Bill Maher the Hollywood Libertarian.....

corplinx

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corplinx
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
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I was excited. There was this new show coming on comedy central called "politically incorrect". I couldn't wait for comedy central's attempt to ride the wash of anti-political correctness sentiment that was floating around at the time.

Instead, I got a very politically correct `show by the guy from the movie "Pizza Guy" who started out each show by supporting whatever Bill Clinton's latest policy was.

It was awful..... Except for some truly funny moments with Ron Silver and Gary Shandling, the show was basically a Clinton apology outlet.

I wasn't surprised in fact when ABC picked up the show. I didn't watch/didn't care. What suprised me were college age people who swore by it and thought they were independent thinkers.

It was ironic to me that Bill Maher was eventually crapcanned for saying something that was very politically incorrect at the time he said it. I was actually upset that he was forced out over it. I didn't care for his brand of FM Deejay level analysis of the day's events but I certainly didn't agree with what happened to him

Now he has a show on HBO, has a book, and goes around to shows like O'Reilly and Larry King and pretends to be some progressive yet pragmatic ideolog. Sure..... Whatever. The thing that miffs me now is his attempt to identify himself as a libertarian while on Larry King Live a while back.

The question I propose to you is:
How is a socialist, government interventionist, gun control advocate, who also thinks pot should be decriminlized a libertarian?

So, I've come up with a new phrase: hollywood libertarian

It basically means you believe in the principles of totalitarianism but you want legal narcotics. I guess the narcotics will make it easier to suppress people.
 
I think people are to hung up on labels.

socialist
government interventionist
libertarian
pragmatic ideolog
liberal
conservative

Labels are a lazy persons way of avoiding having to discuss specific issues. Just label someone, bam, no thinking required.
 
corplinx said:


The question I propose to you is:
How is a socialist, government interventionist, gun control advocate, who also thinks pot should be decriminlized a libertarian?
Click to expand...

Um....never mind addressing the rest of what you said. Decriminalizing drug possession and use is very much a central tenet of most libertarian platforms.

AS
 
You're right about that "socialist" part. I've attended two tapings and we sang German workers songs before the show. Bill came out and talked about the need to organize progressive movements, unite the proleteriat and so on. *

I'm curious about what renders a person a "government interventionist." For some reason I don't think it has anything to do with, oh say, our government defying 90% of the world population and the U.N. to topple another government with bombs and stuff. It sounds far more insidious -- like prohibiting PRIVATE businesses from having 12 hour days.

Very clever with the "Hollywood Libertarian" thing. Very clever. You used many examples to support that monicker. Well, you only used one example -- but it was very, very good.

*I did in fact attend two tapings of the program. I could summarize the experience if anyone's truly interested.
 
DavidJames said:

Labels are a lazy persons way of avoiding having to discuss specific issues. Just label someone, bam, no thinking required.
Click to expand...

Although using 'labels' may be lazy, and not always accurate (like the 'conservative' that believes in drug legalization, etc.), I do believe they serve a purpose. Its easier to say "I'm a Conservative" or "I'm a liberal", and give an idea of the basis for your beliefs, than to try to say "I'm a person that believes in higher taxes, abortion rights, drug legalizaiton, etc."
 
Cain said:
It sounds far more insidious -- like prohibiting PRIVATE businesses from having 12 hour days.
Click to expand...

Although limiting work days and work weeks is a good thing, there are problems with it:
- There is no guarantee that any company would be able to force people to work 12 hour days even without government rules. People have choices. In a growing economy (as what happens the majority of time), people can and do change jobs. Any company with unreasonable requirments will find themselves without employees
- It ignores special cases. Some people may want to voluntarily work more than 12 hour days. (The may want overtime pay.) Or some jobs need longer days for practical purposes (for example, if workers have to work in isolation.)

So, the idea that 'government intervention' is wonderful because it prevents long work weeks is a red herring.

So how can government intervention actually mess things up?
- Punishing taxes (which may force otherwise profitable companies out of business)
- Support for failing companies - Grants or loans to companies that would not survive, either because of a failing industry, or because of bad business practices
- "bad" regulations, for which enforcement causes companies undo hardship (I'm sure Shanek could probably post a hundred of these.)
 
Cain said:

*I did in fact attend two tapings of the program. I could summarize the experience if anyone's truly interested.
Click to expand...

I have only seen this show a couple of times, once when Davis was on. How on earth did they fill a studio with people who support him?

Anyway I made the mistake of thinking the show was supposed to be funny. It was just pathetic.
 
Bill Maher never communicated with the audience. Instead one of the writers named "Danny" said we'd get "some nice chocolates" and play a couple of "fun games." No wonder the writing for this show is terrible, I thought.

The "chocolate" we received were fun sized Snickers. I don't eat chocolate, but I thought with Bill's multi-million dollar contract he could splurge a bit. You can't hear the guest-host interaction during the break. Their microphones are turned off.

Bill looks and acts exactly the same offscreen as on -- like an over-privileged, egotistical prick.

Didn't Randi give him a Pegasus award recently? He's into all kinds of New Age nonsense. At least he has the good sense not to eat animals.
 
corplinx said:

Instead, I got a very politically correct `show by the guy from the movie "Pizza Guy" who started out each show by supporting whatever Bill Clinton's latest policy was.
Click to expand...

Let's not forget Maher's greatest movie of all, "Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death".

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094834/

What I really didn't like about the show is the guests generally had nothing interesting to say.
 
corplinx said:
Instead, I got a very politically correct `show by the guy from the movie "Pizza Guy" who started out each show by supporting whatever Bill Clinton's latest policy was.
Click to expand...

Hey. Pizza Guy had one or two truly good moments. Granted, that's a stretch for a movie that was. . . about 6-7 hours as I recall, but still.

The scene with the Japanese blowfish was excellent and truly, truly funny. "You must choose!" Just the right amount of understatement and a nice, light touch.

Um. The Dukakis bit was pretty good.

Er.

Uh, the Quayle stuff was decent, too.

Um.

Other. . . bits . . . that I can't remember . . . were ok.


N/A
 
DavidJames said:
I think people are to hung up on labels.

socialist
government interventionist
libertarian
pragmatic ideolog
liberal
conservative

Labels are a lazy persons way of avoiding having to discuss specific issues. Just label someone, bam, no thinking required.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the after-school special there.
 
corplinx said:
I was excited. There was this new show coming on comedy central called "politically incorrect". I couldn't wait for comedy central's attempt to ride the wash of anti-political correctness sentiment that was floating around at the time.

Instead, I got a very politically correct `show by the guy from the movie "Pizza Guy" who started out each show by supporting whatever Bill Clinton's latest policy was.

It was awful..... Except for some truly funny moments with Ron Silver and Gary Shandling, the show was basically a Clinton apology outlet.

I wasn't surprised in fact when ABC picked up the show. I didn't watch/didn't care. What suprised me were college age people who swore by it and thought they were independent thinkers.

It was ironic to me that Bill Maher was eventually crapcanned for saying something that was very politically incorrect at the time he said it. I was actually upset that he was forced out over it. I didn't care for his brand of FM Deejay level analysis of the day's events but I certainly didn't agree with what happened to him

Now he has a show on HBO, has a book, and goes around to shows like O'Reilly and Larry King and pretends to be some progressive yet pragmatic ideolog. Sure..... Whatever. The thing that miffs me now is his attempt to identify himself as a libertarian while on Larry King Live a while back.

The question I propose to you is:
How is a socialist, government interventionist, gun control advocate, who also thinks pot should be decriminlized a libertarian?

So, I've come up with a new phrase: hollywood libertarian

It basically means you believe in the principles of totalitarianism but you want legal narcotics. I guess the narcotics will make it easier to suppress people.
Click to expand...

Yes, he is not really a Libertarian. In fact, he is not a libertarian at all. He is a liberal.
 
Although Bill Maher likes to say he was fired for his comments I think he just does that to try to appear as a martyr. I watched that show a lot (too much) and it had just ran its course. I think that show was going to be canned soon regardless. Bill often made a point on the show of how he honestly expressed his opinions no matter what. The problem is that that doesn't necessarily make for a good TV show.

In fact, when it's a show that's on five times a week, making a point of speaking out on issues that are important to you can come across as repetitive and preachy, which is how I was feeling when watching Politically Incorrect near the end of it's run. Bill had about ten issues that were big with him and he hit them over and over and over and over. And over. I agreed with some of them, didn't agree with others, but I got sick of him talking about all of them.

Also, Bill did often talk about being a Libertarian and yet in the Presidential election of 2000 he often mentioned that he was going to vote for Nader instead of Bush or Gore. He wouldn't even mention the possibility of voting for the Libertarian candidate. I guess he is one of those Nader Libertarians.

I don't see Bill on TV nearly as much now since I don't have HBO but when I do see him I am much less annoyed by him than I was by the end of the Politically Incorrect run and I just think it's a function of overexposure. He makes some good points on some issues and so long as he isn't hammering them into you every single night he is tolerable.

He did get a Randi Pigasus Award a couple years back and I've heard him spout woo-woo stuff now and then. But he outdid them all a few months back when I saw him on "Scarborough Country" on MSNBC. He unambiguously affirmed his belief in astrology. I thought the less affluent were into that and that the better off went for crystals and such instead.
 
Number Six said:

He did get a Randi Pigasus Award a couple years back and I've heard him spout woo-woo stuff now and then. But he outdid them all a few months back when I saw him on "Scarborough Country" on MSNBC. He unambiguously affirmed his belief in astrology. I thought the less affluent were into that and that the better off went for crystals and such instead.
Click to expand...

The funny thing is, he claims america is getting deeper into superstition because Bush prays.
 
Politically Incorrect drove me bonkers. I could not watch more than a few minutes at a time. More than half the guests were idiots and only on for the exposure. The talk was insipid, more about getting a laugh than anything substantive. Just when a guest was starting to say something interesting they would move on to a new topic or someone would insert a bad joke.

Really, nothing ever was truly explored on teh show. finally, when he DID say something Politically Incorrect, he got fired.

Lurker
 
corplinx:
The question I propose to you is:
How is a socialist, government interventionist, gun control advocate, who also thinks pot should be decriminalized a libertarian?
Click to expand...

Corplinx I couldn’t agree with you more. Maher is about as much a libertarian as Michael Moore or Al Franken are libertarians.
 
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