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I Guess It's "Or Die," Then
Celebrities, including funnyman Will Ferrell, have put together a Billionaires for Bush-style fake PSA defending health care executives in a way that I have not heard one single human being in the history of humankind defend health care executives. I made it through 38 seconds before concluding that it could not possibly get funny; maybe someone who watches more will be able to answer whether the actors acknowledge, however satirically, that health insurance executives have been helping craft Obama's plan.
UPDATE: Doesn't seem to want to load; link here.
|9.22.09 @ 3:01PM|#
You lie, Matt! You lie! Obama would never even talk to a
corporation!
Why do you lie?
|9.22.09 @ 3:03PM|#
Painfully unfunny. Maybe it's a bad idea to use a string of talking point memos as a script.
|9.22.09 @ 3:03PM|#
Hollywood doubles down on the "demonization" bet. They ignore
the true issue that drives America's objection to the public
option: insurance companies are not great but government is
WORSE.
Are these Hollywood types so dense they can't connect the dots
between the money that funds their jobs and supports their
lifestyles and "artistic" desires comes from profits? Comes from
investments from places such as these dreaded insurance
companies?
The stupidity on display is astounding. Keep mocking us, Hollywood,
keep digging that hole.
|9.22.09 @ 3:08PM|#
I happen to know that Obama has never even done business with a corporation. He hatesss them, yess he doesss, my precious!
|9.22.09 @ 3:09PM|#
I happen to know that Obama has never even done business
with a corporation.
The Chosen One is virginally pure, unsullied by the wonton touch of
filthy lucre (except for the money He made writing books about the
most issue of our days - Himself).
Big Racism|9.22.09 @ 3:16PM|#
"I happen to know that Obama has never even done business with a
corporation."
Only because he has no business experience whatsoever.
|9.22.09 @ 3:17PM|#
ROTFLOL - Pro Liberate, that is a good impression from the
Hobbit! I'm a huge Hobbit fan and know when I see a quote from the
movie!
Excuse me while I wipe the coffee I just spit all over the
keybioard!
BTW - has anyone else noticed how Beck has been incorporating more
Hobbit imagery into his show (particularly the scene when Gandalph
fights the fire troll on the cave bridge? Something tells me he's a
BIG FAN!
Big Racism|9.22.09 @ 3:18PM|#
"Rule #7: A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag." - Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals
T|9.22.09 @ 3:21PM|#
I happen to know that Obama has never even done business
with a corporation.
Exactly! His book magically appeared in the hands of the chosen few
with no corporations involved. Such is the power of the
Obamessiah!
Jonas|9.22.09 @ 3:21PM|#
I think it would have funny potential... if it weren't for the fact that literally almost EVERYTHING in the video is just a play on something that is being said elsewhere seriously. This type of humor is supposed to poke fun at other people's presuppositions (the presuppositions of health-care executives, in this instance). They end up just advertising their own presuppositions about health-care executives.
|9.22.09 @ 3:22PM|#
Celebrity... Will Ferrell, has put together a career. I made it
through 38 seconds before concluding that it could not possibly get
funny.
Same goes for:
Adam Sandler
Ben Stiller
Vince Vaughn
|9.22.09 @ 3:27PM|#
Not sure if I'm allowed to say this due to their Relationship with reason, but I've never found Penn & Teller to be funny.
Abdul|9.22.09 @ 3:29PM|#
The funny part is that the health care executives were bought
off by the administration and therefore aren't opposing the
Obamacare.
Who knew that Ferrel was capable of such subtle irony.
Or maybe he just took one cowbell too many to the head.
|9.22.09 @ 3:31PM|#
Why would anyone watch something that Matt says is so
awful?
This post seems full of fail.
Jimbo|9.22.09 @ 3:31PM|#
Sigh, the sad thing about this is that the opinions of Hollywood
actors will have more of a real impact on the public than anything
put out by other groups who have a much better understanding of the
issues (like a group of economists, or hospital
administrators).
What I don't get is how the actors can be so harsh on Big Pharma.
After all, their industry is very similar to that of the drug
companies.
• Both get better and better with progress (CGI effects, gene
therapy)
• The first object produced costs the company making it millions,
after that additional copies/pills cost virtually nothing
• Both rely on the government to protect their intellectual
property via patents or copy right laws so they can recoup the cost
of that first object. Both industries are also always pushing the
government to expand this protection.
• Both make lots of $$$ by making people happy
• Both result in some employees making an astronomical amount of
money for doing a job that seems easy to the outsider
Given all these similarities, don't you think actors could find
some common ground? If I was making millions for appearing in films
like Bewitched, I sure wouldn't be throwing stones at the glass
houses of others for making too much money.
|9.22.09 @ 3:31PM|#
Not sure if I'm allowed to say this due to their
Relationship with reason, but I've never found Penn & Teller to
be funny.
Entertaining? Yes. 'Funny'? I'm not 100% sure that's specifically
their goal.
|9.22.09 @ 3:31PM|#
"Not sure if I'm allowed to say this due to their Relationship
with reason, but I've never found Penn & Teller to be
funny."
Regardless, their Bullshit episode on hair, where we see a hot dark
haired woman get her asshole waxed clean, is far better than
anyone's comedy.
John|9.22.09 @ 3:40PM|#
I watched the whole thing, pity me, and nope, there was nothing funny in there the whole time, unless you count Will Ferrell white boy 'fro as funny.
|9.22.09 @ 3:43PM|#
Celebrities, including unfunnyman Will Ferrell....
FTFY.
His Pearl short was funny, but that's about it.
You just have to manage your expectations to avoid life's bitter
disappointments.
|9.22.09 @ 3:51PM|#
"""The funny part is that the health care executives were bought
off by the administration and therefore aren't opposing the
Obamacare."""
You don't need to buy off the health care execs to get them to
approve of you making their services madatory by law.
The Ghost of Rodney Dangerfiel|9.22.09 @ 3:52PM|#
Comedy's hard.
It's tough to be funny when you're coming off drugs.
Sam Grove|9.22.09 @ 3:55PM|#
You don't need to buy off the health care execs to get them
to approve of you making their services madatory by law.
That IS the buy off.
|9.22.09 @ 3:59PM|#
I can understand how ordinary people making less than 200K or whatever would want the vague reforms offered by Obama and crew; they think that the reforms will make their health care free or cheaper than it is. But why would Hollywood millionaires who already get great care be for it? Just Obama love? Or do they think their companies will be able to pass health care costs onto the taxpayers?
|9.22.09 @ 4:05PM|#
Ha, I only made it about 10 seconds in before closing it when I
saw it earlier.
-Andrew
|9.22.09 @ 4:06PM|#
Artists are socialists because most of them are simply dumbasses who get thru life feeling instead of thinking.
@|9.22.09 @ 4:09PM|#
I won't watch it, but I know enough about history to point out that most dictatorial regimes have benefited in the short-term by identifying and then persecuting a scapegoat.
|9.22.09 @ 4:19PM|#
You guys have it backwards. The administration didn't buy off the health care executives. The health care industry bought off the administration.
Xeones|9.22.09 @ 4:30PM|#
Not sure if I'm allowed to say this due to their
Relationship with reason, but I've never found Penn & Teller to
be funny.
BLASPHEMY! Also, racism, probably!
Warty|9.22.09 @ 4:33PM|#
Make sure to catch Will Ferrell as Will Ferrell in the outrageous new comedy, Will Ferrell.
MNG|9.22.09 @ 4:43PM|#
"Will Ferrell hasn't been funny for the better part of a
decade."
Dudes, don't let your ideology blind you to ALL of reality. That
guys funny.
MNG|9.22.09 @ 4:46PM|#
I mean, I'm a liberal but I'm totally willing to say that a talented conservative entertainer is, well, talented. For example that guy, you know, the guy that does the thing. That guy's a pretty funny conservative.
M|9.22.09 @ 4:47PM|#
Technically it's not Will Ferrell that is funny, it's the person
who writes the scripts for Will Ferrell. This explains why some of
his movies are much funnier than others.
It drives me nuts when people think actors are funny. They just
read the lines dudes. The writers or directors are funny.
Walter Jameson|9.22.09 @ 4:59PM|#
Wait a second... Are they satirizing opponents to Obama's plan or retarded actors? It is kind of funny if you look at it as the latter.
Zeb|9.22.09 @ 5:03PM|#
"It drives me nuts when people think actors are funny. They just
read the lines dudes."
Yup. That's why anyone who can read and memorize a few lines can go
to Hollywood and make a successful comedy movie.
|9.22.09 @ 5:08PM|#
Zeb
Even if a comic actor's delivery is impeccable, most of them are
lost without good material.
Kind of like politicians.
|9.22.09 @ 5:49PM|#
Dudes, don't let your ideology blind you to ALL of reality. That guys funny.
I suppose if you think that loudly spouting whatever random phrase
pops into one's head passes for humor, then yes, Will Ferrell is a
comedy genius.
Much the same way that stringing a bunch of barely-related and
over-produced-yet-jittery-as-hell action sequences makes Michael
Bay an action film genius.
Jim|9.22.09 @ 6:36PM|#
It pained me to see Tom Lennon and Ben Garant of "The State"
fame in this.
Does anybody else hate it when they find out entertainers whose
work they enjoy are idiots?
|9.22.09 @ 6:40PM|#
What I never got with regards to comedians and punk rockers is
how their political views can often be so orthodox and
homogeneous.
You would think by the nature of who they are and their careers,
the contrary nature of what they do would cause them to tend to
have quirky political beliefs. Not libertarian necessary, but not
straight out of the Berkeley progressive mill.
It just seems to me that the Angry Samoans told people what they
really thought while Bad Religion repeated things somebody else
thought. Like the difference between Sam Kinison and Ferrell. Since
their task wasn't really about politics, it didn't really matter
whether you agreed with the Samoans or Kinison (in the case of the
Samoans how could you), but at least you knew there was some sort
of thought behind it all.
MNG|9.22.09 @ 6:42PM|#
OK, I'm gonna have to call you guys on this, this is your
ideology keeping you from enjoying this.
So it is funny with the beginning where it spoofs these
over-serious PSA's ("something is happening"). And then the
"insurance companies protect us from our own selfishness...'oh help
my daughter is going to die, I need medication,'" the "he should
have to pay it out of his allowance, how else is he going to
learn?" and the "does a person with typos really deserve surgery"
are good send ups of the mind set of "so these people are sick,
life's not fair, you don't 'deserve' health insuruance, stop
whining, fuck 'em" stuff we hear on H&R ALL THE TIME when
debating this issue.
C'mon, I can admit when its funny when liberals are skewered, you
guys need a thicker skin and a funny bone.
faust|9.22.09 @ 6:49PM|#
yes, they need good material, but without impeccable delivery,
good material is worthless.
anyway - to get where they are today, most of the good comics had
to write their own stuff for standup. the great ones do it
improvisationally. all of them with any longevity have an
extraordinary talent for delivery.
|9.22.09 @ 6:54PM|#
Laughter is an involuntary reaction.
So after a minute and a half and not even one upturned lip, I
clicked the "die" button and was treated to a guy being killed by a
ninja. I immediately started giggling.
I'm assuming I was giggling not because my political beliefs
revolve around death dealing ninja, but because the clip just
struck me as funny.
I loved Gang of Four's first album (Entertainment!). Hated
everything after. Each were unapologetically Marxist (the first
even moreso), so clearly my preferences had little to nothing to do
with their politics.
BakedPenguin|9.22.09 @ 7:09PM|#
Voros, of course we have to put our politics on hold. How many
(small l) libertarians entertainers are there?
Drew Carey
Penn and Teller
Dwight Yoakum
Frank Zappa (check out the interview he did for Playboy)
Kurt Russell (? I'd head this once.)
Rush (? They recently started playing "Working Man" at their
shows)
I like at least some of the work of all of the above (more than
anything I've seen by Farrell), but ignoring entertainers with
politics I hate would make for many boring evenings.
Also, I was never a Gang of Four fan, but I was/am a pretty big
Dead Kennedys fan, and Jello Biafra is (or pretends to be) a
Chomskyite anarchist. About the only thing he wrote that's
libertarian is "Police Truck". (Which is a good song to play to
Balko threads).
And your point about the Angry Samoans vs. Bad Religion would make
more sense if the Samoans ever wrote anything vaguely political. Or
anything good, other than "Lights Out".
Joe M|9.22.09 @ 7:17PM|#
Probably the insurance companies paid the actors off to make the short, because they WANT the "reform" to pass. They don't care what people think about them, as long as they get more money through forced participation. Aha! Reverse psychology, er, sorta.
|9.22.09 @ 7:28PM|#
I actually like early Bad Religion more than early Samoans
(don't much like anything since from either), but the point was
simply that Bad Religion was pretty much progressive boilerplate,
while the Samoans were anti pretty much everything and everyone.
The latter is a lot more what I expect out of people whose job it
is to be contrary.
A Chomskyite anarchist is at least trying to be different.
Repeating what you heard in "Social Justice 301" at Berkeley is
not.
Humphrey Haverstock|9.22.09 @ 7:33PM|#
I only recognized Ferrell and Lennon from the group of
"celebrities"...and I can vouch for Ferrell and Lennon's ability to
be funny.
Not here, sadly.
(I blame the Moveon.org people behind it. They have an uncanny
knack for shitty, backfiring agitprop.)
MattXIV|9.22.09 @ 7:54PM|#
MNG,
That PSA parody is HORRIBLE. It's way too long - even if the
writing was sharp, which it isn't, it's over 4 times as long as the
type of commerical spot it is parodying. It's trying to make fun of
overly serious PSAs with daft celebrities in them and insurance
companies at the same time, but insurance companies don't run
overly serious PSAs with daft celebrities in them - it's the setup
of a joke about PSAs with the punchline of a joke about insurance
companies, which is just confusing. The dialog doesn't even sound
like the kind of self serving things that insurance companies DO
say about themselves. I could have done a better job with the same
premise and I don't even agree with the politics.
|9.22.09 @ 7:57PM|#
I actually thought the video managed to be hilarious while simultaneously being scary and depressing. It's hilarious because these people don't seem to understand that they're actually working *for* what they think they're working against (profits of health care companies). It's scary and depressing because this position is taken seriously. Obama and the California nurses' union even made the point themselves! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsu_DRzNOFY
BakedPenguin|9.22.09 @ 8:07PM|#
Joe M - I was unaware. I thought he was conservative.
Voros - I didn't mean to give you a hard time, I really just wanted
to make fun of the Angry Samoans. And I think Jesse Walker had a
point about Biafra wanting to come off as a Chomskyite, when his
real politics were closer to "Minnesota soccer mom".
Walter Jameson|9.22.09 @ 8:18PM|#
Voros , from what I've seen, there's a variety of political
beliefs amongst punk rockers, just not a variety a political lyrics
being song by them.
I play in an awesome melodic hard-punk band with two libertarians,
a moderate liberal, a moderate conservative, and an apolitical
singer/lyricist.
What I think happens is that bands feel anything they say that
dissents the punk rock mainstream won't be welcomed, and their
music will be rejected because of it. That is kind of
hypocritically fucked up though.
jtuf|9.22.09 @ 8:39PM|#
Crying against an "enemy" to drum up support while quietly working with said "enemy" is simply Orwellian.
MNG|9.22.09 @ 10:18PM|#
It mocks the arguments that one hears against reform, ones I've
heard quite a bit here as a matter of fact, that people don't
"deserve" health care, that people who have troubles in this area
are just stupid people who can't police their own contracts (hence
the part about the typos on the claim, this is also a dig on the
cruel technicalism that many see in insurance administration), that
people should have to pay their way (hence the part about the kid
having to pay out of his allowance) and that people who want help
on this issue are whining (hence the part with the guy going "my
kid is going to die if I don't medication"); ultimately it is a
send up of that kind of goofy callousness that motivates a lot of
the opposition to health care reform.
Hey, Matt Welch is a super good and cool writer, but when you watch
a parody of a side you strongly agree with politically and can't
enjoy it because it does not have "the actors acknowledge, however
satirically, that health insurance executives have been helping
craft Obama's plan" is an indicator that one's ideological anger is
thwarting one's ability to laugh at something funny...
MNG|9.22.09 @ 10:19PM|#
"Crying against an "enemy" to drum up support while quietly
working with said "enemy" is simply Orwellian."
Well, any good libertarian should be able to agree that "the health
care executives" are not some monolithic group. Maybe Obama works
with some, opposes others, and vice versa.
JB|9.22.09 @ 10:21PM|#
Will Ferrell just loves that Obama jizz. Drinks it by the
dick-load.
How does it feel, Will Ferrell, to be a washed-up has-been loser
AND a cock-sucking little bitch?
|9.23.09 @ 12:30AM|#
Wow, that was historically lame. It's beyond "or die" - it's moved to "funny or fully decomposed in some sort of CSI disgusting make-you-vomit-in-your-mouth manner".
alan|9.23.09 @ 12:43AM|#
Hey, Matt Welch is a super good and cool writer, but when
you watch a parody of a side you strongly agree with politically
and can't enjoy it because it does not have "the actors
acknowledge, however satirically, that health insurance executives
have been helping craft Obama's plan" is an indicator that one's
ideological anger is thwarting one's ability to laugh at something
funny...
Okay, I gave the entire video a second look, can you point to the
funny, MNG, because I missed it. I was really looking for that
grassy knoll of humor but I guess my ideological blinders got in
the way.
Was it the 'exotic animals petting zoo' bit?
Were you also the one who recommended that awful graphic novel, The
Killing Joke? Batman giggles at one of the Joker's gags at the end,
whoopdeefreakindoo.
Joshua Ginsberg|9.23.09 @ 1:38AM|#
I've written up a thorough response to the PSA here:
http://starboard.flowtheory.net/blog/2009/09/22/hating-on-healthcare-executives/
Michael Ejercito|9.24.09 @ 8:18AM|#
When oil prices were on the rise last year, Congress and the
public blamed oil companies, not the auto insurance
companies.
Why are people blaming the health insurance companies and not the
doctors and hospitals who do the price gouging? If the doctors and
hospitals did not do price gouging, people would not need insurance
to afford health care.
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