FanFare

This week, from the white void, two main stories tonight, focusing of two different aspects of the Trump presidency. #1: the Coronavirus. Bewilderingly, a lot of US Americans seem to think Trump has handled it the best he could. LWT identifies three crucial areas he definitely didn't: Preparation, Coordination and Communication. First main story, on YouTube (21m) #2: Trump's Attorney General William Barr, hailed as a responsible figure when brought on, but quickly revealed himself to be a kind of ultra-toady. Second main story, on YouTube (19m) Other items-- And Now: Our Annual Look At What Happens When Local News and Halloween Collide, and, And Now: Public Officials Prepare Children For A COVID Halloween." Playing the show out is a clip of Attorney General Bill Barr playing the bagpipes. [more inside]
posted by JHarris on Nov 2, 2020 - 4 comments

This week, from the void: many administration and state officials want to reopen the country as quickly as possible despite how stupid that is. And Now: Parents On Television Just Want One Thing (to send kids back to school). Main story concerns conspiracy theories, those things that tons of people believe in, are wantonly spread by Facebook and YouTube, and that are argubly tearing the world apart. On YouTube (22m) To help convince people to stop believing so much bullshit, Last Week Tonight asked several celebrities (Alex Trebek, John Cena, Paul Rudd, Catherine O'Hara and Billy Porter) to make videos asking people to think more critically about what they read on the internet, and put them up at thetruetruetruth.com. [more inside]
posted by JHarris on Jul 20, 2020 - 10 comments

This week, again from the White Void: Mike Pence gave a speech that seems to indicate that we had done enough to slow the Coronavirus epidemic, an amazingly stupid take, and the very states that have been most aggressive about reopening have been the ones to suffer from the highest spikes in new cases. Main story: evictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic, threatening to turn the health crisis into a homelessness crisis. On YouTube (19m) And Now: The Citizens of Palm Beach County, Florida, Have Some Thoughts On Mandatory Face Masks (Warning: extreme entitlement). Finally, John "Papa John" Schnatter, rich white man and founder of the pizza chain, has become a highly undeserving Instagram star in an attempt to rehabilitate his image, and is as potent an argument against obscene wealth as anything on this Earth. [more inside]
posted by JHarris on Jun 30, 2020 - 6 comments

This week (another void episode): After a quick recap of Trump's first rally since the pandemic hit (not a lot of people showed up) and Juneteenth, we go right in to the main story, the Coronavirus, "that thing you regularly have to convince your parents still exists." Specifically, about a surge in cases in prisons, in some cases up to 80% of their residents having contracted it. On YouTube (28m) And Now: A Father's Day Tribute to the World's Greatest Dad. (It's Trump. They're being sarcastic.) And a final piece on fancams, for the old people out there, "short montages of a performer that you like set to music." Which performer? Any performer. The point is, however, K-Pop stars are deploying fancams to fight the white supremacy hashtag [hash]whitelivesmatter, and support tags like #protecttheprotestors. They have also overwhelmed an app police published for people to use to report protestors with irrelevant images. LWT made their own rat-erotica-K-Pop-fancam for use in signal jamming; it's available from (takes a deep breath as I prepare to type this) rateroticafancam.com. Another proud member of the HBO family of websites! [more inside]
posted by JHarris on Jun 22, 2020 - 5 comments

This week: another installment from the white void. Protests over the death of George Floyd, and the terrible take on it from Tucker Carlson. This week's main story is about mail-in voting which Trump incorrectly says is "corrupt," and its dire importance during the pandemic. To help encourage people to vote by mail and be safe, Last Week Tonight reminds us that their stamps are still available at stamps.com/laststamptonight, and they have also made available some "I voted!" stickers with a mail-in ballot theme, which you can get from ivotedbymail.com. And Now: TV Hosts Want to Know: What's That Behind You? On YouTube (19m) Finally, on the UFC, who had been planning on holding fights on what they had called "Fight Island." Two weeks ago John Oliver had suggested a much better name would be UF-SEA. It looks like UFC agreed; they filed a trademark on that name two days after it aired, and in a Sportscenter interview the head of UFC admitted he got the idea from John. You can also buy a baby onsie with the expired UFC trademark phrase "You Will Submit," at tugslabmeatsbabypalace.com. [more inside]
posted by JHarris on Jun 1, 2020 - 4 comments

This week: Another episde from the Void. Rick Bright became a whistleblower into Trump's Coronavirus response, while Trump dissipated his energies unveiling the "Space Force" flag. There is a scandal around North Carolina Senator Richard Burr for profiting off of non-public Coronavirus briefings back in February. And Now: Rachael Ray Is Doing Her Best With Her New, One-Man Production Crew. Main story: Sports, why shutting them down for a while was the right thing to do, and what they've been doing in the meantime, some of which is actually fairly positive! Although some are fairly sucky, with the drive to earn profits overruling some team owners and even schools' desire to keep their players healthy. Which brings us... to Last Week's Tonight's newly-announced sponsorship of Marble League 2020, Jelle's Marble Runs (the producers of Marbula One) Olympics-like marble sports competition! On YouTube (22m) LWT is off next week. [more inside]
posted by JHarris on May 18, 2020 - 9 comments

This week, from the Blank White Void: Someone flushed a toiled during oral arguments in a remote Supreme Court conference. Justice Department head and apologist for power William Barr seeks to throw out case against Michael Flynn for lying to the FBI, not even trying to cover up that it's nakedly an abuse of his position. [internal screaming] Trump flubs a photo-op by touring a mask factory without wearing one, and seems to be trying to convince the US to open up despite the additional deaths it would cause, while also shutting down CDC guidelines as to how businesses could best do that safely. And Now: FOX 4 Dallas's Steve Eagar Reads Viewer's Complaints Out Loud. Main story: the U.S. Postal Service and the issues, in terms of safety and budgetary, it faces during the Coronavirus crisis. YouTube The episode mentions that, while it will not go anywhere near meeting the USPS's $90B shortfall, you can at least help out a little by buying stamps, such as the ones they themselves have produced through stamps.com, at stamps.com/laststamptonight, available through June 15. [more inside]
posted by JHarris on May 11, 2020 - 1 comment

This week: the show once again comes to us from the Blank White Void of Sad Facts. Alex Jones solemnly states on air "I'll admit it... I will eat my neighbors." The Coronavirus has, in three months, killed more Americans than the entire Vietnam War yet with no end in site, yet Jared Kushner essentially declared victory over it on Fox News. Ubiquitious testing is our only real way out of this problem, with current testing levels falling far short of what is needed despite having had months to improve the situation, so the main story tonight is: what happened? On YouTube (23m) And Now: Even During a Pandemic, Florida Just Can't Help But Be Florida. Finally, for some reason cats seem to love Last Week Tonight, so they decided to pander to them with a short spin-off show, "Cat Week Tonight." Contains Martin Sheen. [more inside]
posted by JHarris on May 5, 2020 - 14 comments