We already learned that women working for “The Late Show with David Letterman” sometimes get more than just a weekly salary.

Now, we’re finding out why so few female comics grace Letterman’s iconic stage.

Letterman’s comedy booker, Eddie Brill, has been fired for suggesting in an interview that female comedians aren’t as funny as their male counterparts. That, combined with the fact that the show booked only one female comic last year, sealed Brill’s fate with the program.

Brill’s appraisal of the state of female comedy didn’t go over so well at the newly launched Mirth Magazine, whose editorial condemning Brill subsequently sparked a discussion between readers, female comics who participated in the Times profile, and eventually Brill himself. At first, Brill claimed to have been quoted out of context—a claim that was quickly refuted by the interviewer, Jason Zinoman—but hours later, Brill came around to recognizing that he “should have been more accurate with my words and feelings in the interview,” and admitted, “It is time for me to accept the consequences of my printed words.”

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What hath the sax-lovin’ Bill Clinton wrought?

Then-Gov. Clinton appeared on “The Arsenio Hall Show” way back in 1992 to, A. play his saxophone and B. earn some cool points along the way.

He likely did both. Now, it’s common for both presidential hopefuls and the Commander in Chief himself to appear before Letterman, Leno and their peers to win over the masses.

Former Gov. Mitt Romney joined the late night fun this week by reading “The Late Show with David Letterman’s” Top Ten List. Letterman, whose liberal biases have become crystal clear in recent years, kindly allowed Romney to speak directly to his audience.

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Titled, “Things Mitt Romney Would Like to Say to the American People,” the bit included this highlight – “It’s a hairpiece …”

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The Red/Blue state divide doesn’t just involve politics. Turns out television watching habits are sharply influenced by how people pull the voting levers on Election Day.

A new survey conducted by Entertainment Weekly shows that Democrats prefer sarcastic comedies and morally entangled heroes, while Republicans gravitate toward workplace scenarios.

Yet both the Left and the Right adore “Modern Family,” a pro-gay comedy with plenty of Emmy appeal. Sounds like a media meme takes a hit with that news.

There’s some unintentional comedy packed into the intriguing report, too. Consider this description of why “The View” fares better with liberals:

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The Mainstream Media did what it likes to do best over the weekend – turn a poorly sourced quasi-scandal regarding a Republican into a news feeding frenzy.

Now, late night talk show hosts have taken the bait.

Last night, the majority of the comedy elite had fun at the expense of Herman Cain, the popular GOP presidential candidate accused of sexually harassing two women during the 1990s. The wobbly reportage was condemned by not only conservatives but the left-leaning Pro Publica media outfit. But it proved too irresistible for the usual comic suspects (source: The daily Hotline roundup):

David Letterman: Now (businessman) Herman Cain when he was the chairman of the National Restaurant Association back in the ’90’s is saying there was a claim of sexual harassment. I looked it up. … Here’s what happened: he was just listing the specials. (‘The Late Show with David Letterman,’ CBS, 10/31).

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“I‘m glad they didn’t nominate [New Jersey Gov. Chris] Christie,” my friend Louis (whose Acme Comedy Company is about to celebrate twenty years in the business) said. “A lot of comedy clubs will not survive 2012; Christie would put the final nail their coffins.”

He was really concerned that with President Barack Obama’s dismal approval ratings the Republican primaries would become a winner-take-all contest, with the popular Christie making it all the way to the White House.

Louis believes that political satire is the finest form of the comedic arts, and he has seen it die twice over the last two decades. When the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal broke, every hack in America became a political comic just by appending Bill Clinton to their favorite oral sex gag. As we moved into the new millennium, comics who specialized in blonde jokes could call themselves political just by substituting President George W. Bush into the punchline.

With this new administration, political humor became very tricky, and only a few comics will attempt to make fun of the President. Heck, even the guys who did those “What if a Brother ever got into the White House?” routines were forced to write some original material or abandon the political arena altogether. Louis believes that the political edge of his club is part of what has kept him afloat three years into a recession. (more…)

As someone who lost a friend in the Towers (Port Authority officer Donald Foreman ), I still have a hard time thinking of 9/11 without gritting my teeth in anger. I do remember in those early days after the attacks thinking that the entertainment industry did a good job embracing the public’s heartache and sharing messages of hope and patriotism. I watched David Letterman’s return to the air and tried to laugh with him, but my pain was too raw and he somehow did not come across as sincere.

On the other hand, I was very moved by Jon Stewart’s monologue and there was no doubt about his pain.

It didn’t take long, however, for the entertainment industry to jump on the Bush derangement syndrome bandwagon and every film, show or play to be tainted with liberal hate.

Jon Stewart should take a look back on his feelings that day and tone down his contempt for all things conservative.

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Will Billy Crystal return as Oscar’s host? That’s the question today.

You know, it’s kind of amazing that as telecast ratings for the the Academy Awards sail over a cliff, the Academy appears to be in complete denial over what the real problem is. For starters, a large number of their recent hosts — Alec Baldwin, Whoopi Goldberg, David Letterman, Chris Rock and Jon Stewart — are polarizing and divisive figures who turn off well over half the country. Those of us who don’t live on the coasts don’t like these people, and why should we? They continually insult us, who we are, and what we hold dear. No Bitter Clinger in their right mind wastes a Sunday night with their guts in a knot waiting for a Leftist sucker shot.

Oscar has the same problem with presenters and winners. Every time some mouthy jerk grabs a trophy we sit there on edge waiting, waiting, waiting for it.

If you believe in traditional marriage, love Jesus, adore America, hate terrorists and have finally figured out Obama’s a failed president — watching the Oscars sucks.

Billy Crystal does, however, transcend that problem. Not 100%, but he is a national figure who isn’t polarizing, puts on a great show, and in the talent and class department comes as close to a Bob Hope and Johnny Carson as anyone today. And sadly, he’s about it.

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Latest strategy: x-ray Bachmann’s ass to prove it’s real.

Comedians are free to joke about what they want, but does anyone else find it creepy that David Letterman, of all people, is making sexual jokes about a sitting congresswoman?  After all, it was just two years ago that we learned Letterman had been bedding members of his staff in a secret bedroom above the Ed Sullivan Theater.  I’m not really sure why anyone would find this x-ray line funny in the first place (though I get what he intended), but even if they did, doesn’t the fact that it emanated from Letterman’s pervy mouth turn the “ewww” factor up just a little too high?

Letterman has the aura of a misogynist FM radio shock jock–the type of guy you wouldn’t want near your kids–and nothing illustrates this more clearly than a depraved joke about a female public servant who happens to be highly educated and a mother of twenty-eight (including twenty-three foster kids). (more…)

For policy reasons, unless he won the nomination to challenge our failed President, I never would have voted for Trump, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t do our America a great service and at great personal cost. Thanks to this billionaire businessman/reality show host, the Birther issue is no longer something the MSM and White House can conspire to turn into a cynical political weapon in order to label everyday Americans as racist. Going into 2012, this is a huge tactical loss for Obama and his MSM Palace Guards, and we have Donald Trump to thank for that.

For doing the MSM’s job — for demanding a sitting president release a document reasonable Americans asked to see — Trump was unfairly held up for public ridicule and dishonestly labeled racist. And even though he deserved neither, even with the heat raining down on him from all four corners of his life, including those cowards in Hollywood,  Trump showed great courage in stepping into the arena and taking the fight directly to the White House in the face of unbelievable pressure.

And don’t ever forget that Trump won. Obama blinked and the Birther issue was disarmed.

I’m no Birther, never was. But doesn’t mean I didn’t see how the MSM and White House were using this issue to their political advantage.

Until Trump came along.

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I think he’s wrong about some of these things, I just can’t tell you why. – David Letterman

This is two days in a row where a glib, lefty comedian has taken off his clown nose, engaged in a serious debate with someone from our side they disagree with politically and found themselves caught off guard by a prepared presentation of facts and logic.  Wednesday it was Jon Stewart being schooled by Donald Rumsfeld on the Iraq War and last night a calm, cool, and educated Senator Rand Paul gave David Letterman a terrific lesson on the basics of economics…

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Like Jon Stewart, you have to give Letterman credit for his willingness to seriously engage on this issue. You just have to wonder how long that will last if our side keeps presenting our ideas so well. Will the clown nose and cheap shots return soon?

What is great, though, is that thanks to Secretary Rumsfeld and Senator Paul’s willingness to enter the hostile territory of popular culture, a whole new audience has been exposed to a range of ideas unheard of on these shows before. Instead of our worldview simply being ridiculed or marginalized as punchlines, it’s being presented in reasonable and even attractive ways.

If Letterman and Stewart want to expand their audience; having more of our political stars on, engaging them on the issues, but doing so with this kind of respect would be an excellent way to go about it. 

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Several weeks ago, the “Right Network” premiered with many conservative programs in its lineup. I recently watched  an episode of one of the network’s new shows entitled “Right 2 Laugh.” The stand-up comedy program featured a few strong conservative comics and highlighted the fact that there are so few right-leaning comedians in the mainstream media today.

From Bill Maher to Jon Stewart to David Letterman, the television airwaves are full of comedians with their own programs who lean to the left and love skewing those on the right. Many of these comedians have attracted widespread praise and admiration for their talents. Comedians on the right, however, often haven’t had a television forum to criticize those on the left.

Hopefully, that will change with “Right 2 Laugh.”

Comedian Evan Sayet hosts the new show. At the beginning of the episode I screened, Sayet opened the show with a few jokes and introduced the featured stand-up comics.  (more…)

By now, you’ve probably heard about what Politico is billing as a potential “October surprise” – a “Rally to Restore Sanity,” planned for October 30th on the Mall in Washington and hosted by the brilliant comedians Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.

The day before Halloween? I’m sure it’ll be a solemn occasion, where people intend to reflect upon the real problems that face our nation, dressed up in costumes mocking conservative movers and shakers like Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck. In fact, I can just imagine the oh-so-clever people who will be dressed up like Christine O’Donnell as a witch. (Funny, isn’t it, how when a conservative admits to “dabbling” in something like witchcraft as a teenager it’s a big scandal, but progressive, leftist PC dictates that we should be sensitive to the beliefs of those who declare themselves pagans and Wiccans.)

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert – your hosts

Oh, but I’m being cynical. The Comedy Central guys don’t really “mean” anything by the whole thing. It’s just a big joke, doncha know:

“We’re not provocateurs, we’re not activists; we are reacting for our own catharsis,” Stewart tells [New York magazine's Chris] Smith. “There is a line into demagoguery, and we try very hard to express ourselves but not move into, ‘So follow me! And I will lead you to the land of answers, my people!’ You can fall in love with your own idea of common sense. Maybe the nice thing about being a comedian is never having a full belief in yourself to know the answer. So you can say all this stuff, but underneath, you’re going, ‘But of course, I’m f*cking idiotic.’ It’s why we don’t lead a lot of marches.” (emphasis mine)

Perhaps that’s why the Comedy Central overlords have asked Craig Minassian, former Clinton administration press aide who is now a consultant to Comedy Central, and Chris Wayne, a former Clinton White House event organizer who works on large-scale media events and promotions, to help them file their permit for the October 30th event. But I’m sure they won’t be helping them actually run the event… (more…)

Remember when American comedians went after the powerful in an effort to bring them down to earth with the sharp satire of accountability? Today, they appear to only protect the powerful. Well, unless the powerful aren’t liberal enough. As things stand now you have the likes of David Letterman and Louis C.K. savaging Sarah Palin’s family, SNL terrified to rip Obama with any real zeal, cartoonists proclaiming President Teleprompter too cool to mock, and Will Ferrell films flaking for corrupt public unions, all in an effort to protect the corrupted leftist elitists currently holding power.

It’s like we now live in an alternate universe you might call … North Korea.

In desperate Hail Mary moves to protect Obama and Democrats from what’s looking like a November rout, three of the left’s most beloved Palace Guards have just upped their game considerably. Bill Maher’s now openly blackmailing Delaware Republican Senate Candidate Christine O’Donnell, threatening a weekly drip-drip-drip of videos he thinks will ruin her candidacy unless she agrees to appear on his show – which is where he’ll really pull out the stops to finally win that Emmy by attempting to destroy her:

ABC News:

On Friday, Maher released on his new HBO show, “Real Time,” an unaired clip of O’Donnell admitting to a brief dalliance with witchcraft.

“I dabbled into witchcraft — I never joined a coven. But I did, I did. I dabbled into witchcraft. I hung around people who were doing these things. I’m not making this stuff up. I know what they told me they do,” she said.

“One of my first dates with a witch was on a satanic altar, and I didn’t know it. I mean, there’s little blood there and stuff like that,” she said. “We went to a movie and then had a midnight picnic on a satanic altar.”

O’Donnell appeared on the political talk show on 22 different episodes, and Maher has said he will air a clip of O’Donnell every week until she agrees to appear on his show.

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First off, David Letterman should never feel the need to remind us he’s ignorant.

And good for Donald Trump, who hits the nail on the head when he says that the Ground Zero Mosque builders would engender a tremendous amount of goodwill if they would, of their own volition, move someplace where — as Roger Ebert was good enough to remind us – the ashes of the dead don’t still lay.

Below the fold you’ll find a video of Letterman taking a shot at His One. This makes a total of two jokes (I’m aware of) Letterman’s told at the expense of chronic vacationer Barack Obama. Think about how divisive and biased Letterman is that the strange occasion of his making a joke about our sitting president is found worthy of a mention. (more…)

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Hollywood A-listers avoiding Obama at fundraisers, Jon Stewart declaring the Race Card maxed out, and now the President’s number-one Late Night Palace Guard sees that he has no other choice other than to point to the vacationing elephant in the room.

Obviously Letterman doesn’t read “The American Prospect.” Which is about all the creepy Palin obsessive has in common with the rest of America.

By the way, does anyone know if Letterman’s been to Alaska recently…? (more…)

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10. No one will ever say that David Letterman is “too smart to believe what he believes.”

9. Whatever was left of Dave’s edgy sense of irony died while engaging in a serious discussion about the ethics of journalism with… Rachel Maddow… of…. MSNBC…  

8. Dave hasn’t figured out that “scaring smart people” puts your ratings in the toilet.

7. Dave will believe any lie told by a humorless partisan wearing purple glasses.

6. Two negatives do not equal a positive. Maddow’s inability to feel joy plus Letterman’s similar affliction equals less audience pleasure than a discussion about undercooked meatloaf between two nursing home residents. (more…)

Very smart move on Letterman’s part. Now that he once again has the gritty taste of Leno’s dust in his mouth, doing things like showing Red State, blue collar America a little respect is something he’ll need to do more of in order to remain competitive. His bitter partisanship and savage attacks on Sarah Palin and her family cost him dearly in the audience goodwill department. Maybe this clip is a sign that he’s finally figured out that there just aren’t enough elitists in this country to bring him back to #1.

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[Part 2 and 3 of the interview are below.]

His guest, Pam Stout, is the kind of Tea Party representative the left is desperately hoping to smear as ignorant, frothing-at-the mouth racists. But as you can see she’s just like you and I: an everyday American who loves her country, knows something’s terribly wrong and, though never politically active before, has taken the time to become an activist, but only after educating herself on the issues.

Pam Stouts are springing from everywhere, and her ability to intelligently answer Letterman’s tough but fair questions is what most terrifies the Obamabots and their corrupt supporters in the media. Our bullshit detectors have always been there but now we’re moving beyond instinct and starting to teach ourselves the truth behind the media spin. These past few years, we haven’t been as vigilant as we should have. But now that America’s awake, the left’s in for a real fight because we are fundamentally too good of a people to simply stand by as they decimate our country — even if the price is being called “racists.”     (more…)

Megan Mullally isn’t happy to see a late night host reach out to the other half of the country.

Liberals already have David Letterman, Jon Stewart, George Lopez, Stephen Colbert and countless others on their side.  But that’s not enough for Mullally, the two-time Emmy winner and “W&G” scene stealer.

She recently blasted former Gov. Sarah Palin’s stand-up comedy debut on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” at movieline.com, mocking both Leno’s comedy bits and his attempt to woo conservative audiences.

“Could it be any more bald-faced that he’s going after the red states? It’s insane. It’s just right out there, full on … amazing. And she was wearing jeans [note: said with a drawn out snarl]. ‘I’m gonna wear denim! I’m gonna dress it down!’”

Sounds insane, all right. Why would the host of a popular late night show give a platform to a gorgeous, charismatic politician who appeals to a wide swath of viewers?

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If you want to identify the most controversial person in television, forget about Glenn Beck and Keith Olberman. The answer is obvious: Jay Leno. 

The once and now returning host of NBC’s Tonight Show has incited hostility and outright hatred for many years, simply by virtue of being more commercially successful than rivals David Letterman and Conan O’Brien. In particular, fans of his competitors have derided Leno for being overly conventional and failing to challenge late-night viewers by pushing the boundaries of taste. 

That, however, has almost certainly been a primary reason for Leno’s success: he amuses viewers without overwhelming them with sensational material such as O’Brien’s masturbating bears and potty-mouthed dog and Letterman’s aggressive non sequiturs. Leno is clearly out to amuse, not to change the world, and that is exactly the sort of programming most people seem to want in that 11:35 time slot. 

As a result, Leno returned to his Tonight Show helm last night after a hiatus of several months in which NBC tried moving him to primetime and shifting O’Brien from The Late Show at 12:35 a.m. to the Tonight Show at 11:35. As has been well-documented, the change was a predictable disaster both for NBC’s primetime ratings and for the Tonight Show. O’Brien toned down his comedy for the earlier audience, which didn’t work, and Leno could not make a nightly show consistently special enough to draw viewers at 10 p.m.  (more…)

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