The Half Hour News Hour (vanity)

FreeRepublic | 02-19-07 | Alia

[Alia]

I've checked and seen nothing posted about the premier pilot of the 1/2 Hour News Hour on this forum.

I want more of this show. I laughed throughout.

The satire was crisp, delivery was very good.

The best thing about parodies and satires which grab at one's funny bone is that they are true and factual. The jabs delivered last night were true and factual. And Real.

I and my family enjoyed the 1/2 Hour News very much, and wish it were more than 1/2 hour long -- and covering the range of "news du jour".

How about you?

[Graybeard58]

lol~! Yes, I did post my personal opinion And I thought it was funny, too! ;> I broke a perfect record of zero "vanities", just this morning.

When I commented:

Personal opinion - Not funny.

I was not commenting on your article but expressing my own opinion about the show.

[Mamzelle]

LOvedit--and my favorite was the T-shirt guy!!

[lormand]

"Bless your knees!"

I went ahead and spent the extra dollars on the "gel" knee pads. It was worth the extra $10.

[Doogle]

.....the way I look at it is...anything to get the rats knickers in a bunch


Doogle

[DTogo]

Seems like Rush et. al. would make more money from a commercialized "Talk Radio" cable TV channel than from the "Ditto Cam" and such. Especially with late night (and weekend) re-runs of their daily broadcasts when they're not live on the air.

Hmmm, maybe I should present a business plan to a venture capitalist... or Rupert Murdoch...

[ncpatriot]

You articulated my idea a lot better than I did.

I have emailed a couple of talk show hosts. Maybe there is a market.

[ReleaseTheHounds]

I watched our "TIVO" of the show and I have to agree -- the T-Shirt guy was fine and the whole show was very good. And the people who complain about a laugh track -- I'm pretty sure this was done in front of a relatively small live audience (around 200 people maybe?). Didn't sound like a laugh track to me -- except you're not used to hearing people laugh at politically incorrect jokes or jokes aimed at leftist, liberal "progressive" slime-balls! That was the best part! And Rush's intro was terrific.

[ReleaseTheHounds]

I agree with your entire review... Having rewatched via TIVO, it was better the second time around and it didn't even sound like a laugh track (and I also noticed the audience pan both at the beginning and at the end). Good show... Will look forward to the next editions! Into my TIVO programming!

[bray]

Global warming guy was pretty funny.

[GoldwaterChick]

I heard a few calls to Rush (Roger Hedgcock) and the callers raved! Except for the guy who said he was a liberal and thought it was fun but FNC was the wrong venue for it--it should be on Fox--because "FNC is Fair and Balanced and this wasn't"! What a riot--that's FNC's claim--and the fact that a liberal buys it is priceless.

I hope it's re-played--I was laughing too much to hear it all! Lighten up and loosen up, folks.

[GoldwaterChick]

I LOVE Mallard Fillmore. The Philly Inq carried it for a few days but it's in the Wash Times every day. It probably goes over a lot of people's heads--mostly liberals, no doubt. I've been a mail subscriber for several years and it's worth 10 times it's 25 cent daily price.

But then I'm a grandmother and I love Rodney Dangerfield too. There, I said it. My son keeps telling me we need to have Tivo--but I'm electronically deprived--so if we aren't home for the next 1/2 Hour News--I'll tape it on my stone-age VCR. :)

[GoldwaterChick]

"except you're not used to hearing people laugh at politically incorrect jokes, or jokes aimed at leftist, liberal "progressive" slime-balls!. That was the best part!"

Right on ReleaseTheHounds, you absolutely nailed it. Those ACLU spots were terrific--and so true they must have really hurt.

Now that 24 is over I can catch up!

[Alia]

It's not that people aren't available to write a better show. It's that Fox has chosen not to write a better show because they're afraid that if they did, people like you would be utterly BEFUDDLED by it and wouldn't watch it.

You got proof of this?

I didn't think so.

You are pushing an agenda, liberal style. In lieu of facts, you ad hominem. And consider your ego-central self as superior, when in fact, bullying is more your style.

You sound just like a liberal, yarkstick. They too, always know what is "best" for people.. and because "people are too stupid" to know what they want, need, like or don't like.

There are some sharp posters in this thread -- some who liked the show, some who had issues with the show.

But the silliest, most inane poster of this thread, is you.

Check your premises: I think you've confused insults with "sharp and intelligent".

Furthermore, and lastly while you think the blogs you've cited are A-1, others might not.

It's one thing to write one or two "brilliant" blog items or columns, it's another to churn out that brilliance day after day after day.

It's partly why Rush is a winner -- he has a fine and provable track record of wins. Dittos, Joel Surnow. He too has a successful track record.

You don't.

Sleep on it.

[Alia]

Watching the show was a definite "shwang" experience. :)

I think back to the late 70s in San Francisco when Matt Goering was just a cartoonist peddling his stuff to locals. I still have some. And the first time I was given a P.J. O'Rourke screed ("She has a beautiful... means ...."). Late 70s, it was deliciously anti-PC-establishment material in San Francisco, even then.

[Yardstick]

You got proof of this?

Of course not. It's just a working theory. But it has the unique virtue of having been validated by none other than you on this very thread. YOU were the one who failed to see IowaHawk's humor, just as the theory predicts.

In lieu of facts, you ad hominem.

There are no facts here, only opinions and speculation. You're asserting something too, you know -- namely that the show is funny -- but you no more have "facts" to prove it than I do. I'm just asserting a contrary opinion and backing it up with the best evidence available, which, ironically, you have provided.

I'll will grant you, though, that my line about the nap was a little on the snotty side, and I will retract it. In fact I'll even apologize for it (I regretted it as soon as I hit the "post" button). Ahem...sorry for saying you might need a nap to understand my point.

Also, I misidentified you as a grandpa rather than a grandma, which you might have taken offense to. Sorry about that, too.

Now then, continuing on...

You sound just like a liberal, yarkstick.

No, I sound like a conservative who's frustrated that our side fails, again and again and again, to go out into the culture war fully equipped for battle. The libs are sharp and we need to be sharp too if we're going to beat them.

I think you've confused insults with "sharp and intelligent".

Like it or not, the name of the game with this kind of comedy is to be sharp, and yes insulting, with the point of drawing blood (metaphorically speaking of course) from your opponent. This is accomplished with subtlety, with perceptiveness, with a finely calibrated sense of irony. Subtle things, in other words. You have to be smart about it.

Bottom line: I want to see conservatism win, and dopey writing on a show like this ain't gonna help make that happen.

Furthermore, and lastly while you think the blogs you've cited are A-1, others might not.

Of course, but IowaHawk is widely recognised as one of the best in the blogosphere when it comes to political parody. As I said earlier, even the libs recognize this. They hate IowaHawk, because he's good.

It's one thing to write one or two "brilliant" blog items or columns, it's another to churn out that brilliance day after day after day.

1) Most bloggers turn out stuff day after day. The blogosphere is almost defined by its fast pace. IowaHawk's reputation is based on a paper trail of pitch-perfect parody that's a mile long.

2) Those promo clips for the FOX show were the best stuff they had. That was their opeing blitz, the cream of the cream of months of pre-production writing and skunkworking. They rolled out their best, and it was not particularly good. It'll be interesting to see whether having to crank it out day after day helps them or hurts them. I hope they get better at it -- and I'd say they will -- because I don't want this show to be an albatross around conservatism's neck.

It's partly why Rush is a winner -- he has a fine and provable track record of wins.

Absolutely.

Dittos, Joel Surnow. He too has a successful track record.

A successful track record doing an action show.

Sleep on it.

Got my pillow fluffed up and ready to go.

Nighty night!

[LikeLight]

The writers know they can't be subtle because their audience, which is made up of people like you, won't get it. And so the show sucks.

Nailed it. It was like all the potential to be funny was there, but it kept being so utterly lame instead.

[nutmeg]

FoxFan ping!

Please FReepmail me if you want on or off my FoxFan list. *Warning: This can be a high-volume ping list at times.

[duckln]

Do you need cable to watch it?

[pookie18]

Yes, it's on the FoxNews Channel as opposed to the Fox network. If the pilot is picked up, maybe the network would reconsider airing it.

[Alia]

YOU were the one who failed to see IowaHawk's humor, just as the theory predicts.

You thought IowaHawk's humor was top of the line. It really wasn't. I've read IowaHawk's stuff on the John Edwards Bloggers. What made it work was how righteously snotty it was. His self-parody in what you linked to, just simply, wasn't funny; it tried way too hard. And not comparable to the 1/2 News Hour Show.

And because I/others didn't find it funny, you think this proves a negative. It doesn't.

I don't think Will Ferrell is funny, and that's how the link to IowaHawk came across -- as a Will Ferrell wanna be.

When you and Iowahawk get your work funded and produced on Foxnews, come back and ask me then what I thought.

You continue to play bait and switch games.

You want a comedy show which makes liberals *hate*. As tho that's gonna wake them up? Make them hate, and you get happy. No. And recent elections prove you dead wrong.

Surnow in this pilot has laid out a tenor. You don't think that tenor is mean enough. It's his show. You didn't like it. In order to prove your point you use false premises to argue in support of your theory of humor. And, that "people like me" are just too stupid to get it. Of course, you asserted this after vaunting a FOX conspiracy.

You are your own comedy show, Yardstick.

Most the people on this thread enjoyed Surnow's first pilot. And that makes you so upset, because me/they are too stupid to *get* the humor you find funny.

You've got issues. You feel like a loser, you act like a loser, and you want everyone to feel just like you.

Too bad!