She did some of the best field pieces on The Daily Show and if she can deliver that standard on Full Frontal With Samantha Bee, she should have a terrific show.

Somehow when this show was announced, a lot of folks seem to have gotten the idea that it was a nightly hour talk show like Conan O'Brien's. It's actually a once-a-week half-hour that sounds more like John Oliver's show, though with the host doing more remotes. I would imagine TBS will run each episode several times throughout the week and I hope viewers can find it. Conan has suffered somewhat from being on a channel where many people do not expect to see original programming.

The article suggests some bitterness about her not being considered for the host job on The Daily Show. (So did her body language on Jon Stewart's last episode.) Maybe it was just a matter of money but if not, I'm thinking Comedy Central made a mistake letting her and Jason Jones get away.

The Word of the Year has been announced. I don't really care what it is just so long as it isn't "meta."

Gee, I wonder what would happen if you stuck 10,000 sparklers in a pot and lit them all at the same time…

My pal Dana Gabbard suggested I post a link to this. It's a long Washington Post story about the various Republican candidates for president and how and why they got into the race…and how a few got out. Take a look.

Will Oremus thinks the taxi industry is doomed; that even if they can hurriedly reinvent their business to be more like Uber or Lyft, it's too late. I don't have any particular opinion on that but I do think that unless they are regulated out of existence, ride-sharing enterprises like Uber are here to stay.

I've been taking a lot of Ubers lately. My knee is almost to the point where I won't feel irresponsible getting behind the wheel of my car. Actually, I did get behind its wheel this week just to start it and discovered that either (a) my battery is dead or (b) my battery is dead and my alternator is on the fritz. The car wouldn't start but every light on the dashboard came on and flashed to a disco beat. I'm not going to deal with this until I'm ready to drive again because if it's just the battery and the Auto Club can jump it, I'm not ready to then drive around for a while to get it fully recharged. Or if I have it towed-in and repaired, I'm not ready to go pick it up and drive it home. But soon.

Anyway, I've had naught but good Uber experiences lately. Even had a driver who told me a list of his favorite comic books and included Groo the Wanderer among them. He said this after, in response to his query, I told him I wrote comics but before I'd told him which ones or he knew my last name. Guess who got a good rating.

But I would have given him one anyway because it was a fine ride in a nice car and I can't think of any way a taxicab could have topped it — except maybe to have better insurance if we got into a collision, which we didn't. They've all been like that lately. If I ran a cab company, I'd sure be worried.

Matt Taibbi writes about Ammon Bundy and his band of self-proclaimed patriot thugs. You may be surprised to find out that Matt thinks they're pretty pathetic and stupid.

A music video with Josh Groban, Lindsey Stirling and the Muppets…

Anne Pluta says that the trouble with Donald Trump voters is not that they are uninformed but that they are misinformed. Biggggg difference. Uninformed people just plain don't know. Misinformed voters think they do but they're wrong — and they're usually determined to never admit it. Relevant quote…

In 2000, James Kuklinski and other political scientists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign established an important distinction: American citizens with incorrect information can be divided into two groups, the misinformed and the uninformed. The difference between the two is stark. Uninformed citizens don't have any information at all, while those who are misinformed have information that conflicts with the best evidence and expert opinion. As Kuklinski and his colleagues established, in the U.S., the most misinformed citizens tend to be the most confident in their views and are also the strongest partisans. These folks fill the gaps in their knowledge base by using their existing belief systems. Once these inferences are stored into memory, they become "indistinguishable from hard data," Kuklinski and his colleagues found.

Furthermore, in 2010, political scientists Brendan Nyhan and Jason Reifler found that when misinformed citizens are told that their facts are wrong, they often cling to their opinions even more strongly with what is known as defensive processing, or the "backfire effect."

This is why I've given up having political discussions with certain friends and probably why some of them would say they've given up having them with me. Never mind that we can't agree on what should happen in this country. We can't agree what has happened. I say unemployment is down since Obama took office. One guy I know is certain it's way, way up and the stats I'm citing are just government lies. Those arguments never go anywhere. It's easier just not to have them.

Michael Grunwald thinks all the talk about America going to hell in one of them handbaskets is ridiculous; that while some things could be better, they're already pretty good and heading in the right direction. The economy is up, crime is down, etc. I generally agree.

The folks who opposed Obamacare from Day One are still running around insisting it's a disaster that's gotta go. Jonathan Chait says they're in denial; that it's working fine and what is a disaster are their efforts to destroy it. And after all these years of shouting "Repeal and replace," they still don't have an actual replacement plan…at least not one they'd like better.

We mentioned here at the end of November that Pat Harrington, Jr. — a fine comedian and human being — was in bad shape due to Alzheimer's. His wonderful life and career came to an end last night at 11:15 PM. He was 86.

He was Pat Harrington Junior because his father was a vaudeville star. Junior worked constantly as a comedian, comic actor, game show host and panelist, voice actor and occasionally even a dramatic performer. He first came to prominence as a member of Steve Allen's comic troupe along with Don Knotts, Louis Nye and others, and for his appearances on Jack Paar's show. Often, he assumed the character of Guido Panzini, an Italian golf pro. He was so convincing in the role that at one point, the immigration department checked, found no record of Panzini's entrance into this country and went looking for him.

Later generations knew Pat (Jr.) as Dwayne Schneider, the building superintendent on the situation comedy, One Day at a Time. It won him an Emmy, dozens of other roles and countless fans. Among his many voiceover jobs, he played the Inspector — the Clouseau-like character in the DePatie-Freleng cartoons — and supplied the Groucho-like voice of the stork in the Vlasic Pickle commercials.

Pat was widely (and probably unanimously) loved by other comedians and just about everyone he ever worked with. He was a genuinely nice, funny man with an endless supply of jokes, most delivered with expert timing and a wide range of flawless accents. He was also a very good audience for other funny people. Not all comics are.

He was a founding member of Yarmy's Army, a club for comedians and other funny people that somehow admitted me. It was a joy to see Pat at the meetings. He was one of those people who made you feel happy just because he was in the room. At the next meeting, I'm sure we will all tell stories about him but it won't begin to make up for his absence.

Fred Kaplan on that alleged Hydrogen Bomb test in North Korea. Fred says the problem isn't the bomb. It's the guy who claims he has one.

Alan Alda remembers the late Wayne Rogers.