By now you’ve probably seen one of those TV ads where 84-year-old small-screen legend Andy Griffith blatantly shills for ObamaCare. If not, take a look below at the first spot, entitled “1965.” Put your feet up on the antebellum veranda and listen to the guitar sweetly plucking and Andy gently extolling the benefits of the U.S. government’s incipient hostile takeover of one-sixth of the economy. You can practically smell the magnolias blossoming just outside the overcrowded, understaffed clinic you’ll be stuck in for days once the new law really takes hold.

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There’s something disturbingly Being John Malkovich about Griffith’s Being Andy Taylor routine in these ads. That said, you have to credit the ObamaCare marketing team for this stroke of advertising genius. How do you best sell a wildly unrealistic, Utopian health-care fantasy to a resistant American public? You hire the beloved star of a beloved show set in a beloved, unrealistic, Utopian fantasy town, naturally.

Or do you?

Because, paradoxically, that’s exactly what’s wrong with hiring Sheriff Taylor to pitch ObamaCare. Mayberry was an alien, antiseptic fantasy-land of normalcy run amok. Even by the pristine naive standards of rural 1960, that America never existed. (more…)

So last Wednesday, Nancy Pelosi was speaking at some DC summit, where she noted that – because of the new health-care reform law – musicians and artists could quit their jobs and pursue their dreams, because now the rest of us will be footing the bill for their urinary tract infections.

Here’s the gasbag, now, gasbagging:

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“We see it as an entrepreneurial bill – a bill that says to someone, if you want to be creative and be a musician or whatever, you can leave your work, focus on your talent, your skill, your passion, your aspirations because you will have health care.”

So, to put it plainly: If you want to play your guitar in the subway, no worries – we’ll supply your health care. If you want to join a death metal barbershop quartet that plays everything on a children’s xylophone- that’s cool too. If you want to freeze-dry your feces, jar it, and call it an indictment on the Bush regime, relax, you daring artist – we’ll pay for your pink eye. (more…)

Uh oh.

I am calling to all of you freedom-loving Americans to come once again to Washington D.C. to gather on the Capitol steps on Saturday, at 12 o’clock noon.

We must come by the thousands.

Speaker Pelosi will stop at nothing to fulfill her corrupt conquests. She will bring all of the corrupt ACORN liars to try to bully all the Democrats that may be having pangs of guilt knowing quite surely what their votes can and will do. If they’re bullied into saying “yes,” it will destroy America.

Join me and Rep. Michele Bachmann in Washington DC at 12 noon EST so we can give all the Democrats who know what the end result will be the courage to say: “No, do not pass this destructive bill.” (more…)

In Texas we have an expression:  Saying it don’t make it so.  The proof of the saying is all around us.  Take for instance the latest video from that national treasure Naked Emperor News which shows then candidate Barack Obama pledging eight times to play out the health care reform debate on CSPAN, or MSNBC’s assurances that the Ft. Hood shooting spree was not motivated by religion.

For a real case-study, however, spend a little time on the website of the nation’s foremost youth-voter organization, Rock the Vote.

Just before Christmas, when many Americans were turning their attention to faith and family, Rock the Vote, a tax-exempt 501 (c) (3), remained firmly fixed on pushing through the administration’s health-care reform legislation. According to the organization’s website, they asked (commissioned) web-comedy team Funny or Die to create a video to help cut-through voter-fatigue over the issue.  The result, which was then featured in front of the RTV homepage, is called “F the Vote,” and its concluding recommendation to young voters is that they join a pledge to “never, ever, f**k” anyone who is against health care reform.”  That’ll show ‘em. (more…)

Inciting is usually a telegraphed endeavor, with rhetoric yelled to an audience through a megaphone held by a coarse, weathered hand. But it can also be delivered subtly, with a soft voice and a wink, in the name of doing good.

Subtlety is necessary if a federal agency intends to incite activists to take action on the hot issues of the moment. This approach is what we see when we look at the most recent documents acquired by a Freedom of Information Act  (FOIA) request of the controversial August 10th conference call.

President Obama with Former NEA Communication Director Yosi Sergant

Readers of Big Hollywood may recall an article published in late August entitled “National Endowment for the Art of Persuasion?” that described an August 10th conference call organized by the White House, the NEA, and the Corporation for National and Community Service. As stated during the conference call, the goal was to bring together a group of pro-Obama artists to push the President and his agenda, with United We Serve as the first proposed effort. During the call, Yosi Sergant, then Communications Director for the NEA, encouraged artists to create art on the vehemently debated issues of health care, energy, and the environment.  (more…)

On August 25th 2009, Big Hollywood’s Patrick Courrielche broke the story of a conference call he attended with other “rising artist and art community luminaries”:

On Thursday August 6th, I was invited by the National Endowment for the Arts to attend a conference call scheduled for Monday August 10th hosted by the NEA, the White House Office of Public Engagement, and United We Serve. The call would include “a group of artists, producers, promoters, organizers, influencers, marketers, taste-makers, leaders or just plain cool people to join together and work together to promote a more civically engaged America and celebrate how the arts can be used for a positive change!” 

The email invite came directly from Yosi Sergant, then-Director of Communications at the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), and it advised this hand-picked group that the call was about laying “a new foundation for growth, focusing on core areas of the recovery agenda – health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.” 

Courrielche describes the call this way: (more…)

I recently wrote a critique of the art community’s lack of dissent in the face of many controversial decisions made by the current administration. Entitled “The Artist Formerly Known as Dissident,” one of the key points argued in the article was the potential danger associated with the use of the art community as a tool of the state. Little did I know how quickly this concern would be elevated to an outright probability. 

Sometime between when I finished the critique and when it went live online, I was invited by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to take part in a conference call that invited a group of rising artist and art community luminaries “to help lay a new foundation for growth, focusing on core areas of the recovery agenda – health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.”  (more…)

The biggest success of the “Spending Bill,” oops, “Stimulus Bill,” is ending. Yup, that is right; “Cash for Clunkers” is gone. Why? Because it was such a big success, the government ran out of money for the program not once, but twice. This time President Obama is shutting it down. No more money. It is finished. The official spin is that it brought the automobile industry back from destruction. Or, did it? 

In my opinion, it is just another example of a government program that did not work contrary to what I said in a prior column. To begin with, the government mistook the popularity of the program and only allocated one billion dollars of stimulus money to the bill. That money ran out in less than two weeks. Then, Congress immediately allocated another two billion dollars. That money is running out in less than four weeks. Another Big Government miscalculation!  (more…)

So right now the public option part of Obama’s health care reform bill is in free fall, and many are blaming Republican opposition. Which, of course, is giving the Republicans way too much credit. Fact is, the people you have to thank for this surprising turn of events are old people.

Thank you, old people.

It reminds me of my Macbook. See, mine’s been having problems for the last six months and I keep planning to take it in, but I never do. Instead of walking a few blocks to the Apple Store on a sunny Saturday, I waste the day watching Top Chef marathons in my underwear.

Now, compare that to my mom. I got her a Macbook for her birthday last year – but somehow within a few weeks of owning it, she touched a button, causing everything on her desktop to disappear. Only old people can seem to find that hidden button. (more…)

HR 3200, the so-called health reform bill, in my opinion, is one of the worst pieces of legislation ever to be considered by Congress.  It, not only, would lead us down the path of socialism but, in the process, would bankrupt the entire country.  I am very happy to see that citizens are showing up at town hall meetings throughout the country and voicing their complaints about the bill and health care reform in general.  It is actually quite funny watching Congressmen squirm when the tough questions are asked.  And, it is even more interesting when they cannot respond to the tough questions because they have not read the bill or are even familiar with its contents. 

I suggest you continue going to the town hall meetings and voice your concerns.  And, do not be afraid to get angry.  The Democrat and Republican Congressmen must know they will not be reelected if HR 3200 passes as it is currently written.  But, please, do not get violent.  Violence at these meetings will do nothing except make the opposition look weak and dumb, and hurt the path of democracy.  Violence at these meetings is similar to me being called a racist this week because I stated on a public forum that HR 3200 should not pay for medical services for illegal immigrants.  Remember the protest ways of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King. (more…)

The term “Jump the Shark” has been with us for a while. The clever metaphor is used for the moment when something of cultural significance begins to lose its luster, and descends into lameness.  It is a reference to the T.V. show “Happy Days,” specifically the episode when Fonzie water skied over shark infested waters.   This is the precise moment where the show began to decline.

Republicans and conservatives are dancing with glee every time a new poll comes out showing Obama’s poll numbers going down faster than a Hilton (Perez or Paris) after a nice dinner and a couple of cocktails. The support for things like Universal Health Care, closing Gitmo, and Cap and Trade are sinking even faster. Yet, that’s not the whole story.  Something else is going on here.  Something that begs the question: Has Liberalism “Jumped the Shark”?

Ehhhh…

Over the last sixty days or so, we’ve seen some amazing things. We saw a “wise Latina,” a self-described “affirmative action baby” claim that her statements were taken out of context or merely “meant to inspire,” and that race has nothing to do with her job performance. The White House has re-branded the $787 billion “stimulus package” a “stabilization package.” Our Vice-President, devious genius that he is, stated that we need to, “crazy as it sounds,” spend like lunatics to avoid bankruptcy. A gay blogger and gay civil rights champion called a black guy “the worst thing [he] could think of…a faggot.” We saw our government allow Iranian protesters, who peacefully challenged a rigged election, get shot in the street. Concurrently, we demanded that a tin-pot dictator be reinstated after his government got wise to his schemes and legally booted him. (more…)

Since I turn 50 next month, I’m focused on my Bucket List.  There are only 2 things left I haven’t accomplished.  1)  I’ve always wanted to be “an airhead on a sitcom.”  Of all the roles I’ve played, many of which I wasn’t suited for, strangely, this one has eluded me.  2) Attend a weekly Bible study.  So, I am now in a Bible study group on Wednesdays and the rest of the week I pursue airhead roles, which basically means I wait…for an audition.  I get about one a year.  This year I got an audition for American Pie IV, but I turned it down because of the sexual content.  

At my Bible study group this week I was sitting between Mavis and her Chihuahua named Pedro, and Sonia, an Iranian who lived five years in Russia, where she waited to receive her legal U.S. citizenship.  I asked Pastor Joel “Why does the Bible say Jesus was from the lineage of King David, if he had no blood from his father in him, since he was born of a virgin?  Pastor Joel excitedly replied, “Oh, well turn to Matthew 1 and Luke 3!  Mary and Joseph were both descendants of David as you can see by these genealogies.  So, the Old Testament prophecy was fulfilled that said the Messiah would be from the priestly (through Nathan) and kingly (through Solomon) lineage of David.  The blood of Mary which was from David ran through Jesus.  Oh. I always wondered about that.   (more…)