The final Maher: Sullivan v. Chomsky & Maher
: As is my habit, I watched Bill Maher a day late. It’s the season finale coinciding with the Democratic finale.
: Former Sen. Alan Simpson lectures Bill Maher for making fun of not only the religious right but also of gays. It turns downright nasty. Maher was trying to be nice to Simpson. But Simpson, in his curmudgeonly way, was also trying to lecture the left, telling them what I say below: You’ll never win an election if you make fun of people who go to church.
: Susan Sarandon starts going off on her dumb paranoid drool about election fraud. “Come on, he lost. He lost by a lot of votes,” says the sensible Maher.
Maher asks whether “all the show people stumping for Kerry did more harm than good.” Good question. Doesn’t matter what Sarandon’s answer is.
: Maher says Andrew Sullivan having a must-read blog inspires him to get on the internet. Maher used to blog.
: Andrew says that the Hollywood left did their best to win the election for Bush and galvinized the center of the country by patronizing to them. Same message below (and shortly above). “People are tired of being demeaned. Don’t demean people and then expect them to vote for you.”
: Sullivan says people in the middle of the country felt “they were being written out.” Maher replies: “How were they written out? They’re running everything?”
: Sullivan does very well on this show; he’s the best guest Maher has. He should be on TV regularly — as in, paid to be on TV.
: Maher talks to Noam Chomsky, who’s being professorially glib.
“The invasion of Iraq was simply a war crime,” Chomsky says to Maher’s audience’s hooting.
Maher treats Chomsky with a gentleness he gives no guest: “Why do you think we did Iraq?” When did Jay Leno take over the show? Why for Chomsky? Fill in your answer here.
Maher says the world is not better off without Saddam Hussein; he said the people in his rape rooms are better off but the world is not. Even Chomsky won’t pull back that far. Chomsky says the world is better off without Saddam Hussein.
: Sullivan reacts: “Welcome to the world view of the far left in which the United States is the source of all evil… That is why you lost the election.”
After purring for Chomsky, Maher yells at Sullivan.
Maher tries to say that Chomsky has a different definition of freedom and democracy. Sullivan says quite rightly that’s wrong: There is either freedom and democracy or there is not.
Sullivan: “You don’t have to believe to the United States is perfect to believe it is a force for good in this world.”
He says listening to Chomsky denegrate the United States as he does is wrong and is “one of the reasons the left has lost.”
He challenges Maher: If Sullivan is supposed to condemn the Jerry Falwells and haters of the right, should he not condemn Chomsky as a hater of the left?
“You treated him like a folk hero. You didn’t ask him a single tough question.” Amen, Andrew.
