So after a nice dinner, we get home where I've recorded both Countdown and Rachel Maddow and the Onion News and Portlandia. We play through Countdown, and then Obermann makes his big announcement. And, I'm trying to decide how to react...whimsically seems the best choice.
Like it or not, the left can really get self-absorbed and pompous. Countdown got that way over the years -- Keith raised tough questions and demanded tough answers. However, he spent too much time on silly crap and on pursuing idiots like Beck and O'Reilly and Rupert Murdoch. There is a history between O'Reilly and Murdoch and Obermann and Ingram and we all kind of got into the latest phase of that. Everything that Obermann said about the Foxites is true -- but, Rupert got a piece of truth when he said, "Keith is crazy."
So, I look forward to his next incarnation. Maybe he'll write; maybe he'll run for office; maybe, probably, he'll land another TV show. It will be good, fun, cutting edge, exciting ---and then it will drift off into the sort of self-centered bedtime story that Countdown was on the verge of becoming. I personally thought that reading a story from Thurber once was sort of touching; every Friday? I'm not that fond of Thurber, but he could have been reading the collected lyrics of Bob Dylan or The Girl Hunters by Mickey Spillane...and, it would not have mattered. It was stupid. Fridays might have been slow newsdays once, but no more.
I had been finding some aspects of the new Lawrence O'Donnell show kind of bothersome but I can see a lot of merit to it. Rachel Maddow brings a level of seriousness along with self-depreciating humour and a willingness to talk to people she doesn't agree with. Chris Matthews is a fellow Holy Cross alumni, and if they'd spike his coffee with a couple of valium just before each show, he'd be great. Ed Schultz is a nutcase. So, I guess I'll have some choices about what I want to watch besides NCIS reruns...
If you've read my stuff over the years, you know that I think the strip Monty is a pretty good allegory for everything. Keith Obermann does better channelling Fleshy the Cat or Moondog; unfortunately, he has a tendency to lapse into Master Sedgwick.
I'll miss Countdown, but as the poet sings, "I know your leaving's too long overdue/for far too long I've had nothing new to show to you..." Fair winds, following seas and a reasonably quick landfall. And, Keith, the Mariners are still trying to find a broadcasting lineup!
If you've read my stuff over the years, you know that I think the strip Monty is a pretty good allegory for everything. Keith Obermann does better channelling Fleshy the Cat or Moondog; unfortunately, he has a tendency to lapse into Master Sedgwick.
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