A Man is Whatever Segment of Bill Maher He Appears On
One of the running jokes on Mad Men is how many moments in history they keep getting wrong, as the events of their times unfold around them.
But don’t expect the people who create the show to have any more clairvoyance about the times that they inhabit. Which is why it’s not at all surprising to see ObamaCare supporter Jon Hamm tells Bill Maher:
And presumably AMC or Hamm’s producers aren’t going to lose much sleep over his remarks, even though Mad Men’s already cultish ratings have contracted significantly this year. But Hamm’s ham-handed remarks are a reminder that as always, Bill Whittle’s Lou Grant Rule is inviolable:
The talented Ed Asner, the actor who played Lou Grant on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, is politically to the left of Mao. Put Ed Asner and Lou Grant in a steel cage, let them talk politics for five minutes, and Lou Grant would kick Ed Asner’s ass. Even Murray Slaughter would be handing up folding chairs: ‘Hit the bastard again Lou, he’s still talking about income redistribution!’ Dana Scully is a brilliant, courageous, skeptical physician who is handy with an automatic; Gillian Anderson is deep into crystals and has trouble with her shoelaces. Jack Ryan crawls through the bowels of a stolen Russian submarine fighting a dirty shadow war to keep America free, and Alec Baldwin doesn’t. He seems to find the whole idea of a Jack Ryan deeply embarrassing. This list, sadly, goes on too.
And that was written almost eight years ago. The list has grown infinitely since.
I’m wondering when “affirmative action” is going to be called “affirmative racism” — which is what it is.
How about this one…..
There’s Martin Sheen and then there’s US President Jeb Bartlett -
“We’re for freedom of speech everywhere. We’re for freedom of worship everywhere. We’re for freedom to learn for everybody. And because in our time you can build a bomb in your country and bring it to my country, what goes on in your country is very much my business, and so we’re for freedom from tyranny everywhere, whether in the guise of political oppression, Toby, or economic slavery, Josh, or religious fanaticism, C.J. That most fundamental idea cannot be met with merely our support. It must be met with our strength diplomatically, economically and materially. And if Pharaoh still doesn’t free the slaves, than he’s going to meet my cavalry.”
Didn’t we have an actual President who spoke that way…. oh… about six or eight years ago? And didn’t Asner and Alec Baldwin and Sheen et al just LOVE that fella?
And talk about ass-kicking, Aragorn, son of Arathorn, weilder of the Sword of Isildur and heir to the throne of Gondor, would shred Viggo Mortensen limb from limb over his pro-Orc, “No War for Oil” crap and nonsense.
Viggo Mortensen mouthing off probably cost the producers a large sum of money. Back in the studio days, when Hollywood was run like a business, there were morals and public reputation clauses built into contracts. If any actor stood up and unzipped their ego to the detriment of the business the studio lawyers would have destroyed them.
Actually, Viggo probably didn’t cost them all that much. Anything he cost them in the US was made up many times over by the overseas America-haters.
In the movie “The Departed” Alex Baldwin shouts: “God, I love the Patriot Act”.
I can’t imagine that the “real” Alex Baldwin would veer say anything like that.
You know, when the “Departed” writers gratuitously threw in the silly remark by Alec Baldwin’s civil-liberties-hating character about how much he loved The Patriot Act, I laughed. Because there was NOTHING that was done in that movie by the police that the PA enabled. It was completely irrelevant and a false implication that the PA let them do it.
The PA only enables federal (not Boston PD or Mass State Troopers) to, with authorization by a Federal Judge not rising to the level of that for a search warrant, listen in to INTERNATIONAL CALLS by NON-AMERICANS. But of course, none of the usual suspects ever makes that clear in a movie, tv show or in a self-righteous diatribe on the red carpet.
I would say that the Hollywood Axis of Assholes know better, and are simply lying bastards. Well, yes, they’re liars, but maybe not about the Patriot Act, at least technically. Because I think when it comes to the PA they’re just incredibly shallow, ignorant and incurious cretins who parrot what they’ve been fed.
The one point Bill missed in his most excellent post is that it really doesn’t take much bravery for stars, pop artists, or other Hollywood glitterati to state their beliefs; it’s not like anyone important in Tinseltown disagrees with them. All they’re really doing is parroting what they’ve heard from someone else. Maybe they think it was an original thought, but, honestly, not one bit of it is. They all say the same garbage to the point that we could replace them with sock puppets, use a bot to squirt out random lefty talking points, and it would be little different from the “famous” person’s performance. Honestly, are any of us really listening to them anymore?
The entitled attitude that “We’re better than you because we have fame, money, and power; therefore, we’re smarter than you” has grown tiresome. It’s why the tea party has risen up, in fact — because, frankly, we’re all sick of being told incessantly by stars or the shows and films they appear in that this is an evil country and we’re all stupid people who live in it. Maybe it’s even worse when they feel sorry for us, that we’re stuck in our backward beliefs because we are filled with our own “little” concerns, like whether the company we work for will still be in business next week.
Their sense of entitlement to lord it over the rest of us is galling. It’s the reason so many of them dismissed the criminal acts of the 40-year-old child rapist Roman Polanski, while crucifying Sarah Palin, George Bush, or now Christine O’Donnell for saying something a wee bit inarticulate or frivolous. Because, after all, Polanski is one of them, and Palin and the others are just a bunch of dumb hicks — just like all the other undesirables in flyover country.
Well, after spending countless hours of our lives being fascinated by such “luminaries,” the rest of us have finally realized they have feet of clay. They don’t care about the poor or the environment, or the down-trodden and misunderstood muslims. All they really care about — all they’ve EVER cared about — is themselves. They’re hypocrites of the worst sort, because they rage about how unfair capitalism is when they benefit from it in ways the rest of us can barely imagine and will likely never experience. Too bad Obama and his ilk won’t redistribute these idiots’ wealth while he’s screwing the rest of us over…
Elaine, your note is the icing on the cake of the original article, I wish everyone would read those lines and think about them. Society is being led by the nose by these people and we all shrug and go on with our lives. Thank you for some stimulation to do otherwise.
Very, very well said.
I have felt everything you said in words for a long time.
Thanks very much.
Elaine,
How true. Capitalism’s ultimate victors, those that trade on image to extract huge salary and wealth, want the rest of us to listen to them. They don’t get that just because we pay to see them on television or the movies (or even sports venues) does not mean we want to listen to their political views. Neither fame nor the wealth it allows them does not equal intelligence.
The sudden, startling and dynastic wealth that fame can provide its holders disconnects them from the day-to-day struggles of working people, including many who earn good livings. Entertainers believe that their millions are just like the more modest incomes that those who punch a time clock or work as a stockbroker. Instead of gratefully accepting the benefits of a market system, they think that they are beyond it all. But no so far as to actually advocate for the system that allows them their profound wealth and priveleged position.
Robert Fuller
Hopewell, NJ
Hamm has to spew this nonsense or start doing Burt Reynolds dinner theatre in Stuart, Florida. He and others go on the show not to say what they believe but make sure their liberal cred is still intact. Sad actually to have to be a puppet in Maher’s sad children’s theatre just get your next job.
It’s funny to think that Angie Harmon could beat up Jon Hamm, Alex Baldwin (if he hasn’t fled the country), Matt Damon, and Harrison Ford. These guys play so tough on screen, yet they are really girlie-men when it really comes to defending American values.
Mad Men rating have never been so good, they’re way up compared to last season.
Surprising considering what a bore that show is. It’s been spinning its wheels since the first season.
Have you noticed how the media almost never mentions how much money these celebrities make? It is a really inconceivable amount — I remember sometime in the 1990′s reading that Bill Cosby was earning something like 200 million dollars a year! The Republicans should launch a series of political ads emphasizing — naming names and dollar amounts — how incredibly wealthy these creatures have become, showing that they act like Daddy Warbucks while sounding like Karl Marx. It’s enough to make a cat laugh.
Actors. They have to say the right thing to get invited to the right party to sit on the right casting couch. Whores all.
It takes about as much courage for an actor to spout standard left-liberal views as it did for candidate Obama to oppose the Iraq War, when he represented one of the most liberal districts in the country. It takes courage to go against the crowd – it takes zero courage to preach to the choir. Preaching to the choir is called pandering.
But, as a business move, it is a disaster. It takes a special kind of fool to willfully alienate half of your potential customers. Conservatives actually enjoy good culture, but it is really hard to support people who hate you and think you are stupid. People like Maher who provide a platform for high school drop outs to parade their ignorance are costing Hollywood millions by turning off us rubes.
A little OT, but every decade there appears someone who crawls under my skin in a special way. Last decade it was John Edwards. This decade, Bill Maher and Obama are tied for first. In the case of Maher, it is the combination of nastiness, smugness and self-love that gets to me. He – like Letterman – has also gotten worse. Maybe a decade plus of smoking tons of weed has rotted his brain.
This story pretty much puts all of his lovely traits on display:
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tim-graham/2009/02/20/bill-maher-recovery-plan-legalize-pot-execute-two-random-rich-greedy-pig
Why is anyone surprised to hear such things from an actor on Mad Men, the entire purpose of which is to show that the era in which it is set not only had the flaws we all acknowledge but also never had any of the virtues commonly attributed to it? It is a left wing hatchet job on the period and it’s hard for me to see (1) why any conservative would watch it and (2) why any conservative would expect the people associated with it to do anything other than spout Hollywood’s mindless leftism.
There are guys on Mad Men?
No one here seems willing to talk about or take the next logical step. Antiredistributionist comes closest. If the people providing you with a product offend you, why do you watch or listen to them? If their product offends you why do you buy it? If both the product and the people providing it offend you, for goodness sakes stop sending them your money. Worst of all, your purchase of their product and your continued employment of these people (which is what you are doing simply by the act of watching this crap) helps support an agenda that is antithetical to much of what you stand for.
Yes, it’s hard to break the addiction of watching and listening to the main stream media-but if you’re reading this here you’ve at least taken baby steps in the right direction. It’s as hard to give up the addiction to the MSM as it is to give up smoking cigarettes. As someone who’s given up both, I can personally attest to that. But it’s worth it.
Now please don’t misinterpret what I’m saying. Sure, there is art and culture presented by the mainstream media that is not offensive, and that is worth viewing or listening to, but we are past the time where we can pick and choose and still make a difference. When the time comes that Hollywood and the music business start acting like responsible adults who love their country, I will again consume their products. In the meantime, I’ve found other rewarding ways to spend my leisure time, including reading much of the content offered or linked here on PJM. And for those of you who are inclined to be activists, you can consider spending some of your new free time identifying some of the worst offenders (actors and shows) and then write and/or call their advertisers to let them know that you are boycotting their products. If enough of us do that, we might have a counterbalancing effect to the toxic waste spewed by Hollywood and the rest of the MSM. This is something you can actually do to affect this issue-there are not many effective things the average Joe (or Jane) can actually do, but this is one of them.
At this point it’s clear to me that few people are currently willing to give up their addiction to the MSM, just as few were initially willing to give up smoking in the 1960’s and 1970’s. But that will change, and when it does, we will have an effective weapon to use in the culture wars. As for myself, I’m thankful that I was able to break my addictions to tobacco and to watching and listening to shows which undermine my values and the values this great country was founded upon.
So put down that crack pipe! Yes, it’s tough, and you’ll have significant withdrawal pains, but the end result is worth the struggle and sacrifice.
Bill Maher is a 5 lb rectum, filled with 10 lbs of Bill Maher.