Instead, he’s making excuses for President Barack Obama’s first term.

—–

The increasingly political “Saturday Night Live” alum is co-chairing a Feb. 15 fundraiser for the president’s re-election campaign. But you have to be a one percenter to afford the entrance fee – $35,800 each. Let’s hope that includes Ferrell wearing his cheerleader outfit for some high-energy kicks and jumps.

The bigger issue is getting Obama re-elected, and Ferrell argues the president’s case with a little fuzzy math.

Ferrell declared his support for the president a few months ago, saying he “most definitely” wants Obama to win another term. “Every president has a hard job but I think his is times ten,” he said.

The latter reaffirmed Ferrell’s range without making a dent at the box office, and the former should be put in a time capsule and buried indefinitely. “The Other Guys” proved Ferrell could still draw a crowd, but the film couldn’t measure up to the likes of “Anchorman,” “Old School” or the brilliant “Elf.”

But Ferrell’s new comedy, “Casa de mi Padre,” hardly looks like a return to form. instead, It’s a one-joke premise without an actual laugh judging by the trailer. The Spanish-language film casts Ferrell as one of two brothers warring with a drug lord to save the family ranch. The film co-stars Diego Luna (“Contraband”), Nick Offerman and Gael Garcia Bernal.

The trailer looks like a wonderful starting point for a comedy, but we’re still waiting for the actual jokes to be weaved into the footage. The notion of Ferrell speaking Spanish might be good for a chuckle, but the gimmick wears out before the trailer’s two-minute running time elapses. That doesn’t bode well for the finished movie.

This telenovela parody may play well in Latino markets overseas, and perhaps the nation’s growing Hispanic population will rally ’round the material. Those waiting for “Anchorman”-sized laughs may be flustered.

Let’s hope “Casa de mi Padre” is that rare instance where the trailer couldn’t capture the humor found in the full-length film.

It’s hard to pin down exactly what films qualify for this category – one list of doomsday movies includes dozens of very different films, with plots ranging from the world blowing up to society suddenly changing dramatically into something unfamiliar, dystopian, and creepy.  A documentary about the last two-and-a-half years would qualify as the latter.

From the Cold War nuke paranoia of Fail Safe (1964) to the “Oh s***, it’s a comet” catastrophes envisioned by flicks like Deep Impact (1998), they run the gamut.  Sometimes society is teetering – think California – and sometimes it has fallen completely into the abyss – think Detroit.

But at their best, these movies show us something about ourselves and about enduring truths, challenging our intellects and asking vital questions about the nature of man.  But mostly they’re just cool and fun to watch.

And sometimes they are Zardoz (1974).  This is an utterly insane 70’s freakshow starring Sean Connery that can best be described as what it must be like to party with Anthony Weiner and Eric Massa in Thailand with an endless supply of bad Woodstock acid and a substantial NEA performance art grant.  Gotta respect any movie that offers the straight-faced line, “The gun is good, the penis is evil.”  

Now, here is my list of the Top 10.  I accept that haters are gonna hate – and nit-pick about the cosmic question of “what IS an apocalypse film? – so, like it or lump it, these are mine in descending order.  They aren’t all great – they are all worth a watch on some Sunday afternoon after the Democrats have yakked about their ruinous policy preferences on the Sunday morning shows and gotten you thinking about disasters:

10. Soylent Green (1973):  In the late 60s and 70s, Charlton Heston was the Hollywood honey badger, in that he just didn’t care what crazy movies he made, and as a result he was pretty badass.  He made several end-of-the-world flicks, including The Omega Man (1971) and another one that promises to appear later on this list.  If you were a kid in the 70s, back when the broadcast networks showed movies, you’d be up watching Heston because he was always in something that kicked ass.

Here, the world hasn’t fully ended but it’s pretty screwed up.  The environment is wrecked and people are living packed together like sweaty sardines because of over-population.  There’s also a small cadre of the super-wealthy living the high life – sort of like Al Gore’s life would be if he still lived like a Persian emperor as he does now but if he wasn’t full of shit about global warming.

Just remember – Soylent Green is people!

9. Escape From New York (1979):   Call me Snake.  Here, New York City has become a giant prison and Snake Plissken has to go in and rescue the kidnapped President.  The President in the film is a snooty, dissembling tool with delusions of competence.  You may fill in your own comment here: _____________________.

Yeah, EFNY is probably technically not an apocalypse film, but you’re technically not paying me for my opinions so you’ll take what’s given to you and like it.  This is a cool flick, made on a shoestring yet looking like a million bucks.  Check out the edgy electronic score too – director John Carpenter composed it himself.  There’s also a lump in the throat moment – the twin towers of the World Trade Center play a key role.

Oh, and yeah – there’s a heapin’ helpin’ of Borgnine!

8.  The Last Man on Earth (1964):  This is a Vincent Price movie, filmed in Italy for like $25 and change, that is everything the Will Smith, big-budget crap-fest remake I Am Legend (2007) was not – like “good” and “interesting” and “not stupid.”

You can see the inspiration for the zombie films that would follow as Price, a still-human survivor of a terrible plague, battles hordes of shambling vampires.  The black-and-white cinematography makes the whole world alien and creepy.  It’s pretty disturbing.  Check out this hard-to-find cult classic.

7.  28 Days Later (2003) and 28 Weeks Later (2007):  A couple of zombie/disease hybrids, these are quite different films.  The first is small in scale and personal, the second large scale and much more big-picture.  Both involve horrifically violent beasts terrorizing the normal people of England, and as such are difficult to distinguish from the news.

Both suffer from a weird anti-military bias.  The first has the survivors stumbling on a bunch of soldiers who go nuts and lose all discipline in about 30 days.  That seems a bit quick.  The second has the protagonists, through gross stupidity, ignore the military’s strict and, frankly, smart rules and thereby cause the infection to break out again.  When the military moves to, you know, kill the mad, blood-crazed zombies, we’re supposed to feel bad for the protagonists WHO CAUSED IT TO HAPPEN IN THE FIRST PLACE BY BEING IDIOTS.  Yeah, like our liberal overlords, the filmmakers blame the competent.

But these flaws are exceeded by haunting imagery of an empty England and by the total lack of sentimentality by the filmmakers.  Also, the first film’s scenes of the survivors trying to fight off hordes of zombies with rakes and bats is a powerful reminder the importance of the Second Amendment.  They’ll take my gun when they pry it out of my cold, living dead hand.

6. Logan’s Run (1976):  This one is loads of fun.  Hot girls, cool guns, a bright color palette for the space-age fashions the characters model – yeah, what more could a real man want?  Well, a coherent story and special effects that weren’t developed in a garage would be nice, but no matter – Logan’s Run is a great ride.

The post-apocalyptic world is kept at bay by giant domes built long before by the long-forgotten ancestors of the pleasure-seeking, hedonistic and crypto-fascist young people.  They not only don’t trust anyone over 30, they either get the oldsters to perform what seems to be a fatal anti-gravity interpretive dance or shoot them for defying the government.  No one works; everything is provided for them.  It’s a city of parasites under absolute control.  It sounds like a liberal fantasy; you expect Al Gore to waddle out and berate everyone else for selfishly whining about having to die at one score and ten and then heading off to his 60^thbirthday party.

The highlight is when Michael York tells what is apparently Will Ferrell in his earliest role to “Run, runner!”  The remake will be released in 2014, which is awesome because remakes are always better than the original…

5.  Panic in the Year Zero (1962):  This little-known flick focuses on a family on vacation in the country when a nuclear war breaks out.  It’s awesome not because of special effects or a big budget but because of its small scale – the family and a few outsiders are the majority of the focus.  Things get brutal quickly, and our heroes do too.  It’s a nice reminder about why every citizen should take full advantage of the Founder’s wisdom in enacting our Second Amendment.  You better be ready to protect yourself or you will be supplying goods and services – all kinds of services, as this surprisingly frank for its day film shows – to the savages.  The survivors will be those who aren’t burdened by a distorted liberal view of morality that requires them to crawl defenseless before others.

Ray Milland is the father – it’s somewhat jarring to see a guy as the hero who looks like a regular adult instead of the kind of manscaped, metrosexual TV man-children we usually see on-screen today.  This one actually should be remade (watch it and tell me you couldn’t see Big Hollywood’s own Adam Baldwin as the father), but sadly its tough-minded moral message would fly totally over the heads of today’s Hollywood executive doofus contingent.

4. A Boy and His Dog (1975):  Sold as “a rather kinky tale of survival,” this hot mess of a movie – it has a pre-Crockett Don Johnson and nary a Tubbs in sight – is, like many of these, truly a ’70s artifact.

It’s just weird, with freaky survivors, a psychic talking terrier, and other strange stuff.  The highlight is the last scene where Don keeps his pimp hand strong.  I suggest drinking before watching it.  And during.  And after.

3.  Dawn of the Dead (1978) and (2004):  Similar and far superior to the 28 films, the original and the remake are definitive zombie and definitive apocalypse movies.  Interestingly, both also track the media and its response to the world-wide zombie meltdown – those are some of the most interesting and scariest scenes.  You see the world falling apart, and that’s almost as frightening as the monsters themselves.

Visually, the 2004 remake is as smooth as the 1978 original was ragged.  I have aesthetic objections to running zombies, and the jarring editing is annoying, but the remake is very, very creepy and very, very bleak.  But the original is an amazing document of the 1970s.  People who did not live through that decade think of it as disco music and leisure suits.  It was, as we see here, really a time of linoleum, fluorescent lights, and JC Penney stores.  There is no sparkle to the Pittsburgh suburbs where this was filmed – and no sparkle to the places where 99.999% of Americans lived in the 70s.  No movie feels to me more like those years than DotD.

George Romero was always a terrible filmmaker.  He lucked into a classic with Night of the Living Dead and with this one too – just look at the total pieces of crap his subsequent films all were.  Here, though, his education movie background is perfect for this story.  It’s shot like a film you might see in your science class in junior high in 1977.  And it totally works.

As a story, though, it really is genius.  Put aside all the nonsense, post-release interpretation by shiftless university assistant professors about how this movie is really a powerful critique of consumerism.  What a load of revisionist crap.  Romero clearly thought, “It’d be pretty cool for some survivors to hole-up in a mall with M16s and blast some zombies and maybe some bikers too!”  And it is.

2. The Planet of the Apes (1968):  Forget the silly sequels and the remakes, reboots, and retreads of recent years – the original is where it’s at.  Heston is back, and as if being the head of the NRA wasn’t enough to solidify as America’s greatest hero after Washington, Lincoln, and Reagan, then he nails it with this incredibly cheesy, utterly unforgettable classic.

Featuring one of the Top Ten twist endings of all time, this Rod Serling-penned flick is one of the most entertaining movies ever made.  I dare you to start watching and try to stop – you can’t.  You’ll just sit there, mouthing the great lines along with the movie.  Now get your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty liberals!

1. Mad Max (1979) and The Road Warrior (1982):

While the exact pole position of the other films might be subject to some small amount of debate, this one is not.  The Road Warrior is not only one of the greatest apocalyptic films ever but one of the best movies ever, period.  Let’s start with the amazing – and scarily relevant – opening narration:

Their leaders talked and talked and talked but nothing could stem the avalanche. Their world crumbled the cities exploded. A whirlwind of looting, a firestorm of fear.

Gee, sound like any Western civilizations you know?  Totally unrelated – my short-term investment advice is to buy ammo.

Mad Max, the first of the series, takes place at the tail end of the disintegration of society; there are still some remnants of order left, mostly in the form of an incredibly young and incredibly non-psychotic Mel Gibson. It’s hard to watch Mel of three decades ago with the knowledge of his recent decline – you keep expecting him to turn to the camera and blame society’s collapse on “the Jews” and his uppity girlfriend.

Its wild chases and Aussie B-movie vibe made it a drive-in favorite back when, well, there were still drive-ins.  But its sequel The Road Warrior took it to a whole new level of action and Campbellian archetypal awesomeness.  Certainly, it has one of the great movie openings of all time as the camera backs out of the V8 Interceptor’s roaring supercharger intake.

What makes these movies great (I’m going to ignore the Thunderdome sequel) is not just the world they imagine, or the bizarre characters (freaky Wez, the creepy Humungous, the dentally challenged Gyro Captain), or even the unparalleled action scenes – the chase at the end of Road Warrior is probably the most consistently exciting half-hour in movies.  Like all these movies, they are at their best when they reveal and critique our society’s own assumptions – especially stupid liberal ones.

These are intensely conservative films.  In Mad Max, Max is a force for order – even when all order collapses and he takes matters into his own hands.  In The Road Warrior, Max is totally burned out until he realizes that civilization is worth defending.  But not all the survivors feel that way – despite their leader Papagallo’s speech about the need to defend themselves and their future from the barbarian horde, a fair chunk of the band wants to surrender, preferring the lies of the Humungous over the reality of defending themselves.  It’s always astonishing how some people are so eager to submit to tyrants.

As the Humungous explains to the less cunning Wez, “Fear is our ally.”  He relies on cowardice and moral weakness among the defenders of civilization to bring them down – as do our enemies today, with the eager assistance of their fellow travelers.  It is no coincidence that The Road Warrior came out during the height of the Soviet-blessed disarmament movement of the early 80s, where gutless, half-witted “peace” activists would have turned us over to history’s greatest murderers if not for the courage of Reagan, Thatcher and the millions of regular Americans and others who believed in peace through strength, not peace through surrender.

The Road Warrior shows us that civilization is worth defending, and that it can only be defended with force, not cowardice-masking bumpersticker pieties about coexisting and violence-never-solving-anything.  The sacrifice of Papagallo and (almost) Max – which mirror those of our real-life warriors of the past and present – show that courage and honor are our most powerful weapons.  Note that I use the word “our” deliberately – The Road Warrior is about Western Civilization in the face of barbarity, and its lessons are as vital today – and as lost on weak-willed, pacifist losers – as they were nearly 30 years ago.

Post-apocalyptic films show us a great deal about our society by showing us what happens when critical components of it are removed.  Sadly, some of these films today look less like science fiction and more like documentaries.  But the ones listed here are all worth checking out – even Zardoz, which has the advantage of freaking you out without showing up on drug tests.

And I again repeat my short-term investment advice for dealing when the Humungous and Co. show up – buy ammo.  No one in human history has ever complained about having too much ammo when it hit the fan.

As the story begins, Nick is having a terrible day. After his drinking problem starts affecting his work performance, he is fired from his job despite the fact that he is still making his sales numbers.  Nick then drives home and finds all of his property on his front lawn. His wife, whose relationship with him was also affected by his drinking problem, has kicked him out of the house and is living with friends.

Interestingly enough, that wife never appears onscreen. She may be the person who put Nick on the front lawn but “Everything” is more interested in what he does when he gets there.

In reality, I’m not sure if Nick’s wife could so easily lock him out of the house without repercussions. If the house is owned by both of them, one assumes that Nick could still get access to it even if the couple is separated. However, once viewers overcome their initial trepidation about the premise, they should be able to enjoy the rest of the story as Nick is eventually forced by the police to hold a yard sale to continue living on his lawn.

A few interesting relationships develop between Nick and his neighbors. He develops a nice friendship with his new neighbor Samantha (Rebecca Hall), who is awaiting her husband’s arrival in town. Both of them seem to be in the same place in life. They both see what life has to offer and realize that they were hoping for something better. Nick also befriends Kenny (Christopher Jordan Wallace), a local teen who wants to learn how to play baseball.

Both of these relationships work but the strongest scenes in the film are the few short ones between Nick and Delilah (Laura Dern), a high school classmate who wrote a kind message to Nick in his yearbook. After finding that old yearbook, Nick visits her and their scenes together are particularly poignant. Nick probably doesn’t know what he’s hoping to achieve by visiting her but he’s curious to know what life could have offered him if he made a few different decisions along the way. The scene doesn’t lead to a romance but it’s important because it shows Nick at his most vulnerable trying to put his life back together.

For much of his career, Ferrell has played larger-than-life characters. In “Everything Must Go,” he has calmed himself down to play a regular man who faces a tough situation. At times the story veers off from its main focus but its compassion for the main character is always there. If you live near a theater playing “Everything Must Go,” go see it. It’s a solid story with a quietly powerful performance from funnyman Will Ferrell.

It’s no secret that television commercials, sitcoms, children’s shows and mainstream news are all renowned for promoting left-leaning bias. Woven into the tapestry of primetime Hollywood offerings are messages insinuating that the liberal choice is always the better, more intelligent option.  

Television is saturated with liberals who attempt to influence public opinion with subliminal methods as subtle as smiling approvingly when interviewing a liberal and scowling when discussing a conservative. 

The hit show Glee presents homosexuality as a viable option for confused prom “queens” vying for the dual prize of acceptance and a rhinestone crown. Private Practice’s Dr. Addison Montgomery heroically performed a partial-birth abortion and even Doctor House’s main squeeze Lisa Edelstein, complete with a hanger for a prop, promoted legalized abortion in a “We Won’t Go Back” ad.  

While most liberal bias is blatant, some can be more insidious, because inherent to all liberalism, regardless of genre or venue, is an unrelenting crusade to portray conservatives as idiotic dolts. 

Arrogant, self-impressed celebrities like the vulgar Bill Maher, who fancies himself the smartest person in the world, and horn-rimmed actress/comedian Janeane Garofalo, who also sees herself as an intellectual giant, are so convinced of their own brain power that both have forged full-fledged television careers disrespecting the intelligence and religious persuasion of political adversaries. 

Ask a politically uninformed person on the street if Sarah Palin is smart, and thanks to 30 Rock star/ comedian Tina Fey’s career-boosting misrepresentation of Sarah’s “I can see Russia” comment, a resounding “No!” is usually accompanied by a sarcastic giggle. 

In fact, Tina Fey single-handedly enhanced Saturday Night Live’s ratings by mockingly imitating Sarah Palin’s folksy style and portraying her as an intellectually challenged bubble brain.  Fey prides herself on depicting Sarah as a dim-witted fool.  Tina’s efforts proved so successful that while many people recognize that Palin’s warmth and genuine nature is not a reflection of her intellect, Tina’s merciless efforts convinced far too many people to associate the name ‘Palin’ with idiocy. 

Thanks to Hollywood, in the mind of the public, former president George W. Bush has also been reduced to a bumbling ignoramus. Rush Limbaugh, regardless of weight loss and rehab, continues to be depicted as a fat drug addict. The liberal media is even attempting to portray accomplished Minnesota Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann as a confused, wild-eyed ditz.  

On the other hand, when either Bill or Hillary Clinton is mentioned, the overriding liberal media consensus tends to imply: Both are brilliant. As for Michelle Obama, she is not only smart and savvy, she’s a lithe fashion icon with great biceps, while Barack is an outstanding orator with superior intellect who, despite submitting minimal written proof, is perceived by most as a genius – all thanks to the liberal media’s incessant cheerleading. 

In the Broadway play “You’re Welcome America,” left coast native and former Saturday Night Live star Will Ferrell got big laughs at the expense of George W. Bush. Yet Brilliant One Barack in the year 2011 dated his signature in the guest book in Westminster Abbey “2008” a slip-up that went unnoticed on the Hollywood Mock-o-Meter. 

Does anyone remember Dan Quayle misspelling potato as “potatoe?” If it had been a prominent conservative that had confused the date, the error would have inspired the dum-dum drumbeat to pound away in primetime for months.  

The truth is, Hollywood or otherwise, liberals everywhere perceive themselves as intellectually superior beings.  Those who align with the left do so because in their haughty, deluded minds, liberalism is defined as a cerebral ascent they believe conservatives are incapable of making.  Couple that sentiment with Hollywood’s narcissistic arrogance and the combo makes for television whose goal is to find every opportunity to “enlighten” the uninformed masses by depicting conservatives as liberals perceive them to be – dolts worthy of being laughed at and dismissed.

—–

Not entirely sure what the point of this is. Maybe you can figure it out.

In his 1999 review of “American Pie,” film critic Roger Ebert wrote:

As I swim through the summer tide of vulgarity, I find that’s what I’m looking for: Movies that at least feel affection for their characters. Raunchy is OK. Cruel is not.

Unfortunately, the creators of the new teen comedy “The Virginity Hit” didn’t understand that concept when they created their own story about a nerd trying to lose his virginity. ”Hit” is an often cruel and humorless comedy that makes “American Pie” look like a classic.

Both “Pie” and “Hit” follow similar paths. Like “Pie,” “Hit” begins with a group of male teens eager to lose their virginity. After one of them succeeds, the friends all take a hit on a bong to celebrate (hence the title). Eventually the others lose their virginity and Matt is the only virgin left. But he has a plan with his long-term girlfriend. They’ve scheduled a special night together. Unfortunately, before that night arrives, Matt discovers she cheated on him and then has to choose whether or not he wants to sleep with her or break up. 

Matt chooses a third option. With his obnoxious friends, he plans an elaborate prank. The plan is to sleep with her and then, with all his friends popping out of an adjacent room, confront her on camera about her betrayal. Publicly humiliating her will be Matt’s revenge. None of his friends seems to have a problem with this horrific stunt. However, Matt calls the plan off at the last minute. He then confronts his girlfriend and tells her the truth. After their inevitable break-up, Matt then spends the rest of the movie trying to come up with a new plan to lose his virginity.

Unlike “American Pie”, “Hit” is filmed like a low-budget documentary made by one of the teens in the film. In reality, ”Hit” is a major motion picture with big-name producers such as Will Ferrell and Adam McKay, who starred and directed this summer’s “The Other Guys.”

Although few people would call ”American Pie” a great movie, it was an enjoyable teen comedy. It was a raunchy but it was also funny and featured several likable and relatable characters. Unfortunately, this movie has none of those positive attributes.

The characters in “Virginity Hit” are some of the meanest people you’ll see on film this year.  Including our protagonist, they’re all vengeful and cruel. Matt is presented as the likable lead but he’s not. He’s a loser who limplessly falls victim to peer pressure.

The film is also extremely disgusting. Whereas “American Pie” was raunchy, “Hit” is only repulsive. None of the jokes work and many scenes are too gross to even describe. There’s a twisted voyeuristic quality to everything. Since it’s filmed like a documentary, some of the scenes look realistic and viewers are left squirming during a number of uncomfortable confrontations.

I hated nearly every second of this movie. Almost right away, I was checking my watch to see how much time remained before I could go home. Make sure to skip  the most repulsive and dull movie of the year.

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…

Still, we know that Stewart, Colbert and Comedy Central aren’t activists. How do we know? Jon Stewart told us so! Why would he lie?

Remember when comedians used to speak “truth to power” (I hate that phrase, but there it is) to the rich and powerful? Back in the ’70s, Chevy Chase enjoyed portraying Gerald Ford (an accomplished athlete in his youth) as a perpetual klutz. Even Johnny Carson wasn’t averse to making the occasional funny reference to politicians.

During the 2008 campaign, politicians running for president were the butt of many jokes (some more than others – guess who?, but we’ll put that aside for now). More recently, Will Ferrell loved to bash George W. Bush so much that he even expanded his SNL impressions of W to a one-man Broadway show. And Tina Fey milked her impression of Sarah Palin until the cow ran dry.

Tired schtick.

Then there are the really vulgar offerings of David Letterman and Kathy “I’ll say anything to get press” Griffin.

That’s to be expected, of course. Public figures are ripe for ridicule, deserved or not. It goes with the territory.

But now, Colbert and Stewart (real last name Leibowitz) are, to bastardize a quote from Emeril Lagasse, kicking it down a notch. Because instead of going after the rich and powerful – or those who would like to be rich and powerful – and those associated with them, they’re going after YOU.

That’s right. If you:

• Went to Glenn Beck’s recent (and massively attended) Restoring Honor rally in August or wished you could have;
• are an official Tea Partier or a Tea Party supporter;
• are one of the people whose values are closer to Sarah Palin than Barack “The Won” Obama’s;
• agree with 68% of Pennsylvanians that cutting taxes, not increasing spending, will lead to more jobs
• and read Big Hollywood…

…then the Wonder Twins at Comedy Central have a bone to pick with you.

You see, Colbert and Stewart and their ilk (the big cahunas in the entertainment industry) have risen above such petty concerns as which bills will have to go unpaid this month or what to do when you’ve been informed that your job will shortly be eliminated. Paid much, much more than the average schlub and surrounded by yes men and other adoring admirers, they live in a bubble world where unicorns and sugar-coated raindrops really do exist.

In other words, they are part of the self-anointed elite. As such, the people lovingly described by accomplished actress and American icon Megan Fox as “white trash, hillbilly, anti-gay, super bible-beating people in Middle America” who are becoming more politically aware and not liking what they see, have become a threat who must be eliminated. Not literally, of course.

And it doesn’t matter if you watch their shows or not. Hollywoodites have proven again and again that they really don’t care if they insult their loyal fans as long as they can suck up to one another and to their liberal overlords in the government. How else would they get chances to schmooze with the prez? (Another reason why I think they despised W – he wasn’t as impressed with vapid celebrity as his predecessor and successor.)

This is not a rally to restore “sanity;” it’s a rally to show the Democrats that they still haven’t lost Hollywood – and to show middle America the finger.

Question: Am I the only one who thinks Stephen Colbert is a dead ringer for the nerdy, upper crust Cecil Vyse (played by Daniel Day-Lewis) in one of my favorite films, 1985’s A Room With a View?

Stephen Colbert and Cecil Vyse: Separated at birth?

Seriously, one more question: Will this event be reported as an in-kind donation to the DNC?

But even these movies lost their appeal due to lackluster sequels like the third “Beverly” or “Another 48 Hrs.” (yep, Eddie Murphy was one of the kings of these flicks). And over the past decade, they largely seemed to disappear like some forgotten relic of the 20th century, doomed to be played back on dusty VHS tapes by middle-aged men.

Yet hope springs eternal for fans of this underrated genre, as Hollywood has sprung not one but two of these films upon an unsuspecting public since spring: “Cop Out,” which matched Bruce Willis up against Tracy Morgan, deservedly did so-so business. And now Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg (see what I mean about mismatched teams?) are starring in the new spoof “The Other Guys,” in which they play two hapless desk-bound cops in the NYPD who suddenly get a shot at real action when the department’s best team of daredevils – played in cameos by Duane “The Rock” Johnson and Samuel L. Jackson – get killed on the job in hilariously freakish fashion.

Ferrell is a bookish, quiet accountant for the NYPD’s forensics department, while Wahlberg was a hothead street cop with a gun until he accidentally shot Yankee superstar Derek Jeter and was reassigned to partner with Ferrell. Wahlberg wants to get back on the streets as a heroic police figure, but he’s stuck solving petty crimes like building permit violations and is miserable. That doesn’t last for long though, as these “other guys” race to the scene of a murder in the hopes of being the ones to crack it – despite the fact that their latest assignment is a seemingly boring look into corruption at the state lottery.

Their misplaced gusto they’re soon competing against another team of mean-spirited boneheads for the chance to inherit the deceased hotshots’ position of glory. But when they stumble across a British billionaire (Steve Coogan) and arrest him on a code violation when he’s really hiding much bigger crimes, our hapless heroes are thrust into a spotlight they have no idea how to handle – with Ferrell especially displaying irrationally violent behavior and revealing a colorful history of busty women that leaves Wahlberg in slack-jawed astonishment.

As written by Adam McKay and Chris Henchy and directed by McKay, “The Other Guys” is more a ridiculous sendup of the buddy-cop genre than a revival of it. This is his fourth film (following “Anchorman,” “Talladega Nights” and “Step Brothers”) , and all have featured Ferrell in the lead – so by now, they’ve built an amazing rapport that translates well into freewheeling comic anarchy when the need arises (such as when Ferrell runs screaming from a car crash in his underwear in “Talladega,” or tears up Coogan’s office in a fit of suddenly-unbottled rage here).

Yet Wahlberg is the bigger surprise here, revealing a deadpan comic timing that he hinted at in his supporting role in “Date Night” and is key to these proceedings. He’s especially funny in a couple of scenes spotlighting his immediate crush on Eva Mendes, the stunning Latina actress from “Hitch” who plays Ferrell’s wife.

Together, the duo have fun playing on multiple levels, with the best parts of the movie having nothing to do with action scenes. Rather, the standout moments are hilarious sequences that put a surreal spin on clichéd scenes like Ferrell and Wahlberg having a way-too-rowdy night on the town, or Ferrell and Mendes relaying increasingly kinky messages to each other through her doddering grandma.

The only real downside here is the plot, which deteriorates into even more pointlessness than the original films it’s seeking to satirize here. As “Guys” tries to cobble together a coherent through-line for its endless parade of silly sequences, it relies on increasingly unfunny exposition and action scenes that are played with straight-up flash rather than funniness. For those who are easily offended, the film’s ample array of naughty humor – particularly in banter between our heroes – might be a red flag, but for most viewers, Ferrell once again milks his childlike spirit to full advantage and gets away with saying things that would stall nearly any other actor’s films.
Yet while the film could easily be cut by 15 to 20 minutes, it is so packed with comedy that most viewers will be laughing too hard to notice. And that’s why “The Other Guys” should be your main choice this weekend.

Adam McKay and scarf

There are, however, a couple of memorably funny scenes, including a deliriously inspired and plot-turning leap off a very tall building and Wahlberg’s reaction when he first meets Ferrell’s wife, played by the striking Eva Mendes. For at least 75 of the 107 minutes you’ll have a smile on your face and enjoy a few honest laughs even as you wonder why the cinematography’s so bright and all the expensive action is unnecessarily hyper-edited.

Amusing devolves into outright tedious in the third act, unfortunately, when the plot turns hard-left thanks to a confusing, uninteresting, unfunny, and unnecessarily preachy investment banking plot and stakes that never rise above having to stop a wire transfer. Without spoiling the specifics (though I will below), let’s just say that never for a second did I believe that what might have been lost in that wire transfer wouldn’t have been immediately made up within days using taxpayer money in the form of a bailout. Which brings me to the now infamous “Other Guys” end credits:

—–

So what’s your favorite part of that power point presentation? Mine starts at the 1:50 mark when we’re supposed to sit aghast at the:

CEO to average employee pay ratio.

Me? I just sat there and wondered what was the:

DIRECTOR OF “THE OTHER GUYS” to average Columbia Pictures’ employee pay ratio.

My second favorite part arrived at right around the 2:15 mark when we’re supposed to be even more outraged as we watch the average executive salary climb to over $11 million per year – you know, as told to us at  the end of a movie starring the guy who was paid $20 million for the 90 days he spent making “Talladega Nights.”

And here comes the SPOILER ALERT….

McKay wants us to believe that he’s all about comedic bravery, that he’s Speaking! Truth! To! Power! on behalf of the little guy-taxpayer and not his limousine liberal social-engineering cause. And yet, a big part of the plot device in the director’s evil capitalistic money scheme, is fretting over a police pension fund. Now, I’m second to none when it comes to wanting our first reponders to be well compensated for the important and dangerous work they do, but really? A public pension fund is shown as a good thing in a film that positions itself as on the side of the little guy?

For those of us actually paying attention, it’s not just Wall Street stealing our money, and it’s not just fatcat too-big-to-fail CEOs. What the left-wing propagandist McKay intentionally does here is portray in a positive light the other dark side of our current budgetary crisis: wildly bloated public pensions muscled into being by corrupted unions who are as driven in a quest for selfish gain as any AIG executive. But because public union money is used to fund and support Democrats and union members disproportionately vote for Democrats, to further the leftist cause, McKay doesn’t just ignore this side of corruption, he presents it as something virtuous.

Public unions are second-to-none in their contempt for the little guy-taxpayer and coupled with the success they’ve enjoyed at the public trough, thanks only to the liberal politicians they support, these pensions are now THE major flash-point in budgetary emergencies all over the country, most especially in New York where — wait for it, wait for it — “The Other Guys” is set:

These and other sweeteners are part of the reason why the city’s annual pension payout has increased 900% since 2000. And that’s before health care benefits are included. For every dollar police officers contribute to their retirement, taxpayers contribute nine. Mayor Bloomberg’s office warns that if one thing pushes New York City into bankruptcy again – 35 years after the last time – it will be pensions.

Nothing about this Ponzi scheme in McKay’s end credits. I must’ve missed the section on Fannie and Freddie, as well.

McKay might dress funny, but he’s no idiot. Quite the opposite. In fact, he’s such an effective left-wing propagandist he’s smart enough to deny that what he’s doing is in any way “leftie“:

Some extreme right wing site started targeting me and saying I’m a leftie, and I told the guy – I actually had an exchange with – ‘I’m not a leftie, I just don’t want to be ripped off. I don’t want wars started in my name. How is that leftie? 

Methinks BH might just be the extreme right wing site he’s talking about. And I love how he uses the phrase “targeting me.” You see, when we extreme right wingers engage in a little spirited political debate, it can never be just that. Because the Left has no arguments, they have to shout us down with words like racism or mean-spirited or targeting. And this coming from a guy who’s made a career with millions upon million of dollars at his disposal to target his own political opponents though big studio films, his site “Funny or Die,” and as a writer for “Saturday Night Live.”

McKay also thinks he can say “I’m not a leftie” as though that just makes it so. But maybe that means the two of us can at least agree that being a leftie is something worth being embarrassed about. What he might not know, however, is that possessing the ability to shamelessly say something so brazenly untrue is actually the clearest sign you are indeed a leftie. And so is trashing George W. Bush 19 months after he left office.

Yes, our non-leftie director who Speaks! Truth! To! Power! makes damn sure that when we’re introduced to his investment banking villain (a wasted Steve Coogan) that we see a photograph of him with Bush.

Which is really, Speaking! Truth! To! The! Out! Of! Power!

And McKay might bravely speak truth to the out of power again now that he’s circling around a biopic about Republican political consultant Lee Atwater. 

Brave souls, these Hollywoodists. Anyway, you need not take my word when it comes to McKay’s leftie-ism. Just read the words of that brave speaking truther himself.