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America’s jolliest pundits return for a special April Fool’s day edition of their patented tour through politics and pop culture. It’s a crap shoot this week as John podcasts live from Sin City. Today, our boys ruminate on ObamaCare, why liberals don’t think things go better with Koch, the How I Met Your Mother finale, Rob’s review of Johnny Carson by Henry Bushkin, and the Colbert contretemps.
The joke is on you, EJHill.
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How long have the ladies of Ricochet waited to here Rob Long ask, “What are you wearing?”
Maybe next time the original version by the King? Please.
Rob, I totally agree with your dislike of the last-second ending, but you gotta admit, the ending of the second Bob Newhart show, in which he’s a hotelier in Vermont, is the absolute best ending of any show ever (IMHO).
I realize its sacrilege to admit it, but I personally like the Springsteen version better.
Did Rob Long say the transition to 2.0 was “a little rough”?
I watched HIMYM from about the 3rd season, and have many thoughts, but the two main ones here are:
1.) I’d have given the show a lot more slack if the last episode had been good, or seemed to have a point. Instead, from about the first moment of the episode to the end, it was the show creators undoing everything they had done from the beginning of the show. It was the harshest reset button since, oh, maybe Star Trek Voyager’s Year of Hell episode?
2.) And its a reset button which violates the premise of the show. “Kids, I’m going to tell you an incredible story, the story of how I met your mother.” Hogwash. In the last three minutes of the show the entire series is upended with the reveal that this is actually the story of how Ted got together with Robin. If I’d wanted to watch that show, I’d’ve stopped after episode one.
There are copious other problems -and JPod is wrong that Robin and Ted are soulmates, that was actually addresses about half-way through the last season -but the word limit and heartburn constrain me.
It was interesting to see the finales of Psych and How I Met Your Mother in the same week. Both shows ran about 3-4 years too long, but HIMYM stopped being about Ted and the search for Mother years ago. Psych stayed true to its premise, and the finale fit the show. HIMYM’s ending was jarring and flew in the face of everything they had built up to for 9 years.
John is categorically wrong about HIMYM, though. There was nothing shocking about the ending as it was openly speculated for months all over the internet that this was coming. Doing what they did undercut the entire premise of what the show ostensibly was about, and it was the ending people were dreading they were going to go with.
I just listened to the podcast, read “Mr. America,” and bought Johnny Carson “with one click”.
And that’s despite the fact that—even though I’m the same age as Rob—I don’t think I’ve ever even watched a single full episode of the Tonight Show. I’ve seen a few clips. I grew up in a “no TV” family. Even after we got a TV, I never could stay up after 11.
But that review made me want to read more about Johnny Carson.
Rob, it was a masterpiece. “Second screen” will now be a permanent part of my conceptual vocabulary.
To John Podhoretz’s point about taking the bait, I have say that by making it, he’s doing it. I mean, one intention of the left’s strategy is to make the right look crazy. Another is to divide the right against itself. So, if someone on our side (like Murdock, say), takes the bait and says something impolitic, the left wins. If others on our side act embarrassed and pile on, “He shouldn’t have taken the bait!”, they win again. I say everyone on our side should stop attacking others our side for being impolitic. We should concentrate on defending right policies and ideas and those who champion them, regardless of whether they’re doing it in the way we personally think most effective.
So, instead of freaking out about how embarrassing it is to have a crazy like Murdock on our side, we should be defending him: “He’s not crazy; his position is not comparable to Akin’s, nor is it “extreme”. It’s nothing like as extreme as Sandra Fluke’s, or Obama’s. The reaction of the elitist left to him is very revealing of its contempt for ordinary Americans and their values.”
John Podhoretz, slot jockey?
Also “No mixed swimming” made me laugh.
Yeti, I had such a high opinion of you before now.
I saw the King perform live twice, once in Cleveland and once in Vegas. He was the perfect image for the Vegas of the Rat Pack era. He was also way better live and that is saying something. The audience gave him energy that was beyond any recording. I suppose we could chalk up our differences to your being too young to have experienced the “best.”
Keep up the great work!
Eh, Rob’s review of the Carson book was good, but the article on Sid Caesar was even better.
This is only the second podcast I have been able to access on my mobile since 2.0 went into effect, for crying out loud.
I thought Jonah jumped out of the window.
What do you use to access the podcasts?
SPOILER ALERT: Last episode of How I Met Your Mother errr, how I ended up with Aunt Robin. I should have seen it coming. I mean, they really made it soooo obvious in the last two seasons. As a committed predictor of TV plots, I’m rather embarrassed I missed this. I’m still left with a sense of loss and a feeling of betrayal, but I have to agree it was pretty good story telling.
But to your point that the last episode wasn’t funny. When Tracy revealed she was pregnant to Ted and Barney thought she meant she was getting a boob job? My Wife and I laughter out loud for 5 minutes straights (had to pause).