Why was bill maher such as ass tonight?

[SlicerDicer-]

I dont get it :/ he was such a prick....

[BuyingThyme]

1. Is it not worth staying up for?

[RoyGBiv]

2. Bill Maher is always an ass ...

It's a part of his whole act.

He just happens to be an ass a lot of tend to agree with a lot of the time.

Other times, not so much.

[Ex Lurker]

23. it's human nature to think that just because you agree with

somebody's views, they're like you in other ways, and it causes cognitive dissonance to find out otherwise. I was once in a relationship with a girl with whom I completely agreed on just about every political and social issue. I figured she HAD to be the one for me. Unfortunately we were wildly incompatible in just about everything that didn't involve politics. It was a very confusing time.

[RoyGBiv]

27. That's kinda funny ...

I have had the same problem, quite recently in fact. Brilliant person. Will do wonderful things in her life. Totally incompatible with me in just about every way except politics/intellectualism.

Your friend and my friend should form a club. :)

[ThomWV]

50. I think he's one of the biggest horse's asses on the TV-machine - nothing has changed

I can't stand the asshole even if I do happen to agree with some (certainly not all) of his conclusions. I have no idea at all why the jerk off has a TV show.

[JerseygirlCT]

69. Just what I was going to say

When is he not an ass?

[dysfunctional press]

3. how so...?

what was he being an ass about, in your opinion? i saw the show, but not the assiness you describe.

[Rhiannon12866]

4. What'd he do? I was out with the dog...

I'm back now and he's talking to the panel. :shrug:

[BuyingThyme]

5. How did you teach your dog to talk?

[Rhiannon12866]

11. LOL. I guess I should edit that...

I meant Bill Maher. Though my dog is pretty vocal... ;)

[BuyingThyme]

14. Oh, sorry.

Is your dog named Stevie?

[Rhiannon12866]

22. Nope, my puppy is named Jack, but you're close...

But he's not the only pet I've had, adopt pets from rescue and they seem to find me... :loveya:

Here's my sweet little Sara:


And the remarkable real Rhiannon:

[BuyingThyme]

24. Oh, I might have gone with Sara on the second try.

I had a Rhiannon once, but his name was Alex. All black, but shorter hair. Same eyes.

You and your friends are sure lucky to find one another.

Thanks for the pics!

:hi:

P.S. Jack kinda looks like he can talk.

[Rhiannon12866]

Actually, Sara did tell me her name.

She was found as a stray on the streets of Cleveland where a good samaritan brought her to what turned out to be a very bad place. They still gas unclaimed pets in Ohio... ;(

But she was such a nice dog that the staff managed to get her the last place on an "underground railroad" run which beings pets to rescue groups in NY and Vermont where we have tougher animal protection laws... :-)

Her paperwork said "Cindy," probably just for clerical reasons, but it was obviously not her name. So I tried all sorts of names, got no reaction, until I tried "Sara," another Stevie Nicks song, like my amazing Rhiannon... :D

When I called "Sara," she looked up, ran across the room, jumped into my lap and licked my face. I had finally found her real name! :bounce:

As for Rhiannon, I adopted my uncle's two kitties when he died and his unpleasant wife was just going to drop off his pets at some shelter. :grr:

I knew the other cat, Angela, who was fairly reclusive, but nobody could tell me anything about "the other one" except that "it" was "friendly." What an understatement! :wow:

My cousin, who had rescued Angela, drove from her home in Conn. to my uncle's in NJ, picked up the kitties and brought them to me here in NY. She'd been riding all day, but when I opened her carrier, she did this delicate little leap out and into my life. I said "aren't you a pretty thing!" She was amazing, nearly human, LOL, and kind of picked her own name, too. She answered to it from the very start... :loveya:

You were fortunate to find a remarkable black cat, too. Rhiannon's eyes were bright green. :-)

And Jackie sure tries to talk. He won't let up until I've figured out what he's trying to say... *sigh* :D

Here he is, in action... ;) :hi:

http://www.dogster.com/video/373080/Jack_running_in_circles

[BuyingThyme]

32. Thanks for the video, but

I'm on my crappy ol' dial-up computer and can't watch.

I used to be into Fleetwood Mac and Stevie big time. I never named any pets after them, but I still have a lot of memorabilia around. It's comes in handy when I need to raise a little cash.

Alex's real name was Alex P. Kitten, after the Michael J. Fox character, Alex P. Keaton. I had nothing to do with the name. He was adopted by my girlfriend before I was even in the picture. He was a top cat, but had no front claws. We had nothing to do with the de-clawing, and people rightly object to the practice, but he was perfectly happy and confident. He lived a long time and then left us.

I'll try to check out your video the next time I get to the library.

:hi:

[Rhiannon12866]

35. Well, at least you got to see the pix...

I actually have numerous videos, but most are on the computer that I still have to hook up, sitting upstairs in my room. I've been using my housemate's laptop, for the duration, very kind... :-)

Alex sounds adorable. I've had two black cats in my life, rescued the other one myself, before I even knew, learned it on DU, that black cats and dogs are much less likely to be adopted than other colored pets... :crazy:

And Rhiannon was declawed, as well. Since my uncle adopted her as a kitten, I imagine that the unpleasant wife had something to do with it. :grr:

That was tough, since she was fearless. From the very first day, she tried making friends with my dogs who, fortunately, had no problem with her, except to stay out of her way, LOL. But then I cat-sat for my friend and she went after his cat, who was older, larger and had claws! :scared:

I agree with you. As my cat-loving friend says, "who are you more likely to see in heaven, your cat or your couch?" O8)

Here's Jackie's Dogster page. I also learned about Dogster-Catster on DU... :D

There are more videos and more pix... He's two now, almost three, so I guess I should update it. He's been to doggy class twice, will sit, down and stay, but just wet again in the kitchen. *sigh* Guess that's what he was trying to tell me, though I've taken him out tonight more times than I can count... :shrug:

http://www.dogster.com/dogs/373080

:hi:

[PM Martin]

6. What did he do now?

[Captain Hilts]

7. I can't watch him. nt

[Amerigo Vespucci]

8. Tonight? Remember the story of the frog and the scorpion?

Maher is a self-absorbed prick.

Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow.

PRICK.

People tune into Maher because they're interested in what a prick has to say.

That's ALL he's got.

Just like Andrew Dice Clay had "Little Miss Muffett, sits on a tuffett."

Maher's a one-trick pony and there's no shortage of people willing to take a ride.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

9. Because he IS an ass...........

He's worthless. Don't forget that he got his start by stealing the act of the late, great Bill Hicks - and he started stealing before Hicks was even dead, when everyone knew he was dying.

Maher is a self-serving, utterly self-absorbed little whiner. His insights are so strained, he's become the left-wing (god help us all) version of Dennis Miller.

I saw "Religulous," and I was appalled at how nasty it was. There's a way to present organized religion without mocking the people who honestly believe and making yourself look like a real prick. Unless, as is the case with Maher, you're a real prick.

[emilyg]

31. Thank you.

[madrchsod]

10. i`m not a fan of his style

is he supposed to be funny?

[Taverner]

12. Nothing wrong with Maher - a constant reminder of how cynical we have to be

I love him, but you definitely have to have an anarchist streak somewhere in there to really "get" him.

[proud2BlibKansan]

18. LOL so true

You do have to have a bit of anarchist in you to appreciate Maher.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

36. Hardly

He's an attention whore, hardly any kind of anarchist. He's desperate to play with the big boys, and it shows. There's very little content in whatever Maher has to say, which you discover when he's not totally scripted - i.e., on Larry King Live. That was where I saw him as the hollow tool that he is.

There's a world of difference between a real anarchist - think Bill Hicks - and a wannabe - think Bill Maher.

[Taverner]

51. Disagree

Not sure how you differentiate but I still like him

[Tangerine LaBamba]

52. Why do you disagree?

Say more. I'm curious.

Are you familiar with the work of Bill Hicks?

[Taverner]

53. I am familiar with Bill Hicks and I love him

I think both Maher and Hicks are comic geniuses

[Tangerine LaBamba]

54. Me, too.......

But what is it about Bill Maher that you categorize as "anarchist"? That's what I'm curious about, because I don't see it at all.

[Taverner]

55. His fundamental humor is about going against the established order

Granted, he's anarchist with a little a - nothing like John Zarzan or the Eugene Workshop - but the whole idea of not legislating taste or morality is the core of anarchism

[Tangerine LaBamba]

56. Got it........

You and I have very different definitions of anarchy. That's why I was confused.

Your definition - and I see why you like Maher -is that you see the concepts of taste and/or morality as part of the anarchist's agenda. I see them as peripheral, almost superfluous issues. That's why Maher always struck me as the poseur "bad boy" that I find him to be - he's busy honking at the Establishment, all the while being a very happy member of it.

To live outside the law, you must be honest, Dylan wrote, and I never found anything honest about Maher. Hicks was nothing but honesty.

Thank you very much for your responses. I hate confusion. It's cleared up for me now. Thanks again.

[Taverner]

58. Dylan was wrong

Many folks live outside the law, and are not honest. Many live outside the law, and are. It has nothing to do with living in or outside of the law.

Granted, I am GenX, and I will admit my generation takes a very dim view of Bob Dylan. And the irony is that Bob Dylan would probably agree with us about Bob Dylan.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

59. That's not what Dylan said -

he didn't say that "To live outside the law everyone must be honest." That wasn't what the line meant, not at all. But your personal gloss works for you, I hope, and if that's true, good for you.

GenX means nothing to me - there are just some certainties that I know, and so do you, and they're not necessarily the same ones.

[Taverner]

60. Let's do this without the snark, OK?

We can - and this is a good conversation to have

But without the "holier than thou" snark, OK?

[Tangerine LaBamba]

62. Snark?

You're very tender if you saw snark in what I wrote. And I am being very kind.

Methinks you're far too delicate to continue this exchange, and I wish you well.

[JSK]

67. I love him too

I don't care if he's an ass. I'm a cynical smart ass too; we need to stick together.

[Rhiannon12866]

13. Did he knock off a member of the panel?!

I only count two... :shrug:

[Subdivisions]

15. I'm not absolutely, positively 100% sure, but I think he called T. Boone Pickens

a motherfucker.

[soccermomforobama]

19. he did so in a joking manner

I think he said "you are a wealthy motherfucker".

[blogslut]

20. Good

T. Boone is a motherfucker.

[proud2BlibKansan]

16. What was different?

He didn't seem any different to me.

[lordsummerisle]

17. Wow...

in one thread he went from being an ass to a prick...

No one's got a gun to your head telling you to watch him.

[TexasObserver]

21. Maher is hilarious and insightful, as usual.

He has a way of pissing off people who are too rigid. That's part of his success. He counts on pissing off the easily pissed off.

[Ex Lurker]

25. or those who have a low tolerance for assholes

Stewart and Colbert are orders of magnitude more clever than Maher.

[Uzybone]

30. I like Maher

but I agree 100% with this post.

Maher likes to go for the shock factor, and sometimes falls flat. But while I generally agree with 90% of his views, Stewart and Colbert are light years better than he is.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

37. You got that right

Can you imagine Maher hosting the Oscars or doing a stand-up at the National Press Club dinner?

Colbert won my heart forever when he did that routine and didn't back down for a second. He even had Helen Thomas working with him in that video!

Maher is a company guy - he's like the Official Bad Boy, the one whose replies are always going to be "anti-establishment" to the point of being (big yawn) predictable.

I'll never dare to predict what Stewart and Colbert might do, but I would bet anything that they'll be smart and funny.

[Downtown Hound]

44. Spot on!

You've articulated it better than I ever could. Bill has this air about him like he thinks he's so fucking rebellious and anti-establishment when the truth is, he's friends with fucking Ann Coulter. Bill is about as anti-establishment as Rush Limbaugh is. He may be a bit more liberal, but he's still a power whore with nothing really interesting to say. Anything he says is pretty much like, "Yeah, I already knew that," or "Bullshit." He's as much of a maverick as John McCain is. In other words, not really a maverick at all.

[billyoc]

26. Because he's a libertarian.

They're all pricks.

[Maru Kitteh]

28. He is something of an ass. A little more than something.

I used to love him, but we've grown apart.

[Eryemil]

29. Can't complain about him. He's not exactly the sharpest critic out there but his views on religion..

...are spot on!

[Toucano]

33. SlicerDicer, allow me to introduce you to Bill Maher.

Mr. Maher makes his living being a prick.

Sometimes we love him for it. Sometimes not.

But that's who he is.

"Pleased to meet you, too!"

[SlicerDicer-]

39. I just thought he was overly harsh...

On all accounts tonight. I usually like his show but this was a bit much for me :/

[Zen Democrat]

34. I thought he did a great job smacking down Erin Burnett tonight.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

38. Shooting fish in a barrel

It's like making a Rush Limbaugh joke.

You can't miss.

[thatsrightimirish]

40. terrible panel today

Listening to Cory Booker and Erin Burnett was punishment. "Soaking the rich" :puke:

[Downtown Hound]

41. Because for the most part, he is an ass

Yes, I agree with him a lot. But I still don't really like him very much. He's so fucking full of himself. He's condescending, smug, and I really believe, deeply misogynistic. He tends to be smarter than most of the jackasses on TV that spit out their opinions like they were vessels of truth and wisdom, but there's something about him that I really don't trust. He strikes me as being selfish and ultimately, just another asshole who thinks way too highly of himself.

[EFerrari]

42. The way he talks about women and about sex sort of trips my triggers.

There's something there that I don't even want to know about him.

[jpgray]

47. Yep.

[Onceuponalife]

43. He was the same as always

nothing particularly assy about him tonight. Maher rocks. He's one of the rare talk hosts out there who actually tell the truth.

[OneGrassRoot]

45. Wasn't Coulter supposed to be on there?

as the third, and only two were there? I fell asleep and didn't see beyond the "How F*cked Are We" segment.

I thought he slapped T. Boone pretty well, even though he was there for a nonpartisan energy chat. Maher said something to the effect, "Isn't that hypocritical of you? Didn't you campaign heavily for 'oil man, Bush' over Gore, who would have worked to make us energy independent?"

I loved that. Pickens skirted that, of course. But Maher really called him out, in my opinion.

[B Calm]

46. He more or less told that T Boone Pickens he was a hypocrite!

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

48. So did the women on The View. Pickens was on and they questioned him about using a private jet.

[DesertRat]

49. I liked how he hammered Pickens for voting for McCain

[butterfly77]

57. I don't agree with him on everything but...

I like him because he is one who will say what I and many more are thinking..Things that should have been said for many years in this country.

[VOX]

61. He's not perfect, but he hits back, hard and on target, in times when being nice won't work...

Which, looking at the big picture, is a sad state of affairs. But that's the reality of it now. The right wing has dozens of blowhard talking heads; liberals have...well, you could count them on the fingers of one hand, maybe.

Maher doesn't walk on tiptoe, and for that, I can overlook his faults. Last night was no exception -- Follow the link below to the video to see Maher's "Ode to Goverment." Anyone who doesn't think every word is spot on, well, they're on the wrong message board.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=385&topic_id=281056&mesg_id=281056

[deaniac21]

63. PETA spokesman, what else needs to be said?

[AndrewP]

64. Exactly. That's why I like him.

He pisses people off. Good for him.

[deaniac21]

66. He's too much of a wuss to piss off that many people.

[Baikonour]

65. He's a narcissistic prick.

Albeit, a sometimes smart and funny one.

He wasn't that bad. I like Corey Booker, but he just kept repeating the same lines over and over. You can tell he's preparing for a serious political future.

And I can't stand that woman from CNBC.

[Cetacea]

68. I'll bet republicans thought so for sure. Read this:

Maher:

The thing is that endless variety only exists because Americans pay taxes to a government which maintains roads, irrigates fields, over sees the electrical grid and everything else but enables the modern American supermarket to carry forty seven varieties of frozen breakfast pastries.

Of course it's easy to tear government down. Ronald Reagan used to say the nine most terrifying words in the English language were "I'm from the government and I'm here to help". But that was before "I'm Sarah Palin, now show me the launch codes".

You know the stimulus package was attacked as typical tax and spend, you know like repairing bridges is left wing stuff. Ooh there the liberals go again. Always wanting to get across the river.

Folks, the people are the government. The first responders who put out your fires. That's your government. The ranger who shoos pedophiles out of the bathroom. The postman who delivers your porn. I mean how stupid is it when people say "Oh yeah that's all we need. The federal government telling Detroit how to make cars, or Wells Fargo how to run a bank. You want them to look like the Post Office?"

Yeah. Actually. You mean..you mean the place that takes a note in my hand in L.A. on Monday and gives it to my sister in Jersey on Wednesday for forty two cents? Well let me be the first to say I would be thrilled if America's health care system was anywhere near as functional as the Post Office.

The truth is, recent years have made me much more wary of government doing the opposite. Of stepping aside and letting unregulated private enterprise run things it is plainly too greedy to trust with, like Wall Street, like rebuilding Iraq. Like the way Republicans always frame the health care debate by saying health care decisions should be made by doctors and patients, not government bureaucrats. Leaving out the fact that health decisions aren't made by doctors, patients or bureaucrats. They're made by insurance companies.

Insurance companies. Which are a lot like hospital gowns. Chances are your ass isn't covered.