The Lionel Show Blog

MEET LIONEL IN PHILADELPHIA!

Sean Kensing — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 18:13:18 -0400

Admit it. You want to meet Lionel. While you’re at it, you wouldn’t mind hearing him read a selection or two from his hilarious new book. Maybe you’ve got a burning question you’d like to ask him,without having to call that troublesome toll-free number.

Then you need to be at Robin’s Bookstore in Philadelphia,PA on Wednesday, October 22^nd. At 6 PM, Lionel will read excerpts from his new book, Everyone’sCrazy Except You and Me…And I’m Not So Sure About You. Following the reading, Lionel will take questions from the audience and sign copies of his tome.

Robin’sBookstore is Philadelphia’s oldest independent bookstore, so you’re also doing your part to keep a mom-and-pop shop going strong. The address is below. Get there.

Wednesday, October 22at 6pm: MEET LIONEL

Video: The thing about religion...

The Lionel Show — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 22:55:47 -0400

Dispatches from the Red Carpet

The Lionel Show — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 08:46:12 -0400

Everyone’s hoping it’ll all work out

Everyone’s waiting they’re holding out

- Loverboy

Were they wearing lipstick by any chance?

Only nine? You’re slipping Mexico, let’s pick it up…

Talk about the blind leading the blind.

White House sold separately.

Today on The Lionel Show - Monday October 6th.

Sean Kensing — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 08:31:07 -0400

9:30 A.M. – Dr. Paul Waldman of Media Matters for America joins Lionel to discuss the latest questionable drivel from the mainstream media. Think of Paul Waldman as the doctor who invented a vaccination against caca de toro.

10:00 A.M. – Robert Weiss is a leading Securities Attorney who knows a thing or two about economic upheaval – he was a major player in the Enron/WorldCom class action suits and has championed defrauded investors for two decades. His plan for reforming Wall Street has been the subject of feature articles in The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, and The Wall Street Journal. Mr. Weiss joins Lionel in the second hour to the bailout: what it means, what it doesn’t mean, and what we should expect in its wake.

11 A.M. – If you don’t know who Lee Atwater was, put it this way: he invented Karl Rove. Mr. Atwater is the subject of the new film Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story. In the third hour, Lionel welcomes the film’s director Stefan Forbes in to the studio to discuss Mr. Atwater’s legacy and the seemingly unbeatable strength of his “go negative” campaign tactics. This is a film about a man who helped defined American politics, for better of for worse. It is also, perhaps, a film about why we lose.

My Encomium to Bill Maher and His Magnum Opus "Religulous." Please, America See This Movie!

Lionel — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 13:59:27 -0400

Bill Maher's jocumentary "Religulous" is without peer. Simple. This jocose documentary is funny, no, hilarious, but not because of the genius of Bill Maher, but because of the words and ideations of the veritable endless bevy of religious wackos interviewed, no, make that, those booby-trapped by Mr. Maher's assault on their "reality." No, make that those sucked into the black hole of absurdity by merely answering a question about his or her "faith." Translation: hope, dream, fantasy; superstition; unquestioning acceptance of mythology. He was simply superb. Surgical in his cross-examination, deft in his ability to just let the religious rusticator wax inane. They (and I'm not sure who "they" actually are) say that there are two subjects you should not discuss in polite company -- politics and religion. But that has to rank up there with "Love means never having to say you're sorry" as one of the most stupid statements ever voiced. Political nescience is no excuse today for any member of society to opt or or not care. I don't have to explain all that is happening now that is rather, oh, I don't know, important, to say the least. And said politics is all too often inextricably entwined and entangled with religion. Exhibit A: The '08 Election.

During the primaries Romney's magic underwear and his Mor(m)onism were the talk of the country. Huckabee's "Elmer Gantry" corn pone hokum led him and his fellow science illiterates (Brownback and Tancredo) to wave their hands sillily when asked who disputes evolution and Darwinian mechanics. Some yokels and churls around this great place still think that Barack's a Muslim. Itsy-bitsy Sarah Palin thinks the Earth is 6000 years-old. Our soon-to-be ex-Prez knows a faith so fanatical, he seeks the advice of an invisible man in the clouds for military advice. Shall I go on?

STEPHEN COLBERT POACHES LIONEL'S GUESTS!

Sean Kensing — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 21:10:04 -0400

Following her fabulous appearance on The Lionel Show, Naomi Klein appeared on The Colbert Report. That’s right – we said following her appearance on The Lionel Show. You’re welcome, Mr. Colbert. Check out the clip. It’s a great interview. Naomi once again demonstrates that whether it’s intricate economic forces or good-old satirical humor, she truly “gets it”. And you heard her first…on The Lionel Show.

Video: Palin? Well...

The Lionel Show — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 17:45:57 -0400

SHE SUCKED! There's, unfortunately, no other way to say it...

LIONEL ON TV

The Lionel Show — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 13:24:35 -0400

The Results Are in from the Debate to Nowhere

Lionel — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 06:42:25 -0400

It’s over. Thank Zeus for that. Let’s face it, it’s been fun to think of little miss bubbly deconstructing before our very eyes. Well, she didn’t. And that’s the only thing that she did that was noteworthy. She didn’t flame out. She didn’t melt. And now that the first and only Veep debate is over, let’s put aside our Palin jokes, wait anticipatorily for Tina Fey on Saturday and get real. She can't wink her way out of reality. Nor can we.

Sarah Palin would have been OK as a contestant for one of those creepy Mrs. America pageants. They thrive on folksy, eye-batting, "Can I call ya Joe?" hokum. I don't. The fact of the matter is that this woman despite the corn pone howdy-do's has no business being considered as a possible emergency replacement for the President of the United States. I keep thinking of this woman trying to wax cutesy with the face of evil, Vlad "The Impaler" Putin. I thought of how we'd, yet again, be the laughing-stock of the world and how Lorne Michaels would be offering the farm to Tina to return to SNL. Sorry, folks, I'm not laughing.

Have we taken leave of our senses? Have we lost our minds? Perhaps we've been so numbed by eight years of a monosyllabic dolt, a Boeotian of the first order, that anything approaching an IQ of room temperature is a welcomed relief. But let me make this perfectly clear, Sarah Palin is an abderite, a light-weight and nothing more than a distraction. She's a rodeo clown; her role is to divert the attention of the charging media and voter bull away from the embattled and hobbled rider, Mr. Potter himself. And we've fallen for it. We've been discussing nothing about how Methuselah and his lady-in-waiting will tackle the economic mess on Wall Street, universal health care, global warming, energy dependence, international terrorism, you name the issue that's near and dear to your heart.

Dispatches from the Femme-bot's lair

The Lionel Show — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 06:21:48 -0400

Never doubt that you’re the one

And you can have your dreams

You’re the best, Around

Nothings gonna ever keep you down…

- Joe Esposito

Well my house is destroyed, but hey, look at this giant tooth

Mmmmmm, Fermented Horse Milk…

He should’ve just “Shot the Wamp Rats in Beggars Canyon” if you know what I mean.

Video: Biden's Debate Strategy

The Lionel Show — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 13:37:21 -0400

Yet Again, Counterfeit Conservatives Blame Minorities for Credit Market Crises

Lionel — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 08:42:38 -0400

Whenever the bumper sticker, play book, sound bite, echo chamber, cookie cutter counterfeit conservatives get a chance, they blame minorities for anything they can blame them for. It's become a political parlor game, and this time it goes something like this.

Conservative Boeotians and pundits like the incredibly irrelevant Neil Cavuto, Faux News host of "Your World" (speak for yourself, pal), conservative cadaver and metastatic termagant Ann Coulter and a bevy of other rightwing racists, blame the CRA, the Community Reinvestment Act, the sole intention of such was to prevent the then-prevalent practice of "redlining," viz. withholding mortgages and loans by banks and depository institutions for entire areas and geographic regions that happen to be inhabited primarily by minorities. It never mandated or encouraged lending money and providing loans to people who were otherwise ineligible or financially not entitled to such. Cynthia Tucker of the Baltimore Sun provides a fabulous disquisition on the subject.

Dispatches from McMansion #9

The Lionel Show — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 08:40:22 -0400

With so many Light Years to go

And things to be found (to be found)

I’m sure that we’ll all miss her so

It’s the Final Countdown

- Europe

Is this it? Have we finally hit “Rock Bottom”?

Don’t mess around with the Devil’s Cucumber…get your mind out of the gutter, or if you’re into the whole dendrophilia thing…

Today on The Lionel Show - Thursday October 2nd.

Sean Kensing — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 08:21:40 -0400

This is it, folks: the night we’ve all been waiting for.

Cast your mind back to that day the announcement came over the wires: “Sarah Palin is McCain’s pick for V.P.!!!” The Lionel Show was on the air at the time, so you heard us digest the baffling news in real time. Surely you remember our now-classic bit known as “1…2…3: SARAH PALIN?!?” (Listen to the clip above to relive the action).

We were mystified, amused, befuddled, puzzled…but also, thanks to our intrepid host, a bit scared.

That’s right: even as we joyously mocked her status as a non-entity, Lionel had the foresight to warn us more than once that Mrs. Palin was a force to be reckoned with. And so it has come to pass: people all over this fine country have eaten up Mrs. Palin’s homespun hockey-mom biography and washed it down with a cold can of evangelical morality and meaningless “reform” rhetoric. In other words, she has largely achieved the desired results for the McCain campaign. We thought she’d be a total disaster – but we also thought this election was going to be easy for Obama.

Video: Mika the Sound

The Lionel Show — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 08:20:35 -0400

The Bowels of Commerce Are Clogged: We Need Legislative Bisacodyl

Lionel — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 09:20:18 -0400

I visited my dentist yesterday for my usual cleaning. My Russian hygienist had situated a TV monitor in front of my whilst she was yanking on my tongue which she had firmly grabbed with gauze. Svetlana, I began to suspect, had been a labor camp guard in a prior life. She asked me what I thought of the crisis on Wall Street. I had difficulty in explaining to my Russian mouth attendant that this was not about Wall Street or Main Street, but the world . . . but couldn’t as she had my tongue firmly ensconced in her determined manucaption.

It seems that "man on the street" interviews were played to explicate what Americans feel about Wall Street woes. Had I been able to speak I would have pointed out to her that the idiots interviewed on “The Street,” who were just average Schmoes who happened to be hanging around Century 21 downtown and knew as much about Wall Street bailouts as our “producer” Derm knows about sector 3-4 of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) tunnel, were in fact just that: idiots.

What these “Wall Street” interviewees and Lester Thoreau wannabes kept repeating in lockstep rote nescience was that this $700B attempted bailout was intended to in fact rescue everybody’s favorite neo-bogeyman, the hedge fund fat cat.

To these mouth-breathers who were corralled by some MSNBC “producer” to wax philosophic anent this latest financial tribulation, glitch and bump in the road, it was all about corporate greed. Gee, imagine that: greed in the financial markets. Greed is the lifeblood on finance as ennui is that of the “interactive” department.

Dispatches from McMansion #1

The Lionel Show — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 09:15:35 -0400

Now I'm hiding in Honduras
I'm a desperate man
Send lawyers, guns and money
The s**t has hit the fan

- Warren Zevon

Good thing the church got their finger in that dyke!

The Brown Spotted Boxerfish: Scourge of the deep

Ancient Chinese secret huh? (Sorry Juice)

We did it! We Wo-ho-khuu-huh-huh—hack cough hack (sorry I’m not good at onomatopoeia – but I can spell it)

Today on The Lionel Show - Wednesday October 1st

The Lionel Show — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 09:09:55 -0400

We start things off with a bang today as The Lionel Show welcomes Denis Hamill, the quintessential hard-bitten New York City journalist (who also happens to be a prolific novelist). Mr. Hamill will offer his unique perspective on recent events in NYC politics as well as the absurdity occurring at the national level. You know that guy in your local bar with improbably great stories and a lifetime of hard-won wisdom? That’s Denis Hamill. No, seriously: that’s him.

You may remember Lionel berating you yesterday to the effect that the credit crisis is more serious than you may think. Who better to join him today than Christian Weller, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and the man behind the recent article The Credit Crisis Is Serious. Mr. Weller will tell you just how scared you should be about this crisis, whether you are directly involved in finance or not.

Video: This Crisis Affects YOU!

The Lionel Show — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:59:01 -0400

Let's not lose sight of the big picture. This crisis affects YOU! It's not just about Wall Street, it's about credit, or lack thereof.

The Chimera of the "Bailout"

Lionel — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 11:19:23 -0400

These are the worst of times; these are the very worst of times. This metastatic financial cancer on Wall and Main Streets is beyond anything you or I can even consider, fathom or hope to imagine. It is graspless; we are clueless. Everything has always worked out heretofore through some arcane mechanism and safety net that always seemed to work things out. There have been financial and economic burps and hiccoughs. We’ve endured financial dyspepsia. No big deal. Inflation, recession, not to worry. Tweak this or that. The Fed would tinker with discount rates and all would be fine.

Today’s situation is far more dire and untweakable. Pols have no idea(s) either as to how to deliver a $700B bailout program that, oh, by the way, may not work! What was Nancy Pelosi thinking when she delivered that jeremiad basically accusing Bush and the Republicans, whose support she needed, of being the villains? Barney Frank, I love the guy, has to lay of the shtick. This is serious.

And what do we get? A 777-point plunge in the Dow and a paper loss of $1.2T. Sixty percent of Democrats voted for the package; 67% of the Republicans voted against it, their party and their President. And lets not even think about overseas markets. Anything goes today.

Video: They Really Love Him in Minnesota...Evra-buddeh!

The Lionel Show — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 09:39:39 -0400

Here is the second interview with Lionel on KMSP Fox 9 in Minnesota. Again, Lionel knocks 'em dead with his comedic analysis!

Video: They Love Him in Minnesota Evra-buddeh!

The Lionel Show — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 09:38:39 -0400

In case you missed it, here's an interview from the Republican National Convention on KMSP, a local Fox affiliate in Minnesota. If only all cable news pundits were this good!

Dispatches from McMansion #6

The Lionel Show — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 09:01:13 -0400

Show no fear

For she may fade away

In your hand

The dawn of a new day

- Limahl

This is why “The Italian Job” was a ridiculous movie

She leaned on the judge…

Today on The Lionel Show - Tuesday September 30th.

Sean Kensing — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 08:51:27 -0400

I try to ignore the absurdist theater of American politics, but I still get frustrated sometimes.

I try to protect myself. I try not to watch too much TV news, read too many blogs, swallow too much of the blood that results from the cage-match invective that passes for political discourse…but I can’t shut the world out entirely. (Believe me, I’ve tried – and yes, putting up garbage bags inside the windows does much to create a comforting sense of post-apocalyptic isolation). However, I often find that run as I might, I can’t hide.

I have made peace with a certain degree of cynicism. I expect politicians to lie and to smile eerily while doing so. But sometimes the things these people say and the way they frame the issues becomes so appalling that I am roused from my slumber and forced to confront the absurdity head-on. If this happens early in the morning, I am forced to confront the absurdity while wearing tighty-whities and a hair-net. So it goes.

The bailout failed yesterday, and amidst the fallout everyone is rushing to point fingers and lay blame. That’s fine – go ahead. Doesn’t bother me at all. What bothers me is the textbook Republican/Neo-Conservative reaction, which is to call for transcendent bi-partisanship as soon as the laser beam of public outrage is focused on them.

Video: Watch Debates on Mute

The Lionel Show — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 14:47:29 -0400

How to watch and rate the election debates: