In honor of the start of Burning Man out in the desert somewhere, and the media's shameful treatment of Bernie Sanders, today the Nicole Sandler Show becomes Bernin' Man radio. Oh, and Joel Silberman joins in too!
A busy Tuesday show on tap with cartoonist Tom Tomorrow whose record-shattering Kickstarter campaign ends today; Susan Smith, president of the Democratic Progressive Caucus of FL responding to Eleanor Clift's offensive article on what Florida voters want; and GottaLaff joins me to talk last night's clown car cattle call and everything else. And we attempt to come up with a better description for the GOP acronym.
Welcome to today's stream-of-consciousness rant. Here's what happened on MSNBC this morning: Thomas Roberts was discussing the upcoming six (yay!) Democratic primary debates with a correspondent. Roberts then said, "Hillary will be debating nobody." The correspondent reminded him that Bernie Sanders is running. "Oh, but he's an Independent," said Roberts. 1. Bernie Sanders isn't "nobody." 2. Bernie has said repeatedly he's running as a Democrat. A "news" anchor should know that. Hell, I knew it! Why didn't Roberts? This was as demeaning as it was disrespectful to Bernie Sanders and to the Democratic primary process. Based on what I heard, Roberts appeared [...]
"Top Chef's" Tom Colicchio will be more visible now. No, no, you silly geese, not on Bravo, on-- wait for it-- MSNBC... as its first "food correspondent." He'll be popping up all over the place. You can read all about it here in the Los Angeles Times. Here's a taste (Pun intended... bygones.): "I think the next step is getting a little deeper than food as entertainment and looking more at the social issues around food. How it's produced. The effect it has on the environment. When we started talking about hunger in America, most people we tell the numbers [...]
Yay! Laffy's Big Road Trip was a complete success this year! (As opposed to other years.) Zion National Park was gorgeous, Bryce was spectacular, and our accommodations and dining experiences were great. The people in Utah, Nevada, and Arizona were nice as could be (well, except for that cop who pulled us over in Arizona for a law we'd never heard of-- the Move Over Law-- but at least he let us off with a warning... and turned out to be a fan of Mr. Laffy's show "Naked and Afraid"). Here's what wasn't gorgeous, spectacular, or great: Being stuck with CNN as [...]
U.S. Congressman Duncan Hunter, Republican Patriot from California, has no apparent Intelligence. In either lingual case. You see, according to the good and mad Representative, ISIL is now hopping willy nilly over the (sanz enough prophylactic measures for the Lipton Brigade and the lingering, desperate GOP pursers and hawkers) southern border. Says the news-breaker slash pol who just wants HIS country back, and will apparently ask us to suspend disbelief long enough to incorporate the latest science fiction into his tribe's 'news' cycle. Rachel Maddow chose this juicy bit of balderdash to highlight in Debunktion Junction Wednesday evening, a segment [...]
There is no more news. There's infotainment and speculation and opinion and lots of made-up shit all masquerading as "news," but make no mistake, the news has been canceled. Today's "news" casts on TV are anything but the objective, fact-based reports on the day's events they used to be. A Washington Post obituary of "60 Minutes" Creator Don Hewitt gets to the reason that the actual news can no longer be found on your television set: "60 Minutes" creator Don Hewitt, 86, who transformed television journalism by showing that news programs could generate money, and who helped make TV an [...]
Who will your Congressional representatives will be sitting with tonight? Methinks that more attention will be focused on who is sitting with whom than what President Obama is saying as he delivers his State of the Union address tonight. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing... Although I don't expect any great revelations from our president, I am heartened to learn that he will not endorse the idea of raising the age for Social Security or making cuts to Medicare, as his "deficit commission" recommended. We can expect lots of moving forward (lean forward?) talk. Perhaps those are the words [...]
I'm still stunned and angered by Keith Olbermann's surprise announcement at the end of his show Friday evening proclaiming that he "had been told" that evening's edition of "Countdown" would be his last. Although part of me is excited to see what he'll do next, I'll miss my nightly 8pm date with the man who speaks truth to power better than just about anyone else. I do believe January 21 is a date cursed. On Friday, I bemoaned the first anniversary of the Supreme Court's heinous ruling in Citizens United v. FEC which opened the floodgates for corporate donations to [...]