From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
End of a Late Night Era
There have been gazillions of words written "Late-ly" (Get it? Get it?) about the impact of David Letterman on late-night comedy. They're beautifully-written, heartfelt tributes that try to sum up Dave's brilliance. It's a near-impossible task, though, because outside of the moment itself, reading an explanation of why someone is funny versus why someone isn't is actually pretty tedious. It all boils down to, in the immortal words of Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart: "I know it when I see it."
For me, this bit is the essence of David Letterman. When I watched it again last night, I was reminded that there are these little muscles in the back of my head that get tugged and pulled and stretched on the rare occasion when I'm laughing so hard that I'm gasping for breath---a reminder of what it means to laugh 'til it hurts. This is Dave with the late, great Larry Bud Melman (aka Calvert DeForest):
Whether he was springboarding onto wall of Velcro, dropping stuff off a five-story building or making John McCain rue the day he blew him off, Letterman always respected the late-night prime directive: send us to bed with a smile on our face, even if we had a shitty day.
Thanks, Dave. Good luck, Stephen.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, May 20, 2015
Note: [Sniff Sniff] I sense a three-day weekend nearby. Smells like corn on the cob, steak and freedom pie. Not necessarily in that order. Let us proceed with caution….
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10 days 'til the Native American
Culture Festival in Tennessee!!!
By the Numbers:
Days 'til the vote on same-sex marriage in Ireland:
2
Days 'til the
Native American Culture Festival at Sycamore Shoals State Historic Area in Tennessee:
10
Number of biker-gang idiot halfwits who were arrested in Waco for engaging in organized crime during the gun battle there (on The Sabbath, no less!):
170
Cost of gun violence last year, including law enforcement and medical care:
$229 billion
Cost of obesity:
$224 billion
(Source: Pacific Institute analysis)
Estimate number of air travelers this summer, up 4.5% from last summer:
222 million
(Source:
The Week)
Rank of Chinese, Mexican and Italian among ethnic foods we order most at restaurants:
#1, #2, #3
(Source:
Parade)
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 180 (including 4 Kings of the East and 1 awkward end-times moment). Soul Protection Factor 8 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Happy 107th birthday, Jimmy Stewart…hopefully playing with Beau in the hereafter…
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CHEERS to turning the Super PAC money spigot clockwise. Don’t tell anybody I wrote this and posted it on the internet (I don’t want to get in trouble!), but I'm starting to warm up to the campaign of one Hillary Rodham Clinton. She's sounding all the right notes during her extended listening tour, including this minor little announcement:
The right-wing nutballs are,
as always, keepin' it classy.
"I will do everything I can do to appoint Supreme Court justices who will protect the right to vote and not the right of billionaires to buy elections," Clinton told about 50 supporters at a house party in Iowa.
While Clinton has previously said she would support a constitutional amendment overturning the 2010 decision known as Citizens United, she has not previously said publicly that she would use the ruling as a benchmark for nominating justices. She added Monday she is consulting with legal experts about other ways the court's ruling in the case could be trumped.
I'm still dating Bernie. But the night is young.
JEERS to hostile takeovers. So much for the concept of local control in Texas. Governor Butthead Abbott just signed a law passed by the legislature that strips communities of their power to ban fracking because of health or environmental damage:
Not anymore.
“By signing HB40 into law, Governor Abbott just declared that industry profits are more important than our health, our homes and our kids,” said Adam Briggle, President of the Denton Drilling Awareness Group and a leader in the Frack Free Denton effort. He continued, “The letter of Texas law now says no city can ‘effectively prevent an oil and gas operation from occurring’, no matter the threat to families’ health and safety or damage to private property.“
But Governor Abbott said people should look on the bright side: with all the earthquakes caused by fracking, pretty soon every Texan will go to sleep at night in their very own vibrating bed.
JEERS to faulty predictions. On May 20, 1926, Thomas Edison said Americans would always prefer silent movies over talkies. Great inventor. Terrible psychic.
CHEERS to givin' us that new-time religion. Two major events will occur simultaneously in Indiana on July 1: the state's new "Religious Freedom Restoration Act" will go into effect, and the First Church of Cannabis will have its first service, complete with plumes of pot smoke. And won't that be fun:
I believe! I believe!
“It’s going to be a standard service,” Bill Levin, the group’s leader and self-proclaimed “Grand Poohba and Minister of Love,” told ThinkProgress. He explained the ceremony will last around 45 minutes, complete with music and teachings, but will conclude with an unusual benediction: “At the end of the service, we will enjoy cannabis, because it’s how we enjoy life.”
Recreational marijuana is, of course, illegal in Indiana. But Levin believes the service will be allowed under the state’s new version of the Religious Freedom and Restoration Act (RFRA), which reaffirmed and arguably expanded existing legal protections for religious groups. [… ] “The religious freedom law is, if you have a religion, the government will not impede upon your right for that religion,” Levin, a longtime advocate for the legalization of marijuana, told MSNBC. “And as far as I’m concerned, I have a religion [where I] religiously smoke cannabis and I celebrate life.” […]
He added that he doesn’t expect the service to be impeded, but if he gets legal pushback, he’s willing to muster a “team of lawyers” to fight for his new religion’s freedoms.
Twist up a fat one and stay tuned.
JEERS to the Frank Burns of New Jersey. Another sign that Chris Christie is getting ready to become a candidate for president: he's playing the be-afraid-be-very-afraid card. The money quote, which the Founding Fathers would be appalled by: "You can't enjoy your civil liberties if you're in a coffin. No, but at least you can enjoy a little peace and quiet from the yammerings of Chris Christie.
JEERS to moving day in Dixie. Li'l Civil War nugget: on May 20, 1861, the racist Confederate Congress agreed to pack its bags and move the capital from Montgomery, Alabama to Richmond, Virginia. I believe a similar event would take place 51 years later with the deck chairs on the Titanic.
CHEERS to FAIL Fail. Yesterday Daily Kos writer and radio host (you
do listen to
Kagro in the Morning, right?) David Waldman got notified that Pinterest had shut down his now-legendary "Gun FAIL" board showing just how disgustingly-often gun mishaps occur. That's the bad news. The
good news is, Pinterest quickly restored David's account, but not before he got some
primo national publicity over the brouhaha:
Waldman started searching the Internet for statistics on how many accidental gun deaths occurred in the United States each year; he would add the victims’ stories and pictures to put a face on this problem. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated that roughly 60 people below the age of 15 were accidentally shot and killed yearly, but Waldman started to get the sense that this figure was much higher.
Waldman said he has never been an advocate for the government to either confiscate weapons or limit the types of weapons one can purchase---he just wants to raise awareness of the possible dangers. “If you have them, these are the sorts of things that could happen if you’re not extremely careful and even if you are,” he said.
Pinterest was vague on why David's account got disappeared and then restored. This may or may not explain it, but my account here at Daily Kos usually goes dark when my cleaning lady needs to plug in the vacuum cleaner. (I keep telling her, use the neighbor's socket! [
Sigh] Nonagenarians and their "selective hearing"….)
CHEERS to the Energizer Diva. Hold on to your feather boas, boomers, this may make your bones feel a little creaky: Cher turns 69 today. But she's wearing it well, I think. She doesn’t look a day past her seventh farewell tour.
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Ten years ago in C&J: May 20, 2005
JEERS to flawed firsts. In over 4 years at the helm, George W. Bush has never vetoed a bill that arrived at his desk. So what does he promise to veto first? Why, scientific progress, of course. No surprise there...when was the last time you saw a stem cell in a voting booth?
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And just one more…
CHEERS to life imitating art. Over the weekend we saw this Close to Home cartoon by the great John McPherson in the comics section of our local paper:
And right on cue, yesterday we saw this on twitter from the real world:
I believe in modern-day political parlance, that's called "pulling a Jeb."
Have a pleasant Wednesday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
Mad Max: Fury Road director George Miller has announced there will be a sequel to his latest revisiting of the apocalyptic world. "The second one is called Mad Max: The C&J Kiddie Pool."
---Access Hollywood
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