Chapo Trap House: Episode 234 - Congrat's (8/5/18)

August 6, 2018 5:30 AM

​Papa Menaker is away moving this weekend, so three of his chocolate-smeared children are allowed to get their grubby little mitts all over the pod. Matt, Felix and Amber congratulate Apple for becoming the first trillion dollar company, Paul Manafort for his impeccable fashion sense, and Obama for turning 57 this week. To celebrate Obama's birthday we read from "Hope Never Dies: An Obama Biden Mystery" and try not to succumb to the deep depression it induces.

Soundcloud Link

Reddit thread

Line of the episode goes to Amber on Hope Never Dies: "This is 50 Shades for people who read Daily Kos."

posted by Space Coyote (4 comments total)

Nope, it was every bit as depressive as expected, with the kicker being Matt's reminder that culture now doesn't seem the least capable of actually mining good things from a situation that sucks so fucking much. This sounds like a throwaway joke book cover on Conan or a lazy "Uncle Joe" story from the Onion, but it's actually a real book? Ugh.
You can really tell Will (or Virgil) weren't on it, although it got a lot better by the end. Never underestimate the usefulness of a host/moderator. Also, good on Felix for knowing when to give up.

I know someone who works in IT in Ireland that had to do house-hunting last year, and I think his family was like two weeks away of going homeless (well, not really homeless, but probably trying to fit his family in a studio apartment), and apparently it's not even that bad where he lives.

Also: "pickle rick building".
posted by lmfsilva at 11:59 AM on August 6, 2018

Come on, Amber. If The Toast had become a sentient novel-writing AI, there would have been at least one misandry joke.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 1:47 PM on August 6, 2018

this was an all time great episode and maybe the perfect “starter episode” for someone. i think during the obama/biden adventures segment the three of them did an incredible job of articulating exactly what went wrong with these men as our leaders, and felix’s “9gag won the culture war” take is pretty spot on too.
posted by JimBennett at 3:32 PM on August 6, 2018 [1 favorite]

Huh. I thought that was pretty much a filler episode, even though their self-awareness about it was charming. I also think they are sorta wrong about the Obama administration's lack of consequence - except that a lot of the impact he did have was rather intangible, e.g. setting a tone and *temporarily* shifting the levers of executive power in a way that allowed the movement for criminal justice reform to gain steam. The lasting policy accomplishments are, of course, underwhelming, though some of it may be too early to tell.
posted by atoxyl at 10:28 PM on August 8, 2018