This bit of idiocy has been making the rounds:
Now, I understand that Red Eye is supposed to be a late night “funny” show of some kind, insofar as any show on Fox News can be intentionally funny, which is generally speaking not that much. And I note that the combined military experience of Greg Gutfield, Don Benson, Bill Schulz and Monica Crowley (the individuals in the above clip) is a whopping zero years, but certainly their combined experience as former editors of Maxim and Stuff, being a former assistant to Richard Nixon during the final years of Nixon’s life, and writing a stage play called “The Marijuana-logues” should qualify them to opine about… well, things in general, you know?
It is worth noting that Doug Benson has apologized on his Twitter feed, and in the proper “I was an idiot and I’m sorry” way, which earns him a bit of credit. Gutfield, on the other hand, opted for the non-apology apology by saying his comments “may have been misunderstood,” which is a passive-aggressive “I’m sorry you didn’t understand what I said” shot back. Jesus, Gutfield – if you’re going to be an asshole, fine, but don’t be a wimp about it. Own it.
Top comment: “chucklefucks”: I like this word. I’m going to try and use it more in conversation. — Lister Sage
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I would like to apologize on behalf of people with brain cells all over America, because we keep letting people WITHOUT brain cells, or with substandard ones, on TV.
Someone, please, think of the brain cells.
I think the Canadian military should offer all show participants a Kandahar convoy ridealong.
They sound like typical, insular Americans really (not you, of course, precious, informed but atypical American readers, and rest assured the breed exists in every country).
That does leave the rhetorical question as to why anyone would give early-morning tv-time to a bunch of intellectually lazy yahoos and just broadcast them shooting the shit, though. Aren’t there salad shooter and sham-wow infomercials that could better fill the time?
“(not you, of course, precious, informed but atypical American readers, and rest assured the breed exists in every country).”
But you’re going to insult them anyways. Them being American has nothing to do with the comments. They’re just assholes.
That would be like saying “(not you, of course, precious, informed but atypical black readers, and rest assured the breed exists in every race).”
And a special non-apology apology to you too.
I would like to apologize for my apology.
Someone, please think of the apologies.
OK, I know it’s Fox, but come on. This is Fox’s attempt to appeal to Daily Show viewers, and if you’d heard Jon Stewart make this exact observation you’d have thought it was funny.
No one on this panel is a professional journalist, or even a noted conservative. Doug Benson was in the Marijuanalogues for chrissakes. I know the reflex is “FOX BAD! FOX BAD!” but sometimes a joke is just a joke and no apology is required from anyone.
Oh look at that. “enlightened” non Americans talking about how much better they are than Americans because they don’t make sweeping judgments about diverse groups of people.
My point is, these are four random people who happen to be American. Apologizing on behalf of all Americans or stating that only a minority of Americans are smart is just dragging your own stereotypes of Americans into this conversation.
My point stands. I met an obnoxious man from Montreal last week, does that mean everyone in Montreal has to apologize for his actions?
“This is Fox’s attempt to appeal to Daily Show viewers, and if you’d heard Jon Stewart make this exact observation you’d have thought it was funny.”
No, not really, because Jon Stewart is funny and not a douche, and all these people are clearly the opposite. I even like how four assholes in a circle jerk isn’t enough, they have to go to an outside asshole correspondent just to make sure they have all their demographic bases covered. “Ok, so we have a pretentious yuppie asshole, an unfunny stoner asshole, a nerdy asshole, and a blond ditz asshole, what are we missing?” “A gay guy that looks like Prince Charles?” “Genius!”
Brendan: “…if you’d heard Jon Stewart make this exact observation you’d have thought it was funny.”
Ah, but this is exactly the kind of joke the Daily Show wouldn’t make. Stewart is beloved because he does it right. It’s not the other way around.
MGK: “…if you’re going to be an asshole, fine, but don’t be a wimp about it. Own it.”
There’s something soul-crushing about this form of small-souled cowardice, isn’t there? These proud members of the Eighty-Second Chairborne will thump their chests and take on all comers…unless there are comers. Then they run and hide and pout and hold their breath until they turn blue.
“OK, I know it’s Fox, but come on. This is Fox’s attempt to appeal to Daily Show viewers, and if you’d heard Jon Stewart make this exact observation you’d have thought it was funny.”
Well, yes, probably. Jon Stewart’s got comic timing. These guys have got apocalyptic levels of smugness.
I’m not Canadian OR American, and this makes me want to kill things with hammers.
Also, Gutfield looks alarmingly like a budget Kiefer Sutherland. There must be some way to make money off that.
Hey MGK,
If I can get Wisconsin, Minnesota and the UP to secede, do you think Canada would take us in out of the stupidity?
I only mention Minnesota because those guys are really getting tired of that whole Franken/Coleman fiasco (yes, its still going on) and I think they might like to get out of the system too.
I’ll forgive an attempt at funny, because funny is hard to pull off.
But: it seems the context here is supposed to be “informed news-related funny”. And in that case, one might hope they would know that Canada, rather than being an effete lunch-munching nation, has been the world leader in peace-keeping missions, and other volunteer military programs designed to make the world a safer place.
It’s not appropriate to lampoon them as “stopping for a manicure and pedicure”, when in fact Canada has literally given until it can give no more.
It sort of takes the funny out of their attempt at funny. Their apparent ignorance, when they are in a contextual venue where these are the things they ought to know, is what is so very tragic here.
if you’d heard Jon Stewart make this exact observation you’d have thought it was funny.
Well, no, no I wouldn’t. Because it would be something an asshole would say and I don’t tend to find assholes funny. Unless large heavy objects are being dropped on their heads. And I will admit a weakness to the “asshole gets kicked in the nuts” joke. I’m only human.
And I will also take issue with the statement “This is Fox’s attempt to appeal to Daily Show viewers”. This is patently untrue. This is an attempt to appeal to the same general demographic target audience (18-35 year olds) as Daily Show viewers, but specifically the asshole portion of that demographic. The 18-35 year olds who don’t find Jon Stewart funny because he mocks their politics. “Red Eye” is quite obviously not an attempt to get at actual Daily Show viewers because the humor in the few episodes I’ve seen is mostly “it’s funny because the guy is an asshole bully”. The Daily Show’s main brand of humor is more along the lines of “it’s funny because he’s making fun of asshole bullies”. Same demographic, different target audiences.
Anyone else find it highly amusing that Fox – a supposed NEWS organization – feels the need to put a humor show on the network? Would anyone think it normal if CNN devoted a block of time to a panel of comedians? Or MSNBC? And yet Fox somehow gets a pass on this. More the soft bigotry of low expectations, I guess.
It’s like the Daily show as done by a bunch of semi literate frat boys who were dropped on their heads a lot as children.
Unsurprising that a bunch of armchair general “war on terror” fans would completely lack an understanding of the logistical difficulties posed by Canada having a small army that’s been running all over the place on peacekeeping missions for the last several years. If you have a larger military you can at least rotate individual units out of combat for a time to rest and repair equipment, Canada can’t do that, hence the need to pause operations for a year to play catchup.
If they heard about an American unit being rotated back to the states from Afghanistan for R&R, I somehow doubt that they would be mocking them with jokes about yoga and pedicures.
Uh, that’s because every one of our soldiers are heroes, Josh.
Also, I don’t know if it’s just me, but I get the same icky feeling when I hear comedians talk about “the evildoers” that I get when I hear Christian metal bands.
–d
Fox News truly is for people who haven’t figured out what a complete and total dick J. Jonah Jameson is.
I would like to apologize on behalf of the entire world, just to annoy the crap out of kris.
Someone, please think of kris’s butthurt.
If anyone even hinted at a joke at any American miltary people the U.S. Would lose their minds but still people poke fun at us.
The part that was funniest to me was the “most powerful country in the universe” comment.
I’m insulted that they apologized for this. It was a great piece of farce.
Wait, you mean those people actually claimed to have sort of believed what they were saying???
Zenrage: Shouting at pages, dismissing or stealing Ted Raimi’s ideas and constantly, constantly demanding more pictures of Spider-Man. J Johan Jameson: Total dick.
And he’s still the best thing about the Spider-Man movies.
Not to jump on the “If it were on the Daily Show you’d think it was funny” gang-up, but this clip is perfectly illustrative of a part of Stewart’s overall critique of the current state of cable news. During his takedown of Cramer when Cramer tried to justify NBC’s talking heads and their complicity with the current finanical collapase he said “we’ve got 24 hours of TV to fill,” to which Jon responded “Maybe that’s the problem.”
All it would really take to get the UP to secede is to blow up the mighty Mackinac. Just do it in the summer, because then we can use the tourists as valuable hostages.
It’s pretty sad that it only took like three posts before kris went for racism.
What part of her comment is racist?
–d
A) guy
B) I should have picked a nationality instead, I wasn’t saying racism, I was saying that Odd King basically called all Americans ignorant and uninformed, in a back handed compliment, while complaining about four people making generalizations about Canadians.
I think MGK’s comment about timing is appropriate because at least Canada manages to turn up to wars on time, rather than 3 years late.
I tried to rage out, but I just couldn’t It’s Fox “News”. It’s a bunch of uniformed, insular chucklefucks that don’t know what’s going on in their own backyard, let alone the rest of the world.
Sure, the Canadian military needs an operation break. We’ve been at it for a while and we need to recoup all out materiel and such. Do we look like wimps?
So tell me, Fox “News”, how’s the US military’s supply line doing? Running up debt, fighting a no-win war, and recruitment is at a pretty big low right now, isn’t it? I mean, if your army is so fucking awesome right now, how come you have to send Weekend Warriors to fight in major conflict zones.
Actually I was under the impression (saw it on the news, not Fox News) that recruitment was pretty high right now. That’s not because people believe in what we’re doing, but more because it’s a job with benefits in a market where 400 people are applying for a single position most other places. Though it also said that a good majority of them are rejected outright because they couldn’t even make it through pre-basic. But still… :-p
Are the presenters on the 1/2 hour news hour meant to be wooden and stilted?
“chucklefucks”: I like this word. I’m going to try and use it more in conversation.
Nobody is going to attack Canada because Canadians are a bit saner than us Americans.
“Would anyone think it normal if CNN devoted a block of time to a panel of comedians? Or MSNBC?”
Wait… so Lou Dobbs and Keith Olberman aren’t… you mean they’re SERIOUS?
They didn’t even get Leslie’s rank right…
Uh, that’s because every one of our soldiers are heroes, Josh.
Unless they’re critical of a Republican POTUS, in which case they’re called “phony soldiers.”
A couple of facts (from an American):
Fact the First: The Canadian military is the real deal. They were at Normandy, bitches. They were all up in Kosovo and a dozen other places over the last fifty years doing UN business. Try telling someone in the Canadian military that they are a joke, and then count your remaining teeth. Well, actually, he’d probably just roll his eyes and ignore you. Canadians are an easygoing bunch.
Fact the Second: the idea of a nation’s military taking a year off is a bit rediculous. It is. Had Jon Stewart pointed out the rediculousness of the situation, I’d like to think he’d have worked more from the “How fucked is this war when an antire army has to stop for a breather?” angle, rather than the “Canadians are such wussies!” angle. It is a wierd situation, and thus ripe for satire. Satire implying that people who are out there fighting and dying on a daily basis are pussies, however… no es bueno.
A Third, Bonus Fact: America is a pretty boss country, as countries go. Is it perfect? By no means, but I am more proud than I am ashamed. Does this mean other countries suck? No. Anybody going around saying that other countries suck, however subtly, is kind of a douche, unless that country makes with the human rights violations higgeldy-piggeldy.
In short: Let’s ease off on the USA hate, shall we? Can’t we all just join together as brothers and hate China?
Someone walking by the computer as I was watching this asked if i was watching the Colbert Report. They were shocked to learn that it was Fox News.
Fiction truly imitating life. How depressing.
This tripe is why American conservatives hate Bush too. Because he gave evangelists(aka Uncritical-R-Us) into control of America.
A country’s military taking a year off – weird. People have a right to go ‘huh?’. But creepy stereotyping and mocking front-line troops? Pretty out of line.
I only made it through 2:48 before the idiocy overwhelmed my desire to see what the fuss was about. How people can stand to watch that channel for hours on end…it makes me despair.
Lister Sage: Oh no argument here. But JK Simmons’ role was decidedly more comical than the hatemonger portrayed in the comics.
But seriously, what the hell made anyone think that listening to Peter Parker whine constantly through three movies would make for a decent movie going experience. He whined constantly for the first 40 minutes in Spider-Man 2.
MarkS said: “It’s not appropriate to lampoon them as “stopping for a manicure and pedicure”, when in fact Canada has literally given until it can give no more.
It sort of takes the funny out of their attempt at funny. Their apparent ignorance, when they are in a contextual venue where these are the things they ought to know, is what is so very tragic here.”
This is exactly right. These assholes didn’t even understand what they were joking about, which makes their entire tirade seemed badly aimed. Canadians have been in the most dangerous part of Afghanistan for the last four years, and in Afghanistan for the last 7 years, taking the highest rate of casualties among allies there.
The people talking about “the army taking a year off” are simply buying into the assholes’ interpretation. Are armies expected to be at war indefinitely? It’ll exhaust even a large, well-funded army. By the end of 2011, the Canadian army will have been in Afghanistan for 10 years. Any country’s army would need a break from that. They’re not “taking time off”, they’re just not spending it in a combat zone.
Oh, and for those that may have missed the fact, that break is happening in 2011, ie. not now but 2 years from now.
I lasted seven seconds watching the video. That’s the longest I’ve made it watching Fox in years…
Ideally, armies can make war indefinately. You have two cycles of troops in country: those who just got there and those on their way out. A third cycle is stateside regaining its strength in men and materials.
That’s how the U.S. does it, anyway. The Canadians might be unable to keep this cycle up for any of a number of reasons, though the conciderable expense likely plays into it. Just because you are an English speaking democracy doesn’t mean you can play ball the way the U.S. does.
But, lest anybody think this is a dig on the Northmen, remember that they are in the game.
1. If Jon Stewart had taken a shot at the Canadian military, it wouldn’t have taken 5 minutes, and it would have been actually funny. There’s something to be said about taste, and about Fox lacking it.
2. The Canadian military is, in fact, “underfunded” and “understaffed.” Mostly, it’s because we don’t typically have to go balls out for a decade in hostile territory. We have few enemies, and (probably) none of them are countries. What’s happening now was an unforeseen circumstance; our prior budgeting did not account for the idea that we would suddenly have to be at war in the same spot for 10 years, no interruptions.
3. Americans: Get some real journalism, would you?
We have real journalism. But Fox is negative journalism, which cancels out a lot of our real stuff.
GoatToucher:
You seem to agree with me that the US is in a different league with regards to war-making capability. So maybe you’ll reconsider calling it “rediculous” for another nation to have to take a break after 10 years.
Also, consider this: the US will be pulling out most of its troops from Iraq by 2011. While there are numerous reasons, one of the big ones is that it, too, has been stretched too thin for too long, and it, too, needs a break. Soldiers have had their absences extended and leaves shortened; it seems even while rotating units, the army is up against its limits. Many US Generals have said as much. An army can reach its limits if you push it far enough. Even an army designed to fight multiple wars can commit to one war too many for too long.
Zenrage: To be fair, even the Spider-Man in the comics is a whiny bitch.
I’m not saying that the Canadian military taking a year to regroup is not a good idea. It just does not jibe with preconceptions about militaries in general.
My point is, to me it’s your preconceptions about armies that don’t jibe with reality (even the US army). By definition, you can always overstretch an army. In many peoples’ opinion, both are overstretched, but of course it takes different levels of commitment to do that for each. Your comment that “ideally” armies should be able to fight wars indefinitely doesn’t hold water. Not to mention armies usually try to win as fast as possible, not die by pieces forever.
“There’s something to be said about taste, and about Fox lacking it.”
COMPLETELY agree. (No matter what one’s politics are.)