I don’t know how many Real Time fans we have here, but I would imagine quite a few. I don’t know about anyone else, but I thought this week’s show was one of the most bizarre I’ve watched in a long time. Scotty-boy McClellan is still pimping for the White House, and forgot he wasn’t sitting in front of the Lap-dog Press Corps with his sorry talking points and got some love from the audience for it. Former Sen. Bill Bradley was great on there, but what the hell is wrong with Dana Carvey?
Every time Sen. Bradley tried to dig into Scotty and make some real points, Carvey jumped in there with another one of his imitations and tried to get the two go have a group hug, and IMO, really ruined the show. Don’t get me wrong, I love Dana Carvey as a comedian, but there’s a time for jokes and there’s a time for serious discussion, and when the humor doesn’t even contribute to the discussion, to me, it’s just a turn off and distraction.
For a look at what happened after HBO turned off the cameras for its cable audience and on for watchers on the internet, check out the video clips below.
For those of you who didn't already know this existed, Overtime is HBO's five minutes or so where they take questions that people submit on line, and ask them to the panel after the show. You can log on and submit questions yourself every week, and watch the video live right after the show on Bill Maher's HBO web site. I thought I'd share the last month or so of them with all of you here if you haven't caught them.
First here’s this week’s Overtime with Dana Carvey, Fmr. Sen. Bill Bradley and Scott McClellan and some additional New Rules. Scotty doesn’t have much to say and lets Carvey do a lot of the talking. Bradley finally makes one comment right at the end when he gets a chance and Carvey shuts up for one minute after Maher addresses Bradley directly, and it's just a weird continuation of what happened during the entire show.
Next there’s the Overtime discussion with D.L. Hughley, Michael Smerconish, Catherine Crier from 3-30-07. The questions are about the media bias and the politicians partying with the press and being too cozy with them and the role poverty plays in supporting terrorism and the role Halliburton is playing in Iraq.
Here’s the segment from 3-23-07 with John Legend, Myr. Shirley Franklin and David Frum. Maher gets at Frum for the Axis of Evil speech, Halliburton moving to Dubai, and the overspending in Iraq. Frum tries to defend the contractors and outsourcing of our military to corporations and never answers the question about how it costs more.
Here’s the segment from 3-16-07 with Jason Alexander, Dan Rather and Martha Raddatz. Rather and Raddatz try to say that the American people don’t really want impeachment. They have "better things to do" and are weary of impeachment talk according to them. Jason Alexander is the most sane sounding one there.
And last the discussion with Deepak Chopra, Roseanne Barr, Dana Milbank and David Kuo from 3-9-07. They ask if Gore should run for President again and weigh in on the Presidential candidates. They also weigh in on checks and balances in government and how corporate America has taken over government.
Enjoy the videos and I'm wondering if anyone else felt the same way about the way Carvey acted on the show or if it’s just me. I enjoy the humor, but for heaven’s sake didn’t he have a single constructive thing to add to the conversation besides impersonating someone and trying to act like Bradley and McClellan should be best buds? Also, you can check out more of the Overtime videos along with clips of New Rules and some portions of different shows' segments on HBO’s web site Real Time With Bill Maher.
I also thought Bill acted a little crazy this week due to the whole Imus firing ordeal. He's having flashbacks to his show being canned, so I understand the perspective, but I think it's skewed his view of what happened and he's just looking at it through the lens of what happened to him.
Also I'm posting this even though the video from this week is still loading. The content of the diary is not dependent on it. If it's not working yet it should be shortly so check back if you want to watch it.