Kevin Marshall's America
Taking a cue from Congress, I've decided to combat a slight smell in the bathroom by cutting off my nose entirely.
If the WordPress plugin I acquired is working correctly – and it being me that’s probably not the case – that means when you visited this site, you saw the message noting my opposition to SOPA and PIPA (the respective Senate and Congressional anti-piracy bills).
SOPA and PIPA are supposed to protect intellectual property, but instead allow for an unprecedented level of censorship. Many of us have wondered aloud how a bill can pass through so many hands and encounter so many revisions and get it all so wrong. A simple explanation might evoke that old adage that a horse by committee becomes a camel, and besides, politicians are out of touch fuddy-duddies, right? But their staffers aren’t, so something is amiss.
What actually happens is that legislation like this is, both figuratively and almost literally, authored by the interested parties that lobby politicians to propose and pass them. In this case, it’s the entertainment industry. Their interest in combating piracy and other violations of intellectual property is not rooted in art and artists but in profits and excuses. They’re not making enough money, and in cases like the MPAA, they don’t want to address the real problems of the movie industry’s woes (a stunning drop in quality control and excessive movie prices that in many cases surpass the price of a concert ticket). It’s the same reason why The Mouse has been able to successfully extend copyright protection looooong past the life expectancy of the artist. Legislation like this doesn’t serve the interests of artists, but of the corporations that acquire the rights of dead ideas and work against the interests of future artists and the public as a whole.
As a result, we now have SOPA and PIPA: legislation that will do untold harm to free speech. Please note that I didn’t say “on the internet,” because we need to think of it as something more than a niche problem. Whether it’s a sign in a demonstration, a political view expressed in a town hall meeting, or something on a website, free speech is free speech. As Americans we have a responsibility to extend and extol its virtues and combat threats to it.
CLICK HERE to contact your representative and tell him/her that you won’t stand for any vote other than no. Your future and your ideals depend upon it.
Tomorrow night (Wednesday, January 17th) the weekly Comedy Open Mic formerly hosted at Flavour Cafe will relocate to its new temporary home right around the corner at Bat Shea’s (95 Ferry St.) in downtown Troy.
Bat Shea’s has kind enough to provide a temporary home after the regular location, Flavour Cafe, suffered a fire last week that will keep it closed for a couple months. While they rebuild, we’ll be providing the same great comedy with a wonderful atmosphere, delicious food (seriously), and drink specials ($1.50 Miller Lite and PBR).
Best of all, it’s FREE and you never know who will show up.
And of course, I’ll be there to do a few minutes of stand-up.
Sign-up is at 7:00pm.
See you there!
Comedian Eddie Brill, a veteran of the scene and the guy in charge of booking stand-up comedians for “The Late Show with David Letterman,” was profiled in a piece for the New York Times.
In response to criticisms that he only books acts that are ridiculously famous or white men from the Mid-West, Brill offered his critique of crazy dames who deign to get up and tell jokes:
Only one woman (Karen Rontowski) was booked in 2011. “There are a lot less female comics who are authentic,” Mr. Brill said. “I see a lot of female comics who to please an audience will act like men.”
Jessica Kirson, a comic who has performed on “The Tonight Show” several times but not on “Late Show,” responded: “What does that mean?” She added, “I like Eddie but the only way to make it as a female comic is to have strength and be assertive and confident.”
Look, Jessica honey doll sweetie cakes babe pie, here’s the thing: dames are just trying to be men up there! Right? Surely there’s a lack of authentic voices coming from female comics whereas it comes from male comics in spades.
From anecdotal experience I can dismiss that concept, because I find that while there’s more men doing stand-up locally, there’s a lot that are putting on an act. Even the acts Brill books are often going through very rigid, specific motions that have original material that you feel you’ve heard before. Is that honest?
What it comes down to, I fear, is that mindset still possessed by many veteran comics that women aren’t funny. It’s often cited, in fact, that John Belushi thought women weren’t funny and wasn’t shy about saying as much. But he also thought it was a good idea to speedball himself to death, so grains of salt and all that.
What I’m getting at is this: I’m sure Brill is a nice guy, just as sure as I am that he’ll insist he was taken out of context. But the idea that women are up there trying to act like men is intellectually offensive and downright untrue.
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Important stuff.
No, seriously.
The point of this segment and the stunt is a furtherance of Colbert’s message with his (now Jon’s) Super PAC: how the rules allow for all sorts of financial shenanigans in politics, how we got there, and why it’s important that we raise the issue. It’s funny, but also scary, how much truth there is here.
Video is after the jump.
I expect a lot of debate over whether this guy is crazy or simply playing it. My vote is for the latter. He’s too concise, specific, and absolutely dead on with his use of absurdity as satire for this to be crazy. Particularly the bit about ponies, which is actually almost verbatim the talking points heard for other programs pushed by politicians with a close association with certain special interests.
Well, okay, that might be true and he might still be a little crazy. But whether on purpose or accidental, it’s some of the most brilliant political satire I’ve seen.
NOTE: Randall Terry, seen at the end of the video, disowned his own son for being homosexual.
Watch the video in full. The whole thing is gold.
When the Penn State scandal broke several months ago and the depth of the cover-up was revealed, the cries of outrage were nearly drowned out by angry denials and gasps of disbelief. Residents of Happy Valley and Penn State fans throughout the country steadfastly refused to believe that Joe Paterno, head coach of forty-six years, would allow such a thing to happen under his watch. Further investigation and court documentation revealed the worst, or what we think is the worst. The Board of Trustees at Penn State fired Paterno, likely saving him from further revelations of impropriety.
The reason people were shocked is because Paterno has a previously unshakable reputation as a man of honor and integrity. He was a shining beacon in an ethically muddled NCAA. How exactly did he gain that reputation? Simple: because that’s what he and his handlers told people. Should that be enough? It is for most people, even though it shouldn’t be.
Did we really not know?
I was reminded of Paterno this morning when seeing reaction on Facebook to this week’s edition of the NPR program “This American Life,” which included an excerpt from writer and monologist Mike Daisey’s one-man show about Steve Jobs. The excerpt detailed the atrocious working conditions at Foxconn, the Chinese manufacturer responsible for making Apple products. Among the findings were crippling injuries, toxic exposure to unsafe chemicals, and children as young as twelve years old working at the plant.
The shock and dismay I saw expressed over the piece seemed genuine, just as it did with Paterno. Yet at least Penn State’s boosters had the excuse that they were not given any reason to suspect Paterno would help cover up pedophilia and child abuse. In the case of Apple and Chinese working conditions, though, there was plenty of precedence.
Did we really not know, or was (is) it just easier to pretend we didn’t?
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"You're coming with me."
The fact is if I become your nominee we will make the key test very simple – food stamps versus paychecks. Obama is the best food stamp president in American history. More people are on food stamps today because of Obama’s policies than ever in history. I would like to be the best paycheck president in American history.
Now there’s no neighborhood I know of in America where if you went around and asked people, would you rather your children had food stamps or paychecks, you wouldn’t end up with a majority saying they’d rather have a paycheck.
And so I’m prepared, if the NAACP invites me, I’ll go to their convention and talk about why the African American community should demand paychecks and not be satisfied with food stamps. And I’ll go to them and explain a brand new social security opportunity for young people, which would be particularly good for African American males because they are the group that gets the smallest return on social security because they have the shortest life span.
- Newt Gingrich, 1/5/2012
The arrogance in deigning tell the NAACP that black people should ask for jobs instead of food stamps is almost as astounding as the ignorance and borderline bigotry in the statement. Excessive hubris is never a more dangerous or reprehensible character trait than when it’s combined with (and exacerbated by) outright stupidity.
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In case you aren’t familiar, the Empire State Plaza Concourse is a cavernous corridor that allows State workers to traverse the entirety of the vast landscape of State government offices and agencies that Jon Hodgman from The Daily Show described as a “concrete shrine to Nelson Rockefeller’s vision of dehumanizing bureaucracy” (source). Or, if you prefer, it’s the post-modern version of that network of subterranean tunnels that housed the Morlocks from H.G. Wells’ “The Time Machine.”
As if it wasn’t strange enough already with its ridiculously high ceilings and everything from a miniature bus terminal to a gigantic McDonald’s combined with a high school cafeteria, an acquaintance of mine on Facebook (Kathleen Jordan) shared this notice that has been posted around areas where there’s constructions:
Where do we begin?
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There’s a new episode of the MANville podcast up!
CLICK HERE FOR MORE (MANvilleShow.com)
You can also find us on iTunes.
If that’s not enough Kevin Marshall Audio for you, don’t forget to check out my guest shot on this week’s edition of The Unpaid podcast!
Okay, firstly, start the video at the :18 second mark. I want you to get a load of the guy who gets a kiss on the head from the adorable girl sitting next to him but can’t be bothered to take his eyes off the image of himself on the JumboTron.
Then, a few seconds later, we get the awkward marriage proposal. While I feel awful for the guy, I also can’t help but wonder what he was thinking proposing to her at a college basketball game in a 3/4ths empty arena.
Also – and maybe I’m alone in this – but this is just the sort of thing I absolutely wouldn’t do at a public event. It’s not even a matter of potential for public embarrassment or shame. I just feel like something that momentous should either be a private moment shared by the two of you, or something shared with only those very closest to you. Again, no fault towards those that think otherwise, but that’s my two cents.
And I won’t ever become a viral video after someone says no.
STALK ME
