Newsbusters has the results of a study it performed to examine the political orientation of Late Night TV Guests. It isn’t a surprise to me in the least, yet seeing the results still gave me a jolt. As I write this, I am trying to figure out what this obviously intentional practice of the networks and entertainment industry is, exactly. But first, the study…
It tallied the guest appearances on five daily late night comedy shows: ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live!, NBC’s Late Night with Seth Meyers and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, CBS’s The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and Comedy Central’s The Daily Show. The period examined was the nine months from October 2, 2023, to June 27, 2024.
In that period, progressive/Democrat guests outnumbered conservative/Republican guests 137 to 8, or 94% to 6%. If you just count partisan officials, the count was 34 Democrats to 5 Republicans.
Colbert—naturally—had the greatest cumulative discrepancy at 14-1. The Jimmy Kimmel balance count was 7-0. Seth Meyer’s was 3-0, and Jimmy Fallon, who is mostly apolitical (except in his monologues) was 1-0. Jon Stewart’s The Daily Showcame in at 9-4.
In the category of journalists and celebrities, the slant was 104 progressives to 3 conservatives.
Colbert was again the most biased at 34-0. The Daily Showwas second in bias at 29-1. Meyers had a 21-0 progressive imbalance, Fallon’s was 11-1, and Kimmel’s was 7-1. No journalists from conservative publications or platforms were allowed: here are the outlets represented:
For some reason, the debate in the comments to the recent post about the proper use of “ad hominem” ended up about Rush Limbaugh, who has been dead for a while now. The issue was whether Rush’s referring to then-Georgetown Law Student Sandra Fluke, briefly a media star for her argument that birth control should be free, paid for by taxpayers, as a “slut” was an ad hominem attack or not. Ryan Harkins, in his Comment of the Day, decided to arbitrate the dispute, and did so with his usual logic and objectivity.
I do have a couple of points I want to make in this introduction to Ryan’s COTD. He admits that he never listened to Rush, and that’s a problem. As I kept emphasizing in the discussion in the comments, Rush Limbaugh was primarily an entertainer, though he was one with a political agenda and clear ideological orientation. (He was also was master of the slippery “clown nose on/clown nose off” device, like Jon Stewart.) I don’t think he can be fairly analyzed without that context. Ryan says that the use of slut has no place in “honest argumentation,” but Rush Limbaugh’s routines were no more intended as honest argumentation than a Lewis Black set or a Louie CK rant.
Nor can his work be fairly assessed second or third hand. There are several posts about Rush on Ethics Alarms; my wrap-up on his career and legacy is here.
I also neglected to mention in my lengthy exchange with jdkazoo123 that I did designate Rush’s “slut” comment about Fluke as “the worst of Rush.” That still doesn’t make it “ad hominem.” Limbaugh also apologized for that insult, something he didn’t often do, but it was pretty clearly a forced apology, though he said it was sincere. His show was losing sponsors over the controversy. Fluke refused to accept the apology.
Watching this exchange, I’ve had to consider a couple of things. First, I never listened to Rush, so I don’t know how his monologue progressed. But I would have to agree that throwing out the term “slut” would poison the well. Compare the following statements:
Naturally, the reaction was explosive on both sides of the, uh, well, both sides. “News about Heterosexual Awesomeness Month has spread worldwide!,” the bar announced in a follow-up social media post. “Many people have asked how they can support us. Owner Mark Fitzpatrick is excited to build a 25,000 sq ft community event center nearby to host events, provide amazing and wholesome food, support conservative ideas, and help true conservatives get elected. So, we started a GiveSendGo fund. For the haters spewing venom, perhaps you feel bad and want to contribute a few dollars now? For the rest of you reasonable people, if you feel inclined to give, please do! May God bless you!”
The Old State Saloon in in Eagle, Idaho, not far from Boise, and its promotional stunt is the work of new owner Mark Fitzpatrick, a South California transplant who bought the bar in 2023 and who describes himself as “a Christian, conservative, Constitution supporter, retired police officer, and family man.”
Ew!
The fact that this promotion is taking place during “Pride Month,” when everyone is supposed shout out hosannas for minority sexual practices while festooning everything in rainbows, means that it is also being taken as a shot across the hallowed bow of wokeness. LGBQ Nation snarks, ” Fitzpatrick claims to have banned a couple of dozen hateful negative Facebook commenters for ‘using horrific words, expletives, using the name of the Lord in vain, etc,’ but it’s hard to tell one heterosexual man’s hate from another’s unbridled excitement.”
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…
Is “Heterosexual Awesomeness Month” unethical?
I’m open to being convinced otherwise, but I think it is a divisive tactic, essentially tit for tat, but inevitable and perhaps necessary. Once upon a time “days” and “months” designated to celebrate particular components of the American melting pot were benign and opportunities for all to signal appreciation for our component cultures. The practice quickly curdled into group chauvinism and anti-majority bigotry with the continued celebration of Black History Month, Women’s History Month and Pride Month. Those groups once arguably needed their “months” to restore self-esteem after long being discriminated against, but now they just resonate as “Who needs whites and men?” exercises in division.
As an aside, anyone who is “proud” of their sex life has problems. I remember when Grant was tiny and we watched “Sesame Street” together, I was consistently amused by a oft repeated number in which a bovine Muppet sang, “I’m proud, proud, proud to be a cow!” “Pride Month” strikes me as similarly excessive. OK, so you’re gay. I don’t care. I’m bald. What do either of us have to be “proud ” about?
If it is unimaginable to have a “Heterosexual Pride Month” or “White Achievement Month” or “Hooray for Men Month,” and it is, then it’s time for those other month-long celebrations to be retired as past their pull dates, and now doing more harm than good.
To that end, I suppose “Heterosexual Awesomeness Month” has a certain “So how do YOU like it?” appeal. Nevertheless, two wrongs don’t make a right.
Added: I have to include that “Proud to be a Cow” song. Here you go…
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) June 1, 2024
On the Josephson Institute’s Pillars of Character, one of the values comprising the fourth pillar, Fairness, is proportionality. Proportionality is essential to perspective, and understanding te need to maintain a broad perspective is essential to fairness, a core ethical value.
When I first started watching that video meme above, my immediate reaction was, “Oh, please. This is ridiculous. Then I saw the pay-off, and laughed out loud. I would have laughed just as hardily if the two men had been reversed.
Being unable to appreciate good-natured, puckish satire when it is aimed at your favorite politician, party, elected official, organization is a sign of a closed mind and an absence of proportionality and perspective. That video makes both candidates look silly, and that’s just fine.
If you can’t see the humor, I feel sorry for you. And I fear you. You have lost all perspective, and that leads to fanaticism.
Well paint me blue and call me Smurphy! True, it only took almost four years, and a Republican with such rhetorical handicaps and brain fog would have been skewered weekly, indeed daily, by all of the Axis-allied comedy shows. Think of Dan Quayle, or David Letterman’s nightly mockery of George W. Bush, and Trump, of course. Late night TV has left a lot of big laughs on the metaphorical table, but it was worth it, the writers and comics concluded—“it” being to divide the nation, insult half of all potential viewers, and abandon their supposed mission of being as funny as possible without playing favorites, and politics be damned—to “get Trump” and make the world safe for Woke Fascism.
In the comments to the previous post regarding the juvenile incivility and playground level exchanges of insults in the House of Representatives last week, Chris Marschner notes in part,
“Today, our representatives are products of our public education system where the original classics have been banned for being offensive to one group or discarded as irrelevant to current society. Linguistic presentations today reflect the gutter because that is how the teachers they had speak.’
Last night, before Chris issued his comment, I had already resolved to write about the following revolting development:
In a new episode of “Blue Bloods,” the long-running CBS police and family drama that Ethics Alarms awarded “Ethical TV Show of the Year” several times back when I was doing such things, the show concluded with Erin ( Bridget Moynihan), the NYC prosecutor and police commissioner Tom Selleck’s daughter, making an erection joke. At Sunday dinner. And not even an original or particular funny one.
The discussion around the dinner table of this devout Catholic extended family—where grandpa constantly reminds the brood to “keep it civil”—involved the fifth wedding anniversary of youngest son Jamie (Well Estes) and his policewoman wife. The group noted that traditionally this was the “Wooden” anniversary. Erin then asked, “So, Jamie, are you up to giving her wood?”and punctuated her witticism with a suggestive upward arm thrust.
Hearty laughter all around.
I look forward to next season, when Sunday dinner is disrupted by Grandpa (Len Cariou) loudly farting during dessert.
How can anyone still argue, as I have many times, that Donald Trump is too crude to be President?
If you are looking for a funny rather than syrupy entertainment diversion for your mother (or grandmother) this Mother’s Day, you couldn’t do better than spend 90 minutes or so with Jerry Seinfeld in his new movie for Netflix, “Unfrosted.”
Don’t worry: it’s a lot better than “Bee Movie.”
The film, co-written by the comic, is sly, clever and funny provided that the viewer knows enough about the popular culture of the early Sixties—you know, before everything went crazy—as well as U.S. history to understand what is being satirized. Seinfeld has always been a Sixties trivia buff as he demonstrated repeatedly on his classic sitcom, but this movie is an orgy of such references: JFK, the space program, the Cuban Missile Crisis, Jack LaLanne, Werner Von Bron, Quickdraw McGraw and Saturday morning cartoons, Johnny Carson, Walter Cronkite, Silly Putty, the Twist, Thurl Ravenscroft (the original voice of Tony the Tiger who also sang “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch!” ) the Doublemint Twins (who are both apparently impregnated by JFK while Jackie is away), on and on.
Filmmakers, musicians, writers and other artists began whining about that ad above for the Apple iPad Pro from almost the second it was released. As Sonny and Cher warble one of their lesser efforts, “All I Ever Need is You,” a hydraulic press crushes musical instruments, cameras, a framed picture, paint cans, record albums and other stuff in a colorful explosion of chaos.
“The destruction of the human experience. Courtesy of Silicon Valley,” tweeted actor Hugh Grant. “Who needs human life and everything that makes it worth living? Dive into this digital simulacrum and give us your soul. Sincerely, Apple,” added “Men in Black” screenwriter Ed Solomon. There were lots more metaphorical squeals of indignation and alarm on social media, as “creative people” accused Apple of gloating over how Big Tech is co-opting the traditional tools of art and on the verge of eliminating the human creativity with artificial intelligence.
So, naturally, as is the norm these days, Apple “assumed the position” and groveled an apology. Pledging that Apple would never run the ad on TV again, Tor Myhren, the company’s vice president of marketing communications, said, “Creativity is in our DNA at Apple, and it’s incredibly important to us to design products that empower creatives all over the world.” The statement continued, “Our goal is to always celebrate the myriad of ways users express themselves and bring their ideas to life through iPad. We missed the mark with this video, and we’re sorry.”
Seriously?
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…
Oh, lots of things: Is there anything unethical about that ad? Do its critics have a legitimate point? Should Apple have caved to their complaints? Was that apology sincere?
As various pundits on Prof. Reynold’s Instapundit are wont to say of such news, “Who had “Presidential candidates with brain worms” on their 2024 bingo card?“
The New York Times tells us today that in 2010, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “was experiencing memory loss and mental fogginess so severe that a friend grew concerned he might have a brain tumor.” After consulting several neurologists, RFK had the mystery solved. His cognitive problems were “caused by a worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died,” Kennedy says.
Oh.
All righty then! What can we take from this development?
1. Kudos to RFK Jr. for candor and honesty. The other candidates haven’t been so forthcoming. President Biden won’t undergo cognitive testing, or if he will, he won’t reveal what the results were.
2. Yet the Times informs us that despite this startling revelation, Kennedy’s campaign refuses to release his complete medical records. There are worse things in there than the fact that a worm ate part of his brain? Oh-oh…
3. I still salute RFK’s courage. If this doesn’t launch a thousand jokes and memes, I’ll be disappointed. (I won’t offer any, because I don’t want to be accused of “worm-shaming.”)
4. Given Kennedy’s frequently extreme and even bizarre opinions, the reflex response from many will be, “That explains a lot.” Not from me though! Uh-uh.
5. When asked if any of Kennedy’s health issues could compromise his fitness for the presidency, RFK’s spokesperson, Stefanie Spear, replied, “That is a hilarious suggestion, given the competition.”
If she had not taken advantage of a straight line like that, I would have been disappointed. To her credit, Spear deposited that metaphorical hanging curve in the upper deck.
I had to post an ethics quiz on this, especially after beginning the day writing, “I’d say anyone celebrating Star Wars Day today (“May the Fourth be with you!”) on this May 4 needs to get out more. In addition to being a day that promises further depressing developments on college campuses as the decades of progressive, anti-American, and Marxist indoctrination have their predictable (and probably intentional) consequences—though somehow the ivory tower revolutionaries in charge of those campuses were oddly unprepared for them!—this date has an ominous history.”
And there he is, J.B. Pritzker, the Governor of Illinois, posing with his wife on social media to celebrate “Star Wars” in a pose apparently evoking a yet-to-be released “Star Wars” sequel in which Luke and Leia are victims of the Empire’s diabolical fat ray.
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…
Is it responsible for high-ranking elected officials to present themselves to the public looking and acting ridiculous?
Ethics Alarms 