As the Wall Street Journal recently reported (subscription required):

The world’s biggest retailer, Wal-Mart Stores, and Procter & Gamble, the world’s biggest consumer-products maker, are jointly creating a made-for-TV movie, in an effort to promote “family-friendly” alternatives to what they say is increasingly risqué TV fare.

The two advertising heavyweights have teamed up on the two-hour “Secrets of the Mountain,” to be broadcast in April on NBC. The movie, which focuses on a single mother who brings her family to a mountainside cabin, highlights values—such as generosity, honesty and togetherness—that Wal-Mart and P&G executives say are in short supply on television.

Now, the root cause of the problem is clear.  Television and other Hollywood executives are interested in two kinds of currency.  One currency is dollars.  The other is coolness.  And you don’t get a coolness payoff by producing entertainment involving decent people and solid values.  Sure, a show about a normal family, free of the perversions and bizarre Blue Velvet-esque weirdness Hollywoodoids always seem to attribute to normal Americans, might make money.  But what are your peers going to think?  Are you going to win an Emmy?  Are you going to be labeled a visionary?  Are girls with piercings and daddy issues going to even want to talk to you anymore?

No, Hollywoodoids get the kind of ego reinforcement they crave from pushing the envelope and thinking outside the box.  Except Proctor & Gamble is the envelope, and if the proverbial box had a name it would be “Wal-Mart.”

I know a little something about Proctor & Gamble since it fed me while I was growing up.  My Dad was an executive there – if you like Folgers coffee, you can thank him.  Now, P&G is headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, a city with a non-ironic coolness quotient ranking somewhere between Styx and jeans shorts.  Wal-Mart, of course, is down there in Arkansas, which on Hollywood maps is denoted by pictures of dragons and the legend, “Here be gun-toting rednecks.”

They are straight -up middle America.  But as proudly uncool, unhip and unedgy as these two corporations are, they still have a whole lot of money, and without money the Hollywoodoids would eventually have to get real jobs.  The Hollywoodoids used to control both the ability to produce entertainment and the ability to distribute it to the public, so while  they needed the advertisers, the advertisers also needed them,.  This forced a kind of uneasy truce, with the Hollywoodoids always trying to push past their advertisers’ comfort zones, but not too far.

Except now that balance of power has changed.  A fickle audience with a multitude of channels, Tivo and the internet as other options, has left NBC sufficiently weakened that these two huge advertisers can start to dictate how things are going to be.  In a way, it’s a “back to the future” scenario – when TV was just getting started, a single sponsor commonly funded an entire show, like the Colgate Comedy Hour or the Chevrolet Tele-Theater.  And everyone but the most militant Wikipedia-denier knows that the name “soap opera” came from the fact that soap manufacturers originally sponsored them.

As a practical matter, this is likely going to make free television more family-friendly in the long run, instead of relegating such programs to obscure cable channels as if TV shows a family can watch together appeal only to some sort of weird niche demographic.  This is good – especially because it will happen without government meddling.  Those who want to watch more traditional fare will be able to; those of us who prefer edgier material are not going to have any trouble finding it among our 500 channels.  That’s also good, because – as I’ve made abundantly clear in the past - unless the kids are in the area, the thought of watching a TV movie that “focuses on a single mother who brings her family to a mountainside cabin [and] highlights values—such as generosity, honesty and togetherness” ranks on my personal “To Do” list somewhere between re-attending Basic Training and enduring a three-encore Lady Gaga concert. 

But there is another message here, one that affects us as conservatives.  The media gatekeepers are losing their grip.  Control of the media, both in the arena of distribution as well as in the field of production, is rapidly becoming decentralized.  Technology is allowing just about anyone to make media content that is both professional and cheap.  For example, Steven Crowder here at Big Hollywood makes a lot of quick, funny short films.  With a few more bucks and some slightly more advanced equipment, he could be producing low cost, broadcast-quality content.  In the past, a conservative comic like him would have no real chance at getting a series on TV based not on the quality of his work or the potential to draw an audience but solely upon his point of view. 

Except now, the gatekeepers are losing the luxury of ignoring dollars in order to focus on how cool the content makes them seem.  When you’re concerned about the opinions of your commie peers, you can ignore talented rightwingers who could draw eyeballs to your network.  But when the key currency is dollars, then the only question about content is, “Will people watch?”  And there are a lot of conservatives out there who would love to have something to watch that appeals to their sensibilities besides Fox News and parts of “24.” 

P&G and Wal-Mart ‘s decision to make their own movie and stuff it down the Peacock’s gullet  is just one of the first tremors in an earthquake that will shake Hollywood to its foundations.  The next shake-up will come from the Right.  Like the Tea Partiers who have turned Washington, D.C., upside down (The seat held by Ted Kennedy got snagged by a Republican – think about that for a second!), Hollywood is going to have to come to grips with the significant plurality, if not majority, of Americans who will simply no longer going to sit back and accept whatever the Establishment – whether in D.C. or in the TMZ - chooses to force upon them.  If we don’t like what we’re getting, we’ll make a change - whether it is seats in the Congress or channels on our remotes.  The Hollywoodoids will adapt or they will be pushed aside.  And so will the politicians.

Welcome to the Revolution.

In this episode, “NewsBusted” covers: Time Magazine, President Obama, Asteroid, Christmas Terror Bomber, Cosmic Rays, McDonald’s, Brady Bunch Actor Barry Williams, Chris Brown, and Wal Mart.

Well, I disagree. A movie’s effect on the culture is often independent of intellectual considerations. The passage of years highlights a film’s vintage regardless of pedigree or awards. Father Time has a sneaky way of giving even erstwhile pop-culture artifacts a rich patina of nostalgia and meaning. And so it happens that light-footed entertainments like Smokey sometimes have lessons to teach, if only we can muster the wisdom to listen.

Let’s return for a moment to the film critic Gary Arnold, who in the summer of 1977 penned a lengthy appreciation of Smokey for The Washington Post. Along with Star Wars, Hal Needham’s film was dominating the domestic box office, especially at the drive-in theaters that were still fairly common in rural America. Given the movie’s success and the CB phenomenon, an article about the picture was a no-brainer. But what’s interesting about Arnold’s essay is how he goes beyond mere cinematic merit and expands his analysis into the realms of culture and politics:

Although it opened to indifferent reviews and business in New York two months ago, Smokey and the Bandit has already grossed close to $25 million in the South and Southwest. It will probably turn out to be one of the year’s most popular and profitable films, and the potential appeal should have been obvious, even from New York.

It might not be a bad idea if the Carter administration also took a look, because the film is in touch with certain deep-felt national preferences. Smokey and the Bandit seems both an authentic and exuberant expression of how much taking the wheel means to Americans.

“Taking the wheel” can be interpreted in both a literal and figurative sense. It is perhaps worth noting that by the time Reagan rescued the country from Jimmy Carter’s economic death spiral, the screenwriters of 1980’s Smokey and the Bandit II had taken Carter’s massive inflation into account by raising the Bandit’s prize money from $80,000 to $400,000. Even many partisan Democrats realized by then that things had veered dangerously out of control.

For all of their comedic, stunt-happy antics, Hal Needham and the makers of Smokey were all-too-aware of the growing fear and outrage gripping middle America. But unlike so many other 1970s films, their message to audiences was not morose acceptance and surrender. Smokey and the Bandit’s script didn’t resort to suicide by cop, or to Russian Roulette, or to wallowing in cynicism over our society’s failure to right every wrong.

Instead, Smokey breathed optimism.

Pay attention while watching the movie. In dozens of little ways, Smokey delineates a vast social network within rural Southern society based on charity to neighbors and longstanding notions of tradition and culture. “Screw the guys taxing and regulating and mismanaging us to death,” the film seems to say. “To hell with their speed limits and bootlegging laws and bottomless hunger for interfering in our life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. We can take care of ourselves, using the unspoken laws of the open road. Independence. Common sense. Christian fellowship. All the stuff that came down from our forefathers.”

That appealing vibe is, to this day, easily felt throughout rural America. Go to any small Southern burg, and you are likely to see a downtown that has barely changed in over a century, with buildings that can often be matched up perfectly to photographs taken a hundred years earlier. It may surprise city-dwellers to learn that there are still many places in America where one has to motor down a two-lane highway for a half-hour just to reach the nearest library, movie theater, hospital, liquor store, Wal-Mart or McDonald’s. People in flyover country have access to amenities like satellite TV and cell phones and home-style restaurants, sure. But in other ways they can’t help but feel far removed from the government busybodies stealing their tax dollars and giving them nothing but draconian legal nightmares in return.

Against that tapestry, a character like the Bandit becomes nothing less than a modern-day Robin Hood, with Sheriff Buford T. Justice serving as a humorous reflection of the Sheriff of Nottingham. And of course, where would Robin Hood be without his Maid Marian (decked out in the tightest jeans this side of the Mississippi, natch) and his pals Little Snowman and Friar Fred — er, Tuck.

Smokey captures the mindset of the times in other ways as well. Hal Needham carefully presents a South largely free of the racism that has haunted that land’s history since the first slaves were brought to Spanish Florida in the 1560s. Among other characters, the movie prominently features a black sheriff, a black restaurant owner, and various black friends of the Bandit (such as a gas station attendant and a pair of mischievous hearse drivers). All of these people are portrayed as quite respectable in their milieu, and they have no trouble mingling with the good ole boys littering the landscape. It’s telling that — in a picture marinated in all things Southern and rural — the only racist line of dialogue comes when the villain discovers that another sheriff he has been talking to over the CB is black:

SHERIFF BUFORD T. JUSTICE

Hey boy – where is Sheriff Branford?

SHERIFF BRANFORD

I am Sheriff Branford!

SHERIFF JUSTICE

Ohhhh. . . heh heh heh. For some reason or another, you sounded a little. . . taller on radio. Heh heh.

Gleason, a master of nuance and timing, then turns away in embarrassment and mumbles, “What in the hell is the world comin’ to?” This scene regularly succeeded in eliciting good-natured laughs of recognition from mixed, racially sophisticated 1970s audiences, because it caters neither to the knee-jerk prejudices of city elites nor to the racism of unreconstructed Klan thugs. This is that rare film about the rural South that possesses a sharp self-awareness, and as such it does justice to the integrated society it so affectionately portrays, warts and all.

Toward the end of the movie, there is a perfectly executed montage that sums up the thematic subtext of the film, belying its reputation as a live-action cartoon possessing no redeeming artistic value. It comes after a motley convoy of truck drivers conspire to save the Bandit from a predatory Smokey by cleverly using their rigs to shield his Trans Am as the police pass by. As Reynolds maneuvers into the nest of semis, he looks at them arrayed on the highway like glittering knights and murmurs, “Trucks — I love ’em! I love ’em!” The Bandit pumps his arm up and down, the universal signal for “Trucker, blow your horn!”, and all around him the big rigs bellow and trumpet in answer. Even the orchestra accompanying Jerry Reed on the soundtrack fires off some brassy notes of solidarity. Reynolds smiles and marvels, “This isn’t a convoy, it’s a dream!”

Then, after the Bandit “puts the pedal to the floor, ’cause they’ve got his back door,” it’s the Snowman’s turn to motor his now-iconic semi past the convoy. As he chugs forward, director Hal Needham does a wonderful thing. He suddenly cuts out all extraneous sounds — the voices of the truckers, the roar of the engines — leaving just the music and the triumphant bellowing of Snowman’s horn as he flashes a wide grin and a big outstretched thumb at each rig. They return his salute, and the rousing music, the booming horn, the waving hats, and the broad smiles all create a cathartic, overriding sensation of camaraderie. It’s the grand culmination of Hal Needham’s artistic vision, whether or not he would ever admit it or even be conscious of it.

And at the end of Snowman’s journey through the convoy, Needham leaves us with a final nostalgic surprise that clearly comes straight from his heart: the last trucker we see smiling out of his cab is none other than the actor Hank Worden (1901-1992), who like Needham was a veteran member of John Ford’s Stock Company — you may remember him best as crazy ol’ Mose “Thank’ya kindly!” Harper from The Searchers (1956). His well-known visage popping up so unexpectedly here pays tribute to that group, and for me lifts an already great scene up on an eighteen-wheeled chariot to redneck heaven. “I’ve seen Smokey many times,” Burt Reynolds says, “and each time it makes me smile. Perhaps that’s the simple secret of its success.” Of all the hilarious, clever, exciting, and even lovely moments in Smokey and the Bandit, it is this one which never fails to put the biggest, warmest smile on my face.

In the end, Smokey and the Bandit just plain adores rural America in all of its messy, worn-down, spacious-skyed and amber-waved splendor. “What I want in my life,” Reynolds once said wistfully in an interview, “is to be living in a little town like Evening Shade, with a little creek in my backyard, and to fish with my son. I want to salute the flag and say grace before dinner, and I don’t want to get mocked or laughed at for that.” The cute, irreverent little film we’ve been discussing for the last five weeks shares those sentiments in spades. It’s a joyous and honest (if often uncouth) celebration of American values, with a profound sympathy for that large part of the country that habitually gets short shrift in Hollywood. In the final analysis, that’s what separates Smokey and the Bandit from so many of the trash films of today, and why it remains endlessly rewatchable after thirty-two years.

This concludes our five-part study of Hal Needham’s memorable 1977 directorial debut Smokey and the Bandit. Come back to Big Hollywood next Saturday for the beginning of an all-new look at an all-new film from an all-new year.

Previous posts in the series “Hal Needham, Burt Reynolds and Smokey and the Bandit”:

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

FURTHER READING and VIEWING

OK, you’ve learned a lot about Smokey and the Bandit. The lives of the director and actors. The political climate in which the film was made. The derision of the critics. The staggering support of the public. Even the subtext and values underlying what was on the surface a shallow chase and stunt film. It’s time to break open a brewski, settle comfortably into the La-Z-boy or on the couch, and let the opening strains of Jerry Reed’s guitar fill your living room with acoustic goodness.

You can buy the Smokey and the Bandit Special Edition DVD for around eight pazoors with free shipping, or you can spot that little beaver over at Netflix and pop it into your queue. The film was released on the now-defunct HD-DVD format a few years back, but no Blu-ray has appeared as of yet (and if the HD-DVD is anything to go by, when it does show up it won’t be an earth-shattering improvement over the standard DVD anyway).

Be sure to be well-rested before screening the picture, as by the end you’re going to be exhausted from 96 minutes of smiling and laughter.

To them, the American hinterland is part Deliverance, part Raising Arizona. Toothless gas-station attendants. Frumpy diner waitresses. Motor-home brothels hedging the highways. In the Heat of the Night racist police officers on the prowl, yee-haw! Ignorant picnicking churchgoers spewing toxic barbecue fumes into the pristine blue sky. Country-music lovin’ high school students destined to grow up into unwashed, uncouth, uneducated truckers.

Coast-bound libs fancy the South as kinda like Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, but with Wal-Marts. Flyover country. A nightmare realm.

Well, back in the summer of 1977, flyover country was pissed. The nation they loved was being run into the ground by the jet-setters. Skyrocketing inflation. Rampant unemployment. Plummeting GDP. Crushing misery index. Multiple oil crises. Vanishing trade surpluses. A wretched President. Ordinary people were scared and angry, looking for — what’s the word? — oh yeah, “change.” Spare or otherwise.

So it was like manna from heaven when that May an ex-stuntman and his cadre of good-ole-boy pals offered audiences a silly, funny, blissfully outrageous movie, one that stuck a middle finger in the collective faces of the ruling culturati. Hot cars! Hot girls! Hot stunts! Cold beer! Even a hound dog! All of it rollicked across drive-in screens throughout this great land, in a story notable for its complete irreverence and utter lack of pretension. Nanny-state road safety? Eat our dust, you sumbitch! Humorless feminism? Soon as I get home, the first thing I’m gonna do is punch yo’ mama in da mouth! FDA-approved diet recommendations? Let me have a Diablo sammich and a Docta Peppa, and make it fast, I’m in a goddamn hurry! Global cooling? Stick the tailpipe of this flamin’ chicken, Starlight black, gold-pinstriped, snowflake-rimmed, T-topped special edition Trans Am in your mouth and smoke it!

By the end of the summer, the country had given the film a big 10-4 and made it a cultural phenomenon, and the big-city mandarins suddenly had a new sneering name for America’s blood-red hinterland: “CB country.” The critics viewed this orgy of laughin’, cussin’, and lovin’ with incredulous disdain, dismissing it as a piece of lowbrow cinematic fluff. But in CB country, Smokey and the Bandit (1977) had become one of the top box-office smashes of all-time and a veritable Robin Hood outlaw myth for an entire generation of disaffected Americans. Thirty-two years and a horde of mediocre pastiches later, the original’s raw appeal remains undimmed.

Keep your foot hard on the pedal.
Son, never mind them brakes.
Let it all hang out, ’cause we got a run to make.

The boys are thirsty in Atlanta
and there’s beer in Texarkana.
And we’ll bring it back, no matter what it takes!

The man who gave us the legend of the Bandit was Hal Needham, a guy perfectly suited to his role in our popular culture. Born in 1931 in Memphis, he spent his boyhood years raising hell in the backwoods of Missouri and Arkansas. Always rangy and athletic, in his late teens he spied an Uncle Sam poster featuring U.S. Army Paratroopers kicking butt in Korea. Promptly signing up with the 82nd airborne, he began the training that would ultimately lead him into the risky, high-wire world of professional Hollywood stuntmen. During one jump his primary chute failed, and he fell for thousands of feet trying to work his reserve chute free as comrades looked on in horror. Losing consciousness, he woke to learn from his buddies that he had freed the chute seconds before hitting the ground, slowing his fall just enough to survive. It was the first of thousands of stunts he would perform throughout his life.

After leaving the Army (when pressured to re-enlist, he told his Captain, “I gave a dog a can a C-rations the other day, and he went around for a week licking his back-end trying to get the taste out of his mouth”) he took a job lumberjacking. One day, at the very top of an enormous tree, he happily sawed through the trunk — only to realize with classic Road-Runner timing that he had just cut off the part he was securely strapped to. Another death-defying fall ensued, this time sans parachute and attached to a bone-crushing hunk of wood. But again, God was looking out for fools that day — Needham fell a hundred feet into a large pile of springy branches and leaves, escaping with only some scratches and bruises.

He eventually migrated West, met some stuntmen at his day job, and began hanging around film sets looking to do anything to impress. Some daring parachute and wing-walking work for The Spirit of St. Louis (1957) made his name among stunt coordinators, and soon he had his first regular gig as Richard Boone’s double on television’s Have Gun, Will Travel. Chuck Roberson, the longtime stunt double for John Wayne, became his mentor, and Needham worked for John Ford and John Wayne throughout the fifties and sixties, developing a reputation for skill, fearlessness, and a lack of BS. Like many other stuntmen in the Ford/Wayne stock company, Needham would get small acting roles in many of their films. Here he is with John Wayne in McLintock!, all stuntman cool in a minor role as Wayne’s ranchhand:

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Most of the stuntmen in those days suffered regular injuries jumping off buildings, doing horsefalls, and having various items smashed over their heads in fight scenes. But Needham took punishment to a new level and became a legend for the risks he took. He walked away from stunts with broken bones over fifty times, broke his back twice, punctured his lung, and lost some teeth, but none of it fazed him. “You’re not hurt until you have to go to the hospital,” he says about those years. “Broken arms and things . . . hell, that don’t count.”

Needham also separated himself from most other stuntmen as an innovator. By 1970 he had grown sick of the many outdated rules and regulations that came with membership in the industry’s Stuntman’s Association trade group, so with several others he broke away from that organization and formed Stunts Unlimited, a one-stop shop for all the stunts, equipment, and safety expertise a movie might need. He also opposed the no-minority/no women policy of the Stuntman’s Association, and black and female stunt experts found their first official home in Needham’s new company. “We thought we were pretty progressive at the time,” he says today.

Needham also won accolades throughout the industry for helping to invent the Shotmaker, a truck-borne rig that allowed a camera to swoop around a fast-moving car and get shots from any angle, a vast improvement over the static, old-fashioned way it used to be done. This LA Times commercial shows Needham and his invention at work:

–

By the end of the 1960s Needham had become not just a stuntman but a stunt coordinator, and in the 1970s he also began second-unit directing, learning the ropes of camera placement and lighting.

Back in 1959, at the beginning of his career, he did some work on the TV series Riverboat, starring Darren McGavin of A Christmas Story fame, where he met a young unknown actor and sometime stuntman named Burt Reynolds. Both men shared a down-South, blue-collar sensibility, a love of athleticism and stunts. They also realized that they were both more ambitious than their friends. “It’s that good-old-boy country kind of people that we come from,” Needham would later explain. “We were both trying to get a foot in the door and be somebody when we first met.”

They each noticed how driven the other was, even while their friends only made halfhearted attempts to score their next gigs, so they began helping each other. Needham taught Reynolds the intricacies of stuntwork, and introduced him to his many friends in the field. Reynolds, for his part, made sure that whenever he needed somebody to double for him, Needham got the job. When Reynolds’ first marriage broke up in the mid-’60s, he stayed at Needham’s house until he could get back on his feet. When Needham’s own marriage fell apart a few years later Reynolds returned the favor, letting Needham stay in his guest house out back. Movie piled upon movie and the good times rolled on until, before he knew it, Needham had been living in Reynolds’ backyard for twelve years.

On one Reynolds shoot in Georgia, the Coors beer Needham had received from a friend kept disappearing from his fridge. Some sleuthing revealed that the maid was stealing it. When he confronted her, she explained sheepishly that Coors wasn’t distributed east of the Mississippi — it could only be had by bootlegging it across state lines — so it was a rare treat in Georgia, one that she couldn’t resist grabbing for her Coors-loving boyfriend. This was all news to Needham — living in California, he had all the Coors he wanted. But the essential ridiculousness of the tale amused him, and he thought: what a wonderful hook on which to hang the plot of a redneck movie!

For years, you see, as age and injuries took their toll, Needham had thought about attempting a segue into directing. Now, a chance encounter with a thieving maid had given him an idea. He began crafting a screenplay in the seclusion of Reynolds’ guest house, working by hand on yellow legal pads. Through the whole process he remained focused on exactly the kind of picture this was going to be, and the audience he intended to make it for. Screw Hollywood, he thought — this flick was going to be for his kind of people, “The South, the Midwest, the Northwest, all the flyover states.” He wrote each scene, and dreamed up each stunt, with the intention of making the film his first directing gig. He knew that the Buford T. Justices of the studio system would balk at his asking to direct, judging him to be just a dumb stuntman. So he wrote scenes that could be shot on a micro-budget, and convinced his friend, country music singer and sometime character actor Jerry Reed, to agree to star as the Bandit.

When reading the early drafts of the script, one is struck by how — for all of its action elements — the basic mood is one of reverence for the people who live in isolated clapboard houses in the deep South, struggling to get by day-by-day, far away from big-city life. Here’s the description of Snowman’s living room from the script:

Most of the furniture is old and what isn’t, is covered with plastic. No fancy carpets or objects d’art. On the coffee table is an open, colorfully illustrated Bible. A blonde wood television set sits in a corner of the room. There are a lot of toy trucks lying around and over the mantel is an oil painting of a fancy eighteen-wheeler with an epitaph under it reading: “I’d rather be a truck driver, than be a millionaire…”

There’s also a more fatalistic, Vanishing Point style ending, with the Bandit and the Snowman surrounded and captured by the police after they make it to the fairgrounds. As the police drive off into the sunset with their quarry, lights flashing but sirens eerily silent, “we pull further and further away, watching the whole event become history.” And then, as the screen fades to black, two lonely voices are heard over a CB channel:

VOICE ONE

Did ya hear they nailed the Bandit?

VOICE TWO

Yeah, I heard. But they won’t hold him for long. Anyway, he sure gave them sumbitches a run for their money.

Many of the hilarious shenanigans present in the final film aren’t to be found in Needham’s original script — they would be added on the fly during production, by a pair of comedians separated in age by a generation but destined to become a wonderful on-screen comedic duo. The enormous popularity of Smokey and the Bandit was the result of a number of fortuitous pieces falling into place for Hal Needham. The next of those pieces turned out to be the unwavering loyalty of his best friend.

Next Saturday in For Conservative Movie Lovers, we delve into the career of Burt Reynolds, and see how his respect for Hollywood’s old school and its traditions helped turn Smokey and the Bandit from a low-budget “hick flick” into a pop-culture phenomenon.

FURTHER READING and VIEWING

Here’s a cool video of Hal Needham that focuses on stunt driving, with a great scene showing Needham lassoing a moving car:

Read an early draft of the Smokey script here.

The Margaret Herrick Library of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Beverly Hills has a great oral interview transcript with Needham that runs many hundreds of pages. Conducted by Mae Woods in 2004-2005, it covers all aspects of his career in detail, and includes many great stories about working behind the scenes with John Wayne, John Ford, Burt Reynolds, and many others. If you live in Los Angeles (or are visiting) and have an interest in Needham, it’s well worth the trip to the Library to read.

In this episode, “NewsBusted” covers: President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize, U.S. Dollar, Cy Young Award, CNN, Obama Health Care Plan, Al Gore, United Nations, Norway, Wal-Mart, and Secretariat.

Anyway, once you get upstairs it’s literally a few short steps to Valerie Jarret’s office.  She’s been crazy busy integrating Van Jones into the new ruling class, so you might pass her office and it’s only one more door to go.  Now you’re at the corner suite of Christina Tschen, Chicago lawyer, long-time Obama crony friend and major fundraiser for his campaign.  She must have raised a lot of dough, because her office is pretty sweet, and it’s right above Barack Obama’s Oval Office.  Cool, huh?

Anyway, as you two gaze out across the South Lawn from your boss’s corner digs, it must occur to you that life has brought you a long way, and then you remember that you have actually brought yourself most of that way.  You helped Obama take power, and now you find yourself in a position of real power and influence, standing up in the second floor of the White House.  What will you do with it?  Will you stay within the bounds of laws and ethics?  Was that what worked back in Texas?

When the subject of a campaign and a call to directly enlist some people in the arts community comes up, do you raise the question of whether or not the Administration should be actually recruiting and coaching creative people who are hoping to receive NEA grants in the future?  Oh wait, it was kind of your idea, the whole signing up artists thing?  Well, did you wonder about the ethical violations that will be created by your participating in that call, being that you’re in the White House and all?  No, darn it, you really want people to serve the president.  You’re Buffy Wicks, you oversee Serve.gov for the White House, and before you can get people to serve, you need to get their attention.  If that means bending a few rules, what’s new.  I mean, public financing? – LOL  Situational ethics apply, because the President is right about his agenda for the American people.  The President is awesome, and people just need to serve him.  I mean serve America, but it’s kind of his idea, so…

This is what you wrote two years ago, live-blogging from a star-studded campaign event in Los Angeles where the Goo Goo Dolls introduced BO: “The crowd was thunderous. Obama could barely settle them down they were so excited. But when he did, the Senator delivered another in a long line of beautiful oratories. The crowd clapped at Obama’s outrage at the current situation in Washington and cheered at his plan for bringing the country back together. By the time he was done, not only was I convinced he’s going to win this election, I felt that I could actually help him make a real difference in this country’s future. Judging by the roaring crowd, they felt the same way.”

Goo Goo Dolls and everything?  Ah, the smell of the hair gel, roar of the crowd…Those were the days, weren’t they?  It was like the Summer of Love for you guys, or something.  But what if you’re not supposed to be talking directly to artists through the NEA about Presidential initiatives?  Oops, then what if you did?  What if Yosi Sergant was quickly demoted after his words from that darned conference call were released?  Would you be in any trouble?  Probably not, because you have friends in VERY high places.  After all, the only thing that would be really bad would be if you were speaking as someone from the White House, sort of instructing artists, people looking for NEA money, sort of telling them what the White House wanted and what you hoped they could do for the President.  That would be very bad.  It would breach the ethical boundaries of the NEA by suggesting a quid pro quo, something that would change the relationship between the government and the arts.  What’s that?  Oh.  OK let’s say you did.  You should… um, apologize, maybe?  No thanks, not when what you’re trying to do is so good.  Stepping down is unthinkable.  As you said on the call, “It’s the world we live in now – we’re actually running the government.” And don’t you know it!  Heck, you guys won the leadership of the free world (which we know the President is trying to relinquish so you can all focus on ‘fundamentally changing’ America) on an image, a smile, soaring words that almost no one can remember, and an awful lot of cool posters.  There was some other stuff, some of that rule-bending stuff, but whatever.  Republicans do it, right?

People are ready for this kind of propaganda ministry, because if it’s fighting for the truth, it’s not really propaganda, is it?  Conservatives just hate progress, that’s the bottom line.  Look at the way they’re going after ACORN, the good people you relied on and funneled lots of money to during the campaign.  Sure, they’re sloppy sometimes, but they’re on the right side of the big issues – your side – so who cares?  They’re great at showing up and forming a protest when your union friends can’t be bothered.  In fact, come to think of it, you’ve got some pretty intimidating friends.  Let these right-wingers try to come and take your office away.  Let them cross the United Food and Commercial Workers.  Those are your peeps!  OK, where were we?  Oh right, you’re Buffy Wicks.  People love you.  You made a real difference in the campaign, and there’s no way you’ll be tossed under the Obama bus.  Nope, no way.  No sir, no how.

This year they also teamed up with Wired magazine and set up a private green room called the “Wired Cafe,” where select people from the press and the industry are invited during the day. They have a bunch of laptops set up for people to blog and tweet and a cafe with an open bar and great food. I decided to go there for lunch instead of my usual haunts. I had a Smoked Turkey Panini and considered a Dim Sum sampler, which the person at my table ordered with his Burger. Maybe tomorrow.

There were some sponsors there like Patron Tequila and Bustelo Coffee giving out free drinks. I never tried either. Not being a drinker I only had one Patron cocktail, which had grapefruit juice and club soda. It was goood. I gotta say, the Bustelo canned espresso drinks were awesome. I like Starbucks products. Especially when I am driving long distances. But Bustelo is more flavorful. I never had them before. I found out these are advance copies and they will be on sale in a few weeks at Wal-Mart and Trader Joes.

The Con seemed to have the usual Thursday crowds, which were fairly intense. But the next two days will be much worse. I wish I brought my camera. I missed a couple of shots that would have been golden. They have all these pedi-cabs outside carting people between the restaurants and the Con. And I walked by one that had a guy in a predator costume being driven around. It was hilarious.

(I hate using my cell phone; the shots never look good enough.)

There were the usual people in costumes, including the Star Wars variety which are perennial. I remember one year I was sitting on the outside terrace in the back of the Con, which looks out over Coronado island. A friend walked by and we started talking. All of a sudden, about 60 Star Wars Stormtroopers walk onto the terrace and pose for a photo on the outside steps.

“Now I’ve seen everything.” I said. My friend laughed.

This year a lot of booths were scaled down from previous Cons. I’m sure the economy had to do with it. But the movie and TV companies still had impressive set ups.

Marvel Comics has four different life-sized Iron Man costumes with glowing eyes and chest generators. They ranged from the crude version from “Iron Man” to one that may be used in “Iron Man 2.”

SyFy (which used to be the SciFi channel until some rebranding doofus decided to change the name slightly) went so far as to rent a restaurant space right near the Con in the Gaslamp quarter. The coffee shop for the Hard Rock Hotel, usually called Mary Jane’s, is called Cafe Diem during the Con. All the items on the menu are advertisements for Scifi Syfy shows with names like Caprica salads (but not Battlestar Burgers). Lots of cardboard stand ups of their characters. The prices were a little high, like $7 milkshakes, but the place seemed busy.

I got to see a bunch of familiar faces and I was surprised how many people told me they loved my Big Hollywood columns. That’s always nice to hear. I will look for Doug TenNapel’s booth tomorrow. I forgot to write down the number and it’s a huge place. I only got to see about half of the show run today.

Today I parked at the Padres parking lot as the baseball stadium is next door. My mom told me it was free for the Con (disclosure: my sister knows the owner of the team, so I though the info might have come from her). Ha! It was $20. I ended up having to park on the roof because they were almost out of spaces.

Just as I was leaving I noticed I had a really good view of the old El Cortez hotel in the distance, where the Con used to be back in the 70s. It still has that big neon sign on the top with the words “Hotel” lopped off because it went condo. And there was once a restaurant on top called the Skylight Room with a beautiful flashing neon sign below the word “Hotel.” Not anymore. They don’t even turn on the sign at night.

Things change.

Wal-Mart has a longstanding policy about not selling CDs that would require a parental advisory sticker, but that doesn’t stop the navel-gazing band from kvetching about what they seem to perceive as censorship:

“They want artists to censor their records in order to be carried in there,” he said. “We just said no. We’ve never done it before. You feel like you’re in 1953 or something.”

Newsflash to the boys in the band: that’s what’s called making a business decision. Wal-Mart’s business decision is to ask bands to create “clean” versions of their albums for sale in Wal-Mart stores. Some bands comply while others, like Green Day, do not – in turn making their own business decision (something that Obama has yet to take away from businesses other than some in the auto industry).

Will Wal-Mart come to regret not putting the album, which has sold some 250,000 copies already and is at the top of the charts, on its shelves? Perhaps, but that’s their problem if they end up losing money. Likewise, it’s Green Day’s problem if they end up losing money because they prefer to stay true to their art and not comply with Wal-Mart’s request.

I’m surprised that they didn’t come out and say that Wal-Mart was violating their First Amendment rights (which would be incorrect, BTW), but reading between the lines, one can guess that this is what they’re thinking.  Yet like most libs, they want to have their cake and eat it too:

But bassist Mike Dirnt said: “As the biggest record store in America, they should probably have an obligation to sell people the correct art.”

Translation: Wal-Mart should be forced to sell their CD, even if it violates the code of ethics to which Wal-Mart adheres.

This is the kind of thinking that ended up with eHarmony.com, a Christian-based online dating service and private business, being sued by a lesbian for discrimination because the site didn’t cater to gays and lesbians. No matter that gays and lesbians had other dating sites they could join; one site was not available and therefore discrimination must be taking place. (eHarmony ended up buckling under pressure.)

No matter that consumers have a number of outlets where they can purchase 21st Century Breakdown in all its unedited, crass glory. The meanies at Wal-Mart won’t carry it, and suddenly budding musicians might become discouraged!

“If you think about bands that are struggling or smaller than Green Day … to think that to get your record out in places like that, but they won’t carry it because of the content and you have to censor yourself,” he said. “I mean, what does that say to a young kid who’s trying to speak his mind making a record for the first time? It’s like a game that you have to play. You have to refuse to play it.”

Here’s a suggestion, boys: take a civics class and read Thomas Sowell’s Basic Economics: A Commonsense Guide to the Economy. You might learn something.

Announcer

Live! From the fabulous Turtle Bay Ballroom at United Nations Headquarters, it’s the Rat Pack of Evil All-Star International Celebrity Roast of President Barack Obama!

(orchestra fanfare: ‘Make ‘Em Laugh’)

With Pyongyang funnyman Kim Jong-Il! Borscht Belt headliner Vlady Putin! Queen of Mean Liz Windsor! Saudi Sheik of Schtick King Abdullah! Beijing jokeslinger Hu Jintao! Wacky al Qaeda Caveman Ayman al-Zawahiri! Nick ‘the Knife’ Sarkozy! Sassy Wanda Sykes! South-of-the-border slapstick team Hugo Chavez and the Castro Brothers! Taliban Madman Mullah Omar! Jon Stewart! Lovable Libyan lush Muammar al-Ghadaffi! Grovelin’ Guvner Gordy Brown! Bashar “The Chin” al-Assad! The Hamas Fattah Dancers! And starring your Master of Ceremonies — that suntan man with a plan from Iran — that Persian with a nuclear perversion — Sheckyyyyyy Ahmedinejad!

(applause)

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Okay, okay, pipe down. Let’s get this thing over with, this straitjacket is a rental and my magic carpet is double-parked on East 43rd. Mohamed H. Prophet, will you get a load of the evil on the stage tonight? I haven’t seen this many bombs since Janeane Garofalo played the American Legion convention.

(Zawahiri spit-take)

At least there aren’t any Zionist. Hey, wait a minute – there’s Jon Stewart! Oy vey, who let the Jew in? This is a comedy event, for Allah’s sake. Hey Jon, do you know what I have in common with Taco Bell? We’re both gonna give you the gas.

(Jon Stewart mugs Macaulay Culkin ‘Home Alone’ face)

But, hey, enough about these losers. Let’s talk about the man we’re all here to honor tonight: my pal, Barack Obama.

(applause)

What a mensch this guy is. Total sweetheart. As soon as he was elected, he told me he would come to the negotiating table without preconditions. You know what ‘preconditions’ are? That’s Persian for ‘balls.’ Barack, one look at the stars on the stage proves you still have a knack for community organizing. You’ve brought the entire evil community together, in the spirit of international dialog, to ask you one simple question: how does our ass taste?

(rimshot)

But not everybody has a sense of humor. When I was planning this roast, I sent invitations to every bigshot infidel TV comic in Satanland, but they all turned me down. Was it my holocaust one-liners? My ballistic missile schtick? Nope. These douchebags said they couldn’t think of anything funny about Barack Obama. Not a single thing.

(scattered groans, boos)

Yeah, exactly. I mean what the fuck? Maybe I should get my SAG card, because, come on, this clueless pussy is the biggest gift to international insult comedy since Neville Chamberlain. Holy dung, when we heard the infidels elected him, I almost had to shut down my nuke program. My scientists were laughing so hard they kicked over half of our centrifuges!

(Ghadaffi sprays tea on Assad )

But, no-o-o, all these professional comedy dipshits keep telling me Professor Urkel over here is some sort of infidel sacred joke cow. I called up Letterman, and I’m like, Dave how about a couple Obama zingers for the roast tonight? He’s like, “no, no, too controversial. Everybody loves him.” And so I’m like, how about if I just insult America? So he’s like, “yeah, sure, that’s fine.”

Okay then, here’s one: man, that America is one stupid country.

(audience: HOW STUPID IS IT?)

It’s so fucking stupid it elected Barack Obama.

Hey, hey. I kid because I love. In fact, unlike that last mumblemouth infidel asshole, Barack has been a breath of fresh air to the entire evil comedy community. He doesn’t whine about the way we treat broads or homos or journalist hostages or our uranium stockpiles. Nope. He just smiles, and apologizes, and politely asks us to “unclench our fists.” Hey bro, I’d love to, but that’s kinda hard to do when it’s stuck inside your duodenum.

Okay, let’s get this show on the road. Our first roaster comes from England, where she’s the star of a long running one-woman show at the Buckingham Palace Dinner Theater. Ladies and Martyrs, you know her, you hate her, please welcome the Queen of Spleen, Liz Windsor!

(band breaks into God Save the Queen, applause)

Liz Windsor

Thanks for that swell intro, Shecky. By the way, I know how much you love our infidel nuclear technology, but we’ve got another 1940’s invention you should really check out. It’s called deodorant.

(rimshot)

Listen folks, I know you came here expecting me to start hurling some tasteless insults at Barack Obama. But, seriously, I just can’t bring myself to do it. Barack is almost like another son to me.

(audience: awwwww)

Yeah, another jug eared idiot with a hard-on for horsefaced women. Barack was in London a couple weeks ago and rang me up, asked if he could drop by for tea. So he comes in, and I’m thinking, whoa — those Yanks have really stepped up their space program, he’s brought along a real live Klingon. Turns out it was his wife.

(rimshot)

Yep. Then, oh Jesus, in she starts with all the hugging. And I’m like, fer chrissake, somebody hand Lieutenant Worf a planet Earth protocol guide. Then Barack pops off and says, “hey Your Majesty, I brought a gift.” Okay, I’m thinking, car company? Banking system? National Park? Then I open the box. It’s an iPod. A fucking iPod. Preloaded with Barack’s easy listening speech hits.

(stares at Obama amid nervous laughter)

Yeah, way to cement that special relationship, dumbfuck. Jesus Christ, was Wal Mart sold out of Sham Wows? Oh yeah, that iPod is going in the vault with the crown jewels. Right next to that sack of DVDs you bought for Gordy Brown.

Gordon Brown

Now see here, Your Majesty! I thought that was quite thoughtful gesture, and…

Liz Windsor

Oh, shut the fuck up, Gordy. I don’t come to your job and slap Obama’s dick out of your mouth. Listen folks, my time’s up, and this tiara is chafing like a sonuvabitch. Time for me to lie back and think of England. Don’t forget to tip your waitress!

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Liz Tudor everybody! Hey Liz — word to the wise. Stay out of the London subways this summer. By the way, you know the last thing to go through Princess Di’s head?

Liz Windsor

What’s that?

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Her ass. Next up is another monarch who primogenitured his way to the top — give a hand to that Saudi royal with a buttload of oil, King Abdullah!

(applause; ‘Desert Caravan’)

King Abdullah

Thanks everybody! Hey, how about that Shecky Ahmedinejad, ladies and gentleman? What a guy, he’d give you the Zanjeer Zani off his back. Now you know, a lot of people think I got it pretty good being a ruthless hereditary billionaire sitting on top of an ocean of crude oil and the top psycho theme park in the Middle East. But lemme tell you, it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. How’d you like to have 37 mothers in-law?

(laughter)

But hey, controlling the world energy supply has its perks. People tend to treat you pretty nice. They offer you thoughtful little gifts and kickbacks. Now, Barack here, for instance, likes to offer blowjobs.

(gasps, ewwws)

What? What? Don’t believe me? Let’s go to the video. Sure, Bush liked holding hands, but he was a total pricktease. But Barack, hey, the guy goes down faster than a fat shaheed on madrassa prom night.

(Putin wipes away tears of laughter as Abdullah slowly pantomimes fellatio)

Now look Barack, I really appreciate the gesture, but regardless of what you might have heard — homie don’t swing that way.

(looks around slowly to banquet table surrounded by burqqa-clad wives)

On the other hand, send me your cell number. I never know when I’ll need a booty call. Good night folks, drive safely! Unless you’re a woman.

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Now that’s what I call crude humor. Our next performer has been called everything from the Andy Kauffman of international relations to the Gilbert Gottfried of the global nuclear club. Gird your loins for the annoying, far-out, certifiably insane comedic stylings of Kim! Jong! Il!

(applause; ‘They’re Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Ha’)

Kim Jong Il

(walks slowly over to Barack Obama and leans into his face)

Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you! Does this bother you? I’m not nuking you!  Does this bother…

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Okay orderlies, cart him away. Jeez, and I thought I was nuts. Let’s bring it down a notch with a set from my dear old friend and original cast member of al-Qaeda’s Friday Night Live, Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri!

(applause, ‘911 is a Joke’)

Ayman al-Zawahiri

Thank you, thank you. What a panel we got here, huh? I haven’t seen this many sick assholes since I was doing proctology rounds at Cairo General.

(Ahmedinejad spit take)

And there’s our man of the hour, Mr. Barack fuckin’ joke thief Obama. Havin’ fun, buddy?

(Obama smiles nervously)

Listen pal, maybe I live in a cave, but I read the papers. Strafing Manhattan in a 747? Really? In case you didn’t notice, I was doing that routine like eight fucking years ago. I mean, what are you, Carlos fucking Mencia?

(Obama smiles nervously)

What’s the matter? Teleprompter got your tongue?

(Obama smiles nervously)

Holy scimitar, this fuckface couldn’t ad lib a fart. Listen, Barack, I appreciate all the reach-arounds, but if you don’t stop stealing my material I swear to Allah I’m gonna sic a copyright lawyer on your apostate ass. As soon as I can find one who isn’t a Jew. Goodnight folks, you’ve been a great audience! Death to America!

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Ayman al-Zawahiri, everybody! If you’re in Swat this weekend, make sure you catch his act at the Khyber Pass Inn. Our next performer comes from the exotic Orient where he works the Forbidden City Casino. Ladies and Gentleman, the man with the biggest bankroll and smallest dick in international show biz, Mister Hu Jintao!

(applause, ‘Slow Boat to China’)

Hu Jintao

Yeah Confucius say fuck you, you third rate unibrow rug dealer. Don’t make me open a can of one-child-policy on your smelly Persian ass. You’re no Long Dong Wang yourself, and at least mine isn’t covered in camel crap. Hey everybody, how’s it goin’?

(applause)

And how about that Barack Obama. What a prince, huh? The most generous man in show biz.

(applause)

Yep. Generous to a fault. With my money. What? You think all those big tips he throws around come out of his own pocket? Just the other day he called up and said, “hey Hu, how about spotting me a couple trillion till next tax day?” And I’m like, what, does Aunt Esther need another pair of sneakers? And he goes, “no, I got a Social Security payment due.”

I’m like, dude — what happened to that last trillion I lent you? Get this: the stupid fucker spent it on a beat up Cadillac for his union buddies. So I say, look, I’m a little short right now. I’ll catch you at your 30-year treasury bond garage sale. Then the next week he’s like, dude, where were you?” Ah so, round-eye! No tickee, no thirty!

Yeah, that ain’t the half of it. Not only does this asshole expect me to be his personal ATM and pawnshop, he’s always calling up bitching about something. Just the other day, he’s like, “come on Hu, how come you keep busting my balls with your naval drive-bys?” I’m like dude, you’re 3 months overdue on your aircraft carrier payments. Those aren’t Chinese navy boats, those are repo men!

Look folks, I gotta get back home and churn out another load of defective plastic crap for Wal Mart, to make some money, to lend to Barack for some new idiot free bullshit program. Christ, and they call me a Commie! ‘Night everybody, and please remember to thank your designated tank driver.

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Hu Jintao! Toxic Choking Hazard Toy Industry’s Man of the Year, everybody! Hu Jintao. Next we have that crazy Caucasian from across the Caucasus, that Gremlin from the Kremin, 15-time winner of KGB Entertainer of the Year, Vlady Putin!

(applause)

Vlady Putin

Tank yous Shecky! Tank yous very much. Ho boy, it is good to be in America! I love America, is great country. It is land of free! Not like my country. In my country, whole government run by corrupt communist thugs. They ignore the laws. They take over companies and give the money to their friends. America is very totally different! It has 110 volt outlets.

Haha! Vlady make funny everybody! Hey Barack, you teach Vlady how to nationalize the banks, hokay?

Best thing about America is everybody is so very very nice. Especially the President Barack! He is complete pussycat. Pussy, pussy, pussycat. He loves Vlady’s practical jokes. I kick his Air Force out of Kyrgyzstan he say, hokey dokey, Vlady! Then I fly my bombers right over his ships, and he sends fat babushka lady to give me a funny reset button gag gift. I say, hey Barack, what Vlady gotta do to make you mad? He say, “just don’t go to no tea parties, hokay?”

What a country! Because Barack be so nice to me, now I want to sing him a nice American song from the Hoagy Carmichael.

(Vlady pulls out balalaika and tunes up)

Georgia, Geor-or-orgia… no peace can I find… it’s just them old sweet tanks that keep Georgia on my mind.

Tanks everybody! Take it easy on the Vodka!

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Vlady Putin, everyone! Okay, our next performer is a good ol’ country boy from the hills of Waziristan, where he emcees the weekly Grand Ole Stoning show at the Wana Goat Corral. Let’s give it up for Mullah Omar!

(applause; Theme From ‘Deliverance’)

Mullah Omar

Thanks Shecky. When Shecky asked me to do this gig, I was like, what the fuck? Dude, I’m a fucking Taliban, I know as much about comedy as Perez Hilton knows about vaginas. So he says, “don’t worry. I lined up this professional infidel comedian to write your bit.” I’m like, oh yeah? And he’s like, “yeah, her name is Wanda Sykes.” And I’m like, a broad?  And he’s like, “Trust me, Barack loves her. She totally slays the infidels.”

Okay, you know I’m down with that. So then this Wanda shows up at my cave yesterday with a stack of cue cards with her jokes. And I’m like, bitch please — put on a fucking burqqa. So I’m doing the read-through, and every gag is about killing some guy named Rush Limbaugh. So, I’m like, who the fuck is this Limbaugh guy? I thought this gig was supposed to be about Obama. And she goes, “he’s a fat radio Nazi who hates Blacks and Jews and gay people.” And I’m like, hey, sounds like my kinda guy. And she’s like, “exactly!” And I’m like, why would I want to insult somebody I agree with? So she says “because he’s for the war, dumbass.”

And so at this point I’m pretty fucking confused. So I say to her, okay, now I think I get it. This fat guy is funny because (a) he supports Obama’s crusade against us, even though (b) he and I are on the same page, homo-killing-wise. The funny is from the irony or something. And she’s like, “no, idiot! Barack wants to stop the war.” So I’m like, wait a minute… Barack is against the war? Then why is he still running it? Besides, I though he actually likes homos. And she goes, “He does, you retard! That’s why he’s going to end the bombing and leave you alone.”

Now I’m even more confused. So I go, look Wanda, maybe I’m not up on your infidel inside jokes, but this material is really gonna bomb in front of a shaheed audience. So she gives me that look and says, “okay, you cracker ass cracker, why don’t you show me what you people think is funny?” Long story short..

(Omar reaches down behind podium and pulls out Wanda Sykes’ head)

Hey Wanda…here’s your sign.

Alluha Akbar, y’all!

(Omar walks back to his seat, tosses the head to Hugo Chavez who puts it on his hand, muppet style)

Hugo Chavez

Saright?

Wanda Sykes’ Head

Saright!

(Abdullah falls out chair in helpless laughter; Fidel Castro stares in comatose deadpan)

Shecky Ahmedinejad

Mullah Omar, everybody! Now that’s why they call him the king of prop comedy!

Okay folks. Now, it’s time to hear from the man who’s been sitting here all evening, silently absorbing all our insults. Here’s his chance to get a little payback! Ladies and Dictators, please welcome our esteemed man of the hour, leader of the infidel world, and the only man in the room who doesn’t realize he’s way over his head — President Barack Obama!

(standing ovation; ‘Hail to the Chief’)

Barack Obama

Lemme tell ya, I don’t get any respect.

(torrential screams of convulsive uncontrollable sustained laughter; Sarkozy falls backwards in chair; Omar wipes tears away while shooting AK47 into air; Abdullah pantomimes fellatio; Castro stares comatose; Vlady pilots toy airplane above Obama’s head; Kim and Shecky take turns punching gag missile launch button; Jon Stewart mugs look of horror)

Shecky Ahmedinejad

That’s all the time we have tonight! Thanks to all the performers, and Barack Obama for being such a good sport. See you at the next Rat Pack of Evil roast, when we move to the fabulous Boom Boom Room at the Radioactive Crater Resort in Downtown Jerusalem! Goodnight 12th Imam, wherever you are!