We haven't had an episode in a while of 3rd and Fairfax, the official podcast of the Writers Guild of America, so let's rectify that with a good one that's timely. The guest is Greg Daniels, who co-created with Steve Carell the new Netflix series Space Force that premiered just yesterday. He also developed The Office for American television, and created Parks and Recreation, King of the Kill, and the new Amazon Prime series, Upload. He talks here about his writing, TV, his career and his two new shows.
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It turns out that Billie Eilish is a major geek fan of The Office TV series. Like at a serious geek level. So, last year, Billboard magazine set up a surprise quiz for the singer at home when Rainn Wilson showed up with the questions about his old show. As the expression goes, fun ensues... By the way, even though earlier this week we had a video interview with two of my New Trier High School pals Jack Moline and Nell Minow, had another interview today from Rabbi Moline, and as it happens Rainn Wilson is an alum of New Trier, as well, there is absolutely no truth to the rumor that this is New Trier Week at Elisberg Industries. Every week is New Trier Week at Elisberg Industries. Some weeks just have more video evidence. (Due to travel issues and stay-at-home restricttions, we have had to temporarily scrap the New Trier Film Festival with movies starring Charlton Heston, Ann-Margaret, Rock Hudson and Bruce Dern, along with a special screening of Sunrise at Campabello starring Ralph Bellamy, and a tribute to director Ed Zwick with About Last Night and Glory, all ending with a gala, black-tie finale concert featuring Liz Phair, to be hosted by Jake Johnson, two-time Tony-winner Christine Ebersol and Virginia Madsen.) But now, let it Rainn. Okay, for those who missed the live stream yesterday, but are interested in seeing the interview with Pete Buttigieg that my friend Rabbi Jack Moline did as part of his "Stay Home, Stay Focused" webseries for the Interfaith Alliance, of which he's president -- it's now available online. And to save you wandering over there, we have it here below. It runs about 20 minutes. We threw a Trump Dart (tm) last night, and it landed on "Trying to issue an Executive Order about Twitter." In fairness, because that's oozing all over the place it was hard to miss. But still, I'm going to keep this reasonably short just because it's so insane, even by Trump standards, which are so low as to be almost non-existent,
To start with, it isn't real, but just an attempt to distract for 103,330 dead Americans (that we know about) with no clue what to do, other than recommend bleach and hope for a "miracle." But as for the rest, it's hard to know where to start for which is the most insane thing about it. So, in a sort of stream-of-conscious way I'll just toss down reasons as they come to mind. It's illegal. It's obviously and blatantly illegal. The fact-check note they left on Trump's tweet that was full of lies is not "censorship," since nothing was censored, and his words weren't even edited. A private business can censor anything that comes out of it. A government trying to tell an information platform what it should allow and not allow is actually closer to a First Amendment violation than what Twitter did, which was just to leave a little asterisk for a fact check. If you force Twitter to be so concerned about being sued that they have to be overly protective about the tweets posted on their platform, Trump risks getting himself censored, blocked or even banned for the platform that is most-essential to his staying connected with his base. If you even ever somehow magically got this Executive Order passed, then it would put all far-right information sources including "Fox News" at risk of the same draconian requirements that Trump is trying to push through. This won't get passed. It's illegal. Sorry, I mean blatantly illegal. Trying to bully a major source of public information and discredit it is yet another deeply fascist action. It's insane. This only serves to make Trump look like a whiny little snowflake, crying because the big, bad Twitter left a note that said if you want to learn more on the subject and see what the truth was, click here -- and he can't take it. And if he can't take an asterisk that fact-checks him, how on earth can he handle a pandemic???! He can't handle a pandemic. So far, 103,330 Americans have died that we know of. There. Good. We got back on topic. That is what this is all about..
When I saw the heading for this video of the Conan O'Brien show, "Conan Furloughs Non-Essential Staffers," it seemed like a good one to watch, but as it progressed something struck me as odd. Alone in his office, Conan talks about how we are facing a government crisis and that staff workers who weren't essential would have to be furloughed. All well and good, and a solid foundation for a sketch. But then he wanders around the office, talking to his employees about whether they were essential or not, it seemed off. And then I noticed -- it was posted in 2013. But how could something current be pre-dated like that? It didn't make sense. Until I realized that this wasn't current at all, but seven years old referring to that government shutdown over the budget. Pretty darn prescient as comedy bits go. |
AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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