Scott Pinsker: CBS's Decision to Leave Colbert On the Air Even Though He's Cancelled Puts Them In a Stinky Howard-Stern Hole

Scott Pinsker recalls that Stern announced he was quitting terrestrial radio in 2004, but remained on the air through 2005.

He used this time to bash the station he was still employed by and broadcasting from.

After discussing Stern's descent into farty irrelevance, Pinsker writes:

Stern's audience is a pitiful sliver of what it once was.
And eventually, that'll be Stephen Colbert's fate, too. But don't focus on that yet: The important part is what happened after Stern announced he'd be leaving terrestrial radio (Oct. 6, 2004) but before he actually left on Dec. 16, 2005.
Stern spent much of his final months on terrestrial radio hyping up how awesome his new satellite radio show was gonna be (often by throwing shade at traditional radio). It led to a 43-page CBS lawsuit for "[misappropriating] millions of dollars' worth of CBS Radio air time for his own financial benefit." (The lawsuit was later settled, with Sirius paying CBS Radio a few million bucks, while also receiving rights to rebroadcast Stern's old radio tapes.)
In retrospect, nobody at CBS should've been surprised: Of course Stern was gonna hype up his move to satellite! His new financial model depended on it! (Indeed, Stern later sued Sirius XM -- and lost -- when he demanded a payment of $300 million for the new subscribers gained via the Sirius-XM merger.)

Indeed, Colbert is already doing this, one single day after he was told he was cancelled.

He's already priming his small audience for whatever political talk show he's planning next, whether it's a podcast or an MSNBC gig called Maddow's Doppleganger.

For the next ten months, it's going to be little but Colbert telling Trump "f*** you," and, as he nears the end of the ten months, telling CBS, Paramount, and SkyDance "f*** you."

CBS late night host Stephen Colbert didn't mince any words Monday night about his show's cancellation, telling the president off in coarse fashion to audience cheers.
During the opening monologue of "The Late Show," Colbert dished on what led to CBS' decision to end his show and gave President Donald Trump a few jabs, joking that he won't be holding back now that his show's on borrowed time.
"And now for the next ten months, the gloves are off," he said, "I can finally speak unvarnished truth to power, and say what I really think about Donald Trump starting right now. I don't care for him."

I think he's being ironic. I sure hope he's not so deluded to think that he's previously been a professional and avoided making his hyperpartisan feelings public.

Elsewhere, Colbert fired back at Trump for celebrating his show's cancellation.
"I absolutely love that Colbert got fired," Trump wrote on Truth Social Thursday night. "His talent was even less than his ratings. I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next. Has even less talent than Colbert! Greg Gutfeld is better than all of them combined, including the Moron on NBC who ruined the once great Tonight Show."
"How dare you, sir?" Colbert responded on-air. "Would an untalented man be able to compose the following satirical witticism? Go f--- yourself."
The liberal audience cheered loudly in response.

He's previewing his podcast or MSNBC show, of course. When he starts his podcast or MSNBC show, he'll have a much smaller budget and a smaller audience. But he needs to really excite that small audience so that they follow him into his next demented venture.

This is why I said that CBS would find a way to get rid of Colbert early. Both parties will claim that the decision to end the show early is "mutual," but it will in fact be caused by Colbert hate-casting to his small core of actual fans to ready them to pay $20 a month for his podcast, while making his show almost entirely unwatchable except for the 10,000 mental cases in the country willing to pay actual money to watch Stephen Colbert.

MXMNews digests a paywalled PJ Media essay by Brandon Morse.

Although he was at first rewarded for pandering to Trump-deranged lefties who needed their lunatic hatreds validated, his fortunes quickly turned.

All of that changed, Morse argues, when Donald Trump was elected in 2016. That moment "broke" Colbert. "He got caught up in the Trump Derangement Syndrome," Morse wrote, likening the shift to "a grown toddler... thrashing around." It was a profitable tantrum--initially. Colbert surged in ratings, surpassing Jimmy Fallon, and solidified his identity as late-night TV's chief anti-Trump spokesman. One infamous lowlight came when he called Trump "Putin's c**k holster"--a moment that Morse rightly highlighted as grotesque and illustrative of the descent into hyperpartisan theatrics.
But as the Trump presidency gave way to Joe Biden's, the ratings began to nosedive. Morse argues that Colbert's unwillingness to pivot cost him his audience. "As dissatisfaction with the [Biden] administration grew," Morse wrote, "its cheerleaders began losing popularity alongside it." Viewership cratered once President Trump returned to the political stage, not as a media punching bag, but as a resilient contender demonstrating the glaring incompetence of Democrat rule.
Morse raises the provocative but fair question: "What would Colbert have been without Donald Trump?" Had he chosen a more moderate, inclusive comedic path, he might have evolved into a modern-day Carson or Leno. Instead, Morse concludes, Colbert "jump[ed] onto a political trend that paid off at first, but ultimately became divisive and unpopular."

I disagree. I never thought Colbert was funny. He was funny-ish on Strangers with Candy. But that show was basically the same joke told over and over. Yes, it was a good joke, and I enjoyed it for the first season. But it was just one joke. It can't last.

So yes, Stephen Colbert did have one funny joke in him. I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

Emily Jashinski talked about this situation. She points out that network television talk shows used to be intended for a mass audience.

But Colbert and the rest of the late night no-ratings punks pursued a different audience: a micro audience. There's a reason for that; narrowcasting to a small, select group makes that group feel special and valued, and will be more loyal. Kind of like how people love small unknown bands until they find broader appeal, in which case they've "sold out" and no one likes them anymore (except for the millions of new fans).

I'm pursuing a similar strategy, tailoring my message to the small but passionate group of readers who understand that JackStraw is a dirty drug addict homeless Sea Hobo and garrett is so gay he drives the ghost of Jm J. Bullock to haunt the Grindr servers texting eerie homophobic slurs.

But obviously, you cannot pursue this micro-targeted strategy while collecting a salary of $15-20 million per year and paying $100 million per year on a writing staff of 21 people plus something like a hundred crew (camera men, lighting, makeup and hair, publicity, etc., etc.)

If you want to micro-target, your budget must be micro-sized.

And yet all of the late night "comedy" clowns have pursued a smaller and smaller segment of the audience while spending $100 million per year or more.

Adam Carolla talks about this complete disconnect between payroll and potential audience. He points out that Greg Gutfeld's show is "lean and mean" with no writers room -- I think he's wrong about that, I think Gutfeld has a handful of writers -- and no dedicated studio. (They just re-decorate The Five's studio every day.)

And yet Gutfeld's ratings are much better than Colbert's, with a tiny budget to match Gutfeld's tiny stature. (Got 'im!)

It's just incredible that they all pursued the same strategy of guaranteed failure, and even more incredible that the "suits" who are supposed to be sober, competent professionals permitted them to do so or even encouraged them to do so -- that's how strong corporate media Trump derangement is.

Late night used to be a cash-cow for the networks -- the shows were cheap-ish despite being on most weeknights of the year, but brought in big ratings. That's why there was such drama over the Leno-Letterman struggle and the Leno-Conan putsch. And why CBS was willing to break the bank to give Letterman whatever he wanted. Just to get a piece of that late night income stream.

Remember when late night pulled in such good ratings that NBC launched a show at the unheard-of timeslot of 12:30? The old Letterman slot? And then CBS followed with Craig Ferguson?

And then they colonized the 1:30 am slot as well with Carson Daly and other late, late night hosts?

But now nobody is watching.

If NBC decided to drop Jimmy Fallon from the Tonight Show and seek a new host: Would you even care?

No, you wouldn't.

In past years people would follow the news about late night hirings and firings.

No one cares about this nonsense any longer.

I saw a video by a YouTuber called Captain Midnight who states the obvious: This isn't about late night television. Late night tv is just the canary in the coalmine, the first to die.

Yes, late night television is going away. When it all shakes out, all of the current "comedy" hosts will be fired. All networks will abandon original programming in these timeslots except for one. Probably NBC, because they have such a longstanding corporate commitment to late night programming. They've been doing the Tonight Show since the 1950s. And that single show will post meh ratings and be borderline profitable as long as they keep the budgets low and have no competition from other channels to split the small audience.

Ed Morrissey quotes from a NYT article about the death of Regime "Comedy:"

"The Late Show," a fixture of the network for over three decades, was racking up losses of tens of millions of dollars a year, and the gap was growing fast, according to two people familiar with the show's finances. Like other late-night shows before it, "The Late Show" was canceled when the network could not figure how to make the finances work in an entertainment world increasingly dominated by streaming.
So as CBS executives mapped out the schedule and budget for next year, George Cheeks, CBS's president, decided in recent weeks that the network couldn't take those losses any more, the two people said. Mr. Colbert learned of the decision on Wednesday night. Shari Redstone, the controlling shareholder of Paramount, CBS's parent company, learned about it on Thursday, according to two other people.
...
Over the past couple of years, many of the surviving late-night shows cut their budgets. Network late-night shows now generally produce four new episodes a week, down from five, in an attempt to save money. "Late Night With Seth Meyers" now frequently tapes two episodes on Mondays to limit filming to three days a week.
"The Late Show" began losing money at least three years ago, two people familiar with the finances said. Like "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon" on NBC, it cost more than $100 million a year to produce. CBS executives weighed the possibility of trying to find ways to sharply reduce its budget but, amid the mounting losses, concluded that there was not a viable path to profitability, one of the people said.

But it's not just about late night. All of television is collapsing. This is about the networks. Prime time is going to be contracted, maybe just 8pm to 10pm, the way Fox used to do it when they were just starting out, with a 10pm news cast or some kind of cheap syndicated tv shows. Eventually someone will start running Korean soap operas at 11:30, paying peanuts for the license rights.

And then little by little, the networks will just wither. I don't think they'll go away completely, but they'll be so unimportant that no one bothers talking about them any longer.

Even Andrew Breitbart will just get bored of gloating in heaven, and then he'll move on.

Could this have been avoided? Could network TV have saved itself by focusing on a mass, not micro, audience? Avoiding divisive hard-left extremist political messaging?

I don't know. Has anyone noticed, as I do a lot, that there are very few shows even made any more that have a neutral gender skew? There used to be. There used to be a lot of shows that men and women (and even kids) could agree on: broad, light comedies, police procedurals, etc.

Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?

Almost now every entertainment is atomized and made for one highly-specific target audience. Shows no longer seem interested in attracting a broad audience, only a loyal micro-audience.

And I think this is a real driver of division and toxicity in our society. We just don't enjoy the same things any longer. We have less and less in common.

And I can't say that's the TV executives' fault, because we've all collectively decided that it's not worth it to watch a broadly-appealing, but kinda bland, entertainment with our spouses and children, but that we'd all rather just retreat into separate rooms to watch individually-tailored fare on the computer or TV.

Posted by: Ace at 02:32 PM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 Ozzy Osborne is mort

Posted by: kallisto at July 22, 2025 02:32 PM (wIvDP)

2 Waah, plenty of OPM to keep Colbert on the air!

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1) at July 22, 2025 02:32 PM (tT6L1)

3 Stinky Howard Stern hole?

Goodbye appetite.

Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 02:33 PM (/pbrl)

4 I guess it was kind if on topic, he must have been on Colbert at some pont?
Definitely on Stern (piss be upon him)

Posted by: kallisto at July 22, 2025 02:34 PM (wIvDP)

5 It's just incredible that they all pursued the same strategy of guaranteed failure, and even more incredible that the "suits" who are supposed to be sober, competent professionals permitted them to do so or even encouraged them to do so -- that's how strong corporate media Trump derangement is.

========

What if I asserted, without evidence, that there was federal jawboning and even federal grants involved in this decision making process?

Would I be laughed out of the room?

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:34 PM (GBKbO)

6 @3

>>Stinky Howard Stern hole? Goodbye appetite.

I bet I can get an AI to write a thousand words on that subject.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 02:35 PM (XV/Pl)

7 Well, they're not all that smart. Any of them.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 02:35 PM (N1DT3)

8 I have never seen any episode or outtake or bit from Steve Colbert, and I plan on keeping it that way.

Posted by: Fuck Steve Colbert at July 22, 2025 02:35 PM (rqga2)

9 >>>8 I have never seen any episode or outtake or bit from Steve Colbert, and I plan on keeping it that way.

LIE! You've definitely seen "the Vax-Scene."

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:36 PM (KRtlO)

10 Could this have been avoided? Could network TV have saved itself by focusing on a mass, not micro, audience? Avoiding divisive hard-left extremist political messaging?

========

At best, I think they could have slowed the process.

But once it was possible to target to micro-targeted audiences through the internet, the writing was on the wall.

It just takes a while for institutions to fail, even when they're actively shooting themselves in the head.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:36 PM (GBKbO)

11 But it's not just about late night. All of television is collapsing. This is about the networks.

Unless you're watching some live event which, for some reason, isn't being streamed somewhere or you're an older boomer, who actually watches broadcast TV?

Posted by: I used to have a different nic at July 22, 2025 02:36 PM (ExV1e)

12
Eff Colbert over. Pull the plug on his show and take him off the air next week. Run Captain Kangaroo episodes in its time slot until next May.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 02:36 PM (xG4kz)

13 You don't think there was -taxpayer money-funding the efforts behind these shows do you? Because that would be crazy.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 02:36 PM (9/ad+)

14 I think he's being ironic. I sure hope he's not so deluded to think that he's previously been a professional and avoided making his hyperpartisan feelings public.
_______
Disagree. I think you're underrating just how delusional and lacking is self-awareness these guys are. These are people who really think NPR's news coverage is "straight down the middle".

Posted by: Eeyore at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (od0dV)

15 Almost now every entertainment is atomized and made for one highly-specific target audience. Shows no longer seem interested in attracting a broad audience, only a loyal micro-audience.

=======

Even loyal micro-audiences that don't exist.

Which is weird.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (GBKbO)

16 I like Gutfeld's show.
Looking forward to Greg making fun of Colbert like he did with Stelter.

Posted by: redridinghood at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (NpAcC)

17 "And now for the next ten months, the gloves are off," he said, "I can finally speak unvarnished truth to power, and say what I really think about Donald Trump starting right now. I don't care for him."

How is this any different that what he was already doing?

Posted by: Mister Scott (Formerly GWS) at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (e5NfL)

18 >>>Unless you're watching some live event which, for some reason, isn't being streamed somewhere or you're an older boomer, who actually watches broadcast TV?

and live events are more and more being simulcast on streaming. Amazon now has Thursday Night Football and a playoff game, don't they?

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (KRtlO)

19 And if taxpayer money was funding them, why would they go off the air just around the time it was certain the taxpayer funding had dried up? It doesn't make sense.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (9/ad+)

20 >>>, but that we'd all rather just retreat into separate rooms to watch individually-tailored fare on the computer or TV.

or just scroll endlessly on your phones

Posted by: brak at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (jGJov)

21 >>>Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?

Not every chick is into busty lesbian porn.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (i24o9)

22 ... Even Though He's Cancelled Puts Them In a Stinky Howard-Stern Ass Hole

-------------

Suggested minor addition.

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (z/usA)

23 Colbert's schtick to me was cozying up to the camera, and saying "Here's a joke! It's a HILARIOUS joke! It's the funniest joke you've heard in a long time! You'll laugh and laugh! " "Wasn't that great?? Oh, it wasn't funny? THAT'S THE JOKE! That it ISN'T funny! Hahahahaha! It's meta, you have to be REAL smart to get it."

Posted by: William F. 'Buck' Dharma at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (Ft5W9)

24 Colbert's new gig will be called The Dead Show

Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (/pbrl)

25 Ozzy Osbourne has died.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (L/fGl)

26 >>>Not every chick is into busty lesbian porn.

such a pity.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (KRtlO)

27 16 I like Gutfeld's show.
Looking forward to Greg making fun of Colbert like he did with Stelter.
Posted by: redridinghood at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (NpAcC)

I love Gutfeld but he's not really considered "Late" night is he ? He's on at 10 PM...

Posted by: It's me donna at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (VE6XX)

28 >>>25 Ozzy Osbourne has died.

you're kidding.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (KRtlO)

29 He's previewing his podcast or MSNBC show, of course. When he starts his podcast or MSNBC show, he'll have a much smaller budget and a smaller audience. But he needs to really excite that small audience so that they follow him into his next demented venture.
---
The Morning Co-.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (krQz2)

30 >>>Shows no longer seem interested in attracting a broad audience, only a loyal micro-audience.

You know what has broad appeal? Family programming.

F 'em if they don't want an audience.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (i24o9)

31 Colbert's bit on Doug Ford was funny. For about three minutes before the "It wAs in TeH pASt" joke dragged.
Oh, and Colbert's run at Swalwell's on-air ass blast was hilarious. Admittedly fart jokes are easy mode.

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (gKWVE)

32 > Ozzy Osborne is mort

I'm honestly shocked he lived to be 76. He did nasty illegal drugs for decades, then Sharon got him hooked on prescription drugs and he turned into an incoherent, shuffling Monty Burns creature.

Posted by: bonhomme at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (lIio7)

33
Agreed, the teevee is dead. A pretty weather girl here and there would've helped.

Posted by: Auspex at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (Y8DZL)

34 @5

>>Would I be laughed out of the room?

Ehhh. Having been in that world where 90 plus pct of the people are leftist lunatics, if there was any pressure it was to lighten up and not get too crazy.

I almost got fired for arguing the utility and meaning of the electoral college during the 2004 campaign.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (XV/Pl)

35 I dislike news shows

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (YqCDc)

36 Watched Johnny Carson and Ed when they had an afternoon show. Then they took over the New York tonight show after Jack Paar resigned. Good memories.

Posted by: Kingsman at July 22, 2025 02:39 PM (ehY6c)

37 I read that the average age of Colbert's viewers is in the sixties. Demographic death spiral indeed.

Posted by: Citizen Cake at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (CwhoI)

38 >>>garrett is so gay he drives the ghost of Jm J. Bullock to haunt the Grindr servers texting eerie homophobic slurs.

Fucking poetry.

Posted by: Jack Package at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (8LP6B)

39 https://apnews.com/article/ozzy-osbourne-dies-

adff88b55f1d3b0bace5705d58d3cdde

linked in the sidebar

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (KRtlO)

40 "a Stinky Howard-Stern Hole"

I just now threw up a little in your mouth.

Posted by: For gp, The Action IS The Juice at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (kRXt7)

41 I'm beginning to suspect that some of you don't read the content prior to posting.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (fGmWu)

42 I know I'm breaking the thread-stompin' rules here...

But I'm hearing Ozzy died.

Posted by: Gunslinger at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (R2gO3)

43 The networks would get better ratings if they just played reruns of the original series Star Trek episodes at those time slots.

Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (PzXaK)

44 Most of the networks now had their streaming subscriptions...the problem is they can't earn enough in subs and much reduced advertising revenue to make up for the original tv/cable and ad revenue.

People (like me) rotate too often b/c now it's possible. Before, it was "have tv and get everything" or "don't have tv". Now, it's get Peacock for $2/month for 6 months...then switch to Paramount for $5/month for 6 months, then switch to Hulu/D+ for $5 month/6 months, then get AppleTV free for 6 months (through a cellphone offer), etc. That's a much reduced revenue stream for each formerly "big" media network.

Posted by: Nova Local at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (tOcjL)

45
Ozzy Osbourne has died.

you're kidding.
Posted by: ace

I don't get it.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (xG4kz)

46 >>>37 I read that the average age of Colbert's viewers is in the sixties. Demographic death spiral indeed.

yeah, thanks, I saw it reported that it was 68. I think Gutfeld might have mentioned that. Or Carolla.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (KRtlO)

47 24 Colbert's new gig will be called The Dead Show
Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (/pbrl)

He can book Ozzy. It's not like he can refuse anymore

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (gKWVE)

48 So saying the same thing every other television personality is speaking truth to power and a demonstration of moral courage?

Posted by: Still lurking up north, read some, don't comment much at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (kTd/k)

49 46 >>>37 I read that the average age of Colbert's viewers is in the sixties. Demographic death spiral indeed.

yeah, thanks, I saw it reported that it was 68. I think Gutfeld might have mentioned that. Or Carolla.
Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (KRtlO)

=====

His demo aged with him.

Letterman's average was 60...8 years ago.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (GBKbO)

50 Almost now every entertainment is atomized and made for one highly-specific target audience.

He's Black, and a Leninist. He's Asian, and a Maoist. Can their forbidden love conquer their differences? A new comedy, based on riveting real life stories.

Pound Me In The Ass, Class Traitor. Coming this fall to NBC.

Posted by: I used to have a different nic at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (ExV1e)

51 > Stinky Howard-Stern Hole

Can you imagine what Stern's house was like when he hid from Covid for years? I doubt he let housecleaners in, and he doesn't seem the type to clean up after himself.

Posted by: bonhomme at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (lIio7)

52 27 16 I like Gutfeld's show.
Looking forward to Greg making fun of Colbert like he did with Stelter.
Posted by: redridinghood at July 22, 2025 02:37 PM (NpAcC)

I love Gutfeld but he's not really considered "Late" night is he ? He's on at 10 PM...

Posted by: It's me donna at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (VE6XX)

That IS late night for his audience.

Posted by: Nova Local at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (tOcjL)

53 "Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?"

Don't know, don't care, and loving it!

Posted by: For gp, The Action IS The Juice at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM (kRXt7)

54 Well, I was certainly late to the party on that one...
Obviously didn't read through comments before posting.
Sorry all.

Posted by: Gunslinger at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (R2gO3)

55 Colbert should have been fired for his dancing syringes

Posted by: It's me donna at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (VE6XX)

56 Somebody should tell Jim J. Bullock he's dead.

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (asXVI)

57 It's not just television. Hollywood is dying too. Oh, everything they make could make a profit if they budgeted accordingly, but as Katee Sackloff noted, "The Mandalorian" has a bigger catering budget than the entire budget for "Battlestar Galactica" 20 years ago. Union contracts demand entire writers' rooms get hired, and then the result is some Jurassic crap movie where none of the characters or plot points make sense.

"Entertainment" from US conglomerates became a jobs fair for unemployable lefties, and now the financial reckoning is hitting.

Posted by: the lower depths at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (+b4rY)

58 OK, perhaps an example of how crap things have gotten.

Look on YouTube for a video of Carson inviting Doc Severenson to Thanksgiving. I bust a gut STILL.

Does anything in current late night approach that level of comedy or longevity...?

Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (PzXaK)

59
TV networks going the way of Woolworth's.

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (HZi96)

60 https://apnews.com/article/ozzy-osbourne-dies-

adff88b55f1d3b0bace5705d58d3cdde

linked in the sidebar
Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (KRtlO)

Someone drove a stake into him, to make sure he just didn't turn into a vampire?

Posted by: Hour of the Wolf at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (S/Y4j)

61 I'm pursuing a similar strategy, tailoring my message to the small but passionate group of readers who

...
are waiting for you to read Hound of the Baskervilles

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (YqCDc)

62 >>>His demo aged with him.
Letterman's average was 60...8 years ago.

Young Zoomers like us just don't watch TV any longer.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (KRtlO)

63 Boomer libs can't support an overpriced late night show?

Weird.

I'm told we should fear their electoral weight.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (GBKbO)

64 >>> It's not just television. Hollywood is dying too.

don't forget the music industry

pretty soon it will all be AI generated anyway, Orwell's "versificator" come to life

Posted by: brak at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (jGJov)

65 || That IS late night for his audience.

But didn't we learn that CBS brought Colbert in to attract young 'uns, because the average Letterman viewer was 60?

Ten years later, the average Colbert viewer is 68.

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (asXVI)

66 "CBS late night host Stephen Colbert didn't mince any words Monday night about his show's cancellation, telling the president off in coarse fashion to audience cheers."

And isn't this the way it is in all tyrannies? A mouthpiece of the opposing party uses national television as a personal and party apparatus to malign the tyrant. THIS is how you know the Democrats/Progressives have Trump the Tyrant nailed dead to rights. Why, it's as if Democracy has been destroyed already.

Posted by: AnonyBotymousDrivel at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (gLikB)

67
So saying the same thing every other television personality is speaking truth to power and a demonstration of moral courage?
Posted by: Still lurking up north, read some, don't comment much

It's marching to the beat of a different drummer! Or so they say, those bold speakers of truth to power!

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (xG4kz)

68 Not every chick is into busty lesbian porn.
Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:38 PM (i24o9)

Well... not every chick will admit it.

Posted by: I used to have a different nic at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (ExV1e)

69 I'm beginning to suspect that some of you don't read the content prior to posting.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (fGmWu)

Despite Ace baiting us to read.

>>>garrett is so gay he drives the ghost of Jm J. Bullock to haunt the Grindr servers texting eerie homophobic slurs.

Fucking poetry.

Posted by: Jack Package at July 22, 2025 02:40 PM (8LP6B)

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (i24o9)

70 I think he's being ironic.
---
Yeah, I detected what might be a fragment of his remaining sense of irony.

Because how could this be? You're being cancelled for "speaking TRUTH to power", but you have yet to tell the full "truth" about your low opinion--especially having called him "Putin's cock-holster".

For the enjoyment I used to get out of this guy in dribbles, I hope he is being ironic.

I also think the "witticism" is a touch of his remnant whimsy.

But those traits, irony and whimsy, are vapors.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (krQz2)

71 It takes a staff of 21 to come up with "Trump's a big poopy head"?

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 02:43 PM (Cdp18)

72 >>>I love Gutfeld but he's not really considered "Late" night is he ? He's on at 10 PM...

1 am on the west coast tho right? 12 am mountain?

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (KRtlO)

73 Shows haven't been about attracting an audience at all. They have been about giving a voice to stupidity.

Ooh look what's popped up in Dopey Diana's YouTube feed today...

A safe looking pussywhipped white fag handing out DNC narrative with an audience of trained seals to give it cachet. Think of it as The Nightly News for dumb broads.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (9/ad+)

74 Has anyone noticed, as I do a lot, that there are very few shows even made any more that have a neutral gender skew? There used to be. There used to be a lot of shows that men and women (and even kids) could agree on: broad, light comedies, police procedurals, etc.
_______
Hard to say. I really don't watch tv anymore, except old movies. (And when I say "old" I don't mean the 90s.) I just asked my wife and she says House was probably the last one I made a point of watching with her, until it got sensitive. Malcolm wasn't bad.

But I won't watch continuing stories unless either (a) I know how they end (Claudius) or (b) they're set in Frostbite Falls, MN.

Posted by: Eeyore at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (od0dV)

75 51 > Stinky Howard-Stern Hole

Can you imagine what Stern's house was like when he hid from Covid for years? I doubt he let housecleaners in, and he doesn't seem the type to clean up after himself.
Posted by: bonhomme at July 22, 2025 02:41 PM

I'm betting he had live in help that wasn't allowed to leave his estate and if they did they'd have to quarantine and test until they could be inside the main residence again.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (fGmWu)

76 >>>The networks would get better ratings if they just played reruns of the original series Star Trek episodes at those time slots.

I think informercials pitching 'George Takei's Astro-Lube' would garner better ratings.

Posted by: Citizen Cake at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (CwhoI)

77 “garrett is so gay he drives the ghost of Jm J. Bullock to haunt the Grindr servers texting eerie homophobic slurs.”

…

Pure poetry, Ace.

Posted by: Open Channel D at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (gYnrv)

78 So Ozzy finally stepped off the crazy train?

Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (/pbrl)

79 1 am on the west coast tho right? 12 am mountain?
Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (KRtlO)

No.. I think it's 10 PM Eastern

Posted by: It's me donna at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (VE6XX)

80 >>>are waiting for you to read Hound of the Baskervilles

soon

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (KRtlO)

81 55 Colbert should have been fired for his dancing syringes
Posted by: It's me donna at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (VE6XX)

------

Someone who was injured by the vaccine should sue that POS for encouraging the public to get the shot.

Posted by: Seems Legit at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (PMtkd)

82 "Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?"

I've stopped trying. Now I just stream the Gorilla Channel on my phone while my girls are watching Tylerton Abbey.

Posted by: Jack Package at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (8LP6B)

83 Are we supposed to be upset that the lefties on late night tv are in a hole and digging it deeper? Confusion to our enemies! May God save the Right and our duly elected President!

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (075ei)

84 "Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?"

Some people on r/romance_for_men are saying that not all romance novels are wholly chick lit. I hear good things about T Kingfisher's "Saint of Steel" books. I assume R4M is mostly inhabited by dudes.
Obviously a lot of R4M is harem and/or catgirls which can hardly appeal to most women.

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (gKWVE)

85 Remember how Girls was supposed to be a cultural phenomenon and it got less than 1 million viewers?

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (GBKbO)

86 Stunningly Jim J. Bullock is still breathing.

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (Cdp18)

87 Gutfeld like the carol burnett show (thats a ways back) has some of his writers like tom shillue, and joe mackie as guests, well the latter is the butt of the joke,

Posted by: miguel cervantes at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (bXbFr)

88
Hound of the Longabergerbaskets was better

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (xG4kz)

89 What shall I watch tonite?

1) Anything I frickin could ever want, on the internet?
2) Whatever happens to be on TV tonite, at a time of TV's choosing?

Real hard choice.

Posted by: For gp, The Action IS The Juice at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (kRXt7)

90 72 >>>I love Gutfeld but he's not really considered "Late" night is he ? He's on at 10 PM...

1 am on the west coast tho right? 12 am mountain?
Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (KRtlO)

It's on at 7 pm in my area.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (fGmWu)

91 ... whether it's a podcast or an MSNBC gig called Maddow's Doppleganger.

----------------

Chris Hayes hardest hit ...

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (z/usA)

92 no cap if it's more than 8 minutes long im out bro for real for real

Posted by: Gen Z at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (jGJov)

93 Ozzy went out rocking. Ozzy’s final on‑stage performance took place during the farewell concert “Back to the Beginning” with Black Sabbath on July 5, 2025, at Villa Park in Birmingham. I had feared his last song was Crazy Train, but his last few songs were, blessedly, Sabbath tunes.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (MMp6W)

94 >>>The networks would get better ratings if they just played reruns of the original series Star Trek episodes at those time slots.

I think informercials pitching 'George Takei's Astro-Lube' would garner better ratings.

Posted by: Citizen Cake at July 22, 2025 02:44 PM (CwhoI)

Here's a whacky idea. How about you play music videos?

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (i24o9)

95 And I think this is a real driver of division and toxicity in our society. We just don't enjoy the same things any longer. We have less and less in common.

And I can't say that's the TV executives' fault, because we've all collectively decided that it's not worth it to watch a broadly-appealing, but kinda bland, entertainment with our spouses and children, but that we'd all rather just retreat into separate rooms to watch individually-tailored fare on the computer or TV.

Posted by: Ace at 02:32 PM
>>>>>>>>>

My children and I generally watch 1-3 movies a week, together. SOMETIMES we watch a couple of television episodes in place of those. The only modern stuff is the Pre-Endgame Marvel. We've been discussing starting "The Office"

BUT, being that we have 4 children, I'm fairly certain we're the outliers.

Here's the question though- (1)Did preferences drive people to abandon the collective experiences, or (2) did the "collective experiences" start purposely offending people to push a narrative, leading to the scattering of people's interests.

I think it's #2. Programming got a LOT worse before it got divided.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (N1DT3)

96 Spouse doesn't really watch any media with me - he sticks to online media only (which I don't do - sorry, not a Podcast/Youtube fan, unless it's my kids' homemade videos and their channels).

So, maybe that's why there's way more cooking and baking shows done on tv now...

Posted by: Nova Local at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (tOcjL)

97 Brit Lass loves Justified. She's a good girl.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (9/ad+)

98 "How dare you, sir?" Colbert responded on-air. "Would an untalented man be able to compose the following satirical witticism? Go f--- yourself."

And that's the level of high-brow, clever wit and insight that gets an institution purged. Good job, Dummy. You'll go down as the talent that killed an era.

Posted by: AnonyBotymousDrivel at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (gLikB)

99 85 Remember how Girls was supposed to be a cultural phenomenon and it got less than 1 million viewers?
Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM (GBKbO)

----
Remember how Girls had the raunchiest sexual situations while 16-year-old Malia Obama was allowed to be an intern on the show.

Posted by: Seems Legit at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (PMtkd)

100 I liked watching Ted Knight but that Bullock dickbreath made that one show of his a piece of crap.

Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (PzXaK)

101
Could this have been avoided? Could network TV have saved itself by focusing on a mass, not micro, audience? Avoiding divisive hard-left extremist political messaging?

========

Back around 2005 some Hollywood agent-type person told me that network TV as it existed then (scripted shows, high production standards) had 15 more years tops. She saw things like reality t.v. and, more crucially, interactivity on the horizon. So it's been known for a looong time. (I wish that woman had started a company that I could have bought shares in.)

Also, I think her timing was about right, if you look at what was being produced around 2020 and beyond.

Posted by: Blonde Morticia at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (HL/Ld)

102 shit I thought Jm J Bullock was dead, and furthermore, I got that misinformation from YOU COMMENTERS!

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (KRtlO)

103 "Unvarnished truth to power" = polished fungus

Posted by: Elrond Hubbard at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (n+FG3)

104 Ozzy went out rocking. Ozzy’s final on‑stage performance took place during the farewell concert “Back to the Beginning” with Black Sabbath on July 5, 2025, at Villa Park in Birmingham. I had feared his last song was Crazy Train, but his last few songs were, blessedly, Sabbath tunes.

Ozzy said multiple times if he ever stopped touring he would die. He wasn't lying.

Posted by: brak at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (jGJov)

105 the funniest bone in Steven Colbert was Ben Stiller's....
Wait, that's Janeane Garofolo.

Meh, same same.

Posted by: nononeyouknowyouknow at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (oaPfe)

106 Ozzy Osbourne has died.

you're kidding.
Posted by: ace

Death comes in threes.

Malcom Jamal Warner
Ozzie Ozbourne

Bruce Willis - don't bet against it. He can no longer speak, read or walk due to frontotemporal dementia.

Posted by: rickb223 at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (k3Vs9)

107 Ozzy Osborne is mort
------------

That's hard to believe...

Posted by: Jeffery Epstein, on a beach, sipping mai tais at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (EFZgU)

108 @64

>>don't forget the music industry

Everything in Western Culture is dying from books, to magazines, to music, to movies, you name it, it's deader than the spark of love between Bill and Hillary.

Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

It's probably just Harry Potter and very little else that will remarked on in 100 years time.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (XV/Pl)

109 "Would an untalented man be able to compose the following satirical witticism? Go f--- yourself."

-
Razor sharp satire.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Lying Dogface Pony Soldier at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (L/fGl)

110 I think thats right, much of the programming that could be run at that time is on pluto or fubo or other platforms,

Posted by: miguel cervantes at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (bXbFr)

111 I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.
-----------
You can call me Ray.

Or you can call me Jay.

Or you can call me Sonny.

Or you can call me Junie.

Or you can call me RJ.

Or you can call me RJJ.

But you don't have to call me Johnson.

Posted by: R. J. Johnson, Jr. at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (XZ5S6)

112 What shall I watch tonite?

1) Anything I frickin could ever want, on the internet? (**)
2) Whatever happens to be on TV tonite, at a time of TV's choosing?

Real hard choice.
Posted by: For gp, The Action IS The Juice at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (kRXt7)

(**) Registration and a reasonable subscription fee required.

Posted by: Count de Monet at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (wVcYX)

113 Ace is going to have to do at least two Ozzy obit threads so people can get this out of their system.

Posted by: For gp, The Action IS The Juice at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (kRXt7)

114 >"And now for the next ten months, the gloves are off," he said, "I can finally speak unvarnished truth to power, and say what I really think about Donald Trump starting right now. I don't care for him."
----

prediction: one night, Colbert will take it too far and CBS will just yank him

as in escorted out of the building by security

Posted by: Don Black at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (AOsQT)

115 Here's a whacky idea. How about you play music videos?
Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:46 PM (i24o9)

--

Are music videos still a thing? I stopped even being MTV-aware when they stopped showing them. Do bands even make them anymore?

Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (PzXaK)

116 Was Malia working on Girls when they filmed Brian Williams' daughter getting her salad tossed?

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (gKWVE)

117 >>>Back around 2005 some Hollywood agent-type person told me that network TV as it existed then (scripted shows, high production standards) had 15 more years tops. She saw things like reality t.v. and, more crucially, interactivity on the horizon. So it's been known for a looong time. (I wish that woman had started a company that I could have bought shares in.)

Justine Bateman reported that Hollywood now asks if TV shows are "screen friendly," which means: Is the show a low-attention-necessary show so that you can play on your phone while you're half-watching/half-listening to the show without missing too much?

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (KRtlO)

118 I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

I agree. I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

Posted by: Amy Schumer at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (0sNs1)

119 RIP Ozzy,

I was at this concert and it was wild

https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=EdM3RfH-zFo&list=RDEdM3RfH-zFo&start_radio=1

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (fGmWu)

120 I always used to tune into "late night" shows if I was up. then a few things happeend. A zillion other things like streaming, the net, You Tube and places like this smart military blog. They still would have had a place in my viewing, but as others point out. They ceased to become funny. Like at all. Not even a slight chuckle. So why bother? I probably haven't watched a minute combined of those types of shows in 10 years or so. Craig Ferguson was actually funny. Kimmel is the most punchable in the group. Colbert second. And I am not even counting the feminine Seth Myers in there. He's not even on the charts. Fallon is meh.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (ewjUl)

121 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

50 Shades?

Posted by: Count de Monet at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (wVcYX)

122 For the next ten months, it's going to be little but festive hats.

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (Os3Lc)

123 Incidentally, there's a LOT of "family" programming that's of surprisingly good quality.

For example, the last "Puss in Boots" had no business having that much character development and serious themes- fear of death, selfishness, regrets, family, etc...

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (N1DT3)

124 58 Another good example is when Carson had Ed Ames on to demonstrate his tomahawk throwing technique. The results were absolutely hilarious and appear to have been entirely unscripted.

https://shorturl.at/AnzbY

Posted by: the lower depths at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (+b4rY)

125 > Here's a whacky idea. How about you play music videos?

There's a good reason they stopped. It wasn't making money.

Posted by: bonhomme at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (lIio7)

126 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

50 Shades?
Posted by: Count de Monet at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (wVcYX)

Son of Black Sword.

(Yeah, I know it's not mainstream.)

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (N1DT3)

127 Hound of the Longabergerbaskets was better

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 02:45 PM

My mother was obsessed with those baskets. She would get the entire extended family together for trips to the factory. She still has dozens of those things in her house. I don't see what the big deal is.

Posted by: Mister Scott (Formerly GWS) at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (e5NfL)

128 Oh gawd, YA. I actually bought Sarah Maas' "Throne of Glass" like an idiot. I've never read such ridiculous slop.

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (gKWVE)

129 The first I ever heard of Colbert (kohl-BARE) was when some idiot had him testify in front of a Congressional committee, and the prime idiot (kohl-BARE) did it in character.
I thought "who is this a$$hole?", and when I spoke of it to someone, they told me that was his famous conservative character, and hadn't I see it before, and wasn't it hilarious?
No. No, it was not.
But overarchingly appalling to me was that some elected official thought it was a good idea to basically bring on the old "where's the beef?" lady and just have her say that in committee for half an hour.
Congress became a little deader to me then.

Posted by: barbarausa at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (enw9G)

130 Stephen Colbert - The Day the Clapter Died

Posted by: Now on K-tel Records at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (4DY5T)

131 Filbert>Dilbert>Colbèrt

Posted by: Elrond Hubbard at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (n+FG3)

132 I'm pursuing a similar strategy, tailoring my message to the small but passionate group of readers who understand that JackStraw is a dirty drug addict and garrett is so gay he drives the ghost of Jm J. Bullock to haunt the Grindr servers texting eerie homophobic slurs.
_______
I suspect a cover up here. Ace is actually making over 20 million selling shelving to Ewoks.

Posted by: Eeyore at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (od0dV)

133 Late Night shows caught SNL disease.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (ewjUl)

134 >>>I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

In Soviet Russia, career jokes you!

Posted by: Yakov Jerkov at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (jGJov)

135 '(**) Registration and a reasonable subscription fee required.'

What is this reg-istra(?)tion you speak of?

Posted by: For gp, The Action IS The Juice at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (kRXt7)

136 Learned the other day that Michael Keaton seriously disliked Robin Williams, because before he left the standup circuit, Williams improv would contain a number of Keaton's jokes.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (krQz2)

137 Bullock on that show was an annoying puftah but Lydia Cornell was hot

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 02:51 PM (Cdp18)

138 (**) Registration and a reasonable subscription fee required.

Posted by: Count de Monet at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (wVcYX)

Or VPN and bit torrent.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:51 PM (i24o9)

139 Nick DiPaulo has said that he writes for the Gutfeld show and so does Aaron Berg

Posted by: Patrick From Ohio at July 22, 2025 02:51 PM (FCrpy)

140 Imagine the great position major league sports would be in if they had not fallen for the DEI bullshit. That would be the one thing that people would more likely watch in real-time, so they could talk about the game the next day at work.

I suppose sports are still in a good position, but some people found other things to do on the weekend or evenings when the BLM kneeling and shit was all the rage.

Posted by: PaleRider at July 22, 2025 02:51 PM (yMN/A)

141 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

The Three Body Problem... Maybe?

Posted by: Victor Tango Kilo at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (6rbLO)

142
My mother was obsessed with those baskets. She would get the entire extended family together for trips to the factory. She still has dozens of those things in her house. I don't see what the big deal is.
Posted by: Mister Scott (Formerly GWS) at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (e5NfL)

I had never heard of those. My mother keeps cleaning out her kitchen and she gave me a bunch of those and I don't get it either.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (fGmWu)

143 >>>Are music videos still a thing? I stopped even being MTV-aware when they stopped showing them. Do bands even make them anymore?

Of course. They're on the artist's Youtube channel.

And MTV's highest rated show ever was...The Osbournes. That was 20 years ago.

Posted by: brak at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (jGJov)

144 The first I ever heard of Colbert (kohl-BARE) was when some idiot had him testify in front of a Congressional committee, and the prime idiot (kohl-BARE) did it in character.

Posted by: barbarausa at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (enw9G)
---
Yeah, that was cringe.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (krQz2)

145 Colbert only told and reinforced truth. Anyone who politically disagreed with him was invalid, and shouldn't have political opinions about anything. It really is that simple.

Anyone who agrees with MAGA is a monster, and completely beneath all contempt. They should not exist.

Posted by: Sid at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (ukeFl)

146 "Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?"

This rings true, but I don't watch any network shows anymore; what are some examples of girl only shows? I know a lot of the Netflix ones like "Primeval" and "Pinky Blinders" are going to have mostly male audiences, but don't lots of women like these too?

Posted by: UGAdawg at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (xP8uf)

147 >>>I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

In Soviet Russia, career jokes you!
Posted by: Yakov Jerkov at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (jGJov)

Juuusst a bit outside.

Posted by: Bob Uecker at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (wVcYX)

148

But obviously, you cannot pursue this micro-targeted strategy while collecting a salary of $15-20 million per year and paying $100 million per year on a writing staff of 21 people plus something like a hundred crew (camera men, lighting, makeup and hair, publicity, etc., etc.)

Did you say WNBA?

Posted by: imp at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (g6TN6)

149 Posted by: Sid at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (ukeFl)

======

Not touching this one.

Just gold.

Vote Vance, Sid.

Vote Vance.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (GBKbO)

150 > Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

The Road by Cormac McCarthy was pretty good.

Posted by: bonhomme at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (lIio7)

151 I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

Any Schumer's vagina begs to differ.

Oh, wait you specified "funny."

Posted by: Victor Tango Kilo at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (6rbLO)

152 >>>I always used to tune into "late night" shows if I was up. then a few things happeend. A zillion other things like streaming, the net, You Tube and places like this smart military blog.

I stopped watching Letterman around 1995. His show just became very lazy.

Letterman had always had this "joke" he thought was funny, which I also thought was funny. He would fill the airwaves with NOTHING, like just dialing up strangers on the phone, and the joke would be, "Ha ha, I am totally wasting the network's time and money by doing literally nothing on a TV show, isn't that hilarious?"

And I thought it was, until I realized: Wait, that means you're wasting my time, too.

This became more and more obvious to me during the CBS show, where the one joke he just did night after night was all this fanfare and fake hype for something dumb, something literally zero-entertainment, and then they'd do it, and the joke was "all of that build-up was for nothing, now we're wasting CBS' time and money."

He also turned bitter and sour, and it was palpable, and no longer felt the need to really work at the show, because he no longer had the goal of landing the Tonight Show. Just phoned in every night.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (KRtlO)

153 Ace...you are seriously funny.

Love the inside jokes.

Posted by: Mark Andrew Edwards, Buy ammo at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (xcxpd)

154 So the biggest issues for The Resistance seem to be disproportionately loaded with "Nobody wants to pay for the people i want to see on tv to be on tv".

Colbert. PBS. Anyone on CNN.

It's kind of... pathetic.

I guess Ukraine reruns got boring and the Joos kicked too much ass to quick to fill a full season.

Posted by: Warai-otoko at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (RlmPm)

155 @116 I read somewhere that Brian Williams was on the set when his daughter was filmed getting her salad tossed. Daaaad!

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (Cdp18)

156 shit I thought Jm J Bullock was dead, and furthermore, I got that misinformation from YOU COMMENTERS!
Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (KRtlO)

Next thing they'll be trying to tell you Rip Taylor was a queer.

Posted by: Jack Package at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (8LP6B)

157 It's not just television. Hollywood is dying too. Oh, everything they make could make a profit if they budgeted accordingly, but as Katee Sackloff noted, "The Mandalorian" has a bigger catering budget than the entire budget for "Battlestar Galactica" 20 years ago. Union contracts demand entire writers' rooms get hired, and then the result is some Jurassic crap movie where none of the characters or plot points make sense.

"Entertainment" from US conglomerates became a jobs fair for unemployable lefties, and now the financial reckoning is hitting.
Posted by: the lower depths at July 22, 2025 02:42 PM (+b4rY)

Someone will replace them. Godzilla Minus One made a movie with serious themes, heart (and some Japanese melodrama), as well as a giant, firebreathing monster that looked as good as anything disney puts out for under $13M.

Proving you can use existing IP to tell a good, new story that pulls in the audience without spending half a billion dollars.

But our "elites" don't want to take risks and ESPECIALLY don't want to do anything other than what their peer group says is the right idea, so Hollywood is in for a LOT of pain until those "elites" are gone.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (N1DT3)

158 At 11:00 PM bring back Schaefer Award Theater. 20 year old movies, no commercials except for five minutes at the beginning. Sponsored by a beer often sold in dive bars for a quarter a can.

Posted by: bill in arkansas, not gonna comply with nuttin, waiting for the 0300 knock on the door at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (gm9Sb)

159 I think somebody is socking Sid.

Or perhaps he's oblivious to how doctrinaire he is being.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM (krQz2)

160 Justine Bateman reported that Hollywood now asks if TV shows are "screen friendly," which means: Is the show a low-attention-necessary show so that you can play on your phone while you're half-watching/half-listening to the show without missing too much?
----
That's apparently a Netflix directive.

A few weeks back I saw a Korean animated feature called "Lost In Starlight", not knowing it was a Netflix joint.

I liked it. It was a sci-fi/romance story with nice visuals. But me and the Boy decided we weren't going to see any more Netflix movies (another animated feature got released the very next week!) because even at 90 minutes, it was padded.

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM (asXVI)

161 And I can't say that's the TV executives' fault, because we've all collectively decided that it's not worth it to watch a broadly-appealing, but kinda bland, entertainment with our spouses and children, but that we'd all rather just retreat into separate rooms to watch individually-tailored fare on the computer or TV.

Posted by: Ace at 02:32 PM
--------------

But, how much of that change was driven by "you can't say that" culture? Arguably shows like Carol Burnett, Mary Tyler Moor and Bob Newhart were extremely funny and good family fair. Cheers was much the same, as was Frasier. However, those shows contain items deemed "unclean" by the standards of today.

Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1) at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM (tT6L1)

162 The last time I enjoyed a comedian's act, it was David Brenner on the tonite show.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM (MMp6W)

163 Jay Leno used to tour colleges and do stand up in front of 5-15k people. Can you imagine Colbert doing that? Neither can I

Posted by: Jupiter no rings mofo at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM (2YC93)

164 A troll unmasked, Sid is Stephen Colbert

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM (Cdp18)

165 121 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

50 Shades?
Posted by: Count de Monet at July 22, 2025 02:49

I read a popular novel, a beach read type book, maybe Gone Girl and I figured it out really early and I thought the writing was meh. I didn't know if I'm just older or the popular beach read chick books weren't as good anymore or they were always kind of meh. I still don't know.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM (fGmWu)

166 126 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

probably "The Martian". I mean, it's just Landis' "Mars Crossing" with just one stranded crewman and done in diary form, but it's a fun read.

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 02:55 PM (gKWVE)

167 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

One Second After

Posted by: Count de Monet at July 22, 2025 02:55 PM (wVcYX)

168
I saw Demented Venture open for Burisma Charisma and The Samizdat Commies at the Empire Room in '20.

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 02:55 PM (z/usA)

169 It wasn't making money.

Posted by: bonhomme at July 22, 2025 02:49 PM (lIio7)

Reality TV making more money does not mean it wasn't making money, while increasing competition from rivals and internet probably drove the last nail in the coffee.

I did say it was a wacky idea.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:55 PM (i24o9)

170 COLBERT! Lead us!! -- Sid

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (krQz2)

171 a writing staff of 21 people.

And it's still not very funny.

Posted by: El Mariachi - Attorney at Law at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (gDhA9)

172

I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke

Senor Winces says "S'aright? S'aright."

Posted by: imp at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (g6TN6)

173 Craig Ferguson after Letterman was funny and talked about how he was proud to be American so of course he had to go.

Posted by: Patrick From Ohio at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (FCrpy)

174 RIP Ozzie Osborne may the lord of darkness be too busy to know you died

Posted by: Captain Fantastic at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (uEWUd)

175 Marxists officially took over "entertainment" around 2015.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (9/ad+)

176 I'm pursuing a similar strategy, tailoring my message to the small but passionate group of readers who understand that JackStraw is a dirty drug addict homeless Sea Hobo and garrett is so gay he drives the ghost of Jm J. Bullock to haunt the Grindr servers texting eerie homophobic slurs.

* gives Ace a smoldering come-hither look *

Posted by: Big Penguin at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (0sNs1)

177 The Three Body Problem... Maybe?
Posted by: Victor Tango Kilo at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (6rbLO)

=====

That's a great candidate. That ending...I did not see that coming.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 02:57 PM (MMp6W)

178 He also turned bitter and sour, and it was palpable, and no longer felt the need to really work at the show, because he no longer had the goal of landing the Tonight Show. Just phoned in every night.
Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:53 PM

Yea, you could see it. He went from being unserious and goofy, having fun to just looking at the clock, like a guy who's been in the same job for 45 years. You could see it. Now he looks like the unibomber and seems a bit unhinged.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 02:57 PM (ewjUl)

179 What is fun to watch on YouTube is people reacting to the likes of Don Rickles and Rodney Dangerfield.

Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 02:57 PM (/pbrl)

180 So.... clown nose... on? Off? What are we doing here, Steve?

Posted by: Warai-otoko at July 22, 2025 02:57 PM (RlmPm)

181 My mother was obsessed with those baskets. She would get the entire extended family together for trips to the factory. She still has dozens of those things in her house. I don't see what the big deal is.
Posted by: Mister Scott

Go to Missouri. Especially thru the Ozarks and on Route 66.

Walnut Bowls. Ads more ubiquitous than Burma Shave ads.

Posted by: rickb223 at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (k3Vs9)

182 I read a lot of Japanese Rom-Com, mostly manga but also some light novels. I watch a lot of similar anime. I don’t limit myself to just Rom-Com, but I like the Japanese approach to it. They start with the idea that marrying, staying married, and raising a family are good long-term goals, but you have to find that special someone first. You can tell that the Japanese are worried about their low birth rate, and their cultural xenophobia won’t let them import even Koreans to fill the gap. We are lucky, or cursed, to be more flexible on these issues.

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (075ei)

183 Seriously, "Sid" is a parody account, right?

Right?

Posted by: Captain Obvious, Laird o' the Sea at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (XZ5S6)

184 If you watch on-line - the Rubin report costs about $1 million per year to make, including the hosts salary. And it seems completely professional and makes a nice profit.

Posted by: El Mariachi - Attorney at Law at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (gDhA9)

185 a writing staff of 21 people.

And it's still not very funny.

Posted by: El Mariachi - Attorney at Law at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM

They managed to do the Alan Bradey Show with just three writers.

Posted by: Mister Scott (Formerly GWS) at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (e5NfL)

186 ... Morse wrote, likening the shift to "a grown toddler... thrashing around." It was a profitable tantrum ...

-------------

Cultish mental, psychological, & social infants gotta infantilize.

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (z/usA)

187 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

When was Confederacy of Dunces?

Posted by: tcn in AK at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (1Gsou)

188
overarchingly appalling to me was that some elected official thought it was a good idea to basically bring on the old "where's the beef?" lady and just have her say that in committee for half an hour.
Congress became a little deader to me then.
Posted by: barbarausa

==============

You must have adored it when John Kerry took James Taylor to Paris after the Charlie Hebdo attacks.

Posted by: Blonde Morticia at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (HL/Ld)

189 However, those shows contain items deemed "unclean" by the standards of today.
Posted by: blake - semi lurker in marginal standing (tT6L1) at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM

"Haram" is the word you want to use going forward, effendi.

Posted by: Abdully McAbdulface at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (0sNs1)

190 Justine Bateman reported that Hollywood now asks if TV shows are "screen friendly," which means: Is the show a low-attention-necessary show so that you can play on your phone while you're half-watching/half-listening to the show without missing too much?

--

The industry term is "radio with pictures."

Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (PzXaK)

191 @150

>>The Road by Cormac McCarthy was pretty good.

It's good, not great, and doesn't tread any new ground that any of the great dystopian novels hasn't already trod.

It's essentially Wolf and Cub set against a bleak landscape, shattered by an unknown cataclysm.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (XV/Pl)

192 It's sad to see the second coming of the Sammy Maudlin Show leave the air.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (krQz2)

193 Colbert is not only delusional, he has air of fanaticism about him. Supported by his circle I am sure, just based on how many celebs all of a sudden became extremely agitated that he go fired. As if being fired is an unknown quantity in Hollywood.

Posted by: runner at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (g47mK)

194 I can't get the wife to watch anything really.

But we do watch The Chosen every Friday. I think that speaks to the quality of the show.

Posted by: Mark Andrew Edwards, Buy ammo at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (xcxpd)

195 Jay Leno used to tour colleges and do stand up in front of 5-15k people. Can you imagine Colbert doing that? Neither can I
Posted by: Jupiter no rings mofo at July 22, 2025 02:54 PM

Leno has more talent in half of his chin that Colburt.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (ewjUl)

196 He was overpaid.

Posted by: runner at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (g47mK)

197 177 The Three Body Problem... Maybe?
Posted by: Victor Tango Kilo at July 22, 2025 02:52 PM (6rbLO)

=====

That's a great candidate. That ending...I did not see that coming.

---

Well, okay, but you guys know that's Chinese, right?

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (asXVI)

198 Oppressed Colbert tells Trump to 'go f--- yourself’ after president taunts him over show cancellation, no FBI show up to oppress, cue Steam – Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye

Posted by: SMOD at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (RHGPo)

199 Justine Bateman reported that Hollywood now asks if TV shows are "screen friendly," which means: Is the show a low-attention-necessary show so that you can play on your phone while you're half-watching/half-listening to the show without missing too much?

--

The industry term is "radio with pictures."

Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (PzXaK)

They gave up competing for eyeballs and they are surprised that they are losing money?

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (i24o9)

200
I could not tell you even where the broadcast networks' channels are on the cable menu, and it bothers me not the slightest bit.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 02:59 PM (xG4kz)

201 the writers used the same crayons, and they probably worked on madoff's staff as well,

yeah have you seen letterman and olbermann in the same room,

Posted by: miguel cervantes at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (bXbFr)

202 My kids liked some purportedly hard rock band called Sabbaton(???) that performed tunes about historical events. I hated it.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (MMp6W)

203 Sid sucks cock by choice.

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (gKWVE)

204
Pro and college football are the only things carrying the networks now, and that's going away due to kneeling and million dollar 18 year old quarterbacks constantly shifting schools for a better payday.

Posted by: Auspex at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (Y8DZL)

205 > Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.
----

I liked the Oppenheimer book

Posted by: Don Black at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (AOsQT)

206 The View is ripping Trrrrrump now. ABC show with clips from CBS. Tongues are wagging. I love it. Thank all of you fine folks. Now is an opportunity to speak up.

Jimmy Kimmel is usually trump's daily dose of reality. He delivers his zingers with a big smile on his face. A manchild like trump is threatened by someone who isn’t afraid of him.

He needs to take the opportunity to hit trump hard until May, to make his life unbearable, which is not very difficult, all he has to do is make fun of the guy, his ego is too big to handle any of it.

They've got no fucks left to give, as the saying goes. So Colbert will be worth watching from now till the end.

It's unfortunate that Paramount owns Star Trek. I have quit watching it including the old stuff on Pluto - also owned by Paramount. Everyone should be writing letters to Paramount protesting their capitulation to an extortionist.

Gutfeld is better than all of them combined? I didn't know Gutfeld was a comedian. Someone needs to sue Fox for editing trump to make him look better.

Posted by: Intercepted DU Transmissions brought by the Intrepid AoS Liaison at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (JCZqz)

207 >>> Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?

=====

The last shows my wife and I watched together were "friends", when we were first married, then more recently, TBBT re-runs and as well as Last Man Standing re-runs. Now, she watches the golden girls or Moms. I watch bbq or MORR on utube. Not sure what that means.

Posted by: Turn 2 at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (CyFyf)

208 The best thing about Letterman was also the best thing about Conan... occasional appearances by Norm MacDonald.

Posted by: Yudhishthira's Dice at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (4Iqzz)

209 85 Remember how Girls was supposed to be a cultural phenomenon and it got less than 1 million viewers?
Posted by: TheJamesMadison
=====
Hipsters always seek out some cheap affectation to this book or that movie in order to elevate themselves over the unthinking and unknowing masses.

But I am not talking about you in particular.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (ctrM5)

210 My kids liked some purportedly hard rock band called Sabbaton(???) that performed tunes about historical events. I hated it.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (MMp6W)

Play them some real hard rock. They will thank you for it.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (i24o9)

211 My family just watches reruns of “Everybody Loves Raymond” and outdoor shows. Nothing else interests us

Posted by: Jmel at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (bVhJi)

212 Benny Johnson
@bennyjohnson

BREAKING: Federal judges in New Jersey have refused to extend Alina Habba’s role as interim U.S. Attorney.

This is unacceptable. Cancel the August recess. Get all nominees confirmed.

https://tinyurl.com/48dhs8sp

Posted by: redridinghood at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (NpAcC)

213
Colbert is buying property in Guyana.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (xG4kz)

214 WAAAAAH
Posted by: Intercepted DU Transmissions brought by the Intrepid AoS Liaison at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (JCZqz)

Fixed it for you!

Posted by: gKWVE at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (gKWVE)

215 "What would Colbert have been without Donald Trump?"

--------------

Barry Soetoro's c**k holster.

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (z/usA)

216 25 Ozzy Osbourne has died.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks

I just saw this and read he joked he wasn’t sure he was going to make it through his farewell show, that he might die on stage. Prayers for his family, he at least seemed to be invested in them as a father.

Posted by: Piper at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (p4NUW)

217 193 Colbert is not only delusional, he has air of fanaticism about him. Supported by his circle I am sure, just based on how many celebs all of a sudden became extremely agitated that he go fired. As if being fired is an unknown quantity in Hollywood.
Posted by: runner
======
Even more Democrat politicians got upset to the extent of wanting hearings about it.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (ctrM5)

218 It's unfortunate that Paramount owns Star Trek. I have quit watching it including the old stuff on Pluto - also owned by Paramount. Everyone should be writing letters to Paramount protesting their capitulation to an extortionist.

Posted by: Intercepted DU Transmissions brought by the Intrepid AoS Liaison at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (JCZqz)

Shit, like that's some kind of sacrifice. NO ONE watches Star Trek anymore. Kurtzman fucked it up.

Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (PzXaK)

219 Solid post Ace. This is clearly a subject matter you have ruminated on for years. Your laser focus on a passionate micro sized audience, some might say micro penis sized, gives you a freedom to speak with great clarity. You are sort of the Thomas Paine character of our time and that is to me f'ing important. There is nobody that writes in the political/cultural sphere that has your voice and perspective. Colbert has always struck me as somebody that believes his own reviews and then tailors his act to get more of them. And when I say act I mean exactly that. And, as all the cool kids say about your work, I came for the articles and stayed for the pictures. Keep it up.

Posted by: Alteria Pilgram - My President has convictions. at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (NXz8h)

220 Senor Winces says "S'aright? S'aright."
Posted by: imp at July 22, 2025 02:56 PM (g6TN6)
-----------
Close the door.

Posted by: Pedro at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (XZ5S6)

221 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

Pride Puppy was AMAZING!

Posted by: Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (JCZqz)

222 As for books written in the past 25 years...George R. R. Martin has been revealed to be a hack fraud but A Storm of Swords was spectacular. The first three books are the best fantasy since Tolkien.

It's just everything after that has been ass.

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson is maybe one of the last sci fi novels that actually predicted the future.

I don't approve of Cormac McCarthy's worldview but he's a talented writer at least.

Posted by: Mark Andrew Edwards, Buy ammo at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (xcxpd)

223 I read a lot of Japanese Rom-Com, mostly manga but also some light novels. I watch a lot of similar anime. I don’t limit myself to just Rom-Com, but I like the Japanese approach to it. They start with the idea that marrying, staying married, and raising a family are good long-term goals, but you have to find that special someone first. You can tell that the Japanese are worried about their low birth rate, and their cultural xenophobia won’t let them import even Koreans to fill the gap. We are lucky, or cursed, to be more flexible on these issues.
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (075ei)

Well, Korea is actually worse off, so I can't see importing Koreans would be helpful.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (N1DT3)

224 Posted by: Intercepted DU Transmissions brought by the Intrepid AoS Liaison at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (JCZqz)

Mmm. Tears of unfathomable sadness.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (i24o9)

225 102 shit I thought Jm J Bullock was dead, and furthermore, I got that misinformation from YOU COMMENTERS!
Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 02:47 PM (KRtlO)

To quote Otter- "You fucked up. You trusted us."

Posted by: tankdemon at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (VSht7)

226 What might have been.
P
Defiant L’s@DefiantLs
Jeff Daniels: “I still think about Kamala, and how I think she would have been a good choice. I don’t care what they say, because she would have done what Lincoln did. Liz Cheney would have been Secretary of State.”

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Lying Dogface Pony Soldier at July 22, 2025 03:03 PM (L/fGl)

227 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

'I have two Moms'
- Buttigig's poor kid

Posted by: Tonypete at July 22, 2025 03:04 PM (cYBz/)

228 Talk about aging out.

WorldCon is requiring everyone who attends, all 300 AWFL Karens over 60, to mask up.

Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 03:04 PM (/pbrl)

229 Come and see the violence inherent in the system!

Posted by: Steve Colbert at July 22, 2025 03:04 PM (krQz2)

230 Letterman was generally pro military. Then the retirement and growing the scruffy beard. Now he looks like Ayotollah #17, the guy in charge of goat SDT prevention.

Posted by: bill in arkansas, not gonna comply with nuttin, waiting for the 0300 knock on the door at July 22, 2025 03:04 PM (gm9Sb)

231 Colbert is buying property in Guyana.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (xG4kz)

Don't forget to pack your Flavor-Aid.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:04 PM (i24o9)

232 @85

>>Remember how Girls was supposed to be a cultural phenomenon and it got less than 1 million viewers?

I think I recall an article that postulated that Girls was actually at it's heart, unintentionally, an affirmation of conservative few points and confession of the hollowness of third wave feminism.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 03:05 PM (XV/Pl)

233 Is The Three Body Problem that good? I never read it.

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:05 PM (075ei)

234 The last shows my wife and I watched together were "friends", when we were first married, then more recently, TBBT re-runs and as well as Last Man Standing re-runs. Now, she watches the golden girls or Moms. I watch bbq or MORR on utube. Not sure what that means.
Posted by: Turn 2 at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (CyFyf)

Yeah, I'm not sure what any of that means, either.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:05 PM (N1DT3)

235 Shit, like that's some kind of sacrifice. NO ONE watches Star Trek anymore. Kurtzman fucked it up.
Posted by: WitchDoktor at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (PzXaK)

It's like a bit... it has to be... "I can't believe they'd cancel stuff i like just because no one watches it, i'd totally boycott the rest of their stuff but i don't actually watch any of their stuff anymore. "

Is iowahawk writing this shit for them or something?

Posted by: Warai-otoko at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (RlmPm)

236 My kids liked some purportedly hard rock band called Sabbaton(???) that performed tunes about historical events. I hated it.
Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (MMp6W)
----------
Sabaton. Give 'em a break - how many rock bands have songs about the Siege of Vienna?

Posted by: Captain Obvious, Laird o' the Sea at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (XZ5S6)

237 tbh I don't know if commenters told me Jm. J. Bullock was dead. I think I just heard he had AIDS and made some unwarranted assumptions.

I think I'm blaming commenters because they call someone -- is it Comey, maybe? -- Jm J. Comey.

I think it's just commenters who are keeping Jm J. Bullock current. Well, that and retroviral medications.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (KRtlO)

238 179 What is fun to watch on YouTube is people reacting to the likes of Don Rickles and Rodney Dangerfield.
Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 02:57 PM (/pbrl)

Hell the Dean Martin roasts would make their heads explode.

I watched the clip of where Rickles broke Johnny's Cigarette box and when he came back he took the camera's into Rickles show to confront him.

I think it was said that Johnny Carson killed Carter's reelection by doing the mock Debate, making Carter look like a fool and Reagan good.

Posted by: Patrick From Ohio at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (FCrpy)

239 If any of these rich lefty Hellywood people so outraged at Colburt's curb kicking, were convinced of his talent. They'd fund a show for him. They're just mad their anti orangemanbad circus is coming to an end.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (ewjUl)

240 I propose that any man who slept with Lena Dunham should be sterilized. I don't want them running around in the wild banging animals and siring chimeras.

Posted by: Yudhishthira's Dice at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (4Iqzz)

241 Sigh.

Outlasted another one.

Posted by: Keith Richards at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (VSht7)

242 Colbert is buying property in Guyana.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (xG4kz)

Don't forget to pack your Flavor-Aid.
Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:04 PM (i24o9)

He better hope his lawyers like him. He might be buying just one jail cell on Devil's Island.

Posted by: Hour of the Wolf at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (S/Y4j)

243 Posted by: redridinghood at July 22, 2025 03:02 PM (NpAcC)

how TF does a judge get to say that the AG is not allowed to be re-appointed as interim?

I'm so sick of this state. Declare NJ in insurrection already.

Posted by: Iasonas at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (gUzGB)

244 I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

-----------------

Sacha Baron Cohen hardest hit ...

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (z/usA)

245 Is The Three Body Problem that good? I never read it.
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:05 PM (075ei)

It's mid-tier Chinese propaganda. 30 years ago it would be considered inferior to Chung Kuo but the sci-fi market died in the 90's so it's about the best there is now.

Posted by: Mark Andrew Edwards, Buy ammo at July 22, 2025 03:06 PM (xcxpd)

246 Ozzie Osborn... RIP.

Posted by: Romeo13 at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (mP0Kj)

247 It's just incredible that they all pursued the same strategy of guaranteed failure, and even more incredible that the "suits" who are supposed to be sober, competent professionals permitted them to do so or even encouraged them to do so -- that's how strong corporate media Trump derangement is.

Maybe it's more of an indictment of their academic pedigrees. They all may have gone to the same snotty schools and learned all the bad habits that modern indoctrination entails. Ascension in the industry had become formulaic and a very limited gauntlet of gatekeepers who were essentially incestuous groupies determined what comedy was.

Maybe we're saying the same thing differently.

Posted by: AnonyBotymousDrivel at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (gLikB)

248 >>>Letterman was generally pro military. Then the retirement and growing the scruffy beard. Now he looks like Ayotollah #17, the guy in charge of goat SDT prevention.

I think he was always a nasty lefty. I think he just concealed that because his hero and model was Johnny carson. Once he didn't get the Tonight Show, he became more and more partisan for the left.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (KRtlO)

249 If C BS were smart they would have given him the hook the day after he trashed them on T.V. To give that arrogant cvunt a minute of their airtime is stupid.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (ewjUl)

250 We All know his show is going to just be the more feminine version of maddow. Less facts, more fee fees

Posted by: HowardDevore at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (H/Jxx)

251 Personally The Diamond Age edges out Snow Crash by a smidge. Love Princess Nell and her Mouse Army.

Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (/pbrl)

252 Neil Young is supposed to be in Cleveland next month. Fingers crossed.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (MMp6W)

253 >>Remember how Girls was supposed to be a cultural phenomenon and it got less than 1 million viewers?

Everybody won with "Girls". Lena Dunham got to make out with hot guy, everyone lied and said she was pretty and brave, and we all got to watch her get naked and have sex!!!!

Posted by: Admiral Ackbar at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (JCZqz)

254
I don’t care what they say, because she would have done what Lincoln did.

Freed the slaves? Oh, Jeff Daniels, you simp.

Freeing their slaves is absolutely the last thing that the Dims would ever do.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (xG4kz)

255 I think I recall an article that postulated that Girls was actually at it's heart, unintentionally, an affirmation of conservative few points and confession of the hollowness of third wave feminism.
Posted by: Thomas Bender
=======
All leftist art is that way. Same as lefty speak, for the most part, the more they talk, the more the audience of the speaker can see right through their pretenses.

Leftism ironically came out of a cursed hybrid of the Age of Romanticism and the Age of Reason but left the feeling necessary in Romanticism and the logic necessary for reason.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (ctrM5)

256 Since 2015, WorldCon, the Hugos: they are all a joke! DragonCon and their awards are closer to what the Hugos were supposed to be.

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (075ei)

257 " ... because we've all collectively decided that it's not worth it to watch a broadly-appealing, but kinda bland, entertainment with our spouses and children, ... "

I dunno, when was the last time anything like that was presented i a mass market?

Posted by: sock_rat_eez at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (dKEEs)

258 None of these people cared when Tucker got the axe as a result of--possibly--the Dominion settlement.

So, if this were part of the 60-Minutes commercial for Kamala settlement, I'm okay with that. It's just the type of thing that can be negotiated in a settlement is what I was told when it was Tucker.

They fired not only the most-watched news anchor in the country, and the main one who said on air that he would like to see the proof that Dominion rigged the results, but he hasn't seen it yet.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (krQz2)

259 251 Personally The Diamond Age edges out Snow Crash by a smidge. Love Princess Nell and her Mouse Army.
Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (/pbrl)

====

The dentata in snow crash was a cool idea.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (MMp6W)

260 I keep seeing RIP for Ozzy Osborne, and I keep wondering. Do people mean he should Rest in Peace, or Rock in Perpetuity?

Posted by: Hour of the Wolf at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (S/Y4j)

261 CBS is run by retards.
If you fire someone you walk them out the door that day, not a year later.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (Vvm2m)

262 Remember how Girls was supposed to be a cultural phenomenon and it got less than 1 million viewers?
____

My GF's daughter was five of those viewers.

Posted by: Ghoulposts at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (qUkBO)

263 >>> I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke.

Diversify.

Posted by: Amy Schumer at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (i24o9)

264 Step 1: Build a nice set.

Step 2: Invite up and coming comedians to host an hour-long show.

Step 3 Pay said stand up and coming comedian $20k for the show. He does stand up, and has one guest $20k), and one musical group. This is an up-and-coming musical group, who you also pay $20k for the gig.

Step 4: No studio audience. Minimal crew (5-6 people)

Step 5: Cost per show =

Done and done.

Posted by: El Mariachi - Attorney at Law at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (gDhA9)

265 Neil Young is supposed to be in Cleveland next month. Fingers crossed.
Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM

That he gets hit by a bus?

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (ewjUl)

266 210 My kids liked some purportedly hard rock band called Sabbaton(???) that performed tunes about historical events. I hated it.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:00 PM (MMp6W)

Play them some real hard rock. They will thank you for it.
Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:01 PM (i24o9)

Sabaon is solid.
Winged Hussars, Ghost Division....good stuff.

Posted by: Mark Andrew Edwards, Buy ammo at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (xcxpd)

267 Just a reminder to all those idiots ago over this affront to free speech, Colbert would have happily censored anybody talking bad (aka truthfully) about the Covid vaccine, the conspiracy theory (aka truth) about a lab leak, and myriad other topics.

He can go choke on a splintery dildo for all I care.

Posted by: tankdemon at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (VSht7)

268 The Chosen is a family show

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (YqCDc)

269 He points out that Greg Gutfeld's show is "lean and mean" with no writers room -- I think he's wrong about that, I think Gutfeld has a handful of writers

yeah, but they mill about the hallway; no writers' room.

Posted by: anachronda at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (v3pYe)

270 "Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?"

The wife doesn't care, but since I don't like watching two dudes making out, there's virtually nothing on TV for me.

Posted by: Impudent Warwick at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (f/6Wb)

271 I don’t care what they say, because she would have done what Lincoln did.

Freed the slaves? Oh, Jeff Daniels, you simp.

Freeing their slaves is absolutely the last thing that the Dims would ever do.

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (xG4kz)
---
Suspend Habeus Corpus, then?

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (krQz2)

272 ">>> ... because we've all collectively decided that it's not worth it to watch a broadly-appealing, but kinda bland, entertainment with our spouses and children, ... "

My wife watches Hallmark and related fare. There's no way in hell i'm going to watch that.

Posted by: Archimedes at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (Riz8t)

273 Now Ronnie James Dio has someone to spell him snarling at the gates of hell.

Posted by: Elrond Hubbard at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (n+FG3)

274 Will there be a bat thread after Ozzy's passing? Maybe before or after the food thread.

Posted by: bill in arkansas, not gonna comply with nuttin, waiting for the 0300 knock on the door at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (gm9Sb)

275 how TF does a judge get to say that the AG is not allowed to be re-appointed as interim?

I'm so sick of this state. Declare NJ in insurrection already.
Posted by: Iasonas

Existing law, (and probably under the unitary executive theory--unconstitutional), allows judges in a federal district to pick the district attorney if the appointee is not confirmed after a certain amount of time.

Law came about due to Senate filibusters, blue slips, etc. over DA appointments regarding issues like integration. Not needed now as neither applies.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM (ctrM5)

276 Three Body Problem?

Posted by: The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM (wVcYX)

277 But Colbert and the rest of the late night no-ratings punks pursued a different audience: a micro audience.

--------------

Alteria Pilgram beat me to the micro penis reference ...

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM (b7UNs)

278 Ozzy Osborne is mort
Posted by: kallisto at July 22, 2025 02:32 PM

Damn, that's a shame.

Posted by: Keith Richards at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM (kgE5c)

279 251 Personally The Diamond Age edges out Snow Crash by a smidge. Love Princess Nell and her Mouse Army.
Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM (/pbrl)

I wouldn't argue that. Diamond Age was the last Stephenson book I loved.

Posted by: Mark Andrew Edwards, Buy ammo at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM (xcxpd)

280 Why am I teary eyed about Ozzy?!

Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM (Vvh2V)

281 Make late night much, much cheaper. You are seriously paying Colbert millions of $ to host?

Get a guy who will host for 5 years for $500k. Plenty of comedians would kill for the chance. In fact, have a rotating group of people host.

Posted by: El Mariachi - Attorney at Law at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM (gDhA9)

282 >>>yeah, but they mill about the hallway; no writers' room.

you could be right. There are writers who never come into any room. They just submit bits and jokes via email and get paid per joke accepted. Gutfeld may have an arrangement like that with a dozen people or so.

They also do this at the network late night shows -- they both accept submissions from comedians who don't work for them, AND they pay 20+ people as full-time "comedy" writers.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (KRtlO)

283 I bet guys who dated Dunham are banned from every zoo in the country. Big pictures of 'em in the box office that say "DO NOT PERMIT ENTRY" across them.

Posted by: Yudhishthira's Dice at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (4Iqzz)

284 Nobody under 30 knows that network TV is.

30-50 year olds kinda know and lived with it but have mostly cut the cord and are mainly streaming content.

The only people still watching old school TV are older people. There’s no future in TV. In 10 years it’s over, all of it.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (Vvm2m)

285 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

-
The Big Book of Penthouse Forum Letters?

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Lying Dogface Pony Soldier at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (L/fGl)

286 Why am I teary eyed about Ozzy?!
Posted by: Tammy al-Thor at July 22, 2025 03:11 PM

Beats the hell out of us.

Posted by: Bats Everywhere at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (kgE5c)

287 He points out that Greg Gutfeld's show is "lean and mean" with no writers room -- I think he's wrong about that, I think Gutfeld has a handful of writers

yeah, but they mill about the hallway; no writers' room.
Posted by: anachronda at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (v3pYe)
---
Yeah, he is. Kat was, Gene is head writer (I'd bet), and Machi and Joe Devito are obvious show writers. I can't tell whether Shillieu is a steady writer or a free-lance creator and collaborator.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (krQz2)

288 265 Neil Young is supposed to be in Cleveland next month. Fingers crossed.
Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:07 PM

That he gets hit by a bus?
Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (ewjUl)

Haha. Yeah, but no, I really like some of his songs. We won't be that far away from the harvest moon if he makes it on the scheduled date.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (MMp6W)

289 thanks Alterio Pilgrim!

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (KRtlO)

290 Letterman had some moments

Jerry Lawler smacking Andy Kaufman
Drew Barrymore dancing on Dave's desk and flashing him
He talked Teri Garr into taking a shower during the show
Larry "Bud" Melman doing anything

Posted by: Don Black at July 22, 2025 03:13 PM (AOsQT)

291 We rarely watch anything on TV anymore. The last show we watched and liked was Breaking Bad. Our system gives us everything, paramount, HBO, Max, so many streaming services and we don't watch any.

Posted by: Megthered at July 22, 2025 03:13 PM (GOJbT)

292 I miss the local stations signing off at midnight with the National Anthem.

Posted by: Weasel at July 22, 2025 03:13 PM (Xgoim)

293 My Wife and I only really watch KDrama crime shows, they are well written and you don't know who the Killer is unlike Hollywood, it's the White male Christian. I also like that Kdrama's won't really shit on Christian values. The woke is creepin in but not much

Posted by: Patrick From Ohio at July 22, 2025 03:13 PM (FCrpy)

294 Everybody won with "Girls". Lena Dunham got to make out with hot guy, everyone lied and said she was pretty and brave, and we all got to watch her get naked and have sex!!!!
Posted by: Admiral Ackbar
======
Says something about Brian Williams when he was present on the set when his naked daughter got her ass eaten out for the show Girls. And saw nothing wrong with it.

Nothing says family values more than that little vignette.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:13 PM (ctrM5)

295 Started watching Untamed (Eric Bana) on Netflix- it appeals to both sexes but might be PG 13

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (YqCDc)

296 Been watching “Northern Exposure “ lately. Occasionally gets a bit silly but the writing is generally first rate. The Mrs and I both enjoy it.

Posted by: Javems at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (8I4hW)

297 Fed Judge kicks Habba out of her job days after she subpoenaed Bucktooth Bolshevik Phil Murphy, Killer of Grandmas regarding his possible housing of an illegal immigrant in his home.

Does questioning the timing make me a conspiracy theorist?

Posted by: Iasonas at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (gUzGB)

298 292 I miss the local stations signing off at midnight with the National Anthem.
Posted by: Weasel at July 22, 2025 03:13 PM (Xgoim)

Or High Flight?

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (MMp6W)

299
Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

===============

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt was pretty good.

Posted by: Blonde Morticia at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (HL/Ld)

300 "You must have adored it when John Kerry took James Taylor to Paris after the Charlie Hebdo attacks."

Almost as much as I liked "Imagine" after Bataclan, and the endless loop of the kid telling the CNN "journalist" that his papa had said it would be all right even though his mama had been killed, because "we have flowers".

Posted by: barbarausa at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (enw9G)

301 245 Is The Three Body Problem that good? I never read it.
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:05 PM (075ei)

It's mid-tier Chinese propaganda.

i liked the chinese propaganda parts. wasn't terribly impressed with the sci-fi parts.

Posted by: anachronda at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (v3pYe)

302 I like John C. Wright and L. Jagi Lamplighter’s works. Also Sarah Hoyt’s. And there are others. But there isn’t a resilient mainstream sci fi market for right wing writers or readers anymore. And by right wing, I mean anyone to the right of Mao or maybe Pol Pot!

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (075ei)

303 287 He points out that Greg Gutfeld's show is "lean and mean" with no writers room -- I think he's wrong about that, I think Gutfeld has a handful of writers

yeah, but they mill about the hallway; no writers' room.
Posted by: anachronda at July 22, 2025 03:10 PM (v3pYe)
---
Yeah, he is. Kat was, Gene is head writer (I'd bet), and Machi and Joe Devito are obvious show writers. I can't tell whether Shillieu is a steady writer or a free-lance creator and collaborator.
Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:12 PM (krQz2)

Oh, and let's not forget the Horde, as unindicted co-conspirators in Gutfeld!'s writing efforts. You know they lurk here for material.

Posted by: Darrell Harris at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (OQj7z)

304
I keep seeing RIP for Ozzy Osborne, and I keep wondering. Do people mean he should Rest in Peace, or Rock in Perpetuity?
Posted by: Hour of the Wolf at July 22, 2025 03:09 PM (S/Y4j)

____________

Just as long as it's not Rest in Power. That's the sort of silly, smarmy thing some left-wing atheist would say.

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (HZi96)

305 280 Why am I teary eyed about Ozzy?!
Posted by: Tammy al-Thor
======
It is a reminder of our own mortality.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (ctrM5)

306 I dunno, when was the last time anything like that was presented i a mass market?
Posted by: sock_rat_eez at July 22, 2025 03:08 PM (dKEEs)

Much more succinct than my formulation.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (N1DT3)

307 Been watching “Northern Exposure “ lately. Occasionally gets a bit silly but the writing is generally first rate. The Mrs and I both enjoy it.
Posted by: Javems at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (8I4hW)
------------
Plus, Janine Turner!

Posted by: Captain Obvious, Laird o' the Sea at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (XZ5S6)

308 It's a write off, Jerry.
They just write it off.

Posted by: Kramer at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (eDOZ+)

309 i don't know if I'd count Joe Macchi (?) and some others as "writers," exactly. I think of them more as paid panelists who also write when they're not appearing on the show.

I guess it depends on how you count them. I see them working backstage in little videos he does so they're definitely on-staff.

whatever they are, he doesn't have a big staff. Just a small, tiny staff.

Posted by: ace at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (KRtlO)

310 Ozzy had Parkinson's, which my mom has, and she's a year older.

Horrible, horrible disease.

Posted by: Iasonas at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (gUzGB)

311 296 Been watching “Northern Exposure “ lately. Occasionally gets a bit silly but the writing is generally first rate. The Mrs and I both enjoy it.
Posted by: Javems
========
Underrated series.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (ctrM5)

312 >Do people mean he should Rest in Peace, or Rock in Perpetuity?
---

Reek In Putrescence

Posted by: Don Black at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (AOsQT)

313
Indian Head Test Pattern >>>> Colbert

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (HZi96)

314 It's just incredible that they all pursued the same strategy of guaranteed failure, and even more incredible that the "suits" who are supposed to be sober, competent professionals permitted them to do so or even encouraged them to do so -- that's how strong corporate media Trump derangement is.

----------------

The Cult of Personality ~~Trump Derangement REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!~~

~~Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo!~~ at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (XXfwL)

315 Just as long as it's not Rest in Power.
------------
WTF is that even supposed to mean?

Posted by: Captain Obvious, Laird o' the Sea at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (XZ5S6)

316 Gutfeld doesn't have a teem of writers because he's not trying to be jokey, his specific brand is aggressively corny jokes, humor and bits that are meant to take the edge off the general political discourse of the show.

Which I f**king love.

It's like Cosby but without all the rape baggage.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (XV/Pl)

317 @ 259, agreed, both of you

279, I liked Anathem, too ... & to some extent, Cryptonomicon

Posted by: sock_rat_eez at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (dKEEs)

318 Kat even once said on the show not to be too hard on Greg, because she *often* writes her own intros.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (krQz2)

319 245 Is The Three Body Problem that good? I never read it.
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:05 PM (075ei)
---------

I liked the series.

Posted by: WisRich at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (G0vdT)

320 Who says they're resting, anyway?

Posted by: Theology 101 at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (eDOZ+)

321 You know what's a pretty good book of the last 25 years?

Corstae.

by some illiterate asshole.

Should give it a look.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM (GBKbO)

322 you could be right. There are writers who never come into any room. They just submit bits and jokes via email and get paid per joke accepted. Gutfeld may have an arrangement like that with a dozen people or so.
Posted by: ace
---
Or they can just crib from you and your comments. Plenty of comedy to be found there.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM (ctrM5)

323 Yes, the late show lost $40 in production operations, but it made $220 million in ad revenue in 2024 -- down from $439 million in 2018.

Posted by: JM in Illinois at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM (LPgB/)

324 Colbert, Mike Tyson's inspiration for his most famous quote.

Posted by: bill in arkansas, not gonna comply with nuttin, waiting for the 0300 knock on the door at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM (gm9Sb)

325 *Never* think Ace doesn't read your comments.

Posted by: Jm. J. Bullock at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM (0sNs1)

326 The only Clip of GIRLS I have seen is were the Girlfriend informs her Boyfriend that they can't have sex because she just had an abortion, and the Guy finds out it was his and loses his shit, it was supposedly to show the guy in a bad light but it make the girl look like a uncaring monster.

Posted by: Patrick From Ohio at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (FCrpy)

327 Ozzie Osborn... RIP

These musicians we grew up with started out playing rock and roll cuz it blew their minds and allowed them have worldwide fame and never have to wait to get a table out, to make a lot of money, avoid having to work a regular job, to get a better class of drugs and all the girls that could want. These are all penultimate reasons to be an artist, probably the only reasons that matter.

Where they ended up is creating modern classical music that has stood the test at time, has touched multiple generations, and will continue to do so long into the future. These bands will literally change the course of Western music permanently. That kind of amounts to something important I'm partially explains why you might be feeling a bit of a loss right now.

Posted by: Alteria Pilgram - My President has convictions. at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (NXz8h)

328 319 245 Is The Three Body Problem that good? I never read it.
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:05 PM (075ei)
---------

I liked the series.
Posted by: WisRich at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (G0vdT)

======

The books were good, except for the worst romance story in history that takes up an ungodly part of the dark forest.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (MMp6W)

329 325 *Never* think Ace doesn't read your comments.
Posted by: Jm. J. Bullock at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM (0sNs1)

========

Performance reviews are taken seriously around here.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (GBKbO)

330 307 Been watching “Northern Exposure “ lately. Occasionally gets a bit silly but the writing is generally first rate. The Mrs and I both enjoy it.
Posted by: Javems at July 22, 2025 03:14 PM (8I4hW)
------------
Plus, Janine Turner!
Posted by: Captain Obvious, Laird o' the Sea at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (XZ5S6)

She's one of us! She could be an Honorary 'Ette, considering her political views.

Posted by: Darrell Harris at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (OQj7z)

331 So much easier just to tune to Youtube and get hooked for a week or more on watching a channel that happens to pop up in the timeline
* A bunch of nights watching some dude in Cleveland repoing cars and the encounters he has
* some lady grooming cats and dogs and the various fatties, scared, and wild ones that show up
* Then a week of nothing but police chases ending in pit maneuvers
* Then a week or more of learning about the various WW2 fighters on both sides
* Then a bunch of nights watching boats trying to navigate the various Florida inlets with the occasional bikinni fashions

How the fuck does the MSM compete with that nano-casting exotica?

Posted by: hate_the_deepstate at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (2Dncg)

332 "Writer's Room" is kind of a metonym of sorts. It doesn't mean just "the physical room where the writers meet", it's the entire edifice of thirty people rotating in and out collecting lavish salaries to rip off other people's material and generally do nothing, and pat themselves on the back for how clever they are.

A half dozen people cranking out Quality isn't really what the phrase "The Writers' Room" means anymore. I think that whole idiotic strike fiasco is what really made this a thing.

Posted by: Warai-otoko at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (RlmPm)

333 ace: "whatever they are, he doesn't have a big staff. Just a small, tiny staff."

That's what she said.

Posted by: Michael Scott at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (gLikB)

334 Hopefully he will screw them every day until he is just terminated

Have a great afternoon everyone

Posted by: Skip at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (+qU29)

335 For 20 years now, I have been trying to convince my clients- "Before you fire someone, call me. I will change all their passwords and log them out everywhere. Then take their phone and laptop. Then fire them. Do not let them return to their desk."

Do they listen? Sometimes.

CBS didn't listen.

Posted by: 29Victor at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (j6Ika)

336 I thought the 8th amendment prohibited cruel and unusual punishment.

Florida’s Voice@FLVoiceNews
DESANTIS: People are complaining at Alligator Alcatraz the ham sandwiches aren't toasted

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Lying Dogface Pony Soldier at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (L/fGl)

337 133 Late Night shows caught SNL disease.
Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 02:50 PM (ewjUl)

NBC's late night is all run by Lorne Michaels, and I would bet a lot of the writers, producers, and folks behind the scenes came from the NBC late night machine.

And WTF is CBS thinking? Rule number 1 of broadcasting is to not put someone on the air that has been fired, you walk them out the door immediately.

Posted by: Ashley Judd's Puffy Scamper at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (k1E2D)

338 Just got back from a Polish rodeo.

Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (lHEti)

339 * Then a bunch of nights watching boats trying to navigate the various Florida inlets with the occasional bikinni fashions

Posted by: hate_the_deepstate at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (2Dncg)

I just bought a place in Ft Lauderdale, where does one go to watch this, so you know, I can avoid it...oh who am I kidding.

Seriously, where do I go.

Posted by: Iasonas at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (gUzGB)

340 Today, the United States announced our decision to withdraw from UNESCO. Like many UN organizations, UNESCO strayed from its founding mission. Going forward, U.S. participation in international organizations must make America safer, stronger, and more prosperous. - Tammy Bruce

The French seem to be furieux over this, which means, it is the right move.

Posted by: Hell at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (/U5Yz)

341 What would be cool is to have TJM and AH Lloyd do a book tour together...

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (PiwSw)

342 Corstae.
Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM

Sounds Latin.

Posted by: David Hogg, Harvard graduate at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (0sNs1)

343 The last late night host I gave any shit about was Craig Ferguson and half of that was because of the under-appreciated genius of Josh Thompson. Honestly, I never watched the show while it was actually on and only just recently discovered just how amazing those two were together.

Posted by: Scott1M at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (O9uxk)

344 Holy shit, I read the whole damn thing.

Something about TV.

Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (fV+MH)

345 342 Corstae.
Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:17 PM

Sounds Latin.
Posted by: David Hogg, Harvard graduate at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (0sNs1)

=======

I don't get it.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (GBKbO)

346 https://youtube.com/shorts/7zATMryy-uo?si=hWNTsaAIZdds7a8O
****
Nice advert. As good as it gets.

Posted by: torabora at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (G0jjl)

347 Who says they're resting, anyway?
Posted by: Theology 101 at July 22, 2025 03:16 PM (eDOZ+)

This is a Westinghouse!

Posted by: Just the Punchline at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (wVcYX)

348 310 Ozzy had Parkinson's, which my mom has, and she's a year older.

Horrible, horrible disease.
Posted by: Iasonas at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (gUzGB)

Two friends have it. Awful, progressive disease.

Posted by: JM in Illinois at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (LPgB/)

349 off demon sock

Posted by: Maj. Healey at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (/U5Yz)

350 ace: "whatever they are, he doesn't have a big staff. Just a small, tiny staff."

That's what she said.
Posted by: Michael Scott at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (gLikB)

Speaking of programs with mass appeal....

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (N1DT3)

351 All these people RIP-ing on Ozzy Osbourne!

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM (krQz2)

352 Colbert's insults of Trump are not even high school level.

Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:21 PM (fV+MH)

353 Ozzy reunites with Randy.

Posted by: Darth Randall at July 22, 2025 03:21 PM (e+GpJ)

354 338 Just got back from a Polish rodeo.
Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (lHEti)

I don't get it. What's a polish rodeo?

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:21 PM (fGmWu)

355
Florida’s Voice@FLVoiceNews
DESANTIS: People are complaining at Alligator Alcatraz the ham sandwiches aren't toasted

bwahahahahahaha!

Posted by: Krebs v Carnot: Epic Battle of the Cycling Stars (TM) Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh! Point&Laugh![ at July 22, 2025 03:21 PM (xG4kz)

356 354 338 Just got back from a Polish rodeo.
Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (lHEti)

I don't get it. What's a polish rodeo?
Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:21 PM (fGmWu)

$20 bucks, same as in town

Posted by: Mark Andrew Edwards, buy ammo at July 22, 2025 03:22 PM (xcxpd)

357 That's two celebrities that I killed by thinking about their deaths hours before they died.

Posted by: Josephistan at July 22, 2025 03:22 PM (y9ksN)

358 If Audrey Hepburn liked UNESCO, then I like UNESCO.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:22 PM (MMp6W)

359 Colbert is just going to piss on CBS and Trump for the next ten months. He'll won't get removed unless he says something that could get CBS sued

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 03:22 PM (Cdp18)

360 || My Wife and I only really watch KDrama crime shows, they are well written and you don't know who the Killer is

It's the Korean guy (or gal).

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:22 PM (asXVI)

361 Name the last great novel or book from say the last 25 years.

It's probably just Harry Potter and very little else that will remarked on in 100 years time.
Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 02:48 PM (XV/Pl)

Do you mean "great and meaningful as seen from Manhattan Editorial houses" or do you mean "sold really well and I will re-read it"?

Posted by: Kindltot at July 22, 2025 03:23 PM (D7oie)

362
Two friends have it. Awful, progressive disease.
Posted by: JM in Illinois

===============

Neighbor had it. Killed himself. What I didn't realize until I read more about it is the effect on your mind, too.

Posted by: Blonde Morticia at July 22, 2025 03:23 PM (HL/Ld)

363 Im guessung they are stuck with him because they've sold ad space up until his end date. They could always bring in guest hosts, but they might run in to the same thing where there's just other celebrities crying over his cancellation every day.

Maybe they're hoping he goes to far and hangs himself, then maybe they can just end the show and say there lost ad revenue was his fault, and sue.

Posted by: Rbastid at July 22, 2025 03:23 PM (NL+VW)

364 360 || My Wife and I only really watch KDrama crime shows, they are well written and you don't know who the Killer is

It's the Korean guy (or gal).
Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:22 PM (asXVI)

========

Reminds me...

Park Chan Wook's new movie has a trailer!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAGniYuCjdE

Looks damn sexy.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:23 PM (GBKbO)

365 *Never* think Ace doesn't read your comments.
Posted by: Jm. J. Bullock

Tell him how to run his blog.

He reads comments.

Posted by: rickb223 at July 22, 2025 03:24 PM (ndc+z)

366 Been watching “Northern Exposure “ lately. Occasionally gets a bit silly but the writing is generally first rate. The Mrs and I both enjoy it.
Posted by: Javems
========
Underrated series.
Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:15 PM (ctrM5)

---------------

+1

Cynthia Geary (who portrayed Shelly Tambo) was an eerie doppelgänger of my first love.

I still crack up at the great dream sequence with Joel portraying Robert Palmer in an "Addicted to Love" video.

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:24 PM (XXfwL)

367 What would be cool is to have TJM and AH Lloyd do a book tour together...
Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (PiwSw)

The last thing the world needs is to give TJM a bigger audience so he can rattle on about Prometheus.

Posted by: Alteria Pilgram - My President has convictions. at July 22, 2025 03:24 PM (NXz8h)

368 His real name was John.

Posted by: wth at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (UjdFS)

369 365 Tell him how to run his blog.

He reads comments.
Posted by: rickb223 at July 22, 2025 03:24 PM (ndc+z)

=======

He loves recommendations about Instagram alternatives, in particular.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (GBKbO)

370 Sounds Latin.
Posted by: David Hogg, Harvard graduate at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (0sNs1)

=======

I don't get it.
Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:20 PM

IT'S FUNNY BECAUSE YOU ZINGED DAVID HOGG WITH ALUMNA INSTEAD OF ALUMNUS, AND CLAIMED YOU ONLY KNEW TWO WORDS OF LATIN.

Posted by: BEN ROETHLISBERGER at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (ASdyN)

371 @361

>>Do you mean "great and meaningful as seen from Manhattan Editorial houses" or do you mean "sold really well and I will re-read it"?

As in great book or series of books that will be regarded, remembered, assigned and considered essential reading.

Like Jane Austin or Orwell or Hemingway or Gabriel Marquez Garcia or JK Rowling.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (XV/Pl)

372 Ozzy was the headliner at the 1984 Iowa Jam. I had to go to the car after Motley Crue, and before Ted Nugent, so I never got to see him. Blame it on my first, and only (thankfully) experience with a contact high.

Posted by: Turn 2 at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (CyFyf)

373 I think the narrowing of the audience is also meant to attract certain demographics that advertisers want. They don't care how many broad categories watch just the ones that spend money on their product.

Posted by: Imma Bad Person at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (RRCAT)

374 370 IT'S FUNNY BECAUSE YOU ZINGED DAVID HOGG WITH ALUMNA INSTEAD OF ALUMNUS, AND CLAIMED YOU ONLY KNEW TWO WORDS OF LATIN.
Posted by: BEN ROETHLISBERGER at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (ASdyN)

=======

Ah, I see I'm not the only one who spends too much time here.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (GBKbO)

375 321 You know what's a pretty good book of the last 25 years?

Corstae.

by some illiterate asshole.

Should give it a look.
---

Uh...yeah...I been reading these books about intelligent, evolved insect lifeforms...wild stuff...I don't even like bugs but...

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (asXVI)

376 It’s a novella rather than a novel, but I would put John C. Wright’s One Bright Star To Guide Them up there as a great story of the last 25 years. The reviews are either “I loved it,” or “It’s dreck: don’t bother reading it”. I loved it. I’m guessing the reviewers fall on either side of the political divide which has split sci fi fandom. If you liked Narnia, check it out.

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (075ei)

377 We need to resurrect Gilbert Gottfried to do a hardcore religious show where he heals people using Pez and Dr. Pepper.

To be in the studio audience you have to be a declared Atheist or a Satanist. All audience members are given water balloons (and no rules). All applause has to be "Jazz Hands", and each show includes a remote where Gilbert pranks a hardcore prison inmate.

Gilbert's sidekick is Dennis Rodman.

Posted by: Orson at July 22, 2025 03:26 PM (dIske)

378 CBS and ABC (and the other MSM outlets) are likely to get drug into the Russia treason stuff so if their broadcast licenses get shit canned the Colbert thing will resolve itself and it'll be a win.

Posted by: CrotchetyOldJarhead at July 22, 2025 03:26 PM (3Ope8)

379 Polish rodeo is an example a too narrow interests that do not produce a lot of money.

Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:26 PM (VgTC3)

380 Almost now every entertainment is atomized and made for one highly-specific target audience. Shows no longer seem interested in attracting a broad audience, only a loyal micro-audience.

And I think this is a real driver of division and toxicity in our society. We just don't enjoy the same things any longer. We have less and less in common.

And I can't say that's the TV executives' fault, because we've all collectively decided that it's not worth it to watch a broadly-appealing, but kinda bland, entertainment with our spouses and children, but that we'd all rather just retreat into separate rooms to watch individually-tailored fare on the computer or TV.

This. Remember when friends would talk about the latest new radio hits or TV episodes? We shared popular culture experiences. We don't do that so much anymore. I don't think popular entertainment is important per se, but it helped strengthen social cohesion. There is also much less social interaction like church attendance and bowling leagues and sewing circles. We have become a bunch of hermits.

Posted by: Emmie celebrates the Audacity of Trump! at July 22, 2025 03:27 PM (FMtrg)

381 Tell him how to run his blog.

He reads comments.

Posted by: rickb223 at July 22, 2025 03:24 PM (ndc+z)

---------------

TPOP (ThePrimordialOrderedPair) and Bitter Clinger (two of my faves) hardest hit ...

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:27 PM (XXfwL)

382 372 Ozzy was the headliner at the 1984 Iowa Jam. I had to go to the car after Motley Crue, and before Ted Nugent, so I never got to see him. Blame it on my first, and only (thankfully) experience with a contact high.
Posted by: Turn 2 at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM

I went to the US festival with my older sibling and I have never seen anything like it since. There were people walking around hawking their wares like they were snacks, they had literal signs and they were yelling, get your mushrooms here, mushrooms anyone want mushrooms and every drug under the sun. I coudln't believe it was so open.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:27 PM (fGmWu)

383 Polish Rodeo at 7pm, tonight on the Ocho!

Posted by: Just the Punchline at July 22, 2025 03:27 PM (wVcYX)

384 The streaming services have to put their original programming on broadcast networks first. This will grow the audience for the streamers and save the networks.

Posted by: MikeN at July 22, 2025 03:28 PM (HVZOH)

385 How the fuck does the MSM compete with that nano-casting exotica?

Posted by: hate_the_deepstate at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (2Dncg)

Jomboy breakdowns is more quality thanything ESPN can put out.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:28 PM (i24o9)

386 That's two celebrities that I killed by thinking about their deaths hours before they died.

I can melt ice with my mind: it just takes a while.

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:28 PM (075ei)

387 You have to have two chicks to do the Polish Rodeo right.

Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:28 PM (fV+MH)

388 It's a write off, Jerry.
They just write it off.
Posted by: Kramer
.....

They're Dominicans.

Posted by: wth at July 22, 2025 03:29 PM (UjdFS)

389 I don't think it is a micro strategy, I think it is mostly hubris. They don't like half the country sure, but business is business. Problem is they keep listening to the lefty madness of, "here's a market for x that's 100 million people. Here's one for y that is 10 million, make a show for both an we have 110 million." But that never works because you automatically are appealing to the 10 million (the 100 million already are there) but you destroy the property to get that 10 million and the 100 million leave

Posted by: steinsgateisreal at July 22, 2025 03:29 PM (s8WNT)

390 Streaming isn't so awesome that the content beat out network content on their merits.

Network content is so bad that people will pay money to watch mediocre content on a phone screen because network content is shit.

That's why they're dying. Because they deserve to.

Posted by: OneEyedJack at July 22, 2025 03:30 PM (Hx0tZ)

391 "I can melt ice with my mind: it just takes a while.
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit"

If you stare at a wall for three hours you'll have to pee.

Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:30 PM (fV+MH)

392 I guess I don't understand how Colbert, a 61 year old white male is the hill these hipster/douche 20 somethings want to fight for. Colbert is the establishment crony if there ever was one.

Posted by: Frank Barone at July 22, 2025 03:30 PM (IifOV)

393 Funniest thing on X I've seen today:

"Republicans are the worst gerrymanderers! Look at Idaho! 100% Republican Congressional representation!"

Idaho is a 30+ GOP state with 2 Congressional districts.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:30 PM (GBKbO)

394 The only thing I liked Colbert on was Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law....and that show was only 15 minutes nutes long.

Posted by: mishdog at July 22, 2025 03:30 PM (mgh5v)

395 Remember when friends would talk about the latest new radio hits or TV episodes? We shared popular culture experiences. We don't do that so much anymore.

Posted by: Emmie celebrates the Audacity of Trump! at July 22, 2025 03:27 PM (FMtrg)

Kids still do that, but it's more about youtube personalities like unspeakable or preston.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (i24o9)

396 I saw a video by a YouTuber called Captain Midnight who states the obvious: This isn't about late night television. Late night tv is just the canary in the coalmine, the first to die.

---------------

Andrew Breitbart (PBUH) smiles and chuckles heartily from heaven.

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (nXmou)

397 I must have missed the MTG amendment to cut Israeli defense aid by 500 million. Might as well just vote to fund Hamas .

She needs to leave with Massie. She can’t tell the difference between what’s in the US security interest and what’s not.

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (VofaG)

398 Lena Dunham "Girls" era: https://tinyurl.com/yxz6ybux

Lena Dunham 2025: https://tinyurl.com/5n6rvusj

Insert Jabba jokes at will.

Posted by: Admiral Ackbar at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (JCZqz)

399 UK publisher is mired in controversy right now over a book called The Salt Path.

Couple loose house in legal drama with friend and husband has debilitating brain disease. They go on a journey of healing. Sold a couple million copies.

Except it seems the wife embezzled money from friend's business which then collapsed. They had to sell the house to repay the fraud. And the husband is in pretty good nick years after anyone else with the disease would be Joey Bidet or dead.

Posted by: Anna Puma at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (/pbrl)

400 The only thing I liked Colbert on was Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law....and that show was only 15 minutes nutes long.

Posted by: mishdog at July 22, 2025 03:30 PM (mgh5v)
---
Thank you. I brought up Phil Ken Sebbin yesterday, with no reaction.

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (krQz2)

401 372 Ozzy was the headliner at the 1984 Iowa Jam. I had to go to the car after Motley Crue, and before Ted Nugent, so I never got to see him. Blame it on my first, and only (thankfully) experience with a contact high.
Posted by: Turn 2 at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM

Every concert I go toI'm the dingbat walking through the crowd saying, I smell a skunk and my husband tells me to be quiet that everyone is smoking weed.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (fGmWu)

402 I hate going to a concert where the audience is all boomers smoking weed.

Posted by: Oglebay at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM (MMp6W)

403 >>> I went to the US festival with my older sibling and I have never seen anything like it since. There were people walking around hawking their wares like they were snacks, they had literal signs and they were yelling, get your mushrooms here, mushrooms anyone want mushrooms and every drug under the sun. I coudln't believe it was so open.
Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:27 PM (fGmWu)

======

One of my friends said the guy shooting up next to us was a friend of his brother. Quite the eye-opener for a small town Iowa boy.

Posted by: Turn 2 at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM (CyFyf)

404 A classic Lena 2022 moment: https://tinyurl.com/vt8tz9d3

And another 2025 I hadn't seen, and you will want to keep it that way! https://tinyurl.com/2p9knuz2

Posted by: Admiral Ackbar at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM (JCZqz)

405 What's a Sea Hobo?

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM (PiwSw)

406 Polish rodeo is an example a too narrow interests that do not produce a lot of money.
Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:26 PM (VgTC3)

So, the WNBA then.

Posted by: OneEyedJack at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM (Hx0tZ)

407 I also attended the 83 US Festival.
Got pushed over the front of the stage during Black Sabbath. Made it back to the front for Green Manalishi with the Three Pronged Crown by Judas Priest.
One hellufa show!

Posted by: Elrond Hubbard at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM (n+FG3)

408 guess I don't understand how Colbert, a 61 year old white male is the hill these hipster/douche 20 somethings want to fight for. Colbert is the establishment crony if there ever was one.
Posted by: Frank Barone at July 22, 2025 03:30 PM (IifOV)

He’s a Beta so it makes sense. He makes Hogg look like a bad ass.

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:34 PM (VofaG)

409 Say what you like about Howard Stern, he got Megyn Kelly to reveal she's a B-cup.

Posted by: J. Random Moron at July 22, 2025 03:34 PM (0sNs1)

410 Colbert has a great future as the MC of a rebooted gong show.

Posted by: Alteria Pilgram - My President has convictions. at July 22, 2025 03:34 PM (NXz8h)

411 Lena Dunham looks like she belongs on My 600lb Life

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 03:34 PM (Cdp18)

412 335 For 20 years now, I have been trying to convince my clients- "Before you fire someone, call me. I will change all their passwords and log them out everywhere. Then take their phone and laptop. Then fire them. Do not let them return to their desk."

Do they listen? Sometimes.

CBS didn't listen.
Posted by: 29Victor at July 22, 2025 03:18 PM (j6Ika)

Yep. Back in my radio days, the owner was firing the GM of the station, the GM had gotten the engineer to program the phone system so that he could listen in on phone calls so he knew what was coming. He sabotaged everything that he could. Once I found out what happened, I told the owner that if he wanted to talk about anything like that again that he should call me at home at night to talk about it.

Posted by: Ashley Judd's Puffy Scamper at July 22, 2025 03:35 PM (k1E2D)

413 Say what you like about Howard Stern, he got Megyn Kelly to reveal she's a B-cup.

Posted by: J. Random Moron at July 22, 2025 03:34 PM (0sNs1) Preston.

There was any doubt?

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:35 PM (i24o9)

414 You have to have two chicks to do the Polish Rodeo right.
Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:28 PM

Two chicks, one kolache.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 03:35 PM (ewjUl)

415 Who's JmJ Bullock?

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at July 22, 2025 03:36 PM (2GCMq)

416 My first concert, ever: Ozzy Osbourne at Freeman Coliseum in San Antonio, 1 October 1992. His first appearance in San Antonio since his pissing on the Alamo Cenotaph.

Posted by: Cow Demon at July 22, 2025 03:36 PM (Pce4l)

417 So I pulled IMDB's "Best TV Series of 2010-2020"

Top 10, only two are not rated "TV-MA" and they are documentaries.

Top 20, coming in at 17 is "Stranger Things" at TV-14 while the rest are all TV-MA

Top 30, again, one TV-14 I've never heard of (and some documentaries), but all TV-MA

Top 40, finally, have some fiction shows not TV-MA: Sherlock, Downton Abbey, and Modern Family. I notice only one is out of Hollywood.

50-100, only 9 are not "TV-MA" and most of those are still TV-14 and deal with pretty adult themes. (e.g. "The Good Wife")

I think the market stopped producing mass shows before the preferences scattered. (And, for the record, I generally don't care for TV-MA shows because most of them are dark for the sake of being dark.)

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:36 PM (N1DT3)

418 Lena Dunham looks like she belongs on My 600lb Life
Posted by: Smell the Glove
.......

She's going to impregnate herself with mail order sperm and a turkey baster?

Posted by: wth at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (UjdFS)

419 Even Andrew Breitbart will just get bored of gloating in heaven, and then he'll move on.

-----------

Damn, should have known Ace would beat me to the Breitbart & heaven reference. Someday I'll read the content first before ~~opining~~ popping off ...

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (78LDJ)

420 What's a Sea Hobo?

$20, same as in town.

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (zEUpG)

421 407 I also attended the 83 US Festival.
Got pushed over the front of the stage during Black Sabbath. Made it back to the front for Green Manalishi with the Three Pronged Crown by Judas Priest.
One hellufa show!
Posted by: Elrond Hubbard at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM (n+FG3)

Oh my how cool we were at the same concert. I never went to the front, too crowded and hot.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (fGmWu)

422 Say what you like about Howard Stern, he got Megyn Kelly to reveal she's a B-cup.
Posted by: J. Random Moron at July 22, 2025 03:34 PM

===

There was any doubt?
Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at July 22, 2025 03:35 PM

You know about cups?

Posted by: J. Random Moron at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (0sNs1)

423 Ozzy, despite the Prince of Darkness marketing, wild drug habit and behavior, was a really sweet guy, who loved his fans and gave his all for them.

God bless you, John "Ozzy" Osborne of Birmingham.

Posted by: Field Marshal Zhukov at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (wBaIH)

424 Contracts and all, yeah, I get it, but why not bite the bullet and fire the dude instead of letting that cancer metastasize?

Posted by: Cow Demon at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (Pce4l)

425 So, the WNBA then.
Posted by: OneEyedJack at July 22, 2025 03:33 PM

Loved their pay us what we're worth during their "all star" game. Uuuh, you're subsidized by the NBA,, you lose money, so how about. Fuck you. Pay me.

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 03:37 PM (ewjUl)

426 415 Who's JmJ Bullock?
---
Fenelon! How can you be nearly 29 and not know?

Best known for his fey performance in the syndicated Ted Knight vehicle "Too Close For Comfort", he was actually kind of perfect as Prince Valium in "Spaceballs".

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (asXVI)

427 Theory:

Trump had Ozzie murdered to distract from his scandals.

Discuss.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (GBKbO)

428 I hope the next thread isn't an all-Ozzy thread. Most of us 29 year olds are too young to care much.

Posted by: the lower depths at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (+b4rY)

429 Will be playing Ozzy and Sabbath in heavy rotation tonight midnight EST on blackstonerocks.com. During our Midnight Metal show. Legendary.
Blackstone Rocks Radio

Posted by: Blackstone at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (d8rrv)

430 @418 I don't want to think about it

Posted by: Smell the Glove at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (Cdp18)

431 I started watching some shows of Love America Style. Some of it is pretty stupid but I remember watching reruns of it when I was about 6 or 7.

It probably warped my understanding of dating a relationships.

Posted by: MAGA_Ken at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (YAMwy)

432 Who's JmJ Bullock?
Posted by: FenelonSpoke at July 22, 2025 03:36 PM (2GCMq)
---
Monroe on Too Close For Comfort

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (krQz2)

433 Wait a minute! You're telling me Colbert doesn't like Trump? No way!

Posted by: Minnfidel at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (ewjUl)

434 Never a Black Sabbath or Ozzy music fan but based on the reality shows I watched he was a kind hearted guy that always truly felt bad about the stupid shit he did when drunk or high. He was pretty funny too when you could understand him.

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (VofaG)

435 >>309 i don't know if I'd count Joe Macchi (?) and some others as "writers," exactly. I think of them more as paid panelists who also write when they're not appearing on the show.

I've seen Machi and DeVito referred to specifically as writers on the show. That's why in the "Greg's Leftovers" segment on Fridays he always threatens to punish Machi if the jokes suck.

Posted by: the dandy at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (8l8nW)

436 Posted by: TheJamesMadison
======
I'm gonna wait for your book to tell me what to think about that.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (ctrM5)

437 What's a Sea Hobo?

$20, same as in town.
Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats
......

$15 at the docks.

Posted by: wth at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (UjdFS)

438 427 Theory:

Trump had Ozzie murdered to distract from his scandals.

Discuss.
---
After getting Colbert fired, he stepped it up.

My God, Mark Ruffalo could be next!

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:39 PM (asXVI)

439 Theory:

Trump had Ozzie murdered to distract from his scandals.

Discuss.
Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (GBKbO)
---
So you're defending Putin?

Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:40 PM (krQz2)

440 439 Theory:

Trump had Ozzie murdered to distract from his scandals.

Discuss.
Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (GBKbO)
---
So you're defending Putin?
Posted by: Axeman at July 22, 2025 03:40 PM (krQz2)

=======

I'm defending Xaplax of the Martian Federation.

Open your eyes, sheeple!

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:40 PM (GBKbO)

441 I remember as a kid begging to stay up to watch late night. What gen z or gen alpha kid even cares about late night? They don't watch that, they do scroll tiktok or Facebook reels whatever the hot platform is.

The part that Colbert really can't stand is the culture, and specially the culture of youth has moved past him. And are Trump curious. They are politically genderfluid, not lockstep liberal skulls full of mush. And he can't accept it.

Posted by: LizLem at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (3TIHm)

442 Once I found out what happened, I told the owner that if he wanted to talk about anything like that again that he should call me at home at night to talk about it.
Posted by: Ashley Judd's Puffy Scamper at July 22, 2025 03:35 PM (k1E2D)

Bingo! The most dangerous thing to a company is their employees.

Posted by: 29Victor at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (j6Ika)

443 Do you, like me, find it's difficult to find something that can appeal to both yourself an a significant other of the opposite sex?

---------------

Although the wifey doesn't like Seinfeld, I remember when it would be the talk of the office and water cooler the mornings after an episode aired.

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (78LDJ)

444 442 Bingo! The most dangerous thing to a company is their employees.
Posted by: 29Victor at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (j6Ika)

========

*biding his time*
-SMOD

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (GBKbO)

445 Eventually someone will start running Korean soap operas at 11:30, paying peanuts for the license rights.

A-hem. They're ack-shully called K-Dramas.

Posted by: pookysgirl, being an insufferable pedant at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (fZCRo)

446 There were people walking around hawking their wares like they were snacks
Posted by: CaliGirl
======
One of my friends said the guy shooting up next to us was a friend of his brother.
Posted by: Turn 2

She said "snacks" not "smacks".

Posted by: Dark Litigator at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (KAi1n)

447 Ozzy’s son Jack publicly came out for Trump after the assassination attempt. He thought it was bad ass how Trump got up defiantly after being shot.

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (VofaG)

448 Honestly, the "11 foot 8" bridge feed on Youtube is more compelling than most things out of Hollywood.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:42 PM (N1DT3)

449 Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (asXVI

Sorry: I win the award for seeing the fewest modern movies and TV shows of anyone here . I never saw "Too Close for Comfort. I was watching PBS .

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (2GCMq)

450 Just got back from a Polish rodeo.
Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (lHEti)

How is Bucky Goldstein doing these days?

Posted by: Buzz Adrenaline at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (JRP2U)

451 I would be REALLY distracted from Trump controversy if he killed Mark Ruffalo.

Yes sir that would CERTAINLY distract me from any Trump controversies.

ahem

Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (fV+MH)

452 Craig Ferguson was still my fave late night host. He got that it was a ridiculous gig and never took himself seriously. The dancing horses, the gay skull robot... I actually think if he'd stuck around, Gen alpha and Gen z would have loved his ridiculous humor.

His monologue on youth is the best ever. He gets what Colbert doesn't.

John Carson survived crazy political climate by talking zero pilitics. . His monologue on why he never got political is so good.

Posted by: LizLem at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (3TIHm)

453 ‘ the ghost of Jm J. Bullock to haunt the Grindr servers texting eerie homophobic slurs.’

JM J Bullock is still alive.
I made a joke a few weeks ago assuming he was dead. Astoundingly, he is not.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (jbnUc)

454 441 I remember as a kid begging to stay up to watch late night. What gen z or gen alpha kid even cares about late night? They don't watch that, they do scroll tiktok or Facebook reels whatever the hot platform is.

The part that Colbert really can't stand is the culture, and specially the culture of youth has moved past him. And are Trump curious. They are politically genderfluid, not lockstep liberal skulls full of mush. And he can't accept it.
Posted by: LizLem
========
Has beens often rage against their irrelevance and like the bloody opera singers that take forever to die on stage, they keep popping up reminding us of that fact that they are still around.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (ctrM5)

455 People will ask, “Who’s that lesbian sitting next to Rachel Maddow?”

Posted by: Supreme Gentleman at July 22, 2025 03:44 PM (CG+VL)

456 451 I would be REALLY distracted from Trump controversy if he killed Mark Ruffalo.

Yes sir that would CERTAINLY distract me from any Trump controversies.

ahem
Posted by: eleven
======
How about Ruffalo transitioning? Crowd funding might even help with that project.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:45 PM (ctrM5)

457 You know, there's another issue with these late nite offerings. I never even saw them as having a comedy focus. For me, they were about the guests. And, face it, the celebrities, in general, have been depleted. There are a handful or less I have any interest in seeing (or listening to).

Celebrities have marginalized themselves by failing to realize that their draw is based on popularity. They have no problem cutting off 50% of their potential customer based by espousing partisan idiocy. Name a valid celebrity who hasn't done this and I will show you a ratings draw.

Even that list of celebrities who understand they participate in a popularity contest is further depleted by those that don't understand the concept of oversaturation. Add to that the endless list of "perceived" celebrities that have no talent(s) and no business being famous. It has cheapened the pool.

Posted by: Orson at July 22, 2025 03:45 PM (dIske)

458 She said "snacks" not "smacks".

Posted by: Dark Litigator at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (KAi1n)
---
* nods head *

Posted by: Doug Emhoff at July 22, 2025 03:45 PM (krQz2)

459 Boy! First Hamas vandalized her office and now this.

Sabby Sabs@SabbySabs2
AOC is a con artist. Progressives and socialists need to stop falling for her tricks. Protecting the Iron Dome allows Israel to do what they're doing now, killing and starving Palestinians, with no accountability. Even DSA is calling her out.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Lying Dogface Pony Soldier at July 22, 2025 03:45 PM (L/fGl)

460 how about Xur of the Kodan armada,

Posted by: miguel cervantes at July 22, 2025 03:45 PM (bXbFr)

461 I se the NJ Courts tossed Habba as State AG.. Knew that was coming

Posted by: It's me donna at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (VE6XX)

462 460 how about Xur of the Kodan armada,
Posted by: miguel cervantes at July 22, 2025 03:45 PM (bXbFr)

=========

He died.

*eye visor goes down*

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, searching for thrills with John Frankenheimer at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (GBKbO)

463 must have missed the MTG amendment to cut Israeli defense aid by 500 million. Might as well just vote to fund Hamas .

She needs to leave with Massie. She can’t tell the difference between what’s in the US security interest and what’s not.
Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:31 PM (VofaG)

There were only 5 votes for that bill. Massie and MTG, plus Rashida Talib (D-Hamas) annd the brother ducker Ilhan Omar (and some other Dem).

This is the company MTG + Massie are keeping. They’ve gone off the deep end.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (Vvm2m)

464 Gutfeld is also an extension of Krauthammar's "Fox News discovered a niche audience made up of half the country."

Fallon, Colbert, and Kimmel combined get more viewers than Gutfeld, but he individually beats them all because there is a large segment of the country that wants to see Democrats mocked and humiliated nightly even if it's just variations on Pelosi's botoxed face, Bill Clinton is a horndog, Jerry Nadler shits himself, the View are fat sows, and Joe Biden is dead.

Posted by: the dandy at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (8l8nW)

465 Just got back from a Polish rodeo.
Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (lHEti)

How is Bucky Goldstein doing these days?
Posted by: Buzz Adrenaline at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (JRP2U)

----------------

Still riding the NYC buses looking for beautiful Chinese nymphomaniacs ...

Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (B2tT9)

466 I think some of it is the conceit of the networks themselves. They still refuse to acknowledge the dynamics shift of the last 10 years as far as media preference, especially for the younger demographic.

Posted by: nogooddeed at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (4Af9R)

467 If the networks were smart they would give Adam Carolla a shot at Late Night TV.

He was very successful with Love Line and his interviews on his Podcast are really good. Plus his actually funny in a snarky witty way, which is my preferred comedy style.

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (VofaG)

468 Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:38 PM (asXVI

I have never seen "Spaceballs" either. I did see "Galaxy Quest" which I enjoyed and I adore (d) Alan. Rickman

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at July 22, 2025 03:47 PM (2GCMq)

469 So you're defending Putin?
Posted by: Axeman
======
Colbert had a term for such. Can't think of it because 29. But TJM knows. And glows.

TJM's future is so bright, we have to wear shades.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:47 PM (ctrM5)

470 There are celebs whose politics are unknown to me.

Like Sigourney.

Keanu.

Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:47 PM (fV+MH)

471 442 Once I found out what happened, I told the owner that if he wanted to talk about anything like that again that he should call me at home at night to talk about it.
Posted by: Ashley Judd's Puffy Scamper at July 22, 2025 03:35 PM (k1E2D)

Bingo! The most dangerous thing to a company is their employees.
Posted by: 29Victor at July 22, 2025 03:41 PM (j6Ika)

I had a lot of fun over the next year firing the people that were all involved in the sabotage. As I told someone years later, when you make the decision to fire someone, don't wait, do it right then since they will soon figure it out when they don't get put into the loop on things they used to be.

Posted by: Ashley Judd's Puffy Scamper at July 22, 2025 03:47 PM (k1E2D)

472 I did see "Galaxy Quest" which I enjoyed and I adore (d) Alan. Rickman
Posted by: FenelonSpoke at July 22, 2025 03:47 PM (2GCMq)

My mother hates movies, but loves Galaxy Quest.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:47 PM (N1DT3)

473 Without cool kids shows where will the next Obama emerge? The Church of Manhattan Media has painted themselves into a corner. They can't get out! No Moar Saints and Gods!

Posted by: pudinhead at July 22, 2025 03:48 PM (W3T6M)

474 446 There were people walking around hawking their wares like they were snacks
Posted by: CaliGirl

One of my friends said the guy shooting up next to us was a friend of his brother.
Posted by: Turn 2

She said "snacks" not "smacks".
Posted by: Dark Litigator at July 22, 2025 03:41

They were selling heroin too, shockingly. I couldn't believe it. Still have never seen anything like it. They had cardboard homemade signs.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:48 PM (fGmWu)

475 Sorry: I win the award for seeing the fewest modern movies and TV shows of anyone here . I never saw "Too Close for Comfort. I was watching PBS .
---

Heh. "Modern".

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:48 PM (asXVI)

476 Just got back from a Polish rodeo.
Posted by: Dreamingrobot at July 22, 2025 03:19 PM (lHEti)

How is Bucky Goldstein doing these days?
Posted by: Buzz Adrenaline at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (JRP2U)

----------------

Still riding the NYC buses looking for beautiful Chinese nymphomaniacs ...
Posted by: ShainS -- Make Alligator Alcatraz the Gulf of Gator Gitmo! at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (B2tT9)

When you know, you know!

Posted by: Buzz Adrenaline at July 22, 2025 03:49 PM (JRP2U)

477 John Derek Carson-Parker (28 February 1927 – 5 November 2016), known as John Carson, was an English actor known for his appearances in film and television.

John William Carson (October 23, 1925 – January 23, 2005) was an American television host, comedian, and writer best known as the host of NBC's The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962–1992).

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:49 PM (075ei)

478 Come, let us be honest: Colbert is starting out with a sliver of an audience.

Posted by: Aetius451AD work phone at July 22, 2025 03:49 PM (zZu0s)

479 470 There are celebs whose politics are unknown to me.

Like Sigourney.

Keanu.
---------------
This suggests they are normies.

Posted by: pudinhead at July 22, 2025 03:49 PM (W3T6M)

480 There are celebs whose politics are unknown to me.

Like Sigourney.

Keanu.
Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:47 PM (fV+MH)

My view is if I don’t know their politics, it means they’re right wing. Or at least not overtly left wing.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at July 22, 2025 03:50 PM (Vvm2m)

481 I guess Ace is all tuckered out from writing such a big post this time.

Can one of the cogs wake him up for the next post?

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:50 PM (N1DT3)

482 Nothing says family values more than that little vignette.
Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:13 PM (ctrM5)

I don't think you should talk about his daughter that way.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 03:50 PM (9/ad+)

483 Theory:

Trump had Ozzie murdered to distract from his scandals.

Discuss.
---------

I think Stevie Wonder shot Ozzie. Stevie's not really blind.

Posted by: Crusader at July 22, 2025 03:50 PM (TN0g+)

484 Two "current things" I'm suffering extreme DGAF fatigue over.

1) CEO getting caught cheating on his wife.
2) Anything having to do with the talentless hack Colbert.

Posted by: Defenestratus at July 22, 2025 03:51 PM (WYStd)

485 Now that Ozzy is dead, Sharon will have to screw the other musicians out of their royalties and other earnings all by herself.

Posted by: Crusader at July 22, 2025 03:51 PM (TN0g+)

486 I don't think you should talk about his daughter that way.
Posted by: ...
=======
Bad joke, why eat out when you can eat in.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:51 PM (ctrM5)

487 Its is very clear that Medea and Media share the same narrative arc.

Posted by: pudinhead at July 22, 2025 03:51 PM (W3T6M)

488 If you want to micro-target, you must be micro-sized.

The story the TJMs sex life.

Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy at July 22, 2025 03:51 PM (Q/5g/)

489
Even that list of celebrities who understand they participate in a popularity contest is further depleted by those that don't understand the concept of oversaturation. Add to that the endless list of "perceived" celebrities that have no talent(s) and no business being famous. It has cheapened the pool.
Posted by: Orson at July 22, 2025 03:45 PM

You're talking about the former yacht girl Meghan Markle, aren't you?

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (fGmWu)

490 I think Stevie Wonder shot Ozzie. Stevie's not really blind.
Posted by: Crusader
=======
In the library.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (ctrM5)

491 Of the Eastwood spaghetti western trio how do you rank them.

Watching A Fist Full of Dollars now.

For me It’s

For a Few Dollars More
A Fist Full of Dollars
The Good , The Bad and the Ugly

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (VofaG)

492 Theory:

Trump had Ozzie murdered to distract from his scandals.

Discuss.
---------

I think Stevie Wonder shot Ozzie. Stevie's not really blind.
Posted by: Crusader
......

No, it was Elvis. Jealous of the comeback gig.

Posted by: wth at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (v0R5T)

493
I guess Ace is all tuckered out from writing such a big post this time.

Can one of the cogs wake him up for the next post?
Posted by: Formerly Virginian

=============

Or pull him out from under those collapsed shelves.

Posted by: Blonde Morticia at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (HL/Ld)

494 Posted by: pudinhead at July 22, 2025 03:49 PM (W3T6M)

One of the reasons Michael Jordan is so popular besides his inhuman basketball skills is that when asked to campaign for some black politician in Chicago, he answered:

"Why would I do that? Republican buy sneakers too."

You can guess his politics. But, you'll never know for sure.

Posted by: Orson at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (dIske)

495 Television as an industry used to be infamous for its ruthlessness. Yet here these titans of media, these anonymous Olympian heavyweights, are all bent over a stump and whimpering over some thoroughly washed up mediocrity who is indistinguishable from every other washed up mediocrity slinging the same identical schtick.

Seriously, just can the little bitch, cut him a check just big enough to spell "Shut Up And Go Away", and then get on with running your networks into the ground. It's embarrassing.

Posted by: Warai-otoko at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (RlmPm)

496 (I meant "COB" but potay-to, potah-to)

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM (N1DT3)

497 488 If you want to micro-target, you must be micro-sized.

The story the TJMs sex life.
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy
==========
I think the official name here at AOS among partakers of peen is fun sized.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:53 PM (ctrM5)

498 John Carson survived crazy political climate by talking zero pilitics. . His monologue on why he never got political is so good.
Posted by: LizLem at July 22, 2025 03:43 PM (3TIHm)

Carson told political jokes all the time, but, he made sure that both parties got the brunt of his jokes. While he probably went after the Republicans a little more, his ratio was probably 5:4.

Posted by: Ashley Judd's Puffy Scamper at July 22, 2025 03:53 PM (k1E2D)

499 Two "current things" I'm suffering extreme DGAF fatigue over.

1) CEO getting caught cheating on his wife.
—

Same. I don’t get why everyone was so into this story. It’s like sorry to break it to you everyone but chances are very good your very own CEO is fucking someone not his wife.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at July 22, 2025 03:53 PM (Vvm2m)

500 Two "current things" I'm suffering extreme DGAF fatigue over.

1) CEO getting caught cheating on his wife.
--------

I'm still laughing at that one. Those smug execs probably spent a ton of time talking down to the company's employees, and suddenly karma whispered "I'd like to have a word with the two of you...".

Posted by: Crusader at July 22, 2025 03:53 PM (TN0g+)

501 I have never seen "Spaceballs" either. I did see "Galaxy Quest" which I enjoyed and I adore (d) Alan. Rickman
---

I actually saw Spaceballs for the first time relatively recently. It's kind of amusing to see relative unknowns Daphne Zuniga, Bill Pullman and Jim J. Bullock as the super-bland straight men to John Candy, Joan Rivers and Rick Moranis.

https://moviegique.com/2019/06/spaceballs-1987/

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:53 PM (asXVI)

502
I bet ace's next post is going to be an "Is this something?"

Posted by: Blonde Morticia at July 22, 2025 03:53 PM (HL/Ld)

503 I am thoroughly enjoying wading in Colbert's misery.

I shall never tire of it.

Shalln't

Posted by: eleven at July 22, 2025 03:54 PM (fV+MH)

504 Well, Ace kind of woke up and then went back to sleep, it seems.

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:54 PM (N1DT3)

505 No, it was Elvis. Jealous of the comeback gig.
Posted by: wth
=========
I thought he died after fighting the mummies? Zombie Ray Charles is who I would bet money on.

Posted by: whig at July 22, 2025 03:54 PM (ctrM5)

506
One of the reasons Michael Jordan is so popular besides his inhuman basketball skills is that when asked to campaign for some black politician in Chicago, he answered:

"Why would I do that? Republican buy sneakers too."

You can guess his politics. But, you'll never know for sure.
Posted by: Orson at July 22, 2025 03:52 PM

I like the quote attributed to Barkley when someone asked him about working for a republican, I'd play for the KKK if they payed me enough.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:54 PM (fGmWu)

507 I’ve only watch Mel Brooks films once . The exception being Blazing Saddles.

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:55 PM (VofaG)

508 Let's do the time warp again.

Posted by: jsg at July 22, 2025 03:55 PM (ZXxeb)

509 Ha, ha! Colbert and the rest of the late night fucksticks have all of the appeal of a summertime itchy ballsack.

I'd rather watch reruns of Gilligan's Island than Fallon and Kimmel.

Posted by: Rev. Wishbone at July 22, 2025 03:55 PM (/gTjv)

510 It’s like sorry to break it to you everyone but chances are very good your very own CEO is fucking someone not his wife.

Because it was very public and very much a spectacle. And, it was hilarious.

Posted by: nogooddeed at July 22, 2025 03:55 PM (4Af9R)

511 I'd play for the KKK if they payed me enough.
Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:54 PM (fGmWu)

So in other words a lib.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 03:56 PM (9/ad+)

512 How about Ruffalo transitioning? Crowd funding might even help with that project.

How would you be able to tell? I mean, I guess he'd have active bitch face with tits instead of just active bitch face.

Posted by: Ian S. at July 22, 2025 03:56 PM (2ocoG)

513 polynikes, I will watch Young Frankenstein over too.
(and The Producers)

Posted by: barbarausa at July 22, 2025 03:56 PM (enw9G)

514 Nobody really cares for late night shows. They have zero cultural relevance outside of the blue meat these dummies throw their audience.

The celebs pretend to care because they have to.

And that's all this is. Everyone pretending.

Posted by: The Central Scrutinizer at July 22, 2025 03:56 PM (KbCG3)

515 511 I'd play for the KKK if they payed me enough.
Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:54 PM (fGmWu)

So in other words a lib.
Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 03:56 PM (9/ad+)

I appreciated the honesty.

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:56 PM (fGmWu)

516 Ruffalo transitioning?

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at July 22, 2025 03:57 PM (Vvm2m)

517
Like Jane Austin or Orwell or Hemingway or Gabriel Marquez Garcia or JK Rowling.
Posted by: Thomas Bender at July 22, 2025 03:25 PM (XV/Pl)

Orwell, Hemingway, and Marquez-Garcia were commies if that helps.
I found that Orwell had good insight into the world as he saw it, but I was not impressed by Hemingway or Marquez-Garcia. I did like Islands in the Sea, but mostly the adventure part where he was hunting German submariners. I admit I couldn't get into Marquez-Garcia in Spanish or English.

Posted by: Kindltot at July 22, 2025 03:57 PM (D7oie)

518 Because it was very public and very much a spectacle. And, it was hilarious.
Posted by: nogooddeed at July 22, 2025 03:55 PM (4Af9R)

Yeah, I generally don't care about other's adultery (other than "It's harmful to the body politic, in addition to destructive to families"), but being outed so publicly is worth mockery.

(I feel terrible for the spouses, though.)

Posted by: Formerly Virginian at July 22, 2025 03:57 PM (N1DT3)

519 Heh. "Modern".
Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 03:48 PM (asXVI)

I am used to watching films from the 30's to the 60's so so the 80,'s is modern to me. I also went to seminary part time at night for part of the 80's so couldn't watch any evening programs. I did know the name "Too Close For Comfort?" Does that count?😉

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at July 22, 2025 03:57 PM (2GCMq)

520 I'd rather watch reruns of Gilligan's Island than Fallon and Kimmel.
Posted by: Rev. Wishbone
......

coconut bras > coconuts

Posted by: wth at July 22, 2025 03:57 PM (v0R5T)

521 Nood Ozzy

Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:57 PM (fGmWu)

522 I have never given a flying F for Stern or Colbert.

Posted by: Cosda at July 22, 2025 03:58 PM (gRHI0)

523 Same. I don’t get why everyone was so into this story. It’s like sorry to break it to you everyone but chances are very good your very own CEO is fucking someone not his wife.

Because everyone hates HR. That's it. That's the entire reason.

Posted by: Ian S. at July 22, 2025 03:58 PM (2ocoG)

524 464 Gutfeld is also an extension of Krauthammar's "Fox News discovered a niche audience made up of half the country."

Fallon, Colbert, and Kimmel combined get more viewers than Gutfeld, but he individually beats them all because there is a large segment of the country that wants to see Democrats mocked and humiliated nightly even if it's just variations on Pelosi's botoxed face, Bill Clinton is a horndog, Jerry Nadler shits himself, the View are fat sows, and Joe Biden is dead.
Posted by: the dandy at July 22, 2025 03:46 PM (8l8nW)

Fox News is available in about 68M households, CBS, NBC, and ABC are available in over 110M households. For Gutfeld to beat them in the ratings while being in roughly 65% of the homes is staggering.

Posted by: Ashley Judd's Puffy Scamper at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (k1E2D)

525 polynikes: For a Few Dollars More
A Fist Full of Dollars
The Good, The Bad and the Ugly"

That's my ranking, too. For A Few Dollars More is peak spaghetti western.

A Fistful of Dollars was a great intro to the genre. The Good, The Bad and the Ugly was too preachy and the huge budget made the storytelling more grandiose than necessary. For A Few Dollars More was perfect.

Posted by: AnonyBotymousDrivel at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (gLikB)

526 Posted by: nogooddeed at July 22, 2025 03:55 PM (4Af9R)

I don't have a CEO.

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (2GCMq)

527 If Ruffalo was a Reagan conservative he’s still very punchable . At least how he portrays his characters. . I assume it’s a carry over from real life.

Posted by: polynikes at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (VofaG)

528 Nobody really cares for late night shows.
----------

Craig Ferguson was the last one to do it right.

Back in the NBC days, Letterman was a nightly quirk-show, with stupid pet tricks, late night mailbag, Chris Elliot living under the seats, Larry Bud Mellman, reasonably vibrant live musical acts, and some pretty insane interviews. But he became a old, bitter, liberal nutsack by the time he moved to CBS and eventually retired.

Posted by: Crusader at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (TN0g+)

529 Garcia Marquez is a bit of a niche with Latin magic realism.

I loved 100 Years of Solitude, but that's about it for me with him

Posted by: barbarausa at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (enw9G)

530 appreciated the honesty.
Posted by: CaliGirl at July 22, 2025 03:56 PM (fGmWu)

Maybe not a lib.

Posted by: ... at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (9/ad+)

531 When I was abducted by the Greys, Elvis was with them! I swear!

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 03:59 PM (075ei)

532 I am used to watching films from the 30's to the 60's so so the 80,'s is modern to me. I also went to seminary part time at night for part of the 80's so couldn't watch any evening programs. I did know the name "Too Close For Comfort?" Does that count?😉
---

Counts for me. I tend to use a similar breakdown. Which is odd for a nearly 29 year old.

Posted by: moviegique (buy my books) at July 22, 2025 04:00 PM (asXVI)

533 NJ guv says he’s not ruling out redistricting to wipe out GOP seats.

Which means he’s doing it.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at July 22, 2025 04:01 PM (Vvm2m)

534 I still have the first Black Sabbath album. Never, in my wildest dreams, would I thought that Black Sabbath would still be a thing after 50 years.

Posted by: pudinhead at July 22, 2025 04:01 PM (W3T6M)

535 >> Fox News is available in about 68M households, CBS, NBC, and ABC are available in over 110M households. For Gutfeld to beat them in the ratings while being in roughly 65% of the homes is staggering.

No doubt about that. Just meaning that you have three idiots chasing the same fractured audience while one guy takes half the country for himself. Same thing Fox News did as a whole.

Posted by: the dandy at July 22, 2025 04:03 PM (8l8nW)

536 I read a lot of Japanese Rom-Com, mostly manga but also some light novels. I watch a lot of similar anime. I don’t limit myself to just Rom-Com, but I like the Japanese approach to it. They start with the idea that marrying, staying married, and raising a family are good long-term goals, but you have to find that special someone first. You can tell that the Japanese are worried about their low birth rate, and their cultural xenophobia won’t let them import even Koreans to fill the gap. We are lucky, or cursed, to be more flexible on these issues.
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 02:58 PM (075ei)

One of the first SF writers, Stanley Weinbaum, used a lot of romance plots to sell his stories in the 30s. man lands on island with crazy animals and plants no 2 alike, is rescued by pretty girl leading pack of mutant dogs, they fight off attacks by mutant cats and he discovers the lab of a scientist who invented the mutating machine and destroyed it before the girl was wrecked on the island, so she's not a mutant and can have kids.

Posted by: Oldcat at July 22, 2025 04:04 PM (8avO+)

537 I just don’t watch broadcast TV anymore. I listen to classical music on Sirius XM, watch anime from one of several streamers I subscribe to (Crunchyroll is the biggest source for me) or listen to talk radio or Christian radio. I think the last TV I watched was Newsmax coverage of the 250th Anniversary Army Parade in D.C.

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 04:06 PM (075ei)

538 Same. I don’t get why everyone was so into this story. It’s like sorry to break it to you everyone but chances are very good your very own CEO is fucking someone not his wife.

Because everyone hates HR. That's it. That's the entire reason.
Posted by: Ian S. at July 22, 2025 03:58 PM (2ocoG)

And HR's specific job is to watch for interoffice romance that could get the company sued

Posted by: Oldcat at July 22, 2025 04:07 PM (8avO+)

539 Thanks, Oldcat: yeah I mine a lot of old sci fi, too. Do you know the name of that story by Weinbaum?

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 04:08 PM (075ei)

540 No.MSM TV for me either. Watch a lot of YouTube without ads

Posted by: JM in Illinois at July 22, 2025 04:10 PM (QbJcY)

541 I think Stevie Wonder shot Ozzie. Stevie's not really blind.
Posted by: Crusader

It's true. Stevie ducked when I pitched an empty beer bottle at him in Camden, NJ 1975.

Posted by: Musik Lover at July 22, 2025 04:10 PM (G5+As)

542 You know it’s possible that Stevie Wonder had enough residual vision to duck a lobbed beer bottle, but was still legally blind. Or maybe he could somehow hear it coming?

Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 04:14 PM (075ei)

543 >There used to be a lot of shows that men and women (and even kids) could agree on: broad, light comedies, police procedurals

Have to disagree with you on that one. TV has always been aimed at housewives because that's who watches it. Men watch sports, movies and documentaries. TV is about delivering eyeballs to advertisers and housewives have always controlled the lion's share of household spending, so everything on TV is about getting the housewives to watch. "Broad, light comedies" appeal primarily to women. Police procedurals also appeal primarily to women (it's the same reason they watch Dateline and 48 Hours and SVU). Producers weren't beyond throwing the men also watching a bone now and again in the same way that kids shows and movies will include jokes only the parents watching will get, but that doesn't mean those shows/movies aren't aimed primarily at kids.

Posted by: Daniel Ream at July 22, 2025 04:15 PM (xBngO)

544 Thanks, Oldcat: yeah I mine a lot of old sci fi, too. Do you know the name of that story by Weinbaum?
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 04:08 PM (075

Proteus Island

a kindle edition is available for a buck, probably free elsewhere.

His classic is "A Martian Odyssey" but that does not have a romance plot.

Posted by: Oldcat at July 22, 2025 04:17 PM (8avO+)

545 I just don’t watch broadcast TV anymore. ...
Posted by: NemoMeImpuneLacessit at July 22, 2025 04:06 PM (075ei)

Mrs. Cop will watch her soap operas. A few Sundays ago, for some reason we watched America's Funniest Home Videos. We hadn't watched it in years, and we were shocked at the decline in quality.

90% of the videos were not even funny. The studio audience was a couple dozen people seated at bistro tables (years ago, the studio audience would have been much bigger and in "bleacher seats.")

Posted by: Retired Buckeye Cop is now an engineer at July 22, 2025 04:18 PM (pJWtt)

546 I'd have cancel the show on a Friday, and handed him a banker box of his stuff.

Posted by: El Mariachi - Attorney at Law at July 22, 2025 04:49 PM (gDhA9)

547 Late night shows ended with Carson, then Leno, and Letterman for me which was a long time ago; raising kids, etc.

I would have stayed awake if it was like 1985, but it wasn't.

Then I turned off all TV anything in 2016 and you can guess why.

Notice Trumps capital economy is burning and you know because there is NO focus on it. I am in manufacturing...U.S. manufacturing.

Posted by: Danimal28 at July 22, 2025 05:08 PM (mNOhh)

548 You're not the first to notice how entertainment has become highly specialized, Ace. I read an article at least a decade ago about how they keep trying to bring back the Muppet Show and it never works, because the Muppets were designed for a broad audience, a typical family where Mom and Dad and the kids all watched the same things because broadcast television had to appeal to the widest audience possible.

The change started with cable, most notably characterized by the emergence of kids' channels like Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network. Suddenly kids didn't have to watch the same thing as Mom and Dad. That freed up other networks and cable channels to cater to the adults.

On-demand streaming has only made entertainment more targeted, because having no restrictions on when you can watch an episode means nobody has to compromise when they get to watch their particular channel. Especially with the ubiquity of screens where kids can watch stuff in their own rooms without having to join the family on the couch.

I make it a point to find stuff I can watch with my whole family these days. It's becoming more and more rare to find entertainment we can all enjoy.

Posted by: Caiwyn at July 22, 2025 05:56 PM (LM0nw)

549 "I don't think you can build a career as a comedian on one single funny joke."

Wanna bet? - Jeffrey Ross

Posted by: Bea Arthur's Dick at July 22, 2025 06:11 PM (eYAt4)

550 See B.S. has been mostly Fake News SUNDAY MORNING, 60 MINUTES, EYE ON AMERICA as well as their Morning and Evening News All Leftists Propaganda not news

Posted by: Tamaa the Drongo Bird at July 22, 2025 06:14 PM (wGqjj)

551 I remember Conan O’Brian’s meltdown after they gave the show back to Jay Leno. I honestly don’t think Stephen Colbert has the maturity and self possession to achieve even that level of professionalism. He’s probably gonna write a check for an orange Bugatti Veyron, which he will outfit with a massive blonde “wig“ and a Hitler mustache. Oh, and the license plate will say “Epstein.” (Would it be gilding the lily to say the passenger seat will have a child sized blow up doll?)

Posted by: Rich at July 22, 2025 06:38 PM (LuW+d)

552 "He points out that Greg Gutfeld's show is "lean and mean" with no writers room -- I think he's wrong about that, I think Gutfeld has a handful of writers -- and no dedicated studio."

All of the other late-night shows went dark for the writers' strike, because they're dependent on a room full of faceless mercenaries hashing out a script for everyone to follow. Gutfeld stayed on, because his production model is different.

He writes his own monologues, Kat works full-time on things like scripting their skits, and they book a professional comedian or three as ringers in the guest chairs. Jokes get sourced broadly, from core staff, probably the comedy guests, and I think also remote contributors. (I vaguely recall some blogger, possibly Jim Treacher, mentioning getting tapped for that; but it isn't like a traditional writers pool, because the show itself isn't so heavily scripted and produced.)

It's the production model of a man who thinks highly enough of himself to believe that he can do it both better and leaner than his esteemed predecessors in the format, let alone his mediocre competitors of the present day, and it shows. And it works, and works well.

Posted by: SciVo at July 22, 2025 07:55 PM (MO9js)

553 Jim Treacher writes for gutfeld now- you should follow his Substack. He’s famous for the tweet “Modern journalism is all about deciding which facts the public shouldn’t know because they reflect poorly on Democrats” which Instapundit quotes all the time. He posts his jokes which weren’t used on the show that week on his Friday Substack.

Posted by: PoorYorick at July 22, 2025 09:22 PM (eClUY)

554 Colbert's show supposedly has a staff of 200. Tell you what, they can stay at his house until they get their next job.

Posted by: VirginiaSmoker at July 23, 2025 02:22 AM (YC7Ue)

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