C-SPAN: Booknotes With Brian Lamb: Christopher Hitchens On Hatred, The Left & His Favorite Authors (1993)

Source:The New Democrat

I guess Chris Hitchens rouge's list would be similar to Richard Nixon's enemies list. Both men have come across a lot of people in life that simply don't like them and who they don't like at all. But when you're a self-described Socialist and you are perhaps even to the left of the British Labour Party, a Democratic Socialist party in Britain where Hitchens is from and you put yourself behind a lot of Far-Left fringe causes like supporting Fidel Castro in the 1960s and calling all sorts of people on the Right like Henry Kissinger and Dick Nixon war criminals, even though you don't apply that label to George W. Bush and Dick Cheney in the 2000s, you're going to make a lot of enemies.

Chris Hitchens, I guess was always a Democratic Socialist on economic policy and perhaps social issues, except for perhaps civil liberties where he became a Neoconservative hawk in the 2000s and that is where I'm getting to, because he was a strong defender of President George W. Bush's so-called War on Terror in the 2000s, including the Patriot Act and War in Iraq. You know you're petty unique when you're a Socialist on economic policy and a Neoconservative hawk on national security, foreign policy and civil liberties. Chris Hitchens, was more fun for me and fun to talk about and was funnier when he was a committed Socialist across the board.

Bill Clinton and what Hitchens thinks of President Clinton, is the only thing I'm getting out of this interview. Not that it isn't interesting, but as far as what I want to cover here. Hitchens, accused President Clinton of essentially destroying the welfare state in America. Even though we really never had one, but the signing of the 1996 Welfare to Work Law that required people on Welfare to finish their education and prepare to go to work and go to work. Hitchens uses that to accuse Clinton of essentially ending Welfare and the welfare state in America. And the 1994 Crime Bill is also something that Hitchens uses against Clinton to call him some type of hard-right Conservative.

Yoo Jay: George Carlin- 'The Art and Freedom to Offend People'

Source:Yoo Jay- RIP George Carlin.

Source:The Daily Review 

"Ricky Gervais, Patrice O'neal, Jim Jefferies, Bill Hicks, Louis CK, George Carlin, Jimmy Carr, Richard Pryor and Lenny Bruce. I don't know what the Artist: Underdogz thing is." 

From Yoo Jay

If I’m going to listen to so-called political comedians, I’m going to first listen to people who know what they’re talking about. I’m not going to go to a mechanic to get my knee examined, or hire that person to do my taxes. Just like I’m not going to listen to a comedian who simply doesn’t know what they’re talking about and perhaps just looks at politics from a stereotypical point of view as far as how they look at politics, politicians, Democrats, Republicans, etc. 

Once I’ve determined that the comedian is knowledgable about politics, or whatever the issue is, they got to be funny. And use their own humor and not use material that a hundred other comedians and other people have already used.

To me at least comedy is only funny when it is accurate, or at least not exaggerated. So to make fat jokes about plus-sized curvy women who are actually in great shape, especially when they come from a rail-thin women who gets blown to the ground every time there’s a breeze in the air, is not funny and also doesn’t even make sense. Now a fat joke about a woman, or man who goes to sleep at the all you can eat meat lovers buffet every night so they don’t miss anything, would be funny. But it would also be true. 

Jokes to me at least have to make sense and they make sense when they’re believable and correct. Like making fun of hypocrites (to use as example) like the guy who preaches about the dangers of adultery and homosexuality when he’s cheating on his third wife and having an affair with a man. You could say this person knows these dangers from personal experience.

I also tend to only listen to comedians who are consistent and non-partisan. Meaning they’re not looking to just bash Republicans, or Democrats, but people who they see as either funny, or bad politicians, or a combination of both. 

I’ll also listen to comedians who lean in one direction, or the other, but smart and honest enough to know that their side isn’t perfect either. And will go after their side from time to time when they feel they deserve it. Dennis Miller on the Right, Bill Maher, fairly Far-Left, Lewis Black on the Left, P.J. O’Rourke on the Right, whose not a fan of Democrats, or Republicans and the same thing with Chris Buckley, the son of William F. Buckley.

George Carlin, is one of my favorite comedians and I don’t agree with all of his satire. But he was about as non-partisan as it came with his comedy even though his personal politics leaned very left at least on economic policy. But he didn’t make fun of Democrats, or Republicans, but he made fun of politicians who happened to be Democrats and Republicans. And he made fun of voters who voted for politicians. 

I guess Carlin's idea of a politician was someone who would practically do anything to get reelected, or move on to the next level in government. Someone like that will get taken seriously by both sides of the isle and will also attract followers. Because a, they know what they’re talking about, but just as important they’re honest enough to talk about it. As opposed to the partisan comedian who bashes the other side as hard as they defend their own.

Political comedy and comedy in general needs to be funny first and of course. But it’s not going to be funny if it's not accurate, or at least not exaggerated. And when you’re hitting one side, keep in mind someone is hitting your side and perhaps doing a damn good job at it. And you would better off if you can take a joke. Instead of acting you’re all perfect while the other side if loaded and overflowing with morons that need to be deported, because you’re out of room for morons. 

Comedy also has to be consistent and this gets to political correctness: if redneck jokes are acceptable, so are ghetto jokes. If right-wing Christian jokes are acceptable, then so are right-wing Muslim jokes. And that is just a couple of examples. That great comedians make fun of people that deserve to be made fun of. Instead of picking out one side and hammering them, while they’re trying to defend everyone else.

The Young Turks: Al Gore, Breathable Booze and Shade Balls

Source:The Daily Review

Al Gore for president? Why, would be my question about that. A simple one word question about that. "Vote for Al Gore for president, again and I"ll do", what exactly? Al Gore, the man who lost the presidency to a college frat brat, who thought he was still at Yale and perhaps failed his freshmen year 22 years in a row and suddenly wakes up at the age of 40 and realizes he now has kids, is married and needs a full-time job that will support his family. Who gets into politics, because his father is George H.W. Bush. And I'm speaking about George W. Bush of course.

Al Gore, is not Dick Nixon, or even Bill Clinton. He's someone whose more than capable of being happy in the private sector and making a lot of money and speaking about issues that he cares about and writing about them. He wanted to be president in the 1980s and 1990s, which is why he runs in 2000 and as Vice President to a very popular President Clinton and with almost no opposition in the party to him, he had the perfect opportunity to be President of the United States, but he blew it. It took him about six months to figure out what type of presidential campaign he was going to run in 2000.

If Al Gore, wants to be Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Interior, Secretary of State, National Security Director, by all means he's qualified for any of those positions and would serve the next Democratic president very well. But run again for president when the avenue to get there is not clear unlike in 2000 when you were a heavy favorite to beat Joe Average who lives on Main street in Smithville, whose a swell kind of guy and everything and everyone's favorite drinking partner at the local tavern and hardest worker at the factory, when he's sober and I'm thinking of George W. Bush obviously as far as what G.W. brought to that campaign as far as qualifications, doesn't make sense to me.

The Young Turks: Ana Kasparian & Cenk Uygur: 'Jerry Seinfeld Caught By The Sensitivity Police'

Source:The Young Turks- Comedian Jerry Seinfeld: "What's the deal with political correctness?" LOL

Source:The New Democrat

"Apparently, the bar for racial insensitivity has now been lowered so much that one can be branded with the scarlet "R" for insisting that racial and gender identity issues should be irrelevant in certain circumstances. Merely asserting that merit, and not demographic identifiers which result from accidents of birth, should carry more weight is enough to offend those for whom racial and gender-based grievances suffice for a raison d'être.

Take, for example, Gawker's Kyle Chayka, who objected to comedic legend Jerry Seinfeld's response to a question the performer was asked about his web series, Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, primarily featuring young, white men.

"It really pisses me off," Seinfeld said of the logic behind that question.

"People think that it's the census or something," he observed of comedy in general. "It's gotta represent the actual pie chart of America. Who cares?""* The Young Turks hosts Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian break it down."

From The Young Turks 

Damn! I actually agree with both Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur on the same show, about the same topic. They both just scored a touchdown and converted a two-point conversion in the liberal column for me. Maybe they aren’t as radical and socialist as I give them credit, or blame for. Depending on your perspective.

It would be one thing if Jerry Seinfeld was just talking to comedians of one race, (in this case Caucasian) because that is the only people he wants to talk to. But that is not what this is about. He interviews people he thinks are funny. And in this case the recent comedians he spoke to, all happened to be Caucasian.

It would be one thing if Jerry said (and I can call him Jerry since I’m his German nephew whose not a Nazi) it would be one thing if Jerry said: “Those African-Americans, (or something else) always bitching about how life is tough in America. They can’t take a joke. I’ve seen Marxist dictators with bigger sense of humors. I know this since I interviewed them. If they think they got it so bad in America, why don’t they go back to Africa.”

But Jerry didn’t say anything like that and is not talking to people based on race, or ethnicity. He simply wants to talk to people who make him laugh. This current group he found just happen to all be from the same race.

And oh by the way: if lets say Chris Rock was doing a show and he only interviewed African-American male comedians, no one would be making an issue of this. Well maybe Breitbart, or Fox News. This same argument could be made against affirmative action. Why not just go where the talent is and just judge people as individuals and let the most qualified people regardless of race, ethnicity, or gender, get the best jobs. And leave whatever is left for the wannabes of all races, ethnicities, male, female, who gives a damn!

There are times when one group of people, (fill in the blank which group that is) looks a little better than other groups as far as having their members being part of what’s happening in America. That is the way freedom and private enterprise works.

Cenk Uygur made another great point and its the boy who cried wolf analogy. That real racism, is racism. When people are being denied access in life and given harsher treatment simply because of their race, that’s racism. But when you try to apply that label to anything you can think of to try to make people especially who aren’t minorities in this country, look like bigots and have no real evidence of the charge that you’re making, you become the boy, or girl who cries wolf. You end up looking worst than real bigots and sure as hell than the person that you want to look like a bigot.

Crying wolf is like swinging for the fences, (to use a baseball analogy) when you’re a 150 pound shortstop who has never a hit a home run in your life, even in Little League. And every part of the outfield is at least 400 feet away: it doesn’t work.

Public Domain Footage: Robert F. Kennedy- Speech at Columbia University in 1964

Source:Public Domain Footage- Robert F. Kennedy.

Source: The New Democrat

Robert F. Kennedy, running for U.S. Senate in 1964 and not to replace one of his brothers in Massachusetts, but to run for Senate in New York. A great opportunity for Bobby Kennedy as well in 1964. Because Senator Ken Keating, from New York wasn’t very popular in New York. President Lyndon Johnson, was going to win New York in a landslide. And here is where Bobby Kennedy, had an opportunity to jump on Lyndon’s coattails and take a seat in the U.S. Senate in the following Congress.

I believe Kennedy, answered the carpetbagger question very well. Of course with his Irish-Boston accent, he didn’t sound very New York. Either from New York City, or upstate like in Buffalo, or some place. But he grew up in New York City and spent most of his professional career in Washington and had a home in New York. This is not like Hillary Clinton, who grew up in Chicago and spent a lot of her professional career in Arkansas with her husband and then a New York Senate seat opens up in 2000 and she decides she’s going to be the next U.S. Senator from New York. A state where she didn’t have any roots in going in.

I think Bobby Kennedy, answered the presidential question very well to. You can’t run for both President and U.S. Senate at the same time. At least in most states and that would be borderline impossible to do so before you’re actually in the Senate. Kennedy, was clearly a Senate candidate in 1964 for New York. So that was the seat and race he was focused on. And again in 1964, LBJ looked like he would probably run for reelection in 1968 and perhaps even be popular. RFK and LBJ, were both Democrats. So as RFK said, 1972 eight years after 1964 would’ve been the earliest that he could run for president.

Bobby Kennedy’s politics, might have changed a bit from 1964 to 1967-68. But that had to do with the Vietnam War and growing poverty and racial division in America in the late 1960s. But in 1964, I believe RFK was still an establishment Center-Left Liberal Democrat like his brother Jack. And you could argue that he moved left from that by 1967. But in 1964 he was running for U.S. Senate essentially to continue the vision and goals of President Kennedy. Expanding freedom and opportunity to all Americans and dealing with civil rights, equal rights and equality of opportunity for the whole country.
Source:Public Domain Footage

Salon Magazine: Scott Timberg: 'Stop The Hand-Wringing Over Campus PC Culture'

Source:The New Democrat

Scott Timberg, in his column in Salon, which might be the Federal Chief of the Political Correctness Police, wrote the best piece I’ve seen from a New-Left generally pro-political correctness publication about PC. He basically said, “yeah we might do it. But so do they and they’re better at it than we are.” Which is sort of a childish sophomoric argument, but he least he admits his side believes in political correctness. And then he also goes onto say that comedians and other commentators should have free-will in what they’re allowed to talk about. Which is all I argue for in this debate. Free expression and personal responsibility for what you say.

I don’t see what political correctness warriors are fighting for. Do they want a world where everyone whose not male, Caucasian and Christian to not have to be subjected to criticism and humor, even when the criticism and humor is dead on? You’re not going to find that planet in the American galaxy outside of New York City, Boston, Seattle, San Francisco and parts of Los Angeles? Americans, believe in free speech and free expression. Regardless of political affiliation. That is all Americans between the Far-Left and Far-Right. Which is eighty-percent of us. Liberals, invented free speech, so of course they’re in favor of it. Conservatives in the real sense, support free speech. And so do Centrists and Libertarians.

When someone uses humor in an accurate funny way to describe the shortcomings of someone else even if that person is from another group, religion, ethnicity, race, whatever it might be, what do the targets of the humor and criticism have to complain about? It would be one thing if the people doing the criticism and humor, just target one group of people, while they defend their group, or groups to the hill. But even then the commentator is subjected to criticism and reaction about what they said. And if the person is inconsistently critical that will come out and be made public. Especially if a lot of what they say is inaccurate.

But don’t try to shut people up in a liberal democracy of three-hundred and fifteen-million people who has the most liberal guarantee of free speech in the world. At least among large counties and one thing that truly makes America the number one country in the world, our right to be heard, but also our right to listen and to hear what others have to say about what we’ve said. Political correctness warriors, really need to take up pot and vacation in Hawaii. Perhaps start smoking Cuban cigars since they’ll be legal in America again and learn to chill. They’ll live a lot longer and better for it.

POLITICO Magazine: Robert Gordon: The Fight That Changed Political TV Forever

Source:The New Democrat

What this is about is the debate between Conservative Libertarian writer and publisher of the Center-Right publication The National Review, William Buckley and Socialist, or Social Democratic writer and author Gore Vidal. They were brought on as part of ABC New's coverage of the 1968 Republican National Convention and also went on to debate each other the Democratic National Convention that year as well. They were brought in by ABC News to offer contrarian views of what was going on at those conventions. Bill Buckley, was supposed to represent the Right, or the Republican point of view. And Gore Vidal, was there to represent the Left, I guess the entire Left and the Democratic point of view.

Does any of this sound familiar? It should if you're familiar with American politics today. Because that is now how its done, whether the coverage comes from the broadcast networks, or the cable news networks. You have a moderator which back then for ABC News would've been Howard Smith and today depending on which network you'll have that network, or news division's lead anchor lead their coverage of the conventions. And they would have several reporters there from their team to report what is actually happening. And then have an analyst from each side to tell people what they believe this all means. But that was not how it was done back in the late 1960s. Where you would have two people who are ideologically completely different debating what is going on.

But what happened at ABC News at the 1968 RNC was not CNN Crossfire of today. Howard Smith, was there to moderate and lead the discussion between Buckley and Vidal. But the problem is Buckley and Vidal were in separate rooms as Smith and you could barely hear, or see Smith during this debate. If you're familiar with Howard K. Smith, you know he wasn't some who was short on words and opinions. He had an opinion on practically everything. From things that he was very informed about like politics, to things where he wasn't that informed on like sports. But when you have a debate between two of the sharpest and quick-witted people at least in politics, but the media as well and perhaps in general and they don't even respect yet like each other, it is very hard to get any word in edgewise.

So what happens in 1968 at the RNC between Bill Buckley and Gore Vidal is what we saw with Crossfire in the 1980s and 90s. Essentially a free for all without a moderator. Where the two debaters would make their points, but also listen to the other side. They would debate and moderate the same discussion at the same time. With poor Howard Smith acting not much more as a presiding officer at a U.S. Senate session, or something. Perhaps signing autographs, or catching up on paperwork. And really just serving a ceremonial role. But that debate because of the two men who were involved and what they were talking about and the year that it happened in 1968, made for great TV. And changed how politics would be covered on TV in the future.