'Real Time w/ Bill Maher' Thread

[Cush]

This Friday at 11 pm, Bill Maher welcomes magician Penn Jillette, Rep. Darrell Issa, and scholar Mary Frances Berry. Plus, via satellite, actor Harry Anderson and intellectual Fouad Ajami.

[Pirate Smile]

1. That was sad with Harry Anderson moving from NOLA. Depressing.

:(

[truebrit71]

2. He's not a big fan of Mayor Nagin apparently...

...

[countmyvote4real]

7. self delete

[truebrit71]

10. me either...

...seems to be a bought and paid for mouthpiece...

[IChing]

3. Teller is an ass

He is rich and doesn't care about anyone except himself, cut your fucking hair.

[alarimer]

5. I love what he's saying about evolution

A voice of reason compared to Issa at least.

[IChing]

4. Two libertarians this time

Bill is a little better tonight.

[IChing]

6. this is not a bad dialogue

I swore after last week I would not watch him but I have no life.

Posters on drugs:

You think Mel Gibson is anti-sementic on Alcohol wait tell you see him on crack

[truebrit71]

8. This 'intellectual' is an idiot...

:puke:

[countmyvote4real]

14. Mary Francis: "I can't believe he's serious."

"I was waiting for the joke."

Thank you.

[IChing]

17. Me too same talking points that rummey says

I would love to destroy his "intellectual argument"

[LearnedHand]

9. I'm SHOCKED that Issa sounds so ... well, reasonable

He's the one, isn't he, who sponsored the recall campaign in CA to remove Gray Davis?

[truebrit71]

11. Yes he is...but give him time...

..also mid-terms aren't far off remember....

[devilgrrl]

20. I think he's full of hot gas...

:puke:

[countmyvote4real]

25. It's reelection time and time to talk sense.

Giving him the benefit of the doubt, maybe he was humbled by his failed attempt to be the GOP CA Governor candidate.

[question everything]

39. Yes, this was my reaction

to be south of Orange County - the home of rabid Republicans - and to sound so reasonable.

[devilgrrl]

12. Fouad Ajami... what the f*** is he talking about?

I agree with Mary Frances Berry, he's full of shit. A gift... :eyes:

[truebrit71]

13. Yep...

.

[SeattleGirl]

16. I had the same reaction.

Hello, earth to Ajami!

[fooj]

34. Yes. Issa was in "rare" form...

I'm a Californian. He's either full of shit, jumping ship or pandering for the vote. IMO, it's one of the three. The only thing that I believed him to be sincere about was Lebanon. I'll give him that.

[CollegeDUer]

21. He's the token uncle tom arab

that the MSM drags in to tell us how great bush is.

[gulliver]

30. Yeah, when he said that nothing going on in Iran had anything...

... to do with Iraq, I thought someone was going to clobber him. But no one did, unfortunately.

[gatorboy]

15. Issa is almost making sense now.

Are they going to take his Republican club card back?

[truebrit71]

18. I know!!! Holy shit!!

so help me...

[LearnedHand]

19. He's making more sense about Iraq than a whole HEAP

of Dems I've heard, at times.

On edit: OTOH, he IS slipping into vacuous abstractions now, though. Ms. Berry nailed him on it!

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

23. Too bad he's in the Rubber Stamp party. n/t

MKJ

[IChing]

22. scary but it is HBO and no republican watches that.

except ....

[tsuki]

38. No.

Voting record.

0% by NARAL

http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/members/i000056/key-votes/ Rejected Iraqi timetable, voted for taxcuts, anti-enviromental legislation, CAFTA, flag burning amendment, voted to allow seizure of library records and bookstore record w/o warrants, changed ethics rules, estate tax "relief," marriage amendment, http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/members/i000056/votes/

Other than stem cell research, I cannot see the reasoned man in the seat in the House.

[truebrit71]

24. Maher again defends the Israelis...

:eyes:

[LearnedHand]

26. "Sixty books in eight months"

I'm so VERY sure. WHICH sixty books?

[truebrit71]

29. LOL!!

.

[Superman Returns]

27. hmmmm

last time Issa was on the show, Mahr seemed impressed too. anyone remember that? He sounded very reasonable. Notice how I said "sounded."

[IChing]

28. They are talking about his book learning george's that is

Bill says he reads newspapers..........think about that

[devilgrrl]

31. More on Fouad Ajami...

The media's favorite Arab expert

By Eric Boehlert

Dec. 21, 2001 | Once content to ignore foreign affairs, the American public has been trying to play catch-up since Sept. 11, eager to learn more about the Middle East, its politics, its people and its potential threat to the West.

Helping lead that collective teach-in has been the ubiquitous Fouad Ajami, esteemed professor of Middle Eastern studies at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University.

The master of the trenchant sound bite, Ajami is also a prolific and poetic writer, author of such books as "The Dream Palace of the Arabs," "The Arab Predicament" and "The Vanished Imam," as well as a contributor to several influential American magazines. "My jaw drops when I read his writing," says Mort Zuckerman, publisher of U.S. News & World Report, where Ajami's work has appeared for years. "I think he's the most brilliant authority, with the greatest insight and greatest historical knowledge of the Arab mind-set, in this country."

Ajami has also become that academic oddity: a serious scholar who has crossed over into the mainstream. An electronic database search on Nexis-Lexis retrieves more than 150 Ajami news mentions since the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

It's Ajami's TV appearances that have catapulted him to prominence. Signed on as a news consultant for CBS in the mid-'80s, Ajami has been a constant presence on the network, appearing with Dan Rather and others to comment on all things Middle Eastern. Over the years he's also been a regular guest on PBS's "Charlie Rose" as well as "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer." It's safe to say no other Arab scholar has accumulated as much prime-time airtime as Ajami.

"I find him to be a walking encyclopedia of knowledge," says Al Ortiz, executive director and director of special events for CBS News. "He's articulate and versatile. He can discuss religion, politics, economics." (In 1982, Ajami won a MacArthur Fellowship, or so-called genius award.)

But Ajami's ubiquity irks many colleagues in the world of Muslim and Arab studies, who have long criticized his views as highly unrepresentative of the field. These critics see him as a distinct outsider whose dark vision of the contemporary Arab world and tendency to avoid criticizing Israel are not shared by many of his colleagues. (Ajami did not respond to several phone requests for an interview.)

As the Los Angeles Times pointed out in 1998, "No Arab intellectual has made himself so cordially disliked by his peers" as Ajami.

Scholar Fouad Ajami has garnered more primetime airplay than any other commentator on Arab-Muslim issues. But critics say he's far from a representative voice.


more: http://archive.salon.com/news/feature/2001/12/21/ajami/index.html?sid=1062112

[MazeRat7]

32. Good show tonight. Civil. And that Issa... wow a "thinking" republican...

I thought they were extinct or something. I'll bet he gets a fresh shipment off kool-aid in the morning.

Oh.. and I agree with Bill.... we need to pick whatever will give us our hair gel back... :rofl:

MZr7

[11cents]

33. Get OUT, Issa?

The guy's record in California is nothing but crookedness and hackery. But that doesn't mean he can't make sense too, I guess. Life's a rich pageant.

[fooj]

35. See post #34

At least, it's the way I see it.

[Cleita]

36. What's going on with Issa? In some things he's making sense.

It doesn't stop me from hating him though. I will never forgive him for bringing us Arnold.

[GreenTea]

37. Seems Maher has peaked around here...

Perhaps, if he gets more interesting guest and becomes more informed...maybe he's saving them for the last of his ten shows...

Irrelevant!