Posted on 12/03/2002 11:10:47 AM PST by TomAdkinsCC
Al Gore Is Funny, Bill Maher Isn't by Tom Adkins
From beyond their involuntary retirement, Bill Maher and Al Gore resurfaced last week, dropping into various late night talk shows, apparently galloping down the comeback trail. Show after show, Gore was treated to guffaws and belly laughs. Maher's punchlines were met with cold silence. Why? Because Maher, the sultan of cynicism, is no longer funny. And Gore, once a heartbeat away from leading the free world, is hilarious. It was sorta sad. Once, Gore was VPOTUS. Maher had a big TV show. Now, they are hawking books, trying to resuscitate flopping careers.
How the mighty have fallen. And they can't get up.
Good comedy is always rooted in the truth. Not every comedian knows it, but the good ones always do. Check out Jay Leno: ”Democratic leader Tom Daschle has been whining all over TV, saying that Rush Limbaugh and other talk show hosts have been inciting violence against Democrats. Which is illegal you know, attacking an endangered species.”
Badda Bing! Leno simply connected obvious analogies, tossed in some irony, and out came the punchline, a devastating insight to the self-destructing Democrat party.
Maher fell hard from his lofty perch, atop what was once inarguably the hippest political show. He was a scathing cynic in an age of a President who lied, cheated, perjured and frankly laughed about getting away with it. And that's why everyone liked him. Maher's original show invited a popular entertainer of some sort with 2 or 3 sharp political guests who carried the show, while Maher sniped from the sidelines. But when he went Hollywood, the guest ratio flipped to 3 boobs and maybe one politico. Maher believed he could wade into the deep end of political waters after splish-splashing in the shallow end. The deeper he got, the more he drowned in his own cynicism. When America suffered a real crisis, we discovered the difference between smarmy wit and solid political insight, and Maher paid the toll.
And maybe, so did Al Gore. His scripted one-liners are funny only because he is a political jackass. His election was marked by a sad treat of lying, boasting, and an almost communist attack upon American business. While his Florida fiasco was hysterically embraced by liberals, the rest of the nation turned away in disgust. If Gore ran against Bush today, he'd get about 25% of the vote. But as long as he pokes fun of his incompetence, he's pretty funny.
Now that Bush is in charge, America has wiped our collective brow in great relief. In a real crisis, our perspective changed. We prefer adults. Leaders. We don't want fools. We view Al Gore with pathos usually reserved for that deli clerk who's bombing on Open Mike Nite at the dumpy comedy club you accidentally stumbled into after the bachelor party.
But Maher and Gore haven't changed. The world changed. And political comedy flows on the winds of change. Lenny Bruce was gritty when the world was tired of fluffy. Steve Martin was silly when the world was tired of gritty. Sam Kinison was gutter filthy when the world started peeking into daddy's bottom drawer. All those eras were defined by political events. Watergate. Vietnam. Impeachment.
Listening to Gore and Maher is like listening to Jefferson Airplane. Nostalgic perhaps, but the boogiemen are gone and the discredited philosophy is long discarded. You can find their albums for $2.99 in used record bins. Sure, you can fill a coffeehouse or a voting booth with a bunch of old hippies. But for those whose careers rely upon an era, they must change or die with the times. CNN lost 31% of its viewers last year. Phil Donahue dragged his old giddy liberalism down from the attic and dead-weighted MSNBC into a 43% drop. Gore's career is hilarious. Maher's comedy isn't. Times they are a-changin'.
If good comedy has its roots in the truth, great comedy is chained and anchored to the truth. Politically, Maher was over his head. Away from the safety of a feathered Senate seat, so is Gore. Perfectly illustrating the Peter Principle, both men graduated to a station noticeably above their competence. And in the world of entertainment, you can count on one thing: comedians will pounce upon public figures who have reached that level of obvious ineptitude. Last week, David Letterman offered this during his "Top Ten Signs That Bush Is Getting Cocky": "On CNN, referred to Tom Daschle as his 'bitch.'"
Badda Bing, Tommy… =============================== Tom Adkins is the publisher of CommonConservative.com, and can be seen on FoxNews, CNN, CN8. To contact: TomAdkinsCC@aol.com
They both are not funny.... but are bitter, sour, depressing turd-scoopers!
Unfortunately, eventually he's going to just be annoying, like the Party bore we can't wait to avoid.
LOL! Spot on!
Huh?
Maybe on a projection TV but not in any other shape, fashion or format.
LOL... I hated him at first, but then learned to love him. Remember: "See this. It's SAND. You know what it's going to be a hundred years from now? IT'S GONNA BE SAND!!!"
Or, how 'bout: "Ever watch those poor, starving children on TV. I always think, Gee, you'd think one of the cameramen could give that kid a sandwich..."
Yes, obnoxious he was. Tasteless, too. But there was always a certain element of truth in his comedy...
And the symbol of the Democrap party is....
Good comedy is always rooted in the truth. Not every comedian knows it, but the good ones always do. Check out Jay Leno: ”Democratic leader Tom Daschle has been whining all over TV, saying that Rush Limbaugh and other talk show hosts have been inciting violence against Democrats. Which is illegal you know, attacking an endangered species.”Badda Bing! Leno simply connected obvious analogies, tossed in some irony, and out came the punchline, a devastating insight to the self-destructing Democrat party.
Now that Bush is in charge, America has wiped our collective brow in great relief. In a real crisis, our perspective changed. We prefer adults. Leaders. We don't want fools. We view Al Gore with pathos usually reserved for that deli clerk who's bombing on Open Mike Nite at the dumpy comedy club you accidentally stumbled into after the bachelor party.
Pretty good short read, folks ! 
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