Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: The Republicans' American Health Care Act

March 14, 2017 4:12 PM - Season 4, Episode 5

During the past 168 hours....

• International Women's Day and reactions it it from around the globe, from Russian President Vladimir Putin, from Brazil President Michel Temer, and a particularly clueless San Antonio TV morning show host.
• Wikileaks leaked documents concerning the CIA, although this batch is rather less alarming than Snowden's. It is filled with ridiculous program names though. Program Weeping Angel investigated the possibility of hacking into Samsung TVs to use them as listening devices, which, after two notorious recalls, is everything that company needed. LWT presents a message on behalf of Samsung to try to salvage their reputation, but it doesn't go too well.
• Main story: The Republican response to the Affordable Healthcare Act, the American Health Care Act (YouTube 19m), and the many ways in which it's terrible. The piece concludes with another visit from LWT commercial proxy, the Catheter Cowboy.

Program names mentioned from the leaked documents:
Weeping Angel
SparrowHawk (on screen)
Hive (on screen)
Pterodactyl Tips (on screen)
SQRL (on screen)
AfterMidnight
Brutal Kangaroo
CrunchyLimeSkies
ElderPiggy
AngerQuake
McNugget

Hashtags: #feminism #hashtagfeminism ("Hashtag hashtag feminism")

F. 37: "Larry King Tortus" DIEGO

posted by JHarris (5 comments total)

"You get that, right? Right? ... You get that. ... Right? ... Right? ... You get that, right?"
posted by Etrigan at 5:44 PM on March 14, 2017 [5 favorites]

Has there been any reaction/evidence that Donnie has seen those commercials?

Yeah, that joke ending was precious - but I suspect that before halfway through the tail, Donnie would have forgotten what the message was supposed to be in the first place.

I felt that the 'nerd/geek' piece was a little mean/bullying*, but yeah that's a super annoying conversational tick to signify "am interested in/am excited about X" as opposed to +the unsaid "... and I have self-deprecating faux humility at my notion of my high level of skill/expertise and my interest in the nuances of the subject, especially the controversial ones."

No, I'm not interested in rehashing the definition of nerd/geek.

*I super hope the production got her personal permission to use those clips, rather than through a legalistic access rights route.
posted by porpoise at 8:06 PM on March 14, 2017

The "samsung tv spies on you" joke kinda died the moment we learned microwaves take pictures of you.

I think what Oliver kinda missed on the CIA leaks is that it seemed (from what i've glimpsed) almost a brag of what they could do, and maybe not having microphones and cameras all around the house would be a good idea. If the crazy stopped for a while, there's good potential for a story on the internet of things and potential dangers of a fully-connected home.
posted by lmfsilva at 8:18 AM on March 15, 2017 [4 favorites]

I really didn't like the commercial this time. I mean I get that this is a comedy show, but it just went on waaaay too long.
posted by LizBoBiz at 11:12 AM on March 15, 2017 [1 favorite]

I was surprised he talked about how much of a terrible time Samsung was having... without mentioning that their CEO has just been jailed for corruption in South Korea!
posted by simonw at 8:49 PM on March 15, 2017 [1 favorite]